Lay Har's Birthday

Birthday dinner was arranged at Wild Rocket, a chic little restaurant located on Mount Emily. I was really looking forward to it. Firstly, it is a dear friend's birthday and secondly there are all these rave reviews on the restaurant (googled it, and you'll know what I meant), all the 'oohs and ahs' over the food and ambiance. Before I go to the food part I must say the service is good and prompt. Thumbs up!

Food was so-so, my Atlantic Cod Fish Linguine was served a little too cold for my liking. The dessert on the menu did make me drool though with items like Hawaiian Papaya Panna Cotta, which to my disappointment was not available that night. I settled for Tiramisu, again. Tiramisu is off my dessert list for the next 6 months!

Sharing the limelight with our birthday girl. Smile babes!

Say 'Ah' , unglam mama trying to coax Chloe to open her mouth. I think she looks a little unsure and taken aback . Her first dinner out is a big success, an under 15 minutes timing with not much coaxing. The result of the big crowd, it's show off time.

She's a real darling for like almost 45 minutes. Notice how clean her dress front is.

TA-DA! Presenting my 2 front teeth.

Flirting with Henry after dinner.

Candid shot using Raymond's new toy.

Swim Baby, Swim...

How exciting! Swimming! We're not talking about swishing in the water with a float but a real swim lesson with a swim coach. Again, the very excited person is not Chloe but her papa, who wakes up every morning counting down to the day, 'Chloe, do you know where are you going on Tuesday? Chloe's going swimming! Yeaahh!'

We are late starters for we have a very protective papa who is very against public pool as he thinks people will spit, pee and pollute the water with all kinds of germs and viruses which in turn may attack his precious little one. (Strange, how come he didn't kick up a fuss when I swam in the public pool?)

I can't help but think of the very first time I'm in the water, my so call swim lesson by my Ah Gong. I was 7 then, living in a kampong in Punggol with a huge fish pond (about 2m deep). One fine day, Ah gong decided that my sister shall 'learn' how to swim. So he tied one end of the nylon rope to a styroform ring float and with him holding the other end, we jumped into the pond with the float. I had second thought cos I can't see the bottom of the pond as the water was greenish and next to our pond is a crocodile farm. But Ah Gong was very adamant about it so we jumped and were swimming with swordtail fishes, guppies, tadpoles along with the millions of bacterias and germs the next minute.

Anyway, back to our baby. We are worried that she will not be able to adapt to the cold water but it seems like she takes to it quite well. No big struggles and cries from her, just some worried whines for 10 minutes and she's going after her rubber ducky.

The day begins with me thinking of what to dress her in for her first swim, the bikini or the one piece. Well, every girl has to have at least one bikini in her wardrobe, so between the bikini and her cute little pinkie one piece, we settle for the latter, which turned out to be a good choice as it provides a better grip. Thanks Des, for this nice suit, all the way from Qatar!

I'm not paying attention to every word the coach is saying and doing all the drills. as I wanted her to feel more assured and confident in the water first. Relax and have fun!

Swim lesson is conducted at Jennan's place. Thanks for arranging the swim trial and letting us messed up your bathroom after lesson. :) So sweet of Cranston to share his tub and toiletries, thanks baby!

She was kicking her legs like swimming breaststroke and was really moving forward. Gosh! Okay, I'm easily impressed but hey it's quite an achievement for someone who is in the pool for the very first time.

Babies are really very buoyant. I'm not doing anything here, just putting my hands around her and her bum just floats up. They're not called baby fats for nothing.

Clinging onto me as she still doesn't like water on her face. The only swimmer who swims without getting her hair wet.

Chloe had a great time, she fell asleep the moment she's buckled onto her car seat and slept through the journey home, didn't even stirred when I dropped off to get dinner. She had a great appetite for dinner, actually beating the table for the next spoonful and slept through till early morning. Swimming is the thing to exhaust our highly energetic baby, yeah!

Happy First Father's Day!

We spent Father's Day lazing the day away at home and end it with a walk and dinner at East Coast Park.

I can't remember when was the last time we went to East Coast Park, seems like a long time ago. In the past, Sundays are not completed without a run and breakfast there, so the truth is I really missed it.

The park has changed! They widen and added another path along the stretch in front of the restaurants, separating the pedestrians and the cyclists/skaters. Nice!

Dinner was a big disappointment though. Scruffy Murphy's food is lousy now, standard has dropped tremendously. We ordered fish and chip (their signature dish) was not properly cooked. It was raw and cold inside and the dory fillet had the strongest mud smell. Yikes! Maybe that's the reason why they keep the place dim so you can't see what you're eating.

We finally had some success getting her to sit in her stroller. I have been taking her on daily evening walks in the stroller so she's beginning to love the freedom. It lasted for like 15 mins today as it was her little nap time before dinner, so grouchy baby wants to be slinged. Another workout for me. :)

Waiting for our dinner

A BIG hug for papa

Chloe likes to pull our hair whenever she gets the chance and nowadays she's reaching for my ear stud too. Ouch!

Baby Gym

A baby gym is a good venue for our 'Energizer' girl, something I've been contemplating about for the longest time, just waiting for her to be more mobile.

There are 2 gyms which are good, one pretty near our place but they only accept babies from 9 months onwards, crawlers. The other one in town which to my surprise accepts babies as young as 4 months old! I think it's a little too much to put a baby so young in such a rowdy and hyped-up environment when all he wants is milk and sleep. So after chatting with a girl friend (whose son is attending classes in the latter) we decided to go for a trial class. We are very anxious to find out how she'll react in a room full of babies.

First 5 minutes, our little girl looks a little lost, it's her first time being in the same room with so many babies, loud music and excited parents. I think the parents are more excited than the babies. She cried a little, sulked a little and then started to enjoy herself.

She had a smile on her face by the time class ends so we signed up for the summer camp which last for a month.

These photos are taken on our second lesson and funny thing is almost all the parents turned up with cameras for photo-session.

Warming up before class starts. She loves being carried by papa.

Very good students... paying attention. So serious.

And the fun begins...

Stretching exercises

Isn't this a very nice cobra pose?
My little yogini

Okay, this one, we put her there for picture sake. :)

Teacher Zul showing the mommies how to assist baby with the bar.
She's holding it and the reason is - she wants to chew it.

The ever protective papa shielding her from the bubbles cos she dislike the bubbles popping on her face.

Thank Goodness for Safety Belts!

I plopped her onto her bouncer, buckled her and leave her with a few toys. She started playing and chewing them, well she basically send all her toys into her mouth for a taste test. Okay, all fine, so I turned my back to do some paperwork. The familiar sound of her toys falling onto the floor followed by her cries for them to be picked up. Lazy mummy choose to ignore it, training her to be patient. Wait baby. Very quiet... strange, very unlike her so I turned back to check on her and was greeted by this.

She did a full stretch, bend and try to pick her toy! I panic for a moment cos she looks like she's going to fall off but the safety belt was holding her back safely. Then I worried that the bouncer might toppled but Simon assured me that it will not. Mothers are the worrier or just me? All right, maybe all 7 months old babies are capable of that but it's her first time doing it and we were like 'wow'. So we just sit and watched her throw and pick her toy till she gets tired of it.

Naughty papa then put it on her left side and teach her to pick it up so that we don't have to do it for her the next time her toys drop. Well balanced! :)

Two Front Teeth

Chloe's two front teeth is out! It's the 2 on bottom. And that explains why she's been real cranky lately and is really working out her jaws with her teething toys. Yes, she managed to tear one apart. I found out when she took my breast for a teething toy too, not a very nice way to find out and I ended up feeling really sore.

Hmm... Bring me a chewie

Pureed Food Mask, Anyone?

Meal times are no longer the same! :)

Chloe started on rice cereal a month back and we have already tried a few brands, none to her liking. Okay, there's one the brown rice with ikan bilis, but it's with lots of coaxing. Most of the time the slimy paste (which resemblance mud) would end up on her bib, shirt, high chair, mirror and towel. She will show her displeasure with a big 'boo', spraying the stuff all over the place. Haiz! This girl.

Then we started pureeing fresh with baby spinach, carrots, rice, fish, potato and pork. Guess what, she took to it instantly. She'll actually open her mouth wide waiting for the next spoonful, no drips. Game over in 10 mins. Nice! Our baby loves fresh food, which means I've to cook all her meals, no instant stuff.

So to simplify stuff, I'll cook rice and steam whatever veggie and meat/fish combo together and blend it when she's going to eat, it's really fresh, no processed food, no salt, no sugar, no MSG, just the original stuff. The thing I can't live without at the moment, Braun Blender. 2 mins for a bowl of warm, delicious and healthy baby food! How fast can you get... :) So, whoever invented that thing, thank you!

Why are we waiting?

The end of a meal.
(This is the brown rice mix that looks like mud)

Having her baby biscuit.

Pumpkin, carrot, fish and rice mask

These days we just let her have her meals in her diaper.
Cos we're all happy this way. :)