Vacation

Yes, I love to call Ethan our little *energizer bunny* because it does appear that he never does get tired, although Pete and I are like dragging our feet and all we want to do is plop our heavy heads down on the hotel pillow.  Well, things have certainly changed since the miracle that is Ethan came into our lives. 

Last weekend saw us heading south to Damansara for a family getaway.  No particular reason, just cos we had a three-day weekend in Penang 🙂

This was the simple bento set I prepared for Ethan the morning we left…well, if you can call it a bento set, that is.  It’s nothing fancy like what the other bento fanatics are making, but it was what I could do with what I had at home.  I made some kiddie sushi style salmon bread rolls, butterfly-shaped sandwiches and apple slices, threw in some cherry tomatoes, and added some fish-shaped cheese crackers and a bottle of Yakult.  Guess which one Ethan went for first?  …. of course the Yakult!  Then the crackers.  He hardly ate the sandwiches and sushi rolls, and let’s not even talk about the tomatoes, which he put into his mouth at first (out of curiosity, I suppose) and promptly gave them to me.  Well, at least the sausage roll from Baker’s Cottage, which my Mom gave to us when we stopped in Ipoh, was a hit with him!

Here he is having fun at the Cycle & Carriage Bintang exhibition at The Curve.  He amused himself by pointing out the letters on the ground.  And soon enough, there were many other kids who joined in the fun too.  Looks like the “BINTANG” word attracted a lot more attention than what the organizers expected, eh?

We had dinner at Italiannies with my bro Allan and his wife Pei Gee, and of course my going-to-be-5-month-old nephew Collin.  Look at Ethan demonstrating how to grab a some Shrimp Aglio Olio with the tongs that were provided, showing that he is certainly an eating force to be reckoned with.

The next day held promises of a very busy and fun-filled day, and I was glad we started the day right with a hearty buffet breakfast, and then managed to squeeze in some quality family time at the hotel swimming pool.  It was the first time we had gone to the pool at Royale Bintang Damansara, and I had planned for it the day before, because I had brought Ethan there for a look-see and the smile of excitement on his face was too adorable to turn down.  It was a good thing all three of us had packed our swimsuits along too.  Check out his excited face when I told him we were going for a dip:

And see how he can’t wait to get into the pool?  Priceless!

The baby pool at Royal Bintang was shallow enough to allow Ethan to stand and wade around the pool, which he had not experienced before.  I had to reassure him that it was okay and he could stand in it.  All this while, the pool in our apartment is too deep for him, so his feet don’t touch the floor.  Even the baby pool in our apartment is about 0.7m deep, so if he were to stand on the floor, the level of water would probably reach his mouth. 

After some standing and wading around, he tried to *swim* by bending forward and moving his arms. Hehe…so cute watching him do that.  And then later when I soaked myself in the mini jacuzzi, he wanted to join me too, but the water there was too deep for him to stand.

It was a good thing we went *sorta* swimming too, cos we had buffet lunch at Shogun in 1-Utama.  Ethan had LOADS of chawan mushi and ice cream too.  And then after that, loaded with all the energy and sugar, he roamed the mall.

I had a mini bloggers’ meet in the afternoon back at The Curve, and so Pete volunteered to babysit Ethan during that time.  Well, Ethan did check out the play area in Marché for a bit before he waved buh-bye and went along his way.

When I called Pete after my gathering, I was surprised to hear Ethan still talking very loudly in the background, meaning he had not slept at all the whole afternoon.  Apparently they were in mph and Ethan was demonstrating his *reading* skills.  Took him back to the room to freshen up and get ready for dinner.

We had dinner with Pauline at Absolute Thai, and Ethan enjoyed his bowl of rice all on his own.  In the middle of dinner I suddenly heard a big *clunk* and realized Ethan’s teaspoon had dropped on the floor.  My SIL started giggling and said she noticed Ethan had suddenly dozed off while sitting in his chair!  Unbelievable!  That’s a first for him!  Well, that shows how tired that little fella was!  I took him out of his seat and cradled him in my arms.  He immediately fell into dreamland.  Well, you gotta give the lil guy credit for finishing his dinner before he decided to sleep!

However, just as we got back to the hotel room, he was up again.  And after his shower, he was back to his normal “energizer bunny” self (battery recharging only took less than a hour apparently). 

Ethan recently developed a habit/hobby of bouncing on Pete’s tummy.  Very painful I know, cos he has done it on me before too.  I taught him that he could also bounce on the bolster.  See, how happy he is?  Can pose and smile samo…

The next day, we finished our holiday with our routine dose of Ikea shopping and lunch at Italiannies before we left for Penang.  Ethan fell asleep as we approached Penang, but woke up when we arrived back home.  It was an enjoyable trip for all of us, but you know, all the fun aside, it was just splendid to be home.

The way Ethan took to our hotel room at The Royale Bintang Damansara was like a duck to water.  Made us feel as though we need to plan hotel trips every now and then, because we simply love the look of joy on his face.  Of course, he slept for most of the car ride, so while he was fully charged when we checked into the hotel, Daddy and Mommy just wanted to grab some serious shuteye.

Yes, we took a drive down to KL last weekend primarily to visit Ethan’s new cousin Collin.  When we reached the hospital, Ethan refused to enter the room where Collin and his mommy, Pei Gee were in.  Baby Collin had to be put on the bilibed because he had infant jaundice, and he was rooming in together with his mommy.  My brother Allan thinks it’s the blue light from the bilibed that scared Ethan away.  According to him, perhaps Ethan still had memories of his bilibed experience and was a little bit traumatized by it.  Ethan had breastmilk jaundice for about a month when he was a newborn and had to be in the bilibed for many many days.  Anyway, we all didn’t believe Allan at first but when the blue light was turned off after we came back from dinner, Ethan happily came into the room to look at baby Collin.  Coincidence?

In any case, Ethan had a really good time throughout our trip.  You can tell just by looking at the pictures…

In fact, he enjoyed himself so much that he was tired out and he actually fell asleep in my arms in Italiannies while we were having lunch.  Must have been the soothing jazzy music they were playing too.

Anyway it was back home to Penang after that.  Oh, and for the record, he slept at close to midnight last night.  I have no idea where he gets his energy from.

A holiday would not be complete without good food, now would it? And the recent holiday we had was not spared.  Here’s a rundown of what Ethan had during our recent holidays.  Trust me, this boy can really eat! … and he appreciates good food too!

Kai see hor-fun in Ipoh – he slurped every strand of the smooth koay teow in reckless abandonment. And he had it twice, once on Saturday and once again on Sunday before we left. Oh, how he would have loved the Lou-Wong kai see hor fun… never mind, we go next time okay?

Chicken rice in Ipoh – just like his Daddy, Ethan adores chicken rice, so much so that I might not have enough for myself the next time, since he shares the food with me!

Shrimp Aglio (linguini) in Italiannies, The Gardens – Ethan enjoys his pasta with his fingers, and this time, he also made use of his personal cutlery.  It was a joy just watching him lick the spoon clean and ermmm….also performing other stunts with it.  The linguini was perfecto, just the way I like it too! 

Chicken sausages, rice crispies, corn flakes and pink guava juice at The Crowne Plaza’s buffet breakfast – after he tired of the sausages, I poured some cereal for him in a bowl. He would then reach into the bowl and eat them diligently. He then figured it would be easier to move the bowl closer to him on his high chair tray, so he lifted the entire bowl nearer to him 😛 And yes, pink guava juice is Ethan’s favorite beverage at any buffet breakfast. He will request for it and then drink it up as if someone was gonna take it away from him.

Chawan mushi with rice at Ichiban Boshi, Pavilion KL – We were all very hungry when we arrived at the restaurant and Ethan must have downed the entire cup of chawan mushi and even taxed a little bit from Daddy too!   He was so full that we simply had to let him run around and explore The Pavilion for exercise after lunch 🙂

Oh, and Ice Lemon Tea everywhere we go.

Very soon I bet Ethan would be able to eat many many more things.  And I am confident of this because during the Raya holidays, I spotted not one, not two, not three, but FOUR pramolars appearing on his gums, all at the same time!

We had planned on visiting the Aquaria during this trip to KL because we knew that the Crowne Plaza was very near KLCC. However, little did we know that “very near” meant that the Aquaria was just within walking distance from the hotel! We were in luck! We only had to take the connecting escalators from the hotel, which brought us to the side of Wisma UOA along Jalan Pinang, and from there, it was just a short walk across the road to the Kuala Lumpur Convention Center where the Aquaria was located. (Actually at first we went all the way to the Mandarin Oriental and then we had to patah balik when the kind receptionist from MO showed us the correct way. Heh.)

Anyway, when we arrived at the Aquaria, there was already a tremendously long queue waiting to purchase tickets to go in. I quickly joined the queue while Pete had the honorary task of taking care of Ethan. Our little big boy was very active and kept wanting to go up and down the nearby escalators. At times, he would come and look for me in the queue and at other times, he would rather wander around the entrance of the Aquaria.

When we finally got our tickets (entrance for Ethan was free, of course), we went in, eager to see if the Aquaria was anything like the Underwater World in Singapore. Ethan was fascinated by the all the fish and underwater life and kept saying “shhh…shhhhh” (that’s how he says “fish”).

However, all the fish and turtles were forgotten when Ethan saw the underwater tunnel. He began to struggle to indicate that he wanted freedom to run about. I tell ya, it was so difficult to get a proper picture in the tunnel because Ethan ran so fast! There was a moving walkalator that moved all through the underwater tunnel too, and Ethan was walking and running on it as well. It was tiring for us too, because we had to stay close behind him. Sometimes, when he found that his path was blocked, he would either scream for the people to move aside or he would just push them aside. And if these methods did not work, our boy would just barge through. Tsk tsk… And if that’s not enough, after practically running through the entire tunnel, he ran to the beginning and started all over again. We must have gone through about three rounds that day!

Well, in the end, we finally carried him, protesting and screaming to the exit. Thankfully there was an escalator there to distract him. Pete wanted to take a picture of Ethan and me in front of a model of the jaws of a shark (I think), but this is what came out of it:

This time round, our holiday in the Klang Valley was not spent at the Mutiara Damansara area staying at our usual Royale Bintang Damansara hotel. My Dad and Mom presented Pete and I with a night’s stay at the Crowne Plaza Mutiara KL as an early wedding anniversary present, so we stayed in the heart of the city instead. We checked in on Sunday at about 3p.m. and Ethan was very excited about the gorgeous room, furnished with tasteful decor, and kept running around the entire room (as usual). The baby cot was brought to our room promptly and placed beside our bed. Yes, the speed at which the cot arrived was a very good impression of the hotel indeed.

The room we stayed in came with a shower stall and also a bathtub in the washroom. And our little big boy Ethan had the opportunity to try both. On Sunday night, he showered in the stall, and played peekaboo with us through the glass doors. Obviously there is something fascinating about peeking through glass doors while showering. Then on Monday morning, we put him standing in the bathtub together with his yellow froggie bathmat and gave him a shower. He was intrigued with the shower nozzle that could be pulled out from the shower tube outlet and he was enthralled by the tap, which was within his reach. Of course, he wanted to play for the longest time with the water, but we had to take him out of the tub because we could tell he was already shivering 😛

Scrap Credits: Sweet Serenity kit from Shabby Princess 

After Ipoh, we made a trip to KL.  Apart from shopping and sightseeing, part of our agenda was also to visit Ethan’s almost-one-month-old cousin Jonathan.  We arrived at Paul’s apartment on Sunday evening, and since we had to wait for a while before we left for dinner, Pete and I decided to take Ethan for a short walk around the apartment grounds.  It was the first time for us too, in fact.  And this was an excellent opportunity for Ethan to get his dose of exercise.

Ethan laughed when he saw the little kids running around and swimming in the pool.  And then he caught sight of the fountain.  He paused for a moment, but only for a moment….then he started giggling away.  I carried him up a few steps to get a better view of the fountain and he reached out his hands to play with the water.  Never mind that it resulted in his face being splashed, he had a whale of a time!  Well, we all did.

What an tiring, but eventful and enjoyable weekend it had been! Last Saturday morning we drove down to Damansara. We had planned on making this trip about a week or so back but was having some problems booking a room because it was the school holiday season. Thankfully, we managed to secure a room at the Royale Bintang last Wednesday! That’s the most convenient hotel to stay in because The Curve is just next to it, so that makes shopping so much easier. So we were all set! Although our plan was to leave Penang at around 9a.m., we all overslept and only was able to set out at about 10:15a.m. Therefore our plan to have lunch at The Curve went down the drain and we ended up (again) having lunch at the famous Pun Chun coffee shop in Bidor instead.

It wasn’t entirely a bad idea actually, and although the wan ton mee is severely overpriced, it was good. We thought Ethan is a wan ton mee fan, but he decided he didn’t want any of it that day, choosing instead to dig into the char siew pau. So much so that we had to tarpow an additional pau for him to continue eating in the car after leaving Bidor.

After finishing the pau, Ethan was still going “mum mum mum…”, so I gave him cornflakes. He munched happily on the cornflakes all the way till we reached the hotel.

After checking in to our room, our boy was very fascinated by his new surroundings, walking up and down the room, into the bathroom, opening the cabinets and drawers. It was clear that he had all the energy in the world to go shopping! Since Daddy the driver wanted to get forty winks, I changed Ethan and got him all ready. We then met up with Ethan’s Aunty Pauline in the hotel lobby and went on our shopping excursion! There’s nothing like shopping to beat fatigue 🙂

Of course, I chose to go to Mothercare first and the neighboring baby and toddler shops. With Pete not around, there was a tendency for me to overspend… hah… I ended up with 2 pairs of peejays for Ethan, some clothes and another Baby Einstein DVD: Baby Noah, which was on sale at 10% off at Early Learning Center 🙂 The three of us hung out at The Curve and even walked all the way to Ikano Power Center and back.

Soon, Ethan requested for “mum mum” again, and I took him to the Baby Care room in The Curve for a feed right before dinner. There was a short queue there and we had to wait for about 10 minutes before we got ourselves a cubicle. Honestly, the management at The Curve should consider having another room or perhaps expanding the existing nursing room, because even when I was breastfeeding Ethan, there were so many other mothers and babies waiting in line after me! Ethan almost fell asleep but woke up at the right time, just before we were about to leave for dinner.

Dinner was at Marché, with Pauline, Paul and Guat Tho (Ethan’s Ah Pek and Ah Mmm). Pete and I were craving for Marché since we frequented the restaurant in Singapore and were eager to see if it was the same here in Malaysia. We were however sorely disappointed that there was no root beer 🙁 The one thing we were hoping to get!! Ethan, however, enjoyed his dinner very much. He loved the veal sausage and mushroom soup, and even had some of the pineapple and starfruit juice! He almost snatched my crépè away too, but I moved my plate away just in time!

Scrap papers & elements from Lindsay Jane Designs

After our post-dinner shopping, we went back to our room to retire for the night. Unfortunately Ethan had other plans and only fell asleep (I think) after 11p.m.

The next morning we woke up around 9:00a.m. and rushed to go downstairs for the buffet breakfast. There was already a long line when we arrived at the lobby, so by the time we got seated it was already close to 10:30a.m.

Ethan again enjoyed his sausages, this time it was chicken. He finished 2 sausages I think, and even hijacked some of my pink guava juice.

Then he also walloped some fruit loops. Breakfast is, after all, the most important meal of the day.

We then went back to our rooms to pack and prepared to check out. Shopped for a while at Ikea, because what is a trip to Ikano Power Center without visiting Ikea, yes? The beauty about Ikea is that it had these children stations where they put toys for the kids to play with. These stations were strewn all over Ikea, just to keep the kids occupied while their parents went about their shopping.

Of course, Ethan is also quickly learning to be an avid Ikea shopper, preferring to test out certain items that caught his fancy.

We then had lunch at a Japanese restaurant in Damansara Uptown, called Umai-ya. I tell you, I have no idea how much Ethan ate for lunch, because he at first was sharing the chawan mushi with me (I gave him chawan mushi mixed with rice). Then when I ran out of chawan mushi, Pete and Aunty Pauline contributed theirs too. And our boy was eating it non-stop. After lunch, I could actually see his tummy bulging from under his clothes! Hehehe…

We then visited the show unit of Aunty Pauline’s new condo, Menjalara 18. Ethan went about the show unit as if it was his own home, climbing up and down the sofas and the beds.

After that it was homeward bound to Penang. A rushed trip but a really enjoyable one. We do it next month again, yeah? 🙂