I know I will have Separation Anxiety

Haha!

What separation anxiety lah? Some of you will ask me. I will still be their mummy, stay in the same house and I can continue with whatever I had been doing for them this past one month what...

Well, I cannot continue to do everything I did for them for this past one month.

Maybe to many mummies out there, whatever I had done was no big deal. It had been their usual routine.

You see, every mummy is different. Every marriage is different. Every parenthood is different. We cannot expect every mummy to do the same thing, even when we hope that the "outcome" is the same. 

Routine care helps in bonding. That I do not deny. But that is not the only avenue to bonding with our kids. There are so many other avenues to bond with our kids and still we can maintain a Life of our own.

Laogong and I still believe that to be good parents, we need to sustain and maintain our marriage and couple time. Because how we maintain our relationship/marriage will unconsciously influence our children in their beliefs how their future relationship/marriage should be. 

Laogong had sacrificed his needs for couple time and his "wife" for the past one month, so I need to resume my role as a "wife" soon. Haha!

I need my ME time too so as to sustain my level of energy. I need to recharge so I can love myself more, before I can love everyone else more too. 

And of coz I need to catch up with all the excitement coming up in my new career. I want to play a part in being the pioneer in letting the whole Singapore or even the whole world knows about Sunflower ^^

But...

There are things that I learnt from this past one month which I will like to continue to do for my children but maybe in other methods/ways. 

I will like to have more private dates with my children individually. I feel that they had been trying very hard to fight for my attention and I wish that occasionally they can have me just for themselves. And of coz there are times I wish I can focus just one child at a time. Lets see if this is possible. 

But I know I will still need to go through a slight separation anxiety having to transit back to the previous lifestyles at home. 

7 more days to my Big 37!

Haha! Please tell me you don't believe I am turning 37 in a week's time! At least I don't! :P

Well, time flies.. really flies... another year has passed and so many things had happened in this one year. But I am glad all that had happened are good things. My life had finally changed for the better. I believe many more good things will come along in the next one year! 

正能量，来吧！

As usual, I always like to do a recap before my next birthday. So as to remind myself to treasure what I had achieved that did not come easy, and continue to work hard to retain what I have...

Still Slim and Pretty!

I always use my photo which I took in 2013 to "scare" myself and to remind myself what I had been through back then. I am glad I am still slim and pretty.

For those who forgot what I had been through may read about my "iVain: Obasan to Hot Mama Journal"

http://jolene428.blogspot.sg/search?updated-min=2013-01-01T00:00:00%2B08:00&updated-max=2014-01-01T00:00:00%2B08:00&max-results=50&m=0

Before Slimming (64kg)

After Slimming (48kg)

Don't be shy if you wish to find out more about the TCM Slimming Programme I went through in year 2013 to slim 16kg in 3 months. It is definitely achievable for everyone who sets his/her mind to slim down. 

Email me your queries at jolene428@gmail.com and I will reply within 24 hours. ^^

Let It Go

I still remember how unwilling I was to say Goodbye last year to the workplace I was so attached to, but yet also the workplace that had tormented me emotionally since 2011...

But I knew I had to leave because it was not doing good to my self-esteem and self-worth. It took me a few months and lots of tears to finally let it go.

I now learnt that we should only work hard for bosses who are worthy of us, who can make us feel proud of ourselves and who knows how to unleash our potential and polish us into gems.

I also accepted that Life was not all that unfair to me afterall. I did suffer injustice for 3.5 years but Life was kind to me towards the end of my career in that workplace. Life had introduced me good colleagues, good bosses and new good friends...:)

Life gave me the chance to leave my unhappy career with happy new memories...

A New Beginning

Ending of an unhappy career usually means a new beginning in my work and life...

This new beginning did not come easy. But it makes me realized that, by keeping my options open, opportunities will come along. 

I am happy and thankful in my new career. Work is busy but I really love the busyness, because I am working for someone who appreciates what I can contribute to the organisation.

My new career is definitely not perfect. There are office politics and there are 小人 too. But at least I know that my new bosses have "eyes". I know I can trust that they are unbiased and with good characters. I also know that the majority of my close working colleagues are kind and want the best for the organisation. 

Missing My Travelling Sprees

Suffering withdrawal symdrome from my travelling sprees last year. 

I definitely can feel the itch for not being able to travel this year, as much as I did last year. But I know I have an empty piggy bank to fill up again before I can plan for my next long trip.

I am thankful for the opportunities "to see the world" last year. I enjoyed the visits to BKK and KL to catch up with my long-lost friends, and I had fun spending a good 10 days in Taiwan with Qiuling.

My trip to Taiwan was especially fruitful. Not only, we covered the north-west part of Taiwan, bought tonnes of food and beauty products, I also make a new Taiwan friend. It was also addictive to experience travelling alone. 

Pinky and Me on plane alone

I don't mind sharing that I do have plans to travel alone again by end of this year. And I am determined to make more friends around the world, so that I have more opportunities to travel alone to visit them :P

But I also do not mind travelling with new travelmates too, because I always believe travelling with different people helps to make me a more accommodative, understanding and considerate person.

Jamie goes to Primary School

Time flies and my baby girl is already in Primary 1 now. She is still not reading well but at least I see progress. 

Jamie's K2 Graduation

Jamie 6yrs old birthday party

I was thrilled to hear and see her reading the books brought from the LSP.

We still believe she can catch up with her peers when she is ready to hit her milestone for her reading skills.

Jiayou Jamie! One day, you too can write your own blog! ^^

James Can Talk

In fact, these days we felt that James talks too much. Hahaha... But we are glad that the siblings can finally communicate with each other. 

James' first concert performance

James' big 3 birthday

Goodbye to a Long-term friend 

Ace was like an old friend to us because we had been through so much together with him. Laogong and I had our fair share of scares too during the last few months of Ace's life. We were grateful that Ace survived till his COE expired.

Thank you Ace, you had been a good friend! 

Goodbye for a Better Future

We could not bear to rent out our first love nest but it is not economical to leave it empty. Yet it is not big enough to fit 4 adults and 2 children comfortably. 

Hence, we will be renting it out for a better future for our children. 

Addicted to Staycations

We are busy filling up our empty piggy banks, hence unable to go for long trips. However, it does not stop us to become addicted to staycations (be it couple trips or family trips), especially staycations across the borders. 

Enjoying good currency exchange rate for the past one year had given us opprtunities to try other JB hotels other than KSL and Hotel Jen @ Puteri Harbour. We especially loves DoubleTree Hilton now for the good rates and friendly staff. But we really do not mind trying out more JB hotels to compare their service quality. 

I even thought of going on roadtrips with Laogong to different parts of Malaysia by public transport, like those "good old days" again when we were young and "poor" but adventurous.

Panda Supermum Reporting

This April happens to be the once every two years "supermum peak period". Once again, I am challenged and stretched to my max to test my endurance and time management. 

Lucky for me this round, because my new boss is extremely understanding. 将心比心, I will give her my best within my means even when I am tied up at home. 

I always treasure this opportunity to bond with my children and to train them to be more independent. I know we had been blessed so far with a good helper, but sometimes we really never know if she may change her mind suddenly. 

I also treasure the opportunity to cook for the family. Many people may have forgotten that I actually can cook. Maybe I cannot cook as well as my helper but I believe I can cook well enough for my children to finish up the food I prepared for them. 

However, having to spend more time for my children's routine work eg bathing, eating and putting them to sleep etc, also means sacrificing my Me and Sleep Time. Hence, I totally look like Panda Supermum now! Hahaha! 

Looking forward to be a Princessy Supermum once again :P

My Scheduled Belated Birthday Celebrations

Previous years, I would meet up my friends before my actual birthday to have a meal or/and some activities.

But this year, due to my helper's home visit leave, I could not agree to any birthday meetup before my actual birthday. Instead, I had to pack all my birthday celebrations on the long weekends from 28 Apr to 2 May 2016. 

28 Apr 2016 - I will be on Birthday Leave so I will be having a joint birthday celebration with my nephew, Keith, again! This year, we are trying out the newly opened Punggol Safra Indoor Water Playground! Look out for my review about it! 

29 April 2016 - Birthday High Tea with Uni Friends at Vintage High Tea @ Dempsey. Will do a Food Review! 

1 May 2016 - Helper will be arrived in Sg in the afternoon, hence Night Time should be going out with Laogong

2 May 2016 - Lunch Buffet @ Swissotel and KTV at Teo Heng, Suntec with 好姐妹. Will do a Food Review! 

7 May 2015 - Mothers' Day Lunch/Dinner with my mother

8 May 2015 - Mothers' Day Buffet Lunch @ Carousel with mother-inlaw.

21-22 May 2016 - Joint Birthday Staycation with Yvonne @ M Hotel

Who else want to chope me in May? Hahaha! 

Goodbye is for a Better Future...

Guess I am always the one who is more emotional when comes to saying goodbye. 

Laogong was sure from the start that we have to do this. Actually I also know we have to do this. Being a 4 bedroom 5A flat located in Bishan, my mil house definitely has more rooms to fit everyone comfortably. It is also more accessible to Laogong's work place, Jamie's primary school and many parts of Singapore. We had agreed from the start that eventually we will move back to take care of the old folks and our Punggol house was merely a good investment. 

I don't mind staying with my mil too because she is a very docile and easy-going person. She is also not calculaive and is always willing to help out. She even changed her working shift to help out for this month. She has every right to be like many other grandma these days who just want their personal time and space but she didn't. I am very grateful I have a nice mother-in-law. 

But I cannot help but feel a little sad that our first little nest which we "built" from scratch is now going to be someone's else home. In a way, I should be happy that it will no longer be an empty house but will once again be able to bring warmth to its new occupiers.

Yah, we are renting our Punggol house out. The house where we spent 2.5years; where I did my 2nd confinement; where Jamie and James grew up...

But I know this is the start to a better future... With the extra income, we will be able to give the family a better life... We can even look forward to do a full renovation for my mil house in 1-2 yrs time or a second property in 3-5 yrs time.

So yes, we have to do this! 

May the new occupiers will take care of our house like if it is their long-term home...

We just did our last packing and cleaning of the house and had moved out the last boxes of our personal items. 

Will share the rental procedure experiences in the next blog posts...

Goodbye to a Good Friend of 10 years

11 April 2016, we bid goodbye to a good friend of 10 years.

You have served us well and had been a great help. We are sorry we are unable to extend your stay and lifespan with us. We hope that they will not scrape you but instead fix you and send you to overseas, where you once again can find a good owner who will love you as we did. 

We named him "Ace" because he was once very important in our lives. He saw through my two pregnancies and kept my two children safe on the road. He once had to wake up very early and be on the road with me till late when we were staying in Punggol and had to travel to and fro YCK-Thomson-Orchard everyday for work, Laogong's school and Jamie's school. He once accompanied me everyday to my current new job for many months. He also had travelled to KL, Genting and Melaka with us and so many more places in Singapore.

Once again, thank you so much for being in our lives. Your younger brother, "Alpha", will continue your legacy with us.

Goodbye our loyal, faithful and trustworthy friend...

Supermum Day 12: Cooking a mini storm; for her sick children

This early morning, I received two bad news. 

James was rejected by school due to suspected HFMD. I do not blame them though James did not have a fever nor any symptoms for being sick. I was told there was spots in throat but doctor clarified there was nothing in James' throat and issued him a letter of fitness. We were in a dilemma if we should send him to school still since Jamie was down with high fever since last night and I had eye infection. In the end, I decided to sacrifice my rest and keep both kids at home. 

It was not difficult to get them to nap after their first round of medication. 

And I used the "peaceful" time I bought to prepare lunch and soup for dinner. I decided to cook their favorite dishes during lunch to encourage them to eat as I know sick children usually have bad appetite. It was also a good choice to cook porridge instead of rice for lunch because both children complained of sore throats and unable to swallow hard food. 

Simple recipe to share for this lunch coz the dishes are pretty simple to cook:

Cauliflowers with fried eggs

1. Beat two eggs

2. Cut the califlowers

3. Add some oil and heat the cooking pot. I prefer using cooking pot than frying pan or wok to fry small amount of food. 

4. Fry cut califlowers, Add corn starch dissolved in hot water. Cover the Lid for 3-5 min. Califlowers will be cooked to soft texture.

5. Add the beated eggs and stir fry

6. Done. But if you don't want to end hp with starch/scamble eggs alike texture then use one egg instead.

Steam Salmon 

1. Dethaw a slice of salmon. I prefer thin slices than the thick ones so easier to gauge the time taken to ensure the salomon is not overcooked.

2. Marinate with soya sauce for 30min

3. Place fish in steamer with some water

4. Wa-Lah in 10-15minutes

Note: for thick slices of Salmon, I will usually sliced the salmon halfway through the steaming to ensure the inside is cooked thoroughly but not overcooked.

Airfry Nuggets

1. Dethaw the frozen nuggets

2. Cut them into two. Laogong likes them cooked till crispy.

3. Put them in airfryer for 15 minutes (constantly stir them every 5 minutes)

When the kids were sleeping I also managed to put the soup for tonight to boil and simmer at low fire for 45-60minutes before placing the pot into the multi-thermal pot to continue to simmer till dinner time.

The soup I prepared only need 4 ingredients. Mini chicken drumsticks slices mushrooms, ready-packed soup ingredients and white fungus. Please note that I marinated the mini chicken drumsticks and sliced mushrooms with soya sauce. The soup can also be cooked as a hot or cold desserts. You can prepare this easy-to-do desserts by just adding rock sugar and white fungus together with the ready-packed ingredients into the pot.

Wa-Lah! Dinner is that easy :) Try the recipes when you have time :)

Oops... Sorry to all my readers if I did not respond to your comments or enquires

Oops.. I was labelling my latest posts and decided to pop by to have a look at the list of comments to my posts. Seriously, I did not expect myself to have so many regular readers. I am really very flattered by all the readers who had been following my blog. Thank you very much for your support!

I have to apologise to all the readers who had left me a comment or an enquiry in my comment. I seldom pop by my blog via my laptop and usually upload my blog posts via my mobile apps. Hence, I had missed all the previous comments since year 2014 :(

Sorry everyone! 

I will make it a habit to check my comments page more often in future, so that I can thank everyone of you for your support :)

Oh yah! Please drop me an email in future via jolene428@gmail.com, if you have any urgent query k! I respond pretty fast via email ;)

Meantime, take care of yourself as the haze is here. I am still recovering from my illness :( Hope everyone stays healthy k! Stay Tune for more of my blog posts ^^

Supermum Day 5: Assured and Surviving...

Day 5.

Though I had no ME time after work to catch up with my piling work...

Though I had to "fly" home everyday after work to be the cooking mama...

Though I had insufficient sleep since day 1... coz need to wake up at 3am daily to make milk for James and 5am daily to prepare Jamie for school...

BUT what I gained over these 5 days is priceless. 

I gained more smiles from my kids that assured me I cook well...

I gained more love from my kids for giving/spending more undivided attention and time with them...

I gained their needs for me for putting them to sleep every night, packing their school bags for the next day and waking up early to prepare them for school...

I feel so much more confident as a mother in just 5 days. 

People used to call me "Princess" or "Spoilt brat" for being over-reliant on my helper. Sometimes I started to wonder if I lost my cooking skills and routine care skills too. Over the 6 years, I did doubt myself too. But every two years I was given the chance to assure myself over and over again. 

Today I cooked a two-dish yummy dinner which took me about an hour plus, including preparation time. As time is required to thaw the fish and minced meat hence I took more time to cook dinner tonight. Cooked double mushroom soup with shredded crabsticks and ma po toufu tonight. Steamed salmon for James too because he needs to eat salmon almost everyday. 

Will share the recipe in a separate post :) 

24 more days to go! Jiayou! 

5 Dishes Home-Cooked Dinner in an hour

Friends asked why don't I just buy all my meals or tingkat for the month. Afterall, it is normal for working mummies to be exhausted after a long day of work, hence have the "right" to be excused for not cooking dinner. 

But nothing beats homecooked food, even if they taste only so-so. I always feel that I can only make simple, similar and few dishes but the smiles on the faces of Laogong and the kids have always been my confidence boosters ^^

Beside it only takes me less than an hour to cook the 5 simple dishes, of which I spent 15-20 minutes thawing the frozen food and thinking of what to cook. Hahaha! 

While thinking of what to cook, I realized the "trick" is to do a variety of dishes that require different types of utensils and electrical applicances. You may end up with more pots and pans to wash but this allow us to mulitask, eg. within 15min, we can actually complete at least 3 dishes at the same time using different utensils and appliances. This method is good for families with children and adults having different food preferences, eg. Laogong needs a fried dish or processed food for every meal but does not like vegetables; Jamie loves white rice, broccoli, califlower, mushrooms and fried eggs but do not like fishes; James loves salmon, likes leafy vegetables but does not like eggs; mil is health conscious. 

But there are two other alternative methods for smaller families or families where everyone likes similiar food: 

1. Place your preferred meat and vegetables in a slow cooker, together with a pre-packed soup mixture or ingredients that can withinstand long hours of brewing, before you set off to work. When you get home, you will have a nice one-pot soup of protein and vegetables. You will only need to cook rice.

2. Otherwise you can cook an one-pot dish like fried rice, fried bee hoon, mian xian soup, claypot chicken rice etc. 

If you have the happy call pan or the air fryer, they can actually do more than you thought they can do. I will share more witth you as I do my "experiments". 

Anyhow, this is how I cook the 5 simple dishes in less than an hour.

First 20 minutes: 

1. Thawing of frozen food, such as hot dog, japanese seaweed chicken and salmon.

2. Cut hot dog and seaweed chicken.

3. Marinate thawed salmon with soya sauce

Next 15 minutes:

1. Cook Rice

2. Steam Salmon

3. Airfry seaweed chicken (checked every 7-8min and flip the seaweed chicken to ensure they are cooked thoroughly. 

4. Cooked Baked Bean with Hotdogs. Off fire when bake bean begins to boil and hotdogs begins to "open up" its "designs".

Next 15 minutes:

1. Cook Campbell Chicken Soup with Eggs. Add in corn starch into stirred eggs for the texture.

2. Fried Eggs with frying pan. Add soya sauce and serve.

Last 5 minutes: Serve the food. 

Ta-Da! Ready for dinner ^^ Haha! 

Cooking Tomatoe-based Spaghetti on Monday Night. Will share recipes ^^

Supermum Day 1 - Mission accomplished!

Finally, my little prince is asleep. But he is sleeping in a position that gives me no opportunity to move. Feeling insecure, he had placed his head and buttock on each of my legs.

But his reactions today had showed me that children's basic instinct is to look for their mummies when their usual caretakers (who are not their mummies) are unavailable. Didi has been sticking to me like glue the whole day and only looked for my mil occasionally. While previously, James only look for my helper and mil. 

Was happy to watch the kids enjoyed their dinner tonight. My cooking skills are rusty but yet able to produce nice food I guess. Seriously due to my flu i lost my sense of taste and smell, so I could not test the food I cooked. However, the happy faces of Laogong  and children showed that they enjoyed their food. 

It was a good first day. Tomorrow we will be attending Remus' birthday party! Hope Didi can behave himself tmr! 

Night Night to all! 

Transition into my helper-less month...

In a few hours time, I will be at the airport sending my helper off for her one month leave. Being over reliant on my helper on household chores and matters, Laogong and myself knew that it will be a tough one mth ahead. But I believe we will be able to brave through this "tough times". 

This month is going to be a very happening month too as I finally will get to do my eyebrow embroidery next week. I had waited in the queue for close to 4-6 months. Not sure how it will turn out but there were so many good reviews over her skills. Will blog about her service next week. 

April is my birthday month. Usually my close friends will chope me for my birthday celebrations, but this year i told my close friends that I am okay to do without any get-together makan. Or I can only confirm after next week after the family routine is more stable. Really appreciate my friends for remembering my hatch day ^^ If I am not free to catch up in April, please don't feel bad because we can always catch up later on :)

Having such a good helper has resulted in my rusty cooking skills but I believe I will be able to "revise" and catch up on my cooking skills. So stay tune to read on my cooking "fantasy" this month ^^

Hadn't been well since I returned from Melaka. And today I had a flu outbreak. Hope I will recover soon! 

As I write I kept dozing off coz i had my flu medicine just now :P I guess I better sleep soon! Stay tune! ^^