Julia Gabriel PlayClub (Term 2 Week 7 & 8)

I only realised that I forgot to blog about Week 7's lesson some time last week. Anyway Wk 7's focus was on rice... but they didn't get to eat rice though... haha. They did some art revolving around rice:

The container was painted orange on the inside to resemble curry then the kids sprinkled some rice grains in. The other is a 'frying pan' of 'seafood fried rice'. :) They also got to decorate chopsticks but Alicia wasn't very interested in it so I was the one who did it for her.

As usual, she sat at the side during music time because she was still eating. Seems that it's becoming a habit. Sigh. But she enjoyed herself nonetheless by joining in whenever she wanted by doing the actions, getting off the chair once in a while to dance and groove to the music....

Wk 8's lesson was no different: she was still the spectator while chomping happily on her raisins. Hubby accompanied her on Saturday as it was Daddy's Week. And so I sent them off: I watched her get into her carseat before I left for the market. Apparently she cried a little and looked around for me after that but she soon understood that mummy wasn't going along with her to class.

Here's the artwork she did with her daddy. She had great fun that day because the lesson revolved around 'water' - her favourite. They had a chance to clean up water from the floor with tissues, squeeze balloons filled with water, squirt water and art work was fun too. I'm not quite sure how they did all these but well, I have to say that these pieces of art look artistic. "P That droplet of water with a 'w' was given to each child after art and they got their little hands stamped with the 'w' too.

Hubby says he wants to go next week again.... well... maybe I'll let him. Hehe.

The copycat

Remember the short video clip I posted about Alicia trying to imitate my hubby doing stretching exercises? Here a few photos I captured on Saturday of her trying to copy hubby again! :P

Toddler egg fried rice

This was Alicia's dinner on Saturday. I was at a loss about what to cook for her and decided to try fried rice again but of a different sort.

It was whipped up on the spur of the moment and I've kept seasoning to a minimum since she doesn't really take to food with a lot of seasoning. You may want to add more seasoning if your child is accustomed to it.

Alicia took quite long to eat this too but she still finished about 2/3 of the portion given to her... she kept picking out the peas and shallots to eat at first before agreeing to eat the rest of the fried rice... sigh.

Egg fried rice

Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup rice (I used the 'cup' that came with the rice cooker, not the regular cup)
• 1 egg (beaten)
• a handful frozen peas
• 2T carrots (chopped)
• 2 baby corn (chopped)
• 1 shallot (sliced thinly)

Seasoning (according to your child's tastes):

• light soy sauce
• ground white pepper

Method:

1. Cook rice as per normal.
2. Heat oil in a pan and fry the shallots till golden brown. Remove the shallots, leaving the oil behind.
3. Fry the peas, carrots and corn in the shallot oil till they are cooked through.
4. Add the rice and mix evenly.
5. Pour in the beaten egg bit by bit and stir-fry quickly.
6. Add seasoning.
7. Dish and serve with fried shallots.

Fresh lily bulb with wolfberries porridge

From the looks of it, you know that this porridge ain't mine... :P

Yup, it's my darling Alicia's. I decided to try this for her dinner last night because she suddenly went nuts over wolfberries yesterday and were popping them into her mouth like popcorn... must be the slight resemblance with raisins... she ate a lot of raisins at Julia Gabriel on Saturday too...

Anyway, I saw a recipe about lily bulb and wolfberries in a toddler recipe book before but they used dried lily bulbs. I didn't follow the recipe closely at all and I used fresh lily bulbs at that. Hee. That's the leftover lily bulb from the other day when I cooked the fresh lily bulb dessert. :)

Anyway, someone didn't really like it and took forever to eat. My hubby was doing the feeding coz I was busy cleaning up the stuff I bought from the market earlier on so I'm guessing I'd most probably have yielded a better 'result' if I was the 'feeder' coz she didn't finish her porridge. Then again, it's a huge bowl of porridge so oh well.... at least we tried out something new and now we know she doesn't like it.

Not sure if your kid will like this but you can always give it a try. :)

The health benefits of consuming fresh lily bulbs:

• 'cooling'
• moistens the lungs (润肺)
• calms the nerves
• good for treating 'heaty' coughs
• alleviates anxiety and insomnia
• good for the skin (美容养颜)
• anti-cancer

It is especially useful to consume fresh lily bulbs after recovering from an illness.

Contraindications: Those with 'cold' coughs and diarrhoea due to cold in the spleen and stomach should not consume fresh lily bulbs.

You can read about the benefits of wolfberries here.

Fresh lily bulb with wolfberries porridge

Ingredients:

• 2T rice grains
• 1/2 fresh lily bulb
• 3T wolfberries
• 300ml water
• rock sugar (optional)

Method:

1. Rinse the rice grains twice.
2. Remove the petals from the bulb. Soak them to remove dirt particles. Remove any blemishes.
3. Rinse the wolfberries.
4. Place the water, rice grains and 2T wolfberries into the innerpot of a small slowcooker.
5. Bring the water to a boil on a stove then transfer the innerpot of the slowcooker back to the outerpot. Slowcook for 2hours.
6. Add rock sugar to taste (optional).
7. Garnish with 1T wolfberries.

I chose to add 1T wolfberries only when serving so that the child will get to enjoy a different texture of wolfberries in the porridge. If you're worried that your child cannot handle the wolfberries then cook them together with the porridge.

New waterbottle for Alicia

Since she broke her Piyo Piyo waterbottle, we've not gotten her a new one. This time we just bought a cheap one in case its lifespan is as short as the previous...

When I brought it out for her this morning, she exclaimed, "So nice!" :) Anyway, I've no idea what animal that thing is in black.. but Alicia pointed at it and said "Cat. Black cat". LOL. Black cat it is then. :P

Should I drink water?

Hmm, how do I open this?

I think I'll just walk around with it...

How do I look with my new waterbottle mummy?