Bye Bye... I am Moving!

DEAR READERS, I HAVE MOVED
Due to some changes, I have decided to move this blog. Thank you all for reading.
For future post,
Please refer to http://mapetitp.blogspot.com/

THANK YOU ALL.

Arghhh.... My baby say NO to me!

Today, am going to blog about the little word "NO". I have been hearing and experiencing a lot of NOs daily these days. Well, my little one has started to reject and say no to me for a long time already, but recently she has been refusing a lot of things to almost everyone she knows!

First of all, I am glad since the day she knows how to reject food, meaning using her tongue to push out the teats of the bottle and reject her milk. It is a sign of showing, I am growing up and I know what I want now. While this is good for her emotional development; it is also frustrating for me at the same time.

Well I have to come to the terms that she knows more than I thought and she is an individual who can say no if she does not like it. But she is still young and does not understand what is good or bad for her yet, so now it is my job to make her co-operate with me. I have come out with a few ways to make her willingly give in.

1. Distraction- I will ask her to sit down properly and watch her fav. show, while eating.
2. Bargaining- I will give her a cookie if she picks up her toys and place it properly in the bin.
3. Be creative- I will ask her to do role play with me while I do the chores at home. (eg. Like you are watering the plants like mommy.)
4. Changing the subject- When I ask her to go to sleep and she stills want to read her books, I will play Pee-ka-boo for a while and turn off the lights... and proceed to tune into sleep mode.)

I have found out that there is no use of shouting and scolding her at all, because she is just merely expressing her dislikes and it got worse by shouting at her. By using the above techniques, I get her to give in willingly without tears and shouting "NO".

Paper Cups

First of all I hate junk food. BUT ocassionally on Sundays, we would go for breakfast at McDonalds. Why maybe because my lil' one loves the place. Well besides the point, I am actually goin to blog about paper cups.

As you can see here I have been going to McD for a while and I really hate the idea of my hot coffee being poured into a paper cup.

So, I brought my own mug instead! The picture here shows that my cuppa coffee was poured into my glass mug so I do not also drink in the Wax coating inside of the paper cup that McD is offering. After drinking, I can refill again into this mug of mine or I can just wipe it and bring home to clean it later. :)

New Bamboo Car Seat

I have never seen this before, but my mum was telling me that I used to sit on one of these like almost 30 years ago. Here you can see what this car seat look like, and I know you can say that huh, this is not safe baby can easily climb out from there! Yeah yeah... but for my mum or you could say, old grandma prefer this. I positioned it on the back centre of the car; but my mum was telling me usually they positioned it at the front seat!??! OMG! I would just say one has to drive slowly and only for a short distance if they were to place a child in here.

Here you can see how my baby sit in it! She kind of love it as she stay still and does not move around. her legs are not hanging out but actually stepping on the seat. I guess older baby like her can fit into this car seat but definately not for a newborn!

Reading and Bonding

It is a surprise for my hubby and me that our lil'bean loves books a lot. Every now and then she will entertain herself by looking and pointing at the pictures in a book and try to read out loud. Well hopefully she will keep this habit forever! LOL...

Here she is showing her daddy which is her favourite animals and daddy is trying to ask her to pick out the correct animal when he named the animal!

I have already started to read a book to her every night before she sleeps since when she was 18 months old. Surprisingly, she loves it a lot and insists on me reading more and more books before she goes to sleep at night. Well I try to limit it to one, but guess she prefer more or else she will protests and refuse to sleep. I do not know it is a good behaviour or not; but nonetheless I let her choose her own book and read to her till she is satisfied then she will goes to sleep.

The whole idea of this reading time is that both baby and I get to sit down together and share a special moment. This kind of bonding makes her feel happy and loved. It does not matter if I repeat the same old book everyday though! She increases her vocab and language skills as well through the reading moments.

Once someone told me that it is not the content of the book that the baby understands at this young age, but the voice of a parent reading and the sense of security that a parent give does make a difference through this practice! So, I would strongly suggests to all parents if you can spare some time just read for at least a minute or two to your child, they will really appreciate it.

Party Balloons

My lil' bean loves balloons... maybe because during her first B'day I had all these colourful balloons hanging on the ceiling and since then, she loves them lots! Well, we bring her to a lil' boy one year old Birthday party and well they have a clown to entertain the kids! Lots of fun there, so being a clown he had these little tricks of making cute animal balloons, and well my lil' bean will not miss this out and ask for a green poodle there on the left......... then hmmm, after a few moments of her grabbing and all, it kinda come off a little, so we went and ask for another one.

Come on......... there are lotsa kids and the queue is really long, finally I manage to politely asking for another one for her, and this time it is a pink bear!

The clown was indeed a professional and he really manage to put a smile on all the children faces. A wonderful job indeed, and as for the clown himself, he told us he started this ballooning since he was 13! Since then he has been practicing till now and it is a wonder to even watch him blowing and making all these cute balloons!

My baby still clings on those balloons all the way till we got back home! It shows how much she loves it.....LOL

Chinese Beef Stew

I have cooked beef stew for so many times before but this time i want to try something different. I have the basic beef stew recipe in my mind but I want to give it a new twist. So Instead of the normal sirloin beef that I use, this time I tried using the Beef muscle part, whereby in Taiwanese style always love using the muscle part as it has a chewy feel and the jelly part is really delicious too.

Also the other thing that I add in this stew is the radish. Normally carrots will do but I want to try using radish and drop the tomatoes for a while. last but not least it is an amazing dish but the one thing is that it takes longer hours to cook as the muscle part really took some time to cook well. I did not add tomato sauce at all just chicken stock and a good red wine. We all really love this dish! It goes well with the pasta! Yum!

Spinach Ravioli

Yummy Ravioli.......... it was a long long time since I had Ravioli. The last I had it was in Paris, when I manage to buy some fresh ones in the market there and cook it for dinner. While here back in my hometown, it is impossible to get fresh ones, packed ones are possible if I am lucky! So indeed, I manage to saw some in the grocery store and without hesitation I just bought a packet of Spinach Ravioli!

Here I create my own version of pork sauce to go with the ravioli, and it's a blast! We all love it and well, I will definately cook this again!

I scream Ice cream!

Why I make ice cream when I can easily buy them? Oooo the answer is easy, because I have an Ice-Cream maker at home. Oh it was a lovely present my hubby bought for me for my birthday. He knows I love Ice-cream... and had been dreaming of making it... hmmm! So I have an excuse to make them at home. LOL.

Above here are some pictures on how to make Ice-cream. Well it is my first time making it, I have no clue at all what I am doing and am surprise on what I get it out in the end. (Just relying on a manual and a recipe book!) Well, some tips may be from the tv shows and that's all! So in the end here's how my Rum&Raisins Ice Cream look like!

Nice huh? I add some peaches to go with the ice-cream.......... really blow me away! Sorry my lil' bean is not allow to try this at all......... sweeeeeettt dessert!

Salty Poultry

My first attempt here to cook whole chicken in a wok. My recipe was indeed the Salty Chicken recipe.... (Yim Kok Kai) in cantonese. I wrap the whole chick in a paper bag and use the salt to steam it. Well the chick turn out well, and I manage to de-bone it as you can see it here.

The taste is not so salty as I reduce the salt and add more rice wine on it. Last time I boil the whole chick but this time I tried a different style, not bad huh... my culinary skills are improving... hahhah LOL!

Dine at home...

With my new lovely kitchen, there is no reason not to cook at home. These are some of the dishes I cooked for the night. Hubby loves it and baby loves the crispy garlic bread... oooo the sides only, she does not like garlic anyway...... LOL.

Books + New Words

Have been reading to my little one every night before she sleeps now; and she keeps reminding me about it before her last bottle feeding.... LOL.
Well, I manage to test her on the other day; whether she will recognize the specific book that I mentioned to her; and to my surprise she manage to pick out the specific title book for me to read to her. This really shocked me as I thought she just want me to read a book and does not really understand the story in it, but well I guess I am wrong about it.
Later, I went to shop more book for her as there is a sale in the bookstore. I went to the bookstore with my little one and she was very excited when she enters the store and wanted to touch and flip all the books she can grab on to. I am glad that she loves book, really hope that she will always remain this love forever.

After going to the bookstore, we continued to go shopping. Some new words that I heard she saying was like....
1. Oh Nice!
2. Thank You.
3. Please
4. Eyes
5. Nose
6. Mouth
7. Ears
8. Hair
9. Head
10. Cheek
11. Foot
12. Hands
13. Legs
14. Come
15. Go

She's the joy of my life right now, guess no one can make me laugh so much these days except her.

Poultry on the plate.

My yummy Ginger Chicken Stew with Brocolli, one of the dishes for the night; just another comfort food for my family. A dash of Shao Xing Wine just perfect for the taste and smell too.

Fun to make - Oatmeal cookies

Why I love making these cookies?

Because my little one love these very much and it is the only making her eating and digesting oat and blackcurrants!

Every now and then I have these little cookies at home. I did made some for my family members as a Xmas gift last year and also I made these for the Chinese New Year too. Everyone loves it, as it is healthy and I put less sugar so not so sweet as well.

The flour I use is Wheat flour so it is healthier for both adults and kids.

I just love making them and it is easy to make too.

I follow the recipes from these two sites in the net; of course I reduce the sugar and replace the raisins with blackcurrants.

Oatmeal Cookies Recipe & Video - Joyofbaking.com *Tested Recipe*

Grandma's Oatmeal Cookies Recipe Simply Recipes

You can have a go too! Enjoy baking!

Oysters Oh Oh Oysters

Oysters and Tofu........ yummy. I happen to have some fresh oysters left behind, because it has been around for quite sometime and I guess it is not so fresh after hiding in the freezer for more than a week, so I decided to cook it and eat rather than just some lemon and tabacos sauce.

This is quite a simple dish but it needs a few preparations before hand.
1. Wash the fresh oysters with some water and lemon juice.
2. Boil the oysters in the water for about 4-5 mins.
3. Cut the half cooked oysters in half. (bite size)
4. Diced the tofu.
5. Chopped some garlic and spring onions.
6. Prepare the sauce - Oyster sauce + Sesame oil
7. With a wok- fry the garlic with some oil.
8. Add in the oysters + sauces.
9. Add in the tofu then the spring onion.
10. Viola - done!

Now enjoy these wonderful oysters and tofu dish!

Kusudama project

I have been doing some research on flower folding techniques and I found out about this Kusudama Flower ball which caught my attention. So I decided to give it a go myself by following the tutorial instructions, well not bad indeed right? The picture above shows only one flower with a combination of 5 petals. Ah Yes... this is a Sakura (Cherry Blossom flower).

Here the picture shows half of the flower ball, which has a total of 6 flowers. So if you want to create a flower ball it has to be a total of 12 flowers. Interesting huh! I use some origami folding paper and some recycle paper for this project. So now you can reuse your recycle paper for a decorative idea. Hurray for going GREEN!

If you would like to know how to fold this go check out the tutorial in this website:

Folding Trees » Kusudama Tutorial part 1
Happy Folding!

A Disaster

The Earthquake and Tsunami that hit Japan recently made me think a lot about our own fate in future. I know how it feel like when the earth beneath you shake profusely non-stop (which I experience before). It is uncontrollable, unpredictable and nothing you can do. We are lucky here in Malaysia that we do not have disaster like earthquake only bad floods and hot sunshine throughout the year.
I am thankful to god that I am here rather than in elsewhere where disaster often strikes. What made me think of lately is that, I am thankful that I am near my family, so whatever happens we are near and close to each other. What matters most these days are that my loves ones are beside me so if anything really happened, we are not far from reach.
Sad to say that many people that I know are far from their family because of career and living ideology. They choose to be far away........ most elder people I know of are left behind by their kids. Partly because of a better living in another part of the world or a better choice of career opportunity in other places.
No matter how far they are, home is always home and this is a fact they could not be change. If there is a choice, I believe all parents would love to have their children beside them.

Sweet Potato - My comfort food diary

Whenever I have a feeling that a flu is coming down on me....... oh this Sweet Potato soup dessert will come into my mind. This is one of my comfort food, simple, nourishing, easy to cook and eat.

Simply boil the sweet potatoes with enough water, include some red dates, ginger, some Pandan leaves, and some brown sugar to taste. Good comfort food for me!

More surprises...

My little one has so far adapt to her new home quite well. She loves her bedroom so far and I have already started to let her sleep alone in her room. So far it has been good and now she has gradually use to it and sleep through the night with no more cries and tears. Phew!

These days I am setting new routine for her to get use to it, that is reading her a story before she goes to bed. Hope she will get use to it soon.

Now she still prefer her bottle rather than solid foods, so this is actually a problem that I need to solve before she turns 18 months. No matter how I try she still insists on her bottle. Will try my best to make her not to become so picky on her food.

New Dress

This dress was made for Chinese New Year 2011. I tried to find some nice ones in the market but could not find anything that I like. So I bought this bright red cotton and made a dress for my little one. I even handmade those little cute pink flower on the dress myself! First attempt of mine, not bad right? Isn't she cute! I hope she likes it too..... LOL.

Impressive, Expressive & Suffocating!

Recently I have watched the movie Burlesque which is a 2010 Golden Globe award winning musical film directed and written by Steven Antin and starring Christina Aguilera and Cher. Well, I have always love Burlesque performances; although I did not watch any live one for real, only the movie. SO anything to do with Burlesque had caught my attention, like Dita Von Teese is still my favorite though. Well, the picture above is quite interesting as it portrays a romantic, sensual yet sexy lady like what an ideal woman should be. Well, guess it is just my interpretation only.
The interesting part is who the illustrator is. He is Vania Zouravliov, I was not familiar with him until now. And I think I kinda have fallen in love with his style of illustration and really wish I could illustrate like that. He really reminds me of Aubrey Vincent Beardsley, an english illustrator whoose works are similar in the style of grotesque , the decadent, and the erotic. Well, Vania's more chilling in the sense as his works have more details.

Don't you just love these images by Vania? Really impressively chilling, yet amazingly beautiful!

New Year, New Place... First-day: Part 1

It has been a while... I have stopped blogging. Sorry folks, I am not on vacation but am so busy moving house.

Indeed, I have a new place now, so I needed to pack things up and furthermore add to all these packing and moving..... is having to work part-time and also The New Year preparations and house-warming parties. All in all, I have a very busy start in the beginning of the year which also means I have a lot to blog about.

First of all I am wishing everyone a very Happy New Rabbit Year and Gong Xi Fa Chai!
Here I am First day cooking in my new Kitchen.
We had a little praying ceremony after entering the house. After that will be eating, so I had to cook which is supposed to be some of the things you need to do when entering a new place, I guess. Well, we invited some family members to have lunch together. Since it is during the Chinese New Year, I cooked something simple instead of having steamboat again.

Most of our family members are elderly so we had porridge and some other dishes to accompany it. Some vegetables, some roast pork from the market, some noodles made by granny, and some fried eggs; Simple and just nice for everyone.

After the short meal, we had some photo shooting session. We had ask one of our friends to come over and help us shoot some family photos for memory sake. It was a formal one so everyone kinda dress up and the mood was quite serious but well it went well in the end. This ended the first part of our housewarming party. More to come later in the night!!