HEALTH FREAK MOMMY – Page 299 – The joys and throes of motherhood…

Young Artist At Work

Alycia drawing a birthday cake, balloons and popsicles.

Eversince Alycia attended pre-school early this year, the artistic sense in her has been uncovered. She loves writing, colouring and drawing.

I guess daddy’s artistic genes have rubbed off on her coz daddy can draw pretty well, really damn chun wan.

That was one of the reasons why a naive silly 17-year old school girl 17 years ago fell for her older brother’s best friend who was head over heels over her and hand-made her ‘lum sei ngor lor’ Valentine’s Day cards and greeting cards.

Promise… will try to dig out those cards that DH made me close to 2 decades ago, get them scanned and post them in my blog.

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Feeding Toddlers Medicine

Alycia and Sherilyn have never been easy feeders when it comes to medicine.
Thankfully, they rarely fell sick when they were younger, maybe once or twice a year.

When they were younger, there must be at least 3 people around in order to get them to swallow their medicine and those sick days were full of drama and emotions, and the air in the house was filled with wafts of vomit.

As I was still working then, I had 2 maids at home to help with the chores and to help my mil with the gals. One maid would be holding back Alycia’s struggling hands, the other maid would be holding back her forcefully kicking legs whilst my mil would force open Alycia’s mouth and squirt the syringe of syrup medicine into her mouth, only to be thrown up within seconds. If my youngest sil or I were around, we would be the entertainers, acting out anything we could think of under the sun from singing to acting silly to using a toy to distract, you name it. The house was like a battle ground each time the gals fell sick.

Eversince Alycia attended pre-school early this year and fell sick so frequently (and then spreading the illness to Sherilyn), both gals have kinda got immuned to the taste of medicines or maybe I finally found them a paed who prescribes them with sweet nice smelling and tasty medicine.

As for me, I am now a pro-medicine-feeder to toddlers and can sup sup sui feed both the gals their medicine all by myself even with my eyes closed and don’t even need to use a syringe anymore…. but on one condition set by the gals… there must be SWEET TREATS for them to go with their medicine. No problem lah so long as they willingly swallow their medicine.

So each time the gals are prescribed with medicine, DH and I would stock up the house with cakes, organic buns and biscuits. Alycia actually loves falling sick coz that’s the only time mummy is so lenient and generous with sweet stuff with her. Sometimes she even pretends to be sick for she thinks she can fool us into bringing her to the doctor but she doesn’t know that her mummy is fool-proof.

All set ready to feed the gals medicine…. plain chiffon cake, organic bread, their medicine and measuring cup. Oh, forgot to put the cup of water in.

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Learning Through Singing

Sherilyn has always loved music, singing and dancing. When she was a baby and cried each time, singing and playing soft music had always comforted her and lulled her to sleep.

I have recently discovered a new way of teaching my 2 gals. Since it’s really difficult to make them sit still classroom style with eyes focused on whatever I am teaching them, I discovered by chance some time back that by singing out the word as I read out each flash card to them really helps and they kept asking for more and more and more till I have to say STOP, ha ha..

This is how I sing out my teaching lessons:

Let’s say I am showing them a flash card with the word ‘happy’. I’ll sing out the song “I am h-a-p-p-y, I am h-a-p-p-y” and modify the song a tad bit. They find it so entertaining and now both Alycia and Sherilyn recognize the sight word happy and if I ask Alycia what h-a-p-p-y is (without showing her the flash card) she could tell me the word correctly.

The same goes for many other words. I will try to match the individual word that I am about to teach / sing to them to a rhyming nursery rhyme tune. Eg. singing out the word ‘strawberry’ to the tune of ‘If You Happy And You Know It Clap Your Hands’. After a few times singing out the word, both my gals started to recognize the sight word ‘strawberry’ as well as the spelling of the word orally (without being shown the flash card).

When we go for walks and see a coconut tree for instance, I’ll point to the coconut and tell them that they’ve just seen a coconut and then I’ll sing out the song “c-o-c-o-n-u-t”.

This is such a fun way of teaching my gals and all 3 of us enjoy it so much.

No. of times viewed = 275

Blogger

Blogger has recently added a word verification protection thing to prevent spam as some bloggers had complaint of their blogs being locked out but this word verfication thing is really driving me nuts and I’ve been wasting so much time meddling with it.

Don’t know if other bloggers on Blogger are also facing this problem or just me, the IT retard. You see, it doesn’t allow me to save the document without having to publish the post first. So even if my post is not complete, I have to publish it first to get it saved and then only edit the post to continue with composing my post. What irritates me is that the half-written truncated post is still published in my blog (as can be seen from my side, not sure about other readers) and even if i’ve completed the post later, saved it and click publish, the old truncated post is still seen in my blog and not the new completed post. Aarrgghh….. someone please help me!

Don’t ask me to post my complain or query with Blogger Helpdesk coz so far, they have never replied me and they have been sooooo many complaints about the Blogger team.

No. of times viewed = 391

Alycia Can Tell The Time

Remember I wrote about Bedtime stories where DH taught the gals to read the clock? Well, I have been teaching Alycia how to read the clock for the last 1 week, though not consistently and last nite when I asked her to tell me the time looking at the ‘Tell The Time’ flashcards, she managed to tell me the time, though she only knows how to tell the time when the minute hand points to 12, ie. she has to say o’clock.

Today, I brought out a book on telling the time which my sil had bought the gals a few months back and tested Alycia and she managed to tell me all the basic ‘o’clock’ time.

Tonight, I shall progress to the next step of teaching Alycia how to tell the time when the minute hand points to 6. I promised her that if she knows how to tell the time, I shall buy her a Princess watch and this has motivated her to pay attention when I read to her. Hopefully she can independently tell the time very soon and be my walking clock.

No. of times viewed = 306

Sherilyn Has Swollen Lymph Nodes

We just came back from the paed’s clinic. My poor baby Sherilyn’s lymph nodes on her right neck, just below her jaw are swollen and infected. She has also been having gluey yellowish-greenish goo on her right eye for the last 3 days and I thought she was just plain ‘yeet hei’ as the chinese say it or heatiness in her body coz she had been eating quite a bit of durian, biscuits, corn flakes and pan-fried tempeh lately. I am also having a strep throat and slight runny nose with phlegm and I guess Sherilyn must have gotten the bug from me.

Careless mummy me didn’t even notice the swell in her glands near her neck until daddy felt it last night as he was cuddling her while reading to her. When I touched it and felt a lump there, I really felt a big lump in my throat, so did DH. Being the wimp in us whenever health issues affect our 2 precious daughters, we were actually quite worried, more so as the swell is on the lymph nodes in her neck. All sorts of morbid thoughts came flashing through my mind and I am sure DH’s too, coz I could see he was just as worried but just put on a “nah…. nothing to worry wan” look on his face.

The paed said Sherilyn’s lymph nodes are infected and if we brought her to the clinic a few days later, the lymph nodes could get inflamed and then more invasive medical treatment is necessary. The lymph nodes got infected as they were trying to fight off virus from invading the body. She also has URTI (upper respiratory throat infection) and antibiotics (Augmentin) is needed to treat it. She was also given an ointment for her eye and allergy medicine for her nose.

As Alycia has also developed a slight cough this morning, she was also given an allergy medicine for her nose. Both the gals have sensitive nose and get nose allergies easily, or so said the paed. The total bill came up to RM140. Cost aside, DH and I are both relieved that Sherilyn’s swollen glands are nothing serious.

No. of times viewed = 650

To Go or Not To Go To School?

I can’t believe that it is already June, which means it has been slightly more than 3 months since I had stopped sending Alycia to pre-school as she has been falling sick continuously eversince attending pre-school in January 07.

As the school term will reopen in a week’s time, I have been asking myself this question… should Alycia go back to school? While the health freak mummy and wimp in me keep telling me NO, since her paed said her immune system is not fully developed yet and that it’s best to send her to school when she turns 4, the kiasu mummy in me keeps telling me aiyah, just go lah. If she doesn’t go, she will be so far lagging behind her peers and how long can you keep her at home? She needs exposure to germs and virus to get immuned to them.

So how? I am really in a dilemma. To go or not to go to school? What if Alycia goes and then the whole sickening cycle of her falling sick repeats itself? This will even weaken her immune system further and may later lead her into developing asthma. That will be big time headache for me and big hole in pocket for DH.

Some friends have asked me to homeschool Alycia and Sherilyn. I seriously don’t mind homeschooling my gals as when it comes to teaching them, my enthusiasm is always unbounded but my gals just won’t reciprocate the way I want them to. Alycia is for one who learns better when she is with peers. I was surprised that she had learnt so much in school in a period of less than 2 months and loved going to school so much and she is actually raring to go back to school.

So what say everyone? To go or not to go to school for Alycia?

No. of times viewed = 408

Please Help Locate Madeleine McCann

Folks… please help Madeleine’s parents reunite with her little girl. For God’s sake, she’s only 4 years old. Whoever abducted Madeleine for whatever reasons, please spare her and end her parents’ and loved ones’ misery.

Fellow bloggers can also help by putting this banner in their blog. Please click here to obtain the codes :

http://www.bringmadeleinehome.com/news/

No. of times viewed = 167

Cool learning method… strewing

A few days ago, The New Parent wrote an interesting article on strewing up…. a method of introducing new things to his little girl through discovery. I thought what a cool fun way of teaching Alycia and Sherilyn to read through discovery.

Yesterday when the gals were having their afternoon nap, I strewed flash cards around their room… one card in their mega blocks tub, two cards in their toys closet and one more card on their bed for them to discover.

Later that night, as they got into their room, they were so thrilled and surprised to see flash cards strewn everywhere. They thought mummy had forgotten to keep the flash cards back into the drawer. As they returned the cards to me, I read out the words and number on the flash cards to them. What fun way of teaching them to read. No coercion on them and they actually looked at the cards. Tonight, I shall strew a few more cards at different places in their rooms for them to discover.

These are some of the pix I managed to snapped candidly of Alycia and Sherilyn when they discovered the cards.

Mummy, the word “fun”. Sherilyn always recognizes this word.

“How come there’s a card here too mummy?”

No. of times viewed = 299

Miss Pukey Sherilyn

Sherilyn is nicknamed Ms Pukey coz she throws up very easily from the time she was a baby right through now. She pukes when she cries, when she eats food that she doesn’t like, particularly meat, when I brush her teeth, when she gets choked on food or when she’s over-eaten and simply when she wants sympathy and attention. She even knew how to gagged her throat with her fingers till she puked just to get our attention whenever she was locked up in the playpen when she was barely a year old. She knew mummy would not easily succumb to her crying and pull her out from the playpen but if she pukes in the playpen, mummy would rush to her aid and bring her out from her little prison. See how cunning and manupulative my brat can be.

Sherilyn has been rather whiny, cranky and cries easily for no real reasons for the last few days till she really gets on my nerves. Yesterday, she woke up from her nap bawling away as if she had had a bad dream. Nothing seemed to subdue her. I then fixed her a bottle of milk and she drank it with her head lying on my lap like a baby.

When I went into the kitchen to wash the bottle, she was still bawling and rolling on the floor. I was already very pissed off with her as there was no apparent reason for her bawling and I’ve exhausted all my means of trying to placate her from distraction to laughter and my patience was really wearing thin.

As I had expected, Ms Pukey then choked, coughed a tad bit and I knew she was about to puke. This happens most of the time when Sherilyn has a bawling session. I dashed right into the storeroom and fished out a huge garbage bag (that’s all I could see in the storeroom) and headed back to retrieve Sherilyn’s vomit. The milk that had formed into fresh curd spewed out from Sherilyn’s throat right into the garbage bag. After she was done, she pushed the bag away and said “finish already”.

Afterthat, I brought Sherilyn to the loo to have her washed up. As she sat on the toilet, she was still whining and sobbing for no apparent reasons. I was even more pissed off with her now and as I looked her straight into her face, I told her this, “Sherilyn what’s the matter with you? Why are you crying non-stop for no reason? You’re not in pain, you’re not hungry, cheh cheh didn’t bully you and you’re not a baby. Only babies cry like this because they don’t know how to talk. Can you tell me what you want instead of cry? If you want to be a baby, fine…. I’ll put you into the playpen and you stay in there”. Without any second thoughts, Sherilyn blurted out “i don’t want playpen”. For a moment, I could feel something magical had happened. Sherilyn stopped bawling, then the bawl gradually dwindled into a faint whimpering and then as I dried her body and put on her clothes, she transformed into an angel…. singing and giggling as she tried to start a conversation with me. Hiyah… kids are just so unpredictable and sometimes you just don’t know whether to get mad or laugh at their quirks and idiosyncrasies.

No. of times viewed = 309

How Do You Back-Up Your Blog?

Fellow bloggers, how do you back-up your blog? I’ve read it before, somewhere in my Google Blogger’s instructions but can’t seem to locate the info now.

Anything can happen and I’ve read that some poor bloggers’ blogs had been deleted or unblocked by unscrupulous parties and blogger rivals. That’s really scary.

Would someone please enlighten this IT / blogging idiot here?

Thanks thanks!

No. of times viewed = 178

A Bad Day

At times, Alycia and Sherilyn’s behaviour and temperament can be crazy… though I hate to use this word to describe my 2 gals but they behave as though they are crazy and totally out of control…. and this drives me crazy.

Today is one of those crazy days where both Alycia and Sherilyn got all cranked up right from the moment they rose from the bed in the morning through pass lunchtime.

Early this morning, Sherilyn had refused to get up from bed coz she wanted to watch the Shrek 3 vcd that DH had bought last night and gave the gals half an hour of viewing just before they went to bed. I am totally against letting the gals watch cartoons just before bedtime as they would rebuff going to bed later and a meltdown would ensue when I turn off the tv. However, DH who spends very little time with the gals love pampering his 2 angels with not-so-healthy pass-times and his favourite pass-time with the gals is spent watching cartoon with them on the bed before bedtime, which infuriates me.

Last night after I had turned off the tv, a meltdown begun as the gals demanded to have more Shrek. DH had to spend half an hour coaxing the gals to bed whilst I just laid on my bed, ‘no eye see’ and said “serves you right” to DH. He had to carry Alycia and Sherilyn one by one from our bed to the gals bed in the room next door at least 6 times as the gals demanded to be carried like a baby to be transferred to their bed over and over again for a good 15 minutes and it was already way past 11:30pm. What the fun!

This morning, Sherilyn refused to get up from bed as she wanted to watch Shrek 3. After I had failed coaxing and distracting her, I just pulled her out from bed and then another meltdown session begun. This lasted until lunchtime. Sherilyn would disagree over everything and kept whining and whimpering. The sounds of her whining just make me insane.

When lunch time came, the gals were happy coz I had baked a loaf of bread and they had sandwich for lunch. Then the gals demanded for their dessert and I gave them a packet of organic alphabet biscuits to be shared between them. When my maid opened the packet and gave the first biscuit with the letter ‘A’ to Sherilyn, Alycia saw and hollered and said she wanted to have biscuit A too as Alycia begins with the letter ‘A’.
Before my maid could retrieve it back, Sherilyn had already bitten on the biscuit and then another crazy meltdown begun. Alycia wailed and rolled on the floor. We tried to look for another biscuit with the letter ‘A’ for Alycia but unfortunately there was only 1 miserable ‘A’ biscuit which is now in Sherilyn’s tummy. Alycia’s outburst lasted for around 15 minutes when I could no longer stand it and decided to open another box of organic biscuit with moon shapes. This managed to subdue the gals for a while.

Amidst Alycia’s tantrum outburst, Miss Pukey Sherilyn vomitted on the kitchen floor after I had cleaned her teeth with a hanky after her lunch.

Alycia who was still seething and terribly upset that she didn’t get her ‘A’ biscuit then started to act up. She scolded my maid by saying terrible things like “I hate you kakak, I want to cut your stomach”. OMG, where on earth did she learn such an awful thing? I then lectured her and this made Alycia more upset. Alycia then scolded me and blurted out the word “stupid”. OMG… I was even more enraged now and gave her another lecture and I think this time she finally realized she was wrong to have scolded her mummy.

After lecturing Alycia, I then left the gals alone and they slowly patched things up between themself whilst I went to the computer to destress and chill myself out.

Now, they are gleefully playing and giggling away as if nothing had happened. Sometimes, it is better to ignore a child when they are in the midst of a tantrum outburst. I sometimes give them the cold silence treatment and continue doing my things nonchalantly and I think they somehow got the message through.

Sorry for the loooooong and boring post! Just needed to divert my anger somewhere else sometimes.

No. of times viewed = 234

Alycia Wins My Heart

Last nite, Sherilyn dropped a hard box of zig-saw puzzle onto my foot when I reprimanded her for taking it out from my drawer. Sherilyn has a habit of putting the pieces of puzzles into her mouth and throwing them everywhere and shoving them under my king-size bed and under my mattres and eventually losing them.

One side of the sharp-edged box landed on one of my toes and as I yelped out in pain, Alycia who was in her room playing dashed into my room and asked me what had happened. I told her that her mui mui had dropped a box on mummy’s foot and mummy is now in pain. As she saw me winced in pain, she darted back to her room and brought back a piece of mega block and pretended that it was a first-aid tape dispenser and started to put the imaginary plaster on my toe. When I saw Alycia pulling out the imaginary tape with the block, I just burst out laughing and asked her what she’s doing. Alycia then said “don’t move mummy, let me put plaster for you first”.

I was really touched by Alycia’s concern and wittines in handling first-aid situations like this. Alycia then said “don’t be sad mummy” and wah…. her words and actions were like water dousing off a raging fire in my heart. I gave her a big hug and kiss and said “thank you Alycia. mummy loves you” and wow… I can see Alycia’s face beeming with pride as her self-esteem inflates and her love tank filled to the brim with mummy’s love and hug.

It has been a long time anyone had touched me so deeply and made me laughed this hard. Sometimes, Alycia can really win and melt the coldest of heart.

The sharp edge of this hard box landed on my toe.

Alycia put plaster (band-aid) on mummy’s toe and sayang mummy’s injured toe.

No. of times viewed = 281

Peter Rabbit Organic Cornflakes

Today, Alycia and Sherilyn had Peter Rabbit Organic cornflakes for breakfast, thanks to koo mah #1 who bought this from Hong Kong. These cornflakes are sugar-free, salt-free and additives-free. Though they tasted rather bland, but they were crunchy and the gals and I loved them. Even their kakak got to taste some of the cornflakes. I shall buy a box of fresh Marigold HL milk this evening so that the gals can have the cornflakes with fresh milk for breakfast tomorrow.

No. of times viewed = 4370

Alycia In Her Tight Pyjamas

Alycia and Sherilyn have always been vain pots and they are very picky over what they wear. Whenever my maid and I choose something for them to wear from their outing dress to simple clothes to be worn at home, they almost never accept our choice of selection but instead, both of them will pull a chair to the cupboard, climb up and pick up an outfit of their choice. Well, I have no one to blame for my gals’ vanity as their mummy is just as vain, if not vainer 😀

Last night as my maid and I were getting the gals ready for bed, Alycia handpicked an old Mothercare onesie pyjamas that she had worn when she was 12 – 18 months. I told her that the pjs is way too small for her and that she has grown so tall now that she cannot fit into the pjs but my vain pot insisted she wants to wear it. Not wanting Alycia to burst into a fit of rage as would have expected if her demand is not met, we gave in to her request but my maid could not button up the pjs. Her body was so stiff in the pathetically worn out tiny Mothercare pjs and she could barely bend her legs. As I was raring to go down to complete my Blogitive paid posts, I just took a pair of scissors and snipped off the bottom part of the pjs where the feet are and this is how Alycia looked in that ridiculous pjs :

No. of times viewed = 287

Picking Up Toys

This is normally the scene at my house if I am not around to supervise my gals when they play. Lately, I’ve started to train my gals to keep their toys after they are done with them. It’s not easy to get them to cooperate as most of the time, they’ll just ignore me and continue playing, as though I am invisible. It’s only when I raise my voice (again), threathen them and flash out the cane that they finally hear me. But when they are in a good mood, they will gleefully and willingly keep their toys without being told. Guess they have been pampered by the maid who has always been cleaning up their mess. Time to make a change now.

No. of times viewed = 233