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My little one was having a bad round of fever and flu on Thursday. My parents as usual were kind enough to take her to see her pe-ad on Friday morning – the necessary medications were given and the doctor had advised to be wary of public places since hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) is on a rampage, again.

So you can imagine how cranky and clingy she was for those past few days. Even taking a shower was a chore for me since she was continuously crying out for me. Then on Saturday morning, as I was changing her napkin, I noticed bumps around her legs and arms. I panicked and yelled out to my husband, thinking it was that dreaded HFMD.

We rushed to the clinic nearby and were told it was just an allergy reaction, probably from the fever or one of the meds the doctor gave her to treat her sore throat. I was extremely relieved to hear this but of course, it saddens me to see those ugly bumps around her

In all that panic and rushing to see the doctor, it was then I realized the state I was in – oversized baggy t-shirt that was wet from my hair, ugly ethnic pants which I got from Vietnam (to my defense they are crazy comfy), wet knotted uncombed hair, makeup less bare face, and the mother of all no nos – unshaved legs!!! Swear I got a look of disapproval by one of the girls waiting to see the doc – probably thought I was Sairah’s maid.

I was literally quite the sight. Even my sister texted to ask if I killed anyone with my looks.

Look at what I’ve become, I told the husband. And attempting to be funny he said, look on the bright side, at least you remembered to wear your bra in the midst of that mad dash.

Did I care about the way I looked? No, coz all that mattered at that point was my girl and off we went to get her fav Moo Cow yogurt as a little treat

The way we sacrifices the way we look (among others too of course), for someone far more important than ourselves, makes me think.

Woo I made Japanese. Korokee if you must. Which if you ask me is pretty much a fusion dish mimicking the French/Spanish croquette. Probably was created in recent times because I almost don’t remember seeing this in Narita during my trip yonks ago.

Either way it’s a great dish because it’s one of those dishes meant for weekday cooking. You know, where you can make it on a weekend, freeze it and then just cook them buggers on a working day. Very easy, convenient and minimum cleaning up to do after.

I don’t always cook on weekdays but when I do, it turns out awesome!

Hah, that should be my tagline for weekday cooking, okay kidding. But I have to say cooking on a weekday is indeed a rarity on my part!

Here’s the recipe:

4 russet potatoes
Tray of minced chicken
1 large white onion
2 eggs
Panko
Flour
Black pepper & Garlic salt
A dash of soya sauce & Worchester sauce. (I added this on my own, just for extra flavor).

As simple as the ingredients look, it does take some effort in preparing it.

Instructions:

In a large pot, boil potatoes until soft. Put them in a large bowl and mash it down while adding some butter, black pepper & garlic salt.

In a pan, fry onions and then sauté the minced chicken. Add in some black pepper, a dash of soya sauce and worhester sauce.

In the bowl containing the mash potatoes, add in cooked minced chicken and mix them. Add in more black pepper.

When mixture is warm shape them into ball shape. The recipe calls for putting this in a fridge for 10-15 minutes before you coat it. You can do that if you have time (I’m assuming it’s to hold the potato + meat better) but if you don’t, no biggie.

Dredge each ball into flour, egg and then in panko. It’s a tedious process but well worth it!

Now FREEZE! Or if you want to cook it then and there, so be it

When you’re ready to cook them on a weekday, let it thaw and deep fry it in a pan.

Transfer your Korokee balls into a paper towel to absorb the oil.

This is how they should look as they thaw

And here’s the end results Looks just like the ones you can find in Jusco don’t ya think, ahem

Also, my deep frying skills suck. I can get Panko covered stuff cooked beautifully the first two batches and then after, it goes down hill like so:

But iz okay, it was still pretty good. I gave the husband the nicer looking ones and sacrified myself by eating the ugly batch. Such a good Indian wife I am.

You can eat it with Tonkatsu sauce on its own. I couldn’t find the Tonkatsu sauce it in Jusco coz it was all out so we used chili sauce instead and it was lovely. And if you prefer rice, you could always sauté up rice with soya sauce and egg and eat it with this I reckon. I”m going to try to stuff some cheese in there next time and see how that one turns up. Even the baby refused her soup with rice and ate this instead.

So now it’s a shame I can cook Japanese better than I cook Indian. Hah. But in all honestly, I”m not much of a Japanese food fan except for sushi with tuna bits. How about you guys?

P.s: Anyone looking out for a good afternoon tea set, do check this one out for Delicious All hail the group-discount queen

To be sung to I had a bad dayyyy….

Yup, there’s such a thing called an off day.

Actually, there is such a thing as an off-day cooking, off-day restaurant visit and heck even off-day casting! And all that can happen in a day.

Allow me….

We went to Ala Thai on Saturday to redeem our voucher. You could say  almost all our meals are voucher based, lol. Usually our experience have been a real good one (coz let’s face it, some restaurants take part in group discount sites to get in customers, hoping you would return to them again) except for this restaurant called Ala Thai in Solaris Dutamas.

First off cock waiter lied and said some sessions were fully booked making us to settle for the 12.30pm slot. We get there at 1pm (coz we’re rebels like that) only to find the restaurant half empty anyway. As soon as we whip out our voucher, you could see the waiter’s face change. True we paid RM9.90 each for a four course meal but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t get proper treatment right? Anyway, service was slow, had to raise our hands up for the longest time before we got any service. The restaurant wasn’t even that huge for us to go unnoticed. And then when I asked for an empty plate, it never came!! The pineapple fried rice I had was horrible. Even the soup and dessert that came with it was so bloody off, it was beyond tasteless and watered down. Husband had better luck with his Pad Thai and dessert, to give them some credit.

The heck kinda service is this?? Ponders baby girl…

I should add the prawns in my rice was stale and old!

Anyway, will we be their return customer? Of course not.

After hanging around Publika,  we took the little one for a casting after lunch and my pedicure She was to be casted as a ‘fair urban malay’ toddler. I never knew people could be described that way, lol. We got there to find alot of people waiting for their turn. It would be a minimum wait of 1 hour I thought. But lo and behold our name got called within 5 minutes of our arrival! I was happy with the VIP treatment (of course later it dawned to me the lady had mixed up the papers and reached for mine first). It was also close to the little one’s sleeping time so I was afraid she’d get cranky and true enough……….all she did in that casting room was cry cry cry her head off. Would have been perfect if that was for a Cry Baby ad I’m sure.  She didn’t want to pose, kept hiding behind my leg and calling out to me – she was afraid of the casting director. Infact I had to tell him if it was okay for his lady assistant to take her photos and video. We had better luck, but she still was slighty uncooperative. Castings are definitely best attended in the morning me thinks :)  Sairah knocked off for 1.5 hours that evening though

Then I thought it would be nice to cook Indian food for a change for dinner that night. You know, to make the Indian husband happy. A nice EASY Garam Masala Curry I thought. Heck, even the recipe said it was EASY! Easy my foot coz the curry just went all wrong. I stood there for the longest time wondering what I should add in more and even resorted to using Tandoori Masala powder and yogurt even when the recipe didn’t call for it just to balance out the taste and spiciness. In the end it was the husband who came to the rescue to make it taste better – something about adding lime to cut down the spiciness he said, whatever.

I am not destined to be a good cook where Indian food esp curries are concerned. Period. The spices involved are a whole lot more trickier than rocket science! Swear he’s in charge of making curries in the future. But if anyone has a good curry recipe then share pleaseee.

I did have better luck where the vegs were concerned so maybe Indian vegetables dishes could be my thing. I got the recipe from here but instead of baking it, I fried it after boiling the potatoes and it was super yummy. Threw in some taufoo too just coz the packet was lying around.

Looks like a smiley face! A good end to the day that was pretty off I reckon. And the cherry on top was seeing my little one sleep throughout the night like a log coz she was exhausted from all that swimming in the evening.

Guess it wasn’t that bad of an off day afterall eh?!

Sorry for the lack of creativity on the header part

Okay just sharing some of my recent finds for Sairah. Mothers with baby girls – heads up ladies Actually mothers with baby boys can check out this site too.

This is my third time now purchasing clothes from BBluvsme.com and that site never fails to excite me everytime I receive an email about their updates. I could be wrong but I think they are probably the same people responsible for Thepoplook.com – also another site that I diligently check out and never fail to buy from every other update.

Seriously, for just RM93 (including postage), I managed to get 4 items for the little one. This time around I decided to buy sizes meant for a 3 year old for maximum usage Plus on the days when my mother feeds her too much RICE, I reckon these would fit just nice

This is SUCH an adorable combo in my opinion. Where can I get black boots for her??

I love the quality on these tops despite paying less than RM24 for each. The designs are sweet enough and can be easily paired with black leggins and even a tutu skirt for a dash of girly girl!

All three pretty tees in a row…though I have to say, for someone who loves black, the black tee appeals to me the most

Oooo mine!!

And then the other day I came across this cute little jeggings from Jusco in MV and couldn’t resist it. After a 10% discount, got this baby for RM9.50! Major score yo. I love the lace and ruched design at the bottom. Who ever said dressing a kid can be an expensive affair? It’s not if you look hard enough and keep a look out for a good sale.  If mommies have their fav go-to places for baby clothes, do recommend and share okie.

Now I’m having a huge headache what sort of shoes to get coz I”ve never been a shoe type of person and can never find affordable fashionable shoes in the store.

Oh and I’m waiting for this gorgeous baby to arrive from the US. I only paid less than RM50 (shipping included!)

And quite randomly, these two boys were Sairah’s playdate for the weekend! They were so sweet to bring Sairah a gift too. And yes, 3 kids in one tiny room = havoc, check out all the toys all over the place. It was a war zone in there.  Me having 3 kids in the future? I dont think so, swear my back would give way from picking up all the toys It is a rather colorful sight though.

And just when I was hoping Sairah would behave herself and enjoy her playdate, she seemed to be disturbed that they were 2 boys in her room playing with her toys.  She was one uncooperative kid that day which was odd because she usually loves kids. I do think baby girl is fast become quite territorial now that she’s bigger. Like Dhash puts it, kids are sooo unpredictable! Hopefully more playdates would fix the problem But we still had fun and she even planted a kiss on Nikhil AFTER playing hard to get. Maybe that’s why he looks extra happy in this photo

I love this photo because the parents are busy posing for the the camera while the little ones are busy with their toys!

To plenty more playdates Dhash! She has been reading my blog for some time now and we for most parts email each other almost every other day. Contrary to ‘dont meet people from the internet’ I have made friends with some people that way and you’d be suprise how nice and sincere they are – that’s how I like my friends to be btw

And iIf anyone wants to join us in the future, just let me know Boys, girls of all shapes, sizes and race are most welcome

The little one seems to be getting naughtier by the day! NO and gimme gimme are her favorite words. Whether she understands them or not, that’s a different story.

Gimme susu-milk, gimme maam maam, gimme book, gimme gimme while pointing to random objects…….and no matter how many times I emphasis the PLEASE, it goes on with a deaf ear. She only uses the P word if I hold back whatever she wants but sometimes that doesn’t work coz then she’ll go on a screaming spree and whatever I say after that is like pouring water on a duck’s backside! Sometimes she tries the coy sly way of planting a kiss to my lips before asking for something.

Bath time is also almost impossible; she hates water on her hair. Changing and blow drying her hair can also be a challenging feat. God knows what she’s hiding under that mop at the rate she’s so protective over it.

She doesn’t listen to us anymore…..she insist in walking by her own showing so much hatred for her stroller. Sometimes when she runs off to wherever her legs wants her to go, and when we call out to her to follow us, she looks straight past us and walks wherever she wants to go! Grocery shopping with her around has become an impossible task.

Run run run…that’s all she wants to do. She has however mastered the art of breaking her fall by quickly putting out her hands first. I told the husband at least she knows how to protect that cute face, lol.

Out of all the rooms in the apartment, she wants to go to the kitchen! Every single time. Maybe coz she knows there’s a whole lot of maam maam in there? And we close off the kitchen door, she proceeds to bang it and finds ways for us to open it. Despite warning her that the kitchen is off limits, she insist in hanging around there while I cook.

Lord please help us and let this Terrible Two phase go by quickly!! Yea she’s not even 20 months yet and she’s already showing these traits.

So I came across this article the other day about putting toddlers as young as one for time-outs.

Sure, it’s a very western concept but I was skeptical. Coz how the heck do you get a 1-2 year old toddler to listen to you and stay put? As it is, they don’t understand you most of the time, what more listen to your instructions? Some parents too did comment and say time-outs don’t work for kids under 3 but of course I wanted to check it out myself

The idea of Time-out is to get them to face the wall by sitting on a chair where they can’t reach the floor for a good 2 minutes to ‘reflect’ what they have done. I thought the chair bit would be dangerous coz my naughty monkey would just jump off it anyway.

So I asked her to stand with her hands up on the wall, lol. Instead of reflecting, she thought this was a game.

She stood like this for a few seconds. Then she realized this was actually fun!

Oooo light….

Oooo fingers….

Oooo photo frame….seriously short attention span just like her father!!

Uh oh mom’s staring at me, let me just stare back and give her my I’m-cool look

Har har mom, I iz defeating your orders by enjoying this game.

Run run run….

Manja face with mom. Just when I thought that perhaps it might have worked a little….

She goes and does this despite telling her not to go close to the TV! It’s not a touch-screen device for god’s sake. YUP in conclusion Time-Outs dont work for toddlers at all!! At least not for the naughty ones.

And this was the very next day after her time-out. She insist on standing in front of me while I change and put on my makeup thesedays. She watches closely and tries to mimic whatever I do. For the past one month it’s been mommy mommy mommy,  I have no idea why she’s extra clingy thesedays. 

So with access to my wardrobe, she did this. Oh hai, I am Little Red Riding Hood. Currently her favorite book btw

And then last night, for the first time ever she thought it was be ‘cool’ to bite and leave her teeth mark on our coffee table!!! I was wondering why the hell she was squatting down by the table when I saw the marks on the table. Why baby girl, whyyyy??!

Incase you’re wondering, YES toddlers have bloody strong teeth like a brick, how I know? Coz one fine night out of boredom I thought it would be funny to put my finger in her mouth and that kid bit the heck out of my fingers leaving her fang prints on it. She thought it was funny and proceeded to laugh her head off.

Hey I never once claimed to be wise so….:D

Grrrrrr, stop blaming me for shit I didn’t do old lady. For the record, I actually told her to give me her angry face hence this photo. There are days she tries that look on us and I tell her not to play around with the god damn person who invented that look in the first place.

Sigh. Terrible Twos……..sho sho, please go away. I want my angelic lil baby girl back.

P.s: Time out sucks! I think they only work for white kids or something. Our asian kids are just too hyper. Husband blames it on the milk. I blame it on him for sending a naughty trooper if you get what I mean