Elmo, Big Bird and Cookie Monster

My Other New Hobby

2007-01-20T22:40:00.000+08:00

When I ended my last blog entry alluding to the fact that I had a new hobby, the intention wasn't to keep everyone in suspense for so long. Work's been super busy, Ray's been travelling a lot since he moved to a new position within the same company (which means more babysitting for me!) and now that I can't even blog from work (bloody increased firewall security) AND I'm been spending a lot of time on my new hobby, it's taken a while to get this new entry in. Sigh....

Anyway, enough with the excuses, I've been bitten (badly) by the scrapbooking bug!! One of my friends suggested doing a class at Laine's Papeterie at Wheelock Place and I had heard about it but didn't think much of it (or rather didn't think I was creative enough to do it).

In an effort to be social, I went, armed with 3-4 photos with the same theme as instructed and I ended up with this!!

It does take a number of hours to get each layout (LO) done but since I had all these photos of Alicia just lying around in a shoe box somewhere, remnants of good intentions to complete her baby photo album, I thought this was a much cooler way to display her photos!

After reading up and learning more about the craft, i realized I didn't like the first one I did so much. So here are a few others that followed:

The papers available are just so pretty that you can't go wrong!

Best part of all, they make great gifts! It was my mum's birthday yesterday and I decided to make her a tribute to Grandma LO. These pages can't be fitted into regular frames because of all the 3-D embellishments so they have "shadow boxes" - frames with depth.

I used to think that scrapbooking was something you made from scraps but this trend has been commercialised! These days, they make really expensive "scraps" which means I've had to cut back on shopping for me.

I'm hoping I won't lose interest too quickly. It'd help if my friends reading this show some interest too for mutual inspiration. Just like how Pui, Meips and I "inspire" each other to attend our weekly photography lessons religiously. God knows if they weren't there, I would be so much more tempted to skip the classes.

Uncles

2007-01-02T21:57:00.000+08:00

Instead of our annual Oz Christmas visit, this year, we decided to ship Ray's two youngest brothers over to Singapore for a visit instead. Since Ray is usually pretty tied up with work during the course of the year, this visit was a great opportunity for some brotherly bonding and for Alicia to get to know her uncles better.

When I first met them, Glen and Dean (aka "the boys" or "the kids") were only 11 and 9 respectively. Now they're 21 and 19, both taller and bigger than Ray, who at 6 ft 2, is no midget himself.

Well, boys will be boys, and given that the McGregor folks are super duper competitive (in all things) and sport jocks, the boys (including my dear hubby) decided to challenge each other in a 100m dash. Obviously, the appeal of that was totally lost on me but I thought it would be a great opportunity to test out my new Nikon D80 and provide a photo finish in case of sibling disputes! (I did say they were competitive :)

The results were not surprising - Glen, who weighs 10 muscly kg more than the other two, won easily but old(er) man Ray still managed to keep up with a not too shabby finish.

The funniest part of this was when Alicia saw all of them running - she decided it was a cool thing to try out as well. This, coming from a "gu niang" girl that loathes walking too much and is always saying "bao bao", was a pleasant surprise.

She even looked like she was giving it 100% as well with sheer concentration on her face and arms pumping vigorously to keep up with her little legs that were working as fast as they could. It was hilarious to watch.

On another note, I loved how my photos are coming out on my new DSLR camera. I've always wanted to be able to take these pro looking shots with a clear subject and a blurry background. As I've learnt in the photography classes I'm taking with Meips and Puiming, this is known as a shallow depth of field. Cool. Here's Alicia taken with a shallow DoF.

The other thing I've realized about photography is that it can get expensive if you want to be a serious amateur (is that an oxymoron?). If that's not bad enough, I've recently picked up another hobby that's proving to burn some more holes in my pocket. Will blog about that in my next entry.

Three Christmases, Three Countries

2006-12-28T21:45:00.000+08:00

It's that time of the year when we all get a little nostalgic and start lamenting on how quickly the year has passed and it's already the end of another year. (I also think time speeds up exponentially after you turn 30).

This is the third Christmas we've celebrated with Alicia and it gets better every year. Due to our rather itinerant lives, we've actually spent Christmas in three different locations over the past three years. The first was in New York, Alicia was just over a month old and it was the start of the bitter NY winter.

That was probably the worst Christmas we had. Saddled with the fear of Alicia catching a bad cold in sub-zero temperatures, we stayed home all day. To make matters worse, that was the start of Alicia's colicky phase as well which meant long (or what felt like a long time) periods of incessant crying.

Here's when she just woke up, still looking sleepy and grumpy. (She's still grumpy when she wakes up even now).

Last year, we braved the 8 hour flight (which is like eternity when you a have a restless toddler in tow) to Brisbane to join my in-laws for a nice big McGregor family Christmas. It was the first time Alicia got to meet all of her uncles and aunties and it was great to have so many babysitters around for when I wanted to go shopping :).

This year, we decided to stay and spend Christmas in Singapore. Ray's dad couldn't get too much time off so we didn't do our traditional Aussie family Christmas. Instead, Ray's two youngest brothers (he's got three plus one sister) are here for a two week visit.

At two, Alicia now understands the concept of the Christmas tree and of course, the presents that go under it! It was great fun opening presents with her on Christmas Day until she found one that she liked, got distracted and lost interest in opening the rest. I even managed to get her to pose for some shots.

So here's wishing everyone a very happy new year and more blogging in 2007!

First Pet

2006-12-19T21:39:00.000+08:00

My childhood never consisted of a 'real' pet. The closest I got to that was a weekend with the class-owned hamsters (remember Mark Anthony, Julius Caesar and Cleopatra?), a couple of months with a chick that eventually got big enough for my parents to see it as chicken soup potential and minding my aunt's poodle for a few days while she went on hols.

I was hoping to relive that part of my childhood through Alicia, get a pet, pretend it's for her when it's really to erase that bit of juvenile deprivation. Unfortunately, Alicia's innate timidness towards animals didn't make for good reasoning to get a pet that required more work for the maid and detraction from her main task of looking after Alicia.

After holding out for a few months (we even made a trip down to the SPCA to see if we could be tempted!), we settled on something that could amuse her yet was low maintenance. And voila! Alicia got this bird as a Christmas present from her Ah Kong! As with all new things that she deems exciting, she greeted it with shrieks and squeals.

My dad proudly declared that he chose this bird because the shopkeeper said this one was a "singer" but a whole two days passed and there was not a peep out of it which then promptly my mum to name it "Dumbbell". Sheesh...

Now that Alicia and Dumbbell are firm friends, we'll see if we can make room for more interactive furry buddies :)

Happy Birthday!

2006-11-18T11:46:00.000+08:00

My little girl turns 2 today but ironically, there'll be no big celebrations or cake cutting for her, just hugs, kisses and well-wishes.

If you're thinking about how sad that is, don't. Alicia had not one but TWO birthday celebrations last weekend. One for friends and the other for the extended family. We couldn't do them today as venues were booked out, my cousin's getting married and god forbid we even contemplate the inauspicious thought of after-the-actual-day celebrations.

Most people wouldn't even have a celebration for a 2 year old's birthday - they're too young to understand, they say. But hey, given we only do this once a year and she'll have photos to look at when she gets older, we went for it.

We held the party at Raffles Town Club in one of their function rooms. The best part of this was that they had birthday party packages which includes decoration, party packs and games which really saved me the trouble of trawling through the Concourse party shops like I did last year to assemble the party packs.

Alicia had a blast even before the guests arrived checking out the balloons and playing with the decorative plastic hats that adorned the room.

As a sign that our parents network is growing, last year we had like 4 kids at Alicia's party, this year we had like 15! The thing with kids' parties is that you have to have something that entertains them, this in turn keeps the parents happy as well as they get to indulge in adult conversation with the other guests. So Ray decided to get a clown.

Not having much experience in clown selection, I simply searched for someone on the web and went on blind faith. The programme included a ventriloquist act, magic show and ballon sculpting for an hour and at the prices they charged, anyone would have been incentivised to put on a silly outfit and entertain children!

First up was his ventriloquist act with "Dodo" the duck. Not that I've seen many a ventriloquist in my time but it was so not what I expected from a pro. He was so unintelligble during his act that our friend's 4 year old son turned around and exclaimed "WHAT IS WRONG WITH THAT DUCK?" Sheesh....

Fortunately, things got better from there (it couldn't have gotten much worse). His magic show was credible and he even pulled out a live bunny rabbit which of course, thrilled the kids to no end. And he ended it off with balloon sculptures for all the kids which was always a perennial favourite.

As all kids' parties experts would say, keep it short and sweet. The duration of the party usually corresponds with the age of the child. So in this case, it was slated for two hours and it was time to bring out the cake. The problem with cakes is that you always have to match or top what you had last year. And Alicia's cake last year looked like this...

So we went back to the same 3D cake makers, e-creative, and ordered another character that Alicia likes. She even had a say in which character she wanted. Here's what we ended up with.

This time around, I didn't hired a pro photographer to take the pictures which is why the cake might look less delectable. On hindsight, this was a mistake. It was so difficult to entertain the guests, watch the kid, keep the party going and try and take good quality pictures at the same time.

In any case, everyone seemed like they had a good time. The rest of Alicia's second birthday pics can be found here.

How quickly time flies....Alicia's already two and will actually be starting nursery class next year. Here's a look at how she looked like a year ago and now:

Such a girl

2006-11-08T15:22:00.000+08:00

In less than two weeks, Alicia will be two years old.

And because we have friends and family that live overseas, the postman always surprises us with unexpected gifts that trickle in as the big day draws closer.

When I got home from work yesterday, there was a big Postpak lying on the table. Ripping open the wrapping paper with such fervour and mounting anticipation of its contents, it was as if the present was meant for me!

When I saw what was inside, I eagerly rushed over to where Alicia was playing in an attempt to get her to try it on. Surprisingly, she was more than happy to oblige and so I present to you....

Princess Alicia!

She then proceeded to spend the next 10 minutes (which is pretty long in toddler land) admiring herself in the mirror, giggling at how the earrings jingle jangled as her shook her head.

Why do I get the feeling playing dress-up will be coming up in the not too distant future....

Bike Tike

2006-10-23T09:22:00.000+08:00

In my regular pursuit of activities to keep Alicia occupied, we stumbled upon one that kept everyone amused for almost an hour - hubby, kid and even our helper.

For most people living in Singapore, if you grew up as an eastie, you'll tend to want to live around the east when you get your own place. At least that theory holds true for Ray and I. So despite living in the central (we will move east when the lease is up!) at the moment, we still make our regular jaunts out east for walks with Alicia along East Coast Park and to get some good seafood.

Last Saturday, as we arrived at the East Coast hawker centre, Ray lamented that he wasn't hungry yet so we decided to take a walk around. As I surveyed the the streams of dog walkers, wobbly learner roller bladers and cyclists, I noticed a huge grin on the face of a kid on a child seat strapped to the front of a bike.

That's it! With newfound enthusiasm, I suggested we rent bikes and take Alicia for a ride. Given Alicia's hit-or-miss temperament when it comes to new things, we decided to let Ray take her for a quick spin first to test the waters.

(PS: I blame the haze for the fuzzy pic)

It was a hit! Despite the rather apprehensive look on her face in the photo, Alicia loved tearing along with the wind in her hair, waving to her mummy and ya-ya. When our hour was up, she seemed disappointed that it was over.

Now Ray's all gung-ho about getting a child seat attached to his bike at home and is even willing to turn his posh, rather expensive Trek mountain bike into an Ah-gong bike complete with un-glam rack and kick stand.

Oh, the sacrifices parents make.....:)

Getting an early Rafflesian start

2006-10-18T09:34:00.000+08:00

Last Saturday, Ray and I attended a charity gala dinner organised by the Singapore Children's Society where they featured the "Dim Sum Dollies" (yes, Emma was there in her full glory fraternising with the crowd in true "dollie" fashion).

Ray's boss had purchased tickets for two tables and invited us along. So in a bid to check out Singapore's "high society" and to show "face" to Ray's boss, we got all "dolled" (pun totally intended :) up and went along.

I ended up sitting next to his boss' wife who at some point in the conversation commented on how people with kids ALWAYS end up chatting about kids and maids. Sigh....that's so true....

Anyway, I'm digressing...

One of the BIG discussion topics for parents with kids around Alicia's age is which school to put them in. It starts off innocuously with which nursery, then which kindie and progresses up to whether to send them to local or international primary schools! All this planning for someone who can barely string a sentence together!

So as Alicia gets closer to starting Nursery 1 (in 2.5 months), I've been exploring several options to find a school that she likes and that we're comfortable with.

She was in Julia Gabriel for a long time and I must just reiterate how wonderful that school is, especially for the Chinese playgroup. Only problem is, we are now looking for a drop-off program where we can drop her off at 9am and have my parents pick her up at 12pm.

A neighbour recommended MMI ( Modern Montessori) on Claymore Road. It's a huge school, overpopulated and understaffed. We enrolled Alicia for a two week trial and at the end of it, decided against continuing with them. I just felt that they spent so much time trying to organise the kids and getting them to move from the playground to the classrooms and so little time on actually teaching them anything.

The little area they made into a gym was SO crowded it was like an accident waiting to happen. Guess we were too spoilt by Julia Gabriel where everything ran like clockwork.

Next....

I drive past this school all the time but never really gave it much thought till I saw them advertise in "Young Parents" magazine. By this time, I was just trying to find something that had immediate vacancies, was not so overwhelming and had a drop-off programme. The fact that it's called Raffles House Pre-school and the founders are all from Raffles was just a cool coincidence.

So far, Alicia seems to be enjoying herself and I'll probably continue with them after her trial period.

What I thought was a pretty interesting nugget of marketing info was how they justified their choice of name:

"We have chosen to call our school Raffles House Preschool, not only because the founders were all from Raffles Girls' Secondary or Raffles Institution. More importantly, because our vision is to build a premier preschool, in line with the accomplishments and strong heritage that the name has come to be associated with, in the education services"

Auspicium Melioris Aevi!

Dotted Line Originals

2006-10-11T10:17:00.000+08:00

Here's my chance to say that I own pieces of the fabulous Dotted Line's very first collection before my friend Dorothy becomes a super hot celeb fashion designer!!

It's great to see people my age doing so well and being so entrepreneurial. Would be nice to start a business of my own as well. Tell that to my fat and lazy, accustomed-to-sitting-on-office-chair butt.

Sigh...so for now, it just living vicariously through friends like Dot.

Attended her launch party on Sunday at MAAD, which is incidentally the same venue where I had my virginal art jamming experience.

Was great to see everything come to fruition, especially after having followed Dot's trials and tribulations through her blog.

The collection looked great! So much so that I grabbed practically every piece of garment there to try on! These are the ones I just had to have!

Dorothy also designs bag and accessories. She's even promised to include some diaper bags in her next collection. Woo hoo! Can't wait!

Whaddya lookin' at?

2006-10-04T22:51:00.000+08:00

Gold Coast, Australia

2006-10-04T14:31:00.000+08:00

Back to reality again after two glorious weeks on the Gold Coast where the weather was simply "beautiful one day, perfect the next" (and to make matters worse, we returned to ungodly PSI levels).

Lots of pics to post this time around, starting off with the apartment we stayed at. Located practically on the beach, this 27th floor 3 bdrm place offered breathtaking 180 degree views. As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words...

Unfortunately, Alicia is like deathly afraid of getting sand on her feet and the one time we decided to expose her to the beach to try and rid her of this un-McGregor like phobia, she yelled, screamed, hollered, sobbed and convulsed so badly that any sane, loving parent would think twice before subjecting her to that kind of trauma in the near future.

That put a very quick end to any planned beach activities.

Other things though, she was more game to try. We took her to Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary to experience koalas and kangeroos and other indigenous Aussie animals like the echidna. Initally apprehensive, she got coaxed into stroking the koala but was still very wary of the 'roos and was satisfied to just let mum and dad feed them.

We even managed to develop an afternoon routine while we were there. After Alicia's daily nap, we would take a stroll downstairs around the back of the apartment building where there was a large pond with ducks and geese and other assortments of birds (including peacocks!) that roamed freely, waiting patiently for kind visitors to hurl them a bread crumb or two.

Right next to the pond was a playground that really tickled Alicia's fancy when she first noticed it, then she realized that it was based in sand which kind of annoyed her as it meant she couldn't run around in it as she please....not unless she wanted to risk getting sand on her precious soles .....god forbid.

But she had heaps of fun riding in the swing and even learnt to make "wheeee" sound effects to accompany the upswing.

We also took her to Sea World thinking she might be excited about seeing some sea animals but throughout it all, she remained rather nonchalant, nowhere close to the shrieks and squeals that evoked tears of joy when she saw Barney "live". The only thing that seemed to vaguely enthrall her was the dolphin show where she sat still, mesmerized for 20 minutes solid (which for a hyper-active 2 year old is a feat in itself).

The funny thing was, Alicia got the most amusement and entertainment not from the zoos or seaworld but the "cheapest" place for us - Toys 'R' Us. It was cheap in the sense that it did not cost us the bloody AU$63 per adult like it did for Sea World but given the amount of time she spent amusing herself there, it was inevitable that we ended up spending on toys that amused US as well. (Remember the slinky - we had to get that and relive our childhood memories).
Alicia checking out the playhouses at Toys 'R Us

The other big part of this holiday was just catching up with the in-laws again. Here's Alicia spending time with her grandparents and uncles (to whom she got really close as they chased her around the apartment playing "peek a boo").

Sigh....still nursing the holiday bug. Am already checking my calendar to figure out when we can take our next vacation.

We're off to Oz!

2006-09-15T17:07:00.000+08:00

Finally, a long awaited holiday! Haven't had a proper one since last Christmas. We're off to the Gold Coast tonight for some R&R and to catch up with my in-laws.

2 weeks of glorious Gold Coast weather! Will blog more when I get back!

Doing stuff

2006-09-14T09:11:00.000+08:00

I have a cousin whose daughter is exactly the same age as Alicia, not taking into account the US/SG time zone differences in which they were born.

Given that it's their second child, I figured they were more experienced and I'm constantly asking them for tips when we meet up.

They have a Saturday routine where they'll take their kids out to either the zoo, bird park, botanic gardens etc. Ray and I are so lazy that we use Saturday to simply bludge around the house and poor Alicia has to just amuse herself indoors.

So anyway, I got inspired by them and last Saturday, we took Alicia to a goat farm! It's one of these things I never knew you could actually bring kids to, but I figured I'll let my very "city" kid experience a touch of farm living.

The trip itself was enough to make me rethink this new found enthusiasm, it was out in like never, never land. We got to drive along Jln Bahar, a REALLY wide stretch of road that I later learnt is actually meant to be used as an emergency airstrip.

When we finally got there, it wasn't quite what I expected. Being a lot smaller in size than I had anticipated, it actually made getting around and to the goats a lot easier. We could buy a packet of feed for $2 and feed those seemingly ravenous goats that kept nipping on Ray's leg hairs, my skirt and basically anyway that look remotely edible.

My cousin's kid apparently LOVES this part of the visit but Alicia is a real wuss when it comes to certain things and I found out that feeding strange new animals was not something this city kid is comfortable with. (Hence, the whole look of apprehension)

So after much coaxing, she decided to patronise her poor parents who drove all the way out to Lim Chu Kang and made a brave attempt at holding out a stick of grass.

Oh well, don't think we'll be heading back here anytime soon.

"Alicia the Lifeguard"

2006-08-25T21:56:00.000+08:00

One balmy and breezy lazy Sunday afternoon, as I lounged around in my favourite deck chair...

My super acute toddler vision spied someone needing help in the pool!

My first instincts were to grab my trusty goggles and prepare to dive into the pool and haul him back to safety!

But wait! Mummy said I should think outside the box. Maybe it would be faster if I just toss him this super floaty kick board instead....

Yay! It worked! He caught it and is using it to come back to the shallow end.

Thus brings us to another happy ending in the saga of "Alicia the Lifeguard" as I help Daddy out! Bye!

Why does it always have to be about men?

2006-08-24T13:58:00.000+08:00

When I first read this entry from my secondary school friend, Shimian, my first thoughts were gosh, how brazen can these maids be!

Little did I know I was about to get practically as incensed as my friend got with her domestic helper.

I didn't grow up in a home with a maid around but one of the key reasons for coming back to Singapore after having Alicia was to make sure that we get some help.

She was my first maid and I was her first employer. I didn't know what to expect and I guess, neither did she.

She was young. 23. Single mother of a three year old daughter.

She came from a very ulu part of the Philippines and this was her first big city experience.

It was kind of a desperate hire. I needed help bad and she was there and seemed to be able to play with Alicia (then only 5 months old). There was a lot of work to be done training her. She was definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Hygiene was a major gripe for me in those early days where she would not wash her hands after using the toilet if she just peed. She reserved those special cleansing moments for the major 'dump' sessions. That was really a pet peeve especially with a young infant prone to catching all sorts of germs.

It would take too long for me to vent about everything that I didn't approve about her. So I'll cut to the chase about what finally made me let her go....

She'd been gradually getter bolder in the vanity sense. Constantly polishing her nails, putting on make up even when we go grocery shopping or for her medial checkups and her dressing got skankier with every day off.

One Sunday, after she had come back from her day off, she brought a cell phone back with her (which incidentally she never told me about; I just saw her using it). When asked about it, she said her friend had lent it to her. Trying my best to provide her basic human rights, I said "Fine but please don't use it during working hours".

The very next day, she hid in her room and was frantically smsing when I caught her and told her off. After which, she stopped using it in my presence and instead took long and frequent bathroom breaks which I assume was when she carried on her telecommunication activities.

Shortly after, I found out that not only is she in contact with multiple men. She claimed one of them as her boyfriend and that she is so "in love" with him (despite only seeing him once a month on her off days).

She even had tons of pornographic messages sent to her!

On the day we broke the news to her that she was leaving (she had an hour to pack up and go), I asked her if she had a boyfriend and she vehemently denied it.

Amidst her angry tears, she told me she didn't want to go home and I told her that the agency would find another employer for her if indeed she didn't have men "baggage".

Just got a call from the agency today and they said she has decided to go home. When I went to the office to pay the return airfare, I spoke to the girl working there and more shocking truths emerged.

The day I left her, she told the agency that she had no idea why we were letting her go. She was asked to relinquish her cellphone after which I was told (by the agency girl) that the phone rings constantly with a consistent flood of SMSes coming in from numerous men.

When questioned about who these men were, she told the agency that she had NO IDEA and that the phone did not belong to her!

They also found the porno messages and confronted her about it at which point, she simply remained silent.

From what the agency told me, my assumption is that she realized that this agency is not going to put their reputation on the line and recommend her to any employer so she decided to go home first and maybe try again with another agency. For her, it would preferably be an agency specializing in expats.

In any case, I'm happy I'm finally done with her before any real damage was done. But why does it always have to be because of men?

I guess because people have urges and needs and some curb it better than others.

Art Jamming

2006-08-14T18:34:00.000+08:00

This post is about me for a change.

Two weeks ago, our department had an offsite. While most people get to have offsites at exotic locations, since our department is mostly based in Singapore, we have to have ours here every year. Sigh...

So every year, the boss comes up with some novelty idea to 'spice' things up and encourage team bonding.

This year, it was to be ART JAMMING! Sounded pretty cool and funky when I first heard about it but on second thought, it was like, damn, does this mean I have to draw something?

As my primary school art teacher Mr Goh would testify, especially after giving me a "D" for my hideous still life portrait of a banana, Art is so NOT my forte. I'm one of those people that loses constantly at Pictionary, you wouldn't want to be on my team.

On their website, it says:

To art jam, you need:

A desire to experiment (yes but hardly ever with paints)
An urge to create (yes but never on canvas)
An ability to laugh (definitely but usually at how bad my art turns out to be)

Everyone is born to jam. Remember how you mashed porridge on the table?

I questioned the verity of this statement as I trudged along to the venue (couldn't back out, I tried - believe me).

Plus, the theme was to draw the most significant event in your life and explain it (to all the people you work with).

I took the easy way out and came up with this:
In case you were wondering, the one on the right is mine (yes, the one that looks like the Nickelodean symbol).

Here's what it's supposed to signify: the most significant moment in my life (to date) was giving birth to Alicia (hey, I thought this entry was about me!) but since it was a drug free (not by choice) birth, all I could remember is trying to shut out the pain by keeping my eyes shut all the time. (Hence, the black background)

The splotch of red is meant to be symbolic of the amount of haemoglobin that exited my body during the whole process. (eww....)

There you go.... my piece de resistance.

Glamour Shots

2006-07-26T17:25:00.000+08:00

Every baby these days has it. And they don't come cheap.

It's so true what they say about your own kid. No matter how they look to the outside world, you will always think they're the cutest little thing alive.

When Alicia was around 7.5 months, Young Parents magazine had a special promo with Out of the Box photography studio where every new subscription entitled you to a free A4 size "glamour shot" of your kid.

Why wouldn't you take advantage of that especially when you were already planning to subscribe? And so I did.

The catch - there actually wasn't one but they would take like 20 over shots with different looks which meant that if the photos turned out well, it was really hard to just pick one favourite photo for the "freebie".

Sigh....so I ended up with 7 extra shots and $280 poorer (yes, each shot was $40!). But here some of the shots I chose.

The funny thing is, at that time, I thought they were so cute, but now looking back at them, I think to myself, yeesh, Alicia looked so bald back then.

Anyway, these days, this is Alicia's typical expression when she sees a camera. She's trying to help mummy out with her "camera smile".

So I was very lucky when I managed to get this shot in. Here's my attempt at a glamour shot :).

Water baby

2006-06-26T16:26:00.000+08:00

It's my belief that this stems from the McGregor genes. Every since, she was old enough to hold her head up (4 months), Alicia has been exposed to the joys of swimming.

Most swim classes in Singapore cater to babies from 6 months so it was two full months later that I could actually sign her up for official swim "training".

Classes at that age consist mainly of attempting to dispel water phobia (which you would think can't possibly exist given babies lived in a sac of liquid for close to 10 months!) which includes dunking their heads underwater and also teaching them water safety.

From day one, Alicia braved these tasks without so much as a whimper so much so that her swim teacher decided to use her for activity demonstration (instead of her 'floatie').

This all continued nicely until she was just over a year old. It's funny how kids change overnight. She still loved playing in the water but absolutely whinges about having to do any form of structures swim drills....sheesh....so we decided it wasn't worth the $25/lesson to put up with a struggling kid and we were better off letting her play in the baby pool at our place.

Here she is....all smiles as usual when she's by the pool. I put this picture in cos' I thought it was funny how she picked out matching toys (which I've been told look like DILDOs! hmph...) to her wet suit (which I've also been told is absolutely fugly...sad to say, I have to agree).

Catching up

2006-06-13T10:43:00.000+08:00

Lazy days are here again. When I started this blog, my first entry was about how long I would sustain this blog and at the moment, I'm fighting a losing battle. Sigh....

I could attribute this to the fact that work zaps all my energy and blogging inspiration or that Alicia's developmental milestones have plateaued with age and there's nothing too exciting to blog about but nah, it's just plain old laziness.

Anyway, here's an update on Alicia. She's like the little girl with the little curl in the middle of her forehead (literally too!) - when she's good, she's very very good and when she's bad, she's horrid.

Fortunately, she tends to have more good days. She typically wakes up happy, loves to play cheeky little tricks on everyone and has absolutely no stranger anxiety. Which is a good thing we're not living in NY anymore or I would be in constant fear that someone would kidnap her.

But the one thing she refuses to do is talk. I watched her "best friend" at playgroup go from saying "Mummy" to forming two word sentences like "Water, mummy", hoping that she do some of that mimicking kids her age are good for. But nope, nada, not a peep, just random "urrgh, urrgh" whines when she wants something.

Breakthrough though in the last couple of weeks. She now says "Mama" and "Dada" pretty clearly and "up" when she wants to be carried and finally after months and months of coaxing, she made my maid's day by saying "yaya" (tagalog for nanny).

She's also gotten into the habit of saying "bye" followed by a flying kiss which incites squeals of delight from the aunties and uncles we meet when we go out.

All this talking only happens when she's in the mood. Otherwise, she has no qualms about clamming up and acting like a "yaya" diva when you're trying to get her to perform.

I guess we all have our off days.....even toddlers!

Fun and games

2006-04-25T17:39:00.000+08:00

Lo and behold, Alicia has entered the phase of pretend games. When she's feeling generous, she'll share some water from her sippy cup with Elmo and her other stuffed toys. When she thinks they're hungry, she'll stuff her plastic cookie ferociously down their "mouths".

Pretty interesting how she discovered the world of role play.

One thing we've discovered is how vain our little girl can be. Most kids do get tickled by their own reflection in the mirror but Alicia, in addition to that, would don her favourite accessories (cap, hat, drum) and parade back and forth in front of it, swiveling to check out her left and right profile at the same time.

She also has a penchant for Mummy's bracelet and mummy's watch and whatever little 'bling bling' she can get her hands on.

At playschool the other day, she found another use for those link-a-doo rings.

Her teachers say that most kids really hate having those rings round their necks and can't wait to yank them off but Alicia's LOVED running around with it on and shed a few tears when she had to say goodbye.

Here's the little princess posing on her horse. Note the elegantly raised foot positioning. (I got a kick out of that!)

2006-04-01T16:30:00.000+08:00

Not sure why I like this shot but I'm drawn to it. Maybe it's just looks like my little girl's growing up so quickly....

Just catching up...

2006-03-11T22:33:00.000+08:00

It's been a while since my last post (yes, I've been reminded about my tardy blog entries). Guess that's what happens when you get caught up with work. I remember those early months when I spent every single waking moment with Alicia (or at least every single one of HER waking moments).

I could end up with an average of 50 photos of her a week! (and that's not even counting the ones I deleted because the Kodak moment was just not right).

Sigh...now, I'm lucky if I get a couple of shots of her a month. Motivated by guilt, I recharged my handy Canon Ixus and started shooting...

The many faces of Alicia

Alicia on her playdate with Emily who's exactly 2 weeks older. She's suprisingly social and has hardly any stranger anxiety and even lets the other kids play with her toys (not her favourite ones that is).

The Kiasu Mother

2006-02-14T09:23:00.000+08:00

Being a mum is already a gargantuan task in itself (as I'm finding out everyday) but being a mum in Singapore has its additional pitfalls. Mothers here have somewhat of a herd mentality or should I say a competitive streak.

Once you set foot into the realm of playgroups, childcare or even browse the infant literature section at Borders, you will no doubt find yourself bombarded with well-intentioned "advice" from other parents.

Since Alicia is half Australian, I was justifiably concerned that she did not end up being monolingual like most of her Aussie counterparts. After having conducted my due diligence, I found out that not many places in Singapore actually offer Mandarin classes/playgroups to children under 18 months (another sign of my increasing kiasuism), except Julia Gabriel.

I guess they realize that they have a niche market as well as their fees are substantially above average and they require a minimum attendance of at least 3 times a week. So, succumbing to peer pressure and boredom at home (this was before starting work), Alicia now attends Mandarin playgroup 3 times a week and most of the time, looks like she's enjoying herself.

Not surprisingly, I now have other mums at the playgroup suggesting that I register Alicia in so-and-so nursery NOW as it has a long waiting list and will be very hard to get into. Hmm.....I sense that this is going to be a long term trend.....

It's all about the Ang Pow?

2006-01-27T06:40:00.000+08:00

I was just thinking to myself the other day how much Chinese New Year has diminished in celebratory magnitude for me. First, the conjugal commitments meant no more collection of ang pows and then bitching about who gave how much :).

Next, with the demise of my last grandparent three weeks ago, family reunions have shrunk to just the immediate family.

BUT....CNY gets festive again when you have a kid. This CNY is Alicia's second one and to try and increase her level of cuteness (or rather for my own amusement), I've been trying to teach how to say "Gong Xi Gong Xi" with her hands and offer two kams in exchange for her ang pow.

Never one to perform on demand, she'll only do the "Gong Xi Gong Xi" fisted hand rocking when she's in the mood to please. And when I placed the two kams in front of her, she decided to do the taste test first.

Now that she can run around, I couldn't resist putting her in a cheong sum.

Presenting.....Miss Chinatown 2023......

Happy New Year everyone!

The Androgynous Look

2006-01-21T18:23:00.000+08:00

(My primary school friend Shimian commented that she wished I could blog more often so I'm going to try and accede to that request especially since I spend so much time reading her blog and empathizing with it quite substantially.)

In terms of hair thickness, Alicia unfortunately was not one of those babies blessed with a full head of hair. In spite of the Chinese tradition that shaving the head would stimulate an abundance in hair growth, I could not bring myself to do it, largely due to the fear that it might not work and then I'd be stuck with a bald baby instead of one with just the thinning hairline.

So for the first ten months of her life, I kept getting comments like "Aww...what a cute baby (big grin on my face)....how old is HE? (grrr....)" or the perpetual "Is it a girl or boy?" even though I had painstakingly picked out pink clothes or dresses to accentuate Alicia's gender. And on the rare occasion where I decide to retort with "She's a girl, that's why she's in pink", I get the inane comment of "boys can wear pink too..especially Indians". Err...excuse me but in what way does Alicia even look like she has Indian blood in her?

I could have tried little bandannas or hats as other mothers do but my highly opinionated child would have nothing to do with it. She was an au naturel baby and chose to remove any foreign objects placed on her that were detachable (ie. hats, socks, bibs etc). She even tried removing clothes at one point but soon realized she was fighting a losing battle.

Fortunately, her hair finally starting growing out and having inherited her Daddy's hair colour and texture, she also inherited the little curls at the ends which helped perpetuate her femininity. She got vain as she got older as well and loves checking herself out in the mirror and getting her hair brushed.

One day, my cousin brought a bag of 'hand me down' clothes over to my place and lo and behold, there was a little red cap in it. They were all keen to put it on her but I thought, no way, that would last less than a second on her head. Seems like her vanity got the better of her and once she saw her reflection in the mirror, she was thrilled to strut around the house with the cap on.

It was a cute look, I must admit but I figured if I took her out wearing that, it would be "Is it a boy or girl?" all over again. So for now, the cap's only for home wear.

Beginnings and Endings

2006-01-11T12:08:00.000+08:00

Can't believe my first blog entry for 2006 is on the 11th of January. So many things have happened during my extended blog silence and I'll try and squeeze them all into one entry.

We went to Australia to spend Christmas (click for all pics) with the family at a place called Blacks Beach to be exact. It's actually quite a ulu place that's like 12 hours drive from Brisbane or an hour by plane. For our sanity's sake, we chose the plane route. Alicia was quite wary about re-uniting with the extended family again given the long absence and was extremely sticky to mummy for the first two days, after which she had a ball exuding her charming and cheeky self to the rest of the family. She also made great strides (pun intended) in her walking ability.

Despite not having much to do at Black's Beach, this Christmas was infinitely more pleasurable than the last where Alicia was only slightly over a month old and as we later found out, just on the brink of becoming colicky (ie. extremely grumpy for no apparent reason). Here's grumpy Alicia 12 months ago and one of her this Christmas.

After a week with the family, we moved on to Hamilton Island for the rest of our vacation. Hamilton Island is like the idyllic vacation spot. We actually planned to have our wedding there before we decided it was too much of a hassle to do the cross continent thing (kudos to Alicia Altorfer-Ong and Jo-anne for pulling it off! =)

Well, here's the catch - Hamilton Island with a toddler is far from being idyllic. With no "baby sitters" around, that meant we were on our own. The island had a day care centre, but our darling pint size Princess was so used to one on one attention, she would have nothing to do with the 1:4 caregiver:child ratio present and she established that stance by severely exercising her lungs and screaming the house down.

After that, we decided that no one at that centre would want "that kid from hell" back so we were on our own. That meant no jetskiing together or snorkeling amongst the glorious reef and marine life either.

So we spent a rather quiet and uneventful New Year's eve there with the exception of a chicken pox scare from Alicia. She went down for a nap in the afternoon and woke up with large red spots on her cheeks that threatened to erupt through the rest of her body. Being a first time mum that's fiercely protective of my baby's pristine, unblemished porcelain complexion, I was understandably (?) frantic.

Trapped on an island with limited media facilities, we had to page the doctor to come back to the clinic and have a look at her. His prognosis was either a heat rash or chicken pox (man, kinda extreme right?). If vesicles appeared in the next 24 hours, it would be most likely chicken pox and we would be quarantined on the island till her scabs fall off.

After a whole night of waiting, hoping and praying and directing huge blasts of aircon at her, she finally awoke the next morning her usual self again, flawless skin and all! Phew, I still shudder at the thought of having to deal with a sick kid with no help =P.

As if that wasn't enough, 2006 really kicked off with a series of unfortunate events. During our little excursion to the golf driving range on the island, I get an SMS from my mum saying that my paternal grandfather has passed away. Sigh...more bad news.

Not that it was totally unexpected - he was after all a nonagenarian and went peacefully in his sleep. Given the amount of babysitting we were doing, we weren't that distraught to cut the last part of our vacation short and return home for the funeral.

I have a feeling this is going to be a rather 'suay' year for me given that it's only been 2 weeks into the new year and I received another piece of disruptive news on my FIRST day back at work.

My boss is leaving and with his departure, my role becomes questionable. Not that my unemployment would have such a devastating effect in the large scheme of things, one could also argue that I should just get back to the cushy 'tai tai' life and live it up. But I would have liked it to be on my terms instead of being the victim of corporate restructuring. Sigh....oh well, we'll see what happens.

To look on the brighter side of things, I could simply follow the lunar calendar and deem all these events the END of a bad year. So goodbye year of the rooster and hello year of the dog!

The best time of the year?

2005-12-14T10:37:00.000+08:00

Time flies - cliched but how appropriate. Can't believe just one year ago I was still trying to work out the supply/demand mechanics of breast feeding, trying to avoid the projectile excretion of a new infant and freezing my butt off in the unforgiving New York winter.

Now I'm back at work, still testing the limits of human sleep deprivation. Having offspring is hard work but what's worse is having one that is sick. Poor bubby (Aussie speak for baby:) caught a pretty bad case of the flu this week. Her eyes, usually glazed with hints of cheekiness, were now dull and teary.

But being the trooper that she is, she braved on despite the wimpering, showing signs of her usual self with the occasional burst of energetic crawling and little cherubic giggles.

Her ped said that she's got some minor ear infection as well, typical of "ang moh" kids. Between Mongolian spots and ear infections, she's got the bad end of the "mixed kid" stick.

Anyway, it's now day 3 since her viral onset and it looks like we got through the worst of it although our helper has more vomitus sodden washing to deal with.

The Idiot Box

2005-12-02T20:29:00.000+08:00

With every new season of US network TV, there are usually a couple of shows on my "must-see TV" list. For years, that was Friends, but with the telecast of the finale (that had me bawling), it was time to move on (Not to mention that the Jen and Brad split just exacerbated the situation).

Fortunately, the TV gods bestowed not just one but TWO, fantabulous, highly addictive, primetime dramas last season, namely Lost and Desperate Housewives.

So anyway, I'm feeling like Lynette Scavo this week since I'm leaving my little domestic nest and rejoining the corporate world again! It was really hard to leave Alicia on my first day at work and my mum had to fend off my incessant phone calls asking if she's ok, had she eaten, did she have her nap etc etc.....

Finally made it through the first day, despite the continual mental battle that went on all day about whether I had made the right choice going back to work. Once I got home, from the moment her big round eyes spied my presence, I was greeted with huge grins and frantic "pick me up, pick me up" arm flapping motions. Sigh....to be loved so unconditionally...what a rush...

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

2005-11-24T09:23:00.000+08:00

So my mum and I took Alicia to the zoo for the first time yesterday. I figured maybe the live stimulation would spur on some response from her to my incessant stream of questions such as, "Alicia, what does the dog/cat/horse/cow/tiger/lion/monkey/bird say?"

Talk about being a kiasu Singaporean. But hey, when in Rome....

Even though it was a gray, cloudy, threathening to rain anytime kind of day, it was still humid as hell. Note to self: NEVER go to the zoo on a sunny day unless you're trying to work your sweat glands overtime.

At this age, Alicia showed signs of interest but none of the exuberant zealousness exemplified by the older kids. She liked the birds, was scared of the wooden giraffe, loved the dog show and cried when a sheep "baaa-ed" at her. :)

"So Alicia, what does the bird say?"

What A Difference A Year Makes....

2005-11-21T20:49:00.000+08:00

I must say that the last year has been the most eventful 365 days of my entire life. I went from playing office politics in the dog eat dog advertising world in New York, to having a baby, to moving continents, to Having A Baby, to being a stay at home mum, to HAVING A BABY! Ok so I didn't have three babies, it was just such a big deal I had to say it more than once.

Nothing would have prepared me for the roller coaster ride I'd been through (and still am going through). Still, we really lucked out on this one. Alicia is such an awesome, happy baby now, I've almost forgotten the hellish nights we went through during her colicky months. Definitely new found respect for all mothers out there. You go girls! :)

So we just celebrated Alicia's first birthday and I thought I would commemorate this significant milestone with these two pictures of her just to illustrate what a difference a year makes.

And of course, the all important first birthday cake!

Happy Birthday, little one! We survived the first year!

Jumping on the blog wagon

2005-11-21T10:30:00.000+08:00

During my younger days, I was never one to keep a diary. With every New Year, a new resolution would surface that typically resulted in only a week's worth of diary entries. Sigh...as a kid, I definitely preferred to spend time doing things than writing about them.

Fast forward to today.

After a lengthy discussion about blogs over dinner with friends on Saturday night, I finally decided (didn't take much persuading there!) to give it a shot and see how it goes. I figured this time round it will be different because:

It's electronic - easier to type and erase
I actually have an interesting ever changing subject to write about this time - dd Alicia! (dd in 'mum lingo' = dear daughter)
With friends all around the world, it's easier to let everyone know what's going on in my life

So here goes - my first attempt at maintaining a blog! All comments will be much appreciated (go easy on the slagging pls :).