CHICKENPOX!!!

"I think I may be coming down with something. I feel a little body ache. Maybe it's because I didn't sleep well." I shot him the most sarcastic look I can master and replied, "YOU didn't sleep well??? I bet your body ache because you slept TOO WELL! The roof would collapse and you would probably still be sleeping!" But Cobby was right. For the next few days, he was suffering from on-off fever, but nothing too serious. In fact, we even went to watch Wall Street on one Saturday. (It wasn't very good btw...)

But when we came back in the evening, Cobby was preparing to take a shower when he complained that he seemed to be having a breakout of pimples on his face. Then he asked me to check his back for him. Seems like there were some pimples or mosquito bites on his back too. I took a look and almost fainted.



The fever, the "pimples", the "mosquito bites", the liquid filled pox... It all makes sense! Cobby has the chicken pox!

Initially it seems quite mild. The pox looked like innocent little pimples, only a few appearing on his face and body. The next morning, Cobby went downstairs to see the doctor. But the young doctor didn't give him anything other than a little lozenges for his mild sore throat and a miserable 7 day medical leave. Only 7 Days! Maybe his pox don't look so bad. But then, the pox grew more and more...








Obviously it was super uncomfortable for poor Cobby. He was still having on and off fever, but the worse thing was the itch! We tried calamine lotion, but it was quite messy and the soothing effect was only temporary. We also tried snake powder, which was less messy, but also temporary. The itch was SO BAD, one night he couldn't sleep the whole night! He even recorded me snoring, but I wasn't snoring, I was just breathing very loudly. :P

I feel so helpless. I don't know how to help him feel better. Many times I actually don't have the strength to do so as I had to play and take care of Jolie, do the chores, cook for everybody, run all the errands myself and care for my Hubby too! Forgive me if I wasn't feeling sympathetic to his whining. -_- Thankfully Cobby's Mom came every other day with some food, herbal tea for Cobby and help watch Jolie while I cook and clean or take a shower.

On Wednesday, pus started to fill up in the pox! I have never heard that chicken pox would have pus, so it was quite scary.



He went to see the doctor again, suay suay, it's the young inexperienced doctor again! He said that this was just a little surface infection due to the build up oil and sweat, so he gave Cobby a tiny tube of antiseptic cream. The nurses were quite funny and ruthless. They looked at Cobby's face and said that they'll give him 2 tubes instead. They also said that Cobby should come back again on Saturday, as there would be a more experienced doctor in, and he could ask for an extension of MC. The doctor's room door was opened then, so obviously they don't give a damn about the poor young doctor's feelings. Haha...

On Saturday, Cobby went back to the clinic and finally got to see a more experienced doctor. He asked why didn't the 1st doctor didn't give Cobby any anti-viral pills to lessen the pox. Also, apparently there was an oral medication that curbs the itch! It's like a sedative that knocks you out so that you can have a good night sleep instead of itching the night away. DAMN THE 1ST DOCTOR!!! Cobby could have been spared the sleepless nights! So he prescribed the meds to Cobby, but it wasn't that itchy anymore... -_-

Thankfully, after applying the cream, the pus has started to disappear and over the next few days, some of the pox had started to shrink and dry up.



Interestingly, the pox on the face started to dry up 1st, and they seem to be moving downwards. But the pox on the lower back and legs are still there and filled with pus, so I guess we still need a few more days. But with the fever long gone, days are much easier now. I'm just relieved that he's on the road to recovery. :)

Gifts for everybody

Sis came back for visit again, so as usual, it's gifts for everyone! Her favourite niece got her favourite toy of the moment, which was Timmy from Timmy time. It's not sold in Singapore, so she had to order online and paid in Pounds! :P But it was very adorable.





Dad wanted to make a swing for Jolie, so he bought swing hinges from IKEA, but bought materials from elsewhere. So this is the final product.



Naturally, Jolie LOVED it. But she's so irritating. She would demand you put her on the swing, swing for a few seconds, get off the swing, run off to play somewhere else, come back after a few minutes, and demand to get on the swing again. REPEAT...



Me, I got my birthday present, which is this absolutely gorgeous bag from Marc by Marc Jacobs.




It's reversible!



A very trendy bag that's spacious enough to contain both Jolie and my stuff without looking bulky.



Mom got one in black later on too! :) Thanks for the lovely presents Sis!

Go Fly Kite!

Bought a kite from Taka for such a long time, but we never seemed to have the right opportunity to play with it. Either it's always raining, or baby gets sick, or something! Cobby just so happened to be on leave that day, so we headed to East Coast Park for some kite flying!



Turns out that kites these days are so idiot-proof! Just take it out of the packaging, tie up the strings, untie the tail, and off it goes into the wind! I remember flying a kite during my childhood. And it involves lots of running, the kite may or may not end up in the sky, and most of the time, even if it's up, it would be spinning around in circles. :P



It was very nice and windy, but the sun was very fierce that afternoon!





After a nice dinner at some "Hong Kong" diner, we gave in to Jolie and let her have a kiddy ride before heading home.



Back home, I noticed that the moon was orange in colour! Why is that???

Happy Birthday CoCo 2010!

Cobby had to go for his Army half marathon in the early morning, so Jojo and I were alone that morning. After I finished washing up Jolie, the phone rang. Mom and Dad wanted to invite me to have dim sum at my favourite 红星酒楼! I thought that I would have breakfast with parents and get Cobby to join us after his run, so I got Jolie prepared and off we went!

It was quite early, but the restaurant was notorious for it's long queue if you go after 10am. So we didn't have to queue that morning! Great! So we had a delicious breakfast for my birthday! Cobby called after is run and we decided to just hang around and wait for him to join us.

It was about 10.45am when he suddenly appeared, all sweaty, with a cake and a beautiful bunch of roses! What a surprise!



Apparently he had planned to celebrate at home after his run, so he had to quickly pick up the flowers and cake himself when he found out that I had run off to have breakfast with my parents. Poor Cobby! Anyway, what a lovely surprise! What beautiful roses! Jolie liked them too...



I love this photo, just so happen that I was dressed in red. Matching!



After dim sum we headed back to my parent's place for cake cutting! Cobby bought Glee Season 1 DVD for me and Dad shared a TOTO with me. Haha...









Jolie sang her own version of Happy Birthday and pretended to blow out the candle. So cute.



Happy Birthday to me!



After that, we headed back home for Jolie to take a nap. In the afternoon, we went to MIL's place like we always do on Sundays. It was a simple yet pleasant day. :)

Taiwan Food Festival 2010

Went to the Taiwan Food Festival today, it was held at Clark Quay. We arrived a little early, so it was blazingly hot!



There were also some stalls selling stuff, like pasar malam. But majority of the people were only there for one purpose, and it's the food!



Cobby buying from the stall. All the stall owners were flown in from Taiwan. The food fair was suppose to promote food from 台中, so many food were new to Cobby and I.



We started out with one of our favourites, stinky toufu, 臭豆腐!!!





We loved this 猪肉馅饼, which was this pastry with pork and spring onion stuffing. It's so juicy and peppery! Delicious!!!



After that I decided to go for the longest queue there, which was the oyster omelet. Cobby went to queue for the fish ball, which took about 15mins. We ate the fish ball soup while still queuing for the oyster omlelet. It was very delicious, but eating piping hot soup on a hot afternoon was really torturous! We wanted to get bubble tea, but the queue was even longer than ours!

The food festival uses a coupon system, and we had just a few dollars worth of coupons left. So Cobby went to hunt for some other food while I continue queuing. It was pure torture! I really chose the wrong day to wear high heels. It's been too long since I wore them, so my feet was really hurting. It was so hot that afternoon and so unbelievably crowded! Seriously, do I have a sign that says "COME HITHER!"?? It seems like everybody wanted cut through the line by crossing in front of me. ARGH!!! LEAVE ME ALONE!!!

I wanted to give up, but it would mean wasting our coupons! I was queuing for about 50 MINUTES when suddenly Cobby appeared with a life saver!!!



Ice cold shavings... sweet mangoes... creamy drizzling of condense milk... MANGO ICE, 芒果冰! Oh yeah... every mouthful just melts in our mouth and cool us down to the core. A perfect dish on a hot day... SHIOK AH!!!

After an hour of queuing, we finally saw the stall!



Watching the 师傅 make the oyster omelet, I realise that he was actually making 16 omelet each batch. But people were sweeping up everything after queuing for so long. That's why it took so long!



At 7pm, we finally got our oyster omelet! By then my legs were about to give way, so we just took our food and sat down on the side of the street. I was thinking, after so much pain, if the food sucks, I would have to burn down the stall. But thankfully,
IT WAS DELICIOUS!!!



I'm not a big fan of oyster omelet, but this one was delicious! It's nothing like the Singapore version, where everything is fried into one big mush. The starch and egg was separate, on top of that, they add bean sprouts and lettuce, so it's very well balanced. Best of all, the generous serving of mini oysters were very fresh, plum and sweet! Another specialty of Taiwanese oyster omelet was their sweet sauce. I can't tell what it was, but it brought everything together and made the whole dish so yummy and special!

So OK, to me, it was worth the wait and I didn't have to burn down the stall afterall. But after that we were so tired we really didn't have energy to queue for more food. But we were not full yet! How? OK it sounds a little lame, but we headed to a nearby Macdonald's for a cheeseburger before going home. Haha...

Hari Raya 2010

It's a public holiday, but we didn't have any plans, so we just hung out at home until late afternoon. After Jolie woke up from her nap, we decided to go Marina Square for dinner.

We dressed up Jolie in her new Zara dress we bought in JB. So pretty!



Unfortunately her pretty hair clip didn't last very long on her head. She yank it out before we left the house. -_- When we got there, there was some exhibition and Jolie got comfortable and just joined the other children in the activities!



She even wanted to go inside the air chamber when she saw the kids standing inside. We were concerned that she'll freak out half way through. Besides, she's wearing a full dress! She would be like a mini Marilyn Monroe! So we had to carry her away for dinner, kicking and screaming.



She was having a little flu, so she didn't eat much dinner at all. She kept throwing her tantrums, so dinner was quite torturous. She was definitely not in a good mood.



Halfway through she didn't even want to be sitted in her chair, so we had to take turns to accompany her to walk around. She just wanted to go back to the exhibition. I saw that the mascot was out, so I thought she would want to take a photo with it. But apparently she wasn't keen on being near the mascot without me, so...



She didn't eat any food during dinner, so we had to buy a apple turnover from Starbucks, but she barely ate much of that either. She did have a jolly good time at the kids playground on 3rd floor, next to all the kids clothing store. But as usual, we have to deal with her tantrum when it was time to go.

I think now that she's getting bigger, her tantrums are getting more frequent. It's a little irritating, but as long as I don't give in and just ignore her while she kicks and screams, she usually return back to normal after awhile. No harm done. :)

Potty Training

I've been potty training Jolie for awhile now. Right now she would use the potty for her "business" only in the morning, before brushing her teeth. To encourage and give her some positive reinforcement, I've created a simple rewards chart. To give her a star for each poop or pee in the potty.



She don't look very happy. That's because I made her hold the chart up but she didn't want to. Not very cooperative...

Anyway, so far she's only using the potty in the morning. Hopefully we can increase the frequency for the rest of the day. I'm getting kind of sick of changing diapers really, and diapers aren't exactly cheap either.

rocking chair

Jolie recently saw her old rocking chair that she refused to sit when she was an infant. She kept pointing at the chair and insisted on sitting it, so I removed the plastic cover and gave it to her. Interestingly, she just started sitting and rocking on it, and now it's like her favourite chair!



It looks squeezy, but it actually fits her just nice. It's more like a lying down rocking chair, but it's perfect for when she takes her milk or when she's watching TV.



She would even make it more cosy by making us cover her up with a blanket! The girl really knows how to enjoy life!



I realised that I didn't post photos of her when she 1st sat on the chair. When I found the photos, I was surprised at how different Jolie was back then.



Looking at the video brought back alot of memories. Life was a little easier then. I was under confinement, so all I had to do was eat nourishing delicious meals made by mom and have lots of rest, including sleeping through the night. The most vigorous "work" I had to do was to feed the baby. Sigh, it's great to be pregnant, but it's also great to be pampered during confinement. But I'm sure if there's a 2nd time, it wouldn't be so cushy with Jolie around. Haha...

Universal Studios Again!

Cobby have yet to visit Universal Studios at Sentosa, so we decided to go together on Saturday. As usual, we left Jolie at my Mom's place before setting off to Vivo City for breakfast. I really like the roti prata at the Food Republic food court, so that was our breakfast. Yummy!



After a full stomach, we bought tickets for the monorail to Sentosa. I even helped a tourist having trouble with one of the machines. Just being a helpful ambassador! :) Even though it's my 2nd time there, it was still exciting to have finally reached Universal Studios!



Finally got Cobby there...



It's so different going with Cobby versus going with a group of ladies. For one, when I went with the girls, we spent almost 15mins outside the park, taking pictures of the globe before even getting in. And when we got in, we took another, oh I don't know another few hundred shots just at the entrance. Haha... With just the 2 of us, it's quite difficult to take any interesting shots! So we quickly moved to Madagascar land, took one or two pictures and moved on to Far Far Away land.



Very fast... note the timing on the photo...



We didn't have much luck with the mascots that day. Every time I see one, they were just about to leave. But Puss In Boots was kind enough to pose for us one more time before he left. Meow!



You know, they should make the fat version of him, like in Shrek 4. Wouldn't that be super adorable??



So we watched the Shrek 4D show next, which was great, but not so scary this time, because,
1) I know what was coming
2) No Wenjing screaming and grabbing me at every little scene. :)



We moved on to Jurassic Park next and headed straight for the water ride. I was prepared to get wet this time, so I even brought a ziplock bag to put our belongings. But Universal Studios got smart and started selling ponchos at the entrance of the ride. $2 each! But it was brilliant. Almost everybody bought one.



I waited till it was almost our turn before putting it on. It clings on to your skin like those cling wrap film, so it's pretty uncomfortable!



Our boat consist of four couples, including us, and one of the girls was so damn nervous. The other was going a little overboard with the poncho, even using a hair clip to secure the poncho near her face, making sure not a single drip of water gets to her precious hair. A little OTT if you ask me... A little water is what makes it fun right? The other couple didn't wear the poncho at all. I just hate the feeling of wet shorts, so poncho is fine by me. In the end? Scared girl's boyfriend and No-poncho boyfriend got the most wet as their side of the boat hit the water first. I didn't kanna much this time. :)

We stopped for lunch and had hotdogs. It wasn't as good as it looks, but it sure was filling! Which was a pretty bad idea cause we rode the gliding ride immediately after lunch. The ride was surprisingly fast and swung us left, right, up and down. Thank goodness the ride was quite short, because we seriously felt our lunch coming up after the ride stopped.

When we were sure our hotdogs stayed safely inside our tummies, I challenged Cobby to rock climbing. He was hesitant at first, but gave in eventually. He was quite good at it! Steadily gone all the way up to the top. Yeah Cobby!



I didn't do so well, I guess I was too anxious, so I slipped a few times before finally finding my footing and got my way up.



Oh my god our arms were burning when we got down! But it was really fun! We moved on to ride my favourite ride, which was the Mummy Returns indoor roller coaster ride. It was so fun we went twice! If not for the long queue, I seriously could go a few times more!

So the giant roller coaster wasn't ready yet, so as usual, we just walked right by and watched the Steven Spielberg's Movie Effect's show instead. Super cool, loved it!



I screamed so much in the Mummy ride my throat was being to feel sore. So we rested at the diner for some drinks. Cobby wanted to have coffee, but I couldn't resist ordering the chocolate milkshake! Afterall, we're in a diner right? :)



The milkshake was super thick, creamy and chocolate-ty, but I was a little disappointed that they didn't serve it in a sundae glass. The onion rings was surprisingly good! We polished them off within minutes! As we were finishing, there was some performance outside the diner, so I thought I take some pictures. Who knew that one of the dancer would suddenly lift up her skirt! Took a pictures of her "undies" unintentionally hor...



There was a "Monster Rock" show starting, so we just walked over and watched the show in the theater. It wasn't very spectacular, but it was interesting enough...



So that ends our visit! On the way out, we bought a T-shirt for me and a funny flower hairband for Jolie. She loved it!




Thankfully it wasn't very sunny, but we were totally burned out by the end of the day. It was really fun and we promised that we'll be back when the roller coaster comes back on in a few months time. :)