One of the rare photo of daddy and his girls.
This little girl is starting to flip those magazines.
Another of the girls favourite lunch. Macaroni soup. Yes, I use our home-made chicken broth for it and add in lots of stuff like mince pork and chicken or shredded chicken, chinese mushrooms and lots of different vegetables. Macaroni soup can have many different variation. It all depends on what's in the fridge. I like cooking this as it's simple, it's colourful, it can be very nutritious and best of all, the girls like it.
this serves me well. Now that it's gone, I do feel a little nostalgia about it. Afterall this is the first item (that we own from day one in our new home) to be dispose of. We bought a new washing machine but it's a top loading one this time. I'm starting to recycle my laundry water and I feel more comfortable with a top loader. I guess I have more control. The water from the wash is discarded but the water from both rinses are recycled. Either for washing down the corridor (so it feels cooler and would not be too dusty), the shoe rack, the bicycle wheels, the common toilet or for flushing the toilet bowl. I feel happy doing it, not so much for the savings we might enjoy (frankly I do not know if this actually saves us money as we still have heaps of clothes to wash) but for the thought that we are not using clean water to wash the above mention. It seems such a waste! Anyway I hope my girls can learn from our recycling habits (we are also recycling plastic stuffs and metal like cans and tins and whatever we deem recyclable). It does feel good to recycle. Think about the good that you might be doing for the environment and yourself. Start by bringing your own bag (BYOB) to the supermarket.
On sunday we celebrated MaMa's 59th birthday with a home-prepared lunch. Joelle delivered her first egg-mayo sandwich that afternoon. She learnt it from a cooking lesson in school and wanted to do something for grandma so beside boiling the eggs, she did everything else. Mummy prepared fruit salad while mary whip up a very nice dish of fried noodles. My sister supplied the cake with two missing candles (that explains the numeric two). The girls had lots of fun with their grandma. I thank God constantly for my mum, who might not be the best mother, but is now the best grandma! She gave me great ideas for nutritious meals and when to give the girls some lee-ways. Honestly I also learn alot of "what-not-to-do" from my mum in terms of my children. My mum did not fail, she just did not become what I'd hoped for in a mother. Now I made sure I give my girls what I felt I'd never enjoyed, like lots of hugs and kisses and little pillow talks. I guess times have changed and how my mum brought us up may not be the ideal way to bring up this generation of children. It's not easy to determine what the girls want in a mother and it's definitely not easy to compromise on that expectations but I'm willing to try. I want a relationship that can be base on love, trust and respect. First, I need to create a strong bond with them.
Celebrated YeYe's 72nd birthday with a dinner on friday. We booked a table with a 'restaurant' in AMK ave 10 that sells roasted pig. My BIL was craving for roasted pig and he ordered a $160 little pig for the meal. It was the most ridiculous ($160 PIG!) thing to be paying for, especially for something I never liked. The last time I ever came near to a roasted pig was on my wedding and that was a bigger pig! Joelle felt so sorry for the "baby pig". She refused to eat it, though she pose with it after her younger cousin did. Isabelle was afraid of the head but liked the meat/skin. That dinner turned out to be very expensive and definitely not worth it as the rest of the dishes were mostly vegetables. 
We headed back to their place for the cake-cutting and the girls (as usual) scramble to be in the 'limelight'. Children simply enjoys singing birthday songs, blowing candles, cutting cakes and the whole 'dum-de-dum' of a birthday celebration. YeYe had to cut his cake three times with each of his granddaughters. Next year he will have to do it four times! But he'll be willing. I can see how much he adores the three girls. As with most fathers, they usually become better grandfathers. Yup, my grandfather's the same and I'm glad I'm his granddaughter! The only exception, perhaps, would be my own father. Unfortunately for him, he failed both as a father and a grandfather. I do not see any genuine love for his granddaughters. I could have shun him in his trial for all that he was, but as a parent myself, I know I can't. And I also believe strongly in the saying "the world is round". Moreover everyone has to answer to their God in a matter of time and so I just need to know that I'm doing my rightful duties as a child and my children will learn. That's the important part. 
The cousins... enjoying their cakes!
This is another of the girl's favourite. All I did was to use home-made chicken broth instead of the usual chicken stock. And I added some quail eggs which the girls got so excited about. They call them "baby eggs!". I guess I'm still not a kids-food expert but I do try to make my lunches as interesting and appealing to the girls as possible. But I realise that it's way too pressurising to have to do it everyday so I decided to do "nutritious food with looks" like once or twice a week and the rest would just be nutritious food. So far they're eating their lunches (no rejects) and I feel good about the value.
Holidays are here again! So it's back to the holiday's schedule.
Mornings: Breakfast, outdoor, shower, school and activity.
Afternoons: Lunch, nap, snack with 'tv', school and play.
Evenings: Dinner, outdoor, shower, book-time and goodnight.
It's 8.30am to 8.30pm.
I'm exhausted and it's only monday.
Another lunch prepared by mummy dearest. This is one of joelle's favourite - mac & cheese. I cook the meat and blanch the vegetables before adding the cheese and bake. Joelle enjoyed this lunch and ate one and a half portion. On the other hand, issy seems to prefer more "chinese" food. The girls (I noticed) are very different in their preferance for food. Joelle, like me, prefers "non-chinese" menus. We like sushi, pizzas, pastas, spaghetti, chicken chop, meat pie and interesting stuffs. Whereas isabelle prefers "chinese" food like noodles, porridge and rice with cooked dishes. I'm not sure if daddy's the same because daddy seems to consume anything on the table. Anyway this makes food preparation a liitle challenging but I'm still enjoying it very much. Well I'm still singing in the kitchen! 
Coming 2010, this baby will be in nursery. No more a play-school. Time really flies... I just registered her in joelle's kindergarten under the sibling registration phrase. I do wish that they would be in the same school but joelle would be moving on to a primary school next year. I pray she'll be fine. She's more an introvert than her sister. Sometimes I wonder if she got that from me. I always thought I'm very outgoing but as I aged, I realise that I like a quiet lifestyle. Perhaps I'd partied enough, talked too much and now I yearn for serenity. Or maybe I'd always been an introvert forced to be outgoing in the lifestyle that I chose. Well it doesn't matter any more I guess. As long as I'm happy now. I've been relatively happy in my life and with my choices. There were some dark period though, almost black. But I survived and I'm thankful for all that I'm given right now. Nowadays I do not ask God for things that I want. I ask Him for things He wants me to have. Yes it's true that isabelle (meaning devoted to God) is my key to God. With her conception, pregnancy, birth and health, I realise I'd learnt to understand God's words and works better than in my entire life as a baptised catholic. It's liberating I tell you. To stop blaming God for your failures, unanswered petitions and all the bad and to see God in your successes, your thanksgiving and in all the good. I'd never felt so reachable, so loved by God till little isabelle came along. I have learnt to acknowledge my blessings and thank Him for each and every one of them. Praise the Lord!
More changes are also expected (of mummy) over 2009 as we approaches our major crossroad - mary's departure. We may sound dependent and useless here but we can't deny that mary's involvement with the family two years ago has brought about daddy's indifference and mummy's reliance on the "extra hands". Two more months (and we're not counting) and we'll be left on our own devices. Imagine this... Isabelle will be wailing and fussing over the absence of her dear auntie, joelle will be drag to school without morning milk, mummy will be breaking dishes and burning skin at the stove and daddy will be digging the laundry for clothes to wear. And that might not even be the worst case scenario yet. So in order to overcome the mummy at the stove part (at least), I choose to start preparing myself for the change. So starting march, mummy's taking over the lunch cooking. For a start, I've decided to make their lunches healthier and that means taking up more preparation time and money and thoughts. I have sleepless nights just thinking up menus for five lunches a week! So this is the first lunch prepared solely by mummy dearest. It looks simple right? I wish it was that simple. Perhaps with more practices, it would be. I slow-cook the stock (meat and vegetable) over 12 hours (overnight) and use it to cook the porridge. Usually mary just uses water and I feel that it could be more nutritious and tasty. At least the girls get the goodness of the stock in the porridge (if they end up not eating the meat or the vegetables). Surprisingly they ate even the meat and the vegetables and they ate more than they usually did. What an inspiration! Their refill requests really motivate me to work out more nutritious menu for them. Sleepless nights can be worthwhile too.
Changes are expected over 2009 as we move into our next crossroad. Joelle will be starting her formal education in 2010 and so we are starting to get her ready in every ways. For one, the milk bottle must go. We 're not demanding that she drop her bottle and take off with the mug immediately but we do hope that she will not "crave" for the bottle too much. So these days her afternoon milk comes in a "princess" mug. Well she has demonstrated her share of rejection and objection but so far it has still been milk in a mug for the afternoon.
Joelle is the understanding and sensible five and a half. Though she gets the most punishment at the moment (compared to her younger but naughtier sister), she gets the most time slot with mummy. Next year she will be starting her formal education and I'm spending quite a bit of time talking to her about it. I think it might be a huge change for her but I believe she can cope. With her outgoing temperament, I'm sure she'll do fine. Sigh... my firstborn is all grown up.
The "starting-to-state-her-rights" 30 month old younger girl is a thinker as well. I can hardly trick her with my questions, answers or even statements. She listens to your every word and I have never caught her in a wrong reply. That is when she is in a nice mood of course. Her temper is quick and she is demanding though most of the time she can be pacified. She is learning to fight for mummy's time now and I believe my guilt allowed me to spoil her a little more than I should. WOW! These are my girls.
