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Alicia says thank you to everyone who visited her! She’s lost a wee bit of weight and had very slight jaundice but everything is a-ok now. Nothing that mummy’s milk and some sun can’t fix.

Date of Birth: 24 Mar 2009
Time of Birth: 13:39
Weight: 3.64kg
Height: 51cm

Yay! It was a very very smooth delivery compared to the first one. Alicia was out after only a few pushes in a personal best time of just under 15 minutes for Zhiyi!

Mission accomplished!

Alicia’s first family photo

Meditating about the meaning of milk.

Visitors

I’d like to say a big thank you to everyone who dropped by and showered Alicia and wifey with gifts and well wishes. Also, apologies that I didn’t manage to catch everyone’s picture (Zhiyi’s colleagues, Allan & Hsueh Ting, Anthony & Canny).

From left: Guoming, Erwin, Thomas, Fendy, Zhiyi, Jowena, INK, Alicia, Doyle, Lloyd and Rajen

From left: Alicia, Zhiyi, Cryst and Gab

From left: Livi, Merv, Alicia, Zhiyi, Tze Wei, Hillary, Yee Leong, Virginia and Vincent

From left: Alvin, Charlotte, Cheryl, Zhiyi, Alicia and Ashley

As I’m typing this, Zhiyi is now lying in bed waiting to give birth, having fallen asleep after being administered with epidural. Just five hours ago, I got woken up by Zhiyi complaining of pains and how she felt like the baby was going to “drop out”. Barely five minutes after I crawled into bed.

“Maybe you ate something wrong.”
“But it hurts.”
“Yeah, try sleeping it off. That’s what I do.” I mumbled as I started drifting out of consciousness.
“There’s blood!!!”

Groan.

One hour later, after a shower and some frantic packing, we were at Mt Alvernia checking-into a delivery ward. This was followed by a nurse doing some preliminary checks and hooking up the baby heartbeat and contraction monitor. According to her, Zhiyi’s cervix had dilated 4cm. Once it get’s to around 10cm, that’s when the huffing and puffing and pushing will start. In other words, just a few more hours to go!

That’s the baby monitor on the right.

Photonut INK is up to something…

Thumbs up and good to go!

Here’s how I lit the shot: SB900 at 1/128 power zoomed in to 200mm and gelled CTO on a Gorillapod dangling off the surgery lights. I was really scared of getting caught by the nurse so quickly grabbed around 5 frames before she came back into the room.

Everytime is a good time to Strobist!

Dilation History

• 23/03/2009 5pm – 2cm
• 24/03/2009 4am – 3cm
• 24/03/2009 6am – 4cm
• 24/03/2009 8am – 6cm
• 24/03/2009 10am – 7cm
• 24/03/2009 12pm – 9cm

Still waiting…

One of the "must see" regions in Western Australia is Margaret River, about a 4 to 5 hours drive south of Perth. The Margaret River region, also known as wine country, is home to 200 vineyards and 90 wineries. It’s also famous for its many award wining eateries, sadly none of which we could try as they were all booked out every single day of the week!

Below are pictures taken around the grounds of The Voyager, one of the premium wineries cum restaurants in the area. And no, we didn’t get to eat here either.

View the full Margaret River gallery here.

This is starting to sound like a countdown.

Anyway, being pregnant isn’t easy. Not only does Zhiyi have to carry around an additional 14kg of tummy, she has to spend hours posing for her photonut hubby too. And this is all he has to show for it…

Here’s looking forward to 25 March!

Zhiyi really looks like she can pop any time now! We’re also getting close to a name so a big thanks to everyone who has chipped in with suggestions. All I can reveal for now is that it was one of those very nice suggestions that we received! See, it pays to ASK.

Zhiyi, Ashley and Baby in High Key

Ashley feeling around

Squeeze

Babies just bring a smile to your face don’t they!

Here’s the setup:

Photography Notes:

• Cloth (e.g. tulle) make for good backdrop material as well as makeshift, um, garments. You can get them from Arab Street at a fraction of the price compared to Spotlight. Bargaining is a must as most shops there give a very high starting quote.
• Putting a huge light source behind the cloth backdrop allowed for a high key look and, if controlled well, highlights the flow of the fabric. Notice how the lines lead the viewers eyes towards the subject.
• No f-stops numbers this time as this shoot was done 2 weeks ago. Note to self: make notes!

During our 3 days at the Margaret River region, we stayed at the Margaret River Hideaway, a unique accommodation featuring 3 cottages situated right on a farm.

Every day at 9am sharp, the owner would take visitors around the farm to feed various animals like ducks, chickens, peacocks, sheep, alpacas, and cows. It was a perfect experience for Ashley as she got to interact with all the animals up close. Even the huge cows didn’t scare her!

Baa… get out of the pen!

Eggs are Ashley’s favourite food and today she got to gather them in person.

Feeding the alpacas.

Speaking of alpacas, they are highly prized for their very soft wool and are great additions to farms because they protect sheep from wolves. They are cautious but curious animals, and the two alpacas that were on the farm followed us around the place even after the feeding was over. I think they just wanted a photo.

Best friends forever!


View the full Margaret River Hideaway gallery here.

It’s been awhile since Ashley stepped in front of the camera for a “studio shoot”. But today after taking a shower, she was in a pretty good mood and jumped on it when I popped the question. In awfully humid Singapore, I think anyone would be in a good mood after a nice cool shower!

Nothing fancy this time round with just her in her Barbie sleeping gown and a basic one light set up against a slate grey background. The key to making a photo work is not so much the equipment and setup but the skill to coax the right expression out of your subject. Once we got the rhythm going, Ashley even came up with some poses of her own.

Note: Each image can be clicked on for a bigger version.

Rabbit ears. Ashley thought of this one herself!

Drying off my wet hair.

Another Ashley thought of pose.

After the shoot, we swapped places with Ashley directing me how to pose while she snapped away. I must say, she has talent, though her photos are not something I dare to post up.

Here’s the setup:

While many people know that the colonization of Australia began when convicts were shipped there from Britian, most probably wouldn’t know the difference between a convict and a criminal in the context of an early Australian prison. Convicts were basically people who were sentenced in Britain whereas criminals were sentenced in Australia itself.

The main prison block

One of the well known attractions in Fremantle is the Fremantle Prison, which was built in the 1850s but decommissioned in 1991. The prison consisted of 4 divisions, each one meant for different categories of offenders, with the 4th division reserved for the worst of them all (e.g. murderers). A total of 44 people were hung in this prison with the last execution taking place in 1964. Australia has since abolished the death penalty, although I don’t think the same would happen soon in Singapore.

The Anglican Chapel – Interestingly, the words to the sixth commandment on the Ten Commandments painted on the wall behind the altar had been modified from "Thou shalt not kill" to "Thou shall do no murder". The former would have seemed rather hypocritical given that the gallows were still being used and England was involved in so many wars.

During our visit, we signed-up for the “Doing Time Tour” – an hour long walk around the prison compounds to see the various cell blocks, chapel and gallows. For the more adventurous, there is also a tunnel tour where visitors explore the labyrinth of passages beneath the prison.

Prison art – Rules forbidding painting or drawing on walls were relaxed after it was found to calm violent prisoners.

Prior to the tour starting, the guide told me a story about how two recent tourists with high end cameras had their equipment fail on them when trying to take pictures inside the execution chamber. It made my skin crawl, but thankfully, my faithful D3 didn’t skip a beat. I even took a picture of the noose but was quite disappointed at the lack of any mysterious ghostly silhouette in the final picture.

Full Fremantle Prison gallery here.

Day 2 saw us, um, oversleeping a little resulting in us having to take a train down to the port city of Fremantle instead of one of the local cruise ships.

The Leeuwin – A 55-metre three-masted sail training ship that’s still in service.

Only 30 minutes away by train from Perth Central train station, Fremantle is unofficially regarded as Western Australia’s second capital. Unlike Perth, Fremantle’s period architecture has largely been preserved since there has never been much economic benefit from knocking them down.

The Round House – This small prison, which had only 8 cells, was eventually turned into the living quarters for the chief constable and his family during the turn of the 20th-century.

What struck me upon arriving was how empty the city was. Granted, it was Boxing Day and most people were probably indoors rather than roaming the streets, but it did feel awfully like a ghost town while walking down some of the streets.

Inside the Fremantle Markets

Full Fremantle gallery here.