Chitter Chatter of ZMM

Donna Hay's Chrismas Pudding

2007-12-18T15:49:00.000+08:00

Many were interested in getting the recipe of the pudding I made, I got it from Donna Hay Modern Classics Book 2.

Click on the pix to read the details.

In my case, I made them in individual sizes.

So the cloth size should be 30cm (12inch) squares x 8.

Each pudding should be holding ~250g mixture.

Cooking time : 1hr 30mins. Reheat time : 30mins boiling (that's what the recipe suggested but I steam for similar amount of time instead).

Enjoy.

Jelly Brains

2007-12-15T23:27:00.000+08:00

Jelly Brains is the nickname we gave to our Filipino maid. Why do we call her that?

Her name is Jelly (real name which is printed on her passport). And she's absolutely forgetful.

Here are a few incidences : 1) Went to my sister's appartment, and when she were going home, after a few steps down the stairs, she exclaimed, "Alamak, I forgot to wear my slippers." (you mean you were bare feet and you didn't know until after taking a few steps?)

2) She changed Zaria's diaper during Zaria's evening bath, and left the soaked diaper on Zara's wooden toy house just next to the cot. When we were doing reading in the night, we were curious where the urine stench came from. We then discovered the the wet diaper. When we asked her, she said, "Oh, I forgot."

3) She reheated Zaria's porridge, and went on to bath Zaria, forgotten about the poridge on the stove. The pot was burnt! That night, Zaria had to eat instant cereal. Sigh.

4) She watered the plant without removing Zara's bicycle right below the plant. Drenching Zara's bicycle.

5) After I took the girls out for a walk, I called her out to bring Zaria up for her bath, while I entered the house with Zara first. She carried Zaria from her cot, went straight up to the room to bath Zaria, forgetting to lock the door.

Jelly brains or not?

Formaldehyde in Beer??

2007-12-05T10:27:00.000+08:00

Daddy had this Xi Hu beer in Hangzhou the other day when we were in Shanghai.

On it, there was this text printed : "free from formaldehyde". Daddy and I were joking about this, and thought it was just a marketting gimmick that this brewery is using to promote itself as more 'superior' than others, although the test of the beer wasn't that superior.

I wonder if people actually use formaldehyde in beer brewing.

Well google has the answer,

"It had been known that some Chinese breweries have habitually added a small amount of formaldehyde to the mash, ostensibly as a clarifying agent. Large export and joint venture brewers have stopped using formaldehyde, but the recent study indicates that the practice remains widespread." taken from this article, and you can read the whole article from that site.

So, watch out beer drinker out there.

This blog

2007-11-30T17:22:00.000+08:00

Since I'd already have another blog to chart the development of the girls, I will use this blog more as a personal blog.

For my thoughts, my feelings, for me.

In the next few days, the lay out will be changed, so what started out as a blog for my daugther, Zara, will now be a place for me for my thoughts.

Abandonned but revived!

2007-11-29T17:13:00.000+08:00

This blog has been left abandoned for quiet a while. It's time to revive it. If you have been visiting their site at my own domain, you know the girls are doing great. Zara has just celebrated her 3rd birthday, and Zaria is alread 11th month old. Seriously, time flies. Look at how big they have grown!

Moving Out

2007-01-09T18:41:00.000+08:00

1) Blogger has been giving me lots of problem esp with photos loading

2) We have new addition to the family and All About Zara just won't work any more.

So I'm moving out to wordpress (can't afford my own domain yet). Here is the new link about My Two Girls, and we have finally decided on Baby's name.

See you in there.

Updated Nov '07 :

I finally got my own domain, my birthday present for myself and have moved from wordpress to my own domain, you can visit the girls site here

The first post from that site was written in September. Enjoy..

Photos - Baby, Girls' moment

2007-01-08T12:11:00.000+08:00

Who does she look like? She has Daddy's eye lids, but my big pupils. Daddy's nose, and sharper face

Looking pretty serious here.

Zara's pretty loving towards meimei the minute they met. She wants to 'sayang' meimei every time when meimei cries or frets by stroking and singing to meimei. She likes to hug meimei for no reason. Drinking milk together in the night.

Meimei's small hands compared to mine.

Update on Zara When we asked Zara what we should call meimei since we have already shortlisted to 2 names, and we wanted her to choose one, she just said "mei mei's name is mei mei." Zara has also started to ask the Why question. E.g. "Why the korkor (Chinese : big brother) nose like that one" when she saw a picture of a boy with big longish nose. Zara's is getting better in reasoning. Daddy asked her to walk when all she wanted was to be carried when they go for their park trip. She told daddy, "Daddy carry Zara. Daddy need(s) excercise." I told her to stay away from meimei since she is not fully recovered from chicken pox and she told me, "I'm feeling better already. I eat (ate) my chicken pox medicine already." And she started calling Daddy "Dad" and me "Mum". I have no idea where she learn that (TV maybe?).

Updates - Birth, Baby, Zara, CL, Me

2007-01-08T00:00:00.000+08:00

Birth Our 2nd daugther was born on 28th Dec evening. I opted for elective induction and admitted in the morning to be induced. Dr inserted a pill into the cervix to start things off and later put me on drips. I only got a little contraction, I could still read, listen to music, talk to Daddy gaily. When the drip dosage was increased to 100%, my cervix was barely 2 cm opened, even though the contraction pain started to become unberable. I wanted to go without pain relief for as long as I can but after 1 1/2hr, I started using the (entonox) gas. Then the midwife suggested that I go with pain killer since I got very tense every time the contraction started which would affect the cervix dilation. After talking to Daddy, I opted for Pethidine, just like I did with Zara's birth. The minute Pethidine was injected, I started relaxing and the cervix started to dilate. We were disturbed by baby's heart beat though. Every time when a contraction started, her heart beat went down, after the contraction, the heart beat recovered. Dr was called and he told us that it may be due to 1) baby was compressed in the birth canal or 2) baby's umblical cord was around her neck. The latter could be life threatening. He told us we could either opt for emergency c-sect for safest bet, but looking from the way things are progressing, he told us to hang a little bit longer. We were worried, but trusted his judgement. Soon after that, I could feel the urge to push (that's why I didn't want to go for epidural since it will numb all such sensation). Midwife checked me and found that baby's head was already crowning. Every thing started to happen, within minutes, Dr was back in the labour room, gave me an episiotomy, and the delivery began. This round, no help needed, baby just got pushed out with one push. The minute I heard her cry, all pain was forgotten, although I still felt a bit high and dizzy from Pethidine, the rush of joy was overwhelming. The little girl was 2.91Kg (Zara was 3.39Kg), and her height was 51.5cm (Zara was 50.5cm).

The room we spent 12hrs in awaiting for the birth of our 2nd daugther

Baby I worried too much. When I was pregnant, I was constantly worried that I will not love baby as much as I do with Zara. I just found new capicity to love her. How can you not love your own flesh and blood? Baby is good, she's more patient than Zara and even when she's hungry, she'll cry a little and wait for me to feed her (Zara used to cry and turn black every time we were a bit too 'slow'). She sleeps a lot still, but when she's awake, she likes to look around, checking us out. She was admitted back to the hospital for jaundice for 2 nights and now she's back home coping well. We still call her baby or mei-mei (Chinese : Small sister) since we haven't decided on the name yet. :( Zara Zara is doing very well as a jie-jie (Chinese: Big sister). We gave her a set of nice markers as a present from baby and also bought her a baloon when she came visiting, telling her she's now jie-jie to baby and mummy's assistant. She's very proud of her new titles. The first few days, she cried when baby cried for milk. She didn't want the Confinement Lady (CL) to handle mei-mei when mei-mei cried but insisted that "Mummy, sayang (Malay : pat) mei-mei. Don't want aunty (CL) sayang." She constantly wants to hug and stroke her mei-mei but unfortunately, she contracted chicken pox (probably from visiting mei-mei in the peadiatric ward) after mei-mei was discharged and we told her not to be too close to mei-mei for the time being.

Confinement Lady What's wrong with these people? They think so highly of themselves that they don't wash dishes, do house work or help out with the older kids even when they are just siting around doing nothing. I'm barely able to stand her, and Daddy is very tempted to get rid of her. She's more like a cook instead of a CL. Since I'm 100% breastfeeding, and I like to be a bit hands on (like cleaning baby's poo or topping and tailing baby) she doesn't have much to do.

Baby sleeps with me in the night, and when I naps. I wake up to feed her while the CL sleeps away. She cooks for me 3 meals a day, washes baby's clothes, bathes baby and that's about all she does. She doesn't help with Zara at all, nor anything else in the house. She sleeps when I sleeps (and sometimes before), and when Zara watches her VCDs/DVDs, she watches with Zara(but not to care for Zara, even small little things like giving Zara snacks or taking a drink for Zara from the fridge, CL will shout for Tuyam to do it). The only good thing that came out of this is she knows what I should and should not eat and make sure whatever I take help with milk production. With Zara (without a CL), my milk came on day 5. With baby, my milk came on day 4 and supply is pretty good. Me I'm doing fine but a bit tired. 2 kids vs 1 is very different.

When baby is feeding and Zara needs attention, I have to be tactful, or still give Zara the attention by talking to her or doing things with her with my free hand. I still try to spend as much time as I can with Zara so that she doesn't feel I'm neglecting her.

When baby is alert, I try to talk to her and carry her around to show her the house or look at new things.

I only get to rest when both of them are sleeping. Luckily, I can breastfeed while lying down, so in the night when baby wakes up for her feed, I just latch her on and continue to sleep while she feeds.

I'm not sure what is wrong with blogger but have been trying to post more photos but not able to after the hospital shot.. *sigh* May not be able to update or read blogs as frequently for now until things are more settled.

Things She Says Prior To The Delivery

2006-12-27T23:03:00.000+08:00

She woke up one morning and started crying, big drops of tears flowing down (not the wailing type of crying). Me : What happened? Zara : Mummy gone! Me : Did you have a bad dream? Zara : *still crying* Mummy gone to Morib. Me : Mummy is not gone, see, mummy is here. Zara : *smiled and wiped her tears* Yeah, mummy is here. Not gone. On our last visit to the Dr. Zara : Zara ask Dr Jason to take out baby from mummy's stomach. Me : Why? Zara : Then mummy can go to the park with Zara. Zara can sit on mummy's lap on the swing, then Zara and mummy can swing high high. (She missed the time I used to sit her on my lap and we shared a swing together) Earlier today. Zara : Mummy, Daddy, Zara, family. Me : Yeah, later we'll have mei-mei. Then it'll be Mummy, Daddy, Zara, mei mei. We're a family. Zara : I don't want mei mei. Zara's family only have Mummy, Daddy and Zara. When I tugged her to bed, I prepped her for tomorrow. Me : Tomorrow mummy will go to the hospital and stay there ok? Zara sleep with Daddy in the night. Zara : *started crying* I don't want mummy to go to hospital, I want mummy to stay with Zara. Me : Zara can come and visit mummy with Daddy you know. Zara : *still crying* Then Zara say hi to mummy. *started wailing* I don't want. Me : Ok ok. We talk about happier things then. What did we do today.. let's see....... Zara : *stopped her crying*

Ho-Ho-Holidays!

2006-12-27T01:10:00.000+08:00

I'm going to pop soon, and here is what we'd been doing, to spend time with Zara as the only child before the arrival of no. 2. Eve of Christmas Eve : We had dinner at Eat Work Shop, and I had my roast turkey! It was good! The owner, Marcia, even threw in the turkey wing for free! After that, we took Zara to hotels (The Saujana and The Holiday Inn Glenmarie) to check out the Christmas decorations, and she really had a good time, since these 2 hotels were very spacious and quiet, and she can run around freely. Christmas Eve : The big family dinner was supposed to be 3 tables at a Chinese restaurant. My eldest sis decided not to join us and my youngest sis got admitted for dengue fever the day before. So the dinner ended up being a small one, with only King's Wife's family and ours with my dad. Dinner was err.. cut throat price in Overseas Restaurant and not nice at all! After dinner, we adjorned to the hospital to visit my sister and open up our presents together with my sister's family. On Christmas Day : Zara was kept busy playing with her Christmas presents in the morning. We then went to have lunch with my dad, and later dinner with Daddy's friends. Whole day of eating and outing!

She and her favourite present, the singing pink car, from Chloe, our neighbour

On Boxing Day : Daddy went back to work. I brought Zara to Kidzsports with Tuyam and then to the Pet Shop, per the requests of the little girl. Bought myself the Allerhand bag (Christmas present from Daddy), and end my hunt for the perfect bag for carrying Zara and baby's things. Best of all! Zara and I are both very happy to receive these from Domestic Rat and May. Thanks Ladies!

Zara loves the doggie; I believe the Chocolate lolly was supposed to be a raindeer, but it has melted. :( Zara was however, very keen in tasting her first lolly pop.

I'll be going in to the hospital on Thursday to get induced. Today (Wednesday) will be my very last day spending with Zara before the arrival of baby. Some how, I feel a bit melancholy. After this, she will no longer be my only child, where all my energy and attention has been channeled to the last 2 years.

Wish me a safe and quick delivery, will you?

Confinement Sleeping Arrangement

2006-12-21T08:58:00.000+08:00

We had very bad experience with our first confinement lady (CL) when we had Zara. Being extremely unhygenic (picked nose then applied diaper cream on Zara; dipped a spoon into her mouth to taste her own cooking and then using the same spoon to stir the broth later), totally non supportive of my breast feeding plan (when Zara cried because of hunger, she started chanting, "aiyo, girl girl ah, mummy naughty ah, don't let you drink powder milk ah", as though I wasn't already stressed enough) and rough (the thumping sound she made when she burped Zara was heart breaking); she got the boot the 2nd day. I took care of Zara on my own (no MIL to offer help, didn't trust maid with Zara) with a few visits from the hospital nurse to teach me how to bath and care for Zara. We are trying our luck the 2nd time this round. Since I only started looking for one after I got my amnio result (into 5th month), we were not left with many choices (better ones were already hired). I haven't met the CL, don't know what she looks like, how she is. Daddy is extremely skeptical about leaving baby at night with the CL alone in a room for that one month. Since I'm going to breast feed anyway, we plan to have the CL sleep with me in our room, while Daddy takes the guest's room. The thing is where will the CL sleep? On our queen size bed with me? Err.. I don't think I want that. On Zara's bed? Hah, here is what Zara said when we tried to 'negotiate' with her. Me : "Zara let Aunty sleep on your bed, then Zara sleep with mummy on mummy's bed ok? At night, mummy can hug hug you to sleep (to 'motivate' her)" Zara : "Zara's bed is Zara's. Aunty sleep downstairs on the sofa." Me : "There are lots of bugs downstairs at night." Zara : *pointing to the guest's room* "Aunty sleep in the other room." Me : "Daddy is sleeping there already... We changed the mattress, bed sheets on your bed, then Zara let Aunty sleep on your bed can or not?" Zara : "Nooo! This is special bed *pointing to her bed*, only Zara can sleep here. Nobody can sleep" (and I was worried she won't settle in her own bed, when we moved her from her cot to the bed) Me : "Then where will aunty sleep?" Zara : *pointed to the floor in our room* "Sleep there then." So, here is our plan, we'll be setting up another single bed in our room near the cot, and have the CL sleep there for that month. Have a look at the room now, it'll turn into a dorm when the other bed is moved in!

Weekend Parties

2006-12-19T13:35:00.000+08:00

Tasha (my eldest sis' daughter) celebrated her 1st birthday on Saturday in Cocca Restaurant. The thing is, Zara never wanted to admit it's Tasha's birthday. When we told her we're going for Tasha's birthday party, she said, "No, it's Zara's birthday!". When we asked her to pass the present to Tasha, she said, "No, it's Zara's one!". She didn't want to give Tasha a hug, or wish her Happy Birthday. She didn't even want to join in the other children for a group photo. Hmm.. at this age, she is really not showing much interest to kids her age or younger than her. Maybe it's the competition (for attention) she finds unsettling. She stuck to her older cousins all the time, joining in their games.

Playing with her cousins; Tasha with BIL and sis; Tasha and her Tinkerbell Cake; Zara attacking the sugar flower on the cake.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ On Sunday, we were invited to my neighbor's daughter, Cayley's full moon party. My neighbor's older daughter Chloe (the same age as Zara), is Zara's play mate. They seem to have this love hate relationship. They want to play with each other, and yet, they can't share toys, and sometimes even have the occasional shouting bout. E.g. "It's mine!" "I take (took) first!" etc. Before we left for Chloe's house, Zara herself was telling me, "Go Chloe's house, no fighting yeah? No snatching toys yeah? Must share share, yeah?" Daddy and I were busy stuffing ourselves silly with all the lovely home cooked food, while Zara made herself at home playing with Chloe's toys (she's been to Chloe's house a few times, and knew where Chloe's toys were kept). And true enough, to my relieve, she didn't do any snatching or fighting with Chloe.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm trying to get all my cravings fulfilled before I give birth and start the herbs, wine and ginger confinement diet (blech). The next item on my list, Turkey!

I'll be starting my leave next week, back at work on April 1st. Lots to clear up before the long leave!

Christmas Spirit

2006-12-15T18:04:00.000+08:00

Most of the evenings after dinner (especially now when it's close to Christmas, and she sees Christmas trees every where), Zara will ask us to play the Christmas Karaoke VCD for her. She only selects a few songs she wants to listen to or have interesting videos. These are her demands when she's watching the video. "Mummy come, sit near near Zara, Zara scared with (of) Santa Clause (which appears in the Jingle Bell video)" "I don't want Fer lis na we dah (Feliz Navidad)." "I want Rudolf The Red Nose Reindeer only." "I want Pram-pam-pam one (Drummer Boy)." "I want the one got horse pulling carriage one." While playing one video, sometimes, "I don't want the next one, I'm scared with (of) the statue." Since I'm the one who's familiar with the VCD (which songs have which scene etc.), I have to sit with her the whole time she watches the VCD. One of her favourite video in the VCD is Rudolf The Red Nose Reindeer, and after a few listening, she started to be able to sing some part of the song. Here's her singing, with me helping out. (Half way through, you can actually hear her say, "I want birdnest." One of her favourite after dinner treat these days, which I'm making quite often for baby and myself.)

Zara is happy to have stay over Guests!

2006-12-14T08:43:00.000+08:00

Guess who stays over at our place this week? King's Wife and her daughters! Guess who's the happiest of the lot? Zara! She's so happy to have her cousins play with her, especially Sam. The house is noisier, busier, merrier. During the day, she no longer shouts for me, it's always, "Sam jiejie, come!" "Sam jiejie, play with you (me)!" "Sam jiejie" here "Sam jiejie" there. She wants to dress up like Sam, wants Sam to sit next to her when she watches her TV program, wants Sam to watch her brush her teeth, wants Sam to bath together with her, wants Sam to accompany her wherever she goes etc. Luckily Sam is a girl with full of patience, and she gives in to Zara's demand. That's also probably why Zara loves her to bits!

a glimpse of her with her cousins (she's always so affectionate with Sam)

She's going to oh-so-miss-them when they go home!

Pregnancy Update - Baby coming soon?

2006-12-12T08:43:00.000+08:00

My stomach is extremely huge, I have slightly more than 3 more weeks to go. Resting is no longer possible. Laying on the right or left no longer feel comfortable. Sitting hurt my back. Standing tires my calves. I wake up middle of the night with eyes wide opened, trying hard to go back to sleep. Baby is still active although with not much space for movement, we can see the tremors she creates when she moves, skin stretching before our eyes. I'd sorted out all the necessities for the arrival of the baby : 1) ordered my confinement herbs and herbal wine from my Chinese Dr. 2) confirmed with friend's mum who will be supplying me with home brewed rice wine. 3) signed up with Stemlife for baby's cord blood banking 4) bought a few new pieces of clothing to welcome baby's arrival (the rest will be wearing her jie-jie's clothes) 5) checked that we have enough bottles/milk storage bag to store breast milk if I need to pump out 6) bought new Dr Brown bottles for her during occasions where I cannot breast feed directly 7) rearranged the furniture in the room to accommodate the cot (Daddy has yet to raise the cot and fixed its railing) And yesterday, I'd even packed my bag for my hospital stay. So now, I'm just waiting for baby's arrival. ~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~ On the other hand, Zara has been bugging us to bring her to the beach, to Morib, to Penang, to Cowboy Town. We had to explain to her I'm too big to be traveling now, and we have to wait for Mei-Mei's (Chinese : Little sister) arrival before we can travel again. So over the weekend, besides bringing her to the mall, we let her play in her wading pool. She was very very happy, since her last dip was actually in Phuket, quite a while back.

On Zara's Speech Again

2006-12-08T09:17:00.000+08:00

Zara has been calling Daddy other names other than just Daddy. When we are going home from my sis' place, she would announce, "I'm going home already, to see my Old Man, Bob The Builder." When she has shouted for Daddy many times and got no response from him, she'll start using his name (first and last name together), "XXXXX LOW! XXXXX LOW!" Just like I would address him when I don't get any response from him. ~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~ She started to have some sense of time, and started using words to describe the past. However, she's still confuse with the usage, and it's cute to see her attempts. E.g. "Just now we went to Cowboy town, the pony kick kick Zara right?" (although it wasn't just now but some time back.) "Last time Zara saw reindeer in Ikea, and point(ed) to Mummy and Daddy." (although it was something that happened the day before) Me : "Zara you shu-shu (Chinese : Pee) is it?" Zara : "No, I didn't. I (am) lying down only" (she was on the bed trying to get herself to sleep). Me : "How are you today? Do you still have runny nose?" Zara : "No I didn't (don't). I'm feeling better already." ~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~ She likes to help Tuyam with her pronunciation or us when we can't find the right word to use. Me : "Remember in Phuket, you saw the lobster in the restaurant, hmm.. what are those things on the lobster's head? *using my pointer to make the 'horn' on the head* antenna?" Zara : "Mummy, it's fillers mummy! It's fillers." *grinning happily* (Is it really called fillers? I actually don't know, but that's what Daddy told her during the trip and she remembers.) Tuyam : *Pointing to a bee picture on her book* "See this 'beh' flying flying." Zara : "Bees lah. Kakak, Bees" ~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~ Yesterday, she was crying so much for me before her nap. Wanted me to give her milk and nap with her. After her nap, when she was in a better mood : Me : "Why did Zara cry just now? Kept asking for mummy?" Zara : "........" (she always doesn't like to talk about embarrassing stuff, and crying is one) Me : "Tell mummy, why did Zara cry just now?" Zara : "Because mummy pregnant (I started wondering what has this got to do with her crying) . *She paused then continued* (obviously trying to find the right words) Zara wants to sayang sayang (Malay: TLC) mummy." ~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~ On a loving day, Zara : "Zara is mummy's 宝贝 (precious). And mummy is Zara's 宝贝."

Mixing Too Much with Boys

2006-12-06T16:17:00.000+08:00

Little Miss Engineer has been mixing too much with her cousin Norman and playing a lot of his toys when she's stationed there at my sis' place. She gets very excited as well when Daddy has to do some DIY stuff at home, she calls her Daddy, "Bob The Builder" (and other names, which I'll talk about it later); and herself, "Little Bob The Builder"; and starts singing the Bob The Builder Song when Daddy takes out his tool box. She knows the name of some of the tools used like hammer, screw driver, spanner, screw, saw; and always keen in lending a hand to Daddy when he has to work on something at home.

'Drilling' my dad's table; All geared up to be Bob The Builder; Working on her own 'project'; Helping Daddy to put up the storage box for her toys.

My sis' maid was so curious that I allow her to play with such toys and even thinking of getting a tool set for her for Christmas. This is an exploring stage for her, so I just let her play with whatever toys that interest her, be it boys' or girls'. That reminds me, I have to start doing some baking, to expose her to some of the girlish' activities.

Weekend Short Takes

2006-12-04T13:22:00.000+08:00

Daddy installed the Ikea chest of drawers we bought for the girls' clothes in our room, and a new toy storage bench for Zara's toys, with lots of ~~interruptions~~ help from Zara. Now the girls will have proper place to store their clothes (I used to store Zara's clothes in Ikea bought boxes), and later, a proper play room (we planned to convert one of the rooms to a play room so that Zara can stop ~~messing up~~ playing in the living room). ~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~ We have a big family dinner at Eat Work Shop on Saturday, in honour of my nephew, Nick, and niece, Ally, who got 5As each for their UPSR (Primary 5) exams. Zara was happily occupied by her favourite Sam jie-jie and Norman kor-kor (her 2 younger cousins), and I have Tuyam (who rarely goes out with us) to run after her. It means I could stuff my self silly with all the sumptuous food (And Eat Work Shop does serve very good western cuisine).

She kept sticking to Sam jiejie

Zara with her favourite 2 younger cousin, Sam and Norman; Sam with Tasha; The dinner table; The 2 As scorers with the dinner sponsor, my dad.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Daddy insisted that we go visit an Ostrich Farm (he thinks I'm still super mobile in my 9th month pregnancy) on Sunday and decided to go to the one in Klang.

For RM15/adult, it was more of a 'mini zoo' than an Ostrich Farm. We saw some sickly ponies, bald ostriches, skinny horses, ugly pythons and other small unhealthy looking animals in a smelly and muddy environment. Zara wanted to leave the minute we stepped into the 'farm', claiming it was "So smelly!", and she refused to walk about, saying the ground is "So dirty.", and complaining the ostriches are "So ugly." In and out, it took us less than 30mins. Daddy said, "Give me another hour, and I'll bring you to the one in Semenyih, which is supposed to be bigger and better." But I said that's enough of Ostriches and smelly animal dung for a day. So we went home instead.

~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~

For dinner, we went to Benkay Japanese Restaurant in Nikko Hotel, since I got a RM50/- off voucher.

Dinner was absolutely lovely. Zara ate some softshell crab maki, a whole prawn tempura, and a bowl of chawan-mushi. It always gives us a good feeling to see her enjoying her food (which is rather rare).

After dinner, we spent sometime enjoying the Christmas Deco (We forgot to bring the camera, what a waste). Daddy purposely drove passed the busy Jalan Bukit Bintang to look at the Deco put up by the malls and the hotels. However, the decorations were pretty lame.

Melting Moments

2006-11-28T22:44:00.000+08:00

Knowing someone loves you and cares for you, especially your 2 year old is oh.. so.. precious. Here are some precious moments of mine. Zara : *fussing and did not want Daddy to brush her teeth for her* I want mummy do! Mummy! Mummy! Mummy do. Me : *from the bed room, giving excuse* Zara, mummy stomach painful, cannot brush your teeth. Let Daddy do. Zara : I want to go out, I want to go out Daddy : Brush your teeth first. Then you go out. Zara : I want to go out, give mummy medicine. (She probably thought the Multivits that I get her to feed me nightly will help with my (fake) stomach ache.) Me : Mummy cannot carry you so much because mummy's stomach so big, carrying you will make mummy's back painful Zara : *points to my massage oil* Mummy give you (me) the oil? Me : What oil? Zara : The oil to massage mummy. I want to massage massage mummy's back. (Daddy gave me a massage once for my shoulder ache, and she was 'helping' out. So she thought she could help relieve my back ache with a massage.) Me : I love you Zara Zara : *big lovely grin* I also love you mummy

2yrs old - Updates

2006-11-28T00:02:00.000+08:00

After a week of celebrations (another birthday song singing just within the family, a trip to Kidzsports and Gymboree) and not being well (sore throat from all the nasi lemak and little fish, fever, cough, flu), finally the birthday season is over. :P Here is just for my record, her 2year old development. ~ Weight : 10.2kg (taken during her fever) ~ Height : 86.3cm Emotions and Character ~ I'm not sure if it's a two year old thing or it's because our 2nd one is coming, she's extremely clingy to me. She prefers me to tuck her to bed, even for her afternoon nap (she'll cry if I don't do it but I just ignored it), she only wants me to bath, she's always asking me to look after her instead of working, "Mummy look after Zara, don't want mummy to work" ~ She's expressing her love, by kissing us or by saying, "I love you Mummy" (almost every night before she goes to bed), "I love you Daddy" (occasionally). ~ She is becoming a handful especially when we go out shopping, and she goes wild running here and there, climbing this rack and that. ~ She loves going to the super markets (Giant is her favourite because of the free kiddy rides) ~ Very stubborn, especially if she has set her mind on something (e.g don't want to take bath, don't want to have her meal). However, my ultimate weapon, ignore her or send her to the naughty corner, or sometimes smacking (I'm really trying to avoid smacking her, but there are times when she's really unreasonable even after much coaxing, and I sometimes blame it on my raging hormones.. I know it's just an excuse). Language ~ She is doing very well in this respect ~ She's making up the lyrics of songs she knows spontaneously, e.g. when I can't find my car keys, she'll go "Where oh where is mummy's car keys, Oh where oh where can it be?" (singing to the tune Where Oh Where Has My Little Dog gone) ~ She started picking up Malay and Mandarin words; speaking to Tuyam using some Malay or to us using some Mandarin. E.g. "Kakak, this one very sedap (tasty)"; "Kakak, Zara tak mau (don't want)"; "Zara is mummy's 宝贝 (precious)"; "Mummy, Zara 不要 (don't want)." Toilet training - I wonder when she'll be potty/toilet trained ~ She's getting adversely affected by the smell of poo and urine. Especially her own. She vomited once when I got her to pee in the shower cubicle before her bath and she smelled her own urine; she also vomited when I got her to flush her stool away and refused to do it again (normally I flush her stool even when she did her business on the diaper) ~ She once said, "I don't want to poo poo already. Poo poo is so smelly." when trying to control her bowel movement ~ She knows to be a big jie-jie (Chinese : big big-sister), she has to stop wearing diaper, but she doesn't want to use the toilet bowl or her potty because she said, "Shu shu and poo poo is so smelly." (Tips anyone?) Food ~ Very fussy with what she eats and has very acute sense of taste. Just a speck of coriander on her steam fish, and she'll spit out that piece with the coriander mixed with it. ~ Doesn't eat a lot of things, and doesn't eat much, and it's making us worried. We're trying to psycho her into saying if she doesn't eat, she'll be very thin like her mama (Chinese : paternal grandma), and won't have muscle like daddy or have body shape like mummy, and it helps sometimes, saying she wants to have body like mine (Ha! Wait till she's older, but now, I'll just savour this). ~ Loves ice cream, sausages, chocolate, pop corn, cheese. For real meals, she likes rice or porridge with ikan bilis (Malay : little fish or anchovies); macaroni and cheese; garlic bread. ~ Have 3 or 4milk feeds : 6oz in the morning upon waking, 6oz in the afternoon before her nap, 4oz in the night before bed, and sometimes 6oz in the early mornings which started recently (she's preparing me for my night feed)

Headache

2006-11-23T13:49:00.000+08:00

I have slightly more than a month to go before No. 2 arrives. There are 2 things which I'm cracking my head with. 1st : No. 2's name Daddy and I can't decide on a name for No.2. We wanted a two syllables name which starts with Z and ends with A. That doesn't leave us much choice. Daddy doesn't like my choice of names, and I don't like his choices. Anybody has any names to recommend? (Some jokers have suggested Zebra. Well, even if they named their kids Hippo or Oinky, we still won't name ours Zebra) 2nd : What are we to do with Zara when I have to be in the hospital to have the baby? When Zara was born, Daddy was in the hospital with me the 2nights I stayed there. Now, Zara has never slept without either one of us at her side. I'm not sure what we are going to do when I have to be admitted this time. 1) Have Daddy stay at home with her, so I'll be alone in the hospital? 2) Have her stay with us in the hospital together? We asked her if she would be ok to sleep at home with Kakak when mummy goes to the hospital. She said, "Cannot. I want to sleep with mummy only." The only person she's willing to sleep with without mummy is Sam, her favourite jie-jie. She said, "Can sleep with Sam jiejie, mummy stay in hospital." For those who have two kids, what do you do with no. 1 when you were in the hospital giving birth to no. 2? ~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~ Zara is getting more and more clingy even with Tuyam back. They can play together, Tuyam can feed and change her; but when it comes to nap time, Zara would be whining for me, "I want mummy to sleep with Zara." When it's time for her evening bath, and if Daddy wanted to bath her, she would say, "Don't want Daddy. Want mummy do only. Mummy do, mummy do." followed by crying if we don't oblidge. At night, only I can sleep next to her. If Daddy stayed on too long at her side after saying good night to her, she would say, "Daddy sleep there (pointing to Daddy's side of the bed)." or "Daddy go down (from my bed)" If Daddy lied on her bed. Yesterday, when Daddy got her things ready and wanted to brush her teeth (most days I do the brushing), she told Daddy, "Daddy brush la. Use Zara's toothpaste, use Zara's tooth brush. Ok? Daddy brush la, use Zara's water to rinse mouth. Zara don't want". I wonder how I will be able to cope with a clingy 2 year old, and a new baby.

Negotiation Skill & Reasoning

2006-11-21T23:44:00.000+08:00

Today is Zara's actual birthday, I'm supposed to write about her monthly development, but I'll do that later. I want to write about her negotiation skill and how good she's getting at it. Zara : Mummy, I want to watch TV. (she started using lots of "I" instead of Zara now) Me : No, bed time already, go and brush your teeth and change to your pajamas. Zara : Mummy, one time only. Me : No, it's bed time. Zara : Mummy, please. One time only. *puting out her pointer to show ONE* Me : Ok then. One time yeah. Zara : Ok. *happily sat down and wait for me to put on her program for her* After finishing Me : Ok, time to get ready for bed. Zara : Mummy, one more time. Me : No. Enough already. Zara : Please. Last time. Last time only. Me : No. Just now you said one time only. So, you already watched one time, so get ready for bed now. Zara : Last time please. *looked at me with Bambi eyes* Me : Ok ok.. one last time. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~ She had fever yesterday, and started recovering today. Zara : (for lunch) I want to eat nasi lemak (Malay : Coconut rice) with little fish. Me : No, you still have a bit of fever, cannot eat nasi lemak with little fish. Zara : I'm feeling better already. Me : No, not today. When you are all well ok? Zara : Little bit only. Please. Me : No. (not this time) ~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Tuyam got her a set of toy bathing set from Indonesia which came with hair dryer, shampoo, comb etc. After opening up Tuyam's present, she wanted to try it on Sam, and 'wash' Sam's hair. Sam oblidged, but after the N-th time, she wanted to stop. Zara : Sam jie-jie, I want to wash your hair. Sam : No thanks. Zara : You must wash your hair. *pulling strands of her own hair to show Sam* After sticky. Got cockroach in the hair. Got bugs. Got lizard. I wash for you, ok? Sam : ...... ~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~ When she asked for me, and I'm in a meeting, she would wail and cry for the whole duration of my meeting. So I asked her : Me : Why Zara always cry when mummy is in a meeting. Zara : Because Zara loves mummy. Me : *melted* Mummy loves you too, but why you cry? Zara : Because Zara don't (doesn't) like mummy to close the door (I always close the door to the study when I have a meeting just in case the people on the other side of the line can hear her) Me : Oh.. But mummy needs to close the door because mummy needs to talk to uncle and aunty on the phone. It doesn't mean mummy don't love you. Zara : *look at me like she understood* Me : Mummy will always love you ok? Even when mummy is upset or angry, mummy still love you. Mummy love you very much. But mummy just can't carry you or have you sit on mummy's lap when mummy have meeting ok? Zara : ok. (not sure if she understood though, but she loves being re-assured that I love her)

Zara's 2nd Birthday Party

2006-11-20T13:08:00.000+08:00

We have been planning for Zara's birthday party for a while, and when we asked her what she wanted to do for her birthday, she recalled my friend's daughter's 1yr old birthday party in the hotel and she said, "Like mummy's friend, party in hotel. Got clown one. Got many balloons one." ~~We were kiam siap (Chinese: Stingy).~~ We did the finances, and thought it would have been better to keep the money saved (from having the party in a hotel or restaurant) in the bank for her. Instead, we have a small party at home, invited just our immediate family members. None the less, it was fun, and the food was good.

The guests : My friend's kids' Jensen and Yen Mae, who dropped by in the afternoon to drop off their presents for Zara. Eldest sis' daughter, Tasha. Youngest sis' son, the shy Norman.

We had Nasi Lemak for dinner, prepared by Tuyam and my sis' maid KC. Daddy said this can beat any best nasi lemak in town, I would have to agree with him. It's absolutely delicious. Zara loved it as well, although all she took was nasi lemak with ikan bilis (Malay : little fish or anchovies) and fried chicken. I ordered a cake from A Piece of Cake, with Zara specifying the design, "Want got cow girl one. Got pony one. Want dog dog" This is the cake that comes with a cow girl riding on her pony with her pet dog.

The beautiful and yummy-licious cake; The kids were all waiting to attack the cow girl and the pony while Zara munched away the candies on the cake; Zara busy stuffing herself with the sugar beads and stars on the cake; The cow girl and the pony after the kids' attack.

For the album : Our family; My dad with all his grand children; With my in-laws; Zara with her cousins

A very happy birthday girl: She loved the part where every body sang Happy Birthday to her; she was scared of the fire from the candle so she stood far away from them while trying to blow them out, and eventually just shouted for help.

She had a good time and slept only at 12am, 2hrs passed her bed time.

A Famosa revisited

2006-11-16T23:50:00.000+08:00

Tuyam is back! Hooray! Things are back to normal now. Zara missed Tuyam, she was touching and kissing Tuyam upon seeing her when she arrived yesterday. Tuyam said Zara has grown taller, and Zara is speaking faster with a lot of more new words which she's not familiar with. None the less, they are still able to communicate, which is important to Zara. I'm able to concentrate on my work now, which is absolutely piling up! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ We visited A Famosa again 2 weeks ago. It was Daddy's company's trip, and family members were asked to join. This time we stayed in the Condo within A Famosa, a spacious studio just for the 3 of us. This 2nd round wasn't as fun for us, it was overly crowded (lots of school organised tour groups); and maybe the novelty has worn off. Zara had most fun at the Monkey Island (probably since we didn't go the first round), and watching the cowboy show (which was a yawn to me).

The carnival

Zara having fun at the carousel; and the elephants having fun teasing Zara.

Animals at the Animal Safari

Monkeying at the Monkey Island

*YAWN*

Short Takes & Blog Break

2006-11-07T10:48:00.000+08:00

I have 9 more weeks to go before I pop. Put on 9Kg so far. Baby is doing fine, kicking and moving a lot, especially when she hears her jie-jie's (Chinese : big sister) voice. Zara is reaching Terrible Two and becoming a bit of a handful, very demanding, very whiney (very tiring for mummy). The arrangement with MIL coming to stay with us and babysitting Zara didn't work out. By day 2, she totally refused 'Mama' (Chinese : Paternal grandma), and worst thing was, she started crying from morning till night, unless she's at my side. Can you imagine how tiring it was for me, especially if I needed to work as well? I took a day off on Thurs and Daddy helped out by working from home on Fri, that made me survived the week. When we asked Zara why she didn't like Mama, she told Daddy, "Mama no fun". I think Mama is over protective, not allowing Zara to do lots of things in fear of Zara falling or hurting herself, and then there's also this communication problem. Mama speaks Chinese, Zara speaks English. but she learnt fast, by Day 3, she started saying "Bu Yao" (Mandarin : Don't want) every time Mama came near her. Now we're back to my sis' place. Zara has accepted one of the Kakaks to play with her (although she still refuses to let the Kakak change her diaper, bath or feed her), so it's easier on me, and she's also very happy to have my nephews play with her when they come home from school. My maid will be coming back next Wednesday. Thank goodness. This morning, when she woke up, Daddy told her, "You be good girl ok? Kakak jaga (Malay: look after) you and you let mummy work." Her replied, "I don't want mummy to work work anymore." Ha. I told Zara, "Then you have to ask Daddy to work harder and make more money so mummy don't have to work." By 11pm every night, after doing a bit of house work and packing Zara's things for the following day (when Zara has gone to sleep), I can feel my shoulders and back aching. And that's when I tried to catch up on some work which I couldn't finish up during the day because of the interruptions from Zara. Work is piling up.. So I'll be taking a blog break. See you all again when my maid is back.

Conversations / Keeping My Sanity

2006-11-01T23:23:00.000+08:00

Some of her conversation with us that tickled me. Me : Do you want to watch Chinese jiejie show (referring to 四千金 musical VCD). Zara : Want. Chinese jiejie got hair clips. Zara's hair clip upstairs in the box (referring to the box I kept all her hair clips). Me : Yeah. But Zara doesn't like mummy put hair clip for Zara. You always want to take it out. Zara : Because it's painful. Mummy put hairclip is painful. Take out then must comb comb the hair. Daddy : Tomorrow is Sunday where does Zara want to go? Zara : ...... Daddy : Maybe we can go to Lake Gardens. Can go to the dinosaur playground, feed the monkeys. How about that? Zara : Sounds like fun! Zara : Don't want kakak KC. Me : Why? Zara : Because kakak is so uh-gree (ugly). Me : Oh, that's not nice. If you have good manners you won't say something like that. Zara : *spent a few seconds thinking* Because kakak is not family. Mummy, Daddy and Zara is family. Me : But you let kakak Tuyam jaga (Malay : Take care of) you. Zara : Kakak Tuyam is oso (also) family. This one new kakak, not family. Me : .... I had a short nap while Daddy looked after her, and when I woke up, she came to me and stuck her face real near mine and asked, "Mummy, Are you feeling better now?" ..She's really growing up... ~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Btw, it has been crazy for me over the last few days. Sis' Filipino maid has to go back to Philippines because of family emergency, and sis needs her Indonesian maid back. So no one to baby sit Zara (although I could still send her to my sis' place, Zara just refused to let the Indonesian maids care for her) and do the housework. Guess who we enrolled for help? MIL for baby-sitting Zara. MIL has been staying with us since Sunday. Zara refused MIL as well, so she has been climbing up the stairs to the study to come to me when MIL is not looking. And I have to do the diaper changing, milk feeding, VCD/DVD playing. She won't allow MIL to touch her, and MIL is too afraid to turn on the VCD/DVD player. Major disruption for me at work. Another 14days before my maid returns. Hope I'll still be sane by then. Psst, my future in-law, do you want to help baby sit Zara? I'll give you discount on the dowry.

Morib revisited

2006-10-30T13:58:00.000+08:00

14 years ago, Daddy in his attempt to impress me, brought me to Morib for a date. There, he whipped out his Bunsen burner and brewed tea for the 2 of us at our little picnic. He did impress me (see who I ended up marrying?). Since then, we'd never been to Morib. Usually when this is suggested by him again, I would say, "Morib? What's there to do?" During our Hari Raya holiday, we asked Zara what she wanted to do, and she said, "Want to go to the beach, want to kick kick the sand." The boss wanted something, and she got it. We packed a few snacks, took some cold drinks in our Coleman, and headed to Morib, the closest beach.

Crab up on shore; Pine tree lined coast; One of the trees that provided picnic goers with shade; Our picnic corner.

I'm surprised it was a very pleasant trip. We picnic-ed at the pine trees lined field facing the beach. The weather was nice, cloudy but not hazy, and the breeze from the sea was really cooling. Daddy brought Zara out to the long stretch of beach, showed her some little crabs, let her wade in the shallow pool of water and played in the mud; while I sat on our picnic mat watching the 2 of them from a far. What a nice break..

Less Than A Month and She'll be Two

2006-10-23T13:53:00.000+08:00

23months! One more month before Zara celebrates her 2nd birthday. We are really happy with the way she's growing. Every night after she goes to bed, we like to stare at her, and talk about her achievement in the last 23months. It's just amazing, how much she's grown. ~ Weight : 10.1kg (2 weeks ago) ~ Height : 86cm (3 cms in a month? But we do realise some of her pants just suddenly shortened) Dexterity ~ Started feeding herself with a spoon ~ Able to press pieces of play dough in a mold to get the shape and print she wants. ~ Floating in a pool with her arm floats (actually she started this in Aug but she's getting really good now) ~ Hold a pencil, marker the proper way (nobody actually taught her this), and able to draw circles or lines or curvey lines (she said she's drawing snakes or worms) intentionally (though not perfect yet) ~ Able to do the thumbs up sign to indicate "Good" and thumbs down to indicate "Bad" ~ Walk up and down stairs without holding on to the railing (but we still insist she hold on to the railing for safety reasons) Emotions and character ~ Becoming very homely, prefers to stay at home most of the time. And wanting to go home after spending some time out. ~ Started to have strong dislikes about some people. These people make her cry or fuss when they go near her. Like the case with Daddy's friend and KC. ~ Sometimes she pretends to be a baby. When she doesn't get her way, instead of telling us what she really wants, she whines. When we change her, she likes to making the 'ooh-weh' 'ooh-weh' sound, and says, "Zara's a baby" ~ She's very into manners now, so she's using Excuse me, Thank You, Sorry, You're Welcome, Please when appropriate. Language ~ Since Phuket, she started pronouncing her name perfectly, stressing the Z and the R. She's no longer calling herself 'Wawa' ~ She's using words like 'accidentally', 'uncomfortable' now ~ She's picking different words to differentiate baby and adult animals; and some cases masculine and feminne of animals. She goes like this, "Daddy horse is called stallion; Mummy horse is called Mare; Baby horse is called Foal." "Daddy chicken is called Cockerel; Mummy chicken is called Hen; Baby chicken is called a Chick." ~ She likes to pretend to speak in different voices and tones to represent the baby, the daddy or the mummy talking (just like voices I used when I read her Goldilocks and The 3 Bears) when she's at play. ~ She's able to sing a few songs completely, e.g. Old Mc Donald, Do Re Me, London Bridge Is Falling Down, Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars etc.; and recite some nursery rhymes, e.g. Wee Willy Winky, Pussy Cat Pussy Cat, Hey Diddle Diddle etc. Learning ~ I'm trying to teach her phonics, and so far, able to teach her the B sound and the C sound. ~ I'm teaching her Mandarin, so far, she knows how to say 嘴巴 (mouth), 鼻子(nose), 眼睛(eyes), 耳朵(ear), 没有(don't have, no more), 要 (want), 不要 (don't want). We don't speak Mandarin at home, so I think it's quite an achievement. :P

Tired!

2006-10-20T13:59:00.000+08:00

Almost a week has passed since our maid has gone home. We're using my sis' Indonesian maid, KC. Our initial plan was to have her take care of Zara and at the same time help out with household chores. However, Zara totally didn't want KC to handle her. I think the reason is KC didn't speak English, and Zara has no way of communicating with her (Tuyam is able to communicate with Zara with her limited broken English). She doesn't even want KC to sit near her while she watched her TV shows. She only wanted my sis' Filipino maid, Elizabeth. Kept sticking to her and every time KC goes near her, she'll be shouting, "Don't want kakak. Aunty Aunty (calling for Elizabeth), come!" There's lots of interruptions for me while working at my sis' place. Sometimes when Elizabeth needs to cook or clean the house, Zara will be coming to me, asking me to play with her; Or running to me for help when KC tries to give her some water or play with her. Oh boy, tough for me. Why is it always the wife who has to endure this while the husband continues with his usual routine when the domestic helper is not around? I'll wait to see if Daddy is going to help out during the weekend, or he's still going to enjoy his weekend like he usually does, in front of his newspapers, 'making love' to his amplifier, and working on his hobby. World War Three will erupt if he thinks I'll have to do all the work, while it's status quo for him!

Short Updates

2006-10-17T13:14:00.000+08:00

No Maid Tuyam has gone home to Indonesia for a month for her Raya holidays. Oh boy, this mummy with big stomach has to take care of Zara most of the time. I'm having my sister's maids to help out in caring for Zara (and I work from my sis' place), but since Zara is still not quite used to them, she keeps coming to me for things and for a cuddle. 28 more days to go before the maid comes home (if she did come back). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ New Phrases Zara is using words and phrases she learns either from the TV or from us. Here are some new ones. Me : "Zara did you touch Rusty (our cat) just now?" Zara : "No way! Zara didn't touch Rusty." In the car, Zara : "Mummy, Zara want eat pop corn" Me : "Mummy forgot to bring." Zara : "Say Sorry girl girl (sometimes we call her girl girl)." Me : "....... Ok. Sorry girl girl, mummy forgot." Me : "Mummy loves Zara so much" Zara : "How much?" Me : "..... Very much." While swimming, Daddy : "Wow, Zara can float now!" Zara : "Pefect!" After dinner, Daddy : "Good girl, you finish your dinner." Zara : *grinned* "Excellent." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Yakking On days when she's in the mood, she yaks non-stop. Here is a conversation taken yesterday when she was telling my nephews what she was going to do to get ready for bed: "Mummy change this baju (Malay : clothes) for Zara" "Dirty already mummy." "Must take off and Zara put in the laundry bag" "Then kakak will wash wash the baju with the hands." "Zara brush teeth, and don't let the water run (the latter phrase is from Barney)" "Then change Pajamas" "Then mummy spray rose water on the face (when I apply my skin care in the night, I spray some rose water for her as well)." "Zara smell so nice" "Then read books, then bed time." She was saying this without pausing for a reply or response from us. My sis Filipino maid said she talked like an old lady.

Phuket - II ~ Sigtseeing, Beaches, Others

2006-10-13T00:24:00.000+08:00

Sightseeing I'm into my 7th month already, and hence I can't go on a speedboat. No island excursion for us this round. We hired my colleague's friend's taxi for a day trip around Phuket island on our 2nd day. When we asked what Zara wanted to do, she said, "Zara want to sit on elephant.". Our first stop was to a place near by for Elephant rides. To our disappointment, Zara refused to take the elephant ride. She said, "Zara scared. Elephant so ugly. So black, and hairy." Since we were already there, we bought some bananas to feed the elephant (yes, just ONE elephant available), and even that Zara didn't want to feed. She kept asking me to do it. So much for Elephant ride! Next stop, we went to Khao Rang, highest point in Phuket town to have a panoramic view of Phuket island. It was nice and breezy, and Zara just slept on her pram throughout. Then we had lunch in town, at this local shop serving Hokkien mee (fried and soup). By far, this was the worst meal we had in Thailand! After the crappy meal, it was shopping time, where we visited the Phuket market and then Robinson Departmental Store. We then headed to Cape Promthep (southern tip of Phuket), best for sunset viewing. Beautiful place, and if I wasn't pregnant, we probably would have gone all the way to the tip of the cape (some hiking required).

She had a good nap on her pram, then she started monkeying around. The last pix showed her interested in wanting to pat and hug all the elephants surrounding the alter.

Zara wasn't interested in the view at all, she was more interested in the Elephant statues available at the prayer alter nearby. The driver then took us to Chalong Bay to dine in the famous Kan Eang Restaurant. Food was really good, and Zara was occupied throughout playing 'cooking' with the cucumber slices, and chives sticks.

Kicking some sand at Chalong Bay before dinner

The Beaches We stayed in Surin area, waves are a bit rough there and not suitable for swimming. However, during low tide, it's pretty pleasant to stroll on the beach. The beach side is lined with local restaurants, where you can covered your feet in sand while you have your meals, and the price is relatively reasonable (much cheaper than the ones on the street in Surin town). Too bad, we only discovered this towards the end of our stay, and had 2 very good lunches there ~extremely delicious fried rice and fried fish.

Surin Beach in the afternoon and evening (it got dark at about 6pm+ daily while we were there)

We took a tuk-tuk to Patong beach one evening to do a bit of shopping and to dine at the famous Savoey Restaurant (another orgasmic dinner, but Zara was chanting "Want to go back Hotel" throughout dinner because she couldn't stand the loud live performance there, so even though the food was good, we couldn't slowly savour it).

Patong beach seems to be nicer (wider, longer stretch). But that area is really too congested for my liking.

Sunset at Patong. The 'boss' demands to be carried most of the time or to 'ride' on her pram.

Others We wanted to spend most of our time at the resort, hence we didn't go out much. We have most of our lunches at Surin area. Most of the time during lunch, Zara fell a sleep, so Daddy and I could munch and enjoy our food at our own pace.

On our last night, we wanted to do a last round of shopping and went to Canal Shopping Village at the Laguna area. There were really not many shops. A waste of time (for shopping). Luckily, we found a nice restaurant, and had a very good dinner, at least our trip wasn't fully wasted.

Waiting for lunch to be served at the beach front restaurant. She wanted Daddy to get her the Pooh bear from Robinson, but of course we said NO. Snoozing at the beach, while Daddy and I had our lunch. Time to go home, and feeling happy.

Thailand is always my favourite destination for a holiday. Glorious food, cheap shopping, and best of all, good service and friendly people. Oh well, our next trip will probably be in 1.5yr time, when no. 2 is old enough to travel.

Phuket - I ~ Hotel, Pool, Pampering

2006-10-12T13:30:00.000+08:00

We took an early flight to Phuket on Thursday (5/10). A Phuket colleague of mine arranged for a taxi to pick us up from the airport for a fraction of the price that the hotel would charge if we booked the car from the hotel.

Being nosy on the plane. Enjoying a cool towel and welcome drink in the resort

The Hotel Twinpalms Resort is a small boutique hotel located in the quiet beach of Surin. Just like its website, the place is beautiful. We got really good rates from the internet after doing some shopping around, and I don't believe you can get anything near that kind of accommodation (and service) in M'sia for that price. We stayed in the deluxe room on the ground floor the first night. Zara liked the room very much, it has a roomy balcony, and a few steps away from the pool. Since there was no bath tub provided, I asked for an anti-slip mat for Zara. I was delighted that the hotel instead loaned us a Winnie The Poo bath tub, together with a set of complimentary baby toileteries (which included bottle and nappy wash). Now, how many hotels would give you some thing like this? So far in my experience, none (not even our famous Pangkor Laut or Tanjung Jara resort).

Horsing around in the room, and the resort

For the rest of the 3 nights, we upgraded ourselves to a Grand deluxe room (err, because the cheaper rooms were no longer available in the bargain website I booked the room from) located on the 1st floor. The room was bigger, and it came with a bathtub. Zara of course enjoyed the new bath tub very much.

Big tub fun, and exploring the resort

The Pool Twinpalms has 1600sqm of water surface, the pool runs across the middle of the premise, with rooms surrounding it. Some of the rooms even have direct access to the pool (i.e. the room is directly connected to the pool). Zara went swimming every day, spending about 1 to 2hrs at the pool. There's no baby pool available, but they have shallow slope leading to deeper end, so she spent most of her time walking up and down the slopes. We don't have to hold on to her, she paddled about herself, even when her feet could not touch the ground. We just have to be nearby to assist her if she has her head accidentally dipped in the water.

The Pampering This is more of relaxing trip for me. Daddy has been great, taking care of Zara most of the time since he knows I'm too big to be running after or carrying Zara.

I also got a surprise gift from my best friend in New York. She bought us a spa voucher in Twinpalms without me knowing, and I was very surprise to see this in our room when we checked in. Our anniversary isn't until end next month, but this is such a nice gesture from her.

On top of this, the booking website also gave us a 2hrs spa treatment voucher for booking more than 3 nights stay. Daddy is not a spa person, so I got all the pampering in the spa, making use of these vouchers, while Daddy looked after Zara in the room. I had such a good back and shoulder rub, oh, it was orgasmic! (Thanks Ping!) And then, what's more blissful than lounging at the poolside sala, sipping herbal tea, while watching the kid and Daddy play in the pool.

(Thanks Daddy, for allowing me this luxury by looking after Zara.)

"Farmer Dee-ka" (Sawadeeka)

2006-10-10T09:00:00.000+08:00

That's the way Zara says Sawadeeka, i.e. Hello in Thai. We just came back from our 5 days Phuket trip late last night. It was a slow pace do nothing much trip. The moment we arrived in the hotel, the very nice Twinpalms Hotel, Zara has started to want to go home. "I want to go home" was something she said so frequently when she's bored. When we told her we won't be going home so soon, and we'll be staying in the hotel for a few nights, she changed and said "I want to go back hotel" when we're out and there's nothing much interesting for her to see or do. She said she missed her macanoni (macaroni) and cheese, her toys, Russ our cat, and playing with Kakak; and when we arrived home yesterday, she was really happy!! Wanting to play with all her toys and flip through all her books that she missed. She didn't sleep until about 12am going through her stuff in the house while I did the unpacking. I guess Phuket has not much to offer to a kid that young, or maybe Zara has begun to be very attached to her home. I have lots to catch up at work, so I'll be posting the photos later.

She misses her cot

2006-10-03T13:23:00.000+08:00

Just when I thought Zara is getting used to her bed, we had this conversation yesterday during bed time. Zara : *just out of the blue* "Kakak put the cot away already." Me : "No, Daddy put the cot away, in the other room." Zara : *pointing to her bed* "Mummy, throw the bed away" Me : *shocked!* "Why?" Zara : "The bed so slippery" (so untrue, but I guess she's just coming out with excuse) Me : "No, the bed is not slippery." Zara : "The cot is better. Throw the bed away. Zara want the cot." Me : "But Zara is already a jiejie (Chinese : Big sister). Cot is for babies, Zara is not a baby, but a jiejie now". Zara : ".... " Zara : "Mummy, Zara want go downstairs." Me : "It's bed time, why does Zara want to go downstairs." Zara : "Zara sleep downstairs." Me : "Downstairs got mosquitos and lizards at night, and Zara will be lonely if Zara sleep downstairs alone." Zara : *tears started rolling down* "Zara don't yike (like) the bed" Me : "Zara sleep on mummy's bed then, mummy sleep on Zara's bed. Ok?" Zara : "Zara want mummy hug hug to sleep." Me : "Ok, Zara sleep together with mummy then" So she slept on my side of the bed.

Pesta Tanglung (Malay : Lantern Fest)

2006-10-02T12:33:00.000+08:00

We never used to take note of such events, but since we have Zara now and would like to expose her to as much as we could, we spotted a banner around KL the other day about this Lantern Fest in Central Market happening on Sept 30th. While dressing Zara up, she asked for her jeans to wear. When I took out the jeans we bought recently, she said, "Don't want this one. Not nice. Want the flower one. The button got flowers one.".. So she chose what she wore. Off we went to KL town. Firstly, a stop at Lakes Gardens (yet again) to feed the monkeys and a round of play in the huge play ground. While feeding the monkeys, one of the monkey touched Zara's hands while trying to reach out for the peanut. She immediately said, "Don't yike (like) monkey touch Zara. Go home (asking us to bring her home)! Don't want feed monkeys any more!" (Recently, although she likes animals still, she prefers not to touch them or let them touch her except the cat in our house.) We finished throwing the last bit of peanuts from the open pack (with Daddy carrying Zara), and then left for the play ground.

She greeted the 'friendly' dinosaur first. Then it was off to the ginger bread man bridge. She loved the swing there. She said the see-saw is better than the one from our park.

When it got dark we headed to Central Market and had a quick bite at the food court. The Lantern Fest was at the Central Market car park. They were giving out free paper lanterns, goodie packs with drinks and mooncake (but we didn't take it since we don't really fancy mooncakes). There was a lantern making contest, and the lanterns were hung in Central Market itself for every one to view and judge. There was also a stage put up for some cultural performance. While some VIPs were making speeches, we just explored the surrounding. We found out there was going to be a lion dance, and a lantern procession.

Touching the Lion's head, she only wanted to touch the head with her straw. Exploring while waiting for the speeches to be completed.

We even managed to see a Dragon Dance, something not as common as the Lion Dance. It was quite nicely done (with the dragon twirling, twisting, flipping about chasing after a ball), and our very first experience seeing one.

Lantern procession (the photos didn't turn out quite well). Dragon and Lio Dance.

We left when an elderly lady took on the stage to sing some Chinese oldies. :P

Fussy Little Girl with lantern

2006-09-29T13:32:00.000+08:00

Zara is really turning into a fussy little girl. She demands and specifies what she wants and if we don't give in, she would make a big fuss or nag us. E.g. If she ordered macaroni and cheese but you give her oat for lunch, she just refused to eat, kept saying, "Zara want maca-no-ni and cheese only!" "Don't want anything else" If she wanted grape flavoured Vitagen and we gave her apple flavoured, she would be repeating, "Zara want purple (grape) Vitagen only! Don't want green (apple) one!" Sometimes we'll have to tell her some white lies to make her accept what we offered or just ignore her cries, other times, we'll just have to give in to her demands. On Tuesday, we brought out the lantern for her to play. I lighted it with a blue candle. She was making such a big fuss, chanting, "Don't want this candle, want pink one!", "Want pink one!", "This candle not nice." "I don't yike (like) this candle! I yike pink one!" I refused to budge, for the whole time the blue candle was burning, she complained. Then when Daddy wanted to shoot some photos with her and the lantern, and the flash went off a few times, she started complaining. Cringing her eyes, and saying, "So bright the yight (light). Mummy, take sunglasses for you (me)." "So bright!" "Don't yike (like) so bright." These are the best shot we could take.

She enjoyed the 'blowing the PINK candle' in the lantern after Happy Birthday had been sung.

Saturday and Sunday

2006-09-27T13:22:00.000+08:00

On Saturday, we collected a nice cake ordered by Eve (someone I got to know through blogsphere), before we went to have dinner at Mizu, Bangsar Village (the set dinner there is just oh so wonderful, but the price is a bit high, so we only go on 'special occasion'). Since it's my day (not to mention Daddy upset me earlier in the car), Daddy looked after and ran after Zara at the restaurant, while I slowly savoured my chicken tepanyaki (which I normally don't fancy, but Mizu does it so well). After dinner, we proceeded to TGIF to meet with Daddy's friends. Zara was acting up, the minute she spotted one of Daddy's friends, she started crying, and pointed to the exit "Want go home! Want go home!" "Go there! Mummy, go there! Want go home!". We tried very hard to distract her with the things hung on the wall, but she just didn't calm down. After about 10mins, we gave up. We thought it might be due to the lighting in TGIF, so we adjourned to Secret Recipe and told our friends to meet there. The moment she heard we were leaving, she waved bye bye to everybody at the table, "Bye, See you later". Zara was her happy self again in the brightly lighted Secret Recipe. While playing with some sugar packs, Daddy's friends walked in. There she went again, started crying, and kept saying, "Go home! Want go home". Daddy's friends thought they better leave as her crying was getting louder. Zara immediately calmed down after they left. That is so strange, she has never shown such fear or dislike for any person, not with so much tears and emotion. So it was just the 3 of us, in Secret Recipe, cutting up the huge cake collected from another Secret Recipe. (Thanks Eve again, for the cake..)

Zara ate the crispy flower and leaves on the cake

On Sunday, we drove all the way to Lake Gardens for Zara to feed the monkeys. A car stopped next to us, and a lady carrying a baby watched us fed the monkeys from the car. She then asked me if I was Zara's Mama. I almost went pale (what a reaction). She said she's Vanitha, who also has a blog. Daddy gave me that "see!-post-more-photos-la" look after they left. After the monkeys, we brought Zara to the big play ground in the gardens. She absolutely loved it! She wouldn't go near those wired dinosaur frames (meant for plants to creep on and grow) around the play ground, she said they are "big, black and uh-gree (ugly)" but loved the colourful dinosaur, saying they are so "nice and friendly" (Anybody knows Vanitha and her blog URL?)

Relocation

2006-09-25T13:06:00.000+08:00

Saturday was the big day for Zara to relocate from her cot to her single bed. She calls it her 'jie-jie (Chinese : big sister) bed'. We got her involved in 'helping' Daddy to install the bed, pretending to be 'Bob The Builder'.

Upon completing the installation, we saw a hint of disappointment in Zara. We asked her, "Do you like your bed?". She said, "Don't yike (like)." When she woke up from her afternoon nap, she cried and wailed, asking me to hold her for almost 30mins. When we asked her what happened, she said, "Zara so yoneyee (lonely)" and then later, "Got bad dreams". I wonder if the new bed gota do with this.

In the evening, after all the bedsheets and bed guards have be put up, she seems more interested in her bed. I told her she can still roll over to sleep with me if she wanted, and that I can still hold her hands in the night when she goes to sleep (something she likes). However, the last 2 nights, she didn't sleep very well, waking up in the middle of the night, and wanted me to cuddle her. Daddy said maybe she miss the scent of her old bed.

I hope she gets use it to real soon.

22nd Month Update

2006-09-21T12:02:00.000+08:00

Zara turned 22 months today. I have been so busy with work and also planning for the next family holiday (before I get into 3rd Trimester), I haven't been updating my blog that frequently. Anybody has any nice hotels to recommend for Phuket, with nice beach and especially away from the parading 'ah kuas'? Ok, ok, this is not about my prep for my holidays. This is about Zara. ~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~ ~ Weight : 10.3kg (2 weeks ago) ~ Height : 83cm (is it possible that she keeps gaining weight but not height?) Dexterity ~ She likes to drink from a cup instead of a sippy cup, and if she pays attention to what she's doing, there won't be any spillage. ~ She likes feeding herself with a fork and doing very well. Still need some assistance when she uses a spoon Emotions and character I start to see her displaying some 'Terrible Two' characters. ~ She never used to walk too far away from me when we're out. Now, when she insists that she wants to leave or go somewhere else, and I tell her to wait for a while, she walks away mumbling, "Zara want go home (or wherever)". And without looking back, she walks straight on. ~ She cries and shouts when she doesn't get her way (but I totally ignore that) She's also doing lots of 'pretend' play nowadays ~ She has conversation to herself and her soft toys, something that goes like that, "You want milk?" "Don't want." "You want cheese?" "Want" "Here, cheese. Take." ~ She dresses up and pretends to be a queen, a cowboy, or even an animal

Pretending to be mummy carrying a baby

She sometimes have emotional tussles with herself, and have conversation like this with herself *reaches her hands out to me* "Mummy hug hug Zara" *put her hands down* "Don't want." *reaches her hands out to Tuyam* "Kakak hug hug Zara" *put her hands down* "I don't want. I don't want." *reaches her hands out to me again* "Mummy, mummy, carry you (me)". *put her hands down* "I don't want. I don't want anybody" *starts making crying sound* Logical Thinking She's able to think logically, ~ when we asked her if she can fly, she will reply, "Cannot, because Zara don't have wings". ~ she knows, "Zara's family got Daddy, mummy and Zara." ~ she knows she's still small and can only do certain things, e.g. "Zara now small jiejie, cannot play with scissors. When Zara big jiejie, Zara can cut cut with scissors" Language ~ She's talking non-stop, and picking up new words all the time. Some of her pronunciation is still off (e.g. In-doh-nee-sah for Indonesia; Taffik yike for Traffic Light), and we sometimes have a tough time trying to figure out what she's saying, but when we do, we can always see the smile on her face, that she finally made us understand. ~ She loves books and picks up lots of new words from books. She can spend a lot of time flipping through books, and sometimes reading to herself (retelling the story in her own words).

Her book moment before bed time

Note : I'm absolutely trying to catch up on my blog reading, so don't mind if I'd not been visiting.

What's in her mind

2006-09-18T13:09:00.000+08:00

We didn't go any where else during the weeked except to get Zara her new bed from Ikea. But here are 2 conversations which took place last week which makes me wonder what kind of thoughts Zara goes through in her mind. Daddy wanted to take a shower. I asked him to see if he can shower Zara. Daddy: "Zara, come, Daddy bath bath you." Zara: *stared at Daddy's naked body* Don't want!" Daddy: "Why don't want." Zara : "Because Daddy so ugly. Like ugly duckring (duckling)." Daddy and I both tried to stiffle our laughs. So Zara thinks Daddy is handsome, but has got an ugly body. Daddy said this is probably her 'natural defence' against men, no naked men should go near her, even Daddy. On another occasion, Zara asked me to go down to play with her, and I said I don't want. She said something I couldn't hear from upstaris, but Tuyam repeated what she said. Tuyam claimed that Zara must be angry for me rejecting her, and she told Tuyam, "Kakak, cut cut mummy. Then cook mummy. And then eat mummy." Now upon hearing that, I quickly went down and question Zara. Me : "Why Zara said Zara wanted to eat mummy?" Zara : *quiet* (her way of showing she's embarrassed at what she'd done Me : "Zara eat mummy already, then no more mummy. Who sleep with you?" Zara : *quiet* Me : "Zara is Goliath? So naughty one huh?" (she has recently started reading some bible stories, and so far, David and Goliath is her favourite) Zara : "Nooooo. Not Goh-lier. Cut cut fish and eat fish only."

Mummy Jaga You (me)

2006-09-15T12:58:00.000+08:00

There are times when Zara wakes up in the morning, and refuse to have Tuyam take over the caring of her. "Don't want kakak jaga (Malay : take care) you (me). Mummy jaga you (me)." "Mummy need to work. Saturday and Sunday then mummy will jaga you." "Mummy don't want work work. Jaga you (me)." "Cannot. Mummy don't work work, then no money to buy Zara cheese, chocolate, and fish" As though she understands, she'll follow me downstairs. However, on such a day, there'll be some protesting when Tuyam gives her her monring bath. "Mummy bath bath you (me)! Don't want kakak do." And if mummy didn't oblidge (which I won't on weekdays), she will cry, while taking her bath, while being changed.

And after that, she'll walk to the study (where I work) with more complaints.

"Go mummy there. Mummy jaga you (me)." (The cry is very fake)

And some days, there will be lots of shouting from downstairs from the little girl, asking me to go down and play with her.

"MUMMY! COME DOWN AND PLAY! PLAY BALL WITH ZARA"

Fun eh? Working from home?

3D scan

2006-09-13T12:20:00.000+08:00

We went for a 3D scan last Thursday, and we brought along Zara, thinking it would be good for her to look at the baby as well. Our Doctor did the scan himself together with a sonographer, and we spent more than an hour doing this. Zara was very chatty throughout, but also got restless after 2mins. "Doctor put oil on mummy's stomach" "Doctor check check mummy. Check check baby" After a while, "Mummy carry" She wanted to climb up the bed I was lying on, and then said this herself, "This is not the play ground, this is hopital (hospital) bed. Cannot crimb (climb) up." After a few bored moments, "*pointing to the door* Daddy go there!" When she saw a glimpse of the baby, "There, baby there on the compiter (computer)" And most of the time, she kept wanting to get out, "Open the door. Zara want go out!" "Open the door!" "Daddy, please, open the door please." When nobody responded, she started banging on the door, and tried to open it herself, making lots of noise. That was when I told her I'm very upset. "Sorry mummy. Sorry." "Zara cannot talk loud loud, must talk soft soft like doctor." When we're done, she was so glad to say, "Thank you very much! Bye bye, See You" to the Doctor and the sonographer. Ah, I should have brought her some books to keep her occupied. Back to the baby, every thing is ok. Throughout 1hr+ scan, she was moving nonstop. One moment she hid behind her hands, next moment, she hid behind the placenta, another moment she lifted up her legs and covered her face, and then did some kicking motion. She was always on the move. See, if I didn't know she's a girl, I would have thought she's a boy again, based on her activeness. Dr was having a tough time trying to capture a perfect shot of her face. However, we did manage to see she has the same skull shape as Zara, she has rather big and slim feet, she has the same button nose like Zara; daddy said, "Don't all babies look like this?", oh well, maybe they do. Most important thing is she's doing well. Here's a shot of her, the best I could get from the video clips that were given to me from the scan. Daddy said the scan looks like abstract art. Doctor said he's not satisfied with the machine, not giving him crisp enough image. (The 2 'hook' like thing next to her face are her hands.)

As for me, I'm doing fine, big, but fine. Into my 23rd week (coming to 6months), have put on ~6Kg, feel like I'm 8months pregnant, always tired, always hungry.

A Famosa Resort

2006-09-11T13:27:00.000+08:00

We had another fun filled but busy weekend. Heard a lot about A Famosa Resort, so we thought we will make a trip there before I get too big. We left the house at about 12pm, there was a massive jam on the highway caused by a major accident, near Seremban, it took us almost 1 1/2 hrs to drive through that stretch. Jason recommended that we stay in Tampin town instead of the resort, since Tampin is very near A Famosa, and there's a brand new 'budget' hotel just opened recently. We arrived at 4pm and went to check out the hotel first. For RM110, Wangsa Mas price wasn't 'budget'; since it's new, it's relatively clean but the room is very basic. After we checked in, with the directions from the hotel receptionist, we headed towards A Famosa, Daddy was saying, "Just in time for the Animal Safari, to see the action (of the animals) in the evening." After 30mins of driving and A Famosa was no where to be found, Daddy got a bit annoyed. "Near is very a very subjective word. Your friend's kind of near, is definitely not my kind of near." Daddy even got more furious when we arrived at A Famosa shortly, and the parking attendant at the Animal Safari told us they are closed at 5pm. So no animals for that day, we headed towards the Cowboy town instead. We paid RM30 per adult (Zara is free since she's below 2yrs old), and when we got in, Daddy was not impressed. It was a dead town (since we were early), with just a street with buildings built to look like a cowboy town. "For this they charge RM30?" Mr Grump said. Since it was too far to go back to Tampin for dinner (so we thought) and too early for anything, we just had an early dinner in a Chinese restaurant in Cowboy Town.

After dinner, we walked about the 'town'. Zara finally meeting a pony (she has been keen to see one since she saw it in her Barney DVD), she was so eager to pat the ponies, and got a kick on her calf by one unfriendly black pony, poor girl. One of the cowboys greeting visitors at the entrance. Red Indian with a very small head.

For RM10, Zara is able to get unlimited ride on the amusement park in the town, but all she wanted was the Carousel. We tried to put her on one of the aeroplane rides (that just goes round like the carousel), and we had to get the operator to stop it mid way because she was crying and screaming.

She didn't want to get down, always asking for 'some more' every time when it's over. We had to lie and said the batteries of the horses need to be charged for her to get down. We definitely got our RM10 worth.

These trampolines were meant for some 'bungee jumping' and the section was closed. We just let Zara jump on one, since she loves jumping on bed so much.

Showtime in Cowboy Town starts at 8:30pm. This was when we started feeling 'worthwhile'. First show was Red Indian show, or 'Fire' show, followed with Animal Carnival.

'Red Indians' spinning torches, swallowing and spitting fire. Trained animals (from chickens to lion) walking the street

And then it was fireworks. Zara got a bit frightened by the blasting sound, but with our hands covering her ears, she started enjoying it as well.

The most spectacular of all the show

We left after the fireworks. This time, with the A Famosa guard giving us directions, it took us about 5mins to get back to Tampin. We took a wrong way earlier. "Your friend was right, it is very near." A cheerful daddy said. "And for RM30, it's quite good entertainment in the Cowboy Town hor?" That night, both Daddy and I didn't get a good sleep, and for some extend, Zara too. We had extremely noisy neighbours, who came in a group, and booked a few rooms. They were slamming doors, shouting to each other across rooms, playing loud music. At 2am, I couldn't stand it anymore, went out of our room and shouted at them, "Oi, what time is it ah? You don't need to sleep other people need to you know?" After a few sorry, I thought they will be more quiet, but then the noise didn't stop till 3am, and then started again at 5am. Gosh, I almost wanted to slap them when I met them in the morning.

And for Zara, I'm not sure if she's starting to get attached to her room, or she finds the hotel room too 'basic' for her liking, she started asking us to "Go home" when we changed her for bed. And middle of the night, she woke up a few times, looked around her, and then nudged me and said "Mummy, go home". She dropped back to sleep when I told her it's too far to go home. So it was like no sleep for me the whole night. The following morning, after checking out and had breakfast in Tampin Market, we headed to A Famosa Resort, to 'revisit' the Animal Safari. Zara was chanting "Go Zoo, go see animals" the whole morning.

Entrance fee for Animal Safari is RM35/adult, free for Zara again. We missed the morning shows (shows start early, and then get repeated in the afternoon), since we arrived at about 11am.

Zara is always keen to meet 'animals'.

We caught the bird show, which was really good.

Photos with the trained birds after the bird show.

For lunch, it was 4 packs of Tong's Garden's nuts, and 2 milo ice shared between Daddy and I. Zara had her milk, and some nuts. Oh well, we were not 'stingy' and unwilling to spend. The cafe in the Animal Safari only served some I-don't-even-know-what-they-are Middle Eastern meals if you ordered over the counter. For more common dishes like Fish and Chips, Chicken Chop, you have to purchase the voucher from the entrance of the park. Stupid system? That's what I told the lady mending the restaurant.

We then watched the Wild Wild West show; the most boring of all shows, for me. However, Zara was so entertained by it, and can even recalled what happened ("Good cowboy take gun bang bang bad cowboy. Bad cowboy fall down from the building. Then got Red Indian jiejie." etc). And then followed by Multi Animal Show (with dogs, monkeys, raccoons performing).

Daddy then took the Safari truck with Zara to go around the park. I wasn't allowed on the truck because I was pregnant, and the guy mending the station said they already encountered 7 miscarriages of pregnant ladies who went on the truck from the bumpy ride. It was a 20mins ride, and Zara said she liked it as she could see lion, tiger and giraffes.

By now, Zara wa very tired, but she kept saying, "Want to see more animals", and trying to keep herself awake. However, 3minutes later, she was asleep in her pram. We only let her have a 30mins nap, we woke her up when it was time for the Elephant show.

Photos with the casts from the Wild Wide West show, and then with the Elephant from the Elephant show.

After the elephant show, it was already 5pm. We took Zara to the last attraction, the Chicken farm. Daddy sneaked his hand into the chicken coup and pulled out a little chicken for Zara to stroke. She really loved it, after that she kept saying, "Little chicken so cute and soft". The Animal Safari is worth the RM35 entrance fee. The place is cleaner, and you get closer to the 'animals' than Zoo Negara, and the shows are all quite entertaining. Very worthwhile for parents with young children.

6 random facts about me

2006-09-07T12:43:00.001+08:00

Laundryamah tagged me on this, 6 random facts about me. 1) I love Zara to bits, she has given me so much joy, happiness and not to mention amusement... oh well, you all know about this already. 2) Secretly, I worry I won't be able to give the same amount of love to the baby I'm carrying. I pray every night and ask that this won't happen, and that I'll love them both equally. 3) I love deep fried food.. Gosh.. it's such a sin to have Puri (Indian deep fried bread) for breakfast, then a piece of sweet potato fritter and a curry puff for tea, and then Lay's potato chip for snack. I feel guilty eating like this, but it's like an addiction.. 4) I'm very untidy (messy table, messy wardrobe) but I'm obsessed with cleanliness. 5) I live in a house I like, in a nice neighborhood. However, I hate the distant it is away from everything (the Chinese coffee shops, the shopping malls, the good nurseries / kindergarten / schools). 6) At the peak of my health, I could run 4Km, now I can't even walk 1Km without resting. Not tagging anyone....

Short conversations

2006-09-06T12:37:00.000+08:00

Yesterday at the park, Me : "Zara, Mummy stomach ache, maybe ceret beret (Malay : diarrhea)." (actually trying to tell her we may need to rush home) Zara : "Come mummy, Zara hug hug. *hugged me* Mummy ceyek beyek. Make mummy better." 5am this morning. Zara : *rolled over to my side of the bed* "Zara drink milk" Me : *groggily, checked the clock* "Still night time, morning only drink ok" Zara rolled back to her cot, tossed and turned, tossed and turned. 2 minutes later, Zara : *rolled back to my side of the bed* "Mummy, Zara drink milk" Me : "Zara hungry is it?" Zara : "Zara hungry, better drink milk now." So I had to crawl out of bed to make her milk. This morning, upon waking up, she examined the crucifix that was hung at her cot, and started talking to her self. "Jesus on the cross" "Jesus don't want to come out, so shy shy." "Jesus come out loh." "Then can see Zara loh."

Share Share

2006-09-05T17:50:00.000+08:00

Zara is at a stage where she's very reluctant to share her things, and we have tried hard to make her understand that sharing is nice, sharing is good. We also remind her that her friends share with her, and so do mummy and daddy. E.g. "Chloe share with you her toys when you go to her house to play right? So you also must share share." "Mummy share with you the nice chocolate ice cream right?" "Daddy share with you the watermelon right?" etc. And "must share share" was something we say to her often when she's not sharing. Sunday after we'd finished shopping in Ikea and took the lift to get to the car park, Zara saw 2 little girls holding on to an Ikea bear each. From her pram, she said to one of the girl nearer to her, "Give you (me) the bear please." When the girl clutched on the bear tighter, Zara said to her, "Must share share mah." Yikes, she thought every thing should be shared and everybody should share.... although she's still reluctant to do her part.

Fun Fun Fun Weekend

2006-09-04T18:50:00.000+08:00

The weekend was all fun for Zara. Saturday, my sis came over with her daughter Tasha for a while to collect Zara's walker. Zara was so protective over her toys, worried we'll be giving away her toys to Tasha.

See how much Tasha has grown.

Later that evening, we went to Elisa's 1st birthday party in Temptations, New World Hotel. It was a good buffet spread. Zara had lots of cheese and some bread sticks for dinner, had some fun running around the place, collected some balloons from the clown. Mummy ate from 7pm to 9pm non-stop. Oh boy, I was stuffed! When one of the guests breast fed her little baby in a corner, Zara was just staring at the two of them, probably reminding herself how it used to be. I had to drag her out of the corner and left the mother with some privacy.

Zara playing with a balloon the clown made her; the birthday girl and her family; the beautiful cake (but I didn't dare to eat any of the icing); Zara and daddy in the crowd.

Thanks to Allyfeel, we had a free trial session in Gymboree. I dragged daddy out of bed early morning to send us there.

Zara enjoyed the session, although she wasn't participating as a group (I guess it's common for kids this age), she drifted out of the group, and played with the other things, and I kept having to drag her back. I was really exhausted at the end of it.

After breakfast, Daddy suggested to bring Zara to Lake Gardens to feed the ducks and monkeys. So we bought some peanuts and bread and headed to Lake Garden. It was 35degree at that time, and it was 12noon. I don't know why I let Daddy talk me into going.

We were lucky we spotted some monkeys on the way. Zara threw peanuts to the group of monkeys to feed them. After the monkey feeding, we walked about in Lake Gardens, trying to spot the ducks to feed. Imagine before Zara, I could run the whole garden (about 4Km) together with Daddy. That day, to walk just from the car park to the lakes, I was panting and had to stop a few times to rest. We didn't see any ducks, but Zara still have a great time.

See how similar the 2 of them look like in the 1st two photos. Zara was exhausted after spending an hour in the park. I wish I could take her place in the pram too. What a workout for all of us

Innocent Comprehension

2006-08-30T17:10:00.000+08:00

After work yesterday, I went to have dinner at my sis' place and to pick up Zara. When I arrived, she was playing in my sis' room. My nephew who's sitting for his UPSR (Primary 6 exams) next week was studying in the room as well. Me : "Zara, lets go out. Nicholas kor kor need to study." Zara : "Don't want." Me : "We must go out. And let Nicholas kor kor study." Zara : *glanced at his books* "Nicholas kor kor need to study A, B, C." I shut the room door and led her outside. After 5minutes. Zara : *came to me and asked* "Go yi-yi (Chinese : mum's sis) room jump jump on the bed." Me : "Cannot, Nicholas kor kor studying. When Nicholas kor kor finished his exams, then you can go in and jump jump on the bed like a crazy girl." Zara was happy with my answer and continued playing in the living room. 10 minutes later, when Nicholas came out of the room to get himself a drink, Zara came to me and pointed to him. Zara : "Nicholas kor kor finished exam already. Zara can go into the room to jump jump on the bed like crazy." That's her comprehension of 'study' and 'exam'. Pst. I'm having problem accessing comments of blog who has migrated to Blogspot Beta version. It's taking forever to launch the comments pop up. If I'd not left a comments in your post, it's not because I'm not visiting you, it's due to this technical problem that I'm not leaving my 'mark'.

Lazy - These few days

2006-08-29T18:36:00.000+08:00

I'm getting so lazy... or maybe I should say tired. Lots of work to do, and these 2 days, I have gone to the office to work and sent Zara and Tuyam to my sister's place. Zara had a good weekend. On Saturday at 8am, she woke Daddy up, "Daddy wake up! Zara want go pet shop." When we asked her what she wanted to do in the pet shop, she said, "See iguana, dog dog, cat cat, rabbit, mouse". So Daddy oblidged, and I told him his daugther has more persuasive power than me. I could never drag him out of bed like that. On Sunday morning, when we stepped out of the house for a walk, we met Zara's friend Chloe and her mum walking passed our gate also taking a walk. Chloe is 9mths older than Zara, and we always see her in the park. Chloe's mum is also pregnant like me, so we have lots of things to share, about our daugthers, about our pregnancies. So we went walking together, 2 pregnant ladies with 2 toddlers. After our walk, Chloe invited Zara to her house to play. Zara had a good time there, this is her first visit to a friend's house. She wasn't shy at all, digging out Chloe's toys from her toy box without prompting, playing the slide, jumping on the sofa like it's her own home. I should invite Chloe over next time but I wonder if Zara will so willingly sharing her toys. Yesterday when I went to pick Zara up from my sis' place, she told me, "Zara happy. Got kor kor (referring to my nephews) play with Zara." She must be so lonely always stuck at home with mummy and Tuyam all the time. And for me, after getting home from my sister's place, I just feel like sleeping and do nothing.. So I went to bed with Zara at 10pm. Zzzzzzz.

Getting Ready For Her Birthday

2006-08-28T13:38:00.000+08:00

Here's Zara getting ready for her birthday..

Girl Or Boy

2006-08-25T12:30:00.000+08:00

Lots of people are asking me this question. I had a feeling I was going to have a boy from the very beginning. Because of the timing of conception (on the dot of ovulation day), and the experience I have with this pregnancy is very different from Zara's. Not to mention seeing the baby's hand reach out for the needle during the amnio test, an indication of a boy in the making. With Zara, there was no morning sickness. My stomach was growing very rounded and towards the side (like a flat wok). With this baby, it is pointy, all growing towards the front. Do I prefer a girl or a boy? I asked Zara that question as well, "Do you want mummy to have a baby girl or baby boy?" She always replies, "Baby girl." If Zara was a boy, I would definitely hope for a girl, since she's a girl, does it matter? A boy would have completed the family, an ideal. A girl and a boy, what more can you ask? Daddy would prefer a boy, he said he could share his engineering hobby with him, i.e. fixing the car, building amplifiers etc. But deep down, I would like another girl. I think girls are easier to care for, girls 'listen' more, and when they grow up, they tend to be closer to their families than boys. From an economic standpoint, a girl would be better, because she can inherit all Zara's and Tasha's clothes and shoes. My friend who has a girl first and a boy then, told me the caring of the KKJ (Chinese : male organ) is tougher. There are so many folds to clean, like below the testicles, the folds between the penis and testicles etc. The reason why I wanted to have a second child was to let Zara have a sibling to talk to and discuss things with when we're old and gone. How many brother and sister out there who are very close? Who can talk about anything under the sun? I just look at myself, we're never that close to my brother, I talk to my SIL more than him; but with my sisters, we get along fine (of course there were tongue lashing, fists fighting days), we can talk about anything, our MILs, our sex lives, the latest skin care, etc. So I was very anxious to know the sex of the baby. And I am very happy to know that we're going to have another girl! I can sense a wee bit of disappointment in Daddy when I told him the sex, but after a while, he said, "actually, girl is better also hor?" My reply to him is, "No matter what, don't ask me try for a boy huh, I'm closing shop!"

About Baby

2006-08-24T13:17:00.000+08:00

Few days back Me : Zara, mummy buy you new bed, you sleep on new bed ok? Your cot let baby sleep. Zara : Don't want. Zara sleep Zara's bed. Me : Where will baby sleep then? Zara : *pointing to our bed* With Mummy and Daddy Yesterday night Me : Zara, mummy buy you new bed, you sleep on new bed ok? Let baby sleep in your cot. Zara : Don't want. Baby sleep new bed. Zara sleep in the cot. Me : Why? Mummy get you nice nice new bed woh, you don't want? Zara : Don't want. Zara likes Zara's cot. Baby sleep new bed. Me : What about nap time? Can baby sleep with you on the mattress (she has a mattress downstairs for her afternoon nap) down stairs? Zara : Cannot. Baby sleep in small cot downstairs. Me : But, we don't have small cot downstairs. Zara : Baby sleep on the floor then. Me : But the floor is so hard and cold. You must sayang (Malay : love) baby, let baby sleep on the mattress with you. Zara : Sleep on mummy's body then. Me : *roll eyes* We still have yet to sort out the sleeping arrangement. We thought of getting a new bed for Zara, park it next to my side of the bed (like we did with the cot), and let baby sleep in the cot. Zara doesn't seem keen with the idea.. but maybe she'll change her mind when we bring her bed shopping. By the way, got my amnio test result, and every thing is ok.. what a relief. So I'm now half way with my pregnancy, 20more weeks to go.

Lawyer Buruk II

2006-08-22T13:36:00.000+08:00

Before we went out over the weekend, I had a short top and shorts on, my tummy showing. Me : *sticking out my tummy* Zara, can mummy go to the supermarket like that? Zara : *looked at me* Cannot. Me : Why? Zara : Because can see breast. Me : Can see breast meh? Zara : *pointed to my belly button and corrected herself* Can see belly button. Zara likes to point to my stomach and says : Mummy stomach got baby. And I like to ask her back : What about Zara? What is in Zara's stomach? Zara used to say : Zara's stomach got worms (thanks to SIL who told Zara she would have worms in the stomach if she continued to suck her thumb) And I told her she no longer have worms, because she's stopped sucking her thumb. Now her reply is : Zara's stomach got egg and cheese (her staple every day). While checking out our wedding photos. Zara : Daddy so handsome. Me : Mummy pretty or not? Zara : No Me : Why mummy not pretty? Zara : Mummy got mole. Like raisin. (referring to the mole I have on chest which is, yup, like a raisin, which could be seen on the wedding photo) I wanted to test her again later. Me : Zara, Mummy pretty or not? Zara : .... (quiet) Me : Mummy pretty or not? Zara : Mummy happy. Aiyo.. cannot say I'm pretty just to please me meh?? I probably have to dress up more nicely at home these days. I have a night conference, after changing her to her pajamas, I told her I need to go and work, and Daddy will look after her. Zara : Mummy stay with you (me). Me : Mummy need to work, Daddy stay with you. Zara : *trying to get rid of Daddy* Daddy, go to the toilet outside poo poo (referring to the shared toilet outside which we use for big business as the ensuite toilet in the master bed room flushing system is not that good) Daddy : Daddy no poo poo. Daddy look after you while mummy works. Zara : Go to the toilet outside to she-she (Chinese : pee) then. Go she-she. Mummy stay with you (me).

21st Month Update

2006-08-21T23:58:00.000+08:00

Zara is 21mths today, 3 more months till she's 2yrs old (oh boy, have to start planning for her birthday party). ~ Weight should be more than 9.7kg (didn't weigh her this month) ~ Height : 83cm ~ No new teeth sprouting. She has a total of 16 teeth. Dexterity : ~ Climbing up stairs without holding on to anything, however, we asked her to at least use the wall to support her, just in case. ~ Able to rinse her mouth and spit out, even moving her cheek to do a through rinse. ~ Able to draw circles (although not perfect). ~ Climbing up ladders in the park unassisted. ~ Able to put on her pants with some help. Language : ~ She can sing and recite some nursery rhymes from beginning till the end. ~ Her reasoning skill is getting very good. ~ She's learning new words very quickly, and the correct usage of them. ~ She's able to sing along with most of the songs she has on CD, VCD and DVD, for words she's not sure, she'll just mumble something to the tune. (and lots more which I'd captured in some of the posts) Feeding and Food: 3 meals and 3 milk feeds a day. Eats a lot of snacks in between, Her current favourite junk food is chocolate ice cream (she only fancies chocolate flavour and nothing else), which I have to keep a tub in the freezer all the time. She only wants to have egg and cheese these days for breakfast and lunch. And for dinner, as long there's a fish or an egg dish, she's fine. She refuses most leafy vege (just suddenly), preferring only beans (long beans, peas). Luckily she takes lots of fruits or she won't have enough fiber intake. Emotions : ~ Officially weaned off thumb sucking. ~ Extremely clingy nowadays, probably feels threatened by my growing stomach and the coming baby. ~ Showing preference to which kid she likes to play with in the park, she only likes to 'hang around' this particular girl, who's 8mths older than her. ~ Very affectionate, giving everybody lots of hugs and kisses, and saying "I love you" to Daddy and me. ~ Very emotional, especially when she sees animals in distressed (mummy not in the same league as the animals).

Play and Learn

2006-08-18T00:08:00.000+08:00

She started showing interest in stacking blocks, and looks like she's doing quite ok. She was occupied with this for quite a while, leaving Tuyam enough time to wash the dishes and her milk bottles. She was so patient, every time the 'tower' toppled, she just restack them, and she refused to let me help her. In the evening, while Tuyam folded the day's laundry. She picked up her favourite pants, and started trying to put on. She's doing quite well here, but still don't know how to handle the back, exposing her diaper. She repeated this a few times, taking it off, putting it back on. When it's time to go to the park and I told her no long pants should be worn. She quickly changed to her shorts.

If she gets better.. she may be able to help change the baby in future. Hee hee.

Lawyer Buruk

2006-08-17T12:00:00.000+08:00

My little girl is turning into a lawyer buruk (Malay : a mediocre lawyer) these days. She's learning to negotiate, giving instructions, recalling events. Tuyam was having tooth ache and she complained to Zara hoping to get some sympathy and hence obedience from her. Tuyam : Zara, kakak teeth pain pain. Zara : *not empathetic* Because kakak never brush teeth! She's been very clingy and prefers me to bath her, even in the morning (which is all done by Tuyam during weekdays). Tuyam : Zara, come take bath. Zara : Don't want kakak bath Zara. Kakak go hang tothes (clothes). Mummy bath bath Zara. Tuyam : Mummy need to work. Kakak finished hang clothes. Zara : Kakak bath bath Rusty then (Rusty is our cat). Take off Rusty diaper and baju. Tuyam : Rusty got wear diaper and baju meh? Zara : Take off Rusty collar then. I just watched her in amazement, smiling to myself, taking in her 'argument'. She shouted for me at 5:30pm, asking me to bring her to the park. Me : Mummy not yet finish work. Later ok, one more hour, then mummy come down and bring you to the park. Zara : Mummy work work first yeah. After bring Zara to ship park (she always refers to our park as Ship park). Kakak cooking cooking at home. Then mummy bring you (me) to see snails (on our way back, we sometimes get to see snails). Then bath bath with you (me). Then makan (Malay : meal) time! And every day before we leave the house for the park, Zara will say bye bye to Tuyam and add this, "Kakak cook nice nice mum mum (referring to her dinner) yeah?"

Zara's awareness

2006-08-16T12:04:00.000+08:00

Zara is not bothered when I'm around her naked. In fact, she behaves as though it's the most natural thing to do. When we shower together, she loves asking me to carry her, and she'll cling to me like a koala and lay her head on my shoulder. She probably likes the skin touch skin feeling. The strange thing is, when Daddy is around her naked (even just being topless), she would say, "Daddy shame shame, never wear baju (Malay: clothes)". If Daddy is topless, she would not let him hug her. She would just say, "Don't want" without giving a reason ("Becausssssssss.. don't want" she would say). We tried this a couple of times, and the behaviour is always the same. I really wonder why. ~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~ I tried to check if she knows the different between a man and a woman one day. So I asked her, "Mummy got petpet (Chinese : female organ) or not?" Zara answered, "Got. Like Zara. Zara got petpet." And then I asked her, "Daddy got petpet or not?" Zara answered, "No. Daddy don't have. Daddy got pineapple. Got hair one." I laughed till I had tears in my eyes. Daddy's definitely doesn't shape like a pineapple, I don't know how she even connect the two.

Weekend bad luck

2006-08-14T13:20:00.000+08:00

Just our luck. Incident 1 On Saturday, while on our way back from the market, at a traffic light on a slope, Daddy stopped behind a small truck loaded with long wooden poles. The truck suddenly backed towards our car; Daddy pressed on the honk, but the truck driver was obviously dreaming, the truck just continued to slide down the slope towards our car, and suddenly BANG! One of the wooden pole just cut straight into our bonnet. Daddy was furious, he immediately overtook the truck, blocked the truck with his car and got down, making sure the truck driver did the same and checked on the damage. Daddy was pointing at the driver, then his car, we couldn't hear what he was saying, but it's obvious he's very angry, an emotion he doesn't show much in the presence of Zara (he's more patient with Zara than me). Zara pointed to Daddy and said, "Daddy so rude", not seeing this side of him before. When Daddy got back into the car, he said when they talked about who's going pay for the repair, the truck driver just said he's just a driver for the company truck, and won't have money to pay Daddy. Incident 2 On Sunday, I went to have dinner at my sis' place and after dinner I brought my dad out for coffee. As I was driving towards the coffee place, going on a straight road, a sudden BANG! and the whole car shook and skidded a bit sideways. We got knocked by a car exiting from a junction on the left! I immediately stopped the car, my dad, the hero, stomped out and started approaching the other car. I parked the car properly, checked the damage, unstrapped Zara from the car seat, carried her and walked towards the other car. I could hear my Dad shouting at the young driver, "You just got your license and you are still on probation and you are driving like a madman?!!" He was giving the boy a lecture. The boy was apologising profusely. I told him I'll get someone to evaluate the damage and then bill him. There's a bad dent on the left back passenger side just after the door, all the way to the bumper. We exchanged phone numbers, and after more apologies from him, we left. I told my dad why he was so angry, and scolded the boy so harshly. What if he was some road bully and beat him up? He's way too gangho. My dad. I was shaken by the accident, but then I counted my blessings. If I'd drove any slower, or if the driver drove any faster, he could have knocked right into the back passenger car door, where Zara was seated. I don't want to imagine that. And I was driving Daddy's car, and not my car, which has cheaper spare parts, more common colour, and he already has a dent from the day before, so if he needed to knock the dent back, he can get them done all together. Lucky in a way?

My Dark Side

2006-08-11T14:17:00.000+08:00

Every night before I go to bed, I always asked for patience and fairness so that I will be able to give this to Zara (and the coming baby) in her (their) upbringing. I realised when I'm tired, not feeling well and if I have some misunderstanding with Daddy, my mood is sour, and I will then be a bit harsh on Zara. When she wakes up in the middle of the night because of a bad dream, and on days when I'm not rested, I would actually grumble loudly to her while patting her, "Please la, go back to sleep la. Mummy also needs rest la." (I should have just hug and calm her, and pat her back to sleep) When she's demands for TV even after she's just watched a whole Barney show, if my mood is sour, I would tell her a firm "NO! NO MORE TV!" No explanation given. (I should have suggested to her other things to do instead of watching TV) When she runs around naked after a bath, trying to be playful instead of letting me dress her up, and if I'm in one of those moods, I'll yank her towards me, and almost shouting, "Don't be naughty yeah! Quickly, let mummy dress you up!" (I should have explained to her that she should get dress quickly, or she'll catch a cold). Get the drift..? Yesterday, I wasn't feeling quite well, because I have a bit of abdominal pain (oh well, maybe this was just my excuse). I was giving Zara a tough time. "Stop splashing water on mummy yeah. Or else you stop swimming!" when she was splashing water in her playful way in her wading pool. "Hurry up la, get out of the bath now!" during her evening bath, because she wanted to play longer in her bath. "You tore your book huh? Ok, mummy throw away the book then since you don't know how to sayang (Malay: Take care) your book." when she accidentally tore a page out from her book. "Please hold your cup properly la. Why you keep spilling?" when she drank from her sippy cup and spilled some out. etc. In the night, when it was time for her to brush her teeth and get ready for bed. She was making a fuss because I got Tuyam to help her instead of helping her myself. "Aiya, mummy not feeling well la. Let Kakak do for you." I grumbled impatiently. She gave me a reply which woke me up instantly. She said, "Mummy so rude!". When I asked her what she said. She didn't dare repeat that, but she said instead, "Don't want Mummy scold Zara.". It quickly brought me to my senses. Why am I being so harsh on her the whole day, or on days when I'm in my sour mood? She's just being herself like any other days. I felt so guilty. So I have my dark side too, but I really hope such occasions are rare, and I'm still learning to be patient, if not constantly at least most of the time.

What Must You Say?

2006-08-10T12:27:00.000+08:00

I've been trying to teach Zara to use the right 'magic' word like Please, Welcome, Sorry, Thank You for different situations. Here is how she uses it. When she starts shouting for something she wants, like chocolate ice cream. Me : Zara, what must you say? Zara : *stops her shouting* Kakak, please, cho-koh-lat ice cream please. Me : *after Tuyam has given her*, what must you say now? Zara : Thank you Kakak. Watching Barney, and she started jumping on the sofa full of excitement. Me : Zara cannot jump yeah. If you jumped, mummy will turn off the TV. Zara : *stopped jumping for a mere 15second, then resumed jumping* Me : Zara, what did mummy say? Cannot jump yeah. Or else mummy turn off the TV. Zara : *ignored me and continued with the dangerous stunt* Me : *turned off TV* Zara : *shocked, looked at me, and then quickly came over to hug me* So sorry mummy, so sorry. So sorry. I never taught her how to say 'so sorry' before, but I guess I'd used it on her before when I accidentally bumped her head or ate the last piece of chocolate. Half way through dinner, Zara pushed the spoon away when Tuyam attempted to feed her. Me : Zara, what did mummy say? It's rude to push the spoon away. Zara : Thank you kakak. Kakak Please. Zara pao pao (Chinese : Full). Welcome. Aiks, I taught her to say, "No thank you kakak. Zara pao pao already." instead of pushing her spoon away, and this is how she said it. When she sneezed. Me : Bless you. Oops, you forgot to say something. Zara : Excuse me. Welcome. Conclusion, she knows when to use Sorry, Thank you, Please, but still confused about when to use Welcome, but she knows it's a nice word to use. :P

Helping Out

2006-08-09T17:57:00.000+08:00

Zara is helping out in the house with some of the lighter chores. When she's in the mood, she puts away her toys by singing, "crean (clean) up" after the mess she created. She helps to bring new diaper to us when she needs changing and then tosses her used diaper into the bin. She helps me bring my book to me, or passes me the remote controls when needed. She helps pass out cutlery during dinner time. Last Friday, I saw her helping out at the kitchen. She was peeling off the skin of Petai beans. Tuyam said although she's very slow in her progress, she was able to peel off the skin of about 10beans, helping out a little, and keeping herself occupied. Just hope she'll be able to help out more when the baby arrives. *grin* ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Helping my friend out here. She has a litter of 4 homebred miniature schnauzer puppies (colour : salt & pepper) for sale. I would love to have one, but I don't think I have time to care for dogs who needs quite a bit of attention (unlike cats). If you are interested, please contact : 012-2005658 / 012-2961099 or mc_foong@yahoo.com / omtarre@yahoo.com You can also check out her add here.

Amnio Test and Weekend photos

2006-08-08T12:17:00.000+08:00

Had my amnio test done yesterday morning. I went in feeling very nervous. I guess the Dr saw my pale face and reassured me everything will be fine by patting on my arm. After identifying the spot which was a safe distance away from the baby via ultrasound, Dr immediately sterilized his hands and my tummy area with alcohol and started the procedure. During Zara's time, I was so afraid I just closed my eyes the entire time until the Dr told me it's over. This round, I chose to watch the entire procedure. I saw the Dr deftly inserted the long needle into my abdomen, the strange thing is, there was no pain. Not even a sting or an ant bite feeling (with Zara, there was at least a ant bite sting). With the Dr holding on to the ultrasound scanner and the needle to ensure the baby is at a safe distant, the nurse started extracting the amnio fluid into a tube. It was yellowish in colour, like urine. I was concentrating on the amount of fluid extracted, and suddenly heard the Dr said, "Oops, baby has moved". I turned my attention to the monitor. I could see the baby's hands reaching out to the needle. Yes, the little one was reaching out his/her hands for the needle! The Dr maneuvered the needle a bit so that the baby could not touch the sharp end which then stopped the amnio fluid from flowing into the collection tube. So it took longer for the desired amount of fluid to be extracted with the baby being so 'busy body' trying to touch the needle every time it was inserted back to the amnio sac. When the right amount of fluid was collected, the Dr took the needle out, and did another scan on my stomach to show that baby is ok, heart beating etc. I could still see the baby's hands reaching out towards the direction of where the needle was. 10 little fingers all stretched out. What a sight! When we got home, I showed Zara the plaster on my tummy, and told her I won't be able to carry her, or bring her to the park these few days. I also told her to be careful when she's around me, no pressing on my stomach or jumping on me or 'blood will come out'. She has been trying to refrain herself from doing all these. We now have to wait 2.5 to 3 weeks for the result. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ And here are the things Zara did over the weekend. Swimming! She's staying afloat on her own for longer period of time now! After 3 weeks of not sucking her thumb, we took out her 'present' for her. She had a good time slowly unwrapping the present, then immediately making use of the paint to do some finger painting on paper as well as on the toilet wall.

Who's the mum?

2006-08-04T13:01:00.000+08:00

One night during bed time, Zara was jumping on the mattress and refused to quiet down. So I threatened her. Me : "Zara, stop jumping on the bed. Time for bed yeah" Zara : *ignored me* Me : "Zara, you don't want to stop is it?" Zara : *ignored me* Jump jump jump! Me : "Ok, then mummy go work work in the computer room (she refers to the study as computer room). Daddy tuck you in then." (Knowing very well she won't let Daddy tuck her in) And then I pretended to reach for the door knob of the room. Zara : *Cried* Urgh!!! Me : *turned back to the bed* So you stop jumping ok? Zara : *walked towards me, and smacked my shoulder* Beat mummy! Me : Why you beat mummy? Zara : Because mummy yai yai (Chinese : Naughty)! Wah, she thought I was naughty because I threatened to leave the room. While we were driving to Penang, Zara was getting restless sitting on the car seat for too long. She started swaying her head left and right and that caused her head to knock against the sides of the car seat. Me : "Zara, you cannot bang your head like that" Zara : *ignored me, continued to sway her head* Me : "Zara, you bang your head like that then your head will be painful and you'll be stupid" Zara : *stopped what she was doing, and stared at me wide eyes* Mummy say stupid! Me : *shit!* "Ermm.. yeah, because you'll be stupid mah, if you bang your head like that" Zara : *stared at me still* Mummy say stupid *waved her finger at me* cannot say stupid! Me : Ok ok.. sorry, mummy shouldn't say stupid. Stupid is not a nice word. Right, my fault, I told her not to use the word, and I use it myself. She's getting to be more like me now.. hmm..

Penang - II

2006-08-03T13:30:00.000+08:00

We spent most of Sunday in the resort itself. After a sumptuous breakfast, when we brought Zara to the beach, we saw horses available for hire. Zara was very interested, and said, "Want to sit horsey!" When I asked if she was going to ride on her own, she said, "Mummy sit with you (me)." So I went with Zara. It was just a stroll on the beach, with the horse handler guiding the horse on the leash. She really enjoyed herself, patting the horse on and off, and kept saying, "Zara so happy." When we got back, she thanked the horse and patted it. The horse handler mentioned she's very brave because most young kids would have been quite fearful of the height while being on the horse, and the size of the horse.

Zara and mummy on the horse; Zara patting the horse to thank it; Zara running about and playing in the resort compound.

For late lunch, headed to town for Sisters' char kuey teow in Macalister Road. Zara was tired and dopey, and only had some prawn fritters from the lobak stall. Then it was a wasted trip to Komtar. Our intention was to get more DVDs (as we got some really good quality foreign film there on our last trip), but because of the raid, the shops were closed, so we left empty handed.

Late in the evening, we brought Zara for a swim. The water was icy cold and even though she was shivering, she refused to get out. She didn't want to leave until she was able to lie in the water and float, and got some applause from two Middle Eastern men watching. She was so proud, and kept telling us later, "Zara so clever to swim. Uncle Bravo Zara."

For dinner, it was again to Nonya Breeze. This time, it was 4 dishes (fish, prawns, vege, egg), 1 duck soup, 1 nasi kerabu, 3 drinks, and the bill was less than RM50.

On Monday morning, Zara wanted horsey ride again. This time, the handler told us he would bring us further, but when we were heading back, Zara asked to get down, she was complaining, "Bum bum pain pain." from the long ride.

Zara patting the horse while on it; Happy to be on the ground again because her bum was hurting; Back up the horse alone for a photo shoot; Thanking the horse and saying good bye.

We then had to check out and move to Equatorial Hotel (as it was nearer for Daddy to get to Prai for work). Daddy headed off to work after dropping us off. Zara and I had a slow leisurely buffet lunch, all she had was some almond flakes and a scoop of ice cream when mummy pigged out.

Back in the room, I had the TV on for her (Tom & Jerry was on) while I washed her bottle in the toilet. Suddenly, I heard her crying outside, I rushed out to check on her, "what happened?". She just pointed to the TV and said, "Cat cat so naughty. Make puppy cry!" And tears started pouring down again. My gosh, she was crying over the scene where Tom woke up a puppy from its sleep (and it started yelping) while chasing after Jerry. No more Tom & Jerry, since it got her so emotional.

Evening was swimming again, and this time, another achievement from her, she could actually let go off my hand, and paddle on her own (with arm floats of course) for a few seconds.

That night, we just had dinner in the hotel as we were too lazy to go out (and don't know where to go).

My morning sunshine.

Tuesday, Daddy left early in the morning. I brought Zara for breakfast, then a swim, and then we had to check out (bloody hotel wouldn't let us have late check out!). Spent the next few hours loitering in the hotel, and also in Bukit Jambul mall while we waited for Daddy to pick us up after work. To get to Bukit Jambul mall, we had to take a cab there, and Zara refused to get on the cab. She actually pushed the door shut while I tried to get her in, she said, "Want to sit only mummy's car. Don't want this car." Such a fussy girl. Even though it's a bit tiring for me to handle her alone (esp lugging the bag containing her water, biscuit, Mr Blue, and our gigantic camera etc; and sometimes having to carry her to walk up and down stairs, with the stroller strapped around my shoulder), Zara was a good girl, and it was very easy to take care of her. Most of the time, she just let me push her about in the stroller, and she kept occupied by singing and reciting nursery rhymes to herself. Daddy came to pick us up from the mall at about 5pm (since no cab wanted to take us back to the hotel or asked for exorbitant price. I heard cabbies were on strike that day because they were supposed to start to run on meter that week), and we headed back to KL.

Penang - I

2006-08-02T13:17:00.000+08:00

Daddy had to go up North for a work trip last 2 days. Since I am going to do my amnio test next Monday, I thought I'd followed him so we could stop by at St Anne's to say a prayer before the test. We arrived in Bukit Mertajam at about 3:30pm on Saturday, the feast day itself. The road leading to the church was closed so we have to walk. There were lots of hawkers lining the street, taking the opportunity to make some money from the event. Some were blasting loud music and songs which I thought was very disrespectful. We said our prayer in the old church, and then spent some time showing Zara around although it was a terribly hot day. Zara was very interested in the various statues of Jesus and the Saints available, especially the scene of the crucifixion. We tried to explain to her what was happening in each scene in ways she could understand. After that, whenever she see her book on Jesus (which we brought along for the trip), she kept saying, "Jesus pain pain". "Bad people beat beat Jesus". "Put Jesus on the stick".

Zara receiving flowers in the old church; Around the church; an ice cream treat for her.

We then headed to Penang island. We stopped by at Nonya Breeze, a restaurant we discovered on our last trip to Penang a year before, for an early dinner. The food at the restaurant was still very good and authentic, and for a dinner with fish, prawns, chicken, vege, dessert, 4 drinks, it only came out to RM41. Rosie, the restaurant owner, even threw in Zara's dinner (which consist of a small fish fillet and a bowl of soup) for free. No way we can get this kind of deal and hospitality in KL.

We let her have some fun at the beech before dinner.

We stayed in Bayview Resort as our favourite hotel Lonepine was fully booked. The resort was filled holiday goers from the Middle East. Our room got upgraded, and we got a very big and comfortable sea view room. Zara just felt so right at home in the resort, she even walked about among the fully robed Middle Eastern ladies without a hint of curiosity or fear. After taking a shower, we went out to the night market to get ourselves some DVDs. With the police on their toes, the shop that we visited (which was recommended by Domestic Rat) was pulling down the shutters to close up, and then reopening after they got the all clear sign, a few times. Daddy and Zara got 'shut in' on one occasion and Zara wailed when she couldn't spot me around. Poor girl. During bed time, since Daddy had to share a bed with Zara, Zara warned Daddy by waving her finger, "Daddy, cannot snore snore."

Weaning - Thumb Sucking

2006-07-28T13:12:00.000+08:00

I'm not sure if we will successfully wean Zara from thumb sucking entirely, but we're making good progress since 2 weeks ago. I didn't want to force her to quit that habit initially, because : ~ I find her very cute sucking her thumb (esp when holding on to Mr Blue) ~ It's a good way for her to comfort herself esp when she wakes up middle of the night from a bad dream Then, she was hurting her thumb more and more with all the vigorous sucking, until 2 weeks ago there was actually a 0.5cm cut, which was bleeding a bit. She occasionally complained, "thumb pain pain". So we thought, maybe it's time she should stop. We didn't plaster her thumb, nor put bitter ointment on her thumb. We just 'psycho' her. We told her ~ she's jie-jie now, it's not nice to be sucking her thumb ~ to compare her left (which she doesn't suck) with her right thumb, left one is so smooth and 'nice', and the right one is not nice and so rough ~ she's hurting her thumb because she's feeling the pain now, and if she continue sucking, her thumb may get broken and I'll have to shelve her thumb in the cupboard like I did with one of the broken figurine we have in our house (to this, she wailed and cried. Bad mummy!). We even told her if she shook hands with people, people will say, "oh, such a nice girl, how come your thumb not nice one?". To which she replied, "Zara shake hand with this hand then (reaching her left hand out)". During nap time, and bed time, when she asked for her linen cloth, the breast pad or Mr Blue (all are her comfort objects which are her 'companions' during thumb sucking sessions), we reminded her, "Don't suck thumb yeah. Thumb thumb after broken and pain pain yeah." She would then said, "Zara hug hug only. No suck suck thumb." The first 2 days were tougher, esp during nap time, she would cry, knowing she cannot suck her thumb (but we didn't refrain her physically, just told her she shouldn't suck), she even asked me to 'go upstairs' (she naps downstairs) and didn't want me to be next to her. The first time ever she rejected me, because I was the culprit who wanted her to quit. The next 2 days, she still cried, but she would ask me to sing to her and pat pat her. She would sob, and then eventually drift off to sleep. Then the following days, she got a bit cunning. She would 'negotiate' with us. "Zara eat sweet first." or "Kakak give Zara choklat", "and then Zara no suck suck thumb." And she did keep to her promise, after the sweet and chocolate, she would not fuss and go to sleep without the thumb. In the night, it's easier, because she's with me during bed time. I'll just remind her she shouldn't suck her thumb, and that she's promised us. I would hug her while she smells and twists the piece of linen, until she falls asleep. We gave her lots of praises and encouragement. Praising her that she's such a big girl, and a good girl, that she listens to us and not suck her thumb. Telling her her thumb is getting nicer and smoother (which is the truth) and no more painful. She would then ask all of us to kiss her thumb and then smile gleefully. I notice she still sucks her thumb in the middle of the night, unconsciously. However, she used to suck on it for long period of time, but now it was just a few sucks here, and there, and she would pull out her thumb after that. Or when I pull it out, she would not place it back in her mouth like she used to (previously it was like a tug-of-war between the 2 of us). We told her we would get her a present if she totally stop sucking her thumb. We asked her if she wanted a bicycle as she's always admiring the bigger kids around our neighborhood riding one. She said, "Zara don't want bicycle. Zara want paint paint only." So that's the deal, when she's totally weaned off, we'll bring out the new finger painting set I got Daddy to buy her from Changi Airport recently. And here she is, finally able to fall asleep without sucking the thumb.

Hickory Dickory Dock

2006-07-27T13:30:00.000+08:00

A mouse went into our laundry room, and caused some excitement in the house. We closed up all the windows and the doors, and put Rusty our cat in the room so that he could catch the mouse, and then we watched from the window what Rusty and the mouse were doing. Here's what Zara said while watching. "Kory, Kory, Dock, Mouse went up the clock." "Mouse climbed up hang clothes there!" (refering to the coat hanger) "Mouse climbed up the sky!" (referring to the mouse up on the curtain railing) Then when she saw Rusty chasing after the mouse, she said, "Wow, Rusty so angry. Catch the mouse like a monkey." (In the end, Rusty being fat and lazy, quit after a while. It was Daddy who smacked the mouse with a broom when he got back from work. Zara didn't see how ferocious Daddy was though, as she was asleep when Daddy murdered the mouse.) The following day, I asked her, "Where is the mouse now?" Zara : "Go up to the sky oh-ready (already)." (she last saw the mouse in the curtain railing) Me : "You want to go and catch the muose?" Zara : "Don't want." Me : "Why don't want?" Zara : "Becauzzzzzzzz (dragging the word while thinking what to say)... Zara scared."

Daddy Sleep On Sofa

2006-07-26T12:58:00.000+08:00

I had a 10pm meeting, and was trying to tuck Zara in before my call. I asked Daddy to 'observe' how I do it, so that he can tuck Zara in in future if I have night call instead of having to always depend on Tuyam. However, since Daddy always excites Zara to the extend of her being alert instead of sleepy, I told Daddy to lay low on the floor, and listen to how I handle her. While Zara was telling me what she wanted to dream about, we started to hear some snoring. Oh well, this always happens (I mean him falling asleep while caring for Zara, but not the snoring) so I just ignored it, but Zara suddenly kept quiet and listened intently. Daddy must be very tired as he usually doesn't snore, and it was getting louder. Zara sat up suddenly, in a frightened voice she said, "Go down stairs! Daddy go downstairs." Me : "What happened girl?" Zara : *with tembling voice* "Daddy go sleep downstairs." Me : "Why? Zara scared?" Zara : *about to cry* "Zara scared scared. Daddy snore snore. So loud." So I had to ~~give Daddy a shout and~~ get him to leave the room before he upset Zara further. After Daddy left, she calmed down and went to sleep. In the morning, she remembered what happened, and she thought Daddy spent the night on the sofa. "*pointed my side of the bed* Mummy sleep here" " *poited to her cot* Zara sleep here" "Daddy go down stairs sleep on the sofa." I asked, "Why Daddy sleep on the sofa?" Zara : "because daddy snore snore like a pig until Zara scared. Oink Oink" (my fault, when I got Daddy to go down stairs the previous night, I told him he was snoring like a pig and frightening Zara) and continued, "Daddy go downstairs, and then no more sound. Zara no more scared."

Weekend (lots of) Fun - Photos

2006-07-25T13:13:00.000+08:00

Weekend mainly is Zara's time. We try to let her has as much fun as she can. Saturday - Wall Painting She wanted to do some painting, but when I prepared her paint and drawing paper, she said "Zara want paint body. Paint face, paint knee". So we moved her to the bathroom. Let her do some painting on the bathroom wall, and paint her body. After that, I just washed the wall out and gave her a bath.

Artist at work Artist and her wall painting.

Sunday - Aquaria, KLCC. Daddy was contemplating if we should go to the zoo or Aquaria, I suggested Aquaria due to the hot and hazy weather. It was a good outing for Zara. She was very fascinated with the water creatures, and some of the other animals available on display, e.g. snakes, turtles, tortoise, spiders, frogs, raccoon (yes! There's even a raccoon). Before the trip, I told her she'll be seeing sharks, puffer fish, star fish, sea horse. I was a bit disappointed when I couldn't show her any star fish or sea horses, I felt kind of cheated. There really isn't much show cases on colorful sea creatures and coral reefs. The main attraction is the tunnel through the big aquarium with sharks, Murray fish, stingray swimming about and above us. If it wasn't for Zara, I don't think we would have ever gone.

Zara was very happy to be in the Aquaria We spent the most time in the tunnel. Zara kept saying "Shark fly high in the sky" after our visit because many times the sharks swam above us. More time in the tunnel. And at last, we saw some living corrals, with some colourful clown fishes.

And then I got this as a present from Daddy. A Samsung MP3 player. We were considering an iPod and this, but an iPod costs RM200 more for the same features. So the $ factor decided for us. Daddy got this for me so that I can play some classical music for the baby in the stomach. With Zara, I used to sit in front of my notebook with earphones stuck to my stomach. This would make me so much more mobile, and I can still move about and play with Zara, while the baby has a dose of his/her classical music.

20th Month Update

2006-07-24T09:43:00.000+08:00

Zara is 20mths, 4 more months till she's 2yrs old. ~ Weight 9.7kg (0.5Kg in a month, yikes!) ~ Height : 81cm ~ No new teeth sprouting. Her 4 Cuspids (canines) are still not fully sprouted. Dexterity : Climbing up and down stairs while holding on to the side of the stairs. Able to feed herself while using a fork. Language : ~ She can count 1 to 10 now. ~ She's started reciting the alphabets A to Z, but skipping quite a few letters in between (e.g. a, b, c, d, e, f, g then skip, and go straight to q, r, s.. etc). ~ She's able to identify and name shapes, e.g. circle, square and triangle ~ She sings and recite the nusery rhymes to herself a lot, and is getting pretty good at it. ~ She even sings part of some Chinese children songs even when she doesn't speak the languge (through memorising the sounds). (and lots more which I'd captured in some of the posts) Feeding and Food: 3 meals and 3 milk feeds a day. Eats a lot of snacks in between, like fruits, biscuit, chocolate, home made ice lollies, nuts, raisins, cheese etc. Her current favourite junk food is chocolate (she especially loves the dark chocolate with marzipan that Daddy got from Germany), and fruit gummies. She 'orders' her food nowadays, asking for "bread and cheese", "egg sandwich", "yogurt", "pancake" for breakfast. "noodle", "porridge", "fish ball" or just "egg" for lunch And dinner she knows she always have what we have and she only ask to eat what we're eating. Emotions : A loving girl, not afraid of strangers, but will check for our approval before being 'friendly' to one. She knows being nice is not to be rude, not to say words like stupid, or push people away. She knows being nice is to say thank you, please, sorry when needed. She loves watching Barney, Richard Scarry, Wheels in The Bus; and watches at least 2 shows a day (her max). She's in the midst of being weaned off thumbsucking (oh I'm so going to miss seeing her cute little thumb in her mouth).

Let me brush your teeth

2006-07-20T12:41:00.000+08:00

Zara is very keen in having nice teeth, we used that to coax her to brush her teeth every night. "Do you want your teeth to be like Uncle Ah Seng's?" Remeber Sengkor's chocolate coated teeth, she would always shake her head and walk to the toilet to have her teeth brushed. She always says, "Zara's teeth so nice. Zara brush teeth." One night, when Zara was playing with Daddy, she spotted Daddy's teeth. "Daddy's teeth not nice! Zara help Daddy brush teeth." To see what she would do, we gave her Daddy's tooth brush, and she started helping Daddy to brush his teeth. Even telling him, "Daddy, EEEEEE" (so Daddy have to say EEEEEE for her to brush his front teeth). "Daddy, AAAAAAAA." (and Daddy said AAAAA so she can reach for his molars) "Daddy, brush tongue." (and Daddy stuck his tongue out)

I have to crop the photos. Daddy would have killed me if I showed him opening his mouth wide ~~like a hippo~~, but you can imagine what he was doing at the other end of the brush.

Cute mistakes she makes

2006-07-19T13:30:00.000+08:00

Zara speaks a lot, and she's picking up words from us daily. Being only 20months old, she makes some really cute mistakes. Sauce is Horse to her. As in Soya Horse and Chilli Horse. She would say, "Don't want Chilli Horse. Spicy." Anything that has pines, or prickly she gets them mix up. Porcupine is a Pineapple Puffer fish is a Pine Cone Pine Cone is a Porcupine But a Pineapple is a Pineapple. She pronunces the BL sound as BR. As in "the light brink brink". And when something drops, she says "Opsy Dentally", fusing the phrase "Opsy Daisy" with "accidentally". She calls a biscuit, bis-kot, as how Tuyam pronunces it. Recently I corrected her, and now when she said biskot, she would self correct and mutter, "biscuit, not biskot, biskot is Mayay (Malay)".

Our Quality Time with Zara

2006-07-18T13:38:00.000+08:00

I have stopped going to the office for a while, and have been working from home for the past 1 month. I take over the caring for Zara from Tuyam at 6:30pm as she has to prepare dinner. What we'll do is go to the park together, or have some water fun before she takes her bath. Then we'll have dinner together at the table (Tuyam will feed her), normally this is when Daddy comes back. After dinner, we'll watch a video or to do some drawing together. At about 9pm, I'll prepare her for bed, and Zara knows her bed time routine. She has to wash her hands first or she can't touch or get on the bed. Then it's teeth brushing, followed by changing her into her pajamas. I'll get her to play on her own or get Daddy to watch over her, while I take my night shower. After that, we let her choose 2 books from her stack which we will read to her. After reading (up to 3 times a book, sometimes), we'll just talk about what we read from the book. Sometimes she tries to 'read' us the book; sometimes she just talk about the story or book. Like when we read Goldilocks and the 3 Bears, she would say something like "Zara like porridge also." "Zara don't like hot poridge, Zara like warm warm one." "Zara got Daddy, Mummy, and Zara." "Zara like soft soft bed. Can roll here roll there." etc. This is a good time to get her talking. If she's still full of energy, we'll do some singing, or else, I'll make her bottle of milk, turn the lights off and have her drink her milk. This is the time Daddy will say his good night, and leave the room. After her milk, I'll kiss her good night, "Good night Zara, sweet dreams." and she'll repeat, "Good night mummy, sweet dreams." If she didn't drift off to sleep immediately, she would start telling me what she wants to dream about. I don't know if she understood what dream is, but she would go .. "Dream about...Small small cheese. Cold cold, yummy yummy one. Zara like." "and then... chocolate. Sweet sweet one! Very yummy. Zara put in the mouth." "Dream about... swimming. Zara swim swim with dolphins. Water cold cold. So nice!" "Dream about.. the zoo. Zara see lion, elephant, giraffe.." etc etc I'll just be the facilitaor and prompt her to tell me more, but let her do all the talking. Sometimes I get too tired, and I'll drift off to sleep before her. Sometimes, I can hear the last word coming out from her mouth, and the next thing, she's sound asleep. This is the quality time we have with her, daily, unless I have a night meeting to attend and Tuyam has to tuck her to bed.

Water Fun - photos

2006-07-17T13:41:00.000+08:00

I thought I'd give Zara a change, instead of going to the park in the evening like we always do, on Thursday, we did some painting, and after that, I let her hava a dip in her wading pool.

I painted her stomach for her, and then let her paint the rest of her body. It's washable paint, and we did that outdoor. So.. no sweat! I washed the paint off before I let her dip in the pool.. It was a hot day. She absolutely loved it!

On Saturday, we brought her to my sis' apartment for a dip in the real pool.

Putting on her arm float for her (Her neck float was getting a too small for her already). Being in the big pool is different for her, she can't touch the ground, so she was clinging on to me. I managed to let her lie on the water to float for a few seconds without holding on to me. What an achievement for her! Or course, we gave her lots of cheers as well!

I then got Daddy to look after her. Zara was 'demanding' Daddy to bring her to the small pool, and then big pool and then small pool ..., not being able to make up her mind. "This one not nice, that one nicer, Daddy go there *point to the other pool she wasn't in*" I just ignore Daddy's complaints about Zara making him run around and had a good swim.

I used to swim a lot when I was pregnant with Zara, going to the gym (with pool) at least twice a week to swim for 20mins (non stop). Since we moved and it's too far for me to go to the gym (and anyway I discontinued my membership), this is the first time I went for a swim after I knew I was pregnant.

I told Daddy we have to go to my sis' place more often to swim. For the benefit of Zara and myself.

Wawa & Baba Black Sheep

2006-07-13T09:10:00.000+08:00

Zara has been calling herself Wawa instead of Zara lately. It must have been the influence of the Chinese song 泥娃娃 (Nu Wawa - Doll of clay). I tried to correct her yesterday. Me : Zara, what is your name? Zara : Wawa. Me : No, not wawa. Your name is ZARA. Zara : *pointed to her chest* Wawa Me : You can call yourself Wawa if you want, but your name is ZA-RA! Zara : *quiet* Me : Tell mummy again. What is your name? Zara : Wawa's name Cookie! Me : *giggled* Your name is cookie? A biscuit? Zara : *laughed* Hahaha. Wawa's name cookie! Me : Your name is not cookie la. Your name is ZA-RA! Zara : Hahaha. *repeated after me* Not cookie la. ZA-AH! Me : Yes. Your name is Zara. Zara : Not cookie! *giggled* Nowadays, I could really have a 'conversation' with her, and I can see, she has some sense of humour. She has also started singing quite a fair bit. With all the miss pronunciation, most of the time, we could still make out what song she's singing. Here's Zara's attempt to sing the song Baa Baa Black Sheep.

Zara's 嬷嬷 (Mama - Paternal Grand mother)

2006-07-12T13:10:00.000+08:00

The days when I was away for my work trip, Daddy got MIL to come and stay in our house so that she can keep an eye on our maid while he's at work. MIL's style of caring for a child vs mine is very different, especially in these 3 areas : 1) She didn't believe in breastfeeding, and thought I breast fed Zara for too long, making Zara too attached to me. She was so glad I finally weaned her off from the breast, even after I told her many times the benefit of breast feeding, including the DHA I'm giving Zara, and the boost of immunity she's getting from all the breast milk. 2) She thinks that a baby should be and can be toilet trained by the 1st few months of life. She's appalled that Zara is still not toilet trained by 1 1/2yrs. She said all her kids were toilet trained within the first few months. I don't believe a child can hold their bowel movement or bladder at such a tender age. It's more of her being 'trained' to bring them to the potty at specific intervals. 3) She over protect the child. Even now, she still has her arms stretched out around Zara when Zara walks about, she's getting ready to catch Zara if Zara fell. I'm actually quite glad that I get to bring up Zara my way, which is through reading lots of books written by child care experts. Tuyam, my maid, is not married and has not cared for a child before, so I thought her my desired method, and she followed them. So when MIL came over to the house to stay, both Zara and her were in for some surprises. MIL was shocked we allowed Zara to play in her bath for so long. MIL was always following Zara with arms outstretched, Zara found it very annoying. MIL tried to stop Zara from sucking her thumb, and or course Zara was very upset. When I wasn't around, Daddy told me that Zara has been asking MIL to be away from her. When Zara is upstairs, she would tell her Mama, "Mama, go down stairs!" When Zara is downstairs, she would tell her Mama, "Mama, go up stairs!" And sometimes MIL close her arms around Zara (ready to catch her if she falls), Zara would point to a corner and tell her Mama, "Mama, go there!" When I was around, I saw Zara pushing MIL away when MIL tried to help her climb a chair or on to the sofa (which Zara is already an expert doing it). I had to chip in and tell Zara, "Cannot be rude to Mama. Mama is just helping ok?" or "Cannot push Mama away, you know Mama is Daddy's Mummy and she sayang (Malay: Love) you very much?". Zara would then turn towards MIL and give her a hug, as though to apologise. I know MIL loves Zara and cares for her. However, her method is not one that Zara is used to, so Zara is not accepting her. I'm glad and thankful she was wiling to help out when we needed her help. However, I'm also glad that she's not Zara's main care giver, as I think Zara would be a very different person under her care.

How does she know how to use such words?

2006-07-11T09:30:00.000+08:00

I'm so into capturing Zara's conversation these days because she's never seized to surprise me every day with her choice of words; and she's becoming so chatty, always talking when she's in high spirit. She likes to grope my breast or Tuyam's, (not sure if this is the symptom of breast feeding her too long), and she'll say when she does that, "Zara humsup (Chinese : act of a pervert)." (I told her before she can't do that, because that's 'humsup') When her VCD starts showing with the volume turned off, she said, "Oh shit! No sound." (I know this is from me, because I use SHIT very often). Calming herself, she talked to herself, "Daddy is here, mummy is here mah, no need to be sked (scared)". She farted and she laughed, "Mummy, Zara fart fart!" "Zara like a skunk." "Zara crazy girl!" "Zara joker" "HaHaHaHa" Note : This post was written a month ago, and didn't get posted it until today.

Dolous

2006-07-10T12:27:00.000+08:00

A few years back, I'd been on the Dolous ship with King's Wife and her girls when it docked in Port Klang. It was more to bring the girls to visit the ship then to check out its book shop on board. When I heard Dolous is back again in Port Klang, I told Daddy about it, and we decided to bring Zara there on Sunday. We arrived at Star Cruise Terminal, West Port 15minutes before it was due opened (@ 2pm), there was already a long long queue awaiting to get in. Upon seeing such a long queue, Daddy started cursing and swearing. "Such a long queue!?" "You are crazy to want to come!" "Only Malaysians would queue up for such at thing!" Zara was asleep, so she didn't hear any of daddy's ranting. I just said, "You don't want to queue then go home lor." "You stay in the car and wait then. I go queue up, and call you when you can come." (It always work if I pretended not to care and let him make the call, hee hee.) So Zara and myself waited in the airconditioned car, and Daddy went to queue up. It wasn't that bad, within 10mins, he called and told us to come, it was also good timing as Zara has awaken from her nap.

The Doulos

It was a hot day, and the ship was crowded! We could hardly squeeze into the book shop. When we wanted to get an ice cream, another long queue awaited us, so Daddy told me to just forget it. Despite the heat, Zara liked it though, to experience being on a ship, to enjoy the cool breeze on the deck. When Daddy pointed to her the sea below, she insisted, "Zara go down there! Go swimming!"

We spent less than 30mins on board the Doulos Daddy was so glad to get down from the ship. While we were getting out, check out the number of people waiting to get on board the ship! We spent sometime at the Star Cruise terminal, enjoying the cool breeze from the sea. Zara started exploring, singing, dancing, playing.

If you are interested, the Doulos will be in West Port till end of the month. Admittance is free, you just have to pay RM1 per car to park at the Star Cruise terminal.

Mummy Away - again

2006-07-06T09:00:00.000+08:00

Leaving for Singapore in a while for a meeting tomorrow. Told Zara about it. Me : Mummy going to Hong Kong (just so she doesn't get confused I didn't say Singapore) to work work again, can or not? Zara : *look a bit upset* Zara no cry. Mummy go work work, Zara sleep with Daddy. Me : Good girl. Zara be brave and don't cry ok? Mummy come back very fast one. Zara : Mummy come back very fast. Zara no cry. Maybe she thought I'll be buying her tons of clothes or toys again. Yikes!

Quantifying Love / Pregnancy Update

2006-07-05T13:21:00.000+08:00

Daddy: Zara, do you love Daddy? Zara : Larf Daddy : How much do you love Daddy? Zara : Two Me : Zara, what about mummy? Do you love mummy? Zara : Larf Me : How much do you love Mummy? Zara : SEVEN! Haha. Daddy 0, Mummy 1 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I'm already into my 2nd trimester. Tummy is already showing. This time, it's protuding front wards instead of going side ways like the time I have Zara. My appetite is getting better, although I'm still not able to eat as much as I used to when I have Zara. Because of my age, my next hurdle is doing the amniocentesis around 16weeks (this round I'm not going for the tripple blood test). For those of you who don't know what this is, it's to inject a very long syringe into the abdomen to collect amnionic fluid. The fluid collected is then sent to a lab for culturing to check if the baby has any genetic or chromosomal abnormalities. The wait time for the result is 3 weeks. A long wait! I remembered the last time when I have Zara, I didn't celebrate until the amnio test came back to say everything is ok. I didn't dare to celebrate. It would be the same this round.

Hong Kong Shopping - Photos

2006-07-04T13:11:00.000+08:00

For the first few days in Hong Kong, I tried to shop for clothes and shoes for Zara, but I couldn't find anything. They were either the upmarket brands where every thing are ridiculously priced (even after discount); or they are cheap low quality stuff sold in the markets. The more popular local brands like Giordano or Bossini only have clothes for kids 3yrs and above. I was getting disappointed with the shopping. On the last day, however, I saw there was a sale on in Zara! I love the kids clothes from Zara, they are ideal for Zara because she is tall and lean; most of the other international brands like Osh Kosh and Mother Care do not fit her well because they are made for bigger size kids. Here are the loot I got for her, most of them are from Zara (which became more affordable after discount). Baby doll clothes are very popular now in Hong Kong. People with flat tummy wearing 'maternity' looking blouse. I got myself one which will cater for the growing tummy. I also got myself a pair of sandals and a bag.

And what is going to Hong Kong without buying the extremely good quality dried sea produce/海味. I got the viagra prawns mentioned in Domestic Rat's blog too, but they are from Southern China and not Sarawak. I bought double of everything below, because I have to give them to MIL as gifts for keeping an eye on Zara and maid during the time I was away.

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Zara modeling her new clothes from Zara.

I got her a watering can from Hong Kong too, she really loves it, and immediately wanted to help Kakak water the plants.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I wonder when I'll go to Hong Kong again (the last time I went was 20yrs ago with my mum and sis), it's not a holiday destination I have in mind. So I'll wait for my next business trip. What I like about Hong Kong ~ The transport system, cabs, busses, MTR are very good and extensive. ~ The porridge in Hong Kong is superb, so creamy and delicious. Anybody knows how to make porridge like the ones you find in Hong Kong? ~ The roast goose is to die for. What I don't like about Hong Kong ~ People smoke indoor, in buildings, in restaurants. Blech! ~ Food or dishes whipped out from restaurants are extremely salty for my liking. ~ Every where is so crowded, and there's no green lungs!

Hong Kong - Photos

2006-07-03T13:22:00.000+08:00

I was back at home on Friday evening, Zara was very happy to see me, she has forgotten how upset she got. She hugged and kissed me, touched my face as though trying to 'feel' I'm real, smiled all the time and looked at me affectionately. For dinner she insisted, "Mummy sit with you (me)". And kept following me every where. At night, she told Daddy, "Don't want Daddy sleep with you (me), want mummy sleep with you (me)." And she wanted me to hug her to sleep. Everything was just like before, she didn't need any 'warm up' time. Here are some photos taken during my trip.

My first meal; after I arrived and checked in to the hotel, it was already 3pm, so I just walked to a near by coffee shop (茶餐厅) and ordered carrot cake (生煎箩卜糕) for a quick bite. I had a table all to myself, but if I lifted my elbow any higher, I would have touched my neigbour's elbow. The tables were laid just so close to each other. Around the hotel. I was staying in Causeway Bay 铜锣弯, a very busy shopping district. Shops were opened till 10:30pm - 11pm. My first taste of the roast goose rice 烧鹅髀饭. It was in a small little neighbourhood restaurant 强记, but it was pretty delicious. Some safety propaganda in the MTR station. View from the meeting room in the office. Dim sum lunch with colleagues. Dried sea produce shops 海味铺 at Sheung Wan 上环 (an area popular to get dried sea produce). I bought quite a fair bit from this shop. The famous Yung Kee Restaurant 鏞記酒家, which supposed to serve the best roast goose in Hong Kong Island. The display of Yung Kee facing the main entrance.

Stupid Mummy

2006-06-27T10:56:00.000+08:00

Zara is angry I left her. When I called her on Sunday, she chatted to me, 'promised' to be a good and brave girl. Say Hi and bye nicely. When I called her on Monday, she came to the phone, said, "Zara play ball", then quickly said bye and left. When I called her this morning, she didn't want to come to the phone, I could hear her shouting, "Don't want mummy." "Don't like mummy." "Stupid mummy XXXXX" (XXXXX being my name) Tuyam told me the whole of yesterday, she has been mumbling to herself, "Stupid Mummy XXXXXX." Stupid is a word she picked up but I have taught her not to use, she never uses it when I'm around. She must be very angry with me for leaving her, using the word against me. *big sigh* ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ On shopping and eating, I don't find it so great here. I wanted to get shoes and clothes for Zara, but I have been shopping and couldn't find much. Food has also just been so so (even with local colleagues' recommendation), the only nice food eaten so far is the roast goose... Aaaa, I would like to sink my teeth into another piece of the goose.

Waiting

2006-06-26T18:14:00.000+08:00

I'm away for work in Hong Kong. Little Zara is taken care by Tuyam with MIL's supervision. Zara waiting for mummy to come home.

Here's a conversation that took place before I left. Me : Zara mummy sit airplane go work work ok? Zara : Cannot. Mummy go work work, Zara cry. Me : Mummy will buy you nice baju (Malay : clothes), pretty shoes, and a big big present woh. Ok? Zara : Ok. Me : What present does Zara want mummy to get? Zara : Hmm.. (deep in thought), Ribena. Zara want mummy buy Ribena. Haha. Such an innocent request. Daddy told me Zara has been very good whole day yesterday. She only cried after she heard my voice when I called home before her bed time. But Daddy managed to calm her down by telling her if she cried, mummy will also cry when at work, then both Zara and mummy will be crying. She stopped after that, such a sensible child. I will keep blogging to minimal as I'll be kept busy in meetings and shopping after work.

19 Months Old

2006-06-23T02:45:00.000+08:00

Zara turned 19th month 2 days ago. I was so busy, I only have time to write down her development (just like the previous month) today. ~ Weight 9.2kg ~ Height : 81cm ~ No new teeth sprouting. Her 4 Cuspids (canines) are still not fully sprouted. Dexterity : Expert in climbing and getting down furniture, but sometimes still prefer to shout out "Mummy help" She's jumping more and higher nowadays. Language : She never seized to amaze us in her language development. Speaks very well for her age, and with quite accurate pronunciation. She's also talking non-stop now, we could always hear her chatter in the house. New popular words: Before & Because ~ Mummy give Zara grapes before ~ Zara sit on horsey before ~ Zara don't want, because Zara don't like. ~ Zara cry, because Zara angry Very good with forming sentences now, and always picking up new words without us consciously teaching her. She can count 1 to 6, not just saying the numbers, but actually counting items. Knows how to differentiate a few colours, purple, green, black, orange, still mixed up with the rest of the colours. Able to recite longer part of some nursery rhymes (Humpty Dumpty, Jack and Jill, etc), and also started singing part of some songs in tune (Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Polly Put The Kettle On etc). She knows a baby frog is called tadpole, and a baby butterfly is called caterpillar. Started differentiating left and right. Knows her left hand from right, and left leg from right etc(mainly her body parts which comes in pair). Feeding and Food: 3 meals and 3 milk feeds a day. Not very adventurous in trying out new food, but will still try with lots of persuasion and the permission given to her to spit out if she didn't like it. Takes most vege except those extremely fibrous and bitter. Emotions : I have to say she's very loving, she gives lots of hugs, and kisses; although still not quite know how to share yet. Although clingy (to me), and sometimes very mischievous to the extend of being naughty, she's overall quite an easy girl. She listens to instructions and reasons (at least to the ones given by me); knows what she can and can't do; knows what is rude and shouldn't do (like pushing people or things away); knows her manners, i.e. greet people (by saying Hi or waving her hand) and say good bye; knows when to use please, thank you, excuse me (when she sneeze). I just love her to bits!

Free Rides

2006-06-21T09:19:00.000+08:00

We just found out on Sunday that there are free kiddie rides in Giant Shah Alam. There are 3 units at the kids' play area, and another 3 near the check out counters. I like the ones at the check out counters. Giant cashiers are not known for their efficiency. From queing to having your items scanned to paying, you probably have to wait for at least 15mins. What a good idea to have some free kiddie rides for the kids while the parents do the paying (and waiting). The rides are old and they play Indonesian pop songs instead of nursery rhymes, but who cares, it's free! We got Zara on a few of them, waiting quite a while for our turn because some kids just refused to get down from the rides, and went on and on.

She probably likes the duck ride the most, because it was the first ride she has. The lion was found at the check out counter. She likes Lion, so she seemed to like this too. Hmm.. Now, she's a bit bored.. Too many free rides already.

Note: These photos are taken from Daddy's mobile, hence the grainy quality.

Hurricane Zara

2006-06-19T18:18:00.000+08:00

Having Zara around is fun, but it also means the house can never be tidy, every where she 'sweeps' through, either a small mess or a big mess is created. Daddy and I sometimes call her Hurricane Zara. The worst hit area is the living room, where she has her 3 boxes of toys, a small shelf of books, her box of CD/VCD/DVDs, her box of colouring and drawing stationary. Depending on her fancy, she helps herself with whatever she wants to do for the moment. It may mean pouring out a bottle of glass pebbles; Then going to her shelf of books, digs for the one she wants, in the mean time scattering the rest on the floor. And then she decides she wants to draw, so she reaches for her box of drawing tools and papers, takes them all out, draws a few lines on the paper A moment later, she goes back to her box of toys, takes out her cooking set, and starts to do cooking. A big messy trail is left behind, all within 30mins. When we bring her up to the room, the same process happens, but b'cos she has less toys up stairs, all she gets to mess up is her stack of books. How can I do without a maid? With Hurricane Zara sweeping through the house so often?

Zara at Play

2006-06-16T18:20:00.000+08:00

She likes the flower making set that Samantha has given her, and she could play with it for a long time, making 'umbrellas' and 'vege', as she calls it. I was working from home, and when I went down for a drink, here was what she's made. And here is another way she spends her days at home, playing with her balls. She says she's playing badminton, using her toy masak-masak (Malay: cooking set) spatula as the racquet. She's muttering "Oh-Dear Oh-Dear" when her ball got kicked away from her sight, and she's saying "What to do? What to do?".

It's really fun to see her play, as she talks and laughs and sings to herself a lot. That's the thing about working from home, if I hear some gigling downstairs, I can always go check out to see what she was up to.

Zara's Talk II

2006-06-15T18:20:00.000+08:00

Last night during bed time, I got her to agree to stay in bed while I went to shut down my pc in the study. When I got back, 5mins later, she told me, "Zara no cry!". I have to give her some hugs and praises, and told her how brave she was (the lights were all turned off except the night light, I think that was very brave of her to stay in a semi dark room all by herself). I pushed my luck further and asked her if I could go downstairs to have a cup of milk. She said, "Mummy go drink milk milk. Zara lie down." So I went down, had a glass of milk, rinse her bottle, went back to the room, and there she was on the bed with a big grin, "Zara so bave (brave), mummy go down drink milk milk, Zara no cry." I carried her and shouted "Hooray" gave her more praises, just to make her kembang (Malay: feel good about herself). I was making her early morning bottle of milk in the room, and she started walking on the edge of the bed coming towards me (our bed has a thick wooden frame which she likes to walk on). I warned her, "Don't walk at the edge, after fall down huh." She ignored and still continued to move towards me, and true enough, she slipped and got her foot stuck between the bed frame and the wall. She looked at me rolling my eyes, and she said, "Very good!" scolding herself (I wonder who used that on her before). She was leafing through our wedding photos, and then she pointed to Daddy and said, "Daddy so cute!" Then I asked her, "What about mummy?" She looked again and said, "Mummy handsome!" *slap head*

Zara's Talk

2006-06-14T13:46:00.000+08:00

On Sunday, I prepared her for bed, and told her she'll be going to King's Wife's place on Monday. Me : Zara likes our house more or Ah Kim's house more? Zara : Ah Kim's house. Me : Why? Zara : Ah Kim's house got Mr Bean (we don't subscribe to Astro and hence no Mr Bean cartoon at home). ... Later in our conversation. Me : Tomorrow Zara bring dinasaur sweet (just bought her some gummies in the shape of dinasaur) to Ah Kim's house, must share with jiejie yeah? Zara : Give Sam jiejie dinasaur sweet. Give jiejie Alicia dinasaur sweet. Me : Yes. Clever. Must share share ok. Zara : Ok. Me : Can share with Navisha jiejie (King's Wife's neighbour who likes to hang around with her girls) or not? Zara : *tears started flowing down so suddenly* Don't want. Don't want give Navisha jiejie. Zara don't want. Aiks.. it was time to pacify her and end of conversation. We had string beans sprouts (Kuai Dao Miu) for dinner yesterday, while Zara had her own dish. After dinner, my niece Samantha took a bowl of string beans and started eating in the living room. Zara saw what Sam was eating, so she asked for some, "Sam jiejie, give Zara beans please" I took some from Sam and started feeding Zara, "Zara likes the beans?" Zara said, "Like!" Then she added, "Jack bean stalk!" and laughed at her own joke. (Tuyam told me this happened just now) Zara was messing around her box of VCDs/DVDs, trying to take out some of the title sleeves. Tuyam : You don't do that. After mummy scold you. Zara ignored Tuyam, so Tuyam repeated herself. Zara stopped what she was doing and stared at Tuyam, "Zara angry!" (She's very good in bullying the maid, but with me, she will never use such tone and said such things.) I was trying to test the water to check if Zara was ready for my upcoming business trip. Me : Zara, can mummy sit airplane and go work work? (That's what we say when Daddy is away for his business trip). Zara : Cannot. Daddy go only. Me : Why cannot? Zara : Mummy stay you. Me : *don't understand* Huh? Mummy don't understand Zara. Can mummy sit airplane and go work work or not? Zara : Cannot. Mummy stay you. Me : *still don't understand* Why cannot, Zara sleep with kakak, ok or not. Zara : Cannot. Mummy stay Zara. (oh.. I finally got it. She meant "Mummy stay with me" when she said "Mummy stay you".)

Thumb vs Pacifier

2006-06-13T09:12:00.000+08:00

Zara is a thumb sucker since birth. We did try to give her the pacifier in the very beginning but she used to spit it out, and stuff her hand into the mouth instead (before she found her thumb). She has a permanant bump on the thumb and sometimes when she sucks too hard, a little cut is found. Last week, I found her thumb was even bleeding a bit from all the sucking, so I took out the pacifier and tried to offer it to her. She did suck on it, like trying out a toy. Here is a video captured with her using pacifier. She had her hand placed below her chin all the time, afraid of the pacifier falling, a sure sign that she's not a pacifier user.

5 minutes later.. it was back to the thumb (photo below taken on a different day).

Ranting

2006-06-08T22:17:00.000+08:00

Every thing looks nice but tastes yucky. ~ That's how my appetite is nowadays. I'm always hungry, and always want to munch on something. However, everything that I put into my mouth, tastes awful, it gets worse later part of the day. Morning sickness? Mine is evening sickness. Nice things smell awful. ~ I bought the Anaku body shampoo for Zara to use because I loved the baby scent. Now, I can't stand it. If I had to bath Zara, I'll change it to soap. If Tuyam used this to bath Zara, I can't even stand the smell of it on Zara. Work work and work ~ My boss changed me to another project team. It means more work, more morning and night conferences with the US folks, and the start of traveling. I'd turned down a trip to Houston and a chance to meet Simple American (excuse, "medical reasons"), but I believe there'll be some traveling within Asia which is quite difficult to refuse. I'm tired ~ My work day sometimes start at 7:30am (meeting), and I continue working till about 7pm. On the same day, sometimes I get a 9pm or a later call. ~ Zara would be crying when I have to leave her at 9pm. I have to pacify her and then pass the crying child to Tuyam (Daddy is pretty hopeless when Zara starts crying) ~ Zara will stay up until I lay next to her. Normally I'm too tired and just doze off with her. ~ At 6am, she'll be waking me up to make her "bottle milk", like a zombie, I do just that, see that she finishes her milk, and try to get both of us back to sleep, even though it's just for another 1hr or 1.5hr. Yesterday ~ She cried when I have to attend my call at 9pm. Nobody was able to pacify her, she was wailing, "mummy, mummy". So I had to carry her in the study, hooked on my headset, listened to the conversation at the other end of the line (and hoped they won't call my name), and pacified the crying girl. ~ When she stopped crying, she started yakking away, about this wooden man figurine that I have in the study, here is part of what she said (She was repeating the same thing over and over for 30mins about the 'boy' being broken, because she bang it on the floor). I was really worried about her, chanting away like that. (If you can't see the player, the wav file can be found here)

Speech Development

2006-06-07T18:15:00.000+08:00

Zara's speech development is just so amazing. There are things we didn't consciously teach her, but she just picks up along the way. She also pronounces most words very accurately, just like an adult. At times, she surprised us with how her little mind words, stringing those words together. Here are some of what she's able to say. In the mornings, when Zara wakes up and hears the sound of shower in the bathroom, she'll point to the bathroom. "Daddy taking shower in the toilet." Points to me, "Mummy lye down on the bed". Points to herself, "Zara sit down on Zara's bed (her cot)." Daddy wanted to shower Zara, and told her, "Come Zara, Daddy bath you." Zara exclaimed, "Oh Ma (my) God!" then, she continued to say, "Don't want Daddy do. Want mummy do." and she ran towards me. (don't know if she knows what Oh My God means, but she uses it so appropriately) I took a tub of yogurt to the car thinking of having it in the office. In the car, Zara spotted it and said, "Yogurt! Yogurt!" wanting some. Tuyam took her Petite Miam (yogurt for kids) out, and asked her, "You want mummy's one or this one?" Zara said, "Zara wants this one (pointed to her Petite Miam). Mummy's one not so nice. Zara's one nicer." (I was surprised she knows how to use the word 'nicer'.) We were in the car and Zara suddenly just said, "So hot outside. Wind blowing blowing. So nice." (She saw some branches swaying in the wind under the hot sun.) I was surprised at her remark, but I responded, "yeah, nice right, the wind blowing?" Zara continued to say, "Nice. Wind blowing Zara's face. Wind blowing Zara's hair. In kakak's room." She was referring to the fan in Tuyam's room. She recently is also able to differentiate: market for wet market (where we "buy fish, buy vege, buy manana/banana, buy papaya"); supermarket for grocery shopping (where we "buy vitagen, buy cheese, buy bread, buy pear"); and restaurant (where we "eat dinner"). She pronounces market, supermarket and restaurant perfectly. Here are few of her common vocabulary blips. She sometimes call a porcupine pineapple, a guinea pig guinea pork, sun as sunflower (she knows what a sunflower is before she knows what sun is). And of course she can't differentiate Me and You, she's always asking people to "Carry you" when she meant "Carry me".

Encounter with a handsome boy

2006-06-06T16:44:00.000+08:00

Here is another shocker. Last Saturday, we went to Bangsar Village to do our grocery shopping (good for gourmet Cheese, and good European styled bread). While I was claiming for parking at the information centre, Zara suddenly let go my hand, and ran towards a boy shouting, "Handsome boy!". She stopped right in front of a startled little boy aged about 7yrs old, who was quite good looking. She grinned broadly, touched the boy's face, waved her hand and said, "Hi! Handsome korkor." The boy looked surprised, but politely waved back at her and walked on. Zara continued staring at his back profile. When he reached the exit and turned back to look at Zara, Zara waved back, "Bye! Handsome kor kor." And started giggling, like a love struck teenager. Daddy and I just looked at each other utterly shocked at her behaviour! Mind you, my little girl is only 18mths old.

Weekend knick knacks

2006-06-05T23:10:00.000+08:00

We brought Zara to the football field in our residential area on Sunday morning. Nobody was playing foot ball, so we got the whole field to ourselves. It was wonderful, Zara was so happy to be running in such a big flat grass field.

She was happy chasing after her ball, throwing or kicking the ball. Daddy kicked the ball into the goal post and Zara shouted hooray (trust her be the goal keeper huh?) Happy, Sweaty Zara.

For lunch, I made Pumpkin soup using the recipe from River Cafe Cook Book. However, because I didn't have any chicken stock, I used the Maggie chicken granules (the one without MSG); gosh, it was so yucky (maybe because it's change of taste bud for me as well), all I could taste is the chicken stock taste, blech. Daddy walloped his bowl without complaint though. The avocado, zucchini and turkey breast sandwich was oh, so good.

As for Zara, she has been crazy about cheese. On both Sat and Sun, all she wanted for breakfast and lunch was, "bread and cheese". Offered her anything and she turned her face and said, "Don't want". So it was bread and cheese for her.

On Sat morning, she even woke up and I think she was trying to tell me what she dreamt about (but of course she's too young to know what a dream is). She told me first thing in the morning when she opened her eyes, "Got big big cheese." before she smiled and stretched.

Anybody knows any good but not too salty cheese to go with bread or cracker for the little one? I'd been giving her Kraft, Baby Bell and the smiling cow cheese spread. We give her some of our gourmet chedder as well, but it's too salty and I always feel guilty after giving her some.

Pregnancy Update, Weaning, Zara Jiejie

2006-06-02T09:00:00.000+08:00

Hui Sia asked why I don't mention much about the pregnancy in my blog. Actually I wanted to wait after the 1st trimester before I include updates of the pregnancy since things can still be very uncertain. We went to see the Dr 2 weeks ago for my first check up. By right at 7 weeks, the baby's heartbeat should be visible. However, the Dr couldn't find one. He told us to return in 2 weeks time. You can imagine how worried we were. Yesterday we went again. This time, the heartbeat was visible (at least to the Dr). From the size of the baby (slightly more than 1cm), Dr thinks that I'm only 7weeks + pregnant. Still very early in the pregnancy. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Weaning Zara wasn't difficult. After I knew I was pregnant, I increased another feed of formula to Zara. I still let her nurse 1st thing in the morning and before she went to bed. I think my milk supply reduced a lot, because she still asked for a bottle after nursing. A week later, the nursing time also reduce, sometimes she just politely pulled down my t-shirt when I offered her the breast and said, "Close. Want bottle milk.". At this stage, I found that the taste of the milk has changed as well, from something sweetish it has become a bit sour, probably due to the pregnancy hormones, nature's way of weaning a child. By the time she turned 18mths (3 weeks later), she totally stopped wanting the breast. Happy to just have the "bottle breast", as she calls it. I was expecting engorgement, and some discomfort, but maybe because the weaning process was spaced out, I do not have any of this. The amazing thing is, the breasts immediately shrunk 2 cups smaller! Just like that. (If only the tummy can shrink in this manner.) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I've started telling Zara about the baby as well. She likes to bounce on my tummy, and I'd told her she can't do that anymore because there's a baby in my stomach, and the baby will feel the pain if she jumped on me. She seems to understand it. Now, if she forgot and started bouncing on me, I'll tell her, "Zara cannot jump on mummy". She would quickly stop, kiss my stomach and say, "Got baby inside".

Photos - Play

2006-05-31T22:34:00.000+08:00

Zara wanted to play with some paint on a rainy day, she started making a mess. So I stripped her and let her paint herself silly in her tub.

When I was not looking, she found my really really old tampons, unwrapped the plastic wrapper, and started playing with it.

We were at my sister's place on Sunday, and she had a good time playing with her cousins. Here is here trying to strum the guitar. She's trying to do a yoga bridge, after seeing King's Wife's daughter Samantha did it. And here is her extremely tired, waiting for daddy's car at the lobby of my sis' apartment

Life's Little Pleasure

2006-05-30T09:09:00.000+08:00

Cocka Doodle wants to know what gives me pleasure, but he should know, it's everything to do with Zara, but I'll try to add in others too which is not related to her. 1) Smelling Zara's skin and hair after her bath or early in the morning 2) Having her wrapped her hands around me, giving me a hug 3) When she plant those lips on mine without being asked 4) Zara laying her head on my shoulder when I lift her up 5) Her funny ways of using words 6) Seeing the naked little bum of Zara's 7) The way she looks up on me to do things she can't do yet (like putting on the CD for her, helping her to climb up a chair, or reciting the nursery rhyme). "Mummy help" or "Mummy do" 8) Daddy shuffling my hair (a sign of his affections) 9) Biting on that piece of juicy duck with crispy skin.. Aaaaa 10) Seeing the 2 love of my life enjoying the food I'd cooked for them I won't tag anybody but it's an easy tag to do, if you are interested, please go ahead and do it.

Funny Little Girl II

2006-05-29T13:30:00.000+08:00

In the morning, Zara wakes up and demands for her milk. Instead of saying "milk milk" liked she used to say before snuggling close by to nurse, she says, "wants bottle breast" (thanks to breast feeding, she thinks all milk come from breast, even if it's the bottle). In the night, after she'd brushed her teeth, and come out of the toilet. Zara : "Zara's teeth so nice." Then she adds on : "Uh-Ker (uncle) XXX Seng's teeth not nice." Remembering Sengkor's chocolate coated teeth at May's birthday. She likes this new VCD Wow! That's What I called Nursery Rhyme very much. I don't quite like it because the nursery rhymes are sung too quickly, and the moving graphics too chaotic. She took the VCD to me the other day, tapping on it, she said "Mummy put this one". I told her, "Mummy don't like this one. Too noisy, make mummy headache" She replied, joining her thumb and index finger together, "Soft soft ma". Ha.. she thought I was complaining about the volume, so she suggested I turn down the volume. While out with my eldest sis and her baby Tasha, we teased Zara. Sis : Mummy tonight sleep with Tasha baby, you sleep with Yi-yi ok? Zara : Mummy sleep with Daddy only. (obviously, I can't sleep with anybody)

Leaving Zara alone

2006-05-26T17:10:00.000+08:00

About 2 months back, Zara started showing some sign of independence. She wakes up in the morning, and if we still wanted to sleep, she would play on her own (although sometimes she stepped on sleeping bodies to get down of the bed, or to reach the other side of the bed to grab things that interest her). I could leave her in the room and take a shower as long as I have her 'approval'. Me : Mummy take shower Zara play on your own ok? If the answer is : OK. It means she'll be fine, the most she would do is come to the bath room and peek into the shower screen. If the answer is : Don't want or Cannot. Then it means she would cry if I really step into the shower. She would normally busy herself with her books, or just play with the bed side table (she pretends that's her piano). Zara understands instruction very well, and we can tell her "Don't carry this because it's heavy and it may fall on your feet (big books or small furniture)" "Don't climb on to the chair if nobody is around or you may fall" "Don't put small things in the mouth because you'll get choked" "Don't put the lotion/cream in your mouth because it'll make your stomach pain pain" and she would not ignore them. We still of course try to make the environment as safe for her as it can be, but it's good to know that even if she found a coin or a button on the floor, she wouldn't put it in her mouth; and she wouldn't climb up the book shelves or try to move the teak chair around when we're not watching. I caught a glimpse of what she was doing through sleepy eyes the other day. She was just playing in her own cot and talking to herself. When I saw how at ease she was playing on her own, I couldn't help but to climb off the bed and took a few photos of the moment. It's also a good feeling to know that if we need to leave her alone for a moment, she wouldn't do silly things to endanger herself.