How time flies! Charmaine is 2 already! To celebrate her turning 2 on 12 Dec, we booked a staycation at York Hotel over the weekend, 10 to 12 Dec. The hotel itself was a bit disappointing, and we would not be going back the next time... We had purposely chosen York Hotel, as it's within the Orchard Road area and we could take the opportunity to take photos of the Xmas decorations...

More photos of our staycation and Xmas decorations would be put up later... Below are just some snippets of our stay & Charmaine's simple celebration with my in-laws. =)

 Charmaine posing at the Xmas Tree at Taka.
  Charmaine liked the chocolate cake from TCC!
 A simple birthday celebration at Coca Restaurant, International Building.
 The girls loved taking photos with the Elephant Parade!
 Daddy & the 2 princesses before their swim.

After being away from blogging for so long, I am back... =)

Yeah! We have the bed to ourselves again! Charlotte has been sharing our bed with us since 6+ months old... As for Charmaine, she has been sleeping on the pull-out bed since 1+ month old in the nursery, which will be the girls' room in future...

Wow! How time flies! It has been 5 months since my last entry... and tomorrow is a big day for Charlotte! She turns 2 tomorrow!

Wow! Time flies! It's now the 3rd week of 2010.

Charlotte is now 19+ months old and Charmaine is 1+ month old. Really glad and happy to see Charlotte bond with Charmaine. Some pics of them together below.





Charlotte's vocabulary has expanded from 1-syllable words to 3-syllables words. She has also become more mobile independently, and able to express herself with various emotions and simple sentences, e.g. Mama/Papa zuo4zuo4, Mama/Papa up, Mama/Papa's shoes...

Charmaine has started to latch on properly! During my last week of confinement, glad that my patience with Charmaine at bfeeding paid off! Or else, it will be very troublesome after Meifang, my confinement nanny, goes back. Dearie and I are very happy to have MF as my confinment nanny. She and SH (from my 1st confinement) are worlds apart! Below is a photo of our 2 princesses with MF.



Below is our first family photo, taken on the day when Charmaine turns 4 weeks old. =) Hope the year 2010 will be a great year! Happy New Year to all!

In all my 30 years, I've never had chicken pox. I've also imagined myself 2b one of the lucky few who might escape having chicken pox in her lifetime. Alas, I experienced my 1st spot last Tue! Then more spots appeared over the next few days, on my torso, back, neck, face and scalp! The place where I experienced the greatest discomfort was my scalp, extremely painful when I lay down. I couldn't even brush my hair properly, for fear of rupturing the spots.

On Wed morning, under Dr Lui's advice, Dearie brought me to KKH 24Hr Women's Clinic for treatment. As I was also experiencing backaches, the nurses put me on CDG to monitor baby's heartbeat and my contractions. As I was having regular contractions, they had me admitted so as to monitor my condition, for fear of preterm labour. They placed greater emphasis on my pregnancy and luckily, I was tested negative for preterm labour. In the evening, they gave me anti-viral drugs for chicken pox while administering blood test to confirm it's chicken pox. Cos though I had the spots, I didn't have fever and didn't seem as tired.

As my contractions stopped the next morning, I was discharged on Thur afternoon. However, I would need to isolate myself from Charlotte. It's cos though she was vaccinated against it last Mon, her immunity would only kick in 3 weeks to a month after being vaccinated. Luckily, Dearie is already immune, having contracted it when young.

It has been a week plus since the onset of my 1st spots. I have stopped growing new spots and the redness and swelling have gone down a lot *phew* Some of the spots are also drying up and falling off. Hope I can recover fast! I miss seeing and playing with Charlotte so much! Hiding in my room, I can only hear her voice and anklet ringing when she moves around. There are also a couple of times when she knocks on the door, calling out for me. Luckily, she understands Dearie when he tells her that Mummy is sick and doesn't want to spread the virus to her.

Tomorrow, I will be going for my follow-up appointment at KKH as well as to know my blood test results. But we guess it should be chicken pox, given the symptoms. Hope my isolation efforts will pay off and Charlotte will not catch the virus from me and suffer unnecessarily. Also hope that she won't forget me after such a long period of absence!

My EDD is supposed to be 26 Dec 09. But having discussed with Dr Lui on the delivery options and the possible risks of having natural delivery (I had c-section for Charlotte), we decided to have c-section for Charmaine.

Dr Lui told us the surgery could be performed at 38 weeks on 12 Dec 09 (Sat), between 3.00 and 3.30pm. So exciting! This means the wait will be shortened to 6+ weeks from today!

Can feel Charmaine's movements becoming more active and visible lately. Dearie likes to place on his hand on my tummy and feel her movements while Charlotte likes to stroke my tummy and call "Mei Mei".

Will be shopping for toys for both Charlotte and Charmaine soon. The toys will be their gifts for each other when Charmaine is born.

If everything goes according to plan, we will have a new family member to our family on 12 Dec 09! =)

30th Sep 09 - The day I felt my world shake.

At around 6.20pm, I was at home and suddenly felt giddy. Been having giddy spells lately, and at first thought it was just my giddy spells acting up again. Then saw the hanging lights above my dining table shaking violently and the whole house spinning... The feeling was scary!

I quickly sat down on the sofa but the spinning continued for around 5 minutes.... Scary, especially so because I was alone at home...

The tremours were caused by the quake at Sumatra... come to think of it, there have been alot of natural disasters in other countries lately... sighz... what is the world coming to?

We decided to bring Charlotte to Singapore Botanic Gardens on 21.9.09. In the morning, we brought her for a swim at Caribbean. Below is a video clip of Dearie n Charlotte on the slide at the pool. She had so much fun, though Dearie was a bit fazed from the fast slide down! =)



In the late afternoon when it was not so hot, we proceeded to Singapore Botanic Gardens. Thought it was a good idea to bring Charlotte out for some fresh air and admiration of the scenery and greenery, something different from the usual hustle of city-life. =)

Check out the photos below for a happy time spent =)

We have more or less decided on the chinese and english names for our 2nd princess... =) 100 more daes to my EDD on 26 Dec. So exciting!

She is much more active than Charlotte... when I am trying to rest or watching TV, her movements will be more pronounced... Dearie reckons she may be sleeping when I move around, enjoying the rocking movements, but when I keep still, she will awaken... but luckily, like Charlotte, her movements are not too painful nor 'jabbing'... *phew*

We have also stocked up on pjs for her, as most of Charlotte's pjs are too used or loose... starting to have nesting instincts now, though there're not as many things to prepare as our 1st pregnancy. =)

Charlotte likes to make various animal sounds and here's a video of her one-man show when she was 14+ months old. =)

One dae b4 Charlotte turned 15 months old, she was down wif gastric flu... Poor ger.. Early in the morning on 31 Aug, she started vomitting water while she was still half asleep... Then she became very irritable, probably from stomach discomfort... Later in the morning, she oso vomitted the milk we gave her... We decided to bring her to see the pd, Dr Simon Ng @ MAH.

@ the pd's, she was still in good spirits, playing wif her favourite toy, walking around the clinic... Dr Ng gave her medicine n instructed us not to gif her dairy products for the time being till her stomach settled down... he told us to gif her porridge water, barley water, soy milk instead... if she was still unable to retain any food, we were to bring her to MAH to be put on the drip, for fear of dehydration...


We brought her to my in-laws' n Dearie took urgent childcare leave... @ my in-laws', Charlotte was still unable to retain the food, she vomitted wateva we gave her n became restless n tired... felt so sorry for her cos she kept requesting for food but jus couldn't keep the food down... we had no choice but to admit her to MAH in the afternoon... She was put on the drip, n her arm was wrapped up wif a soft 'plank' wif lotsa tape, guess to prevent her from pulling the whole thing out... pained our hearts whn we were locked out of the Treatment Room where Dr Ng and the nurses put the drip on her...





Once she was put on the drip, her vomitting stopped n she stopped asking for food... Her appetite gradually improved, able to retain porridge, bread n water... But she was veri bored, being confined within the room n her bed... Luckily, Dr Ng discharged her the following dae on her 15th month. =)

The truth was revealed yesterday at NUH. During my FA scan, we received confirmation that we're gonna have another princess! =)

At first, I was worried that Dearie might be disappointed... but to my relief, he wasn't... he said he was more inclined to having a daughter, cuter and sweeter... but he was just worried he would be bullied by the women in the family... haha!

My in-laws and parents were oso excited at the news... my in-laws have always preferred girls to boys... hee!

Well, we are all very excited... even Charlotte is excited... my MIL said that Charlotte has been saying 'mei mei' (little sister)... does Charlotte already know the sex of her little sibling way before we know from the scan? hmm... Charlotte will oso hug, stroke and kiss my tummy... and she knows her mei mei is inside... Dearie has oso commented that Charlotte may be confused when mei mei is born, and no longer in my tummy when I deliver... hmm...

As usual, Dearie sent Baobei off to to my in-laws' before heading to Gombak Camp @ around 7am this morning. After seeing them off at the gate, me went back to my sleep...

Around 9.30am, me seemed to sense somebody come home, hovering over me on the bed... opened my eyes a little to check if it's Dearie... but saw nobody, so went back to sleep again... suddenly felt someone brush against me while he got onto the bed... quickly opened my eyes n guess who me saw?? It's Dearie! His assignment at Gombak Camp had ended earli n he had decided to take AM off n come home! Yeah!!!! To add on to this pleasant surprise, he had bought us breakfast from Burger King!!! We had told each other the night before that we had cravings for Burger King, hee!

So we had breakfast together while watching the movie "He's Just Not That Into You". Not bad, a nice comedy to start off the dae... Thanks, Dearie, for the pleasant surprise! =))

Baobei's gonna have a younger sibling =) It's also the main reason I have left my job in Jun and be a SAHM. However, Baobei still goes to my in-laws' in on weekday afternoons and come back in the evenings... It's because it's not wise for me to carry Baobei for too long... moreover, she is more mobile now, in her learning stages of walking... she loves to hold our fingers and explore places... so need alot of stamina to take care of her... Below is a pic of her exploring a playground at Bukit Panjang, wif Dearie holding her hands.



I am now in my 16th week of pregnancy, and beginning to feel baby's movements inside me... So amazing! =)

On Baobei's 1st bdae itself (1 Jun 09), together with my in-laws, we brought her to Sentosa.

We had lunch at Sentosa before bringing her to The Underwater World. For her 1st bdae, my MIL prepared abalone porridge for her and let her taste some of the abalone. Whenever we give her new food, she would put on this cute expression where she would close her eyes shut and give us a smile... =) But think we gave her too much 'good' food at 1 shot, wat wif abalone, mushrooms n tofu, her tummy couldnt take it... She became very irritable after lunch n cried non-stop n stuck more to me... It took us a while to pacify her... At The Underwater World, her tummy discomfort must be acting up again cos she became irritable again... Dearie was trying to pacify her and me took over... The moment she passed into my arms, she puked! All over me... onto my hair, my dress, everywhere.... =(( Dearie said she must felt comfortable wif me so chose me as the puking target... Oh well... wat to do... at least after puking, she felt more comfortable n became her normal self again... *Lesson learnt: Dun gif her too much food at one go*

Charlotte in her red Guess dress during lunch... think she looks nice in bright colors.
Like this pic, she's looking and smiling at the camera
After the puking session at The Underwater World
Wif in-laws


Looking interestedly on at the fishes swimming past

2 daes later, on my actual bdae, we brought Baobei to take The Singapore Flyer. We enjoyed having the whole cabin to ourselves and seeing the view... Think Baobei enjoyed herself too!

The night before, Dearie oso got me a surprise bdae cake - Tiramisu cake from BreadTalk. =) Was sleeping wif Baobei whn he suddenly woke me up... got a shock on opening my eyes cos the candle light was a bit bright in the dark room... haha! =) He oso bought me a bouquet of red roses which me found in the backseat of the car the next dae. =) Thanks Dearie, for the 2 surprises!


Taken by the staff before boarding the cabin.. a bit blur =(
Inside the cabin
Baobei looks very happy!
Think she's trying to say she wanna see the view too!