Some things I said to the girls today:
"Don't pull the dog leash too hard Tilly, your sister can't keep up."
"Why has Evie got the leash on her nappy?" (cloth nappy)
"Why has Evie got no clothes on Tilly??"
"Yes, I love your green t-shirt dog, EatEatCatchCatch."
"Tilly!! Get off the TV."
"Go play with your sister. And I don't want to hear anyone crying!!"
Yes, after one whole week inside the house, we've started to go crazy. The late afternoon bike ride around the neighbourhood is not sufficiently expending their energy..... Such is the dreaded Herpangina.... aka hand foot and mouth, without the hand and foot.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Friday, July 29, 2011
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Three pieces of ice, a killing spree and fb
Evie is on the mend from her bout of herpangina, though Tilly has joined the party and is now in bed feverish and with a sore throat. What a difference age can make in taking care of a sick child. And personality too I suppose.
When Evie is sick, she is sick. And she will let you, anyone in the room, the neighbours and potentially anyone down the street know that she is sick. You can't hold her, yet you can't put her down. She'll squirm and yell and cry out with the pain and injustice of it all. This particular illness really set me on the edge of near madness. Her throat was covered in ulcers that were ripe and sore. She couldn't even feed on my own milk because my mlk machine makes the milk nice and warm. The doctor said, feed her only cold. I hadn't realised that snuggling and drinking my warm milk would be like pouring burning coals on to her tiny throat. Poor sweet baby.
The previous evening and yesterday was like walking through a nightmare in slow motion. I think Evie doesn't do sick because I don't do it either. Without your usual go to for fixing a tired, whingey sick baby (i.e. breastfeeding) you have to suddenly find other ways to fix the problem. But nothing but time can get rid of the pain. I even offered her ice cream and cartoons at 12 in the morning. To me, this is like walking into the danger zone.... Ice cream and cartoons at 12 in the morning for an 11 month old??? Fortunately (retrospectively) she was having none of it. I had to use a syringe to get some fluids in to her because she was having none of anything for two whole days. Added to this was the high pressure scene my husband was creating the next day by leaving his bookwork to the last minute and getting me involved in it. Never again do I want a day like yesterday.
Anyway, I just got 6 hours of straight sleep!! WooHoo. I don't think I get that even when she is well. It would have been more were it not for Tilly waking up with a fever. What a remarkable difference age and understanding can make. She woke up Evie, but agreed to lay still while I fed Evie and put her back down so I could concentrate fully on her. I gave her a cup of water and a cold washer for her head before that though, I'm not totally insensitive. Evie went back down quickly and I took Tilly to the living room. We talked about her illness. I got her some medicine. I found three pieces of ice to put in a glass of water. I refilled the ice cube tray. I had time to go to the toilet and violently dispose of a few coachroaches while I was there. (They come out in the night time when nobody is around and this big mama gets her blood flowing with a bit of random killing). I had time to walk around and get more wet cloths to cool her down. I talked about how she needed to go back to bed to get some rest, but if she needs mama to call me one time and I'll come. Tiily's personality has a lot to do with this too.
She is a self sufficient well oiled machine. I went back to her five minutes later and she was on the bed covering herself with the wet cloths she had asked me to put to the side. She didn't realise I was there and said, Oh mum, you scared me! In whisper voice because she knows I don't want Evie to wake. "Here, let me do that for you baby." "Oh! Thanks mama" She's nursing a high fever and a wretchedly sore throat but can still handle herself like that. All she asks is that you talk things through with her and be reasonable.
I felt worn out and ready for the rubbish heap yesterday. I was in bed reading a blog I like on my Ipod - Pratical Theology for Women. I love this blog. Her entry yesterday was, Facebook and the Kingdom. How Christians interact with facebook. When Evie got sick I posted on fb to let people know and to indicate where I think it came from. I'm pretty sure she got ill from a play area for kids we visited on Thursday last week. This is because I didn't take Evie anywhere else for a whole week, not even after that visit to the indoor playground. Much earlier in the week I had taken her for a hep b shot at the clinic down the road, small clinic with hardly any patients. My intention in posting was for those who were there to be careful and watch their own kids. However I think I may have unintentionally stepped on a toe or two. But I won't go into explanations about that. So, back to point. Added to that, with this illness you can't take the kids out or have other kids with you. I had planned a big day of play for Tilly at our house with one of her best friends yesterday. Instead we were descending into a slow madness that was our day yesterday.
I deleted my facebook post, but that's no big deal. I do that all the time. I hate facebook and always mildly regret anything I put up there on the spur of the moment. And I suffered away with my poor sweet baby and my soon to be sick 4 year old, on my own. Well, if Steve wasn't going through his own madness in his office I might have been on my own. Then I saw the post last night on Pratical Theology for Women - Facebook and the Kindgom. Go there, read this blog. I can't get the website anywhere but my Ipod. I have no idea why, both our computers won't let me open it. My friend explained this to me once and now I forget why, something about my computer not supporting something else. A quote or two from her blog:
"In this age of social media, many seem to clamor for a larger public presence. I have been guilty of that at times. I'm thankful for my grounded, private husband, who reminds me regularaly that the kingdom comes quietly, slowly over time."
And this one I like:
"If you struggle with the value of what you do privately verses the exciting things others seem to do publicly, don't be discouraged. The kingdom is like leaven, Jesus taught. It starts small but spreads along and along slowly but surely."
She is talking about top down public ministry versus ministering to people bottom up one on one contacts. Different to my situation here, we all know I'm not ministering to anyone! I just liked it enough to want to share it. Random non-relevance. I seem to have taken the 6 hours straight of sleep to mean a full nights good sleep (I don't know how long it's been since I had one of those). Waking at 4:30 this morning will put the kybosh on that I'm sure when I am still up at 10 or later tonight. Now Evie is up and the day begins. I should have gone back to bed!!
When Evie is sick, she is sick. And she will let you, anyone in the room, the neighbours and potentially anyone down the street know that she is sick. You can't hold her, yet you can't put her down. She'll squirm and yell and cry out with the pain and injustice of it all. This particular illness really set me on the edge of near madness. Her throat was covered in ulcers that were ripe and sore. She couldn't even feed on my own milk because my mlk machine makes the milk nice and warm. The doctor said, feed her only cold. I hadn't realised that snuggling and drinking my warm milk would be like pouring burning coals on to her tiny throat. Poor sweet baby.
The previous evening and yesterday was like walking through a nightmare in slow motion. I think Evie doesn't do sick because I don't do it either. Without your usual go to for fixing a tired, whingey sick baby (i.e. breastfeeding) you have to suddenly find other ways to fix the problem. But nothing but time can get rid of the pain. I even offered her ice cream and cartoons at 12 in the morning. To me, this is like walking into the danger zone.... Ice cream and cartoons at 12 in the morning for an 11 month old??? Fortunately (retrospectively) she was having none of it. I had to use a syringe to get some fluids in to her because she was having none of anything for two whole days. Added to this was the high pressure scene my husband was creating the next day by leaving his bookwork to the last minute and getting me involved in it. Never again do I want a day like yesterday.
Anyway, I just got 6 hours of straight sleep!! WooHoo. I don't think I get that even when she is well. It would have been more were it not for Tilly waking up with a fever. What a remarkable difference age and understanding can make. She woke up Evie, but agreed to lay still while I fed Evie and put her back down so I could concentrate fully on her. I gave her a cup of water and a cold washer for her head before that though, I'm not totally insensitive. Evie went back down quickly and I took Tilly to the living room. We talked about her illness. I got her some medicine. I found three pieces of ice to put in a glass of water. I refilled the ice cube tray. I had time to go to the toilet and violently dispose of a few coachroaches while I was there. (They come out in the night time when nobody is around and this big mama gets her blood flowing with a bit of random killing). I had time to walk around and get more wet cloths to cool her down. I talked about how she needed to go back to bed to get some rest, but if she needs mama to call me one time and I'll come. Tiily's personality has a lot to do with this too.
She is a self sufficient well oiled machine. I went back to her five minutes later and she was on the bed covering herself with the wet cloths she had asked me to put to the side. She didn't realise I was there and said, Oh mum, you scared me! In whisper voice because she knows I don't want Evie to wake. "Here, let me do that for you baby." "Oh! Thanks mama" She's nursing a high fever and a wretchedly sore throat but can still handle herself like that. All she asks is that you talk things through with her and be reasonable.
I felt worn out and ready for the rubbish heap yesterday. I was in bed reading a blog I like on my Ipod - Pratical Theology for Women. I love this blog. Her entry yesterday was, Facebook and the Kingdom. How Christians interact with facebook. When Evie got sick I posted on fb to let people know and to indicate where I think it came from. I'm pretty sure she got ill from a play area for kids we visited on Thursday last week. This is because I didn't take Evie anywhere else for a whole week, not even after that visit to the indoor playground. Much earlier in the week I had taken her for a hep b shot at the clinic down the road, small clinic with hardly any patients. My intention in posting was for those who were there to be careful and watch their own kids. However I think I may have unintentionally stepped on a toe or two. But I won't go into explanations about that. So, back to point. Added to that, with this illness you can't take the kids out or have other kids with you. I had planned a big day of play for Tilly at our house with one of her best friends yesterday. Instead we were descending into a slow madness that was our day yesterday.
I deleted my facebook post, but that's no big deal. I do that all the time. I hate facebook and always mildly regret anything I put up there on the spur of the moment. And I suffered away with my poor sweet baby and my soon to be sick 4 year old, on my own. Well, if Steve wasn't going through his own madness in his office I might have been on my own. Then I saw the post last night on Pratical Theology for Women - Facebook and the Kindgom. Go there, read this blog. I can't get the website anywhere but my Ipod. I have no idea why, both our computers won't let me open it. My friend explained this to me once and now I forget why, something about my computer not supporting something else. A quote or two from her blog:
"In this age of social media, many seem to clamor for a larger public presence. I have been guilty of that at times. I'm thankful for my grounded, private husband, who reminds me regularaly that the kingdom comes quietly, slowly over time."
And this one I like:
"If you struggle with the value of what you do privately verses the exciting things others seem to do publicly, don't be discouraged. The kingdom is like leaven, Jesus taught. It starts small but spreads along and along slowly but surely."
She is talking about top down public ministry versus ministering to people bottom up one on one contacts. Different to my situation here, we all know I'm not ministering to anyone! I just liked it enough to want to share it. Random non-relevance. I seem to have taken the 6 hours straight of sleep to mean a full nights good sleep (I don't know how long it's been since I had one of those). Waking at 4:30 this morning will put the kybosh on that I'm sure when I am still up at 10 or later tonight. Now Evie is up and the day begins. I should have gone back to bed!!
Monday, July 25, 2011
breakfast
oh dear.... i have been sprung so to speak. said vegan friend now has internet at home and is back to reading this blog. i'm feeling less like sharing my recipes!! ha......
i did make the zucchini brownie the other day and did not get round to taking a shot of it. you could also go here for the recipe. this is one recipe i would say not to scrimp on the sugar. it needs it to balance out the zucchini in my opinion. i don't do the frosting but just sprinkle with icing sugar.
as i write, evie is feverish and suffering from herpangina, just another form of hand foot and mouth i guess, but just in the mouth. it's very painful for her and i think it's going to be a long week, or even more if it passes to tilly. my poor sweet babes. we visited one play area last week, just one. evie was at home the rest of the time. it only takes one. i'm too tired to proofread this or even write with capital letters..... she needs a lot of holding and loving at the moment.
Congee peeps....
i did make the zucchini brownie the other day and did not get round to taking a shot of it. you could also go here for the recipe. this is one recipe i would say not to scrimp on the sugar. it needs it to balance out the zucchini in my opinion. i don't do the frosting but just sprinkle with icing sugar.
as i write, evie is feverish and suffering from herpangina, just another form of hand foot and mouth i guess, but just in the mouth. it's very painful for her and i think it's going to be a long week, or even more if it passes to tilly. my poor sweet babes. we visited one play area last week, just one. evie was at home the rest of the time. it only takes one. i'm too tired to proofread this or even write with capital letters..... she needs a lot of holding and loving at the moment.
all she has eaten is some ice, some ice water, and some congee. my milk is too warm for her sensitive throat at the moment (the doctor showed me the ulcers on her throat and they are nasty....) she won't cuddle to feed and i've had to express and chill the milk. even that she isn't real keen on. she had a sizeable amount of the cold congee. so why title this breakfast. well, since we are talking about congee, let me show you what i whip up for my dearly beloved most mornings before he goes off to work. he's doing a good job of working himself to a slow death during this busy summer period so breakfast is our number one, most important time of the day. and i busy myself to make sure we sit as a family and eat together. and here is what he has and it just happens to be vegan. though some days he has a fried egg with it.
Congee peeps.... This is the description Steve gives me of his congee, 'It warms my belly up'. One rice cup of rice gets cooked in 8 rice cups of water. It turns into ricey soup, or soupy rice. This looks like a lot of mafan, but really it's dead simple. The condiments come from the store. There is pickled cucumber, not pickles by the way, different. The little long cucumbers and cut into little knobs. Then there is pickled bamboo in chili sauce. Then there is fermented tofu in chili sauce, so that's basically rotten tofu. To the side I've cut a mango, and above that is fresh bamboo root that I steamed and cut up for him. That gets accompanied with soy sauce and freshly cut birds eye chili. The hot kind. Kind of a running chili theme. Maybe that's why it warms his belly up! cutting up the mango and cooking and cutting up the bamboo is probably as difficult as this gets. the bamboo just needs to be steamed in a bamboo steamer. the rice does its own thing in the rice cooker. the congee gets thick if it stands long enough. it's amazing what one little cup of rice can produce. anyway, as steve likes his congee plain (just the condiments get funky) then it's the perfect thing to give a feverish little bub who won't take anything else. it gets thick and chunky and cold in the fridge and she took quite a bit today. poor sweet baby.
Sunday, July 10, 2011
the humble zucchini
For as long as I can remember zucchini was non exisistent on this island. You could get them imported at Jason's supermarket in the basement at 101 on occassion for a sweet $5+ for one zucchini!!! And to think mum and dad grew these things on a large scale for market. When I was a kid I remember making stuffed zucchini for the family. Also stuffed pumpkin. And my family actually ate it. Now Pop just has a couple of plants, but they are in abundance. So the idea of paying such an amount for one little zuc was too much for me to bear.
Oh Joy!! My local supermarket (I have two that are the same, one is bigger and has more things but is 15 mins walk, the other is smaller and has less things and is 3 minutes walk) started to sell Zucchini!!! They were big and scuffed and horrible to put it nicely, but zucchini none the less. All I could do was bake with them. I made chocolate and zucchini cake with them. YUM. But that recipe isn't vegan. (Another food blog I love to look at, and another recipe I've tweaked sugar wise. I cannot abide more than one cup of sugar in a cake). Then more Joy!! My closer local started selling them very cheaply and they are smaller, fresher, firmer and taste just like the ones I'm used to!!! And that's saying something, the veg at that supermarket leaves much to be desired...... They seem to be growing them here in Taiwan. I filled my fridge crisper with zucchini and found a great recipe for a vegan zucchini brownie. It is to die for. The zucchini releases all its lovely juices and the brownie tastes like fudge.
But, I haven't got any cocoa and haven't had a chance to make the trip to the bake store to get it.... Ah, the joys of baking in Taiwan. So I don't want to post that recipe until I have a picture of the finished product. Why? I don't know. I just think it's excellent and the picture on the recipe site doesn't do it justice. I was rather unflatteringly accused of being OCD today by a friend while I washed the dishes in the sink of another friend. Perhaps I am OCD and that is why I can't put the recipe up until I have my post in order. Personally I just saw a sink of dishes that needed to be washed. So, let's wait for the recipe and the picture so that I can put it all in a neat package and present it to you......
But my excitement over the zucchini has not deminished and I felt I had to share my good news!! I've been cooking them in everything. Creamy zucchini and mushroom pasta, zucchini in this and zucchini in that. I do believe the whole zucchini bonanza might come crashing as it's not a native vegetable and people won't know what to do with it perhaps. Alas it might last on the shelves but a season before it disappears forever only to be discovered again years later in the over priced basement supermarket of 101.
Oh Joy!! My local supermarket (I have two that are the same, one is bigger and has more things but is 15 mins walk, the other is smaller and has less things and is 3 minutes walk) started to sell Zucchini!!! They were big and scuffed and horrible to put it nicely, but zucchini none the less. All I could do was bake with them. I made chocolate and zucchini cake with them. YUM. But that recipe isn't vegan. (Another food blog I love to look at, and another recipe I've tweaked sugar wise. I cannot abide more than one cup of sugar in a cake). Then more Joy!! My closer local started selling them very cheaply and they are smaller, fresher, firmer and taste just like the ones I'm used to!!! And that's saying something, the veg at that supermarket leaves much to be desired...... They seem to be growing them here in Taiwan. I filled my fridge crisper with zucchini and found a great recipe for a vegan zucchini brownie. It is to die for. The zucchini releases all its lovely juices and the brownie tastes like fudge.
But, I haven't got any cocoa and haven't had a chance to make the trip to the bake store to get it.... Ah, the joys of baking in Taiwan. So I don't want to post that recipe until I have a picture of the finished product. Why? I don't know. I just think it's excellent and the picture on the recipe site doesn't do it justice. I was rather unflatteringly accused of being OCD today by a friend while I washed the dishes in the sink of another friend. Perhaps I am OCD and that is why I can't put the recipe up until I have my post in order. Personally I just saw a sink of dishes that needed to be washed. So, let's wait for the recipe and the picture so that I can put it all in a neat package and present it to you......
But my excitement over the zucchini has not deminished and I felt I had to share my good news!! I've been cooking them in everything. Creamy zucchini and mushroom pasta, zucchini in this and zucchini in that. I do believe the whole zucchini bonanza might come crashing as it's not a native vegetable and people won't know what to do with it perhaps. Alas it might last on the shelves but a season before it disappears forever only to be discovered again years later in the over priced basement supermarket of 101.
Thursday, July 7, 2011
Crazy Cake
The next installment in my so called vegan series. Ha! Cupcakes I made for church the other day, same recipe for the birthday cupcakes. The recipe is here
I follow the recipe as is, though go easy on the sugar!! Because I use exactly half the amount of sugar called for, I also find I use less cold water.
This made 40 cupcakes the other day. They aren't very big, but you don't need a lot. I didn't ice them as I wasn't sure how to transport sticky cupcakes to church on a bus......
This recipe is also great for people with allergies etc, as there isn't much in it that you could go wrong with. It's incredibly cheap to make. I think I spent more money on the cupcake cases than I did on the batter. You might wonder why I mention that fact, as things like this 'overseas' are normally cheap to make anyway. I guess here baking is a specialty thing to do. They have bake shops sparsely dotted around Taipei where you can get your hard to find items (and by hard to find I mean, chocolate chips, cream cheese, cooking chocolate, icing sugar, good quality flour, cocoa, anything bakeable, cupcake cases, cake tins etc etc). The good thing about this recipe for me is I can get all the ingredients (well - aside from the good quality cocoa) at my local. Otherwise I have to make my monthly trapse around the city looking for things that I would otherwise get aplenty in a supermarket at home. Another good point for cooking the odd vegan item!!
Have to write this here but thanks for comments guys. I'm having a major bear trying to reply to comments or even post comments on other blogspot.com blogs. It just won't let me do it. Jen, you are right up here with this! And you have access to better ingredients than me! And you're way healthier. You need to make your own recordings...
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Cooking vegan
First a disclaimer: I know little about the vegan diet, only enough to know it isn't for me. Nor am I recommending it. I would never be vegan. My vegan friend rarely looks on here, so I will speak plainly... This is a worthy topic however. Why is it worthy? Cooking vegan helps save the planet, helps save your wallet and no doubt your waistline... But again, not for me. Vegetarian quite very possibly. Though my love for seafood gets in the way of that. All I want to do here is share some of the recipes I've cooked before or on a regular basis.
Aside from a small bowl of sour cream (that was devoured by two little girls who shall remain nameless) Tilly's birthday was entirely vegan. I'm not focusing on this so called 'spread' below as it was pretty average. Nice, but nothing to commit an entire post on. Although the fresh mango and watermelon were big hits. Along with the chips and salsa (that I didn't even make). And the fresh crunchy veggies. All my friends kids love veggies. I even have diehard fast food friends (expect pizza and KFC on any given visit to theirs...... also not readers of this blog) and even their kid loves veggies. I don't buy into the whole my kid won't eat his veggies thing. I digress. Only the hummus in here is what I am writing of.
Hummus is one of my favourites to make. The key ingredient here is not the chickpea, but the tahini. You can't make hummus without it. Tahini used to be really easy to get. And by easy I mean one shop in one particular place had it at least most of the time. Now I can't get it at all. But hummus is my go to for many occassions. So I had to fix the tahini problem. And for that I went here.
I love that blog. I love food and read cookbooks and food blogs like I would read a book. So I learned how simple it was to make tahini. Admittedly I did not make the tahini for this batch of hummus. But this batch did use up the last in the bottle I had my vegan friend wander the city for...... I did make tahini last week for another one of my vegan recipes, but that's for another post.
So, hummus. Spelled differently around the world. This is my recipe, though I can't remember where I got it from. Probably a blog. Maybe, taste.com.au, who knows. All I could remember was that it had tahini and cumin. The other key ingredient.
Take two cans of chickpeas. Don't bother with soaking dried. I'm not into that. Leave a bit of the juice from the can. It helps keep it slick. Not too much mind. Whizz in a food processor. It should already look smooth. Add two heaped tablespoons of tahini, dash of salt, pulped fat clove of garlic (raw I mean - no precrushed bottled garlic here please, heaven forbid!), good shake of cumin and a splash of olive oil. And that is that. Without the tahini, cumin and garlic it just tastes like mushy chickpeas. (And I think only a vegan would be willing to eat mushy chickpeas.) It's a winner for me. A note, I always find it best to keep in the fridge over night. Tastes much better after a good old sit. There it is in the black bowl on the table.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
~
This little devil is running me ragged day and night so I thought it best to put a cute photo of her (and her sister) in to remind me of how blessed I am. Because some days are long...............
Birthday bike
Tilly likes to keep things close to her chest, the birthday bike was a big surprise but instead of reacting like a kid in a candy store, she held it really tight. She eventually smiled.
Note horsey in the basket. Mummy wanted daddy to get a pretty pink bike with a pretty white basket. Daddy got what they had, but he felt it was the right one for Tilly. It is her most favourite possession. She rides around the neighbourhood with confidence now.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
And who was there?
Back in May, or maybe April, my dear friend Heather told me she was planning another trip to Taiwan. She gave me a range of June to September. I told her if she was coming in June to come for Tilly's birthday. And they did!! Her and her sweet two youngest, Lili and Noa. Now, Lili is an old friend of Tilly's so to have her here was golden. Then there is Sarah and Ellie, Tilly's two best friends here in Taipei. And here is how they looked all together:
This is before the cupcake creations began. This is also not a good representation of who was there. Let's not forget, Evie, Abram, Noa, John Amos and wee baby Charlotte just 16 days old at the time, Cousin Bonnie, plus the mummies. Aside from having a party that included my family, this one just couldn't get any better. All our nearest and dearest.
Tilly's birthday in June
A various number of reasons why I couldn't post photos back in mid-June when Tilly's birthday actually happened. But anyway, here we go:
Last year I was inspired by this. I think they are always at the cutting edge of creative inspiration and I was completely inspired. I knew Tilly would love a cupcake birthday party so while I was in Australia, several months before her birthday, I bought packets of cake decorations in anticipation of the big event. I wanted Tilly to have a birthday she would remember, simple but memorable. And I think we pulled it off.
The night before I prepared about 30 cupcakes using this recipe. I have vegan friends. That is to say, one vegan friend with one vegan daughter who happens to be one of Tilly's best friends. Therefore the whole vegan issue becomes a bit important. More on the vegan thing later. I was thinking this morning to do a series on some of my vegan recipes. Simply because a) everyone is doing 'series posts' these days and b) I think it's a worthy topic. This recipe is gold. It never fails and it makes a gazillion cupcakes. Case in point I made some for church this morning and being vegan it cost a few bucks, if that. No butter, eggs or milk - all expensive here. But being an American recipe it has way too much sugar in it. I cut it back by nearly half. Even then I think it's a lot. But it's really great. American recipes are great - unpretentious and easy to follow.
So, some simple coloured icing to go on the top, plus the decorations. The girls had a blast!! Look at the end result!!
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