To the start of artisan bread-making... hopefully

2nd time success at Focaccia bread making

I've been trying my hand at baking recently, specifically bread at that. I used to bake my breads in the bread machine that I found in my MIL's cupboard. But it keeled over one fine day while I was trying to bake a cranberry pecan bread and that ended my bread-making sessions.

Since then, I hadn't made any cos I wasn't too keen on kneading bread by hand -- tried once and my arms ached after. Until most recently. I finally haul out my spiffy KitchenAid that was sitting idle on its side in my kitchen cabinet. I had bought it during my 3rd trimester but hadn't had the chance to use it post-pregnancy.

And so it was, I decided to make sundried tomato focaccia, inspired by the ones that Louis and I have eaten at Pete's Place at Hyatt Hotel. The first time I made it, it was using the recipe from Beth Hensperger's "The Bread Bible". It wasn't too bad for a first time attempt, but the inside of the bread was rather dense, not chewy. I was wondering if it was becos I didn't shift my flour.

Then, I decided to use another recipe from "Baking at home with the Culinary Institute of America". The recipe required an overall longer time for the bread to rise and it also used bread flour as opposed to plain flour in Hensperger's recipe. Lo and behold! The bread turned out to be fantastic with a crispy crust and airy, chewy interior. In fact, it was the best bread that I've ever made!!

Bread-making is definitely very satisfying, seeing how simple ingredients like water, yeast, flour and oil could turn out something so beautiful. Eating a good loaf of bread always brings back memories of our one-year stay in France, where boulangerie abounds and you can get pretty good baguettes wherever you go. In Singapore, the best baguettes so far come from Delifrance, but somehow, they don't keep as well. Whatever that is bought has to be eaten the same day.

Back in France, I used to buy a few loaves of baguette au levin (baguettes that taste a little like sourdour bread) on market days and store them in the freezer, popping them into ovens whenever we wanted some bread. They were good with practically everything, ranging from sandwiches, to pizza, with cheese, as accompaniments to a main meal etc. And they always taste so good. Contrary to popular belief, croissants aren't as popular as baguettes, which were staples to the French like rice is to Asians.

I remembered when we first arrived in France, we were rather amused when we see the French carrying their baguettes everywhere. What shocked us really was that their baguettes are not fully wrapped in neat size packaging like the ones we get in Singapore. Instead, the bakeries would simply wrap a small rectangle or square piece of paper onto the middle of the baguettes, leaving a large part of the 2 ends "naked". And so the French would strolled out of the boulangeries with their baguettes tucked under their arms (hope they don't have smelly armpits), or stuffed into their grocery bags, dumped onto the back seats of their car etc.

After a while, we got used to it and fancied ourselves localised such that we carry our baguettes stuffed into our grocery bags and walk around nonchalantly. Admittedly, we never dared to tuck them under our arms, even though we showered at least twice even in winter.

Thus, for every bread that I successfully bake -- or not -- it never failed to evoke fond memories of Europe and especially, how good the breads were in that part of the world. And we conceded that the French baked the best breads in the world.

Pumpkin Soup

My first taste of pumpkin soup was back when Louis and I were honeymooning in Europe. It was winter and the weather in Brugge, this little quaint town in Belgium, was so chilly and cold that a tureen of soup sounded really heartening and warming. Although I must say that I wasn't particularly enthusiastic about pumpkin soup at that time -- actually, I've never eaten pumpkin anything prior to that. That was an experience that changed my perspective on pumpkin and pumpkin soup. I came back a convert on pumpkin soup and googled many a sites before I stumbled onto a pumpkin recipe that is now my favourite.

It was only a few years later that I come to learn that pumpkin contains high levels of antioxidants and carotene, notably vitamin C and E and therefore may lower cancer risk, heart disease, cataracts and strokes. So, I'm always congratulating myself for being unwittingly discerning whenever I make pumpkin soup. Hahaha...

Anyways, I've decided to put up this post becos Jean has requested for me to share my pumpkin soup recipe. Unfortunately, I've lost that recipe and even though it was found on BBC's Good Food website, I've since been unable to find that same recipe again. Nonetheless, I've made it enough times to remember the ingredients, although not necessarily the proportions. To the best of memory, the below portions are guesstimate, so you might need to add or reduce some ingredients to adjust the taste a little.

Pumpkin Soup

Ingredients:
400-500g pumpkin or butternut squash, diced
1 medium carrot, diced
2 small-medium size potatoes, diced
1/2 red bell pepper, deseed and diced
2-3 stripes of streaky bacon, diced (optional)
8-10 cherry tomatoes
1.5L chicken stock (good if its home-made, otherwise Knorr's clear chicken broth with no MSG is also good)
Salt and pepper, to taste

Method:
1) Sautee the streaky bacon in a pot big enough to cook the soup until the fat oozes out. If you like, can add a little olive oil too. Next, add in the diced pumpkin, carrot, potatoes and bell pepper and mix well, about 2-3 minutes.

2) At this point, I usually reduce the heat, cover the pot and let the vegetables sweat in the pot for about 5-8 minutes. Thereafter, add in the chicken stock and cherry tomatoes. Bring it to a boil. Lower the heat and let the vegetables simmered covered until tender, about 20-25 minutes.

3) Puree the mixture (be careful there!) and then transfer it back to the pot again. Bring the soup back to a boil. Add salt and pepper to taste. Serve it hot with crusty bread if you like :)

This sounds like a lot of ingredients to chop and dice but I really like it a lot. The other way to make pumpkin soup is to cube the pumpkin into about 3 cm pieces, lay them on a single layer in a baking dish. Drizzle generously with olive oil and put into the oven to bake for about 30-45 minutes (depending on size) until tender. Puree the roasted pumpkin, transfer the pureed pumpkin into a pot and add chicken stock. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Personally, I prefer the recipe for the first pumpkin soup. Even though it involves a lot more work chopping and dicing, the end result is well worth the effort :)

Happy cooking!

What's cooking?

I was talking to Louis over the weekend and I told him that I miss cooking terribly. I don't mean the quick vegetables stir-fries and steamed fish type of daily cooking done hurriedly while my mom is babysitting Faith.

The kind of cooking that I enjoy is the whole works starting from perusing cookbooks, deciding on what dish to cook/experiment, shopping for ingredients and that satisfying process of transforming all that myriad ingredients into the final product, be it a cooked or baked dish. Pre-pregnancy and Faith's arrival, I used to look forward to the weekends to grocery shop and cook either for dinners or dishes that I shortlisted on a weekday. That was my ideal of a relaxing weekend, to the delight of Louis who loved entertaining to a home-cooked meal at home.

These days, cooking usually entails the first and the last part of the entire set of steps I've described above i.e. I would shortlisted the item to cook/bake and the key ingredients would be assembled (usually by Louis). All I need to do is to dump them into the cauldron, stir like a witch and abracadabra... my dish poofs out magically ;)

Seriously, when I think of a dish I want to cook these days, I would give Louis a shopping list of ingredients that he could get for me from Tekka market or when we put Faith with my MIL on weekend afternoons, a quick zip to the NTUC supermarket at Ang Mo Kio Hub. Somehow, its not quite the same as a leisurely stroll of my own up and down the aisles of the gourmet supermarket chains like Marketplace or Jason's. Sadly, I miss terribly the morning trips to Tekka market where I am always intrigued and fascinated by the amount of local and "ang-moh" produce, vegetables, fishes and what-have-yous .

Selfishly, its moments like this when I wish Faith could quickly grow up and start eating solids 3 meals a day. That's so I could put her with my MIL earlier or even overnight so that I can have a little more time on the weekends to indulge in the experience of sourcing for my ingredients. Am I evil or what?

I am eternally grateful to my mom cos she comes in every weekday afternoon to help me take care of Faith, allowing me a good 2-3 hours to indulge myself in cooking/baking. To-date, I've managed to do some fairly simple stuff like pumpkin soup, quiche, tiramisu etc on occasions. Like today, I'm trying to make sun dried tomato focaccia *fingers crossed*

On a positive note, Faith is entering her 5th month and it would be another 2 more months before we start weaning her. And that's gotten me so excited that I've gone out and bought 2 books on cooking solid foods for babies -- speaking of which, I've ran out of bookshelves to put all the new cookbooks I've purchased. I know I should not get overly excited and build unrealistic expectations that Faith would take to solids at her first few attempts. Nevertheless, I can't stop myself from anticipating and looking forward to all the different types of food I can cook for her in time to come;- pumpkin, avocado, sweet potato, brown rice cereal, fish porridge, leek etc etc

My next milestone in cooking would be less on the intricate dishes that I can churn out but cooking for a potentially finicky eater and rising to the challenge of getting her to enjoy a wide spectrum of food :)

And the winner is....

Now that I'm based in Singapore for a project, Eve and I have settled down from our frenzy of luggage packing in early July. At that time, we were under the impression that the family would be posted to Beijing for three months. As a result, we had prepared not only Chinese visas all round, stand-by medication for Faith, a medical kit for the two of us, and a suitcase of new baby stuffs as a contingency. Today, the suitcase still remains packed....

As parents, we have quickly learned that such "contingencies" are inescapable. In fact, one can often distinguish experienced parents from people like us by the amount of contingencies in their budget. Of course, by trial and error, there are also gems we picked up early on which we swear by today. Besides such purchases, we've also learnt that sometimes, things don't really turn out the way we plan it...On this occasion of Faith's 4 months, the Faith awards go to...

1. The most useless equipment that Dad (ie. moi) bought

Bought during Eve's third tri-mester, this equipment was purchased at Mothercare along with two Winne the Pooh "night-lights" (which come to think of it, we haven't used as well). I think I had felt guilty then that I didn't buy anything for My Baby then, so thought that this "Projector" was way-cool for my little one. After all, which Baby can resist a ceiling full of night stars? Plus, you can change the slides so that it projects a moon, kaleidescope of pictures etc. This Philips Magic Theatre SCD940 costing around $100 takes its (dusty) place as the most useless equipment we've bought

2. The "darkest horse" purchase

I still remember that we were "cautioned" against investing in a baby monitor. In fact, one of our friends had early on, even offered to find his hardly-used baby monitor for us to use, so that we could see for ourselves, how truly useless it was. Plus, even our experienced confinement lady had told us that we would hear more interferences than Faith's cries. Despite these horror stories, we desperately needed something that would allow Eve to keep watch on Faith without having her physically present in the room (e.g. when she was cooking). Thankfully, Hui Fang recommended a Baby Monitor that was running digital comms and as such, served our needs to a tee. Even at check-out, we were a bit apprehensive about spending close to $150 for the Philips SCD496 DECT Baby Monitor, but we've never looked back since. Had not been for this monitor, Eve and I would not have had the chance to watch our Korean TV, read in our master bedroom, etc

3. Our most wishful thinking so far

When we were expecting Faith, we had heard "horror" stories of how kids who were sleeping in their parents' rooms, found it very difficult to later adjust to sleeping in their own rooms. Being the smart parents we were, we decided - hey, why don't WE sleep in Faith's room instead of her sleeping in our room. That way, she'd get used to the surroundings, and we can easily shift back into our rooms. Today, we are still sleeping in a pull-out convertible queen-size bed from IKEA in Faith's room. Meanwhile, our king-sized Simmons bed sits idly in our master bedroom.

In all, I'm sure there are many more regret purchases, the can't do without buys and the unfulfilled wishes. As Faith enters her 4th month, we are hopefully getting wiser and smarter - one can always hope :)

Happy 4th Month, Faith :)

Faith is all of 4 months old today and yet again, it seem like ages when she was born. I've been told not to wish for my baby to grow up too quickly but to enjoy her in all her stages. Most times, I do. But sometimes when I see moms with their little girls going out together hand-in-hand, shopping, playing, baking and all, I long for Faith to grow up quickly so that we could do all of these together.

At 4 months, Faith seemed to have come a long way from birth. Her cognitive development is still the strongest at this stage. She likes to conduct conversations with adults and that's usually the best way to get her to smile and gurgle at you. She's starting to recognise people and with it, a preference for some too.

By now, she's learn how to grasp at rings that we give to her and other soft toys that are easily grabbed by small fingers. Slowly but steadily, she's learning to bring these toys to her mouth to bite and also passing objects from one hand to another. The latter is still something that she's just started doing and may not be quite as adapt yet. However, her favourite thing to grip is of course human fingers. And this, she would hold on and grip very tightly.

When we prop her up on a pillow, her body seems to arch forward, as if she's wanting to sit up and play. Faith would have to be a little more patient and wait for her back muscles to develop before she can muster the act of sitting up. Then, her view of things that she can take in would definitely be more interesting.

Unfortunately, she's caught a cold since last week and the nose swab that the paedi did only came back today with the result that she has a bacterial infection. As her nose continues to be blocked and is heavy with mucus after 5 days, we've asked the doc to prescribe antibiotics. Keeping my fingers crossed that Faith would recuperate soon with the dose of antibiotics.

Happy 4th month, Faith and may you continue to grow and bring smiles and joy to the people around you :)

No more bottle milk!

Faith dislike of bottles isn't anything new. But hunger strike is. Its as if Faith has had it with us giving her the bottle and she's decided to put her little foot down once and for all. She decides to go on a hunger strike for the times that we feed her bottle. We can't get her to drink past 20-30 ml for the last few days.

In dispair and worrying that Faith would go hungry, my mom and even my MIL have caved in and asked that I breastfeed her. This was even though both had earlier felt the need to bottle feed Faith as they were worried that she wouldn't take to the bottle in the future if she was exclusively breastfed.

And so it is that I'm now feeding Faith. There would be some logistic constraints over the weekends when she goes over to my MIL's place in the afternoons, or that it would be hard for anyone to have to look after her for prolong period of time as she wouldn't drink much from the bottle otherwise. In this instance, Faith is too smart for her own good -- or is it for ours?? I guess those would be times when she would go a little hungry. But over the months, I've read enough and learn from my little one that she would drink if she's really hungry. Otherwise, she would rather skip one or two bottle feeds and wait for the "real thing".

I hope this would mean that apart from the fact that my baby is smart, she would also be a discerning gourmet in the future :)

Real life or reel life?

I've been an avid fan of the current 108-episode Korean drama "Be Strong, Geum-Soon!" that's running on Channel U, Mondays - Fridays at 7 pm. Occasionally, when Louis is home in time to catch the show with me or when we view the recorded episode after putting Faith to sleep, he would be commenting or lamenting about some of the scenes.

Yesterday, the episode featured the father-in-law of the lead character absolutely seething and furious with his eldest son becos the latter hid the truth from his parents and did not tell them he married a woman who was a divorcee with a son (whom her ex has custody of). The father was so disgraced and humiliated that he refused to talk to his son and daughter-in-law and even asked them to move to stay on their own asap.

My dear hubby was next to me and asking if Koreans are still fundamentally conservative and consider a divorce woman to be social stigmas or pariahs, who not only brought disgrace upon her parents but is doomed to a fate worse than the lowest of human form and never to remarry. I certainly don't profess to know any better.

However, I once heard from our Korean friend that in S.Korea, if an old lady deign to scold or lecture a person on the streets (i.e. a stranger), one should be grateful becos the elder cared enough to want to help correct the person's behaviour.

Anyways, the long and short of it was that my hubby was curious enough to drop an email to our Korean friend after the show and asked her about it. I'm curious myself to know too. While I'm a Singaporean Chinese, its not an unknown fact that we're much influenced by Western (more American, I suspect) cultures so much so that the Chinese think of us as bananas (yellow on the outside, white on the inside). Even though the government is concerned about rising divorce rates, I believe the society is tolerant of remarriages for divorcees.

As soon as our friend replies, we'll share whether the scene from the show depicts real or reel Korean values and culture.

TAG: My 7 Vanity Sense Facts

You Are 32% Vain

Okay, so you're slightly vain from time to time, but you're not superficial at all. You are realistic. You know that looks matter. You just try to make them matter less.

How Vain Are You?

Alright... I've been tagged by ACES Family on this particular topic. Certainly, this would be a topic that is close to the heart of most women, wouldn't it? I believe that there's a streak of vanity in every woman, its just a matter of the extent you're willing to act upon that vanity streak ;)

Actually, my results did surprise me cos I had thought that my vanity streak would be pretty high. But I guess they reserve such honors for the tai-tais or socialite types who are at the forefront of every fashion trend, dress themselves in haute couture even at home, be found/photographed on the who's-who list at Tatler events and wouldn't blink an eye while flashing their credit cards for purchases at Chanel, Hermes, Ferragamo boutiques and what-have-yous.

My attitude on looks is that "If you look good, you feel good". In that essence, it extends not only to one's dress sense, but personal carriage too. So, here goes the 7 vanity facts about myself:-

1) I never step out of the house nor meet anyone (with the exception of family members, of course) without at least drawing my eyebrows. Just as one's eyes are the windows to your soul, the eyebrows are the windows to your eyes/face. So, its important that "maintain this particular set of windows" :) Ohh... and if I have time and am not too lazy, would curl my eyelashes too. A set of curled lashes always help to highlight the eyes more.

2) To make myself look better, especially in form-fitting clothes, I would suck in my stomach. Hahaha... the only exception was during pregnancy becos, why bother?! You're meant to stick it out for the world to see and so that crowds will part for you *wink*

3) Yes, I'm one of those guilty of catching a covert glimpse at myself whenever I see a mirror or window. How else would you be able to catch if your lipstick has been chewed finished or if you have a piece of vegetable caught in between your teeth??

4) Louis gets reprimanded whenever he loses weight while praised if his scale moves to the right. Why? Was it Odie who likes to stand next to Garfield becos it makes him look slimmer? Whatever. Its the same theory.

5) Never be caught dead carrying a fake LV/Prada/Gucci or whatever bag or wallet. If I can't afford the real thing, I rather go for a cheaper BUT genuine brand.

6) I only exercise in order to lose weight. Unlike Louis who exercises to de-stress and becos it makes him feel less lethargic, exercising has never given me that adrenalin boost. So, if you see me swimming or running, its becos I'm out to lose some cellulite.

7) I know you need to moisturise your body in order to maintain the skin and have it look supple. But I'm too lazy to do that. So, these days, I go for pedicure once a month so that they can scrub and help apply moisturise my legs for me. Won't do much, but I figured once a month is better than none.

Okie dokie... there are some really vain friends that I wanna tag but they don't have a blogsite. So, how about if any of you guys have read this and are willing, do the vanity test and leave a comment on your scores :)

Negative result for stool test and eczema swab

The clinic called back with Faith's results for the stool test and swab taken of her eczema-infected right ear. Verdict was that both results were negative i.e. stool test found no traces of bacterial infection nor allergy reactions to dairy product. Similarly, her eczema was the same too.

While it may be a relief, its not a satisfying answer for me on why there were blood streaks in her stool. Until there are future instances of blood streaks found in her stool, I do not have to abstain from dairy products for now.

Oh well... so, I still don't know why there's blood in her stool??

Our smiling baby :)

It's no secret that Eve and I love Faith's smiles. And the nice thing is she seems to do it quite effortlessly and naturally. In the morning, one of the rare moments of the day when I actually change her diapers, she'd unfailingly put on her morning smile when she sees me. And I notice how she smiles when she looks at Eve too. Just this evening, Faith was seated on my lap and when she saw Eve sit down beside us, she also looked at Eve and smiled.

I think every parent wishes for their child to grow up happy and loved. And we hope for Faith that she will continue feeling happy and secure growing up. Of course there are times when we sometimes ask ourselves if we're going to be the overly-pampering parents who give too much love and too little discipline. But I think there's a time for everything. At the age of close to 4 months, I think Faith still needs all the love we can give her without us worrying too much about spoiling her. That time will come I'm sure, when we'd have to wield the stick to discipline her in the perhaps not too distant future if she goes out of line. But for now, we're just two happy parents, with one smiling baby :)

Two new feats... and one persistent dilemma

For the past few weeks, I've been trying to get Faith interested in holding and grabbing toys with her hands without much success. Yes, she's able to grip items when you wrap her fingers around them. However, she is not able to comprehend that she's holding something in her fingers nor would she be curious enough to bring her hands up to her face to look at the toys.

So, imagine my surprise last night when she suddenly stared at her hands with fascination. Encouraged, I quickly started giving her her favourite "Mr Sun" rattle and her wrist rattle for her to play with. Thus, my little baby was engrossed with her new found capabilities for some time.

This morning, Faith also managed to flip onto her back while lying on her stomach. I've been giving her tummy time every morning to strengthen her neck. For the past 2 weeks, we've noticed that she would sometimes lean her head on one arm and try to kick her body, as if to flip over. Usually, we would give her a little prod and help turn her over.

This time around, Faith managed to do the little feat all by herself. I've managed to capture her on video. Unfortunately, when my mom came in the afternoon and we tried putting her on her tummy, Faith refused to flip any more and was making noises all the while. Hmmm... if my baby could articulate her thoughts, she probably would be indignant and say: "What? Do you guys think I'm some performing monkey??" ;)

Nonetheless, as Faith is getting older, she's definitely more articulate about her likes and dislikes. For the last 2 days, she absolutely refused to take much from the bottle (about 50 ml each feeding). I think my mom has given up becos she told me to just breastfeed her from now. She's now gone down to the coffeeshop for a cuppa. Sigh...

Frankly, I don't mind breastfeeding her exclusively. Afterall, I will start her on solids and slowly wean her off when she hits 6 months. However, I only hope that there would be a less tedious way of making her drink her milk in the future... whether its through sippy cups or straw.

Productivity gifts

It's an understatement to say that Eve is overjoyed with her new toy. While E has been nice enough to reassure me that she'd try to minimize influence on my dear wife, I must say, it is at least much more practical (and cheaper) than buying say a new diamond ring. At least with the phone, Eve is now keeping up with the news on AsiaOne, reading her blogs, checking up things on Google etc while feeding Faith - what a marvellous idea!!

In fact, it's been a while since I bought Eve anything that practical. And the fact that Eve actually beat me to that idea means I now need to look for an alternative for her b-day....sigh. Since Faith's arrival, we've gotten a new room filled with office furniture, a colour printer, new SD card, upgraded PC and now, a new handphone for mummy. I wonder what new gadget we'd get next - one thing is for sure, it wouldn't be very long before we get "it" - whatever it is.

Blood in stool and eczema

On Thursday night, I've discovered Faith's stool had blood. Concerned, I called her paedi and was advised to bring her in the next day for a stool test as there could be 2 reasons for the blood, namely, bacterial infection or allergies.

It was a visit that killed 2 birds in one stone becos its been nearly 2 weeks since I've applied the medication by the paedi for her eczema. Unfortunately, there hasn't been any progress. In fact, her eczema was spreading to other parts of her face. The reason? I supposed the eczema must be itchy and causing Faith much discomfort. As a result, she keeps swiping her hands at her right ear and also rubbing that same hand all over her face.

I'm still waiting for the paedi to revert to me about the results of the stool test. But in the meantime, as a precaution that the blood could be an allergic reaction to milk products, I'm to abstain from ALL dairy products. Possibly, the avoidance of dairy products may also help pinpoint if her eczema could be a result of allergy too. Guess what that means? No more cornflakes, drinking of my favourite Milo tetrapaks, chocolates, ice-creams and as I go along, lots more food with dairy content. Geez... and I thought during pregnancy that it was a torture that I couldn't eat unpasteurised cheese.

As for the eczema on her right ear, it had become infected and inflamed. In the course of our conversation, it finally dawned on both of us that while he had prescribed Fusicort, a cream with steroid, the clinic assistant had given me Fusidin, a similar cream by the same pharmaceutical company but without steroid. No wonder I had zealously applied the cream for nearly 2 weeks and there wasn't any improvement to her eczema! The paedi was very apologetic about the error and ensured that this time around, I was given the right cream.

One of the staff at the dispensing counter was asking if I remembered which of the assistant was the one that dispensed the medication on the last visit, asking if it was herself. Of course I couldn't remember who it was. At that time, I was only too relieve to know that Faith's eczema was not becos she wasn't responding to the medication.

After 3 days of application, Faith's eczema on the right ear has recovered. The additional moisturiser and eczema cream (separate creams as they had lesser steroid in them) that I asked for to treat the other eczema on her face and body have also helped clear the problem. Now, my pimply-faced baby is pimply no more. Her face has now revert back to the soft, smooth skin that a baby should have. YAY!

Knowing that her discomfort could have been prevented, I'm now feeling rather annoyed with the assistant that gave me the wrong cream. Too bad I didn't notice who it was. Lesson learnt? Yeah... I shall endeavour to remember the faces of the persons dispensing medications in future.

The verdict on the stool test? Well... I'm still waiting to hear from her paedi on the result of the test. *fingers crossed*

On a side note, Faith could sleep for an hour for the 1st part of this afternoon in her new sarong. Its an achievement cos its the longest afternoon nap that she has taken for months. My mom could eat her lunch leisurely and read the papers while she napped too. Yippee to automated sarongs!

Rock-a-my-baby... in the sarong

My friend, E is a terrible person - she's a bad influence on this newly minted SAHM :) After just one visit to her home, I've ended up buying 2 items over the weekend; an automated sarong and a new mobile phone.

Alright, alright... before I start losing friends left right and centre, I have to declare that its not her fault. Au contraire, I really have her to thank for. She and her hubby have been telling us about the automated rocking sarong for the longest time when they knew that Faith has problems sleeping in the afternoons. Louis and I were adamant that we didn't want to have too many gadgets or props to help Faith sleep as it would mean one item more to have lug along if we travel with her. Or so we thought.

And so, for the past few months, Faith has to be held and rocked to sleep while cradled in someone's arms or placed in her stroller and rolled along to sleep for two mere 1/2 hour slots every afternoon. When I was at E's place, Faith was rocked to sleep by the up-down motions of the sarong and managed to fall asleep in it for a good 45 mins -- I suspected that it could be longer as we switched off the automated rocking so that she would slowly rouse herself from her sleep for her next feeding. Louis' lightning response when I messaged him about this "new wonderment" that lulled his daughter to sleep peacefully was that we go get it ourselves. Just goes to show you how often you're made to eat your own words after a kid comes along in your life ;)

As for my 2nd purchase, I have to say that I'm very very pleased it with. Its the Nokia E65 phone. In my opinion, the killer-app is the WLAN. See... when I'm breastfeeding Faith, I'm mostly twiddling my thumbs in boredom in her room. Its a bit hard to lug my laptop from the study room and surf the net while cradling her in one arm. With the WLAN capabilities, I can now check my emails and surf the numerous blog sites easily. For a tiny device, the loading capabilities and GUI is pretty fast and good.

All in, the visit to E's place yielded me with 2 wonderful purchases that I'm still congratulating myself on. While she has generously invited me back to visit again, I'm rather fearful to go... no telling what other purchases I would end up buying the next time I do a "trial-test" at her place ;) Our once minimalistic house is really piling up with all sorts of equipments and furnishings.

D*%M the heat...

The weather is killing these days! Faith is developing rashes on her inner elbows and parts of her thighs. Actually, I'm not too certain if they are heat rashes or eczema. The eczema from one of her ears has now spread to the other (I think its from the heat when I hold her in my arms while feeding). And her face... geez... she's starting to look like a pimply baby.

Part of the problem stems from her mittens. She likes to suck her hands and with the mittens on, it would be soaked with her saliva in no time, Then, Faith likes to rub her hands all over her face and behind her ears too -- I think she scratches her ears becos its itchy.

So, at the expense of my mom and MIL telling me not to do so for a while longer, I've now taken off her mittens in the day as much as possible. I guess scratches on her face will be part of the learning lesson for her. The only thing to look out for is that she does not scratch or gorge her eyes with her fingers *fingers crossed*