Project Cake Pops

Posted on February 15, 2013 by The Giddy Tigress

It had been a while since I attempted to make cake pops since my last cake pop fiasco.  It was also because I couldn’t get any candy melts back in Malaysia.

But here in the US, I saw a whole variety on sale in Walmart complete with the lollipop sticks too!  And since I had leftover cake in the fridge from Ethan’s birthday, I figured why not?

So today, my cooking experiment resulted in this:

The cake balls were nice and chilled in the refrigerator since two days ago, so today, I only needed to melt the candy melts and do the coating and decorating.  Still, I encountered some minor problems:

  • I decided to go with white candy melts and color the rest with food gel coloring.  Unfortunately the food gel coloring made the candy melt mixture thicker and I had to dilute it a little with olive oil (it was the only thing I could think of)!
  • That would explain some of the thicker texture coating on the cake pops.
  • The styrofoam block I used to dry the cake pops had a life of its own and simply would not allow me to stand the cake pops properly to dry.  So I am now left with a hole-y styrofoam block.

I tasted one of ’em cake pops and it was SUPER SWEET!  Not sure if the kids are gonna dig this, but we’ll see.

And that’s our dessert for the day 🙂

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We Survived Nemo and a Low-Key Lunar New Year

Posted on February 12, 2013 by The Giddy Tigress

Last weekend, while our friends and relatives from miles away in Malaysia were busying themselves in the (usually) sweltering heat of the Chinese Lunar New Year, here in the north-eastern New England state of the US, we were preparing for one of the biggest blizzards for a long time.

All public schools in Massachusetts were officially closed on Friday in anticipation of snowstorm Nemo, and most office workers were already planning to work from home from Friday onwards.  I had pulled in my grocery shopping on Friday and did some shopping on Thursday itself.

The snow started mildly enough at about 10:00a.m. and showed no sign of stopping anytime soon.  It got heavier and heavier as the day wore on, and by evening, we could see and hear strong gusts of wind blowing all around us.  A blanket of snow had formed around our apartment building and the mayor had declared a state of emergency, including a statewide vehicle ban on all motor vehicles on the road as of 4:00p.m. Friday until further notice.

We were basically locked indoors from then on.

We were supposed to be prepared for the worst, including a possible power outage; and while we had the necessary extra blankets, we had forgotten to get any flashlights or kerosene lamps!  We only had our flashlight apps from our iPhones!

Thankfully though, there was no power outage in our area, and we were kept snug and warm throughout the blizzard.

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Baby Crib All Set Up!

Posted on February 8, 2013 by The Giddy Tigress

Finally, after weeks and weeks of shopping, deliberating and more shopping, we have our baby crib all set up and ready to welcome our newest addition to our family!

When we moved here, we did not have enough space in our shipment to ship our crib from Penang, so we’ve decided to get a new one here.  We chose a dark brown one this time (versus the white one we already have), and also bought a matching dressing/changing table (The actual color term used by the manufacturer is Espresso).  The crib had been sitting in our room for a few weeks now, mattress-less, until just about a few days ago when the crib mattress we ordered arrived!

Later that evening, we laid out the crib sheets, and stood back to admire the cozy and pretty little sleeping area.  Don’t you think it’s adorable? 🙂

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Time is Speeding By: 35 Weeks Preggers

Posted on February 6, 2013 by The Giddy Tigress

Can you believe I am now 35 weeks along?  At times, I really feel as though my skin is unable to stretch any further, and I am telling just about everyone that I waddle when I walk.  Not a pretty sight, I know.

On Your Marks, Get Set…..

In the past few weeks, I’d arranged for a tour of the Delivery and Birth Center at the hospital where I would be delivering our 3rd child. The tour was in the evening, so naturally Ethan and Hannah tagged along.  I also did the hospital pre-registration on that night itself, just so we don’t need to go through the registration process on the labor day itself.

I’m just about finished packing my labor bag, and am in the midst of laundering all the necessary items, like cloth diapers, napkins, baby clothes, nursing wear and the like.  Nesting instincts, much?

(Psstt…just finished my last load of cloth diapers today.  Will be tackling the folding later. :P)

I See Ya, Baby!

We had another ultrasound when I was at 34 weeks, and as usual Pete and I were delighted to be able to see our little baby once again.  We got a glimpse of the little feet and hands, and also quite a clear picture of the face. 🙂

The baby was in a transverse position at that point, although baby did move head down for a little while before moving back to the transverse position again.  The doctor said that it’s rather common for baby to be in transverse position (especially for the 3rd baby), since everything is more “stretched out”.  However, the baby will probably shift head-down in the coming weeks.

Source and Credits

I have another ultrasound scheduled when I am at 37 weeks, to check the position of the baby, and if necessary, manual intervention will be used to try and reposition the baby then.

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Presenting…My Coupon Organizer!

Posted on February 4, 2013 by The Giddy Tigress

I am inundated with coupons and more coupons every week, especially here in the US, when almost every shopping trip involves coupons of every kind imaginable: free bonus gifts, additional discounts, special purchase prices and so much more.  It’s so hard to keep track of  every coupon that I have earned, and sometimes I find myself tearing my hair out because some coupons had expired without me knowing it.

I store my coupons in my purse, and also some on my kitchen counter.  And I find myself rummaging for the coupons every time I go shopping…sometimes it gets embarrassing, you know.

So when I stumbled upon this 7-pocket accordion file in the Target Dollar section last week, I immediately knew I could use it as a coupon holder/organizer.  It comes in 4 colors :neon pink, neon green, blue and white patterned, and black.  I chose the black one, because I didn’t really want to draw attention to my coupon organizer.

See how nifty it is?  It fits snugly into my palm, just like a long wallet would!

You can pretty much use it to store anything from receipts, bills, cards…but I choose to use it as a coupon organizer.  Inside, it is compartmentalized with label holders too!

 It comes with those regular label stickers for you to customize it to your liking.  However, you know I can never be contented with mere white labels, so I snagged these at Target!

Pretty printed paper tape, or better known as washi tape!  4 for $4, but the ones I got, in the reddish and pinkish hues  were on sale for $3!

I stuck them onto the plastic label stickers, wrote out the categories and then fixed them onto the label holders in the coupon organizer!!

I couldn’t believe how pretty that turned out!  Next, all I had to do was segregate my coupons into the different compartments!

Totally loving this!  And best of all, if I needed a change in the label names, all I had to do was tear out the washi tape labels and create a new one!

…I’m off looking for other organizing opportunities now! 😀

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