Ear infection

I had a shock this morning when Ziyi fussed over her itchy left ear the minute she woke up. I used a cotton bud to clean her outer ear and there was a small amount of pus on the cotton bud. Her ear smelled horrible too. I knew I had to bring her to the pediatrician first thing in the morning. 

She was diagnosed with otitis media, a middle ear infection. Her doctor couldn't tell what caused the infection, but suspected the post-nasal drip that caused the infection because she's been having cough with phlegm since last week.  She was prescribed with Sofradex antibiotic ear drops for her left ear, and Cerumol drop for her right ear (to soften hard wax). 

Doctor doesn't recommend her taking any cough mixture as he thinks that cough mixture will only suppresses her cough but not treating her problem. Since Ziyi's cough is not so serious, I was told to leave her alone and if need be, a dose of Zyrtec at night will be good enough. 

If her ear does not recover in 5 days, I will need to bring her back to either the pediatrician or ENT doctor to flush her ear wax and to examine her ear membrane.  I need to monitor her closely and also to be more sensitive to her coughs in order to find out what actually trigger her cough. However doctor suspected the culprit could be house dust mites because Ziyi tends to develop rashes  due to external contacts. 

of Manglish...etc

I have been speaking Manglish to Ziyi all this while, subconsciously of course. I never notice them until she repeats after what I said.

She has added the word "lor" at the end of her sentences. She sounds so cute but I am trying to correct her and keep reminding myself not to speak Manglish! 

Each time I tuck her to bed at night, I would greet her Goodnight & I love you, and I will tell her to close her eyes & no talking too.  Once, I caught her singing silently to herself, with some hand actions too. When she realised I was looking at her, this cheeky girl immediately hide herself underneath her blanket and smiled cheekily. 

The other day hubs was telling me about Amy Chua’s new book, “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother”.  Has any of you read this book yet? I'm supposed to buy it but haven't done so. I read from The Star that there are few types of parenting styles, The Authoritarian, The Authoritative,  The Permissive, The Indulgent, & The Neglectful.  I'm starting to think that I may fall into The Authoritarian category! Oh no! I'm slowly trailing my mother's footsteps as she was very strict and fierce to me when I was young.  And now with my own daughter, I'm pretty strict with her too. Children of The Authoritarian parents may end up with low self-esteem and confidence in life. I will have to seriously re-look into my parenting style and buy some parenting books to read too. Gotta keep reminding myself to not be the control freak, lest Ziyi may start to dislike her own mother when she grew up.

DSLR... Should I??

I've been eyeing on a DSLR camera lately. It seems like everyone around me are using a DSLR camera. So I told hubs I wanted one too and we started surveying through the web and checking them out at the malls. A slightly upper-entry-level DSLR would easily cost us ~RM2,600 with just a kit lens. 

I am still contemplating on getting one...considering the size and weight, would I be complaining when I had to carry yet another small bag whenever going out on weekends. Should I or should I not??? 

1st School Sports Day - 24/7/11

We were all excited with Ziyi's School's Sports Day. The school has taken almost 3 weeks to prepare the kids for this 'big' day. When Ziyi was first trained for the sports, she was so tanned that I had to apply sunscreen lotion for her every morning. She is the youngest amongst the rest and I was pretty worried that she couldn't play or follow instructions accordingly. However her teachers assured me that she was doing fine and enjoyed herself very much.

 When the day finally arrived, I was more excited than her..LOL! I sent her to school at 7.45am for them to get ready and then hubs and I returned to her school again at 8.30am. 

They started with marching, singing the National Anthem & School Song, followed by an entertaining cheerleading performance by the older kids. 

Ziyi participated in 3 events. She was in the Purple team and she played "Fill me up", "Pass the baton" & "Duck Ring". 

 Kids queuing up for the marching event

Ziyi was led the her teacher

Did you notice the boy behind her? He is a few months older than Ziyi but he was crying the whole time because his parents were around. I was worried too but glad that Ziyi was doing fine. 

She was the first to go in her team. Looking really blur here..

She had to hop from ring to ring

Picked the sponge filled water to another station

Squatting down after finishing her turn, while waiting for the rest to finish.

2nd game. Ran back to pass the baton to another participant.

She was really enjoying herself with all the jumping and running.

This little cili padi cried upon finishing her 3 games! She wanted mummy and so I took her with me and gave her a doughnut. 

She did very well at all the 3 events.  Mummy & daddy were beaming with pride. :D 

She took home 1 gold medal, 1 silver medal & 1 trophy.

We are now looking forward to her year-end concert performance.