Self feeding puffs at 7 months old. Baby led weaning

Our active explorerTiffany has reached another milestone of her life! Learning how to eat puffs! These plum baby organic puffs are healthy, no salt and sugar added, melts in the mouth and easy to chew.
As she doesn't have teeth and she is 7 months old, we were skeptical initially as Trinity had teeth at 5 months old. But we learnt from our friend Tricia, that the gums are sharp with the teeth right underneath. So we tried by holding one puff and let her take a bite to see the response. She took a little bite and chewed for a while and swallowed before asking for the next bite! We were so touched and amazed with the wisdom that God has given her and after trying a few puffs, we invited her to sit in her bumbo seat with her bumbo table and placed a few puffs onto her baby bjorn plate (which is specially designed to encourage self feeding and it is proven to work with Trinity who self fed independently by 11 months old) and let her explore and pick up the pieces independently. So proud of my darling Tiffany! This is her first time trying, practice makes perfect so we will cheer her on as her perfect her pincer grip and eat independently!

Taiwanese Braised Beef noodles

I have not been to Taiwan yet, but I had a chance to eat Taiwanese braised beef noodles cooked by my dear Taiwanese friend years ago. Many years later, I decided to recreate the taste I have eaten and it is very similar. My family enjoyed it and I hope you will try it too! I used pressure cooker in this recipe to speed up the time, if not, you could always boil the beef till tender and soft.

Here's the ingredients:

1 clove of garlic
1 large onion, halved
1 carrot sliced into chunks
4 tomatoes
1kg beef muscle.

3 bowls of water, about 1.5l
2 teaspoon dark soy,
2 teaspoon light soy,
2 teaspoon rice vinegar,
1 teaspoon sugar
1 star anise

Noodles from teabox, a Taiwanese store from sembawang shopping centre. Alternatively you can get dried packed udon, as long as the noodles selected is chewy.

1. Stir fry garlic, onions, carrots, tomatoes and beef until fragrant and slightly softened.
2. Add the rest of the ingredients and use pressure cooker cook. Alternatively stew the beef till tender.
3. Remove oil from the surface of the soup.
4. According to the instructions of your chosen noodles, cook it, wash in cold water and drain.
5. Add soup to a serving of noodles and enjoy!

Inspiring yummy mummies
PoshPearl

Cooking Tip: an ingenious way to scrap yummy sauces off your wok

So after cooking the yummy dish, be it sambal stir fry or braised meat, there's always sauce or a little gravy left behind. How do you fully utilize the yummy sauces and not waste it soaking with soapy water in the sink?

For me, I will get hot steaming rice and coat the sauce onto each grain and make sure that my wok is clean as well. Killing two birds with one stone!

So what do you get? Easy to wash wok and flavorful rice!

Inspiring yummy mummies
PoshPearl

Opinion on child raising

Baking bread now! 2 loaves, chocolate chip and fruit & nuts. I conclude that baking bread is like raising a child. Under proof or over proof will not maximize the bread's optimum texture, just like raising a child, nature and nature are both equally important and we have to nurture our children to their best potential.

Personally, I believe in nurturing. Just a child born in a family of doctors, if abducted by thieves and raised by them, he will never get a chance to be a doctor if he doesn't have the means to proper education and learning from his real family.
Similarly, a child who is adopted by a family of educators will be raised to be a person of good values.

Of course one may argue about peer influence and that one might go astray, but peer influence or pressure, my friend, is a form of "nurture" as well, in my opinion, "Nurtured" by friends to become someone else. In another words, as long as a person is under an
Environment with certain people, after sometime, that person will be "nurtured" or influenced to become like the people around them.
But is it possible not to be influenced?
Yes. With a strong and firm foundation of values, beliefs and knowledge, one is rooted and will not be easily strayed. This is because the person has his own identity and need not succumb to unnecessary pressure to become someone he doesn't like.

So start nurturing your children from birth. Believe in their ability to learn. Never underestimate a child's ability and potential and they will never fail to
amaze you!

Inspiring yummy mummies
PoshPearl

Ever felt condemned?

INTENSITY. What is like when there are no grey areas? This is what it's like.
You LOVE like there's no tomorrow and you HATE till you can visualize the person ripped into two. The PAIN is so great till you feel blood gushing out from your side when the cold metal pierces right into your organs with no apologies.
You TRY your best to balance your love and hate but to only FAIL and feel utterly USELESS.
SELF EFFORT is FUTILE and you have fallen from GRACE when you realize the HURT you have caused to the one you LOVE MOST.
You feel like DYING and the emotional PAIN is much greater than the physical pain. So much so that self mutilation is redundant and serves no purpose. So much so that you wish by injuring yourself can salvage the HURT you have inflicted onto the one you LOVE most.

You JUMP. You jump into this dark hole. SO LOST and SO CONDEMNED. Screaming but there's no voice. Crying, but there's no tears. Fresh dark blood continues to flow and soon your clothes are stained and wet. It's cold in the PAIN is getting more and more intense till you feel numb. You have forgotten how much wounds there are. As you jump mid way, you noticed a rope. Is it too late? You decided to grab hold of the rope, clinging on.

"I'm here!" A familiar voice calls out. A voice that is so calming and secure. A voice that makes your tears flow. A voice that gives you strength to find your own voice back. You see the familiar figure at the top of the hole.
"Help me! Pull me up!" You say. The person refuses to pull you up. Instead, the person JUMPED into the well together with you, as you stare with shock, in disbelief.

In the process, the person broke his ribs. The sharp concrete edges of the hole cause great damage to his skull, piercing through like a crown of thorns. His flesh torn off like stripes of flesh for the tigers. His blood gushed out. More profusely then yours. It kept on flowing like a river.

"What are you doing? Stop hurting yourself!" You say.

"I LOVE YOU." With that, he STRETCHED out his arms and DIED.

You realize that his blood has covered you. From the crown of your HEAD to the soles of your FEET. Suddenly, you do not feel the pain anymore. Still holding on to the rope, you turned round to check. Your wounds are GONE. You are HEALED! But you have not more strength left in you. You are so TIRED. SO, SO, TIRED. You give up. You had enough. You have NO CHOICE but to let go.

"Goodbye." With that, you release your rope. You thought you will plunge to your death. Only to find out that you have landed on ground. You were only inches away from the ground all this while. But because you refuse to let go, that caused your depletion of energy. You looked up and muttered to yourself that the opening is not that far after all. In fact, it is getting nearer and nearer! You feel light and BOLD. You feel energetic. What is happening?

This is when you realize that you are on the shoulders on the familiar figure! Not only is he not hurt, he is flawless and without blemished. He seemed..INVINCIBLE and there's this GLOW. This MIGHTY AURORA around him. He walked on air and walked his way up on reach the opening. He carried you and brought you to a lake and gives you food and water, because he thought you must be hungry and thirsty.

Still in amazement and finding it too good to be true, you wanted to ask if this was a dream. That is when you realize that it is not. It is reality. The wounds are still there. But you have been healed. You are not condemned. All the wrongs have been forgiven, PAST, PRESENT, and even FUTURE. You hug the familiar figure and ask, " I wanna return to be with you. Can I still love you again?"

He says," It is not your love for me, but MY LOVE FOR YOU."

And that marks the beginning of your new journey. A journey that is different. A journey that is PROTECTED in HIS BLOOD. From the crown of your head, to the soles of your feet. HIS BLOOD, from he who is PERFECT but took on flesh, to BLEED and to be hurt and to DIE for you.

And you rejoice. For he has been RESURRECTED. WHOLE and INVINCIBLE. And he did it JUST FOR YOU. Just because HE LOVES YOU.

What's His name? His name is Jesus Christ.

Be loved today!
PoshPearl

The big sister

On the day we found out we were expecting Tiffany at 19 weeks ...

Everytime when we have shopping trips with Trini and we look at children's clothes, Trini will tell us if it is nice or not. But today, after we know that we r expecting Tiffany and was looking at baby clothes, we picked up a piece of clothing and the first words that Trini said wasn't "nice" or "not nice." instead, she said? "For me?"

At that moment, it dawned on me that Trini has a revelation that Tiffany is joining our family and from now on, Trini will be considering about things, whether it Is for Tiffany or herself.

There is this indescribable feeling that I have towards my 2 year old daughter. I'm so touched and amazed at her level of wisdom and understanding.

I feel that Tiffany is so blessed to have an awesome and gracious sister named Trinity and this journey of sisterhood covenant will only get closer and sweeter.

Inspiring yummy mummies
PoshPearl

Reflection on Love

"I love you." 3 simple words with various degree of depth and intensity to every individual. Many a times, love is selfish. To love, to possess, to even manipulate a desired outcome.
But, you see, love in this way will never lead to true happiness. Temporal satisfaction from each other cannot lead to eternity. In fact, the more you demand, the more insatiable you become. In the process, you become greedy and even when you have full possession of the person, you are still empty.
But when love is selfless, it becomes beautiful. The true love of never expecting anything in return makes one appreciate you more. Perhaps the world may think that you are, plainly speaking, stupid. But, you have won over the person you love wholly. That is because when you were selflessly allowing yourself to be hurt and vulnerable to the outside world, you were actually using yourself to protect and save the person you love the most.
Just like when Jesus hang on the cross to die for our sins because he love us so much. Don't you think so?

Child led weaning: a special and exclusive journey I shared with my first born, Trinity, from 8th Sept 2009- 28th Feb 2011

It is finished.

Finished. Not to symbolize an end but to mark a new developmental milestone.



And so I swore that I would breastfeed till at least when Trinity was 6 months old. However, the initial period was so terrifying, I'd thought I would have never made it through.



Severe low milk supply that cause Trinity to have Starvation Jaundice. She was hospitalized for 3 days 2 nights and I cried for 6 hours on that day she was admitted, forcing myself to eat so that I could still have milk for her.



Stress was the main reason for the low supply. That was when I decided to focus on Jesus and let him take over. I went to Mrs Wong at Thomson Parent craft and she helped tremendously in assessing and providing tips for increase of milk flow. (Thank you Mrs Wong, Lilian and Team!!! Eternal gratefulness!)



By the time Trinity was 2 months old, she only needed 1 side per feed. By the time she was 5 months olld and I was going back to work, I had more than 150 packets of frozen breastmilk on reserve for her.



I continued to pump at work and let her feed on demand after work and started supplementing her with formula when she was about 11 months old.



After 12 months old, I felt that she will need to stop eventually but I prayed and believed for a child initiated weaning as I did not want any tears, agony and pain. I wanted her to be ready herself.

2 weeks ago, she started to tell me that I didnt have milk. She asked for Formula and she started to sleep throughout the night. She didn't need to latch on to sleep. She didn't need any comfort feeding.

Though I was sad as this exclusive bonding journey has come to an end, I am happy for her!

We had communion and prayed over her that the journey ahead will be even better. :)



Genesis 21:8 And the child grew, and was weaned: and Abraham made a great feast the same day that Isaac was weaned.



Thank you Trinity for this special journey, Mummy will never forget this , :) I love you.p

Review on Daiso mini ball scoop, long bento sticks, silicon dish and lunch box

A quick review for parents who would like to prepare a fast and fuss free snack bento!

The mini ball scoop is easy to use for both adults and children. My daughter scooped the persimmon balls easily and enjoyed herself.

I also found the long bento sticks useful to make fruit skewers which are appealing to young children. I used persimmons today, but could foresee sticks of kiwi, apple, grapes, oranges etc... Yummy!

The silicon dishes are easy to wash and the malleable shapes makes it a breeze to suit all kinds of bento boxes.

The snack box is small and suitable for children to maneuver independently.

Overall, the items are all value for money and it value adds to your child's packed bentos!

Inspiring yummy mummies,
PoshPearl