But I think about how long this blog has been around and funnily enough, we do develop some attachments to something that is virtual…. I still like writing and blogging and I know I would want to have this form of outlet available to me when I need to, even if there isn’t anyone else coming here anymore (incidentally, IS THERE anyone out there reading this? HAHAHA).

2011 has been a very busy year for me and my family. We had a new addition mid November. Here’s a few pics of him:

Carrot (as Chubbs had nicknamed him when he was still in my tummy), is a very good baby. He sleeps through most of the nights and is generally cheerful. He is also outgrowing his clothes fast. He is about 2 months old now and almost outgrowing clothes for 3-6 month old babies!We are very blessed to have him.

On the uni front – I did very well in the last semester. (1 High Distinction, 2 Distinctions and 1 Credit [which was 2 marks short of a Distinction!])

As I have taken summer semester off to have Carrot, I would be replacing the units in an extra year. I am returning to Uni at the end of Feb… (hope I would be able to update the blog still!!!!!!)

On the arty crafty front – I’m still knitting and sewing. I do have some bags in the store and hope to sew more bags to add to the store as well as handdyed yarn.

Photography wise, I would like to join fatmumslim’s Photo-a-day challenge. I *may not* do a photo everyday.. (don’t want to promise anything! Look what happened to my project 365! LOL) but I try my best!

We had a barbie by the beach yesterday. Lovely summer day! The coastal drive down was beautiful and the food was DELICIOUS! I wished I took a photo of the food before we ate!
We then went for a hike after lunch:

There were uphills and downhills and it was fun for the 2 older kids. Our purpose was to wear them out for easy bed time… hehehehehe.

This picture was one of the first I took yesterday. I forgot to check the camera settings and therefore had overexposed shots. Ack!!!

Sunshine walking down the stairs leading to another beach.

We found beds and beds of MUSSELS!!!!!! Most of them are tiny but some of them are big enough to be eaten. Not that we eat mussels though.

This oyster shell got me into trouble – I didn’t see the tide coming in and my shoes and socks got wet! Chubbs also had a wet shoe as he stepped into a tide pool by accident…. Hahaha.

After the hike, we had delicious watermelon (ahhhh the joys of summer!) and then we went to rest for a while at our friends’ house.

She put them in her wheelbarrow and wheeled them around her huge garden!

Alrighty. I promise to TRY to write often. Do holler in the comments if there’s still anyone lingering around!

Would posting a heap of photos help you forgive me for abandoning this place?

Okay.. just roll along with me here….

First up, recent photos of the kids!

I love his feet and toes.

Through my (fisheye) lens.

Look at the way he is looking at her! LOL.

He was about to push her!!!!

So…. are we interested in what I’ve been up to recently?
Well.. I’m having school holidays at the moment and return to Uni early July (which is soon!!)

I’ve been knitting loads and reading loads, happy to be away from assignments and exams for a bit!
Here some photos of my WIPs (Work In Progresses):

My Olive blouse, knitted with Wollmeise (Blau Tinte 100%) and the collar was knitted with Malabrigo Sock (Caribeno). It’s an endless Stockingnette stitch right now and I only work on it when I need a project that doesn’t need much brain juice.

Well I thought knitting a blouse or cardi in sock weight was bad enough…. Clearly I’m insane to start a Featherweight cardi with malabrigo Lace. I know, right? It’s not in hibernation yet but this is at the bottom of my WIP list. Grrr.

This is my Huntington Castle Pullover. Knitted in Rowan Summer Tweed. I’m left with just a little bit of the hood and seaming the sleeves to go!!!

Uh… another semi-abandoned project… This is crochet and I’m trying to make a hexagon blanket throw for our sofa.

I have another major WIP (possibly the last of its kind too) that I’ve been brewing and that is this:

Which kinda explains why I’ve not been updating much (on top of the school work and housework I have!)

I know my tummy is big for weeks (16 weeks now) but I am assured it’s normal as it is our 3rd baby and my insides expand much faster for subsequent babies.
I’ve JUST finished with feeling nauseous and horrible everyday and am now able to keep my dinner down much better. My spirits have improved although I still feel tired a lot of the time.

We are not finding out the gender of the baby and he/she already has a nickname! It happened when one day we asked the kids,

Me to Sunshine: Do you want a baby brother or a baby sister?
Sunshine: Hmm.. I want a baby sister.
Me to Chubbs: Do you want a baby brother or baby sister?
Chubbs (eyeing the carrot in his food bowl): I want a BABY CARROT!!
Thus, we have our little baby carrot.

Okay dokey. If you are on my list of Facebook friends, you’ll be able to see the other photos I’ve taken……
Once again, sorry for the absence… I will try to make up for lost time.

I was feeling down for a while as I found out that there is a high chance I won’t be getting into Bachelor of Med/Surgery. This is because my UMAT score is on the low side. I had 56 points and the lady at admissions said the lowest they had taken in so far for this coming year is 59 points. However, there is a glimmer of hope as another lady told me that I may have a chance as I am in a ‘special’ category but it would depend on my exam results.

So………. I am counting down 17 more days before results are released and 18 to 20 more days for the uni offers me a place. I have decided to put Bachelor of Nursing as my 2nd choice if I don’t make it into Bachelor of Med/Surgery.

This will be the longest month ever for me. All the waiting! I’m all nervous and jittery and stressed. On top of that, both kids and I are sick. We have the dreaded cold and cough. Chubbs even had fever for a day about a week ago and I spent the whole day cradling him in my arms.

Anyway, I will be spending my time dyeing wool and sewing bags for the shop. Progress is slow but steady. I can’t wait to update!

Few days back I gave Sunshine a treat by letting her dye some yarn with food colouring.

She chose green and blue dyes.

Looking very professional!

Monster green hands!

She’s showing us what a good job she did here!

Here it is, all dry and skeined. I will be teaching her to knit with it soon. Now she enjoys wearing the skein like a scarf and she hangs the skein on my spinning wheel. Hehe. I think she had fun because she’s been badgering me, “Mummy can I dye my wool please?”

Here’s a picture of Chubbs modeling the vest I finished quite some time back but didn’t outline the owl until now:

The yarn was leftovers from Nad’s jumper. Perfect vest for the warmer weather now!

Okay dokey. I will try to update again soon! I’ve just finished sewing a ring sling and will try to get pictures of it tomorrow.

1. I’ve released the pattern for Ulverstone Stole on Ravelry.

This stole is knitted with Malabrigo Sock yarn and takes two skeins. I was left with about 30g from the second skein so was cutting it pretty close!

When I blocked it, it took up the ENTIRE length and width of a single mattress. Didn’t expect it to be that big! I’ve encouraged people to use smaller sized needles as the stole was a little too airy. Some knitters have also expressed interest in using lace weight yarn for the stole. I’m looking forward to seeing the projects of other knitters!

I included diagrams to help with the knitted on edging and what I hope are detailed instructions. This is my first time doing a knit on edging too so if I can do it, so can you!

I’ve offered the pattern for free until January 2011 when I will start charging a small token for it.

I was pleasantly surprised to see 431 downloads on the first day, 123 downloads on the second and 66 on the third upon its release! I had a flood of comments and well wishers congratulating me. Made me soooo happy! Thank you all for your support!!!!!

2. Fun on a pony

We’ve been bringing the kids out quite a bit!

I called up this horse riding school one day and asked if they had a pony for a 3 year old (and hopefully, for a 1.5 year old as well). He said yes, they have a pony but only the 3 year old can ride. We were so excited and thought of Sunshine riding on a miniature pony (think Shetland pony).

When we arrived, the pony is this big:

Apparently, a horse that is less than…ummm.. 16 hands (??I cannot remember how many ‘hands’) in height is considered a pony. This ‘pony’ is one hand short of being a horse.

Look at her glum face…
She wasn’t unhappy. Just a little apprehensive. I had to hold her hand the whole time we walked in the bush. If I let go, Sunshine whined and wanted me to hold her hand again. So being the poor mother I am, I had one arm up, holding on to her while walking beside the horse pony and bumped at the side by the pony’s buldging tummy. -___-

Some parts of the bush had really thick foliage and it was hard work walking beside the pony as the path was so narrow. Once uphill, I tripped on some branches and fell. -___- The things we do for our kids!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

3. Fun at the beach

Since it has warmed up a little, we brought them to the beach.

They enjoyed playing with the sand, flicking it into our hair and eyes. Chubbs even tasted some just to make sure he didn’t miss out on yummy food.

No.. he didn’t like it at all and we had to wash out his mouth. Silly boy.

Their cheeks were really rosy as it was rather warm. Nad held up an umbrella to shield us from the strong rays. I sat knitting while enjoying the sea breeze. Granted, I would have enjoyed it more if I wasn’t wearing jeans!

4. Fun in the backyard.

Here are some pictures of the kids in the backyard. Chubbs is very hardworking. He sweeps the grass instead of the paths.

Am I cute with pouty pouty lips?

I love her smile.

Nad reckons they are twins. What do you think?

Our chookies. Lizzy is on the left and Penny is on the right. I love them so much, esp lil Lizzy. She lays the most awesome eggs. Penny is broody at the moment and not laying. She keeps sitting on Lizzy’s eggs. We have to take it away and lift her to the branch to try to break her broodiness. Hope she snaps out of it soon.

5. Fun at home

Some random shots from home.

They crawled into their highchair and Sunshine read to Chubbs her bible story book. SOOOO SWEET. He was listening to her too! I didn’t know until I heard her reading and turned around to see this. *Heart melts*.

Random shot.

They each have a piggy soft toy. And they love sitting in their toy box, pretending to be in a boat.

He put the headband on his head all by himself. Soooo funny.

Chubbs is the happiest with food in his mouth.

He’s pretty serious about food.

So happy that we can’t see his eyes.

6. Of Lizards

So 2 days ago, I was in the backyard trimming the bushes when I heard benji growling and emitting low barks. I took a look at what he was growling at and saw what I thought was a skink. Except it had a long tail.

It was stuck in the bird netting we drape over our pots of veges. Walked right into the net and got its head and upper body hopelessly stuck.

I came in and told Nad about it while shooing Benji back into the house. I reached for the scissors but Nad said to look up online about it first.

We found out that it was a Eastern Blue Tongued lizard. And that it makes a good pet.
Nad wanted to keep it. -________________-;;;

I said no… we do not need more pets. I can’t say I wasn’t tempted but we simply have no time!!!!!!!

Then we went out together and freed the poor fella.

It’s a fat fat lizard. Look at its waist line!!!!!!!!!

I was surprised when Nad put it in the bush. I asked if he changed his mind about keeping it. He said yes. Because he read it wasn’t advisable to keep with children under age 5 since it may spread reptile samonella. (Hence the gloves we wore while handling it).

I think it looked relieved and happier in the bushes. Don’t you think?

We think it’s a beautiful creature. Sunshine had different opinions though… but then again she has a growing list of animals she is afraid of/ dislikes. Spiders are number one on her list and flies are another. I suppose the lizard made it on the list as well.

7. Exams

Well I’m done with the pictorial part. My exams start next Tuesday and ends 24 Nov. I cannot wait to finish! Part of me wants to drop all studies and run screaming from it. It’s really really tiring. I know how hard it is to get into Medical Science so I have decided to let God decide if I should enter or not.

It’s not surprising for me to be rejected as the entry levels are really high. You really need to be one of the top students to get in and I cannot say I am one. So….. there is a high chance I might not be accepted and if this were so, I will not persue. I will stay home and be a good wife/mum. While knitting. And sewing.

I will still study hard for my exams, of course. Thus far, I am getting majority of  ‘A’s in my school work except for Biology and English. English is a tricky subject to score in. I never liked languages as a school subject! They are so subjective. Heh heh.. see what I did there?

So I guess I will be MIA again until exams are over. Then I can be a normal person again.

8. My granny

My granny who is 95 years old, had a stroke a few days ago and is now in hospital. It pains me to be miles apart from her. She is not doing very well and I hope she feels as comfortable as she can be and not in pain. She has my other family members around her, although she cannot remember a lot of people but I am relieved that she is not alone.

I feel for my sister as she is doing her major exams there now too and still she visits granny every day. She’s a good girl.

My other relatives are flying there to see her this Saturday. I don’t know if she is waiting for them or not but I do hope she goes peacefully. I do miss her at times.

Rightio. I’m going to snuggle in bed now. I’ve a LOT of yarn to dye up after exams! I’ve been reskeining some coned yarn and also dyed up a sample which I am very pleased with. Can’t wait to play with yarn again! I just look at the yarn blanks (undyed yarn) and am filled with inspiration! Soon! Soon!

I’m taking a short break from my PILE of homework to update this space before I forget how to blog. My Maths teacher actually called me a few days back to ask if I could please speed up my pace and hand in the latest assignment.

Exams are in November and I will be done with it all by 24 Nov. (YAY).

On the same note – I have my UMAT results. I’m on the 78% percentile.. which means that 78% of candidates scored the same or lower than I did. I have no idea how many people sat the UMAT but it’s taken by candidates Australia wide as well as some overseas students. In my exam hall alone, I predicted about 200 to 250 candidates. An estimated 1000 to 2000 candidates in total would not be off the mark I reckon.

I have been busy in the store as well.. We had a fresh shipment of yarn arrive and there was a yarnzploshun (yarn-explosion)

See?

It’s fun packing orders though.. I have to wear a yarn-fumes mask to avoid collapsing from the work I had to do.

Well few weeks ago, we had some out of town vistors so thanks to them, we actually had a chance to enjoy a breather from our daily work and visit touristy places! As we are not tourists, we never stepped into the wildlife park here before. We loved it.

We did A LOT of feeding. It seemed like the only thing we did the whole time we were there!

This kangaroo stood up and was almost the same height as I am.

Albino wallabies.

Chubbs had a go at feeding deers.

Sunshine is a natural with animals. No fear of them whatsoever. She fed all the deer and kangaroos without wincing.

We went on the ‘bus’ ride and were given packets of food to feed the animals. This is a HUGE camel. He ate the entire packet of food.

We fed emus and ostriches. I never realised the size difference between these two birds until that day. Ostriches were almost TWICE the size of emus! And they looked scary up close and personal. We had to watch them closely when our children were about!

We got to feed the white lion cubs. They are SOOOOO cute.

She seems not to want us to leave. Haha.

The keeper walks up to these two cubs and they play with him. He mentioned that soon they will have to stop interacting with these cubs as they are growing bigger and stronger. One playful swipe could knock the keeper unconcious and one lick could tear off his skin. It’s a pity, though. They were so close and loving to their keeper.

See? I’m jealous.

Baa baa! Where’s the sale? Run to the sale!!!

In addition to the wildlife park, we also went back to the mountain for more snowy fun!

Here’s a shot of Sunshine… I was trying to be artistic. “Trying” being the key word here.

We brought along our pretty boy. Chiyo is afraid of the cold so we left her at home. I think Benji enjoyed the snow.

I had to bribe Sunshine into taking nice photos with Benji. Chocolate did the trick.

Benji licked her face and she shrieked. Hahahaha!

We also took a week long break away from home, at a church retreat. We didn’t take many photos though.

Lookit his feet off the ground!

Wheeeee!!!!!!! He was sooooo estatic!

This is our homemade dog cart. It worked. We only had to steer it in the correct direction and the dogs did all the pulling!

This is Sunshine acting like a monkey. Please excuse my demented look.

More monkeying around.

Sunshine was carrying her ‘school bag’ and picked a flower. Nad thinks she looks Japanese. Does she?

Well after all these weeks, we finally had to come home to reality. I was immediately bowled over by school work. Had to play catch ups.

While we were busy enjoying ourselves, the kids were busy growing up. Sigh.

This photo was taken today:

My dad bought her this top (it came with a pair of bloomers) 2 years ago. It was too big for her then. When it was just the right size, it was never the right season. The weather finally warmed up a little (maximum of 20 degrees celcius in the day… it’s 10 degrees now as I type… comfortable enough to go without a sweater or heater) and I could put this chinese blouse on her.

She really has grown.

Alright… I have to go do my maths assignment now. My best friend’s cow, Tommy, says ‘Moo’.

Moo!

A couple of a couple of years ago (that is, 4 years ago), I went up a mountain in Victoria and saw COMPACT ICE. Which is very different from snow, thankyouverymuch. The biggest difference is when you have snowball fights? It hurts. Real bad. Take my word for it. Don’t try.

It has been precipitating for the past few nights and I was delighted to see snow on the mountain! So of course, we decided to drive up!

(taken on the way up)

The snow on the rocks remind me of frosting on cakes… don’t they look like it?

I’m amazed at how soft the snow was. It felt so good to lie in it. I even did a few face plunges. (No face plonks were attempted at the 2006 compact ice mountain trip, thankyouverymuch.) The snow was knee deep and we had to try very hard not to stay in one spot for too long. Otherwise we would find ourselves sinking in!

I loved how the icicles had formed on the sparse vegetation.

Err………. the kids did not enjoy it very much. *Sigh*

Chubbs cried as soon as we put him on the snow. He only stopped crying when we gave him some clean snow to chew on.

Sunshine was okay at the beginning. We had snowball fights and she helped build part of our snowman. She was also busy ingesting snow bunnies.

But later, snow seeped into her boots and although she had double layer of socks on, she must have felt cold and wet and she too, started to cry. Don’t worry, we brought 3 changes of clothing. Haha. Talk about being prepared!

You can see how GRUMPY Chubbs looked. I can explain the cowl on his head – I left the car with Sunshine first and Nad came later to join us but he couldn’t find Chubb’s hat. So I put my cowl on his head as a temporary measure while I went back to the car for his hat.

And yes, I notice his boot had fallen off. Don’t worry, we picked it up. (He also lost a glove, careless boy… Nad had to get on his fours on the snow to sniff it out. go back to look for it.)

So… yeah!!! This was Nad when the trip just started. All smiles.

Us and Flog. Flog the snowman. Get it? Ha ha. Flog the snowman? Heheheheheheh *Demented laughter*

Ahem.

The wind was blowing mercilessly into our faces so it was a feat to keep our eyes open.

We then decided to walk to Antartica:

It was a long and treacherous and arduous  trek and winds were a-blowing and babies were a-howling and noses were a-dripping and frost bitten.

It was a bleak, desolate landscape with not a soul in sight.

In this strange land, we heard weird whirring noises and felt electric currents through our body. Wonder what caused it?

We stopped at a stupendous rock to have sourdough rye ration. We named the place sourdough-rye-on-the-rocks.

Then we blacked out for a few hours and when we came to, we had weird unexplained rashes on our arms and body.

This is Nad at the end of the trip – tired and sick of the babies’ crying. I think we woke up on a different planet…..?

Disclaimer: Not all of the anecdotal evidence are submissible facts. Use your own judgement.

One last picture of another mountain seen from the ground:

Bai bai.

Sometimes I have so much to say and it’s all written in my head but when it comes to typing it out, I don’t know where to start!

I’ll just ramble along and insert the appropriate/ matching pictures. They may or may not appear in order of the events that have happened. So much has happened in the past month that I cannot remember what happened when exactly.

It’s been rather cold lately. Snow fell on the mountains which we can see from our front door/window. It only stayed a couple of days before melting. This winter hasn’t been as wet as the last. I’m worried because our backyard badly needs rain. We’ve been carting out bath water and since there’s a fly screen on the bathroom window,  we can’t pass buckets of water through the window to the backyard so we have to cart bucketloads out of the bathroom, through the length of the living room and through the kitchen/backdoor, walk the entire length of the house before we’re able to douse the lawn with water. Very exhausting.

And yes. Grass is dying. Especially the spots where Chiyo pees on. Grrr.

However, Sakuras are blooming all over town. We love the white ones most but the pink ones are more common. We even cut some branches for our kitchentop!

And yes, we don’t have a vase so an ex caffiene bottle would have to do.

The buds opened after a few days and it really brightened up the room. Unfortunately, it also started to shed the petals like ezcema and I had pink petals in my food. So the flowers are sitting on our front step now. Most of them are gone though.

The reasons why I’ve not been updating my blog is because of the mountain of homework I have to wade through. I barely get much sleep nowadays, averaging on 5 to 6 hours a night.

I know to some people, 5 hours is a luxury. But to me, I need sleep. I become very cranky when I don’t have enough sleep. But yet the wee hours of the morning is really the only time I can do any form of study without interruptions. Sometimes I would hear my neighbours starting their car and going to work at 5 or 6am and I’m still struggling with my essays. All these and I’m still very very behind especially with my Biology.

I’m 3 chapters late for Bio!

When I’m not up in the weird hours of the night doing school work, I’m busy preparing updates for the store. My recent fibre update went really well and most of the braids were snapped up within a day or two!

I also enjoyed designing the labels of the braids.

Like this ewe is spinning wool from her back so her top is naked. Tee hee hee.

Now I’m busy sewing bags. Expandabags and smaller project bags for the store. Progress is painfully slow though.

I enjoy sewing and knitting and dyeing yarn/fibre a lot. I love bright and saturated colours. I love being creative and I love my yarn store (mainly because I get the first pick of the lovely Malabrigo yarn that arrives!!!) Thoughts have passed through my head if I should just sod (pardon the french) the whole school thing and just relax and enjoy my hobbies. I have one less issue to deal with in my life.

However, I cannot see us surviving on the yarn store. It started as a hobby business and it will always be a hobby business. It can support my stash acquisition and perhaps pay for some groceries here and there but it will never become a main source of income for my family. I am more than happy for it to be a hobby business and I like it the way it is right now. It’s not overwhelming me (it’s the juggling of my multiple lives that’s killing me) and I like that I can ‘work’ any time I want to.

To have foresight, my studies is the only way that I can support my little family, inclusive of my dearest mum. To have foresight, we really really want to eventually own a little farm. To have foresight, would mean that I have to plod on with my studies. I don’t want to earn ‘big bucks’. I just want to earn enough to afford the kind of lifestyle we want. Not that we are lavish or anything like that! A simple, humble little farm would be great!

So the only thing other than whine about my lack of sleep to my poor husband now is to bite on my lower lip and plod on. 5 more years. I hope I make it till the end.

Not all of the month was bad for me though! I got quite a bit of knitting done:

I casted this on when Sunshine was a little baby. It hibernated for a very very long time and I finally decided to get on with it or else it won’t fit either kid.

Horror of horrors, this wool was discontinued. It’s Cleckheaton country 12 ply from Spotlight and I had 7 balls each of white and black. I needed just ONE more ball of each to seam the jacket up. Lucky for Ravelry, a very kind lady sent me a ball of each so I could complete this jacket.

Then I got a shock when I saw this:

Can you spot the colour difference? There’s a line running through which you can see- one side is whiter than the other.

At first, I was really shocked. “WHO PEED ON MY DONKEY JACKET???” But I realised the ‘pee line’ was tooooo straight to have been a pee line.

I’ve actually run out of wool for this project once before. I ran into Spotlight few years back to grab more balls of yarn but I must have failed to look at the colour. I must have grabbed a few balls of off-white instead of white.

Never mind. It’s the lining of the jacket and unless I point it out, people don’t notice!

Ohh, check out the cute carrot buttons!

How apt for a donkey jacket!

We also went fishing with our close friend and her teenage sons one very nice day. I took my knitting of course.

We enjoyed ourselves. Especially the little ones.

The waters were so clear!

Nad was teaching Sunshine how to skim pebbles but it looks like this one would land on his head……..

We seldom ever get a family portrait so I love this picture to bits:

I was wearing my favourite hat:

Knitted with Malabrigo Twist, Paris Nights and Malabrigo Worsted Oceanos. My two favourite colourways from Malabrigo. I wear it everywhere I go now! Not at home though.

Sunshine also had a lot of fun as she tried her hand in baking.

All under tutorage from our close friend, Lena. (The same one we went on the fishing trip with.)

She enjoyed herself and I would, one of these days, bake with her too. Only I’ve never baked muffins in my life before. I’m sure I can follow instructions though!

I also squeezed some time to make some soap:

The ones on the left are Oatmeal. My favourite scent! The ones on the right are Aussie flavours – Lemon myrtle, Tea tree and Eucalyptus. They make the house smell lovely.

The oatmeal was made hot processed so it could be used immediately. The Aussie one was cold processed but I don’t think I can wait a month before using it. It smells too nice! So shhh, I’m going to use it tonight (it’s been curing for a week now).

The oatmeal batch was made with a swap in mind. I’ve sent out the soap and scrubbie yesterday to my partner.

A few weeks ago, Chubbs started to have purplish and flakey toes. We didn’t know what to make of it. Applied Eucalyptus oil and aloe vera cream on them and changed fresh socks for him everyday. Then, his ring finger on the left started to become red/purplish and swollen as well. We thought it was an insect bite.

Then 3 nights ago, the swell spread to his middle finger and his pinky. That prompted a call to the after hours service and the nurse advised us to bring him to the hospital.

A hospital trip it was, at midnight! Both Chubbs and Sunshine slept blissfully through the whole time we were there. We waited about an hour or two and he was finally diagnosed with fungal and secondary bacterial infection – cellulities.

He was given a course of antibiotics and fungal cream. We reached home at 3am and crashed into bed. That was the earliest I’ve slept the entire week.

For the first two days, Chubbs willingly drank his medicine. Now, we have a huge struggle and our wardrobe has been updated to ‘retro pink spots’. Most of the pink, nasty liquid ends up outside his mouth! Urgh.

There’s still no marked improvement on his fingers although his toes seems a little better. Pray that he gets well soon. Sigh, poor boy.

We have been constantly amazed at his level of understanding lately though. A few days ago, Sunshine was sitting on the toilet and she said to Chubbs to bring her the ‘Hungry Baby’ book.

He walked past my sewing room into the living room and walked past again holding the correct book!

A few moments later, I saw him wearing the kitchen slipper (one side) so I said to him, “Can you put the slipper in the kitchen please?”

He looked lost for a moment until I bent over and pointed, “Slipper”. He immediately took the slipper, walked the length of the house and dropped the slipper into the kitchen, over the baby gate!

Ho ho ho… this little boy knows more than he lets on!

He’s starting to say Eh Pa (apple), Nana! (Banana), Bye bye! and he’s also responding to our questions.

“Chubby?”

“Ya ya!”

“Do you want water?”

“Ya ya!”

Sunshine has been a good girl. She is toilet trained now (like, finally!) and we only put her diapers on when she sleeps. She is reading new words with little difficulty now. The other night when I was ironing on interfacing unto fabric, she read the words on the iron, “Slip Stream!”.

She doesn’t get it all correct though as she has an idea of phonics. So she pronounces the first few letters if she is unsure of the new word. Sometimes she gets the word right. Sometimes she only gets the beginning of the word right. But she’s getting there! She’s also writing most letters in the alphabet now.

There was once I read on a forum (not Ravelry!) and some parents have very adverse criticisms on babies who can read and write (aiming the attack at the learning program that we use for both Chubbs and Sunshine). They believe kids should be playing and not be forced to read or write.
Well, little do they know that kids are NOT FORCED to ‘study’. Learning can be fun and enjoyable too! Both kids of ours love their learning DVDs and Sunshine regularly (read: everyday) wants me to put the disk on for her.  She takes out her exercise book on her own free will and writes in it.
We ASK if she wants to do ‘some writing’ or ‘some reading’ and only proceed to do so when she replies in affirmative. I don’t think anyone can force a young child to study or to learn. But one can always make learning a fun process.

Our kids still get to play in the sun, go for walks in the park, play in the playgrounds, feed the ducks etc… but rather than spending time at home watching mind numbing TV shows, why not encourage them to learn something? A good foundation and a boost at the start is always a good thing.

Yes, while most kids would reach the same level of understanding when they reach a certain age, there’s nothing wrong with giving the kid a boost at a younger age, when their brains are most like sponges and when whatever they learn stays in their memories better. We’ve never forced any learning upon the kids. They are happy, healthy children who do not neccessarily have exceptional IQs. I believe all children have this same potential in them and it’s up to their parents whether they want to unleash it or not.

On the knitting front, I’ve casted on a Huntington Castle Pullover with Rowan Summer Tweed which is a Cotton/silk blend. I’ve never smelled such strong cottony smell from yarn before!

It’s one of my first stranded (a kind of knitting with 2 colours.. not that it’s stranded on an island or anything like that) projects. I casted on the second size but it was too huge so I ripped back (I was about 5 rows into the pullover) and casted on the smallest size. I know this is cotton and won’t be as stretchy as wool so I have to be careful that it’s not too small or I won’t be able to squeeze in! It’s looking good, though!

I’ve also wound 3 Malabrigo Sock yarn into yarn cakes, ready to design my first shawl/stole.

From top to bottom: Caribeno, Impressionist Sky and Abril. What lovely colours. No wonder I’m keeping Yarnandkisses alive. Hehehehe.

Alrightio… off to take a warm shower! Thanks for hanging around.

I just sat for my Physical Sciences mid year exams yesterday. It was 2.5 hours long with 2 sections. One physics and one chemistry. I haven’t done an exam in a while and my brains felt like they were about to spill out.

We were given 15 minutes to read and underline/highlight any important points before the exam started.And whaddaya know? My highlighter chose that time to die on me. No more ink!

My pencil case was chocked full of writing materials. Pens of different brands and colours! BUT, only one mechanical pencil. Which of course, chose that day to die on me.

It was when I switched over from the chemistry paper to the physics paper that it died. I didn’t want to do the ‘tictictictictictictictictictictictictictictictictictic’ thingy with the pencil for fear of incurring the wrath of other fellow students so I had to contend with using a pen and using a short and blunt Ikea pencil I found at the bottom of my pencil case to draw diagrams.

Inori has to be more prepared for exams, ya?

I have a Biology exam on Tuesday which I’m afraid I won’t do very well in (it would be a miracle if I even pass it) as well as the medical university entrance exams (UMAT) on wednesday.

The UMAT is a major one. If I fail this, I can kiss my doctor dreams goodbye. It’s more like an IQ test… very similar to Mensa. I hope I do well for it!

Then my Chemistry exam would be sent to me and Nad would be my invigilator.

I have been busy with the store, making items to spruce up the inventory. I’m hoping to launch the new items in August.

Before I go, I’ll post some pictures of a playdate Sunshine and Chubbs had with my friend’s kids. They were all SOOOOO cute together. Chubbs was awefully shy though and hid in the bedroom for a while! He only warmed up to them when they were about to leave. And this is the 3rd time they’ve seen each other!

I got a very shy boy in my hands!

On Sunshine’s pink car.

My friend’s son who is sooooo adorable. He’s just learned to crawl!

And the sweetest picture of all:

The girls were so quiet that we thought they were up to mischief. But noooo! They were sharing a book in the privacy of the yarn room! How cute is that?!?!?!?!?!?

And here is a picture of her representation of Nad and I.

She claims that the person on the left with a dewdrop shaped mouth is me and the one on the right with vampire fangs is Nad.

My question is…. why do I have 3 legs?

I walked away for awhile and when I came back to him, he was sucking from the bottle!

He had never done it before and has always refused the bottle until that day. He was 13 months and a few days old.

I refilled his bottle with more formula and he drank everything again. And another. And the 4th.

That day was the day I stopped breastfeeding my little baby.

Sunshine wanted to join her brother in the happy bottle session so I made her more milk too that morning:

It feels a little weird and sad not to breastfeed anymore. But yet, I’ve been tired and his teeth hurt me from time to time. We didn’t expect it to last for more than a year. We thought we’d breastfeed till he turned 8 months or so…. so these 13 months has been quite an achievement! Sunshine was only boobed for 2 months (I had to return to work then).

Anyway, I’m relieved as milk supply had been dwindling due to infrequent feeds and I was worried that Chubbs wasn’t getting enough calcium. Sure we give him lots of veges but children this age need much more calcium for their bones to grow.

So it’s a bitter-sweet moment for me. I don’t know if we will be having anymore children so he might be the last baby I’ll ever breastfeed. And I’m glad I did it. It helped us to form a strong bond and I’ll miss his snuggling up to my body every night. He still sleeps beside me but because he no longer drinks from me, he prefers to place his foot in my face instead of snuggling.

:/

Anyway here’s some pictures of the kids.

We gave him an apple to gnaw through church service. It really helped in keeping him quiet!

Look at his big eyes!

Peekaboo mummy?

Chubbs understands what ‘ball’ is. If you tell him to get the ball, he would. Notice Nad running away in the back? Lol.

Huh? Where daddy go?

Hi from my butt!

Cheeky bugger.

Chubbs is rather agile for his age we think. He’s able to climb up and down our bed with ease. A few days ago, I turned my head for a few moments and imagine my shock when I turned back to see him sitting on the dining table!

He had crawled up a stool, up the chair and then up to sit on the table! Amazing.

I’ve sewed a kick-ass bag which I love so much but the sun is hiding behind the clouds now so I’ll take pictures another day.

I will leave you with a link to a funny video of my heartthrob, Kimura Takuya. The guy who I’ve been in love with for about 15 – 20years!

Donguri Korokoro

It’s funny because everyone thinks he’s going to sing an emotional song but the song he sang, Donguri Korokoro is actually a children’s song. It’s about an acorn which rolled down the hill and fell into a pond. A loach (carp) then says hi and invites the acorn to play. The acorn is happy and plays with the loach but after awhile, starts to miss the mountain. He embaresses the loach by bawling.