Motherhood tips – Page 2 – HEALTH FREAK MOMMY

The Big Girl’s Meltdown

The big girl had a major meltdown this morning from 6am right through to lunch time! I had blogged that her fever had subsided yesterday but at around 6ish pm, her temperature shot up to 38.6 degrees Celsius again but she was not feeling uncomfortable. She felt pretty normal and had pretty good appetite. Only her body was very warm, which was partly aggravated by the melting hot weather with a temp. of 35 degrees yesterday. So the hubs forbade her from going to school.

This morning, when the hubs stopped Alycia from going to school, he unknowingly opened the Pandora’s Box! Alycia threw into a horrible fit of rage! She sobbed and wailed and pleaded for us to allow her to go to school. But the hubs said “NO” and no means no, period! The big girl bawled uncontrollably which made her daddy angrier. Thank goodness there is always the indulgent grandma to ‘sayang’ the big girl and pulled her back to her bedroom and tried to comfort her. The brouhaha this morning was something that is happening pretty often of late. I had blogged in one of my earlier posts that lately, this big girl is having a hard time managing her emotions and the manner in which she talks to us. Long story cut short, the big girl went back to bed and cried herself back to sleep. When she woke up, she was still angry with all of us and put on the longest, sulkiest face ever *facepalm*!!

After sending off rascal #2 this morning, I jogged to the mobile market to get a packet of yee mein and prawns to prepare the big girl’s favorite noodles dish for lunch.

A mother knows best. After this delish lunch of yee mein cooked with prawns, squids, fish balls, chicken fillet, veggie and egg sauce, the big girl’s mood was lifted up instantly!

They say that the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach and I think this adage holds true for kids too! 😉

No. of times viewed = 370

Our Dinner – Thursday, 31 Jan 2013

I have been feeling under the weather since yesterday. Yesterday my throat and congested nose were really bad. Today, the congestion on my nose has eased a little but still unable to breathe through my nose — and I hate breathing through my mouth. I could hardly smell and taste my food. No appetite to eat anything but have been feeling very, very thirsty for the past 2 days, caused by the nose congestion and with the goo trickling into my throat. I guess it’s nature’s way of pumping water into the body to keep fever and infection at bay. Since I feel quite bloated drinking water and have no appetite to eat anything else, I cooked porridge and steam eggs with minced meat today.

Here’s our dinner today…

1) blanched mustard green veggie drizzled with organic Tamari sauce

2) steamed eggs with minced meat. The 3 fussy eaters loved it and walloped the plate of dish until the very last spoonful! I can never go wrong with this dish as it is everyone’s favorite.

3) porridge. Porridge was cooked with pork ribs, minced meat, shredded roast chicken breast meat from Jason’s Grocer (overnight), carrots, dried scallops, dried oysters and seasoned with a dash of organic Tamari sauce.

I made an extra portion of steamed eggs with meat and porridge for tomorrow’s lunch. When I steamed the eggs with meat in the big wok, I placed the Tiffian carrier mixture on the lower deck and stacked the stainless steel plate on top. When the dish was cooked, I removed the plate placed on top for our dinner just now. Then left the tiffian carrier one to cool down. Once the porridge and steamed dish are cooled down, I’ll place them in the fridge and tomorrow’s lunch will be gao tim! So happy I don’t have to cook again tomorrow! And we’ll most likely go out for dinner tomorrow since it’s a public holiday 🙂

No. of times viewed = 242

Roping In Kids To Do Household Chores

It’s been more than a month we are coping without a live-in maid. It’s tough but we humans are darn resilient creatures and yes, I am slowly getting used to it, albeit I still wish that there is a live-in maid to help me out. Though the girls help out in the house chores, it is only after being reminded repeatedly and at times being threatened. Well, kids being kids and I doubt any kid will willingly help out without being told, unless the situation at home is one that is so pressing that the kids need to partake in house chores in order to get by his/her day.

One chore that the girls will volunteer to help out without being told is folding laundry. The reason? See the picture below.

Because the only time that I allow them to watch the idiot box is when they help to fold the laundry. No work, no TV and that’s a condition!

And being maidless at home has taught the girls to be more adept with doing basic house chores. Here Alycia and Sherilyn are folding a king-size comforter and they can fold it pretty neatly too with concerted effort. Cass is also getting better and better each day with her clothes folding job assignment. Yesterday, she told me that she liked folding clothes and volunteered to fold the clothes for everyone! After folding the clothes, she will sort them out before keeping them into the respective drawers. I must really credit her for such a job well done given that she is only 4 years old.

No. of times viewed = 476

Washing Delicate Clothes In The Washing Machine

This is how I wash our delicate and expensive outing clothes :

Fold the clothes and place them inside an old bolster case. Tie both ends of the bolster case and then put the bolster case with the clothes into a double layer washing net (which I bought from Daiso and 100 Yen Shop) before putting it into the washing machine in ‘Hand Wash’ mode. Even with a 500 spm spin, my clothes are still not very crinkled and even the lace do not tear. With this method, I do not need to hand wash my clothes that often anymore, albeit I still handwash my sports bras and sweaty sports clothes myself. The above method is only for clothes that are not very dirty and soiled. For really soiled ones with stains and all, you’ll need to handwash them briefly before dumping them into the washing machine for a round of wash and spin. The reason why I use both the bolster case and double layer net is just in case the bolster string is untied, my delicate clothes will still be inside the net. That’s what I call a real ‘safety net’. Not taking any risk of getting my pretty clothes damaged by the spinning.How do you wash your delicate clothes?

No. of times viewed = 738

A Little Embarrassment Is The Trick!

This was what I had to be forced to do when little Miss Forgetful and Scattered-Brain repeatedly forgot to bring her books back home for revision. The Mandarin tutor had asked her to bring her Science textbook along with all her Mandarin exercise books back for revision. Despite umpteen ~~nagging~~ verbal reminders and also written reminders, she still had the cheek to forget! I took the trouble to write the reminder on a piece of A4 size paper and put it into her school bag. But she protested, bawled and attempted to remove the note but I stuck to my gun. A few days later when she had still forgotten to bring her books back, I stuck a fresh note on the EXTERIOR of her school bag, which she removed and stuck it to her pencil box. OK, I allowed, though very hesitant. I gave in as I wanted to save her from some possible embarrassment from being poked fun at by her friends. But this girl did not make full use of the very last chance that her mummy gave her and in the 2nd week, still no sight of the books that she was supposed to bring home for revision! So this is what I did and voila, it worked!

Sometimes, a little embarrassment to a child is all it needs in order for things to get done and for behaviour to improve. It is through embarrassment that one will forever remember not to make the same mistake. Once bitten twice shy, and I hope I do not have to use the same tactic again on her. No prize for guessing who Miss Forgetful and Scattered-Brain is eh?

No. of times viewed = 293

Using Fun Quiz To Do Revision With My Kids

Alycia and Sherilyn are not the type who can sit for hours on end at the table to do revision for their exams or even to do their homework. Alycia is a tad more disciplined and well organized. She knows the meaning of urgency and she knows the consequences of her actions. Sherilyn is the exact opposite. She is fearless! Sherilyn is one who needs me to be seated next to her to ‘spoon-feed’ her, spoon by spoon and telling her what to do. I think she needs attention, loads of them. The moment I leave the table to pee or to get a drink, this rascal will bounce out from her seat and stray. I can never ever leave her alone to do her homework or to do revision, else nothing gets done. Teaching her can really wear off the patience of even the most patient of person. Lately, I even have suspicion that Sherilyn is dyslexic for she often shocks me with her output. She cannot seem to remember or memorize things that her teachers and I have been teaching her since her pre-school days up until now. She cannot seem to remember concepts and she is not very good with her spelling and ejaan. Classroom style of teaching bores her terribly and can lull her to sleep! Many times, she bawled when I told her to read her Sukukata, do Math and other academic stuff.

However, when I try to tweak the teaching method into something that creates fun and competition, I notice that all of a sudden, Sherilyn has found where she had left her brain behind and has put it back into her head. I always tell Sherilyn to look for her missing brain and put it back into her head whenever she does not remember a single thing that I have repeatedly taught her. The other night, on the eve of Sherilyn’s English test, I did a quiz on Common Nouns and Proper Nouns in the kitchen. The quiz was between Alycia and Sherilyn. I told them to name me a few things on the kitchen top that are Common Nouns and a few things that are Proper Nouns. I could see the excitement in them as they raced with each other to find the answers. The next time Alycia and Sherilyn have school exams, this is just what I am going to do to test them. I can use an exciting quiz to test them on Tatabahasa and English Grammar.

No. of times viewed = 197

When There’s Only 1 Left For 3 Hungry Mouths

On the Saturday that we were home without kakak, the girls and I had a bit of fun. After roping them to do some house work where everyone enjoyed, I wanted to reward them with Magnum ice cream. However there was only 1 stick of Magnum left and all 3 girls wanted the part of the ice cream that’s stuck to the stick. So how? I created a little excitement by getting them to draw lots. Alycia was in charge of preparing the papers for the cast and I put the papers into a container for them to draw lots.

The girls with their cast! WHO, WHO, WHO got the stick??

The sole Magnum almond ice cream cut into 3 equal portions.

Who do you think got the stick? Make a guess, haha!

No. of times viewed = 329

What Do You Do With Your Old Socks?

I used to throw them away as soon as the elastics start to loosen but after spending quite a bit on new socks (even bought them for my helper) each time my kids go to kids’ theme parks like Mega Kidz or Jungle Gym, I have started to collect old socks. Before our outing to the theme park, I will now fish out all my collection of old socks and dump them into my bag. Once we are there, everyone will don on the old socks. After all the fun, I will dump these socks right away. No point bringing them home to have them washed as they are filthy and black. Used to do that but gosh, whenever my kids are out from the theme park, the sole of the socks will be as black as charcoal. My helper had to brush and scrub the socks and yet the dirt just won’t budge. So why waste water, detergent, time and energy in washing the socks right? Just chuck them away at the exit point of the theme park, easy peasy job hah! And oh yea, don’t throw your old undies and bras away. Bring them along for your trips. After wearing them, chuck them into the bin. You can travel light this way. And you can save on disposable undies or panty liners 😀

My collection of old socks… and I had thrown them during our last outing at Mega Kidz 😀

No. of times viewed = 403

Trapped Inside The Room All Alone

Who? Cassandra! Yesterday… for a good 15 minutes in her jie jies’ bedroom and thank God she did not hurt herself.

I have always had a phobia of my girls’ fingers being pinched by doors ever since Sherilyn’s thumb was crushed by a metal door when she was 1.5 yo. The bone was a little cracked and the nail was yanked off. It was a terribly gory scene. Since then, I always make it a point to double and triple check that all the bedroom doors have 2 door stoppers on each door, ie. one U-shape stopper on the door and another stopper in between the bottom of the door and the floor. I even have a hook-type door stopper from Cosway for my own bedroom. My 2 older girls have a habit of removing the door stoppers so that they could close the door and have some privacy and mad fun inside the bedroom, especially when I am busy… and they sure know how to take advantage of the situation. This will usually drive me berserk and screaming on top of my voice. They love banging the doors and lock themselves inside, and invite Baby into the room to play too.

Yesterday, Alycia removed the door stoppers of her bedroom door and went inside to play with Baby and Sherilyn. Moments later, Sherilyn yelled “Uh oh mummy, Baby is inside the room and the door is LOCKED!!” I dashed to the room and my mil zoomed to get the bunch of keys. But sh*t, we have not yet labeled the keys and we had to go through 2 big boxes of keys, holy moly! Baby was knocking on the door and screaming to get out. There was a chair inside the room and I was worried sick that she would climb on the chair and fall off the chair. The worst case scenario ran through my mind… Baby fell and injured herself…. we can’t find the damn key to the door…. she loses consciousness…. we have to yank off the door knob with a big hammer… only to find her lying on the floor motionless. Boy, I tell yer, I can be very dramatic and morbid. Thank God after 15-20 minutes we found the damn key. I chided Alycia and Sherilyn like a mad woman cursing a criminal. My mil and I then tried all the keys for all the door and labeled them.

Good lesson learned for us … and for you too if you haven’t already labeled your door keys!

No. of times viewed = 462

Grounded

Rascal #2 doesn’t finish her food every single night! At 8:30pm every night on end, I will nag the same thing to her “finish your soup, finish your rice, you will be grounded if you throw your food again!” About 3 weeks ago, I really grounded her by removing all her privileges – no TV and no snacks for 1 week… and I wrote the punishment order on a piece of paper and stuck it on the fridge door, to remind myself not to give her any snacks muahahahahah!!!

By dinner time, she was famished!! She was the first to reach the dining table and she climbed onto the table top to help herself hahahahah!

The dishes were not even placed properly on the table yet but this fler with a growling tummy couldn’t wait any longer….

No. of times viewed = 253

Nightmare Came Alive!

This morning, my nightmare (which is every mother’s nightmare) came alive for me… at the coffee shop. I was having breakfast with the hubs, Baby and the helper. I was busy chatting with the hubs and my helper was busy eating her food. Baby was seated on double stacked up plastic chairs – in between my helper and me. My helper would normally feed her and eat her food at the same time. Today, she must be so hungry that she had forgotten all about Baby and I think Baby must have kicked her legs and all of a sudden, we heard a loud bang and and and…. Baby who was on the double stacked up plastic chairs fell together with the chairs!!! The chair fell backwards and Baby followed suit. When I saw Baby on the floor with her arm twisted behind the chair, I really thought she broke her arm. Gawd, I tell you, I almost wanted to puke in shock. I quickly pulled her up and she was screaming in shock and in pain. It was really quite a scene and all heads and eyes were zooming on us. After a few minutes, thank GOD, Baby stopped crying. Our friends who were nearby came running to us and checked the situation. Questions like “why you so careless ah huh??” were flying everywhere.

Lesson learnt from this incident for me and for every parent:

1) Make sure one of your hands is holding on to your child’s hand if she/he is seated on double stacked up plastic chairs. Those chairs are very light and topple backwards very easily. Even if you are eating, hold your spoon with one hand and hold on to your child’s hand with your other hand.

2) If your maid is also with your child, don’t assume that she is watching your child. Never ever leave your child’s safety to another person and assume that your child is going to be safe.

3) If you want to chat with your spouse / other kids, make sure that one hand is still holding on to your child’s hand, to prevent her/him from climbing up. A toddler is a toddler. They will never sit still when they eat. They tend to move about a lot. If the chair is without a seat belt, it is really dangerous to leave your toddler there without anyone holding on to him/her.

I thank God that Baby only had blue-black bruises on her arm with some of her skin grazed off. Thank GOD that her arm is not broken, head not broken, nothing broken. Only her guilt-corroded mummy’s heart was broken into pieces. Thank GOD! I am still in shock. After this incident, I now have a phobia of high chairs and stacked up plastic chairs whenever Baby sits on one and I know this phobia is going to stick with me for a very, very, very long time…. just like how I have a phobia of doors up until today after Sherilyn’s thumb was bloodily squashed by one 4 years ago.

No. of times viewed = 362

The Latest Sure-Works Motivation For The Girls

… to get up from bed in the morning is their new bicycles. For the past 3 months, it’s been a struggle for Alycia to stay awake when I jolt her up from her sleep at 6am to get ready for school. It’s even 10x worse for Sherilyn. From pulling her up from bed to getting her to drink her milk, brush her teeth and wash up every single morning is a big chore and a big bag of stress. Then an idea struck me. The girls have been bugging me to bring them down to the lobby of our condo to ride on their new bicycles everyday. I told them that if they can just get up from bed quickly, gulp down their milk quickly and get ready for school without me nagging them, I will bring them down to cycle in the evening. That’s my reward. It is working. For the past 2 days, Alycia sprang up from bed the second I called her. Everything was done in a jiffy and she was all ready for school in under half an hour. Sherilyn was quick too today and did not dilly dally much. I hope this motivation would not wear off after a week or two, else I would have to think of another motivation to get them to move their butt without all the dilly-dallying.

Alycia sleeping on the job whilst doing her homework. Without a power nap in the afternoon, she totally cannot function.

No. of times viewed = 163

Eating With A Timeline

Rascal #2 is the most ‘lau hei’ girl (dilly dally) I have ever known. She is as cool as a cucumber all the time and has no urgency to hurry up to do anything – drink her milk in the morning, wash up and brush her teeth, dress up, do her homework and eat her food. She will only get kan cheong (panic) and start to get ready when we are just about to leave the house, else she will dilly dally with just about everything and this is absolutely driving me nuts. No amount of coaxing, threats and reminders will make her move her butt. Sometimes I felt like recording my reminders and play them on the stereo player over and over again!! Sometimes she will cry when we threaten her that we will leave the house and she is not prepared yet.

Remember I had mentioned many times that rascal #2 always takes 2-3 hours to finish her meals? Well, I have decided that enough is enough, period. If everyone else has finished their meal and she’s the only one left at the dining table, I will bring out the alarm clock and tell her this “when the long hand points to X number, I want to see your food finished, else I will throw the food away” Sometimes she tries hard to quickly eat but this fler just can’t chew her food and swallow them quickly. I guess I made a mistake right from the very start by blending her food until she’s around 3 years old. She was even fed baby cereal until she was around 3 years old coz she liked baby cereal very much and did not really fancy eating rice with dishes. Up until now, she still finds eating rice with dishes a chore!

My advice here to new moms – don’t blend your toddler’s food. Let her/him learn to chew and let her learn to eat on her own. Yes, it’s going to be super duper messy and lots of cleaning up / floor moping to do but ultimately, she will learn to eat on her own very quickly and don’t even want you to feed her. I have never blended Baby’s food and now, she can eat on her own independently. I also let her eat on her own during most meals.

A common scene in the evening. We normally start eating dinner at 6:30pm. See the clock pointing to 7:45? She had been sitting at the dining table for over an hour and still, she had half a plate full of food *shake head*

No. of times viewed = 414

A Promise Made In Writing

Rascal #2 has a nasty habit of not finishing her food, especially her dinner, and especially so if it’s rice with dishes. I get so annoyed that this is happening so frequently that I made her promise me that she will finish her meals… in writing! Once her promise is broken, she can say sayonara to her after-meal snacks and desserts for one whole day.

I made her write (1) I promise I will nap in the afternoon and (2) I promise I will finish my dinner every night.

For agreement #1, she is still not keeping the promise and I still have to flash a cane at her to get her to nap in the afternoon. For agreement #2, I have used the ‘removal of snacks and tit bits’ as a threat and it’s working *big satisfied grin*

Alycia is not off the hook either. This is her written promise to me. Both rascal #1 and rascal #2’s written promise are now stuck on the fridge door 😀

Ever since Alycia started Standard 1, she has somewhat lost her ravenous appetite; now she always leaves her meals unfinished, especially lunch, when she comes home at 2pm and 4pm (twice a week). However, her appetite is still BIG on tit bits. Well, my kids are not all to be blamed for preferring tit bits coz all the adults in the family are big time fans of ~~junk food~~ healthy tit bits and the occasional sinful snacks, O_o !

Hey, do check out my online store for some CNY specials – limited stock and time. Get some stylo-mylo clothes at a steal!

No. of times viewed = 441

Doing Revision With Alycia… Part II

Coaching Alycia in her homework and doing revision with her require tons of patience. Each time I sit with her over her homework or revision, I would try really hard not to loose my cool and blow my stack at her coz I am an extremely impatient person. Being too pushy and hard on her will only frighten her and jam up her mind…. though I must admit that at times I did raise my voice and said nasty words to her…. which I feel really bad afterward. So most times, I use the carrot on the rabbit to motivate her. I use food to ~~bribe~~ motivate her…. and it worked…. coz she’s a real foodie, just like her daddy.

I used the Deepavali cookies that my Sikh neighbor gave us to reward Alycia if she got her sinonim and antonim (in Bahasa Malaysia) correct…. and I could see that she tried her level best. Her eyes were just fixated at the cookies and she was almost salivating as I asked her each of the sinonim and antonim last week, muahahahaha…

Picture taken on Sunday. We did the revision over lunch as we did not have much time left.

No. of times viewed = 406

Placating A Whining Child

This afternoon just before nap time, Alycia was acting up and was whining away. I tried to placate her by reading a story book to her but that did not stop her from whining. Suddenly, I choked on my own saliva and kept coughing. As Alycia was still whining away in my ear, I pretended to ‘choke myself to death’ and after coughing for a moment, I ‘lay motionless’ on the mattress. Alycia was shocked to see mummy ‘lying motionless’ on the mattress and she stopped whining. As she called out “mummy, mummy, mummy….” and on the verge of tears, she took her bolster and hit my face, as if trying to wake me up. She then slapped my face gently and tried to force open my eyes. When I couldn’t hold it anymore, I burst out laughing and gave her a big hug. Alycia too began to laugh and soon, she had forgotten all about what she was whining about and gladly went to nap.

No. of times viewed = 2400