Birthday Coming Soon!

My birthday is coming soon!

As the whole world will be on leave from the office next week, my immediate boss decided to give me a lunch treat today so another colleague could join in the 'celebration' as well. We went to Andre, this french restaurant opposite our office.

Despite having been at this office for 3 months, I NEVER knew the existence of this restaurant. I didn't know what I thought existed before, but I would never think a little french restaurant would be what is occupying the space. Anyway, we decided to make do with that since we had little time left for lunch to go further and the restaurant had the praises of our big boss who according to everyone, 'has a fine taste'.

They offer ala carte menu, 3 course set lunches and 5 course set lunches. The 3 course set lunch consists of an appetizer/soup of the day, a main course and a dessert of the day and prices of the set lunch starts from $20.99 to $45.90 depending on the main course selected. Sounds reasonable. We all decided to take the 3 course set lunch. My colleague and I settled for the seafood linguine and my boss had the chunky beef stew (I forgot the foreign french name for the dish). I also had the soup of the day, which is the pumpkin soup and some western red bean paste was the dessert.

The pumpkin soup was one of the best I've ever tasted. I don't normally like pumpkin soup because they are usually too thick and sweet, but this is done just nice, though at first glance, my boss thought the soup looked diluted. The main course was great, slightly spicy, with enough seafood to last through the whole main course. I found dessert so-so, actually quite good, for the fact I don't like red bean (or any vegetables for that matter) but I actually finished half of the dessert. My boss' beef stew was good too. The meat wasn't too tough, like how it possibly could be sometimes, with nice wine aroma. We were really satisfied with the food overall.

Ambience wise, the space in the restaurant was really limited and exuded a homely feel. However, I do not care much for the service. I couldn't really get what the server was saying due to his strong Thai accent and the other lady serving was as cold as ice.

I could go there again if I crave a good pasta in a hidden corner.

I love birthdays and treats. Another one is coming my way! Desmond will be taking me to Swissotel the Stamford for Champagne brunch this sunday! I'm definitely looking forward to it. However, I'm quite tempted to tell him to give me a birthday present I just saw online instead. It's gorgeous and comes with a gorgeous price tag too. I think he'll faint if I really propose that. LOL.

Guess the price. :)

Thumbs Up for Huggies.com

I am an avid fan of Huggies diapers. So far, it's been the most satisfactory of all the diapers I've tried for my little princess and I'll grab packets of these Huggies diapers whenever there's an offer at the supermarkets. Anyway, I'm not here to get into diapers comparison today - I'll do that another day.

What I want to talk about is the Huggies website. I happen to see the little ad on their diaper pack asking parents to visit Huggies.com for more information, advice and promotions on Huggies product. Since I always buy Huggies diaper, the word 'promotion' was of course, calling out to me loudly. However, that thought only lived in my brain for a mere 5 minutes before I forgot about it completely.

My trip to NTUC yesterday reminded me I needed to go to Huggies.com. They had a promotion where parents who bought the Huggies Ultra for Newborn could stand a chance to win a cool-looking nursery set from Mothercare. I wished they had this promotion earlier. I would have grabbed tons of those diapers. Even though I don't qualify for the promotion anymore as my darling girl has be promoted to wearing M size diapers, I decided I NEED to check out Huggies.com.

I was greeted by this pleasant looking page. Information was divided into mum-to-be and parenthood. An attempt was made to let users zoom in on the information they may find most useful once they get into Huggies.com. Of course, I needed to join the Huggies Club to enjoy special privileges and promotions so the next thing I did was to sign up as a member.
What was commendable during sign up was an effort was made to explain to users why huggies.com needed the information they were asking for. It gave assurance to users that 1)They were not asking for information for the sake of asking, 2)They knew what they were doing with your information, 3)Misuse of information will be kept minimal.

I received a welcome email from them immediately after sign up confirmation.

And to further orientate members on Huggies.com, they even explain the various features of huggies.com in the email, complete with links to the section itself if you happen to decide on the spot that you want information from that section. So far, I was very impressed with sign up procedures. It is a demonstration of engineering a product with the consumers in mind.

Usage of the website for information was easy. While some websites e.g. www.babycenter.com.sg categorise information according to the age of the baby, and then some common problems that parents may face (which is good for parents who generally want to prepare themselves and know what to expect during their child's development), huggies.com categorises information according to the common problems parents may face. Straight to the point, parents get solutions to problems with little navigation around the website.

Overall, it is an extremely pleasant website for parents to get information from. It is truly a website built with parents in mind.

Now I'm just waiting to receive some good offers on those diapers.

It Is NOT My Day!!!

URGH!!! Firstly, Mahjong Princess (a.k.a Me, since now Desmond's Ah Ma is the REAL Mahjong Queen) didn't win Mahjong again today! After 2 rounds of battle, I lost 32 bucks. I was actually looking good at the beginning, with a couple of diao zeng and quite a bit of zi mos. Who knows, I still emerged a loser at the end of the night! URGH!!!

Then Desmond and I went for supper. I thought it was a nice supper outing until we were on our way home. For some unknown reasons, I decided to run my fingers through my hair. Then I thought there were something strange about my hair. It felt like there was some cobweb of sorts of thing on my hair. Suddenly, this huge black insect, which I immediately identified as a cockroach, flew from my head, down my shoulder, onto my thighs and disappeared somewhere in the car! I was so terrified that I was jumping about in the car and demanded that Desmond stop the car right that minute. I even wanted to vaccuum the car then to get rid of the bloody roach because I was determined to walk home if there was even the slightest chance that the roach might still be around. Helpless, Desmond had to give me money to take a cab home while he drove back alone in the roach infested car, as he argued that it's too dark for us to be vaccuuming the car at that time and there will be no way we could spot the insect. I felt so filthy that I went for a good shower after I got home. I'm still in shock despite that happening some 2 hours ago. URGH!!!

Now I'm trying to find some information for my work, but to no avail. The Koreans and New Zealanders should learn from the Aussies and improve their national statistics system! URGH!!
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'Should I Continue to Breastfeed Post 6 Months' Poll Results

Dear Peeps!

Thanks for taking time off to vote for the poll. All votes received indicated that all peeps who voted are avid supporters of breastfeeding and have encouraged me to continue doing so. That is most certainly what I'll try to do, even though I have to go to Australia in mid May for 10 days. Hopefully little Baby will continue to like to be breastfed even after I return from my trip. She is already showing signs of resisting breast milk (according to the infant care teachers) and preferring formula milk instead. *Sigh*

Anyway, yes, I have started introducing infant formula as well because there will be no way I can store enough milk for her to consume while I'm away in Australia. I decide to introduce breast milk to her early so she has sufficient time to get used to formula milk because I read on some websites that some babies may have problem weaning off, as they are more used to breast milk and would refuse formula. She doesn't seem to have any problems with the formula, or any brands so, so far, my worries are really unfounded. I just knew she's an adaptable baby.

Anyway, I think she should be a big baby instead of little baby now.

It's incredible how much she has grown in less than 6 months. No wonder Patrick kept telling me that I'll miss the time when she is small.

Nevertheless, I'm still looking forward to her calling me 'mummy' some time soon.

Online Presence - Futuristic or Need?

This is sort of something I heard yesterday:

"The other people here don't have vision. They are not futuristic like us. That's why we are moving to online now. We are seeing the shift of advertising budget to the internet. We must be involved with the internet, even if we are not making money."

A couple of thoughts on this statement:

• Firstly, what is so futuristic about having an online presence? It's NOT futuristic. It is what businesses HAVE to do NOW. According to AC Nielsen media index 2008 (mind you, not 2010), 2/3 of Singaporeans consume about 3 or more media for their daily news and entertainment needs and among these media consumed, internet, along with the newspaper and terrestial TV emerged top. Some even claim they cannot live without their mobile phones or the internet. Now, doesn't this make the internet more or less imperative if businesses wish to reach the mass? This is not to mention the other benefits of online marketing such as interactivity and accountability.

What's futuristic? According to thefreedictionary.com, it is "Being ahead of the times; innovative or revolutionary." Merely having an online presence doesn't qualify as being futuristic. Futuristic is perhaps having a burger popping out of one's laptop screen after an order at MacDonald's.com is completed. Of course, we know that this is not possible.

• Secondly, it is no longer about having an online presence or not. Alot of money have already been shifted to the internet, not just now. It is about being practical and offering the right things to your target audience. Businesses can have online presence for relatively low cost compared to other business start-ups so it is really not a difficult thing to achieve. It is really about interacting with consumers and moulding one's business to really suit the target consumer constantly. If the art of business is about keeping up with the times, then this is only too true when it comes to the internet.

• Lastly, what nonsense. Of course money must be made, otherwise what is the online presence for?

Maybe whoever made that speech should go back to Business/Marketing 101.

Ugly blog

Dear peeps, I'm sorry if my blog has become ugly again.

After I went for 2 web design classes, I thought I'll try my hands at creating my blog skin again. However, it is really not as easy as I thought it would be. First of all, java script and CSS knowledge is needed for blog skins creation. I am clueless when it comes to both stuff. I only know CSS very very briefly and java scripting is a total stranger to me.

I thought I might take a look at how other people did the coding for linking blog skin to the actual functionality of a blog, however, once I changed the blog skin of my blog to something else, I could not retrieve my previous little ah ma blog skin again. This is means I'm stuck with the current unattractive blog skin, until I finally create my own skin. I'll put up the tagboard soon enough though.

One thing I learnt from my web design class, other than web design itself, was that it's really not easy to be a web designer or developer. Many skill sets are required - you must know web developing software, photo editing softwares, programming etc and lots of planning are required for a nice website. Although the WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) softwares made life alot easier already, it's really still a very tough thing to do (at least for a newbie like me).

So, salutes to the web designers out there and hope I can create my blogskin soon!

Breastfeeding Blues

Alyssa Baby is now 5.5 months old, which means I have been breastfeeding for close to half a year! This is an achievement to me. When I first started breastfeeding, I really wonder if I could ever last for 6 months. That looked like a damn bloody long time to me. Trust me, breastfeeding isn't a fun thing at all and I can still feel the pain when I see new mothers trying to breastfeed.

Desmond, Alyssa Baby and I attended the 'full moon party' (one-month celebration) of Desmond's friend's baby last Saturday. I was in the baby's room breastfeeding when the mother walked in and ask if I'm still breastfeeding fully. She was envious when I told her that Alyssa is still exclusively breastfed and asked if I have alot of milk. I asked her how much she could pump out, to which she replied 80ml. Now, seriously, 80ml of milk is a decent amount to drink for newborns! Alyssa only drank 60ml of milk when she was two months old and 90ml when she was 3 months old. She was convinced by her confinement nanny that she doesn't have enough milk for her baby to drink and supplemented her baby with formula milk.

Now, this milk quantity thing is a pain for many breastfeeding mothers. People from the older generation are used to being able to see how much the baby is being fed and they sometimes doubt if the small-looking boobs of the mothers can contain enough for the baby. It doesn't help when breast milk is more easily digested and absorbed by the baby so they need to be fed more regularly than formula-fed babies, thus perpetuating the misconception of 'insufficient milk' further. What usually happens next is that 1) the mother will be pressurised by the entire world to supplement the baby's diet with formula or 2) the mother will be convinced she doesn't have enough milk and supplement the baby's diet with formula milk. The inability to breastfeed on the 'lack of milk'.

Milk supply is of the fundamental economics principle of demand and supply. The more the baby drinks, the more the boobs will produce milk. Supplementing breast milk with formula milk will only lessen the baby's demand for breast milk, leading to a lower production. Many mothers will say 'but I pumped and could only get 'x'ml!' Well, one thing they don't know is that pump is not an efficient method to extract milk from the breasts! Babies are able to extract milk more efficiently than any pump, which really means they drink more milk than what could be expressed with a pump. Also, if mothers would continue pumping, they would realise that milk will flow for as long as they pump. That means, if mothers pumped for 2 hours, milk will continue to flow for 2 hours (with short pauses in between). If they let the baby latch on for as long as they need to get enough milk, they really don't have to worry that they do not have enough milk for the baby.

I was lucky no one pressured me to supplement my baby's diet with formula (all thanks to the nurse at Mount Alvernia who announced to the whole world that I have alot of milk. I don't think I really have alot of milk but she was trying to be as encouraging as possible). However, I faced the problem of being pressurised to feed my baby water. Again, as formula-fed have to be fed water to prevent them from being constipated and being so used to formula-feeding, people from the older generation thinks that baby needs to be fed water. However, they do not know that breast milk is actually high in water content so breastfed babies DO NOT need to be fed water. It is in fact not advisable to feed the baby water because 1) To feed baby water, it has to be through a milk bottle. To make the baby adapt to the breasts fast and feed properly, it's best NOT to introduce bottles or pacifiers to them and 2) Water can affect baby's demand for breast milk, thus affecting the breast milk supply. My parents know nothing about breastfeeding and accused me of being too lazy to even feed my baby water in the beginning. Now they haven't said a thing since my baby survived for this long but that was quite something to bear.

Of course, what is the breastfeeding experience without the pain??? I think I mentioned the pain before in a previous post. That might be the worst pain anyone can experience, other than the labour itself.

Breastfeeding is actually the most fundamental stuff of child caring and it's ironic how people have made it so difficult for a mother to care for her child. Although more people are opting to breastfeed, but more education needs to be done to help these mothers withstand and eventually enjoy the breastfeeding experience.

I'm glad I managed to pull through so far for my baby.