Virgin Productions

Lately, I have 2 virgin productions. First, I design the artwork for Aron's birthday goodie bag, followed by Asher's birthday goodie bag. See Picture 1 & 2.

Pic 1 Pic 2

Though the designs are not fantastically impressive, at least, they mark the beginning of my creative design. Sons, do remember, without you, mummy probably will not ever start to do this. Hope this will make you feel proud in school.


The next production is... ta-da....

CUP CAKES!

Well, I bought a new mini oven a few months ago, after getting rid of the microwave oven which was sitting in my kitchen for a few years as white elephant. So, I decided, I should not let my new mini oven become the next white elephant.

I followed a recipe from a blog which says: 15 minutes cup-cake, and it is suppose to be fail-proof.

Guess what, at my first attempt, I put in the wrong amount of milk to the mixture of sugar, eggs, and butter. Instead of 60ml of milk stated in the recipe, I mistook it for 600ml of milk! And I actually beat the mixture till I suspected something was not right. Lucky, I didn't complete the mixing and put it in the oven. So after realising my mistake, I told my maid to throw away the mixture. She stared at me with big eyes. Yes, very wasteful, cos its a big bowl of mixture with 3 eggs, that I was throwing away.

I repeated the steps again. This time, the amount of all the ingredients were added without mistakes anymore. But manually beating the mixture was quite tiring.

I made another mistake. I bought the cake cups which the size were too big for the pan hole, so the look of the entire cupcakes were not as presentable as it could be.

But, the taste.....its yummy, at least, for a first timer, I am satisfied with my results. Everyone in my family said its not bad. Even MIL who doesn't take any food with dairy product also tasted a small tiny bit, and think its ok. She suggested that I use "coa-coa" instead of "milk" next time, so that she could eat it.

I shall post the pictures of my virgin cup cakes soon.

Updates

Its been quite a while since I last wrote on the blog.

Since I finished the Asiaworks Advanced Course, I went chalet at Pasir Ris Coasta Sand Resort. Then I worked on Aron's birthday goodie bag design (I spent a lot of time on this, cos it was my first time designing, without much knowledge or any guidance. Though it didn't look fantasitic, it was my virgin production after all). Half way through, I got an acute appendicitis attack, got into TTSH for surgery. I was suppose to take up an assignment, working at an event, but got to turn it down at the last minute. 2 days after I was discharged, in my dizziness and swelling stomache, I continued with the preparation for Aron's birthday goodie, went sourcing for the gift items. Finally after Aron's birthday, I packed up for my family's luggage, and off we flew to HK.

HK was damn hot. As I had not been there for 8-9 years, I had forgotten many places which I used to shop last time. Its quite challenging to balance the time and places to go, to accomodate different interests for all the family members. My children only interested in toys and play areas, MIL and myself interested in shopping. FIL more keen in sight-seeing. My poor hubby, didn't even dare to think where he wanted to go, he is there to work, not to enjoy. We ended splitting up, going in different directions - obviously, I brought MIL for shopping, while Kenny and FIL looked after the children. Though Kenny went HK a couple of times, but I couldn't count on him for giving me the list of shopping places. In fact, I think I know the shopping areas better than him, despite I had not been there for a long time. Imagine, he didn't even know where to get the famous "Yuen Long Lau Po Bing" (which I was craving), and ended up walking down the street, searching for the shop, then came back empty-handed & with frustration. In the end, with much unwillingness, I bought the not so fantastic Lau Po Bing from airport.

HK Disneyland Resort was really a pleasant surprise. Even MIL said she had never stayed in such a beautiful and luxurious hotel in her entire life. The hotel staff was real sweet to upgrade us to the Premium rooms, as they couldn't give us connecting rooms on our request. The rooms were big and the beds were also very comfortable. My boys enjoyed bath in the tub, while my in-laws were pampered with the Bon Cafe coffee made from the coffee maker. The bedroom slippers could be brought home as souvenirs, but I only brought the kids size back for the boys, and I packed all the slipper bags (6 pcs in 2 rooms) into my luggage - they are really useful for keeping my large volume of shoes. With about S$300 per room night, I decided to just stay for 1 night. We were greeted by the Disney characters at the cafe during breakfast. They went from table to table to greet the guests, be it young or old, with their cheerful smile. We snapped quite a number of photos together.

As for the Disneyland itself, to me, it wasn't as good as the ones in LA and Japan, but at least, the boys love it. With their timidness, they only took a few rides which were considered the mildest ones, like the Train-Ride, Merry-Go-Round, Flying Elephants, Tea-Cups and "Its a Small World" - their favourite, cos its so pleasant and sweet. The boys were horrified by the jungle boat ride, which they saw animals like crocodile, snakes, elephants, gorillas, as well as skeletons along the way, that Asher cried so badly throughout. The last part of all - the exploding cave which came rolling out with fire balls and smoke - Aron also burst out in tears. So, you can see how much adventure my boys can take. Therefore, we decided to keep within their "safety zone". The fire works was beautiful, even though we were standing at the furthest possible place to watch. I managed to keep my frightening Aron watching the whole show by carrying him and covering his ears, then slowing uncovered them as he started to relax. In fact, there wasn't much loud sound from the fire-works, unlike those we see at National Day Parade. Maybe, they understand the children's fear. Despite of the little sound, Asher was still scared to death and refused to stay on to watch. The grand-parents, being quite protective, worried he would get "over frightened", brought him out of the park in no time and waited for us outside.

At the end of the trip, I was so glad that we were finally home, as it was really tiring. MIL only got herself 1 blouse and 1 bag, while I got 6 pieces of clothing and 4 pairs of shoes. Obviously my boys were loaded with toys. Kenny, with my guilt conscious of "throwing" the boys to him, got 2 shirts from me. The most pathetic FIL got nothing, and yet worked throughout the trip as nanny without complaining. Really appreciate his commitment towards my sons.

Just few days after we came back, Kenny popped out the question: Where shall we go for the next trip? What about Bali on 1st Oct? At first, I was thinking he might be referring to just me and him. I thought we deserve to go for a relaxing trip that is meant for just both of us and to charge ourselves up. To my disappointment, he was referring to the whole family again. As he brought this idea up to MIL, she begun to look forward to another overseas trip already.

Sometimes, I just wonder: is it that I am too selfish to think about enjoying myself without the children? Or is it that my man doesn't feel its important enough for us to spend some couplehood time. I had mentioned to him a few times about it, but nothing was planned or done so far. Apparently, i think this is not important enough to him, otherwise he would have taken actions. Or maybe, he feels that going for 3 hour Spa together every few months would be sufficient to sustain our romance.

Well, I can't complain much, cos after all, I do have a very very very committed and responsible man, that has done every possible things to keep the whole family happy, to the extend that he doesn't even get to rest on weekends. A man with absolutely no extra time for himself, I don't know if I should expect him to think about couplehood time.