Cupcakes

Another foray into the baking world today, this time for Maddie's 1st birthday tomorrow!

We got a couple batches going, and will frost them tomorrow morning. Will upload more pics then!

Anyhoos! For those who haven't been following the drama on Twitter and Facebook, we got burgled on Tuesday. The day before my operation, to remove a bone that's been growing behind my ear for about 1 1/2 years now.

What? you say, A bone? Growing out behind your ear?! And a break-in?!

Yes. An osteo mastoid. But it's been successfully removed, I'm still recovering, but as you can see, am up and about running the house as well as my chores as per normal. But as if preparation for major surgery wasn't nerve-wrecking enough, we had to have money and my wedding jewelry stolen too. :-(

My new favourite photo...

You can see more if you add Aidan as a friend on your Facebook!

Some new vidz

Happy 18 months!

Yes how amazing! We finally hit this great (semi-)milestone, and I'm so proud of him. And us. We did it!

Anyhoos! Here're the photos I promised about our trip to the Children's Farm!

FARM TRIP

The little one is growing up

Today's Labour Day here in Melbourne and we decided to spend the day having a BBQ in Studley Park with our good friends, The Chews, the Khoos, the newly-wedded Lims and the Chuas.

Anyway, as usual, we would sit there eating while Aidan runs amuck getting his hands in the dirt. Incidently, he's getting really good at calling people's names. The current list includes, Amy (Ivy's sister), Ivy, Steve and just tonight, Ellie. Pronounces them quite well too. I digress...anyway, he came over to me after a whole afternoon of running around and I picked him up and told him to sit still to rest for a awhile. Well, he got upset and actually smacked me on the face. So I decided to discipline him. I told him sternly that because he was misbehave he was to sit on the bench and not be allowed to get off.

I proceeded to go and play ball and he actually sat there (though unhappy) and not get off his seat, and periodically yelled to me "DAH DAH!" "Peeeaasse!" while making the sign for please. It was soo funny but at the same time it showed me that he understood my instructions and followed it. He also kept stretching his hand out to anyone that walked by to carry him. Well, he sat there till I came and picked him up.

Our little one is growing up quick and as he learns we too need to learn how best to discipline him.

Dentistry

Hooray! After much reisistance, A has decided he'll give brushing his teeth a go. He's currently got 10 teeth (I think!) - 4 top front, 4 bottom front, and 2 top molars on either side.

He'd never let me get near his mouth with his toothbrushes - I'd bought plenty to try (the ONE thing he has to put into his mouth, he refuses). But today, after watching me brush my own teeth, and ONLY after I propped him up to the mirror so he could see he'd be doing the same thing with his own toothbrush, he popped it in. And we have blast off. Brush brush brush!

He hasn't quite got the hang of it yet, but at least it's IN HIS MOUTH! We had great fun after rinsing our mouths, and spitting out water into the sink. Too much fun. Methinks a sign of portent - will he never swallow and drink his water again, forever spewing liquids out in a perfect plume?

Aidan's Pigeon Toothbrush Training Set
He's got another one from my dentist, but uses it as a plunger because of its suction base. Hmpf.

For the love of beeswax! And other random stuff...

Lots have been happening lately with us over the last few days, so let's get right into it! In reverse chonological order...

Today (Wednesday):
We just made banana and choc chip bread together, and it's baking in the oven. How cute! Aidan helped me pour the ingredients into the bowl. He also helped mash the bananas too! Then we chanted "mix mix mix" (he's SO clever at repeating words now, even the 'S'-sounds which are typically hard to master) as we stirred the batter, and poured it into the loaf pan. Mmmm....the smell wafting out of the kitchen is delicious! All right... shan't be a food flirt, here's the recipe! It's really easy, got it off May Q, no butter!

Banana Choc-Chip Bread
2 large ripe bananas, mashed
3/4 C sugar
1 1/3 C self-raising flour
50 ml milk
50 ml olive oil
2 eggs
chopped nuts (almonds, walnuts)
chocolate chips (or chopped choc pieces)

Mix them all up in a large bowl, pour into a greased loaf pan, bake at 180 degrees C (160 if using fan-forced oven) for 20-40 mins till outside is golden brown, and a skewer inserted comes out clean.

Serve warm and eat! (If you're really indulging, add a scoop of vanilla-bean ice cream. TO DIE FOR!)

(Sorry if the pictures are a little fuzzy...took it on my 2MP camera-phone.)

Er...the Ribena doesn't go into the cake...it's for the baker's stomach...

He tried to lick the wooden spoon, and got a face full of batter...

The cake should look like this. If yours doesn't, well, maybe baking isn't right for you... ;p

Yesterday:
It was time for childcare again, and neither of us was really looking forward to it particularly. It's always so hard to leave, watching him cry, but necessary. I do believe he needs that interaction with other kids, and plus I need some ME-time! So for the sake of both our sanities (and development), he goes in once a week, while I'm at class.

Turns out, he's adjusting a lot better - less crying, and getting better each time, say the people who work in his room (Pre-kinder one). I can't remember if I've blogged about this, but, he was bumped up to the Pre-kinder class 'coz of some admin error (they thought he was still in Babies), and seeing how there wasn't room left in toddlers, he got bumped up (plus he was close to the right age anyways).

Last week, he was such a little scrapper, pushing back against this other big kid who kept pushing him (in a 'duh...i'm a big giant, hello little thing. Whoopsies, you fell! Duh...whad happened?" kinda way). He kinda reminded me of a feisty chihuahua who won't stand at being bullied, the way he barked back and flailed his arms about as if in a girlfight. This week when the other kid came by, A just ignored him. Haha... well, you gotta preserve yourself somehow when you're smaller and younger than everyone else in class!

As for me, I learnt "i bicchieri va nel'armadio" and "no, non gioco mai tennis". I think I conjugated that correctly...


The day before:
We went to the Collingwood Children's Farm! It was great, we got to see sheep, goats, pat horses, watch chickens cluck and geese and ducks, and a big fat black pig with her little piglets. Aidan had a ball of a time, even though he fell over into the dirt, which got into his nose and mouth. Eww. But other than that, no real anima poo incidents that I had to clean up. Although A seemed more interested in dirt and rocks - kept picking one up after another and wandering around with them. Funny boy! Pictures will come soon in FB.

Another milestone - he's really able to feed himself with a spoon now, quite accurately in fact. He's quite adept at spooning yoghurt into his mouth, although rice, porridge and pasta tend to me messier.

He's also developed a fondness for the blue Ikea kid's chair I've been using to sit on while bathing him. He can actually carry the whole thing, and has been doing so from room to room. He'll even turn it upside down to sit IN it. It's just like how instead of sitting on his Pooh-bear walker, he STANDS on it! Quite proudly too, with a ta-daaaah face! The things toddlers do...

New words spoken: eyes, nose, ear, mouth, amen, chicken!!

As for me: Another celebrity dream - this time, John Mayer called me up, we had a great conversation, and he invited me over to hang out! EG came home and helped me pick an outfit with whatever I had there and then (a black top and a puffy skirt which did NOT go together), and I got into the car. Woke up before arriving. Dang!


The day before the day before:
Aidan found a Forever Sharp knife on the edge of a table in church (& if you've seen those knives, they're really long and serrated at the edge, with twin prongs!), which we had used for cutting a cake. He'd actually reached over and above to grab it. Started wandering around brandishing it, which thankfully a horrified friend discovered and removed before A hurt himself. Or worse, stabbed the Pastor (although at the rate his sermons have been dragging on...doodeedoodeedooo... nahhhhh.)

Pretty eventful first half of the week!