Brown bear

Bento No. 189

I made a brown bear onigiri with brown rice for my boy's bento today.  Its muzzle is cut from fishcake and its facial/eyes are made of nori and cheese.  I placed some stir-fried sesame chicken breast and blanched China spinach underneath the onigiri.  On top of which, he also has blanched cauliflower and red dragonfruit. 

At 4 years old, my boy has already started to distinguish his 'best' friend and 'good' friend.  His best friend is a little girl with long black hair and big bright eyes named Irin.  And she is the only one that my boy will say good bye automatically everytime he finished school.  When I asked him further, he would tell me "I like her" and "she is pretty!".  That is a very straight forward and honest answer.  Even Mommy does not have such a privillege during the courtship.  Kids are always full of surprises for the parents.  And my boy did it over the dinner table.  He said he wanted to marry Irin.  I was frozen for a minute but kind of amused and questioned him "What do you mean by marry Irin?".  And he cleverly associated our wedding photographs as being married.  According to my son, he was invited to Irin's house to watch Tom and Jerry. Some kind of date, I was thinking.... How true is it?  Beats me.

Panda and sushi

Bento No. 188

This morning I was shocked to discover I did not wind up one of the windows in my car.  Gosh, if this happens in Malaysia, I am sure my car would be long vanished!  Good grief, what am I thinking, so careless!!  Perhaps it was due to fatigue and tiredness that I am experiencing from my cough and running nose.  Now, our whole family are either having a running nose or cough.  Hopefully, we could all be well again soon. Afterall, I just saw the Chinese physician at Eu Yan Sang clinic at Plaza Singapura yesterday.  And it was also my first time driving to the shopping center.  The management has re-designed the entrance and exit which I found it better traffic control.  Shortly, it began to rain!  Even though, I had checked and double checked the directions going back to preschool, yet I was lost in orchard again!  Worst of all, the GPS map does not function properly during bad weather.  I was half an hour late when I reached school. 

This is his usual crabmeat sushi with tomago and cucumber, apples, grapes and edamame. My son does not like to eat apple.  But he listened to Mommy's advice that an apple keeps the doctor away and obediently ate all that I packed in his lunchbox.  Good boy! 

Chicken and apple balls on sticks



Bento No. 187

Again, my son was down with fever last Sunday and he missed his classmate, Oliver's 4th birthday party at the newly opened Port of Lost Wonder (POLW) Sentosa.  He was happily shopping for the present on Saturday.  But just before we were all set to go,  I felt his body temperature was higher than normal.  Quickly, I took out the thermometer and true enough, he was feverish.  This is the second time, he succumbed to viral fever within a month.  Coincientally, there had been incidents in his preschool where two children from another class and a staff were infected by stomach flu.  He became very quiet with movements akin of koala bear.  That night, my son has no appetite too.

Yesterday, his temperature has came down to around 37.5 and he seems to regain his cheerful and playful self.  I started to make chicken and apple balls adapted from http://food-4tots.com/2012and /03/27/chicken-and-apple-balls-with-barbecue-dip/.  Surprisingly, my boy came into the kitchen offering to help me.  Together, we shaped the chicken ball and honestly, he did it very well. And, he ate 6 chicken balls with some macaroni and green peas. 

Still, have not had enough of chicken balls, my son requested to include in his lunchbox today.  Instead of macaroni, he had angelhair noodles and tomato sauce.  Can you see a lion salivating over the huge chunk of chicken meat?  That was my son's idea!

Aeroplane

Bento No. 186

Our little one came down with fever last Wednesday right after school. He aslo developed a chesty cough.  He has since recovered from his fever on the 3rd day with less cough.  I have a little fight over whether to adminster the paracetamol every 4 hours prescribed by the doctor with my mother.  His temperature was hoovering around 37.5 to 38.4 at that time.  I did not stick to the 4 hourly schedule.  Instead, I gave him paracetamol twice a day as well as plenty of water for him to drink daily.  And I also ensure that he has sufficient nap/sleep and constantly monitor his temperature.  As a mum myself, I knew that typically, he would recover by the 3rd day.  My mother advised me to follow doctor's instruction strictly and got agitated when I did not heed her advice.  All went well and my son is full of energy now despite still having the cough.  The incident just hit me that when there are two or more caregivers under one roof, there would definitely be conflict due to different opinion.  Should I follow out of respect or trust my own motherly instinct?  Anyway, I caught the bug from my son and now I have a chesty cough and a running nose :( 

The above bento was prepared on Monday.  It consisted of one slice of walnut bread with ham and cheese, some tomatoes, cucumbers, kiwi and grapes.  But he did not eat the bread.  Possibly, he still has no appetite yet.  The next few days, I packed lesser in his lunchbox.  I also notice my boy has lost some weight and his little round tummy has also flatened.

His dearest Sanku was here in Singapore as a babysitter for two weeks.  After she finished her job, she stayed with us for two days before leaving for Penang.  We were pleasantly surprised when my boy said "I love San Ku.  She takes care of me.". And before she left, he gave not one but two hugs.  So sweet!  Although my driving skills are nowhere near perfect, I still could manage to bring her out after dropping my son off at school.  We met up with Pak Leong Lilian at CK Tang where I parked my car at Angullia Park and the next day, we went to Ikea at Tampines because she loves to shop for household things.

Pumpkin rice and Letter "K"

Bento No. 185

Yesterday, I boiled pumpkin soup and had some leftover.  Hence, I cooked pumpkin rice adapted from http://food-4tots.com/2009/06/13/my-recipe-column-featured-in-kwong-wah-yit-poh/ for his lunch.  My son loves pumpkin be it cooked in any style.  I cube and steam it over the rice (which I seasoned with black and light soy sauce and add dried mushroom, shrimp, shallots and chicken breast).  Then I created a letter "K" using the pumpkin.  And I also packed his favourite grapes to go along with it.

After celebrating my little boy's birthday, we have another "old boy" birthday on 9th April 2012 i.e. our dearest Papa.  I have been training my son to sing the cantonese version of birthday song and he did it very well on Monday's night right after dinner.  I decided not to bake any chocolate cake because I think we had enough on my boy's birthday.  Instead, we had orange blueberry muffin and digestive biscuits with chocolate buttercream and an edible image specially ordered/made for my husband.

Green Pigs

Bento No. 184

Yesterday, we went to Jurong Bird Park to celebrate my son's birthday together with my Mum and Papa.  I have made an enquiry earlier regarding reservation for 'Lunch with Parrots'.  Unfortunately, the person whom I have been corresponding via email did not confirm my bookings prior day.  Hence, we headed straight to the Songbird Terrace where the buffet lunch and show are served and held.  Luckily, we met a helpful staff who then arranged to reserve a table right in front of the stage.  I requested for a birthday song to be sang by one parrot which he honestly told us he would try his best but no promise.  We were glad that the message indeed conveyed down to the waiters and the host of the show.  And our wish comes true!  The green parrot did sing a birthday song and said "I love U" as well.  I can see from my boy's smiling face that he was enjoying every moment of the show and the limelight.  Last but not least, we paid $10 for my son to take a picture with a macaw and he also got a painting of 'Pikasso', a cockatoo that paints and a postcard.  The buffet spread was not that fantastic and our dear Papa, jokingly commented that it was an expensive 菜飯.  After the lunch, we brought him to the 'Birdz of Play' for some waterplay.  My son has been asking us to bring him there since the opening.  However, it started to rain heavily subsequently.  But I think he got about half an hour of playtime at least.  Anyway, my son has another great day on his birthday.

Above is the green green pig minus the angry bird which is made of pandan bread.  I was shopping at NTUC yesterday night when my son saw it on the rack.  I seldom buy flavoured bread to make sandwich but my little boy insisted.  Okay, he has tuna mayo with pandan bread, carrot stick, cucumber and grapes.  Taste funny?  I am unsure but he finished all!

Buffalo

Bento No. 183

Library is one place that we frequently go.  We love the African folklore and it is my son's favourite animal book.  The stories are not only entertaining but to teach a lesson too.  We had read mostly written by the author, Mweyne Hadithi, with colourful and beautiful illustration by Adrienne Kennaway.  Unfortunately, some of the titles are not found at the Tampines Library.  We probably have to look for it in other branches.  These are the books we had read :-

1. Cross Crocodile
2. Handsome Hog
3. Enormous Elephant
4. Laughing Giraffe
5. Bumping Buffalo

And the following are the list of titles we wanted to borrow :-

1. Lazy Lion
2. Hot Hippo
3. Greedy Zebra
4. Hungry Hyena
5. Tricky Tortoise
6. Crafty Chameleon
7. Baby Baboon

At this moment, my boy is reading the "Bumping Buffalo".  This is a story of how Buffalo went looking for trouble and found it.  It has become a habit to read at least 3 books before he sleeps.  Even if it is past his bedtime, my boy would still insist to read a book before bed.  Needless to say, this buffalo bento is inspired by the book.  He has fried egg with long bean, char siu, brown rice, orange and grapes.

Birthday Cupcakes

My son celebrated his 4th birthday in advance on Tuesday at his preschool together with six other children.  Every year, I have one big project i.e. my son's birthday.  Papa is not in favour of throwing a birthday bash for our little boy.  Hence, every year, he would celebrate together with his classmates at the preschool. Thereafter, we will have a mini one with our family members.  Last year, he had it at the Singapore Zoo "Breakfast with Orang Utan".  This year, I planned it at the Jurong Bird Park, "Lunch with the Parrots".  Interestingly, my boy adores animals more than cars.  When we talked about going to these two places, his eyes instantly light up and hopping around the house like a rabbit.  

I made chocolate cupcakes this year with the 'Jake and the Neverland Pirates' edible image that I ordered from Reeney's baking supplies.  This is also a special request from my son.  And he also got his wish to put on a red headscarf pretending to be the 'Jake', the pirate.  This is my first attempt baking cupcakes and I would say, the buttercream icing, is awfully sweet.  But the kids love it and savour every bit of it. The receipe I used is from Joy of Baking.  Usually, I would reduce the amount of sugar by 20% or more for all my baking.  And I did it for the chocolate cake except for the icing (in order to get the right consistency to pipe on the cupcake.)  I have a couple of sleepless night searching the correct size of cupcake case and boxes and worrying about the end result.  Moreover, I began to train my boy to sleep in his room but every nights, he would wake me up to sleep together with him.  But my efforts pay off, he is finally able to sleep alone in his own room without waking up in the middle of night looking for me.  Hooray!  Okay, I digress a little...  Continue the birthday..  Besides the cupcakes, I also bought 7 Mickey Mouse and Minnie stationery set to be given to each and every kids.  And I also promised him to twist balloons for everyone.  I managed to do a few simple balloons like pirate sword, doggie, giraffe and hummingbird which I learned from internet.  Lastly, I enlisted my Mom's help to buy a box of chocolate in the shape of gold coins from Sheng Siong (because I could not find any in all the candy stores!).  This is to match the theme; pirates and gold doubloons.  My hubby teased that it is too much for me to handle.  But I had proved him wrong because I did it! 

On that day, children were excited over the colourful cupcakes and each got to choose their preferred choice of image.  The funniest thing was they peeled the edible image off thinking it was sticker.  They just love the buttercream icing!  And my greedy son has two cupcakes at one go!  They were so happy they too received a little gift and gold doubloons from the birthday boy.   Oh, yes, the balloons!  Everyone went crazy over the balloons.  One of his classmate, Jake, was eyeing the balloons and politely asked me  "Excuse me, can I have the blue dog?" when  everybody were too busy eating their cupcakes to notice it.  Clever!

It was a wonderful birthday despite it lasted only 30 minutes.  Most importantly, my son and his friends had a fun and great day!