Sick Little E

Little E has had a fever since Sunday, and he has been under the weather ever since. We have been lucky that he hasn't had any major illness in the last 2 years of his life. He has only had two doctor's visit other than his routine visits -- one for eczema and another for suspected ear infections which proved to be nothing at all. Usually we let his sickness run its course, and he is back to normal within a few days. This time it's different, and my little guy is suffering more than ever. He went to the doctor's office today, and he was diagnosed with imetigo and herpangina. I'm hoping the antibiotics will help. Seeing him suffer is the worse.

Not only is Little E suffering, but so is this mom over here. I am trying my best to help him in every way possible, but I am physically and mentally drained. Little E throws tantrums left and right. His favorite foods are now no longer his favorites, which makes sense due to his mouth infection. He wants to scratch his body nonstop, which is making his eczema so much worse. I'm having a hard time keeping up with his needs and demands. It leaves me no time to take care of myself, which also means I'm not taking care of Baby Negi. Sigh.

I'm really hoping that Little E improves soon. He is a tough little fighter, but I don't want him to suffer or have to fight anymore. Yucky virus, go away!

Introducing Baby Negi!

So I haven't been blogging lately, but I actually have a good excuse this time! I have been incubating a baby inside me for the last 13 weeks, and I have no energy anymore. I would rather spend my free time taking a nap, and blogging is usually the last thing on my mind. I also spent most of April planning an awesome birthday party for Little E, which I will hopefully post about soon.

For now you get to see an ultrasound photo of our little Baby Negi. Why negi? Well I may have had some negi toro (chopped fatty tuna with scallion) when I was pregnant but didn't know it yet. Negi is short for negi toro, and negi simply means scallion. We love our little one and cannot wait to meet him/her in November!

Elliot's 1st Birthday Party

I am getting excited for Little E's birthday, which is quickly approaching. Instead of being sad that my little boy is no longer a baby, I'm focusing my energy on party planning. The other night I compared party planning to wedding planning. Hehe. I love making pretty things and planning something spectacular, especially now that Little E can enjoy them too. While browsing through old photos of his birthday from last year, I realized that I never posted them here. So instead of hiding them in the vault forever, here are Little E's birthday photos... just 11 months late.

We celebrated Little E's actual birthday with birthday brownies, and he loved the taste of chocolate :)

I was so stressed the night before because I felt like we made no progress with decorating and preparing everything. Luckily our friends came through early in the morning and were such awesome troopers helping us out  to make Little E's birthday perfect.

We had so much food! You can tell we don't plan parties often because we over estimated on food and drinks. Cookie favors were made my very talented friend Lena :) (she also baked our wedding cakes!)


when it came to his birthday party, he wasn't as fond of the chocolate goodness known as a gluten free vegan cake


so many amazing family and friends came to celebrate Little E's birthday


of course all birthdays end with opening presents and testing out a new car

The stress level of planning a first birthday party is beyond crazy. I'm so glad that it won't be as hectic this year (or will it?). I am so thankful for all of our friends and family who helped make his birthday so very special. I cannot wait to celebrate his second birthday next month. It will be even better!

P.S. You will be beyond busy taking care of a kid and hosting the party. Do yourself a favor and ask someone you trust to take photos to remember the day. H and I are usually the photographers at family events, and people often forget to take photos for us.

Photo Editing Frenzy Begins!

As Little E's 2nd birthday quickly approaches, I'm finding myself in a photo editing frenzy. Last year I did the same thing and showcased the photos in a slideshow for family and friends. Throughout the year I try to edit photos, but I will glance over a lot of them if they're not good enough. Sounds silly because most of them are edit worthy. I just have limited time, and I focus on editing the latest batch of photos from some special event and the older ones are forgotten. I'm pretty sure I have a ton of photos from his first year that went untouched. Maybe I'll get to them if I ever have the time.

Since I'm busy editing, I figure it's a good time to share some of the photos that have been freshly uploaded to my Flickr. Enjoy!

 

enjoying his birthday present

 

I dress him up in clothes that family and friends generously gift him and take pictures of it in case he grows out of it too fast.

 

I do not have enough photos with him but the few I have are super cute.

 

taking a walk with Daddy & Pop Pop in his new car

 

enjoying sorbet for the second time

 

playing at the park to burn off some energy (aka sugar rush)

 

playing peek-a-boo behind the couch

 

crazy sweaty hair

 

playing behind the curtains

 

asking to read a book (yes, I put a barrette in his hair)

 

Bonus Picture -- H operates on his Canonet QL17 ($3 garage sale find)

I can't believe Little E used to be that little. So much happens during the infant months, and it's all in anticipation for the first steps into toddler hood (walking, talking, eating solids, etc). Once Little E was officially a toddler, his milestones didn't seem as significant as the ones he made as a baby. Now that I look back on the past year, I am amazed how much my little guy has grown. He runs, hops, jumps, talks up a storm, and learns so much everyday. Can he stay tiny for just a bit longer? I'm not ready for him to grow up.

Little E's Valentine's Day Project

I love to find ways to get crafty with Little E, and Valentine's Day was the perfect occasion. I lured him with the words "heart" and "paint." Hehe. He was overly excited, but I was super slow on figuring out the plan of attack. I had a few Martha Stewart bottles of paint, but they seemed to fancy for the occasion. A few months back we painted with yogurt, which seemed to work well. I did most of the painting at the time while Little E cautiously watched. Yogurt + food coloring... yup, that will work.

 

Kids have the greatest memories. Little E was looking back on the painting that we worked on a few months back that I have hanging on the wall. He used that as a guide while he figured out how to paint. I tried to convince him to use his fingers instead, but he preferred painting with his paint brushes. Occasionally he would touch the brushes with his fingers and get a little paint on them. He immediately called for me to wipe his fingers. Such a clean little kid.

 

He had a blast painting, especially knowing that we were making an extra special gift for Daddy. The next day we transformed his painting into a piece of art with hearts. I cut out the hearts and put them through the Xyron. Little E used the newly formed stickers and put them on the pink piece of card stock. He loved every detail about our crafty project, and I cannot wait to make more pieces of art with him.

posing with his work of art :)

Valentine's Day 2013

Art by Little E (with Mommy's help)

The State of My Body

My name is Yin, and I don't like my body. If you travel back in time, you will find that I never liked my body even when I was super skinny. Stupid self-esteem and body issues. Well now I've aged, had a baby, and my body doesn't even resemble what it used to look like. My stomach is flabby. My muscles have long disappeared. The last time I tried to work out was ages ago, and I'm too lazy to exercise regularly. I don't check the number on the scale because some days it doesn't matter to me. I have a visual image of what I want my body to look like, and while that may not be realistic, I at least want to fit back into some of my old clothes.

skinny Yin -- April 2009

Here's the problem. I started out skinny at 109 lbs. I didn't gain much during my pregnancy due to gestational diabetes and topped the scale at 126 lbs before delivering Little E. At 6 weeks postpartum, I weighed 108 lbs. Great... except I have gained a few pounds since then, and I still can't fit into most of my clothes. I was too busy in the first year of being a mom to find the time to feed myself a proper meal. I was still bitter about having gestational diabetes and wanted to eat all the foods that I missed out on for three months. Little E had really bad eczema, and I started to limit my own diet to help his skin clear up a bit. I didn't eat wheat and dairy for 6 months. Now that I no longer have any restrictions, I eat as I please. My leftover sweet tooth from pregnancy doesn't seem to want to go away.

a week after giving birth and hiding in sweatpants and an over sized shirt

I'm Asian. I see people judging me constantly. Heck I just popped a baby out, and everyone wanted to point to my stomach and say, "Why is she still fat?" My parents pestered me about it. My MIL even made a few comments. It wasn't acceptable for me to still look pregnant right after giving birth, and it wasn't acceptable that it took me a few months to get rid of the extra weight. That didn't help with my body image issues and just made it worse. I feared having human contact because I didn't want to feel constantly judged.

hiding my extra tummy weight with an Ergo

I exclusively pumped for a year, and I always had an excuse for packing on a few extra pounds. I needed it to keep up my milk production. I ate an extra 500 calories a day to meet my body's needs. It was a huge change but one that I fully accepted. This was what my body needed in order to provide nutrients for my baby. I had no problem with keeping on the weight, knowing that it will eventually melt away once I stopped pumping. Well a year went by, I stopped pumping, and the weight remained the same. Sigh. I pretty much set myself for failure with the assumption that my extra flab would disappear as soon as I stopped breastfeeding.

unflattering picture of me but there's a cute baby and hubby next to me :)

That brings me to my current state. I checked the scale recently, and it wasn't too scary. Like I mentioned before, the number doesn't bother me as much as my actual body. My goal for this year is to eat healthy. That means eating lots of fresh vegetables and fruits with proteins. That means eating three meals a day. My skinny years were not healthy years by any means, and I want to change that. I want to maintain my weight and eat better. I want to try to be more active (besides chasing a toddler around and running up and down the stairs throughout the day). Maybe I'll try yoga at home a few times a week. Maybe I'll try running around the neighborhood again. Part of the problem is recognizing it, right? I no longer want to live in sweatpants and sweatshirts. I want to like my body again. One step at a time.

so thankful for stylish one piece bathing suits

P.S. I also understand that lots of people would love to be in my body. I'll be honest and tell you that I wear a size small now (going from an extra small pre-pregnancy). Pant size... 2-4. Astonishing, huh? They are relatively small numbers, but it makes the biggest difference on my petite body. I'm afraid of feeling too comfortable in my new skin and not being able to find motivation to get back in shape.

P.P.S. I still wear maternity clothes because it's so comfortable. Maybe I should stop...

Video Mondays: Healthier Oatmeal Cookies

I'm a huge fan of Instagram (follow me @yinthinks), and it's not a surprise that I am jumping on the Vine bandwagon. It's pretty much Instagram in video form, giving you 6 seconds to record a video of your choice. You can split up the 6 seconds or record it continuously. It's fun to see how creative others can be with their videos.

 

making healthier oatmeal cookies

Last week I made a batch of oatmeal cookies using a combination of two recipes (Hellobee and Edible Perspective), which are gluten free and vegan. Yum! Little E loves cookies, and I love being able to make them for him. Of course you won't find me making him chocolate chip cookies any time soon. Only healthy cookies for my little guy. :)

Sweet Little E

Little E is such a sweet kid, and I know he is ready to be a big brother some day. He is so kind to his baby cousin, and here are just a few moments I captured the other day:

I simply watched and snapped the pictures with my camera. Little E read to his cousin, held her hand, told her to smile for the camera, and wanted her to come up with him to look out the window. He is so gentle and caring. Can he stay this little forever?