Sketches of Life|Life Lived in Simplicity

My 2nd girl is specky like me too but she started way too young. I kinda blame it on myself for controlling my food intake when I was pregnant with her. Maybe she did not get enough nutrition when she was in my womb.

Since she is only 4yo, I have hard time making sure she wears her glasses. Not only that, she always misplaces it. To teach her a lesson to not simply place her glasses anywhere in the house and sometimes outside the house, I left her at home when I went shopping the other day because she couldn’t find her glasses.

Unfortunately, that didn’t work. I resorted to threaten her with the cane. I told her that if ever she needs to remove her glasses, she is to hand it to either me or the maid. If I didn’t see the glasses on her face and the maid does not have it, I will just cane her. That works perfectly well. So far.

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I met my first Singaporean Pineapple Tarts customer just now at Melaka Sentral. Sold to her 50 pcs of my Nyonya Pineapple Tarts. Normally, I don’t do delivery but since she travelled all the way to Malacca and Melaka Sentral is just about 2 minutes drive from hubby’s shop and I wanted to buy my girl’s school back at Mydin, we arranged to meet at Melaka Sentral half an hour just before she left home.

You know what, I like her! She is so friendly and chatty; not because she said I am young lar. I know I look young. Many said that to me before; it is in the genes! Hahaha.

Jessica, we should have met earlier eh. If ever you were to come to Malacca again, please call me up. I’ll bring you to the best Nyonya restaurant and the best Cendol stall in Malacca.

One of my BILs runs a car hire service. Praise God that business for him is doing very well. If you happened to be in Shah Alam and looking for a Kancil to rent, look for him ya. But before that you got to email me to get his contact number. He is only renting it at RM60 a day and RM50 for 2 days and above.

Now another BIL is interested to do the same. He has one car idle and hubby pushed the idea of putting it up for hire. He agrees and we have already put up the ads in Mudah. It is an Iswara Sedan renting at RM80 per day. So, if you are in Malacca and need a cheap car to rent, call 012-2544606 ok.

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Thank God all my children are very obedient especially when they are in my tummy, if not I think I would need to look for the Malay midwife to massage my tummy so that my baby will be positioned higher. You see, he was sitting too low until it hurts when I am sitting down.

Maybe it was due to too much sitting down when making the pineapple tarts that the baby went lower; gravity pull maybe.

For the past few days, I lie down as much as possible when there’s opportunity, sit on the fitball and talk to my baby to go up higher. Today, I no longer need to PU every 2 hours and the kicking is above my navel now. Before this, I felt as though that his tiny feet can come out from my V every time he kicks!

Baking Pineapple Tarts!

We baked double this time but I took home only 40pcs.

Because I shared them with my helpers; my youngest sister and my cousin.

The moment my eldest daughter saw me baking the pineapple tarts, she reminded me not to sell them!

No boxes to throw, just a few gift wrapping paper to throw or maybe I recycle them since hubby opened them so nicely.

The best joke this Christmas for me is; hubby received a promotional gift as his Christmas present, sort of! It is a joke because I just wrote about not giving any promotional gift as Christmas prezzie coz it makes the giver looks so cheapskate! And you know what! Hubby received one yesterday! It’s a Hellboys II sling bag.

Oh well, at least he has a Christmas present this year; I have none.

Oh well, Christmas is over and we did not go to any open house by other Christian friends who celebrated Christmas. We are not invited to any actually! The economy is really that bad and many opted for a quiet Christmas this year. So, this year, I didn’t get to enjoy yummy Christmas turkey like previous years.

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Yay! It is Christmas Day!

Have a wonderful holiday everyone.

Eat first, suffer later!

I was contemplating whether or not to buy Christmas present for my children since we don’t really celebrate Christmas. No Christmas decor at home, no Christmas tree, and no Christmas party.

A trip to a restaurant to pack their dinner changed my mind about buying Christmas present for them. My 2nd girl saw a Christmas tree with lots of present neatly arranged underneath. While I was engrossed watching a Chinese series on their pop up tv, my girl asked me this question. “Mommy will the auntie give small children the Christmas present?”

Awww…all children longs to receive present. Even adults longs to receive gift from their loved ones. That made me made up my mind to do my last minute Christmas shopping!

Yesterday was the first time I bake the Nyonya Pineapple Tarts from A to Z all by myself. My mom just supervised.

I kneaded the dough.
I pressed out the tarts’ base.
I filled in the pineapple jam.
I cut the strings.
I applied the egg.
And the oven did the baking.

I started at 8.30am and completed by 2.30pm. 6 hours of hard work that produces 140pcs of beautiful Nyonya Pineapple Tarts (from 1kg of flour). I don’t think my preggy body can do more than 1kg a day.

I experienced backache, neck pain, buttock pain, right pelvic pain and my right tummy hurts even more! I was limping for the rest of the day.

Here’re some pictures that my daughter and I took; not so clear though as the kitchen lighting wasn’t that bright.

This is me filling in the jam.

These are my tools.

This is the toughest part and most time consuming. Cutting the very fine string. All of us dread this part. But without the string (some replaces it with sunflower seeds), the originality is gone. The neck pain comes from cutting the strings!

My first tray of unbaked Nyonya Pineapple Tarts.

Finally, my mom helped to apply the egg yolk on the tarts before putting them in the oven. Only one tray; the rest I have to do on my own.

My mom gave 2 pcs to my dad to try; no complaint from him. Meaning it is good. He is very fussy when it comes to pineapple tarts (and all other food too!).

Well, it is good that my mom “bullied” me. Soon, I can really bake the tarts without having my mom around to supervise.