She's back!!!

Wayne, the Ayi and I were all pretty worried that poor Rosabelle wasn't back to her normal self yet since her bout of fever/cough/runny nose (we continued with Day 4 of her medicine until she was much better), but these few days, she's been on an upward run - atta girl!

Maybe it was the effect of the medicine that made her drowsy and lethargic, but yesterday was the first day she wasn't on medication, and we saw an obvious surge in energy, with her crawling and screaming (well, trying to, as her voice was still hoarse). This is her still looking quite drawn, but playing with Wayne's Phiten neck strand.
But today, WOAAAH! We had to rein her in - today was the birthday celebration of two of the kids in the yard - Bao Bao (Aug 28) and Fei Fei (Sep 3), and I was at first hesitant about bringing her to a closed area (in Fei Fei's home) in the company of so many kids (virus alert!!!) when her immune system was still recovering, but thank goodness we still went ahead. Rosabelle had a whale of a time!

After her breakfast, we headed to the block opposite and saw only one birthday boy, Fei Fei. Apparently, Bao Bao had K.O.ed after awhile, and he remained fast asleep throughout, haha! This is Fei Fei with his devillish Halloween horns which could light up.

And that's the mothers with our kids, where adults and children alike feasted on a Swedish cake - Fei Fei's mum did it herself, having stayed in Sweden for 6 years, and making a 'cake' out of sandwiches with prawns and smoked meats; fruits; gummies; and mashed potato.

Rosabelle was deemed to be the most dressed-up kid at the party, with many mothers raving over her oh-so-cute bunny outfit. At it's most crowded, there were about 6-7 kids, and that's Rosabelle in the background, gingerly creeping towards the bookcases...

She was busy exploring each and every single new toy, crawling and cruising around happily. As they lived on the 28th floor, and with the Beijing autumn dawning upon us, they only had to open the living room window for us to get an 'air-conditioned' breeze, so I had Rosabelle wear her bunny hood at all times for fear of her catching a cold.

She even sat on Fei Fei's toy car. It must have been the increased activity levels, or the fact that so many kids were eating stuff, but her appetite improved with her eating bits of banana, honeydew, dragon fruit, bread, and mashed potato (so much that she did not finish her lunch at home later, and was so tired out and fell asleep shortly after reaching home, shouting in her sleep at times from the over-excitement!). I notice that when we bring foods out of the home, she is more likely to eat them, like just now, after eating half an apple before heading out for her evening walk, she managed to polish off 20 grapes, one small Del Monte banana, and a teething biscuit at one go - wowee!

As I didn't wear non-slip socks for her, there were many times when she almost did a leg split whilst standing, or lost her balance trying to stand up, haha!

So Wayne and I had to take turns to keep a close eye on her, and ensure that the toddlers did not trample on her crawling all over, heh!

She of course enjoyed the company of the other kids, playing with the birthday boy, or rather, snatching the toy from his mouth when he was happily chewing on it...

Fei Fei even lent Rosabelle his shades, which she surprisingly kept on for awhile until Wayne decided it was hampering her vision whilst she was crawling...

Near the end of the party, they had Fei Fei sit in a circle of various objects to see which one he would end up with. Chinese custom has it that at a child's one year of age, the elders will prepare a set of items for him/her to grab, and it is important to see what the kid finally goes away contented with, not the first thing he/she takes. They prepared abacus, stethoscope, car key, microphone, whipping spoon, dictionary, pen, goggles, lipstick, and money.

Fei Fei's parents wished he would take the pen or dictionary, but no luck. The boy was first attracted to the microphone - a career in the entertainment field, perhaps?

He then went for the money, making his parents despair further that he was going to be a roadside singer begging for spare change. After being distracted by the car key, he ended up holding on tightly to the hundred-renminbi note, and even putting it into his mouth.

Fei Fei's parents were satisfied enough - their son was going to be making loads of money, haha!

As for Rosabelle, she was very attracted by the lipstick (so girly, I know!), but ended up gumming the stethoscope...hmmm...looks like we can only tell at her first birthday in two months' time!

Since she got better, she has been spouting long rambles of speech at times. The other day, we were just talking about the humidifier (加湿器) in the room when she suddenly also muttered '加湿器' under her breath! When she saw me eating grapes, she pointed at it and went 'pu' (as in '葡萄'). She even called Wayne 'Daddy' when I asked her to (normally calls him 'Papa'), and knows how to call out to him in a louder voice when I tell her 'Papa cannot hear you, call louder'. She also called 'Bao Bao', and pointed at his dad, going 'Bao Bao Pa Pa', then went 'Fei' (as in 'Fei Fei', the birthday boy). Nowadays, whenever anybody asks me if she knows how to call 'Papa' or 'Mama', our little show-off will quickly go 'Papa', as if to tell everybody that she knows how to do so so.

A grandmother in the yard said if a child speaks early, he/she will walk late. Well, I'm not in a hurry for her to start walking anytime soon, as I'd rather she crawl well first...so...I'm content with a yabbering little one on my hands for awhile to come, and more importantly, a healthy little one at that!

For Ayi

When our nanny passed me her identification card for safekeeping during our travels to Zhengzhou, I saw that her birthday fell on 27 Aug, today, so I kept that in mind and arranged to get a fruit cake for her this morning. I also got Wayne to help buy a scrunchy for her (a fake Burberry) as a small gift.

Rosabelle also basked in the limelight as we lit the candle and sang a birthday song for the Ayi, who turns 48 years old today.
After she blew out the candle, she also made a wish, and I'm sure she also wishes for Rosabelle's speedy recovery. My mum tells me whenever children fall sick, they will grow and learn fast very quickly after... well, it'd better be worth it, given all the suffering our poor girl has had to go through, what with high fever, then cough, then now a runny nose with mucous that shoots out when she sneezes... ewww....

Rosabelle was also fascinated by the plastic knife and was more hindrance than help when the Ayi wanted to cut the cake.

That's Ayi with her favourite Yue Yue.

The whole affair didn't cost us much time nor effort to plan/put into action, but it was just a small gesture to reward the poor lady for working her heart out, and for the turmoil she has also been going through during Rosabelle's fever period. She was very appreciative, and I'm sure if Rosabelle could say (she's been babbling loads these days), she would wish Ayi a 生日快乐!

Sunshine after the rain?

When we brought Rosabelle out for her evening walk just now, she hitched a ride on an older girl's push-car bike, and an older boy was pushing her from behind. I really should have watched more closely - I only let go of my hands for all of like 5 seconds when the older boy lost his balance and the whole bike turned on its side, with poor Rosabelle still seated within. I quickly picked her up (had some difficulty doing so due to the awkward position and thus pulled her face slightly along the floor), and pacified the howling girl. Luckily there was no bleeding/bumps or scrapes on her face/head, and another mother quickly gave us a wet wipe to wipe away the dirt on her face (Phew! Wayne thought it was a big patch of blue-black at first!), and another applied aloe vera to the area. However, her left hand was slightly bruised from landing on it, and had two small dots of blood, and her cheek thereafter had a slight red spot.

Her crying stopped very quickly, but the boy pushing her bike was still crying, maybe still frightened and afraid the adults would scold him. Considering that our girl is ill, and that she got a shock and some bruise, I think she took it very well and was very brave, but it gave me a wake-up call to exercise every caution with our dear Princess man!

Speaking of caution, Wayne had his spate of bad luck yesterday when he reversed our car into the parked car beside us, denting the back passenger side of the car. Insurance will be covering the damages (RMB1,500!), but he of course had to spend time contacting/apologizing to the owner, making his way down to the repair shop, and of course us having to live without a car till Monday. Sigh! He said he just didn't see the car next to us, which is strange. Looks like Mummy dearest's warning that this is the Seventh Lunar month should be heeded...but just in case, when Rosabelle had taken ill last week, I also sprinkled on and let her drink some holy water we got from Singapore, and added some to Wayne's water after he told me about the accident. Blessing in disguise that nobody got hurt, and this is a relatively minor accident, teaching us all to be more cautious when driving in future.

Another thing looking up for me is upon my brother-in-law's advice, I wrote an email to KKH central appointment to explain that I would be back in Singapore for only a short time, and to try and squeeze an appointment slot for Rosabelle with her usual paediatrician, and it worked! Yaay! So she'll be reviewed on Thursday afternoon, the day we get back. At least we will be in the capable hands of a doctor who can help with the many queries the sub-standard Amcare doctors in Beijing have not been providing us.

Our girl will hopefully get better soon, and the nanny let her practise walking by stepping on her feet today, so sweet. Get better, get better, get fatter, get fatter!

I'd like for my old Rosie please, thank you

Since Rosie fell ill, we've been hearing more crying around the house for the past few days than the whole 10 months since her birth. Our happy baby has lost the sparkle in her eyes, and we seldom get to see her dimples or hear her chuckles as she's too lethargic/sleepy to play much.

Her cough took a turn for the worse on Monday night, waking her up at times, so when she woke up on Tuesday morning, we started her on her dose of Western medicine (Stada Guaifenesin, Methylephedrine and Chlorphenamine), as well as Chinese medicine (Beijing Tongrentang medicine for heatiness) that Amcare prescribed the day before. I consulted with my brother-in-law, who was at first hesitant for me to give her the medicine, as they don't normally prescribe these for kids under one year old in Singapore, but after hearing that the instructions inset referred to paediatric use, he was more reassured. She was also slightly feverish on Monday night, but I held off giving her more paracetemol as it was just low-grade fever, and I really did not like the idea of her taking so many kinds of medicines.

She was quite ok with the Western medicine, as it is sweet, but the Chinese medicine is very bitter, so we mixed it with some gripe water. She took one mouthful and decided she did not like it, and we had to resort to pouring the mixture into our dish bowl and pretending that the adults were all enjoying the concoction to tempt her into drinking it as well. It worked, for the first time.

She needs to eat the Western medicine 3 times a day, and the Chinese medicine 2 times a day, finishing 3 days of medication, so it translates into 15 sessions of painful medicine-taking for her, and us. We tried to coerce/convince her, changing bowls/cups, and the nanny at times had to trick her to open her mouth to drink water and quickly insert the spoonful of medicine instead, making her go all angry.

When she simply refused to open her mouth, we let her watch a bit of TV (Wheels on the Bus series), so she would glue her eyes on the screen, and even clap/wave/dance...but no use, lips remained sealed. So for the last two times she ate the Chinese medicine, we'd had to force-feed her. I was quite adamant not to have to resort to this, as I was afraid she'd choke/throw all the medicine up, and get all fearful of medicines ever again, but it was better than her not eating it, and I knew that it was going to make her better, so I'd rather grit my teeth and watch her bawl and struggle for awhile as we fed her the medicine. At least after we are done, she's easily consolable and does not continue with her crying, what a good girl.

For the Western medicine taken this morning, I had to carry her for 45 minutes and rock her back to sleep before she opened her lips slightly for us to pour a spoonful down, and we gave her the remaining spoonful after I'd set her down and turned her on her back...sigh, the things we resort to...

She was in rather high spirits last night, playing with us on the bed before her bed-time, and her temperature was pretty much normal for the whole day already. However, when I brought her down for her morning walk this morning, everybody remarked how listless she was, and the color had gone from her cheeks, and that she'd lost weight. Even when she got excited and screamed, there was not much voice. Poor thing. She does not have a good appetite, maybe from the medicine as well, and she's also not so active. I can only hope that all things will be back on track and she'd start eating well to regain the weight lost, and to make-up for her poor little body's suffering over the past few days. I told the nanny off for making her own call to stop feeding her any meats since Monday dinner, as she did not eat much fish for lunch. She was already diagnosed as anaemic and needs all the nutrients she can get - the nanny should just make the food and even if Rosabelle does not eat, at least we gave her a choice and offered it to her, right? Grrrr....

The older guardians in the yard all tell me when kids have a fever, they turn all the more stronger from the experience, and will be more sensible/learn new things. Well, if I had a choice, I'd rather poor Rosabelle not learn anything new, just as long as we can have our dear happy, active, and healthy baby girl back!

I'm eager for her to get well soon as we're due to fly back next Wednesday night - just me and her alone - and we'll be in Singapore from 3 to 16 September. Singapore Airlines has a promotion, so I got my tickets cheaper than usual, but as Rosabelle's ticket is 10% of the full fare, our total ticket fare was still slightly more expensive than if I'd bought Air China. Oh well, it's my first time flying with her, and I think we'd need all the good service we can get! Wayne collected Rosabelle's entry/exit permit today, so I have the task of settling her Chinese citizenship renounciation in place when back. Of course, it'd also be a time for catching up with dear family and friends, especially my brother whom I have not seen for more than 2 years (since our honeymoon in Switzerland and Rome in February 2007). My mum and sister have been pottering around getting things in place for our coming back, vacuuming the toys/mattresses, cleaning the curtains, buying stuff etc etc...

So, Rosie dear, get well soon, we have loads of places to see, and many things to do when back in Singapore!

Chasing her Zhengzhou roots - Day 3

On the last day in Zhengzhou, Rosabelle woke up in high spirits, and as we waited for the expensive steamed egg breakfast, she cruised along the bed frame, in spite of her precarious near-falls due to the over-long pair of Peter Rabbit pyjamas pants I wore for her...
She likes to wave 'hello', and this video captures her trying to steady herself and continue her Sunshine Ambassador wave of peace...

After her breakfast, we all headed to Wayne's grandparents' home, and strangely enough, she refused to be carried by anyone else today, thus I did not capture any farewell shots. She was happy enough busying herself with crawling/exploring of the bed, and even refused to take her lunch that the nanny prepared for her at the house (noodle soup with pork, potato and vegetables). So we had no choice but to bring the lunch back to the hotel with us.

When we left the house, Wayne's nanny broke down in tears at the thought of not seeing Rosabelle again. Only when she's bigger can we bring her to Xinjiang, as it's quite a trip there, and it must have been a whirlwind ding-dong of emotions for the poor old lady who enjoyed every moment spent with her precious great-granddaughter over the last few days. It did not help that Rosabelle did not want to be carried by her, so there was not even any last hugs, sigh... Back at the hotel, Rosabelle managed to eat some of her lunch, and had a nap after her bath. We arranged for a late check-out at 3 pm, as the taxi was due to fetch us at 3:15 pm to catch the 5:40 pm flight. However, at 3 pm, our dear girl was still deep in slumber, and this was in spite of me packing and rustling through all the plastic/paper bags, and switching on more lights than usual. We also did not want to pluck her from her deep sleep for fear of having a grouchy baby on our hands, so when she turned over in her sleep, Wayne went 'Yue yue, Yue yue' in hushed tones, and she sleepily opened her eyes and smiled. Great! We took the opportunity to quickly excite her into waking up and set off for Zhengzhou Airport.

Wayne sent us there, as he wasn't due back till Monday night, and enjoyed some time with Rosabelle dear as the girl feasted on her afternoon snack of her favourite grapes. After we'd checked-in, whilst waiting to board the plane, we brought Rosabelle to the children's playground located within the waiting area, where she happily interacted with a 4-year-old girl who was waiting for a flight to Sichuan. As they sat facing each other, the little girl wanted to teach Rosabelle some recital/clapping games. These days, Rosabelle knows how to voluntarily clap on her own, though it's more an action than the production of any solid clapping sounds, and she claps when she's happy and/or when she hears music and singing, so clap she did together with this girl. And it got her all excited that she let out her usual shrieking scream, making the little girl look away in horror and wonder at what she'd unleashed... Rosabelle does seem to like and learn alot from playing with older kids, and we could see her observing the girl closely. Very soon, it was time for us to board the plane, and this time round, even after I nursed her, she did not sleep at all, jabbing her little finger and pulling at anything and everything, keeping the nanny's and my hands full throughout the journey. The plane was late in taking off and we reached Beijing Airport 40 minutes late, at only 7:40pm.When we reached the airport, we made her dinner of banana and milk cereal, and started feeding her in the taxi I had arranged to pick us up. She was, however, too distracted by the novelty of sitting in a taxi and did not eat much, continuing with the dinner only when we reached home. Needless to say, after her dinner and bath, she had a well-rested early night, with memories in her heart of her first-ever trip to Zhengzhou to see her great-grandparents!

I was quite worried about her meals on this trip, and made sure she drank loads of water, but thankfully it all turned out well and we managed to get her proper meals. What helped was I brought loads of disposable bowls so we did not have to keep dirty bowls and rewash them, and as I did not have access to a sterilizer, we could only scald her utensils before using them. As for her dose of fruits, it was also not an issue as they were easily accessible, and I made sure to arrange fruits that can be easily taken on the go, like bananas, grapes, peach/mango/papaya that can be scraped etc.

All was smooth-sailing during the whole Zhengzhou trip (well, safe for the fact that when we reached Beijing Airport on the first day, Wayne realized that he'd forgotten to bring his bag of clothes, and had to buy some clothing to change whilst home, haha!), and it was certainly an eye-opener for our dear girl! If only she didn't have to fall sick after coming back...sigh, poor thing...

Chasing her Zhengzhou roots - Day 2

Maybe it was the new surroundings, or maybe it's because she slept early the night before, but Rosabelle was up and alert by 6:30am on Wednesday, Day 2 of our Zhengzhou trip. I did not have a good sleep as even though we placed her in the middle between the nanny and I, she kept surging to my side of the bed, leaving me with little space. When she woke up, she crawled towards me and I purposely kept my eyes shut, but she would have none of it and peeled my eyelids with her little fingers - how inconsiderate - tsk tsk!

Wayne's mum was due to help steam egg for her breakfast, but as Rosabelle had woken up way too early, she had gone out for a morning walk, not knowing that her grandaughter has defied the schedule. In the end, rather than waiting for her to come back, we ordered the steamed egg from the hotel. Here it is - impressive huh? It'd better be - it cost us RMB55, excluding taxes and service charge. The nanny and I gorged on the bread rolls, whilst Rosabelle enjoyed half a bowl of the steamed egg. The first round the hotel staff brought me a bowl of egg soup, and I had to clarify I wanted steamed egg...duh...

We requested for a high chair the day before, and here she is atop her throne.

After filling her up, I brought her on a walk around the hotel as the nanny enjoyed her breakfast. Wayne then came on to the hotel to pick us up, first posing outside our room 759.

That's the Shis in the hotel lobby.

And the nanny with her at the lobby of the adjoining Holiday Inn Express.

We then made our way to Wayne's grandparents' house - the whole idea of this trip is to spend time with them, as it'd probably be their first and last time seeing Rosabelle as they head to Xinjiang from August 29.

Rosabelle very nicely found a comfy spot on great-grandmother's lap as she chewed on some honeydew.

Wayne's father bought her a sound-activated parrot that could move and chirp songs upon detecting sounds/movements. Rosabelle was very fascinated by it and kept tugging at the parrot.

We managed to also capture some shots of Rosabelle and her great-grandparents.

We then all headed out for lunch together with his cousin, who has a 4-year-old daughter that Rosabelle enjoyed playing with. Rosabelle ate some chicken/vegetable cereal that we brought, and we all then left to get the (wierdest ever) family photo taken together.

It was then time for us to head back to the hotel for Rosabelle's bath and afternoon nap, and I managed to sneak downstairs for a facial and back massage - nice! When I got back, Rosabelle was still sleeping (!), and she woke up after a 2.5 hour nap, meaning we had some time to while before meeting Wayne's primary school friends for dinner.

Upon the recommendation of the hotel staff (also Wayne's neighbour working there), we went to Walmart, which was supposed to also have many other shops around it, but it turned out that the hypermart was the only shopping area we could get. Before we bored ourselves silly with a trip to the hypermart, we brought Rosabelle on her first merry-go-round ride.

She wasn't very keen on riding on the horse by herself, so I carried her to sit on the carriage, but it wasn't long before she got quite bored, probably from seeing the same scenery repeated ad nauseum, so we asked to get down before our 10 minutes was up.After the ride, on walking around to look for a taxi, we managed to chance upon the shopping lane the hotel staff told us about - very disappointing array of lesser-known shops, I must say...well, I can't expect too much, I guess!

Dinner was with a bunch of Wayne's friends - the three guys have known each other for 25 years, and each of them are respectively married, with one also expecting a child in December. This is Rosabelle with Wu Lihua, who had a knack in getting Rosie to be carried by her.

We got Rosabelle her dinner of instant porridge (cooked in the restaurant's microwave oven with our own bottled water), and she very quickly became sleepy after her dinner, so the nanny and I left with her first, taking a lift from one of his friends. When we got back to the hotel room, Rosabelle again fell asleep fairly quickly, probably exhausted by all the on-goings during the day.

Thankfully I managed to sleep better on this second night, zzzzz.....

Chasing her Zhengzhou roots - Day 1

Last Tuesday morning, Rosabelle woke up in time to finish her breakfast before we headed to the airport for Zhengzhou. As we were afraid she would not be able to have a good lunch on the plane, the nanny woke up exceptionally early to make her some apple pancakes and steamed carrot sticks to eat bring along. For breakfast, she must be too used to her steamed egg, and did not eat much of the noodle soup that the nanny whipped up.

So, whilst waiting to check-in for our 11:40am flight, Rosabelle leisurely enjoyed her morning dragon fruit snack at Beijing Capital Airport..

As there aren't many Burger King outlets in Beijing, Wayne and I make it a point to try to enjoy some fast food whilst at the airport, and quikcly wolfed down our yummy burgers as Rosabelle waited along with the nanny.

As it was a long walk to the departure gate (though the flight was delayed by 30 minutes), we decided it would save us alot of hassle to just pay RMB20 for a driven buggy to bring us to where we wanted to go. Wayne caught some shots of Rosabelle with her eyes half-closed as she shielded herself from the slight breeze caused by the speed of the buggy. At one point, she even jerked her knees in a dance to show her excitement, haha!

It's Rosabelle's second time on a plane (after birth - I took the plane thrice whilst expecting her), and the nanny's first, so I guess they were both equally excited! However, we were all assigned separate lone seats, and had to do some swapping on our own - so troublesome. In the end, Wayne still had to sit away from us as the row we were on had only 3 oxygen masks - just as well, the nanny and I had more space together with Rosabelle in a three-seater row.

As I was afraid the air pressure during take-off would get to her, I nursed her as soon as the plane started moving off, but we again met with delays from air traffic control which did not clear our plane for landing soon enough, and Rosabelle fell asleep even before the plane took off! So I covered her ear and let her have a snuggly doze of 50 minutes - just nice, we were due to land very soon after so it was quite an easy flight where she did not make any noise nor become all fidgety.

The 1hr 20min journey ended soon enough, and Rosabelle woke up excited to see an older boy sitting behind us, and she screamed through the gap to try to wake him up, getting all hyper when he started playing with her. She also enjoyed the apple pancakes and carrot sticks for lunch. A man behind us remarked, 'Oh, there's a baby sitting in front? I'm surprised - some babies cry all the way, and your baby's quiet enough.' So sensible, our dear girl...

Wayne's high school friend picked us up from the airport as we made a 40-minute journey to Sofitel Hotel, quite near to Wayne's home.

By the time we checked into the hotel, it was already way past Rosabelle's nap time, so we bathed her in the bath tub, giving her hotel toiletries bottles as floating toys to keep her entertained, haha!

She was obviously very excited by the big bed and climbed/crawled all over.

The cottony-soft bed and quilt, cold from the aircon, were also very nice for her to just laze upon and play peekaboo with.

After the excitement wore her out, she had a quick nap and we quickly made our way to Wayne's grandparents' house thereafter.

It was the first time Wayne's grandparents were seeing their great-grandaughter, and his grandma gave Rosabelle a big angpow.

Surprisingly, our filial daughter did not make any noise at letting his grandma carry, and even sat comfortably and obediently on her lap for at least 20 minutes! Blood relations are indeed strong man!

Rosabelle then walloped half a banana for her tea-time snack, amazing all the older folks with her appetite and chewing skills in spite of just two lower teeth, heh.

Wayne's Dad and Mum of course also took turns to carry the girl as she basked in their attention.

Even Wayne's old grandfather mustered enough strength to carry her for some precious moments pictures.

And of course, how could we not let her demonstrate her crawling and cruising prowess by letting her loose on the big bed?

We had a nice reunion dinner at the house, and Rosabelle ate some plain porridge with a side dish of potato and snow fish/vegetables puree. I know his father and grandma were quite concerned that we aren't adding any salt, sugar, or fatty meats (!) to her foods, saying that children need such items in their diet so they can have fats and grow chubby... Thank goodness Wayne and I have a common understanding in this, and I'd already forewarned him beforehand that we are against this, and for him to reject any other questionable foods they want to give her...phew!

Wayne said that his grandma really loves Rosabelle - he has never seen his grandma trail anybody from one room to another, and she keeps wanting to carry her even though she is already quite weak (celebrated her 80th birthday in May). From what Wayne tells me, his grandma dotes on him, so naturally, she will adore her great-grandchild, and she was actually looking forward to a girl as she has two boys in the family.
After dinner, we headed on back to the hotel for a good night's rest, where our poor girl knocked out by 8:45 pm! Wayne and I went downstairs to enjoy the hotel's welcome drink, and I came back half an hour later to find Rosabelle awake on the bed, clutching the nanny around the neck. Apparently, not long after I left, some inconsiderate buggers in other rooms shouted along the corridor, waking her up rudely from her deep slumber, and upon seeing the strange and dark surroundings of the hotel room, and me not being around, she was inconsolable. The nanny even deliberated calling me, but instead focused on pacifying her. When she saw me come to the bed, her lips quivered again and I had to nurse her to sleep. Poor girl...at least she slept quite well through the night!