So excited to package and sell our first hamper today!  A friend of mine, C, wanted to buy some gifts for a friend who just gave birth and left it up to me to suggest some appropriate items.  I suggested the Tiny Love Grip & Grasp Stroller Bar, the Baby Einstein Octoplush, the Little Quack's Bath Book and the Baby Einstein Animal Discovery Cards.   To me, its the perfect combination of toys and education.  What I like about the Stroller Bar is that it allows you to place a cup on it.  The bath book is great for keeping baby occupied during bath time and the Octoplush and Flashcards are stimulating and fun at the same time.

I also recently bought the Sassy Take and Talk Phone.  Marc is always intrigued when we talk on the phone and literally trails us around the house when we chat on the phone.  So I decided to get him one of his own.  Didn't take him long to figure out how to use it.  I say "Marc, Mummy is calling you" and I pretend to use my mobile to call him.  He will pick up his toy phone and place it to his ear.  Adorable!

I am still extremely thankful that the Singapore government has increased maternity leave to 4 months. It makes a whole lot of difference especially to breastfeeding moms.

With my 4 months stretch & some accrued 08 leave, I am due to return to the working world again in Feb 09. What is even better is that I am going back on a job-sharing basis! Amazingly, another of my colleague was expecting exactly the same time, thus it worked out well that we could co-share the role. This means being at work for just 2.5 days per week! And of course, without a maid now, mommy would have to look after Isaac for the other 2 days & catch up on the household chores. A perfect arrangement!

Through some contacts, we managed to find a friend’s mom who could babysit Isaac while I return to work. Aunty V stays just 5 minutes drive away & she has even offered to pick Isaac up from our place in the morning if it is too rush for us to send him there! We decided to have a ‘trial’ week to simulate what it is going to be & see if she could manage Isaac at the same time.

So, early on the Monday morning, we dragged all of Isaac’s ‘barang’ – which was A LOT! (bath tub, all his bathing accessories, clothing, expressed milk, toys, bouncer chair…) Luckily, Isaac was in a good mood that day as we didn’t want him scaring his babysitter off on day 1! After settling down, we went through with Aunty V Isaac’s daily schedule, his likes & dislikes & how we usually make him sleep & play with him. Isaac seemed oblivious as to what was happening around him, of course J He just looked around with deep curiosity & smiled whenever someone played with him!

As I needed to send hubby off to the station for work, the time came to bid farewell. This was when I started to feel ‘separation anxiety’, leaving my son in the hands of his carer for the day. Since my delivery day, I have not been away from Isaac for more than an hour & this is the first time I’m  leaving him with someone for a whole day! When I stepped out of the house, kissed Isaac goodbye, I was overwhelmed with emotions…I guess this is what ‘maternal instincts’ is all about!! I just had to keep reminding that Isaac isn’t too far away afterall & comfort myself that I could always go back to see him if need be!

The day went well as Aunty V & I exchanged sms-es. She would update me when Isaac sleeps or feeds & kept assuring me that he was well. As it was a cool, rainy day, Isaac also made our life easier by sleeping about 5hours in a row!

Hubby & I are really happy & thankful that we have found a great nanny, whom we could entrust our son with. Aunty V is super organized, extremely clean, able to converse in both English & Chinese, very responsible & offers help & advices whenever she can. Most importantly, she seems to like Isaac too! A super nanny indeed!!

Last Sunday, I caught "Front of the Class" on TV when it premiered as Hallmark Hall of Fame's 234th presentation (http://corporate.hallmark.com/Current-News/Hallmark-Hall-of-Fame-Presents-Front-of-the-Class). Front of the Class is based on the true story of Brad Cohen, a young man diagnosed with Tourette Syndrome who refuses to give up amidst all odds and eventually becomes a gifted teacher.

Tourette Syndrome (aka Tourette's), according to Wikipedia, is an inherited neuropsychiatric disorder starting from childhood and is characterised by the presence of multiple physical tics and at least one vocal tic. Tourette's is no longer considered a rare condition but it may not always be correctly identified because most cases are classified as mild. Between 1 to 10 children per 1000 have Tourette's, as many as 10 per 1,000 people may have tic disorders, with the more common tics of eye blinking, coughing, throat clearing, sniffing, and facial movements. The severity of the tics decreases for most children as they pass through adolescence, and extreme Tourette's in adulthood is a rarity.

Back to Front of the Class. When Brad was young, his involuntary sounds & sudden jerking movements were seen by teachers and even his own father as attempts to get attention despite his explanations that those sounds & movements were not within his control. His mum refused to accept doctors' inconclusive diagnosis and after much research on her own, finally realised that her son has Tourette's and persevered to encourage her son. In school, Brad was teased mercilessly by his classmates and he hated classes. It was only when a principal believed and recognised his condition and arranged for Brad to explain during a school assembly that the entire faculty finally understood and accepted Brad. It was at this point that Brad decided he was going to become "the teacher he never had". At adulthood, despite impressive college results and glowing recommendations, Brad was turned down in 24 interviews (obviously because of his condition) before he was finally offered a teaching job in Georgia. He even went on to win the Teacher of the Year award for Georgia! 

Brad Cohen in the middle, with the actors depicting him in Front of the Class

Try to watch Front of the Class if you can. There is also a book by Brad Cohen by the title "Front of the Class: How Tourette Syndrome Made Me The Teacher I Never Had". I found the show extremely inspirational and touching. In fact, watching the show made me feel really bad... back home, often when I was getting ready to go to work in the morning, I'll hear this series of loud "hiccups" by an adult man walking past my block. After hearing this "noise" a couple of times, I found myself getting irritated with him, not knowing what he's doing or whether he's trying to be funny. After knowing about Tourette's, I have this strong feeling that the "noisy man" I was so irritated with probably could not control those loud "hiccupping" noise at all.... he may have Tourette's. I suddenly feel so ashamed of myself and so sorry for that man who is probably misunderstood by lots of people around him. 

Through my little effort in this blog, I hope I've at least raised awareness about Tourette's in a few people...   

Isaac received 2 items from his wishlist on Saturday! 

Now, every morning he ernestly awakes to fine music played by his little ducky. With the press of the ducky's arms & legs, he is able to learn different instruments (his favourite one is definitely the drums). The finale would be a kick on the ducky's tummy whereby a combination of instruments create a beautiful symphony orchestra!

The other gift was an enchanting aquarium playmat given by Aunty E from Australia. With the array of colors made up by the bountiful sea animals, Mummy can be freed for a good 1/2 hour as Isaac dives deep down, exploring what lies beneath the peek-a-boo flaps of the mat as he listens to the ongoing classical background music.

A friend from Church bought Marc a superman outfit - here are some shots of him in his outfit at Church...I quite like the cape...

And we welcome all who are willing to work for free at Baby Wishes - no staff member is too young...even Marc can help with inventory lists and invoice creation. :)

The day after Thanksgiving, we set off on a 5-hour drive to Lake Placid, a village in the Adirondack Mountains in Essex County, New York state which is best known as the two-time site of the Winter Olympics in 1932 and 1980. This trip is an early birthday treat from BusyHubby who absolutely hates the cold so I was really really happy when he agreed to bring me to this freezing winter wonderland!

We arrived in Lake Placid at around 5+pm and checked into the Crowne Plaza Resort & Golf Club. It was already dark by then... see the lovely view from the balcony of our hotel room! It was almost fairy tale-like! ;p

Every morning, we'll wake up to this view... really wonderful feeling and it almost felt like we had been transported to another world! The lake in the picture is Mirror Lake... ironically, downtown Lake Placid is located along Mirror Lake and not the nearby Lake Placid ; p I took a picture at our balcony every morning and was captivated by the variations in colors of the sky, lake and surrounding houses each day.

We spent our 3-4 days there exploring the various olympic sites like the Olympic Jumping Complex, Olympic Center & Museum, Olympic Sports Complex... to some people, this may sound very touristy, but it was a really interesting experience for us to see these places for the 1st time and I think we can probably appreciate winter olympics events alot more now : ) Of all the sites we visited, the most memorable one is without doubt the Whiteface Ski Area. The Whiteface Mountain, at 4867 ft is the fifth-highest mountain in NY State, and one of the High Peaks of the Adirondack Mountains. We took a Cloudsplitter Gondola ride which brought us from the base lodge to the top of Whiteface Mountain's neighbour - Little Whiteface (3676 ft) in less than 15 mins!  The view from the top of Little Whiteface was HEAVENLY! Till now I still can't stop looking at the few pictures we took up there!

For those of you who are planning to come to NYC, take a few days off from the buzz of busy NYC and drive up to the Adirondacks region... even during non-snowing months (it apparently snows 5 months in a year!), I'm sure the views are spectacular in a different way. It'll be the most memorable part of your trip.. guaranteed ; p

Last Thursday was Thanksgiving Day!! I'd been hearing alot about the annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade that has been held every year since the 1920s... that morning, I dragged BusyHubby out of bed to check out the parade near our place. The parade which features giant ballons, floats, bands, etc started at 9am from 77th St at Central Park West and proceeds down Broadway. 

We reached 40th St near Broadway at 10am, but by then the crowd made it impossible for us to even catch a glimpse of Broadway! It was really cold, but we heard people saying that they'd been waiting for the parade to start since 6am in the morning! From where we were standing, we managed to see some familiar characters passing by before leaving after an hour : )  

In celebration of this day, instead of having Turkey and other usual Thanksgiving fare, we decided to go Chinese... we had STEAMBOAT!! Few days earlier we went to Chinatown to stock up on steamboat ingredients and since then I'd been talking non-stop abt this meal we're gonna have.. hahaa!! After coming home from the Thanksgiving Day Parade, I started slicing and marinating the beef, chicken and pig liver, then boiled the soup base with chicken bones and carrots. As you can see, we had a REAL FEAST! Other than the meats, we also had prawns, pacific clams, Fuzhou fishballs, tofu fishcakes, wanton, enokitake mushrooms, etc etc. Oh, I almost forgot to mention that we don't have a proper steamboat here and had to use our trusted Zojirushi rice-cooker to do the job! It was a great meal... and what I would call "comfort food" in this cold weather in faraway land : )