Christmas is Here

Well, many of you already know that Clara got quite sick on our flight back from Shanghai. She threw up almost all the way from Tokyo to Newark, except when she slept. First it was food and then it was just bubbly saliva and eventually, it was some nasty yellow liquid that she threw up. I finally managed to call MIT Medical in Newark but was cut off by the custom officer who said cellphones prohibited, burst into tears and only to be "comforted" by my husband who commented to Sonya that "mummy cannot take stress".

Clara continued to throw up for another next day after we got back to Boston, then the vomiting stopped but got fever and diarrhea instead. Fever and diarrhea went away but she threw up again in the morning on the third day. I know she got better on Thursday because she was getting herself in trouble around the house again :) I must confess that I did ask myself if I preferred her when she was sick and not breaking anything or when she is well and getting her fingers into everything :)

Anyways, it was Christmas Eve and with no school that day and Clara just recovered and shouldn't be outside yet, I thought I would let Sonya and Clara decorate a gingerbread house. It was not exactly gingerbread. I just got Justin to buy me two boxes of graham crackers and a pack of M&Ms and with some powdered sugar, I got the house up for them to decorate. I know I can buy one of those kits from the store but why do that when I can make one that cost so much less :)

Sonya started this finger pose thing whenever she took photos when we were in Tokyo or Shanghai. Clara has since caught on the habit, finally managed two fingers instead of three :)

We had such delicious food in Tokyo and Shanghai that within a few days since we got back, I have made Tonkatsu a few nights ago and last night, 小笼包 for dinner. I cheated by buying readymade Shanghai dumpling wrappers instead of making my own but I did roll them out thinner so that the 小笼包 would be more delicate.

Before steaming above and after steaming below. The main thing about 小笼包 is the soup trapped within the dumplings. I found out how to do it from a recipe I found on the internet. Maybe I didn't mix the filling thoroughly so some had more soup than others. Maybe those without soup broke somehow :( Well, my in-house food critic gave 1 mushroom for it so it must have been good ;)

Before Christmas, we had asked Sonya and Clara what they wanted for Christmas from Santa. Sonya said magic wand (surprise! surprise! definitely not!) and Clara said a star.

Sonya threw a picture for Santa, wrote a note for him before she went to bed and we left out 2 cookies (courtesy of Inka) for him too (I am assuming that he would be very full if he eats cookies at every house, right?).

The next morning, they woke up to presents from Santa ;) He got Sonya her magic wand. He could only find tiny little candy stars for Clara (despite searching the whole Target store inside out) We comforted her by saying that she only got little stars because she was only a little bit good girl, which is true since she just played while Sonya cleaned up the toys on Christmas Eve.

I also got them Hello Kitty notebooks and a marker set for Sonya since she loves drawing so much and animal tatoos for Clara since she loves stickers and animals. Justin got a Enya CD.

Merry Christmas!