Making Curry Puffs

We made curry puffs 2 weeks ago, a few days before we went to Taiping. I used my mother's recipe to make the curry puffs. For some unknown reason, it is easier for me to use my mother's recipe instructions than following cookbook. She makes the steps very easy. She usually uses a lot of intuition, when measuring the ingredients and so do I.  I find cookbooks quite complicated and difficult to follow. I prefer to watch video instructions online.  

Out from the oven

Making the fillings     

·        Garlic
·        Onions 

·        Potatoes

·        Sweet potatoes

·        Salt

·        Sugar

·        Curry powder (1½ spoon)

Steps:
Boil 4 potatoes and 1 sweet potato

Peel skin the skin

Dice the potatoes into small chunks

(I used the other variation, where I peeled the skin first, dice them, then boiled them.)

Saute the garlic and onions

Add in the boiled potatoes

Add adequate salt & sugar 

Let it cool

Making the dough

·        150 g butter

·        ½ cup milk or water

·        1 egg

·        300g wheat flour 

·        ½ tsp baking powder

Steps:

Mix the remaining ingredients into dough

Knead dough

Roll flat

Cut with cutter

Put it on the mould

Heat the oven to 190 degree celcius 

Put into oven and bake it until it is golden brown.

Remove from oven.

Rolling the dough flat

Carefully lifting the dough

Careful, careful!

Putting it on the mould

Adding in the potato fillings

Pressing shut

Peeling off the excess dough 

Placing the curry puff into a tray

E also wanted to help out

Peeling off excess dough

Ta-daah!!!

Enjoying the fruits of their labour

Sweeping

S made a mess on the floor with broken eggshells and out of his own initiative, he decided to sweep it.
He had a sudden interest in "sweeping" which he hadn't had before.

Dumptruck

We got a new dumptruck at Tesco, with a dumper that could be tilted. It came with a tiny watering can and 2 spades. Earlier on, I had changed the container of the sandtray to a larger one, but it still looked a little small for the dumptruck. I wanted to get a larger tray, but it took up space and the moderate size one was more practical. As the trays are stackable, I used another tray to cover the top of the sandtray, mainly to avoid cats from littering in it.

Playing in the "hot" afternoon sun, immediately after getting back home from shopping.

Counting

I was looking through the kitchen cabinet for items to be sent to be recycled and came across the children's plastic milk tin covers. We had amassed quite a number as they drink a lot of milk.

I suddenly had an inspiration to use the covers for writing. I took a whiteboard marker pen and started to write on it, and S decided to join in by writing numbers.

Happy at his writing

Learning to write number 15 by referring to number 5 
and putting a number 1 in front of it

Making sure they are all there

Arranging the covers in each "box"

 Since I had many stones, I took them out and got S to count and arrange the stones in the box.

Counting the stones

Arranging the stones

This is as far as he got, before he lost interest.

Buttering bread

Once in a while, I would make brown bread, which is healthier as it doesn't contain preservatives. Yesterday, S for the first time, showed an interest in buttering his bread. Usually he doesn't like to butter his bread whereas E loves to butter it. He didn't like the coarse peanut that was in the peanut butter, and would remove it one by one.

Buttering bread for his brother

Where does tissue paper come from?

Yesterday, S started to have a sudden interest on where things came from. He asked me so many questions while he was having his breakfast.

S: "Mummy, where does tissue paper come from?"
Me: "Err, tissue? They come from trees."
Before I could further elaborate how they are processed, he bombarded me with another question.

S: "Where does the rain come from?"
Me: "Rain comes from the cloud. When the clouds gets too heavy, it will turn into rain. That is called condensation."
I explained to both of them about condensation (reinforced from a Winnie-the-Pooh book which he read earlier)

Then he asked me where the plastic plate, the stainless steel spoon, the mirror, curtain, cloth (and many more that I can't remember), all came from. He also asked me to explain step by step, how they come from and go through the factory process until it reaches the end user. E, also started to follow his brother, asking me where certain things came from.

Today, he asked me: "Mummy, where does paper come from?"
Me: "They come from trees".
I didn't really bother to elaborate how they are made.

Thank goodness for the internet. I can now google up the answer. LOL!

Paper Race Car

Here we are making a paper race car. I wanted to keep it until the kids were older, but S pestered me to make the race car. It was the most difficult craft I've ever done, as it had many pieces and took a long time to complete. Furthermore, the instructions were quite difficult to follow. I just winged it and did my best.

It was quite flimsy that after playing with it a few times, some parts became dislocated and I had to stick them together with cellotape. 

Baking cookies

Last week, we baked wholemeal cookies again. E loves to help me to mix the ingredients, as he is a kinesthetic person and loves doing things with his hands.

Putting butter and flour

 

Putting sugar

Mixing the ingredients. I later used an electric hand mixer to mix the flour. 

Making Cupcakes

Once in a while, I would make cupcakes. I try not to do it too often as refined white flour and sugar is not healthy. I also lessened the butter and sugar content of the cake. For this cupcake, I also added grated carrot.

Putting chocolate sprinkles onto the cupcakes

"Mmmmm, yummy"

Combine Harvester

I left 2 rolled-up yoga mats lying around and S decided that it was a Combine Harvester. He has seen a combine harvester in a book on tractors as well as on youtube. How creative! I would never have thought of that.

Visit to Taiping Zoo

 tWe visited the Taiping Zoo on 25 November 2010 before we went up to Sasanarakkha Buddhist Sanctuary to conduct the Lotus Bloom Children Camp there.  I heard that it often rains in the afternoon in Taiping, so I did not put much hope on us visiting the zoo. Furtunately, the weather was fine when we arrived at the zoo at 1.30 pm. E had a short nap in the car along the way, while S did not sleep at all. I wondered if he would be able to get through the zoo visit.


The zoo entrance fees were RM12 for adults and RM8 for children, more expensive than the Melaka Zoo that we visited earlier. Tram rides were free. As we entered the zoo, there was a tram waiting there, and we immediately hopped onto the tram for a ride. The driver drove quite fast. He spoke softly and very fast over the microphone and I kept turning my head left and right according to his fast pace to look at the animals he mentioned. Some slipped my eye because he drove fast. 


S was observant and asked why the tram was like a tractor. He said "It looks like a tractor". It did. The tram was pulled by a tractor in the front. The thought did not occur to me, as I just sat in the tram, without observing.

Driving a zebra tractor. 

Why were the chimpanzees huddled together like that for quite some time?
They reminded me of the "See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Do No Evil Monkeys"

Can you spot the baby elephant?

The tram ride ended after around 15 minutes, whereupon we got down at the elephant enclosure and took some photos. Other trams passed us by quite frequently and we had to make sure that we stood safely at the side of the road and were not in its way.  

We spent about 2.5 hours there. It was quite cooling and not as humid as expected. Before we went back, we went to get another tram ride. It took us some time to find the tram station at the beginning of the zoo, due to lack of signages. This time, the tram was slower and the driver spoke clearly although the microphone had problems and kept crackling. It was worth the second tram ride. I saw animals that I didn't see during the first tram ride. S fell asleep during the second tram ride. 

Children Art Class

I haven't been posting for the past few weeks, and am slowly catching up. 


Seeing S' enthusiasm for art, on 4th September, just after he turned 4, I enrolled him for a children's art class at the Malaysian Institute of Art. I also enrolled myself and sat in at the back of the class, doing my own painting. He was the youngest in the class. I was quite impressed to see him sitting independently and listening to the teacher. He draws very fast and confidently and hardly uses the eraser. He could sit for an hour just doing the drawing and painting. The last half hour, he got restless.  

I wanted to send him for a trial class, but they didn't have any, so I had to stick on for a month. The art class was 26 km away, and it was held on a Saturday, from 4.00 pm - 5.30 pm. I had to use the Middle Ring Road 2 which was usually heavy with traffic and it took me 45 minutes to reach there and on some occasions, I hour to get back. In the end, I stopped after 1 month as I'm usually busy on Saturdays and couldn't commit for long term. I liked the teacher and found that she was good at handling young children and could relate at their level. At one point of time, there were 14 students in her class...no mean feat.    


The teacher found it challenging to teach him initially as he always draws what he wants and wasn't open to suggestions. That's why the boat in the second picture turned into a caravan, as he loved wheels. 

S is seated strategically on the far left. 

The teacher asked him to draw anything he liked, and he drew trucks - his favourite drawing object at that point in time

"Caravan on water" - was supposed to be a boat actually

"Sunflowers"

From the story - "The three little pigs". 

I liked the way he used the paints like a game and splashed brown "mud" on the small pig in front.


I was a little sad to stop his class as he loved it very much. However, I am often very busy on weekends and the art class is only held on weekends. 


After that, I tried searching for a nearer art class, but the teachers weren't suitable. Maybe they were good at art but that wasn't the criteria I was looking for. I wanted one who was caring and could get down to their level. Their art skill need not necessarily be the best. The two teachers that I visited - who were operating franchised art centres did not fit the bill. 


In the meantime, I decided to just let him draw at home. Surprisingly, he does his own drawing by "copying" other drawings / pictures and gets me to guide him whenever he needs help, which is not often. I will post that artwork in another post.