Enfagrow or Anmum

Have you ever smell your baby's bottle after they are done with their milk?? I  always sniff BabyD's bottle after he's done.  Perhaps  out of habit haha

Anyway, i noticed that there's a vast difference of smell with Enfagrow's range of milk and Anmum's. I recently switched milk for BabyD. He's been drinking Enfalac, then to Enfapro all this while but because of Anmum's claims of lesser sugar in their milk, I then decided to switch it to Anmum for him as well. Peanut has long ago switched to Anmum.

Frankly..Enfagrow's milk smells really weird..it doesn't smell "milky" at all. I don't know how to describe the smell but it just smells funky. To the point i feel nauseous. And it's worse if you leave the bottle out for at least an hour after they're done with it. Anmum, on the other hand,  smells like milk. Like how they're supposed to smell like. And even after one hour, it still smells okay. Why is it like that huh?

I'm not advertising for Anmum hoh, and neither am I saying Enfagrow's milk is not good. Both Peanut and BabyD drank Enfalace and Enfapro in their first years and it served them well. :) I just find the  difference in smell strange.

Biter

BabyD is a biter. Hungry? *Ngaaaap*

Didnt get his way? *Nggaaaaap*

Want to get your attention but your eyes are too busy watching tvb drama? THIS is what happened.

One deep tooth mark on my thigh which result in a little bit of bleeding. The area is still sore after two days. Hebatnye his gigi.



BabyD updates

Aiyo..poor BabyD. I hardly update his progress at all. How to remember in future?? Ok trying to dig into my memory now.

• Smiling - 10 weeks. Wtf why take so long one. Made me so worried, everyday i had to make funny faces just to see him smile. And finally, one day, he just did it.
• Sitting down - Approximately 6 to 7 months
• First few teeth - Around 6 to 7 months
• Stand up while holding furniture - 9 months
• Babbling with more definitions ie. baba mamas gugu gaga - 10 months
• Can clap hands upon request - 10 months

And..i have not been taking as much pictures. Lazy mummy. Ugh.. tonight must charge the camera!

Shocked..

Yesterday after a full day of outing..we arrived home, and as we were about to park the car, we saw that our front door was slightly ajar! SHITS!!!!! and the lights were on!! DOUBLE SHIT!! Who the hell is in our home?? Okay, our iron grill  door is still locked, but the wooden door is open..

Immediately, DH went on alert mode, and asked me to stay in the car. My heart was thumping wildly and i asked him to be careful. Images of robbers with parangs came into my mind. I couln't think straight some more, cos BabyD was screaming so loud in his car seat.  Saw DH stepping gingerly into the house, carrying a shoe horn  in case he needs it to smash ppl's heads. hahah..and I also press the doorbell just to scare whoever is inside to leave so we won't encounter them.

DH took a while to check the whole house. Seems like..everything is still intact.
So does this mean that I did not close the front door properly before we left the house? *SLAPS FOREHEAD* BLUR SOTONG OR WHAT. We always leave some lights on before we leave the house, and this time i must have forgotten to lock the wooden door in my haste to leave..alamak..

Sometimes i scare the shit outta myself.

Preparing for kindy

Now that Peanut is going to Kindy next year, I've started prepping and mentally reminding her that she's going to school next year. So far, she's taking it all in her stride, always give me a cool "okay!!!!". Ceh..act cool only but i feel a storm is brewing cos knowing her, i think she's gonnna freak out.My worst fears: She will bawl her eyes out and will refuse to let me go out of her sight. How??

She doesn't attend pre-schools, and has been staying at home  during the day with her Popo. She knows her ABCs and numbers, do easy number additions, loves to paint and dance, and can speak clearly in long sentences, but throw her in any social situation, she turns from a tiger at home into a ...rabbit. Alamak. She's very VERY quiet among strangers, or people that she hardly sees, and she needs time to get used to her surroundings before she can "open up". I wanna refrain from using the word "shy" but that's what she is. And that's how I was when i was really young that I will turn bright red everytime a stranger approach me. Same genes lah haiyor. Lol.

So to prep her, and to get her to be more sociable before she goes into Kindy, I have been bringing her to Musikhaus and Kizsports during the weekends. Musikhaus sessions are 45 minutes each, and each class is RM38 and she's put in an age appropriate group. The first two lessons were pure torture for us. (us meaning me and DH). She refused to do anything, or touch anything, and the whole time she was  just sitting in my lap (A parent can accompany the child in the class). She just wanted to lie down and kept saying she's sleepy, and at the end of the class, when the teacher wanted to give her a ink chop on her hand, she held her arms back tightly.*face palm*

Other kids in the class were answering questions and doing whathever the teacher wanted, and i was getting sympathy glances from other parents lol, and everyone kept saying "oh..she's so shy". We did not attend Musikhaus the 3rd week, but instead we went to Kizsports, hoping a different environment will make her react differently. Kizsports has a lot of obstacles courses, with slides, tunnels, ball pits..the works! At first she was really hesitant, she didn't even wanna go into the ball pit and kept saying "interesting". Need to ponder one kah?? Asked her to go into the  tunnel, again she said "hmm..interesting". With the hand on her chin some more. Macam a professor deciphering a difficult code. After what seems like hours, she finally gained the courage to step gingerly into the ball pit...and then into the tunnels...and then finally, she was playing happily!! Hallelujah! She was climbing up and down, disappearing into tunnels, going down slides! Phews. At the end of the session, i was praising her non-stop to encourage her. Telling her because she tried, she managed to have fun. So all the way back home, i kept telling her "You must try everything. And if you fail you need to try again, see you had so much fun because you tried". So she's been repeating that ever since lol. That's our Motto for now. Though i need to change my tune when she turn into a teenager..later she really go and try everything how??

Then came the fourth week. Frankly, we were wondering whether we should bring her back to Musikhaus since she refused to do anything. But when we asked  her whether she still wanted to go , she always said yes and always seems very eager to go to class. So okay lor, bo pian cannot give up. Gave her a pep talk before going into the class. And finally, she participated! I will consider this a breakthrough la wtf. She danced, played games when the teacher asked her, wrote on the whiteboard, and she was attentive throughout the class and I didn't have to stick close to her. What a relief.. baby steps. Baby steps!! The real test waswhen we brought her to Marmalade in Bangsar yesterday. Marmalade has a small kids section in an enclosed room. There are lots of toys inside. Told her to go in and play by herself with other kids while we drank our coffees outside. Before, she would have refused (because she will say she's scared) or even if she goes, she'll want me to be very very close to her. But now, she can go in herself and play without much pushing from me.

DH and I both high-fived. Gotta keep this up. Hopefully, there will be less tears on her first day of Kindy..

All down!!

Crap! I've been down with a serious bout of sore throat and coughing for close to two weeks!! I really really hate it when I cough because my coughs are usually really loud, and it lasts for a long, long time. And i've tried ALL sorts of medications. From antibiotics, to various types of lozenges, to two different kind of western cough syrups and two differnt kind of chinese cough syurps..And i'm onto my last resort now! Chinese herbs which has been pounded into powder, and i need to take these three times a day. Please let my coughs be gone, because i can't speak 4 to 5 sentences before i start my coughing fits again.

As for the kiddos, they were sick too. In fact all these started when spots started appearing on BabyD's body. At first I thought he was allergic to something..but then more spots start appearing, and he doesn't seems to be in discomfort..and it's not itchy. Brought him to his Paed, and the Doctor said it's a viral infection (what else) and there's no medication that can get rid of the spots. And she also mentioned that it's very infectious..which means we might get it too! But perhaps in other various forms..such as fever and such. True enough!! the next day Peanut woke up with a fever, which lasted for a week. And that's when i started my sore throat too. And DH is also coughing. Argh..

For now i hope both of them don't get my coughs.

Upcycle: Creating a play kitchen out of cardboards & furniture

Recently, Peanut was gifted with some toy food / kitchen sets. She has a toy sushi set, vegetable set, etc which you can "slice" through with a knife as these items are stuck together with velcro. When I was a kid, I used to love playing 'masak-masak' with my sister. My mum bought us toy doughnuts, vegetables, fruits and we can play for HOURS.

I think it's a girl thing, because Peanut loves playing masak masak now. She loves serving us "drinks" in her toy cups and saucers, and forcing us to eat the fake oranges and watermelon. If we don't pretend to eat it, she'll scream bloody murder! Seeing that she loves the kitchen, i went sourcing for a toy kitchen set. Ikea used to sell wooden toy kitchen sets but sadly they have discontinued it. There's still one more kitchen set on display in the toy section in Ikea. I love it cos it's wooden, and it's all pink and yellow..

Toys'r'us sells toy kitchens as well but it's plastic and very small.. Peanut will tower over her kitchen if i buy those for her. I don't really fancy buying those cos it looks so fragile. One kick of a leg and it'll fall apart  T T.  ELC sells wooden kitchens but it cost around RM800 plus and above? I don't  wannna spend so much on something that it's probably gonna get played for a little while..and i have to think of ways to dispose it in future.

And have you seen those play kitchens on Pinterest?? omg..those people are seriously talented..they actually build toy kitchens from scratch, or from a discarded cabinets etc. i'm neither a carpenter, and neither do i have the necessary skills with all the power tools..so i did the next best thing. I create play kitchen from boxes + and a stool! And here's the result. Haha. Nowhere near as good as what you can see on Pinterest but it will do la. And Peanut loves it. And i can recycle them after she's done with it for good!!




That's a 'television' on the left, which was requested by Peanut lol. I used two bendable straws as the antenna so you can actually adjust it for 'reception' haha.

  It took one giant Mamypoko diaper box, one half of a LCD tv box, and a square wooden stool with a cushion on top to create the base for this kitchen (you don't have to use a stool of course. This can be easily replaced with a box, but because i have it..i might as well use it) I removed the cushion obviously, and put a cardboard on it. Just a note, the boxes that i used are pretty solid. It doesn't bend easily, and I have to use a box cutter to cut for size. You can't use the boxes which they packed those canned drinks or instant noodles  in because those will be too soft.

I also used a stainless steel bowl that has a rim as a 'sink'. I cut a hole in the cardboard (which i have wrapped with colored paper) and then put the bowl on top. And a Biore facial wash pump as the water tap. I also hung an ikea basket at the side so Peanut can store some of her stuff in it.




This is my oven + stove on top. I covered the boxes in brown paper, and then a black colored strip of paper at the top. Plastic bottles caps are used as oven dials.. i also cut a hole in the box for the oven and  with the cardboard that I cut out, I created the oven door. I poke two holes at the bottom of the door, and another two on the boxes. I tied a string through the holes to act as hinges.



To close the oven, I used a velcro sticker (which i happened to have lying around the house) . Basically i used whatever i have  around the house to make this kitchen.

This is the inside of the oven. I create a shelf inside the oven by using those polystrene stuff (the stuff that is used to protect your goods in boxes) as the shelf holder and I cut a cardboard to use as the shelf. I used my glue gun to stick it. I love the glue gun. You can use it for anything!!!

If you open the curtain (which i sewed from leftover fabric from another project), there's another shelf inside so that there's more storage space for Peanut's  food stuff. You can get similar ready made curtain at Daiso.

 This is the back part of the kitchen, which is held by a hard piece of cardboard. I then build 2 more shelves, by using the same polystrene thing as the base to hold the shelves.

 And i painted the polystrene in brown color so that it looks like wood. I also added screws in (saja only) to make it look more authentic. I secured it using the glue gun so Peanut can't take the screws out and leave it on the floor for BabyD to put it in his mouth.

 My shelf. Created a flower pot from a toilet paper roll haha.




Some hooks to hang Peanut's knives and chopping board. Again, I secure the hooks by using glue gun so it can't be taken out. And that's it!!

 Stuff that were used to assist the creation:
a) tape
b) scissors
c) brown paper string (from Daiso)
d) glue
e) long and thin screwdriver to poke holes into the boxes.
f) large sized box cutter knife
g) glue gun (from tesco)

Peanut posing wif her kitchen.

Little brother watching the construction from afar. :)