Early reunion dinner

This year since sis is going to Bangkok for CNY..we had the early reunion dinner at her place..
On actual reunion dinner after my own session with ILs at my house, we will go back mum's house to have 2nd round..

We are in charge of bbq portion..including food and prepare food for everyone..We got taiwan sausage, hotdogs, tofu, bacon+mushroom, portebollo mushroom with cheese, cold storage pre marinated bulgogi pork in 2 flavours.

The steam boat ingredients..with wei ming mum signature soup with sea cucumber, loads of kon pei and etc

More views of bbq food..spring roll from wei ming mum

Tuck in time for the yummy steamboat

Yu sheng

Group pics.

More baking

SW brand premium pineapple tart with cheese topping..


Preparing chocolate cookies, Jared requested.



Shapping them

She saw the kungfu clothes in wardrobe and asked to dress in it to take pics..Since our CNY deco are all up..we had some CNY theme pics..hehe

Phew~ Finally the peanut cookies work..the 1st batch a wk ago, was disaster..this 1 I measured the peanuts weight properly before start work..

Recipe: Source Fenying recipe
花生饼干 Peanut Cookies

炒香花生 : 500g ─ ① 磨碎
(fried peanuts, grind finely)

普通面粉 : 500g ─ ② 过筛
(plain flour, sifted)

细砂糖 : 400g ─ ③
(fine sugar)

花生油 : 500g ─ ④
(peanut oil)

全蛋 : 2粒 ─ ⑤ (打散)
(2 beaten eggs for glazing)

方法:
1. 把花生碎, 普通面粉, 细砂糖, 放入钢盆内, 混和均匀
Mix grinded peanut, plain flour, fine sugar, in a big mixing bowl

2. 慢慢倒入花生油, 顺同一方向拌均成团
Slowly mix in peanut oil till form into a soft dough

3. 用手搓成小球状, 然后一粒粒的排在已涂上油的烤盘上,
搽上蛋液
Form into small balls, place onto a greased baking sheet, and glaze with beaten eggs

4. 送入已预热的烤箱, 180°C烘约25分钟至金黄色, 冷却后贮存于瓶内
Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180°C for about 25 mins till golden.Remove, leave to cool
before storing

Note: I only had 370g peanuts..so I used 370g flour. Sugar about 120g..

More 2011 CNY baking

Honey cornflakes..I took the pic by myself..clear and nice bokeh..heh

The camera just made kids looking good..

The rabbit we made..maybe if its rat yr more suitable hehe

More pineapple tarts..

Cornflakes cookies

A typical song by Kaylen @ 2yr 4mth

Beautihu butterhuai huaing all around

This is the most mis pronouced song..

Beautiful butterfly flying all around
But she pronnouce F as H..that’s how the song turned that way..hehe.

Edited 26Jan'11..I managed to get her sing for recording..

2011 CNY Made with Love

I am submitting this to the Aspiring Bakers #3 My Favorite CNY Cookie



Photo taking inspiration from The little teochew..Look like a nice smiling face..


The full tray of love and goodness!



That's Kaylen been so cooperative and patience with the camera..





Recipe adapted from Fenying's blog.
Read somewhere that she lost her recipe, so can't link to actual post

Notes: I've made the 2nd batch of the yr, and I think I've found the best home made pineapple tart recipe...This will be a keeper..
Updates comparing to previous years, instead of 1 egg yolk, I changed to 2 egg yolk. Instead of no sugar or icing sugar for the pastry, I used castor sugar..

Pineapple Tart (Rub in method)
Ingredients A:
250g butter (cut butter into small cubes)

Ingredients B: (sifted)
340g plain flour
20g custard powder -> corn flour
½tsp salt
Castor sugar 2.5 to 3 tablespoon

Ingredients C:
20g egg yolks -> 2 egg yolks
¼ tsp vanilla oil -> ½ tsp vanilla essense

Phoon Huat red man pineapple filling ((divide into small part and form into balls)

1 egg yolks(beaten, for glazing)

Method:
1. Place Ingredients A & B in a mixing bowl
2. Use finger tips and rub butter into flour until it resembles breadcrumbs
3. Make a hole in the center, add in Ingredients C and mix into a dough
4. Leave aside to rest for 20 mins before shaping
5. Form small ball with the dough and fill a pineapple filling inside
and seal up, glaze with beaten egg yolk
6. Bake in a pre-heated oven at 180ºC for 20 mins till golden browm.
Remove from oven. Cool completely before storing

Weird thing white egg yolk

My lunch as usual fruits + 2 eggs. But today 1 of the egg turned out so weird..It has white colour egg white!...But I can't bear to throw the egg of course...so I ate it..hehe..and throw the egg yolks as usual.

Yellow & white egg yolk.

2011 Kids Update

It has been a while since I did the kids update..
Here’s 2011 update


Jared 5yr 2 mth
Milk
Since Jan 2011, when K2 started..he has started to feel embarrassed drinking milk from milk bottle..during awake times.
So he would asked milk to be made in a cup for him to drink before sleep, most time when he is not grouchy.

Reading
We have been really lazy during the 2010 dec sch holidays, hope we will be able to catch up from Jan onwards.

We are now at P&J 9A and 9B. Skipped 7b half way, 8a and 8b..cos it was getting too simple, and reading without challenge anymore.

But we hardly have time for other books..which we really need to try harder to find times.

Chinese Reading
My order from dang dang.com si wu kwai du finally arrived. Ordered on 4Nov, finally arrived on 24 Dec.
He used 1 wk on book 1..now he’s at book 2. But the way he read the Chinese is like reading English ascent..heh.

Violin
During the last lesson of 2010, he was scolded very bad but Prof Thanf when he played allegro..and he re-tape the violin for him. Since then he has been able to play pretty well.
Now he just started on Perpetual Motion..struggling with memorizing the notes…he could play with reading the notes..but memorizing still need a while..

He did improve very very much compared to Jan2010,but may be slow compared to others..since he can’t put in 100% concentration.

Abacus
He’s now counting without abacus..using fingers..again his laziness really get nothing much done, during the abacus lesson..He would do only ~40sums and leave 200 over sum for homework..that is such a headache.

But he could do them pretty accurately and fast if he really wanted to do

36-5+7
Etc etc

Blinking Eyes
No more no more…from Dec ’10 onwards..now no longer seen him doing it..such a big relieve.

Relationship with Kaylen
When they are very close they stay truly close to each other, play, talk, eat, everything together.
When they fight..they fight all the time.

But she is truly a great companion to him..i can see without her, he would get so bored, and so quiet..


Kaylen 2 yr 4 mth
Chinese Reading
Getting lazier and not much progress from then, but she definitely know a significant amount of Chinese words..compared to Jared who knew nothing at this age.

Writing
She can now following the tracing to write A, B
She followed koko habit on doing everytime…she would ask for a hug before and after she write an alphabet.

Talking
So so talkative and noisy all the time

Weight
11kg

Lasik

Ok I finally did my lasik..planning and thinking for more than a year..

I planned so well that, I’m on my last pair of contact lens, last bottle of contact lens solution..so that no wastage is done..heh.

But something did happen..my thyroid which was supposed to be under controlled the whole year..did came back just 2-3 wks before it..so I had to have higher dose..and don’t listen to doc advise and go ahead with lasik..

I had a pre-lasik 2hr assesment 3 wks before..then when it came to real thing..nothing really scary happen..

Intralese and laser machine..just focus on red/green dot..listen to doc instruction..and everything was fine..Immediately after lasik I can see better without glasses..after 1 hour of sleep..I woke up with some pain after the aneastic went off..After another 2hr nap, I woke up with perfect eyes..The next day I went for check up I had 6/4.5 eyes both side..Wonderful.

But right now I do have dry eyes..and yes slightly more sensitive to lights. These side effects were supposed to go off in 1 wk to 1 month….I hope they do go off..

The cost intralase lasik $2888 before gst..after gst and togetehr with medication is ~$3138.

I hope this is the last big amount for my makeover..hah.

Oops ugly tripple chin..hehe..the eye shield is to protect eyes from accidental scracthes during sleep..Eyes were matt black after the procedure..kind of scary

Day 2 post LASIK had6/4.5 eyes both side better than normal 6/6

Day 2 still matt black..eye black is eye black, eye white is eye white..unlike normal eyes which is bright and shinny...

Day 3 Eyes back to normal..can see red veins and shinny eyes...but still dry..

2011 1st day of school..K2

Good that he managed to get up earlier, to get ready for school. He has been sleeping late, and wake up late for the whole school holiday..heh

He doesn't grow fast enough, this set of uniform was since nursery..I think we don't need to buy him any new uniform this yr too..so it actually lasted from 3-6yr? with minimal growth..haiz

An evening at Sembawang Shopping Center

1st Swim for 2011

Why is it so special? Cos Kaylen had never need to think when she take the slide..she will zoom down immediately..but this round..she got a bit scared..

Jared never take this slide before..he's scared.

Jared hugging float to swim, I thought him the method...but his leg still don't listen to my instruction..i wonder when can he ever start swimming lesson..

Kaylen got stuckked movie clip

2011 New Year

We spent the day at ah yi’s house.

Watched the Gulliver’s travel at Tampinese Mall, with Jared…then Kaylen and mum came to pick us up and we went to take pics at the playground there. Ever since we had that camera..we love to go places to take more pics..hehe.

at ah yi house..like proffesional studio shoot..jared look so good in this pic

The chocolate lava cake ah yi make