What did you just say, Mommy? It’s New Year again?

Oh, this time we’re celebrating Lunar New Year! Bye bye Rabbit, hello Dragon!

Mommy says we must put on new outfits when we go visiting during New Year. How do I look in my new pink dress and bunny hat?

Happy Lunar New Year and Gong Xi Fa Cai! May you enjoy success and good health in the year of the Water Dragon!

祝大家：新年快乐，恭喜发财， 身体健康，万事如意！

The images in this post were shot with Sony NEX-C3 with SEL1855 lens (on loan from Sony Singapore).

Yo, what's up?

Dear Aunties & Uncles, jie jie & kor kor – Happy New Year!

Mommy says I’m 5 months old today! She said I should update you on what I’ve been up to. Now, I’ve discovered how to flip onto my tummy, but I still don’t know how to flip back.

Mommy also says – with a tone of disgust – that I put everything I can grab into my mouth. What’s wrong with that??

In another month’s time, I can start to eat solids. Yay! When Mommy and Daddy eat, I can only look on and drool. Their food smells so yummy! Can’t wait for my teeth to pop out so I can start eating proper FOOD!

That’s all for now. See ya around!

Food first, baby later!

And so I’m back at Singapore General Hospital for a 3-day 2-night stay. The last stay was a pregnancy-related health scare; but this time, I’m here for a happy reason.

Class B1 ward patients have the flexibility of choosing from Western, Chinese, and Muslim/Indian menus (subject to dietary restrictions). Maternity ward patients can also have the confinement menu. But I tried their confinement lunch and dinner on Day 1 — not nice! So Day 2 onwards, I ordered from the Chinese and Western menus.

Day 2 breakfast was American-style pancakes from Western menu. Tastes exactly like McD’s hotcakes! Sorry no pics, cos no camera.

Lunch (Chinese soft diet) - Teochew fish porridge

Surprisingly, this fish porridge was very more-ish! Cooked in light but flavorful stock, the rice grains were soft but still whole. There were generous amounts of fish fillet, silken tofu cubes, fresh choy sum 菜心, dried seaweed, and tomato wedges. Pepper and sliced red chilli in soy were provided to spice things up. Dessert was fresh honeydew slices.

Tea break - Pumpkin flan & warm Milo

Not-too-sweet pumpkin puree in shortcrust pastry flan. A much welcomed afternoon snack!

Dinner (Full Western diet) - Garlic herbs roast chicken

First course – cream of sweetcorn soup. Not artificially thickened with starch. Instead, it was robust with natural sweetness of corn. Nice!

The garlic and herbs from the roast chicken smelled tantalizing! Pity the meat was slightly dry, but the delicious gravy provided moisture. The roast potatoes were slightly underdone, but otherwise tasty. Side veggies was a generous heap of stir-fried cabbage.

Dessert was plain yogurt with fresh banana dices. Yum!

Breakfast (Chinese soft diet) - Fried carrot cake

Day 3 Chinese breakfast was a tough choice between vegetarian fried beehoon (full diet) and fried carrot cake (soft diet). Finally picked the latter because I was curious as to what hospital chai tow kway would taste like!

Well, it certainly tastes more appetizing than it looks. The rice cakes were somewhat clumpy, probably because little oil was used in the frying process. But despite being less oily and salty than its hawker counterpart, it smelled and tasted scrumptious! Wouldn’t mind having it again!

Lunch (Western full diet) - Fish & chips

Cos Mom-in-law had prepared confinement food for me, hubby had this meal instead.

First course – some kind of tomato-veggie soup. That’s all that hubby remembered.

I sampled the fish & chips. As the food was transported in a plastic food cover, the trapped steam had caused the fried stuff to lose some of its crispness.

But the fish and chips still tasted very good. The batter was light and not too thick, and the fish was thick and moist. The chips were no longer crispy, but they weren’t soggy or oily. Portions were very generous. Even hubby couldn’t finish the meal.

Once again, very impressed with the meals I had. They used less oil and seasoning, but didn’t compromise on flavor and presentation.

In fact, the food in the ward tastes way better than the food sold in SGH foodcourt. Hubby was very amused that part of the reason I was looking forward to my hospital stay was the food!

Our little bundle of joy @ 3 days (9 Aug 2011)

Say “hi” to our baby gal (let’s call her Baby M for now). She arrived on Saturday, 6 August 2011. Hmm, we were tempted to hold out for 3 more days so she could be a National Day baby, heh! But she was already one week overdue, so the doc had to induce labor for medical safety.

The journey to parenthood has been a long and at times, painful one for us. But we’re glad we didn’t give up. Of course, we couldn’t have done it without the support of our family and friends. We’re truly blessed to be surrounded by so much love!

Baby's birth date: 6 Aug, 7th day of 7th lunar month

Oh, and my mom alerted me to this piece of news: Baby M’s birth date came out as 2nd prize in 4D draw! Too bad we don’t buy 4D. Huat ah!

Dinner: Chicken roll set (image taken with Sony Alpha 350)

Throughout my short 2-day 1-night stay at Singapore General Hospital (SGH) B2 ward, I was given the Chinese (Full Diet) menu. The above was my very first hospital meal.

The chicken roll is like a giant ngoh hiang. I think it was made with minced chicken, plenty of finely chopped carrots, and perhaps some other chopped veggies. The interior was moderately tasty, crunchy and moist. Lightly stir-fried Chinese cabbage, a small mound of rice, and fresh watermelon made up the rest of the meal.

No pic of breakfast, cos hubby had taken the DSLR home the night before. But he brought our old Canon point-n-shoot when he came to visit at lunchtime the next day. The following images are taken with Canon Powershot A590.

Lunch: Teochew steamed fish set

I thought the steamed fish would be bland, but it was surprisingly flavorful. Perhaps it was because of the salted vegetable 咸菜 and tomato that lent some tang to the sauce.

By now, it seems like lunch/dinner for the Chinese menu comprises of rice with meat/fish, veggie, and fresh fruit.

Dinner: Prawn paste chicken set

Wow, har cheong gai 虾酱鸡! This was a nice surprise. I didn’t expect hospitals to serve fried chicken!

The prawn paste chicken — they used drummettes — wasn’t as salty or oily as those served by zi-char stalls. But it was still reasonably tasty, and the meat wasn’t dry. Think of it as the healthier version of har cheong gai!

On the whole, hospital food wasn’t that bad as I’d expected. Obviously, it’s lighter — not as oily or flavorful — compared to hawker or restaurant food, but it’s definitely not bland. The veggies — retaining a bit of crunch — were nicely cooked too. Only thing is, it can get a bit repetitive if one has to stay for a longer period.

This was the first hospital stay in my lifetime. Definitely not looking forward to another one! Shan’t bore you with details of why I was warded. Briefly, there was a minor health scare, and I had to be admitted for observation. After 2 days of medication and injections, I was discharged and now under doc’s orders to rest at home.

This means no eating-out escapades for the next week or so. But I still have some backlog posts, so do check back for updates!

Meow...

Greetings and salutations. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Cookie, of the species felis catus a.k.a. house/domestic cat. As you can see, I’m a beautiful striped tabby with the distinctive “M” mark on my forehead.

Adopted circa three years ago by designer Casey Chen, I’m currently under the temporary care of Julia Khoo, as said adoptive sugardaddy has scooted off to NYC for some fancy-schmancy furniture exhibition.

I am part of the reason why female slave Julia Khoo has no time to update this blog, or so she claims. Eight days ago, I was brought, kicking and yowling, to the slave’s teeny abode. Naturally, when I arrived, I was in the foulest of moods. When Daddy left, that foolhardy woman gave me a bath! The nerve!

Despite my kicking and yowling, she took her own sweet time with the water torture. So I bit her! Silly woman screamed, but apparently that didn’t teach her anything. She proceeded to pin me down and dry me with a noisy hairdryer.

So I bit her again! So hard that this time, blood was shed. Tears were shed as well (hers, of course). Bah! I retreated to sanctuary of the sofa underside, safe from the bleeding fingers of the silly slave.

To show my displeasure, I went on hunger strike for 24 hours. Silly slave was sick with worry. Kept begging me to come out for food and water. Even tried to entice me with some kitty canned salmon with shrimp. Hmmph! As if I’d fall for that!

Well, I did start to feel a wee bit sorry for the slave, so out of the sanctuary I emerged. The legs could do with some stretching. Belly was starting to rumble too. Plus I really needed to pee.

It’s Day 8 now. I’m getting used to the slave. She gives good massages. Changes my litter box and tops up my food and water bowl twice a day. Brushes my coat daily, too. Not bad.

As for the hubby, I like him. Actually, I prefer the hubby. He doesn’t do stupid things like dangle a string in front of my face.

In the meantime, I’m counting down to the day Sugardaddy will return, which is a week from today. Hopefully, he doesn’t get the oink flu. Or else I’ll be stuck with the silly slave for another week. Or two. NoOooOooooo!

How do you like my cover shot above? I’m such a natural in front of the camera, no? For more pussy porn glamor shots, view the slave’s Flickr set.

Update [May 20, 2009]: The old posts are temporarily down. As all the images were previously uploaded on TypePad’s server, I now have the mammoth task of manually re-uploading all the images onto my new WordPress site. Yes, all images for all 300 posts. Each post has an average of 5 photos. Please do the math. Your patience and understanding is much appreciated. Thank you.

A lovely mango cake that was the perfect balance of sweet and tart.

Thanks, Gary, for the scrumptious birthday cake! Thanks, Desmond, for the gorgeous Semillon! Most of all, thanks for helping me pull off the surprise.

Wishing all a wonderful year ahead!

cheers!

My husband’s grandmother passed away yesterday morning. As a mark of respect, I’ll not be putting up any new posts this week. Please check back next Monday for new updates.