Flashback Friday #12

16 June 2011: My boy took his first assisted step with his walker! He could stand, and move a little on his own bed from 7-8 months old, but he never dared to use the walker he had in his room to venture into the world of walking. At 9 months old, we finally got him to stand with his walker, and we got a huge surprise to see him take a step with it!

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P.S. been kind of busy running all sorts of errands (work and personal), and OB appointments are now bi-weekly. I've also been feeling tired all the time! I haven't had the time (and motivation, since all I want to do is sleep nowadays) to really get down to blog about Blake's birthday parties. And today, Blake developed fever in school! I had to rush over to his school immediately to bring him home. It's also the last lap for this pregnancy! Another 2 more months, and I'll see my baby girl! :)

Flashback Friday #11

Decided to bring this particular past event forward. It is to mark one year after Blake's surgery last year. I will return to the chronological order of super backdated posts after this.

22 September 2011: Blake went for a surgery about two weeks after celebrating his first birthday. The surgery had something to do with his private and sensitive areas.

We went to the hospital, praying for the best, but not expecting things to be in our good favor. I was even prepared to bring Blake in for a second surgery when he is older, as part of the recommended process by his specialist and surgeon.

As it turns out, the result of the operation brought great news to us! Everything went successfully, and it exceeded everything we expected! There will be no need for a second surgery. But the most important of all, we don’t have to worry about Blake's self-esteem and emotional confidence when he's older :D

Before going into the operating theatre.
Sean went in with him, and came out after Blake fell asleep from GA.

I waited outside, since only one of us was allowed to follow Blake in.

After Sean came out, we went to grab a bite while waiting for Blake's surgery to be done.


After the surgery, which bore awesome news to us,
Blake continued sleeping till the GA wore off in the late afternoon.


A little after the GA wore off, and he woke up


By dinner time, he was back to his normal happy self :)

We stayed over for a night, cos I was afraid of possible complications.

His surgeon assured me that it's a normal day surgery, and that we can head home, but I'd rather play safe, and have him check on Blake first thing the next morning before going home with a complete peace of mind.

Mommy's brave boy!

Civil Defence Heritage Gallery

The day after Blake’s birthday celebration in school (will do a post on that as soon as I have the edited photos from the photographer), Sean had the day off so we decided to take Blake out on a trip to visit the Civil Defence Heritage Gallery. I have thought of bringing him down a couple of times, but was never really motivated to. Hehe.

The day started out slow, and we actually spent more time at Funan DigitaLife Mall. Haha. There was an ELM Tree book fair, where we bought over $100 worth of books for Blake, and Sean and I took some time to window shop for a new mobile phone for yours truly.

In between, Blake played with ride-on machines, fell asleep, and we had lunch. I thought we would never make it to the gallery, cos it closes at 5pm.

We finally made our way over to the gallery, when we ran out of things to see and do at the mall. We still had about an hour left before they closed.

It turned out to be quite a small place, and we did not even need an hour to explore the whole place! It has two floors of exhibits, with most of the fire fighting related display on the first floor, and the rest on the second.

Blake had the most fun on the first floor. He kept climbing in and out of the fire engines, turned the hose reels, and played with an old school telephone.

He even attempted to climb on fire engine exhibits that prohibit climbing!

He also tried to get Sean to carry him up to one of them, but Sean took him away instead. Haha. It was quite a funny sight cos Blake was going, "No! NO! NO!!!" and kept pointing towards the fire engine he wanted get onto. He even tried to steer Sean towards it by using his body weight while Sean was carrying him.

The second floor has more interactive display, but I guess it’s mostly suited for older children. Blake didn’t really appreciate it much.

We left after spending about 30 minutes there cos Blake was starting to throw tantrums when he couldn’t climb onto some of the fire engines on display. We took the struggling boy out, and when he saw a field with pigeons just next to the gallery, he was back to his normal happy self again.

We gave him time to run and chase the birds before heading over to the club for a swim, dinner and then, finally, calling it a day.

Gallery Opening Hours:
Tuesdays - Sundays, 10am - 5pm (including public holidays)
Closed on Mondays

For more information, visit their website

Blake's 2nd Birthday - Preparations

Plans for Blake’s 2^nd birthday celebration started as early as January – selecting of theme(s), caterer, baker, testing out various party favor ideas etc. Sounds like a huge project, yes? It is to me! But I didn’t go into full force till the month before the party, though the venue was booked 6 months in advance. Hehe.

Initially, I came up with two birthday party themes, both of which are his favourite English cartoons – Fisher Price Little People and BBC’s The Octonauts. Then, I realized I had to choose only one, cos at that time, Blake hadn’t attended preschool yet. I was so torn between the two; I stopped thinking about the party altogether! That is, until Blake started school... His first birthday party in school! Hehe. So glad I managed to use both themes in the end, cos I had so much fun experimenting with the party favors! J

Starting early also gave me time to look for bakers. The bakery I was relying on from the very beginning decided to close for a few months worth of renovating works, slated 1-2 weeks before Blake’s birthday party! Thankfully, I found out about this closure rather early on, and with a plea on Facebook, I managed to find another baker in time. I think she will be our permanent baker too! J More on her, and the photographer we hired to take beautiful photos for us, in later posts.

Once majority of the outsourced items were settled, and I have confirmed the day of celebration in school, I focused on the items that I needed to work on. Then, I found out that Blake’s birthday celebration falls on the same day the school will be celebrating teacher’s day, so it’s kind of a double-whammy for me. I have to prepare party favors for his schoolmates, and gifts for the teachers!

Alright, enough of words. I shall now let the photos do the talking :P

Colourful gift boxes I made for the party favors

Packing and sealing them up!

Phew! All 50 boxes, done!

Made some Cookies and Cream Muffins for the children too, cos it coincides with their tea-break, and I wasn’t sure if the cake was going to be enough to go all around the school.

Packed the muffins along with packs of Oreo cookies, cos the very crazy me bought 4 boxes worth of Oreos from NTUC when I saw they had the 100^th Birthday Box that came with a glass. Haha.

(Yes, I just had to have the ‘Daddy’, ‘Mommy’, and 2 ‘Me’ glasses!)

More cookies and cream muffins, but this time round it’s for the teachers!

They like the muffins I baked, so I thought this would be more appropriate as a party favour to them, 
instead of the kiddy items in the gift pack.

Moving on to teacher’s day gift!

I thought about it for quite a while, and it seemed fitting to give them gifts related to flowers cos the preschool is called Honey Tree (considering all the teachers are females too)!

I came up with this in the end,

Ok, ending abruptly now. I shall leave you with a picture taken during Blake’s birthday celebration in school with my own personal camera. Yes yes, I know, hire photographer already still bring my own camera along to take photos. Haha. What can I say? I love photos!

♥

Flashback Friday #10

26 May 2011: Blake practically wolfed down the biscuit we gave him! We were pretty surprised (in a good way). Babies are so amazing!

3 June 2011: Had dinner at IKEA Tampines when we went to look at some furniture. This cute lil’ one burst out laughing at his pacifier clipper jiggling in front of him! Hehe.

Flashback Friday #9

26 May 2011: Because taking photos are fun!!! :D

A Week of Partying

Just a short post for this weekend.

With Blake’s birthday coming up (he’s turning 2!), I have a really busy week ahead of me!

I have to prepare for not one, but TWO birthday parties this year – one in school, and one at home. On top of that, the day we will be celebrating his birthday in school, is also the day the school will be celebrating teacher’s day!

I’m also attending my boss/friend’s baby girls’ first month celebration this weekend.

Gifts all around for everyone!

Here’s what I bought and put together for my boss/friend’s baby girl’s first month celebration. My version of a baby diaper cake:

And, a sneak preview of the party favor boxes I made for Blake’s birthday party in school (50 in total!):

Have yet to start work on his teachers’ day gifts (got to make 10!), and party favors for his party at home (at least 30!). Oh, the rush! Wish me luck!