Mom is leaving soon

Despite all the complaints that I've had about my mom being here for 2 months during my "confinement" period, she actually has been more helpful than I expected.  She has held the baby in the afternoons to allow me to have afternoon naps most days.  She folds all our laundry.  She makes soup for me and tries her best to cook the few dishes that she knows how to make.  Spending so much time with her in the past 2 months have made me realize that my mom really is getting old.  Her hair is actually all grey/white but she colours it black.  She often has aches and pains - I even took her to a few sessions of acupuncture while she was here.  She sometimes forgets things which makes me wonder if it's the early onset of Alzheimer's.  While I still look forward to having my life back, I am thankful that she has come to help me these past 2 months.

Christmas time is here!

Every Christmas, my husband and I give each other an ornament.  The ornament is supposed to remind us of something that happened during the year.  Since we've been married for 7 years, we now have a decent collection of ornaments but we have never bought a tree to put the ornaments on.  We simply don't have space in our living room for a full size tree and we also don't have space to store a fake tree in a box during the other 11 months of the year.  This year, I figured out a solution!  I bought a real tree but it's table top size so that it can sit on top of our side table in our living room.  Merry Christmas!!

Potty success!

We've been potty training our 3 year old on and off for about 6 months now.  Part of the reason why it's taken so long is because I've been procrastinating.  I don't want to deal with accidents and I also dread having to take him to the bathroom when we are out.  But now that we have a newborn, I'm pretty tired of having to change his diapers.

Last Saturday, we tried to put him in underwear and within 2 hours, he wet/dirtied 4 underwears.  We didn't even get any pee/poo in the potty.  I was absolutely disgusted with having to clean him up after the poo accident.  Today, I decided to try again with Pretzel snacks (to make him thirsty and to act as a treat), apple cider (to quench his thirst, to fill his bladder, and to act as a treat), and the iTouch (to keep him entertained on the potty).  It worked!  He peed and pood in the potty while playing on the iTouch.  After he went, he got a pretzel and apple cider treat.  In the same way, he proceeded to pee in the potty after lunch, after his nap, and after dinner.  Yay!

Steamed egg custard dessert recipe (dun dan)

I love this dessert.  I'm trying to improve on this recipe each time I make it.

Ingredients:
- rock sugar (size of a golf ball)
- ginger, crushed with a cleaver (size of a golf ball)
- 400mL of water
- 1 tsp custard powder (optional)
- 3 eggs


Directions:
- boil the ginger and rock sugar in 400mL of water.  Let cool for 10 minutes and strain out the ginger.
- Stir custard powder into the sugar water to make it look more yellow.
- beat the 3 eggs and mix into the cooled rock sugar mixture
- strain the mixture into 2 bowls
- put plastic wrap on the bowls ensuring that the plastic wrap doesn't touch the mixture.  poke a few holes into the plastic wrap to let the steam out
- put the bowls into a steamer and turn the steamer on
- steam for 20 minutes
- eat while it's hot!

Makes 2 servings

Chinese steamed fish recipe

I love Chinese steamed fish.  It's so easy to make and very good with rice.  Here's how I steam my fish...

What you need:
1. A live fish that has been gutted and cleaned. I usually buy the white Tilapia from the Chinese grocery stores because they are fresh and relatively inexpensive.
2. 1/4 cup Lee Kum Kee Seasoned Soy Sauce for Seafood (or dissolve 2 tbsp of sugar into 1/4 cup light soy sauce)
3. Ginger and green onion
4. 2 tbsp of oil

How to do it:
1. Clean and wash fish.  Ensure there are no scales left on the fish and dry both inside and outside with paper towel.
2. Put some ginger slices into the stomach of the fish.
3. If fish is already at room temperature, steam for 10 min for 1 lb, 13 min for 1.5 lb, 16 min for 2 lb.
4. Cut some ginger and green onion into slivers and set aside
5. When fish is ready, heat oil in pan.
6. Place ginger and green onion slivers on fish and drizzle the hot oil on top.  You should hear a sizzle sound.
7. Pour the soy sauce mixture on top.
8. Enjoy!

Reno update

Yay!  After 1.5 months, the renos are (almost) done.  The results are amazing.  I have new kitchen floor tiles, potlights in the living room, a 'Harry Potter' closet under the stairs (aka Swiffer closet), a brand new bathroom with a super strong industrial flush toilet, a super deep tub, an undermount sink with quartz countertop, rain shower, triple shower door, and hardwood stairs.  The only thing remaining to be done is my ensuite bathroom (toilet, air vent, and medicine cabinet), and a few more steps for the stairs.  I love my newly renovated home!

My mom

I have to vent about my mom.  She is here to "help" me during my "confinement period".  Sounds nice other than she doesn't know how to cook, she doesn't like to clean and all she wants to do is to go out, talk on the phone, and watch TV.  She tries to be helpful where she can, i.e. fold clothes, do dishes, burp the baby, etc...  Here are a few snippets of our interactions so far:

Interaction #1 (first thing in the morning)
Mom: when your cleaning lady comes, tell her to clean the fridge.
What I thought: Why don't you clean it, it's not like you have anything to do.
What I said: The cleaning lady is here for 3 hours every other week.  Do you want her to clean the bathroom or clean the fridge?

Interaction #2 (while I'm cooking fried rice for myself as she holds the baby)
Mom: is that all the rice you are going to have?
What I thought: Since I haven't even taken the rice out of the fridge yet, she must be referring to the three eggs that I just scrambled to put into the fried rice.  She can't even tell the difference between eggs and rice?!
What I said: These are eggs.

Interaction #3 (while she's preparing a steam fish because she just told me that she knows how to do it)
Mom: do you put the oil in with the fish to steam?
What I thought: I thought she said she knows how to cook the fish.
What I said: No, I have to cook the oil separately and pour it on the fish after it has steamed.

Interaction #4 (the water has boiled and she's getting ready to put the fish into the steamer)
Mom: do I put the whole plate in?

What I thought: No mom, you have to cut the plate in half in order to steam the whole fish.

What I said: Yes.

I have to endure this until Dec 6th.