Blackout for 2 hours

It's been a busy weekend.  There were some shopping we need to do and family gatherings.  I have to say.. we adapt the new life with 2 kids pretty well, given Baby L is only 2 months old.  

On Sat, while we're enjoying some quiet time in the late afternoon, we suddenly lost power.  Not knowing how long the blackout would last, we try to get prepared in case the blackout last longer and perhaps overnight.  But at the same time, Baby R enjoyed the blackout a lot!  Since the last blackout 2 years ago around Christmas time, he seems to be very excited about it.  Then we started to play some games on the easel with chalks.  That's a bonus for the afternoon!! :) 

What I know for sure

It is always enjoyable to read/listen to successful people to share their experiences and life stories.  I recently gotta read a book from Oprah Winfrey "What I know for sure".  It's an e-book that I'm reading, but as I'm reading it, there's the voice of Oprah already in my head, just like an audio book that Oprah is reading to me. :)   It's not a personal development book that I normally read.  Instead, it's a self-help kind of book to tell people living in the moment.  I'm only half way through but can't wait to finish the whole book!!

My cake story

I once heard from someone saying that moms are incredibly efficient, because there are so many things to do on their hands.  I can't agree more.  And I also think that most moms are good at time management because of the juggling of tasks.  

One of the challenges for cooking or baking nowadays is that it's hard to find a dedicated time that you can finish the cooking without interruption.  When I was making the cake, there are 3 stages.  
1. Measure and Prepare the dry ingredient
2. Measure and Prepare the wet ingredient
When I was about to mix the dry with the wet... Baby L just cried. So I gotta stop, cuz once they've mixed, I gotta put it into the oven.  

For the cake, I didn't make the cake because I don't want Baby R to eat too much chocolate, but I should try the chocolate ganache recipe some day!  The cake turns out a bit dry.  I don't know if it's because of the wheat flour, or I didn't adjust the baking time since I only used half of the portion.  

I've also made some modification from the original recipe:
- cut sugar for 25% -- The cake is still sweet enough
- substitute coffee with orange juice from real orange (with zest) 
- substitute buttermilk with 2% milk 

Happy 2-month old!

Happy 2 months old, Baby L!!  Can't believe it's only been two months since he arrived.  I felt like I've been with him for a long time!  Let's see what are his accomplishments:

• Lifting up head: I think he could do that long before, and he's getting better at it.  
• Sleeping 6-7 hours at night: I'm always hoping he could sleep longer, but couldn't complain.  When we told the PD about his sleep schedule, he told us not to tell our friends cuz they are going to hate us. :P  In fact, this 6-hour stretch get us sleep much better already
• Smiling:  When Baby L was a few days old, he smiled.  But I wasn't sure if he's doing it involuntarily.  Now, I'm sure that he is really smiling.  I love when I was talking to him and he's staring at me and smiles back.  That just makes my day!
• Making noises other than crying: Maybe I spend most of the day time alone and really need some human interaction.  Sometimes I think when I talked to Baby L, he would answer me "yes".  
• Enjoying moments by himself: I don't know if it's officially an accomplishment, but it makes my life easier when he enjoys looking around from his bassinet.  

I hope he would continue to be a happy baby, just like his brother. :)  

As for the celebration, I've made a cake using the recipe from Ricardo. 

http://www.ricardocuisine.com/recipes/6151-the-i-best-best-i-chocolate-cake

Will continue the story about making it tomorrow.