Plants at home

It’s said that having indoor plants helps to reduce stress and boost mental well being. I’m not sure if it’s true but I do like to have plants in the house to brighten up the spaces. 

Flowers

Fresh flowers in the house make a whole load of difference, giving it a more welcoming feel. I am happier coz maybe I love flowers especially tulips

It isn’t easy on the wallet to have fresh flowers all the time. So I turn to boring greens. 

Partially this reason why I turned to having a Click n Grow system at home and have lavender leaves (not successful for me but did grow and thrive well in che-che’s room once or twice before) .  

photos taken from my FB post in 15th June 2020

Pansies are beautiful. I love looking at pansies when it’s winter during our family vacations.

Lavender flowers. Aiyoh I’ve changed lavender a few times after the first n second batch mati, and weren’t that successful with lavender flowering thereafter. However the leaves do give off lovely smell

I stopped putting Click n Grow in her room when she went to the US. She didn’t want it anymore after she came back 😢. If only I could put one in my bedside table.

One day when I’m free I’d like to order a nice table arrangement of bright coloured preserved flowers for the home

Greens

It started with the pot of syngonium that Ms Wong gifted me on Mother’s Day in 2021. I continued experimenting with monstera, pennywort, sansevieria (toilet). 

I found out the hard way that monstera adansoni and syngonium thrives easily indoor 

Once in a while will need to put the vase in the A&E corner aka yard area for some sunlight. I usually don’t open the louvre windows in that direction but when I do, it means I need to help with ☀️ 

What is your Felicità?

OMG! My Felicità would be there listening to this in 🇷🇺 with my family. 

Such an upbeat song which I can’t sing coz I can only say  penne all'Arrabbiata and grazie. Need to complain why was I rostered only 2 FCO flights? 

I like this Swiss roll

I buy this Swiss roll once in a while when I’m in Donki. I fell in love with this chewy cake, then lil’ one started to like it too. She also likes Mister Donut, so yah you get an idea she likes things that are doughy chewy. 

$5.90 好容易赚咯！the cake batter is very thin. The cream is a lot but small cake. Good to satiate that sudden craving for cake and it’s guilt-free.

Glutinous rice flour is the key ingredient that sets this apart from other swiss rolls. 

Mister Donut uses tapioca flour and mix into their flour to get that chewy texture, no wonder lil’ one likes it so much coz she loves boba pearls. Next time I should just pour the tapioca flour into her mouth and mix with water, and ask her to swallow 😂😂. Save the hassle of making boba pearls. 

This popped up today, altho she posted a few days ago. Screenshot from @ food_aomi (美食奥秘) Instagram page

I follow her account as she has so many fantastic bakes. Always want to bake but I get tired so I end up looking but not doing anything. 

I should do this one day. Always wanted to bake the decorated swiss rolls since lil’ one was 4? 15 years ago 😂. Bought the books but did nothing. 

Skin problem and Kiehl’s

Noticed che-che’s has a terrible breakout since the last few weeks, which is rare. Told her to find a salon and go facial. Talked but she didn’t do anything, so it means her mother has to do it right? 

Facial services

Now the question is where? Bring her back to my beautician which I haven’t gone back since before covid? Other salons? Where? And I really hate those hard selling packages. Which is why I haven’t been back to my beautician coz they keep wanting to sell products if not new packages. Then I remembered Kiehl’s has a (new?) facial service in Singapore. Not sure when they had that in SIN but I was surprised when I came across a pamphlet when I was in NYC and thought it’ll be nice if we have it here. It’s not easy to make appointment with them, a lot of days even weekdays are fully booked. Finally managed to book her appointment at the end of September. I should book one for myself for another day to try it out. At least if Kiehl’s wanted to hard selling any products, we might have them. 

Possible cause(s)

I believe she is under a lot of stress at work, yet during today’s lunch I saw her scratching her arms and asked if it’s allergic reaction itchy. This girl is mono-syllabic and hardly answers us unless it’s something that she’s interested in, answered me “dunno”. Dr Teo thinks it could also be (1) dry skin coz she never puts any moisturiser + sleeping in aircon room. (2) never use her Cetaphil. She has been using the normal body wash. Lil’ one chipped in “but it’s goat milk” thinking it’s pure. I don’t study the ingredients of both Cetaphil and goat milk but I’m sure there’ll be some ingredients that people with sensitive skin shouldn’t be touching. The price difference tells it all right? Cetaphil is so expensive, Aveda and Kiehl’s is so expensive. I will have to monitor her, worst come to worst bring her back to Dr Chu. 

Honestly I don’t baby the two of them to make sure they follow the facial cleansing regime. Please lah! 23 and 19 still expect me to nag and pull them into the toilet and slap the lotion on them meh? Past few days I notice she was slapping masque almost on a daily basis. But somehow the a-little-smart-me suspected that she shouldn’t be using the Rare Earth Deep Pore mask at this time, I couldn’t tell her coz she wouldn’t believe me and I may be wrong. Anyway, decided that since she’s working today we should drop by Kiehl’s in TMall to check which products to use.

@ Kiehl’s 

Haven’t been shopping in Kiehl’s since a year ago. Officially downgraded to Ruby 😂. I might be downgraded again after Sep 2025? 🤣

It must be a blessing in disguise, I actually have a $20 voucher that will expire on 1st Sep. Just nice I can use it. 

Brought items to recycle. They do accept bottles and containers of items that is only available in the US as well. Yah! I just brought that hugeass bottle of Calendula facial cleanser. 

Recommended some items which we don’t have and to use what I have at home. And 我猜对咯, she shouldn’t use that mask. 

Took pic at home on these products I have at home related to acne usage

Bought 4 items 

Have 4 travel size to choose from 

How is it I’ve never seen the soft cream before? I use the rich & nourishing cream for my going to age anytime soon skin.  

Needed to know the difference between the two

The samples. We have lots at home. lol 

Since on the topic on Kiehl’s, decided to dig up whatever I have posted on FB before. All for my memory sake. 

On This Day - (30th Aug) #Reminders from FB#

30th Aug 2024

Mummy's stomach therapy while waiting for lil' one.

Then we start the eye therapy cycles again. Sigh...

30th Aug 2023

Don't ever bring me there unless you want to hear my high pitch and loud scream, pepper with some 🤬 words. I think I'd be so tired less than 20mins into the game.

30th Aug 2023

TB to July.

The day my daughter made me a fishy lady 😂

たこ焼き was piping hot, she took a piece and was trying to cool 💨 n blew it towards my hand n arm. I was feeling sticky (hot) and wet (rain), iykyk suddenly started 🌧️ flakes on me 🤣

30th Aug 2019

"This young lady would love a glass of wine"

30th Aug 2019

Going to be spell-bound by the aurora borealis and SSO.

30th Aug 2019

Spent 6hrs for a かわいい class, a treasured time with a long time 老朋友 catching up as well.

30th Aug 2012

* tagged along on one of hubby’s business trip to SHA in 2009. While he was working, I arranged for a photo session in the studio on one day. 

At that time, she was still crazy over Hi-5. She was doing the letter 'O'

When will her Prince come to rescue her from the evil mother?

Footnote written in 2020 : Forever my precious #1

Some of you might remember I took this picture as her printout of her birthday invitation card that year.

Pretty mermaid

Was taken like 3 years back?? She was dropping her tooth. She looks so 可爱。

我的小明星！

Very playful during photo shoot. Mummy was real tired, coz this girl eat potato kind, didn't understand what she was suppose to do. I had to translate

Footnote written in 2020 : Yah to think that last time her golden mouth refuses to speak mandarin and she was really ?? (or maybe she was acting. Coz when she did open that mouth and blurt out in chinese, the Berries teacher were shocked. Not that she didn't know the words, but she just pretend.)

And now her chinese is her forte. Total opposite!

Footnote written in 2024 : Coz she don’t make life difficult for her parents and carers, she’s not Aricia. So young already such a cunning and difficult child. 😂

Ask her to point to the strawberries, instinctively she started counting the strawberries. See her pouting lips, can you guess which number was she at?

This was a candid shot

Footnote written in 2020 : I kinda like this coz it was just that moment when they were fooling around and then I heard a click.

Looking back at my kids photos.

Studio shots taken in Shanghai

30th Aug 2011

KZ related to me abt what happened this morning.

Lil' girl's eyes barely open, haven’t brushed teeth, she walked out of bedroom n went to studyroom, did her mountaineering job (chair to highchair) n looked at her time-table for Tuesdays. Stare for quite awhile, think was trying to digest what she's reading in her blurry state. Did her big biz, washup, eat n did her work straightaway.

30th Aug 2011

Guess who wrote this? Lil' girl in her confuse state of mind. "She is both sad and happy"??? And her spelling!!!- hoilday?

On This Day - 29th Aug #Reminders from FB#

29th Aug 2025

* feeling frustrated 

I think nobody is working in CapitaLand !! Had a few transactions which didn't seem to credit my points in and contacted them via contact form coz l had to attach images. One transaction done on ND, more than 7 days and no response. Sent again together with last weekend's two transactions and no response.

29th Aug 2022

Because it's too good.

The leftovers from trimming che-che's lavenders.

Kept this in a small box and spreading the lavender smell from her room to the living area.

29th Aug 2017

I've just taught my girl to be selfish.

She loaned her friend a few books sometime in end of May (think she said it was 7 or 8 books). She had to chase after her for the return in July-Aug. Then when she heard from another friend that her storybooks were confiscated in class by their FT (lil' one n friend in diff class), she went up to the teacher to ask if her book was amongst those confiscated. N she blurted out to tchr abt the long overdue books. I told her she shouldn't get the tchr involved. Not nice betraying friend.

Anyway...

...after some chasing, she only returned one

book - The Longest Whale Song. Can see how destroyed her books are. The other Cupcake Diaries book went through her and returned destroyed as well.

I've used another J.Wilson book - Cookie- as well as the books in che-che's bedside shelf to see the comparison at how well our books are maintained.

Her friend has yet to return the rests and then told lil' one she bought her one book in exchange for another book also destroyed. Lil' one told her she wanted the original books back. Anyway, what are we going to do with the extra Harry Potter book? Don't forget I have a die-hard HP fan at home.

I guess I should know the condition of the rests of her books, the remaining 6-7 books.

We will not ask for the return anymore. I told girl never to lend her friend books again. Be a selfish person.

Footnote written in 2020 : And we never got those books back.

29th Aug 2014

Handmade mooncakes by a dear friend. Feeling a little loved.

Footnote written in 2022 : 

A good reminder from FB on these yummy handmade mooncakes.

Tho I like snowskin's skin, I prefer the spiral teochew mooncake. #wasiteochewahnia# and I was so fascinated looking at the neat spirals while rotating the box

Told myself then that I should learn to make the mooncake, I did watch YouTube videos on that.

FFWD 8 years later still nothing is done 🤣. And now nobody likes to eat mooncake.

29th Aug 2015

Looking through the list.

Me: "vegetable?! What vegetable? Who BBQs vegetables? (Coz l'm thinking of kangkong, lettuce those kind of veggies. Now as I think ..it's possible - eggplants, cucumber)

Che-che : "Dunno. xxx says she'll get the vegetables."

Me: "Then just bbq like that? Eee... Can marinade with teriyaki sauce."

Che-che: "yah…..that's why the senior says they'll get the sauce. U see the 'sauce' I indicated on the list?" Me: "But ....do they know what sauce? So vague, can be tomato sauce, chilli sauce, oyster sauce." Che-che : "oh yah hor!" Wah... 😅 Youll Song, you think we need to position ourselves somewhere nearby to see what disastrous food the girls cook? And maybe standby Macs for them? 

29th Aug 2014

#exhausted#frustrated#wannasmackmygirlsiftheydar etocomplainagain#dontmesswithagrouchylady#anyo nerequiresentertainmentpleasehelpbabysitthelittleon e#

Really exhausted! For the first time I slept thru steaming till beautician woke me up. Been on solo since hubby left to work in July. I'm exhausted mentally & physically handling everything all by myself. Argh!!!!!!

29th Aug 2012

Conversation between me n lil' one

A: Mummy, how do u read that one?

M：潮州鱼圆粿条面。

A:What is 潮州？

M: Its a dialect group. I means a province, a very big city. Mummy's a #), do u know what is your dialect group?

A: (gave me a vy blur look)

M：你是哪个洲人

A: (eyes widened n smiling) I know.... 肉粥 eh no no I'm a 鱼粥 or maybe Shark 粥, correct?

* slap head* message not brought across obviously.