Back to School

Tara went back to school this morning, after 2 long weeks of absence. Since a couple of days ago, I have been asking her if she wants to go back to school. She always replied yes and kept rambling on the teachers' and aunties' names. But when I said she must not cry when she goes to school and she decided she can't promise me that, so she kept quiet.


This morning, I asked her where is she going, while changing her into her uniform. She said school. I asked where is Mummy going, she said work. And I asked where will Papa be going, she said work. A good start I should say.


When we reached the school, there were 2 teachers screening the kids near the entrance. Tara still remembered where is her pigeon hole for her shoes and the getting-really-particular young lady took a while getting both shoes neatly in the pigeon hole. Taking out one shoe, putting the other in, took it out again and put both in until she was satisfied that both shoes are sitting nicely together.


We queued up to have her temperature taken. Teacher Mingchue, who was at the next screening station, saw Tara, said hello to her, and Tara started crying. Although she was crying, she was able to listen to instructions. I told her to move to the next chair after taking her temperature and she did so herself, although still crying. Teacher Mingchue got her to open her mouth, showed her hands and feet and she did so accordingly. And when Teacher Mingchue said she did really well and asked her to give herself two thumbs up, she did so too, with tears still in her eyes, though. So cute.


As we walked to the classroom, she started bawling again and wanted me to carry. I carried her to Auntie Chen and to my surprised, she reached over to let her carry and then said bye bye to me.


I guess she understands that she has to go to school and Mummy and Papa has to go to work, so even though she didn't want to be separated from me, she knew she has to.


This picture was taken on the way to school this morning. Noticed a chicken box scar on her nose? I asked her to smile for the camera and she gave me a crooked smile.

Tara's Dinner & Beef Stew

This is Tara's share. Beef stew, pan fried fish and spaghetti with a little sauce from the stew. There's also a side dish of stir fried mixed mushrooms.

She loved the beef stew and the spaghetti and finished it all. But she was not so keen on the fish though. She tried a little mushroom, said it's nice, ask for more and I guess she ate a little too much and got sick of it and started spitting it out.

I made beef stew last night again, cos I promised Bob. But I guess I'm too tired and was rushing to get the dinner ready, last night's stew wasn't really good. Tasted like spaghetti sauce cos I added too much ketchup. I wanted to keep to the ingredients from my first attempt so I used the ketchup. The next time round, I must ensure I used the proper ingredients for the stew.

My Virtual Model

I gotta load this again cos I can't see the previous upload.

I "cloned" myself on My Virtual Model. Looks like me, I think.. Hmmz. Except I think I look more fleshy in person.

Strange Behavior

Recently, Tara's been behaving rather strangely. She dare not venture into the rooms anymore and insist that we follow her wherever she goes. Or she will walk into the room to get her hanky and run out, screaming and said she's scared of uncle.

Sounds eerie. I asked her what uncle and where is he but she will keep quiet. Just this afternoon, I was chasing her around trying to take a picture of her. She walked into my room but I didn't follow. Seconds later, she screamed and ran out crying. I'm not sure what exactly cause this fear. I never tried to scare her or anything before and Bob didn't either. So what's wrong with her?

She won't even sit in the hall by herself anymore. And will follow me around. Just now, I wanted to take a shower while she slept in the hall. She woke up crying and came to look for me in the bathroom. I put her back to sleep and crept back into the bathroom, but she woke up again. So I told her mummy really need to shower cos it's getting late and I thought of pulling the mattress to a place where she can see me but she didn't want to. So I told her to sit beside the bathroom door while I get a quick shower. After sitting for a short while, she lay down on the floor and fell asleep right on the spot.

She has never behave like this before.

Strange, isn't it?

At Home and Cooking..

There's no one to take care of little Tara today so I had to take a day off.

And knowing that we both will be grounded because of her chicken pox, I bought some groceries yesterday for my meals. I had this craving for beef stew, so I bought some beef and onions. It's a good chance for me to clear the carrots and potatoes my MIL left behind.

I only tried cooking beef stew once, and following a recipe I pulled off from the internet. So I can't remember what are the ingredients I need to get. Anyway, I tried to get a basic beef stew recipe this morning and found there's still quite a few stuff that I lack. Like I mentioned, I'm grounded, I can't even bring her to the provision shop down my block, so I thought, I'll just make do with what I have and pray for the best.

I had to substitute a couple of ingredients. I used potato flour instead of wheat flour, fresh tomatoes and get this, tomato ketchup, instead of tomato puree. Chicken stock instead of beef stock. And china potatoes instead of small potatoes. I don't have sage leaves, some other herbs and celery. And I thought, hmmz, it will be quite a task to get a decent meat stew.

When I started cooking the onions with the butter, Tara stood beside me and kept saying how nice the smell is. She kept telling me she wanted to eat.

After an hour, my stew was done. And I would say it's pretty decent. And I'm really surprised that the ketchup really brought out the taste of the stew. And the flank steak wasn't tough at all. It's so easy to prepare. I sms Bob to tell him that I will cook beef stew for him when he's back. He's been asking for it for eons, but I didn't dare try after my 1st attempt, which was quite near to disaster.

I even cooked the butter and herb rice I bought some time back. And also stir fried some mushrooms to make the meal complete.

Here's my lunch:




The butter rice was too salty, even though I followed the instructions on the box and added the right amount of water, it tasted like I added a packet of salt! I even added almost twice the amount required but still it was too salty.. I don't think I will ever buy it again. And I really love the stir fried mushrooms. Just some garlic, butter and salt and it will taste fantastic!

Anyway, Bob replied my sms just now. He said "Good! Can add oxtail?".

Little Miss Polite

Just now, I was washing the dishes after dinner. Tara came up to me, passed me her bowl and said,

"吃饱了。谢谢。。"

Way too cute....

Crabs from Mellben

I had this for dinner on Saturday night. Bob and I went all the way to AMK to get this. Not only this butter crab, we also have crab in fried bee hoon and crab in soup been hoon. Ah... Bliss..

Spots All Over

This is how Tara look like now.

Her face.



Her back



It's very difficult to stop her from scratching especially during the night when we were all asleep. I noticed 3 spots on her face was scratched rather badly, and I guess the scarring will be inevitable.

Bob trimmed her nails really short last night. I just hope that her amazing healing power will work it's magic again.

Chickenpox Spreading Islandwide

I spoke to the admistrator minutes ago, and informed her that Tara was diagnosed with chickenpox. She told me 3 other children were infected too and the school did a screening this morning. They had to turn away quite a number of kids as they have shown symptoms of the infectious disease.

The administrator told me that they have checked on the Ministry of Health website, which reported that there is an increase of chickenpox cases islandwide. I tried checking the website but I couldn't see anything related. Or maybe I'm checking on the wrong website?

Anyway, for those of you out there who has yet to vaccinate your child against chickenpox, you better do it soon. But even if your child is vaccinated, there will be chances that he/she will still get some mild symptoms. However, it will not be as bad as those who are not vaccinated.

And those who are pregnant, avoid crowded places. The disease has an incubation period of about 10 - 14 21 days before symptom starts to show, so you won't know you are infected till it's too late. For the sake of your baby, try not to go out too much.

I asked the administrator if they will be closing the school, she told me they are monitoring on this and will keep me updated.

Poor Tara, I saw quite a number of new red spots on her this morning. She's starting to get cranky too. I guess she must be feeling really uncomfortable.

Tara has chickenpox

Last week and yesterday, the school gave parents letters to inform about chickenpox cases in the school. There's only 1 case last week, from K1 class and yesterday, there were 5 cases. Only 1 case in Tara's playgroup class though.

About 3 plus today, when I was in my manager's room, my colleague intercom me and said Tara's teacher called me. I knew something wasn't right already, and told my colleague that I'm worried Tara might have contracted chickenpox since there's so many cases already. I returned call to the teacher and she confirmed the dreaded news. She said there's quite a number of red spots on her body, one on her right eye brow and one on her neck. I saw the vesicle on her brow last night, but I never thought much of it since Tara has no fever.

Bob wasn't able to pick Tara so I took time off work and went to her school. She was kept in the office and was crying when she saw me at the door. Teacher Ming Chue was with her. She showed me the spots on Tara's back and her neck. She said Tara saw her classmates going into the Nemo room (indoor playground) and was pretty upset that she couldn't go. Tara had a good appetite though, both the teacher and the administrator looked so proud when they said that Tara finished her tea.

We went to Kelly's clinic in the evening and the doctor confirmed she has chickenpox. Tara's only given calamine lotion, fever and itch medicine.

I had wanted to bring Tara for her chickenpox jab once her persistent cough goes away. But it's too late.

Tara is still as active as ever though. With only low grade fever. Now my only worry is that she will keep scratching the spots. Tara kept touching the vesicles and I stupidly told her not to scratch them, to which, she immediately did so. I should have just shut up.

Just now, I counted the number of spots while changing her for bed. Total 18 spots. See if there will be more tomorrow.

Hana Kimi

I have just finished watching the last episode of Hana Kimi on YouTube.

So sad that the show has ended.

The male lead is way too cute! And I thought cute guys don't exist anymore. I think his features are too perfect.

I felt I'm becoming a 16 year old all over again...

Conversation with Tara

On our way home after picking Tara up from school.

Tara: 我要听 zai！我要听 zai！(She wanted to listen to her favourite CD but she can't seem to remember the word 歌 despite numerous correction).

Me: Tara, 要听歌， 要讲清楚....

Tara: 清楚!

Actually I wanted to tell her to ask me properly. I tried again.

Me: 不是，要讲好好...

Tara: 好好!

I was in between laughing and knocking my head on the steering wheel! She didn't even wait for me to finish what I wanted to say!

This is what I wanted to tell her..

Tara, 要听歌， 要讲清楚, 你应该说，"妈咪，我可以听歌吗？Please."

Income Tax Submitted!

Whoa. I've never been so 'on the ball' before! My record was always submitting my income tax on the extended deadline!

I realised my income last year is higher than 2005, even though I didn't work for a month and I was in my current company for 3 months. Meaning to say that I only work 8 months on my sales job yet I earn more? Should be that fat comm cheque I received beginning 2006.

And I realised something else. I actually forgot that I was still eligible for the Grandparent Caregiver relief! I stupidly took it away, thinking that Tara was already in childcare but totally missed that fact that she started school this year, not last year! Last year, my parents are still the main caregivers! I want to shoot myself.

Guess I will just let Bob claim that.

Anyway, I'm happy. One task done.

Many more to go.

Biting Ants Attack!

Last night, Tara and I had dinner at my parents' place (Bob's away on business trip). We took the lift down with my Dad and after Tara said goodbye, we walked to the car.

The minute I placed Tara on the passenger seat, she started crying and scratching her feet. I took a closed look and saw many black ants on both her feet. And I saw this really big one biting the big toe on her right foot. Immediately I pull a piece of tissue and tried to pull the big ant away. The big guy refused to budge! It took me quite a bit of strength to finally pull it out. And when I removed Tara's sandals, I saw the bitten area starting to bleed.

It took me a while to remove most of the ants from both her feet. All the ants were biting my darling! I'm not spared either, but I only had about 4 or 5 bites, whereas I found at least 20 ants on Tara!

I was very worried about the bleeding wound though, and called up Kelly's clinic to check if I should bring her in for him to take a look. The assistant told me to do so. Kelly checked and told me that it doesn't look like an ant bite, which is supposed to be a just a hole. Tara's looked more linear and look like a scratch. I thought I might have scratched her in my haste to remove that ant. Kelly disinfect the area and said he can prescribed a cream if I want one. Since he said it wasn't an ant bite, I didn't ask for the cream.

When I reached home, I told my PILs about the ants biting Tara and the bleeding wound. My MIL said ant bites doesn't cause bleeding. Well, I'm not so sure about that but I had to use a bit of strength to pull the big ant out, so I'm not surprised if it caused a scratch there and then. Then again, I remember I used a tissue to catch the ant, so I don't think my nails would have scratched Tara.

On the trip to the clinic, a couple more ants still managed to get onto Tara's body to bite her, I was driving at a fast speed and I told Tara to smack the ant so it won't bite her. I said Mummy is very angry because the ants are biting my baby, I said tell the ants to go away. And almost immediately, Tara said "Angry! Go away!" and kept smacking herself, laughing away. Funny girl loh, still can laugh at this time. I was so worried. Even when we reached the clinic, there are still ants biting her! I even found 4 on her hankie!

I tried to recall the route that we took to the carpark prior to the ants biting episode. Both Tara and me only stopped once and for less than 15 seconds! I'm really not sure where the ants came from. I've already told Dad to go investigate and report to the RC (where he's a member) to do something on this. My Brother told me both he and her girlfriend was bitten before too. Around the same area where I parked.

Tara had nightmares last night and kept waking up crying. I'm not sure if it's the ants biting episode or still because of school.

But one thing for sure, I'm very sleepy now.