cheap alternative to a playpen

Who needs an expensive playpen. We just lay a mattress on the floor and let Caitlin roll around. The round activity mat was given to us by Kelvin's colleagues. She just loves exploring all the different rattles, crinkly bits and mirror that comes with it.
Caitlin can identify Daddy's voice from far across the room now. Whenever she's feeding and she hears Kelvin's voice, she'll detach herself and look for him. What a daddy's girl.
I'm all dressed up for cousin Ivy's wedding tea ceremony. You can't see but Caitlin's wearing a cute little dress. She only owns 3 dresses at the moment.
3 generations. My mother, Caitlin and me. My mom is very proud to be a grandma; Po Po. She keeps saying over and over how my baby photos look exactly like Caitlin now. E Gu-joing (2nd Aunt's husband) says that Caitlin's my "photocopy". Except for a few grey hairs and a couple of age spots, can you tell that my mother is 58 years old? If she just paid a little more attention to her appearance, I think she'd look like her 40s again.
Cousin Ivy in the Kwa. Caitlin's being manja.

Falling asleep without Mommy: the impossible

Last night, another miracle--Caitlin fell asleep on her own. Kelvin put her in the cot and she fell asleep on her own after playing for a little while. On the one hand, I was elated. On the other hand, I felt a little sad that she didn't need to suckle and that our special time of closeness would come to an end eventually. She sleeps a lot better now. By 9.30pm she's out and she only wakes once or twice through the night. This gives me some time to myself in the evenings. She's also not as jumpy anymore. Every day I pray for her to sleep better. Part of it is also that she's more alert during the day and we can engage her more. This means that she getting into a pattern of regular nap time during the day so she sleeps better at night.

She's 5 and a half months old today. Recently, she's begun licking me deliberately. She does it occasionally with Grandma Dolly but it's mostly me that she licks. She'll latch on to my chin and start slobbering away. The maids think she's "kissing mommy". I do feel like she's doing it out of affection for me. Then again, who knows? Maybe she just wants "nan nan" (milk). Here she is Caitlin "kissing" Mommy.

Kelvin took this shot of Caitlin and the shot below. She can now lift her entire chest off the surface of the bed. Sometimes, she'll push up with her arms. She's also begun playing by herself. I'll place her on a thin mattress on the floor and she'll immediately flip over. Then she'll pull and chew on a colourful activity mat. She particularly likes licking her reflection in a little mirror that comes with the mat.
Still not a lot of hair on the top of her head. It is growing in but it's all very short fine hair at the moment.

Grandma Dolly brought the whole family out. Since we forgot the pram so we had to borrow cousin Ellie's push-chair. It was actually really windy so we had to cover Caitlin up.

Ellie Jie Jie Rocks

Some new photos

Caitlin just passed the 5 month mark. Just grown so much and it's been just pure joy watching her grow. Recently, she's taken to either licking any surface that she can get her mouth close to (including my face) or pulling things towards her face so she can put it in her mouth (that includes her feet). She's also begun sticking her tongue out at us. She enjoys it because she gets a squeal of delight from me. Last night, Kelvin was playing Rock Band and she was "singing" right along in a loud voice. Not in tune of course but there was a lot of sound in co-ordination with the music.

Below she's playing with her hanging mobile and some pictures of her being fed for the first time. Now she's such a pro at feeding. She'll open her mouth wide and chomp down, even biting the spoon.

Conquering baby outing sans maid

The maid went out with Kelvin's mother and the other maids tonight. They visited the Chinese gardens to look at the lantern festival. Hence, we were left to handle the baby ourselves.

Kelvin and decided to have a little outing of our own. Since, 1st September was Teacher's Day, the we get to ride the Singapore Flyer for free for the entire month. Kelvin and I went by ourselves yesterday to check it out. I asked and we get one free ride per day, even on weekends.

I feel so proud, our first outing with just Kelvin and I handling the baby alone. It wasn't too bad. She got a bit restless in the car so I breastfed her while waiting to get into the Singapore Flyer carpark. While we were 42 stories up in the air, she hungry again so I fed her while up there in the flyer pod. I must say, I felt so proud. It was a surreal experience--breastfeeding with a stunning view of the Singapore skyline at night. I think I deserve some kind of medal. Anyway, the point is that Kelvin and I worked as a team and we proved to ourselves that it IS possible to bring baby out and it's not too difficult.

The whole Flyer experience is definitely better at night. It felt really cosy in the pod. We pushed the pram into the pod as well so we had all our barang with us which was useful since Kelvin and I kept dropping baby's face towels. The skyline looked really spectacular because it was all lit up. The Flyer itself looked really cool; glowing in different colours.

On the way home, I fed Caitlin in the car until she nodded off to sleep. We got home past her night bath time but it was okay. I think we survived unscathed.

Above: I think these are the stands for the F1 race, the first ever F1 night race. The black building must be the pits where all the action is.

Above: Another view of the pits with the flyer in the foreground. It wasn't until we got off the flyer that we realized the wheel was constantly changing colours.

Above: A view of fullerton and the Esplanade. The "blazing white hot" areas around the Esplanade are the actual roads that are part of the race track. They were testing the lights for the F1 race.

Below: A view of Suntec city and more roads that form part of the F1 track.