Weekday mornings

I check and see if everything is in order, ok?

My weekday breakfasts typically comprise a hot drink with bread and something savoury - eggs, bacon, tuna, ham, luncheon meat, sardines, meat floss, BBQ meat or canned curry chicken. No sweet stuff when I'm hungry, please. :) When I'm preparing breakfast, hubby would be in the washroom and the maid occupied in the garden. Luckily it's relatively easy to keep Jo Ern occupied. Put her down in the kitchen and she heads for one of her favourite cupboards - all those with lots of things inside.  She will be busy for quite a while taking things out and playing with them.  If I take longer, she'll move on to another cupboard. The only downside is keeping the things after she's done!  I've tried to steer her towards cupboards with fewer contents, but those are obviously not so interesting.  Heh.

This kid basically loves anything containing multiple objects to mess around with.  Sometimes I put her on the counter top (under supervision) and she'll check everything she's allowed to lay her hands on.  Quite often she'll put things into her mouth though...
 

Oh we have a bottle of honey here

Check and see if nice or not

14 months

Hehehee... playing peek-a-boo with Mummy

I'm watching you... must behave ok?

And she's 14 months!  Jo Ern is looking more like a little girl, less like a baby.  I do miss the cute baby year, but she's definitely easier to take care of now.  Comparing little Jo Ern and baby Jo Ern:

Less attention-hungry
She is mobile and doesn't cry to be carried so often.  Of course she does need to be monitored like a hawk.  Or else she'd be very happy tearing up tissue, playing with the phone/ipad, turning the knobs on the DVD player etc. 

Less AM feeds
She wakes up only once in the night for milk vs 2-3 times.  This one time ranges from 4.30am to 7am.  The latter is already my wake-up time and not considered middle of the night. 

Solids vs Milk
Definitely easier now compared to when she was fully on breastmilk.  Hoo hoo I was super stressed as I don't have much.  I devoted a whole weekend once to resting and pumping, getting 5-10ml each time, and was pleased with the resulting ONE extra milk portion of 100ml.  Then I discovered my brother's new maid had taken TWO of my milk portions to feed baby Jensen instead.  What's more, I had already counted in these two portions so Jo Ern didn't have enough that day.  I was so upset I could have cried... only I was too angry. 

And of course she is bigger and not so fragile!  And therefore can wear pretty dresses.  Hehe.

Bathroom pest

How come people stay inside here so long?

Huh?  What do you do here?

How do I keep Jo Ern from following me into the bathroom??  If I close the door, she will sit right outside and cry pitifully.  If I leave the door open, she'll be happy as a lark crawling in after me.  Then she'll mess around with the dustbin... lick it or take the contents out.  Yucks.

She generally loves making her way into bathrooms - it's probably the novelty since she only comes here for her bath.  I have scooped her up from various bathrooms countless times already!
 

Toys

Wow so many toys. Which one shall I play with?

OK I climb on THIS one first.

Mummy: Oi! Get down from there!!

Jo Ern's toy collection is growing!  Some play music, some have lights, some are educational, some just have various nooks to place things.  They're all colourful and generally nice to look at.  I am quite impressed by how some are designed to work and teach - obviously big toy companies do have child experts in the R&D department.

I had thought to trot out regular household items for Jo Ern to play with rather than buy toys that will only be used a while.  While she does like to mess around with our stuff, no harm having real toys to play with!

My buying spree isn't over!  I'm aiming for toys of different categories and hopefully those with longer entertainment value.  At least now I don't feel bored heading for the same few items hehe.  I just got a box to put her toys in and Jo Ern would chortle with delight when opening this box.  To me, that's priceless.  :)

Jottings 9 June

Wait ah, my batteries are charging.  Ready in 100, 99, 98...

While Jo Ern is sleeping, some jottings about happenings to myself.

I finished my half-year assignment in the heart of KL and was sad to go.  Funny, coz I absolutely hated it at first.  Traffic was still awful.  But people there were friendly and helpful, traits not too common in my profession.  My two immediate neighbours noticed early on that I eat all the time and generously plied me with food.  So many attended my farewell lunch and 3 separate people wanted to buy me coffee that afternoon!

Had a run of bad luck.  Soon after hubby's disastrous casino outing (well, his money is also my money hehe), I came home one day to find the house flooded.  The water tank at the roof had overflowed, flooded the upper story and waterfalled its way to flood part of the lower story too.  Sigh.  Quite a lot of damage done considering the short time - veneers on various cupboards peeled off, soaked mattress and boxes in the storeroom, parquet tiles swelling and causing the floor to be uneven, water marks on the wallpaper and ceiling boards.  It isn't easy or would cost a lot to rectify these... leaving them alone for now.

Then I had a toothache which turned out to be due to a wisdom tooth embedded DEEP.  Just had it out yesterday and am nursing a swollen jaw right now.  I'm glad my brother told me about Ng Oral though - op took less than 20mins when my regular dentist had estimated over 2 hours (and warned that she might close up and refer me elsewhere if the tooth proved recalcitrant).  I did have to fork out RM1000 for this specialist vs RM800 for the normal dentist, but in this case it's worth the money!  The x-ray did show ANOTHER wisdom tooth which is likely to cause problems... think I'll wait a bit while me and my pocket recover!

On the bright side, I get 3 days of MC.  Heh.  Last night I was in some pain - good thing hubby helped to watch Jo Ern and I just played with bubbles, hit rats, shot zombies, fed frogs and whatnot on the Ipad.  That me-time was really nice!  Today my face is still swollen but the pain is less and I think the worst is over.  I am on a liquid diet - my maid was so amused to see me pureeing porridge for myself!  Well, pureeing food is something I am very used to doing by now.  :)

Up!

Look, look at me! Clever or not?

This kid is practicing standing all the time.  Even on the bed... the good thing is the mattress cushions her when she eventually drops, bad thing is it's pretty difficult to stand/walk on mattresses.  You can see the process unfold - little legs bend, little butt stick out and then push, she's up.  Last night while I was drifting off to sleep, something made me open my eyes to see her standing up beside me!  Had to postpone sleep while I caught her and made her lie down, heh.

Hee-ahhh!

She can walk when holding on to someone's hands or when pushing somethiing.  That something can be a light chair, a walker, her toy table.  And she can take a few steps independently.  Won't be long before I have to chase her around!

Genting trip 8... ouch

Room was free again.... but ouch for the heaps of money hubby generously donated at the casino!  We could have gone for a luxurious overseas holiday instead.  Sigh. 

Got a balloon animal from Mr Clown.  But I cried coz clowns are very scary

Went to the theme park again.  It was the school holidays and the place was packed.  We didn't bother queueing for rides since we can always go another time.

While hubby was being the casino Santa Claus, I enjoyed spending time with Jo Ern in the room.  She was in a happy mood and laughed a lot, bounced on the bed, played with things and was overall a great companion.  We shared the food we brought - a 'meekoo'/red tortoise bun, popcorn, biscuits, fruit.  We had a new game:  She'd throw her doggie to the floor, I'd make it complain "doggie don't want to be the floor, doggie want to go oi-oi" and make it walk under the sheet, blanket or pillows.  She loved looking for it and would giggle when she found it.  Then she'd throw it again.  Heh.

Comfy pillows, eating 'meekoo' with my doggie... ahhh this is the life

Where did mummy hide my doggie this time??

I make coffee for myself.  Next time I will make for people

Maybe we should hold off going to Genting for a while though.  With the casino lurking in wait, trips there have the potential of turning out VERY expensive.