OF BEING ILL AND MEDICATED

I was ill last week and the cough just wouldn't go away.  But then again...my tonsils were so badly swollen that even swallowing my saliva was painful.

Then it hit Jonathan.  He came down with blocked nose then escalated to infected lungs.  With all the chest physio and Ventolin inhalant treatment, and thankfully, after 3 days of antibiotics, the doctor said his lungs are all clear.  But we still have to nurse his blocked and sometimes runny nose that is slowly recovering.

Thank you Lord for his speedy recovery.

One of the treatments that we have learned since Jonathan was 3 years old, was introduced by a GP who felt that giving Ventolin orally wasn't good for Jonathan's body.  She explained that taking oral Ventolin not only helps to clear the respiratory tract and lungs, but also affect other parts of the body.

She was right.  Whenever Jonathan took Ventolin orally, he became so hyper that sleeping at night was difficult.  She recommended we use the Ventolin inhalant.  But because he was too young and didn't know how to inhale from the puffer, she got us the aerochamber.

So we have been using this apparatus for a long time.  We tried the nebulizer machine once but he didn't like it because of the weerrriing sound it makes and it doesn't really help clear his lungs.  By using the aerochamber, the Ventolin goes directly into his respiratory tract and lungs because the mask is cupped over his nose and mouth and he just needs to breath in and out.  Against oral Ventolin, this is a better option and doesn't affect his whole body.

This is how the aerochamber works:

The price of this aerochamber being sold at our local pharmacy is probably $50 (or more ... I can't recall).


I'm thankful for all the GP doctors that Jonathan has seen has seen so far because they provided the best solutions.  Thank you Lord for leading us to them :)

Hope the above information will be able to help anyone who reads this blog post.

God bless you and your children with good health!

DOES WEATHER HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH FLU?

Maybe there is, depending on how you see it.

I've lost my voice.  It was quite bad yesterday.  And I notice some people sort of avoiding me so as not to catch my flu.  I don't have runny nose.  Just that my tonsils are as huge as big fish balls.

When I talked to others, the first they blame is the weather.  So does the weather really have any contribution to the flu that people catch?  I don't know.  I blame the food I eat.  haha.  Actually I blame ME for putting the food down my throat that I know are potentially "heaty".

Well...here I am trying to talk to Jonathan and the voice just wouldn't amplify.  In the end I had to ask Harith to repeat my instructions, which of course, was answered with a quick response from my prince.

I'm avoiding as many close contact as I can with Jonathan.  And I've used up all my masks.  But thank God, he's been ok.  And that I don't cough so much does help in a way.

Here's wishing anyone out there who is ill .. SPEEDY RECOVERY!

OF BEACH AND BOOKLETS

Beach and books do go hand in hand when you plan to go there to read and enjoy the sun, sand and sea.

We did go to the beach on Monday (7th Feb).  No, we didn't bring any books.

Jonathan protested when we reached Changi Village.  He's not a nature person but a cityscape kid.  After a short breakfast, we proceeded to the beach.  The Lord blessed us with excellent weather, windy and cool.  Not much sunshine and it was perfect.  Jonathan's protests immediately stopped and he began to enjoy the breeze as we walked along.  After we finished what we were there to do, instead of hurrying us to leave, Jonathan decided that he wanted to go to the Boardwalk, which was at the other side of Changi Village.
It was too hot then.  We promised him the next time.

Some pictures to share:

Later we proceeded to Changi Airport for lunch:
This is one of my favourite beverage ... lemon juice with sour plum.

Harith had Yee Mee (stir fried flat noodles) with mushroom

I had hor fun (flat rice noodles in gravy)

And while we were eating, the little prince had a good laugh listening to his Whee of Fortune tape:

Today, I finished another 3 birthday booklets that my friend ordered.  I kinda like these 3 better compared to the first 2 I made earlier (HERE).

I used yarn / fabric paper / heat tranfers for the alphabets / zots dimensional tape.  Front:

I wound the rainbow yarn making them zig-zag across the cover.  Did the same for the back cover.  The alphabets were cut from vinyl transfers and heatpressed onto the fabric paper.  I mounted them on cardstock to make them stronger.

I used glitter pattern paper for the cover, felts for the squares and Doodlebug Alpha Stickers.  The ribbon was taped below the felt squares.

I only use plain cardstock for the cover, ribbons and chipboard alpha-bites designed by American Crafts.

I love it that there are dashes on the chipboard alphas:

That's about it for today.  My table is a mess so I have to start packing before I take them out again to do another few more birthday booklets.

Thanks for dropping by :)

FOURTEEN

We had fun taking this video.  But I turned off the back light because I wanted Jonathan to see the candles.
He was pleasantly surprise when I brought the cake out.  Notice that he also tried to blow the candle light out.


Jonathan is 14. Officially older by another year but still a baby to us.  Although lacking in some areas but he's still perfect in every way.

14 years is a long time.  It brings me back to day one.  When everything was all set but became a setback.

But this setback has been set straight.  It's a totally different journey now and everyday is a different life experience.  And we are improving as we go along.

What has Jonathan accomplished?

1)  Able to spit water from his mouth.
2)  Knows how to get rid of hiccups by covering his mouth and nose.
3)  Able to pronounce some words at the spur when you encourage him to.
4)  Pull his t-shirt down whenever it moves up from his tummy (see HERE).
5)  Helps me to pick up a t-shirt / towel near him (see HERE)

We brought him to Tampines 1 to choose his cake but he didn't want to buy any.  We asked him what present he wanted, he said "No Need".  But we bought the cake anyway.  We wanted to.

He celebrated his birthday with his mama (Harith's mum) on 5th Feb.  That's her actual birthday.  He almost didn't want to go for the birthday dinner but in the end, reluctantly agreed.  We were at Yummy Thai Restaurant (at 285 Changi Road) and the food was nice.  Thank-you to his aunties, uncles and cousins for his gifts.

But today, being his actual birthday, we did our own private celebration.  Here are some pictures of us with Jonathan we took this evening :)

The cake called Secret Garden was bought from The Icing Room at Tampines 1.  It's rather delicious cake.  Sponge cake with cream and red beans in between.

Excuse my hair that's all messed up heh heh (below).  Harith holding Jonathan's hand to cut the cake.

Thanks for dropping by :)

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR

Reunion dinner ... check!
First day visitation to grandma (Harith's) ... check!
2nd day visitation to ma ma (Bie's) ... check!
Ang pows given ... check!
Ang pows received ... check! LOL!

I'm glad we have finished what we planned to do for this chinese new year.  Food was great at Harith's mom's place.
Peranakan food like chap chye (mixed vegetables comprising of : vermicelli / mushroom / black fungus / cabbage)

Baba ayam buah keluak.  You can refer to what this dish is HERE.

Bak wan soup (meatball soup with lots of bamboo shoot)

sambal prawns, homemade ngor hiang, all cooked by my Harith's mom, cousin and sister.

For the last 14 years, I wasn't able to give a helping hand since Jonathan was born and I'm thankful to them for cooking the delicious food.

This year, Jonathan was great!  He went to both of his grandma's homes to 拜年 (send greetings) and stayed mostly for 2 hours or more.  Thank God this time around, the medication I gave him worked and he was able to stay out for the lengthy period of time.  Most of all the Lord provided excellent weather that it was windy and not humid.

Yesterday (2nd CNY day), when we were at my mum's, I greeted her xin jia ju yee (happy new year in Teochew dialect) and she replied with the same greeting.  That was really nice to hear from her.  The amusing part of our visit today was that my brother had a giant orange that was in a bag of oranges his friend gave.  I just couldn't resist taking a photo.

This year, I made red packets again.  I bought these really nice red papers embossed with flowers from a local scrapbook store.  These papers are from Cordinations Cardstocks.  At the store, they had 2 different designs but I bought this (see below) and they only have 7 pieces left.  It was enough for me cos I used a faded red for the backing.  Materials are the cardstock, glitter pailettes (Ellen Krans Mini-Butterflies) from  Me&My Big Ideas and also Mini Alphabet Stickers from My Little Shoebox.  Design for the red packets were simple and production only took 2 days.

i didn't put any embellishments cos the paper spoke for itself.  the embossed flowers are pretty enough.

I'm glad the celebrations are over.  At least now we, especially Jonathan, can rest :)

Here's wishing all my blog visitors 新年快乐!

CUSTOMIZED NAME CARD BOX

My friend ordered a box of name cards from me.  But it's hard to get hold of those transparent plastic name card boxes as they are sold in bulk of 200 pcs.

So I decided to make one myself.
Materials:  250gsm cardstock (for strong backing) / scrapbook cardstock / scrapbook pattern paper / double-side adhesive tapes / chipboard alphas / ribbon

Here are the steps:

Start off by taking the measurement of the name card.  Leave at least a few mm more from the actual name card size.  The actual height for 100 pcs of name cards is around 3cm high.  So I worked from there.  I had to have double folds for the edges.  This main box takes up almost a whole A4 size paper.

Once above is done, work on the template for cover (below).  Cover has to be 2mm wider than the main box.

Then start tracing on the cardstock / pattern paper. Here (below) I'm tracing out the cover.

Next, I prepare the insert to make the cover and main box stronger.  This will be hidden once the flaps are folded.  the insert has to be slightly smaller.  Otherwise, the flaps of the main box will not fold properly.

When everything is ready, start putting them together.  If you look closely, the white insert backing is already placed and adhered to the base.  Then I put the pattern paper flap over it and seal it.

Once everything is in place, start applying double-sided tape (which has stronger adhesive) and press down for a firm seal.

Here's the finished box.  I didn't seal the edges properly but the turn out was pretty good, I must say.

Adding chipboard alphas and tying a ribbon across to hold the box, here's the final outcome:

Hope you like my customized name card box.  Thanks for visiting!

BIRTHDAY BOOKLETS

I've started working on projects again.  My friend has ordered birthday cards but I've decided to do birthday booklets instead.  All the birthdays stretch through the year so I can do and mail/pass to her whenever they are ready.

Here are the first 2:

Materials for these 2:  Chipboards / Fabric Paper / Ribbon / Pattern Papers / Zutter binding / Buttons

For the inserts, I used double-sided color cardstock and stamped on them using black Staz On ink and clear stamps that I borrowed from a good friend, Olive and she gave me some ribbons too, including the happy birthday one (above).

For their names, I used my tshirt transfers, cut out the names and printed on the fabric paper.

Two down and 9 more to go.  I actually finished another one but will post it another time.

In the meantime, I just bought this fabulous small "equipment"... can I say that?  haha.  It's the Fiskar Scissors Sharpener.  So small you can just store it in the drawer.

 

This little gadget is truly amazing!  My scissors are sharpened with just a few slide across the white ceramic.  The more you do it, the sharper it gets.  You can get this from SCRAP-N-CROP.com!  Here's youtube DEMO.

Thanks for visiting!