Older and wiser??

And so it has been crossed, the milestone that is 35 years old. Everything seemed ages ago.. school, first dates, homework... And in its place- school, first dates, homework through the eyes of my 6 year old as she sets out on her virgin journey into official school-dom.

I am blessed to be surrounded by friends I adore, and family who love me back. Sapna even gave me a bday surprise, so sweet of her! This, even as I have to forego our planned Perth trip in exchange for a new baby boy.

Perhaps the one upside of getting older and losing everything to gravity is acquiring some money to call my own, and the ability to splurge on expensive things. Happy Birthday Me! :)

Mamma Mia

4 Mamas at Pappamia (ironic!)- 2 tai tais, a temp SAHM and a very hardworking Singaporean.

$124 worth of food.

5 rounds of gift exchanges.

3 hours worth of catchup session.

'Nuff said.

Water Dragon

I do wonder sometimes, even as Aidan is #3, if I'm doing it all wrong.

I am a selfish Mother, I do admit- I tend to put my needs first in spite of all professional advise especially my need to cuddle and be at arm's lengths from the kids, close enough to just crane my neck for an itty bitty kiss or sniff so I take them to bed with me. And in bed with me they stay until they are 7.. Arissa has only started sleeping in her own room without Mummy and I've had to bribe her with star points towards a Littlest Pet Shop mansion. But if Mummy can't be around at bedtime, then Daddy will do too so the state of our marriage is as a cousin wisely observed "aren't kids supposed to bring a marriage together, in your case its keeping you apart". I sleep with Aidan in our King while Hafidz is squashed by 2 girls in their Queen bed.

The 'mistake' I made with Sofia was I had nursed her exclusively for 4 months and when it was time to head back to the office and give her the bottle, she refused point blank. She chose starvation over a rubber teat. It was such a stressful time for me, rushing home from work to feed her 2 full boobs because she refused formula AND expressed BM in a bottle and had not been nursing since 9am that morning. My cabinet is still full of bottles in various shapes and sizes- NUK, Avent, Tommy Tippee, Pigeon.. we tried every brand in the market and she spat it all out in disgust. So with Aidan, I started him on mix formulation from Day 1. Sure I felt guilty as hell, it felt wrong not to nurse him as I had nursed the other 2 but there's just an insatiable hunger to being a boy. He went from 2.79kg at birth to a sumo wrestler at 2 months, and my BM just couldn't keep up.

 Aidan and his newborn cousin, Arish

The other problem is the amount of wailing he subjects us to. This boy sure has a set of lungs on him- we used to be afraid he would go into fits wailing like that, face swollen and body rigid, but Hafidz and I have learned that he's just a loud and demanding personality. I guess it comes with being a Dragon baby? One night after a bout of endless wailing, I turned to my agitated husband and said "y'know God is great, he gave us a fussy baby on our 3rd try.. can you imagine if Aidan is #1?" and Hafidz solemnly nods in agreement then shoots back "kata water Dragon year, but this boy ni Dragon gembeng!"

(';')

Under House Arrest

G-whizz has it been 2 months since my last posting.. and 2 months of bliss it had been. No laptop, no emails, all I do is BF day and night. Ha.

The confinement period is spent at Mum's, thanks to her kind soul for welcoming me back into her home and feeding and caring for me like the only daughter that I am. I believe I was spoilt in that 2 months, even though I was sans hubby during the period from the lack of space in my old room, but I had 2 spare pair of hands to pass Aidan to whenever I needed to shower, eat, nap or watch dvds.

The Helper arrived on 12 November and was a big help in some ways although she was young and needed a lot of hands on training. I mean, seriously, after paying 5k I get a totally untrained maid??! The saving grace is that she is keen to learn and doesn't get offended when we get upset with her. The lucky thing is I have another 2 months of home leave before going back to work so she has to be independant by then.

The 7 day massage was heavenly.. and I got a few tips about my body. One of which is that I am still tres fertile and judging by the seat of my womb, the next one (if if if), would be a little girl. Gaaaahhh!!! Where is the gynae's number, I gotta book myself an IUD.

::Aidan at 5 days::

Pictorial

 The ones who love me unconditionally

 Baby of the family for a little bit more

 My VVIP visitors

 1st visitor for Baby M

 Going home!

 Snooze time after morning bath

 The very loving Big Sis

Getting his baby massage

A Prayer Answered

Its been 12 days since D day. Let me recount the steps, lest I forget and try to get pregnant again.. *wink*

We went back to Dr Ang on 17 October, feeling a little bit apprehensive, I had a bit more energy than usual and felt like I could hold bub in at least til the Friday that he had scheduled me for delivery. I was still 37+ weeks making bub 'borderline preterm' but my belly looked like a torpedo ready to strike.

Au contraire, that's not my right boob as some did think.

After a painful internal examination (note to self: very very painful) he appeared a bit distraught asking Hafidz if he could get me to the hospital in 30minutes as my waterbag had been leaking apparently and I was 4cm dilated. I'm not sure how my waterbag leaked, i was clean and dry the whole time. He even offered to drive us to Thomson Medical!! Thank goodness the hospital bag had been sitting in the car slowly gathering dust from 2 weeks ago. Hafidz and I rushed there amid peak hour traffic with me gobbling down tao suan on the way for energy as the heavy steak lunch still had me quite full.

We got to Thomson Medical at 530pm, I waddled straight into the Delivery Suite where a nice Indian nurse attended to my every whim and went through all the motions with me.

Literally.

Purging, then shaving, then putting on the foetal monitor, making sure I had my water bottle in case I got thirsty and my socks in case I got cold feet (pun intended). Hafidz came in slightly later after having admitted me and by then only 30mins had passed but the contractions had started by then. I told Hafidz that it would be over by maghrib hopefully and went on to focus on my doa, an invocation by Prophet Yunus/Jonah (peace be upon him) when he was swallowed by a whale and seeked God's protection- La Illa ha Illa anta subhanaka inni kuntum minadz dzalimin..

None has the right to be worshipped save You

Glory be to You, far removed are You from any imperfection

I have been amongst the wrong-doers

6pm- sending a mass watsapp message to the cousins

7pm- in the Delivery Suite with pethidine to elevate the pain

At 7:49pm- after 15minutes to being held back in the birth canal by the attending nurse (note to self: painful beyond imagining!!!) where I ended up screaming, something I had never done in the previous deliveries, while waiting for my gynae to arrive; 4 hard pushes later; a forcep delivery only to find out the umbilical cord had wrapped itself around his neck and a dead knot elsewhere- the imminent arrival of our Little Prince, Mika Aidan Abdul Hafidz (meaning: cool, sweet, intelligent, helpful). He looked like a squashed pumpkin with abrasions- battle scars of a newborn.

And here it is... the dead knot in the umbilical cord that went undetected and could've caused so much problems. How lucky we were as my Mum would say, "berkat doa dan solat".

I could not sleep that night thinking of all the endless possibilities (all negative). How relieved to get confirmation from the paediatrician the next morning that he passed everything with flying colours and that everything is normal as pie.


So we're back at Mum's for my recovery, at least until my Helper gets here in November. Now here is the last reminder to self: just when you think the worst is over, the 2-week recovery period is just as painful to deal with. Hah, that is motivation enough to send me back to the gynae for my IUD next.

The Waiting Game. Again.

In the words of the great Sebastian Vettel who incidentally won the recent Singapore F1 race:

I put everything in that last lap, 

it was very emotional when I crossed the line. 

It was all I had, I gave it all.

The last lap is always the hardest, for so many reasons- because you're out of motivation, because you're physically exhausted, because you're fighting with elements beyond your control. It takes a huge effort to stay focused, stay sane and stay calm.

In many ways, its the same with every pregnancy. Its the last month that wears you out and wears you down. When people around you seem to think you're capable of handling the same things you're handling because well.. you've always been able to do it; when you get easily frustrated by how immobile, sleep-deprived and physically beaten you feel most days; when the body doesn't easily respond to what you will it to do- much like an F1 car with bald tyres, it takes a lot of effort to stay on course.

So my last lap goes on- I was happy for it to end today with the 37th week routine checkup- but Dr Ang says we need to wait until next Friday to pop even though bub's a healthy 2.9kg today (compared to his sisters who were both 2.7kg at birth). Just to make sure the baby lungs are matured enough to not cause any problems. I got a Decordex jab to speed up the maturing process of his lungs within the next 24hours just in case he decides to make an appearance before next Friday. Its a $20 jab that could save us $2k in incubation fee.

And so we wait. Again.

The Inner Critic

It was a fun client project shooting around Singapore but the London-based Producer couldn't get enough Malay speaking voxpops so we got thrown in as well- ha!

That's about my 2 seconds of fame!

xx

Bye Bye BB

Ab-Ab-Absolutely luvin my new iphone 5 which synchronises effortlessly with work machines MacBook Pro and Ipad. Too bad the hubby decided to switch camps from IOS to Android but he is full of praises for his Samsung SIII too so what the heck..

Instagram is an awesome cosmetic surgeon minus the knife. Like we say it in the media world "its all in the lighting". Pardon me, I've just crawled out from the BB cave- no love lost there.

Enjoying our new 4th C- 'country club' membership.

Taking stork

Its all a bit strange in hindsight. I remember getting the diagnosis from my KK gynae prior to our wedding.

"You have polycystic ovarian syndrome which means getting pregnant can be a challenge"

My world crumbled around me. Infertile??! How do I tell the soon-to-be husband..

Hafidz already knew something was not right with my irregular cycles and when I finally told him what it *could* mean, he was surprisingly calm. He pointed out that we could always adopt. Aah, the beauty of pre-marital love- they always are willing to forgive your shortcomings.

But somehow, we got pregnant 6 months after the wedding. I breezed through the pregnancy and the labour and out came a healthy little girl. Followed by a 2nd little girl. And I told the world "that's it. My production line's closed". But in time, God showed me little signs here and there, that having a little boy is important too.

And so we got pregnant again.

And family/friends all around me were surprised, knowing I wished to stop at 2. Even my own parents were caught off-guard, I was most worried telling them the news, don't ask me why.

And God fulfilled our ardent prayers to please bless us with a boy this time. Not because I like boys over girls, not because a boy is more important than a girl but just so I can really shut down the 'factory' without feeling an ounce of guilt.

I just never thought I'd get here. The only advise I have for all PCO sufferers is a medical professional is never 100% accurate. If God wills it, it will happen so continue hoping and praying.

And shagging.

:)

Larger than Life

Its that time during a pregnancy when you just can't wait to pop and be done with the 3rd trimester niggles- the heartburn, the lowered appetite, the swollen feet, the reduced mobility, the breathlessness, the heaviness... the list goes on.

Here I am: 35weeks and 3 days into this pregnancy. I have to hold it in for at least another 5 days just to be safe, says the gynae, and then I am basically safe to deliver at any point. The jabs and kicks are much stronger and more pronounced, the braxton hicks contractions are occasionally painful and he's definitely down the passage, any stretches and I feel like I'm going to pee in my pants!!

Sadly, the helper hasn't arrived, not at least until end November, so the plan is we all pack up and move to my Mum's house until she gets here. Its going to be challenge spatially, because there will soon be 5 of us but I've no other choice, really...

I've started working from home too in the meantime, thank God for flexible bosses.

So these are the last few Open Houses I attended during the Eid month, thank you everyone for feeding me endlessly. The gynae has now advised that I go on a 'diet' as he is 'bigger than average'- what irony!

Can't wait for him to join this clan of happy munsters!

xoxo

When your in-laws have 10 siblings each and your parents have 7 from each side, Eid is a frantic affair. Its the 2nd week of Eid with no end in sight- it will get even busier before I get a chance to kick back and let the kids open up their green packets (at the moment neatly piled together labelled 'Hana' and 'Sara', because I'm anal like that).

Being pregnant has its pros and cons over Eid. There's food glorious food at every house, I'm sure I just got lots heavier over this past week alone. Everyone would smile encouragingly when I stuff my face at every house. They would nod in understanding as I sit like a permanent fixture at the buffet table and go for 2nd and 3rd servings- family.. gotta love them.

But with all that houses to cover (12 houses this weekend alone!!), my feet has shown signs of swelling. Housework is virtually nonexistent and I have had to learn to co-exist with dust balls at every corner of my house. Note to self: start looking at biodatas for Helpers by end month.

What I love most about Eid is the catching up with the old folks- we only see them once a year after all. Arissa is always interested to know which side this old, wrinkly folk came from- Nani? Nenek? Atok? late Atok? And I in turn get a refresher course about the varying branches and sub-branches within our combined massive family tree, and its origins- Guangdong, Palembang, Banjar Masin, Melaka- they all started as FTs you know... :p

Its a journey back to one's roots and my MIL is always happy to tell and re-tell the glorious tales of their life journey.

I'm just happy to capture the special moments when these munchkins act cheeky. They fight like cats and dogs, biting involved, but when there's love they can be oh-so-adorable.

Congratulations to my brother, Shahril for successfully persuading a beautiful woman to marry him.

And Emilie Joson, we embrace you as a new SIL and a new Muslim.

Amin Ya Rabbal Al-Amin.

Hola again!

Four months of writer's block (although I'm not exactly calling myself a writer here), but that's a long time to be away from blogging. I just got a little bit more involved with short-form writing- called Facebook- and started to get chills at the thought of writing longer pieces.

So anyway, where did I leave off? The P1 registration drama, but of course. Anyhow, I went with my initial gut instinct and now it is decided my firstborn will go to a neighbourhood school called Greenwood Primary School where P6 pass grade is "above average" and there is Mendaki tuition in school on weekends. Its a bit more comforting to put her in an environment I'm familiar with, to be honest. And the moment I walked into the school on registration day, I'm greeted by an assuring banner that says "You have made the right choice. Thank you for entrusting your child with us at Greenwood Primary School".. if there ever was a sign from God to allay my fears, then that would be it. If not from God, then at least the School Principal, whatever.. my doubts are laid to rest for the moment.

Next.

Moving the family logistics to Woodlands once again. I've put in the internal transfer form for Sofia to be moved to a My First Skool near home. We will next engage a Helper, hopefully someone just as good and low maintenance as my last one. I put a call to my previous agent and was left feeling totally ripped off. Higher agency fee, higher salary, less work days (if contract starts 2013) but absolutely NO GUARANTEE of a more efficient or more proactive Helper because, hey, that depends on my luck. What ghetto justice is this?! Last I checked, my luck is free.

So anyway because we need one desperately.. we will start looking at biodatas after Eid. Something I'm not very excited about.

In the meantime, I'm 'happily' putting the two girls through bottle weaning and teeth (not tooth!) extraction (Arissa) as well as toilet training (Sofia). I shamelessly dangled a $2 bribe per tooth that Arissa pulls out on her own and she has given me 2 teeth so far, saving up money to buy herself more 'Little Pet Shop' toys. As long as the craze is there, I will continue to milk it! ;p

My brave little 'Toothless' 
 

Also in the works was getting their room ready, that's Daddy's gargantuan task and getting them  accustomed to sleeping in it, which is my endless job it seems! A month and a half later, I'm still sleeping on a mattress in their room, foregoing my resplendant new King bed- a true mark of a Mother's sacrifise might I add!

Before

 Not-Fully-After

And this last piece of news is the best..

I am now 7 month pregnant with a baby boy. :)

Alhamdulillah. Amin. Now can close shop without feeling guilty.

My 6-year plan

I've always wondered what the P1 registration fuss is all about.

To an untrained mind like mine, it could not be any simpler- just enrol the kid into the school nearest to home, like my parents did. The parents save transport money, the kids save sitting-in-bus-looking-out-window time in exchange for stoning-in-front-of-the-telly time and we're all set. Right?

WRONG.

Here I am 3 months away from the start of registration and my browser's most-visited site is the Ministry of Education website. Here's what I don't understand-

1) why are all the schools moving to single sessions?
2) why are all the oversubscribed school double session-ed?

I have a feeling its connected. I mean, seriously, who wants to deal with a 7 year old at an ungodly 6am. Mine won't even volunteer to shower at 8am, she says it will give her runny nose (and I agree). And heartland schools like Northland is oversubscribed by 200%, that's got to be a joke right..

My initial plan was exquisitely simple- we would enrol Arissa in a primary school where me and hubby are alumni. It is 3 minutes walk from Mum's house and has been around long enough (all my lifetime anyway) to be erm..fairly.. reputable. At least among the community living within the 1km radius of it. Hey, I'm not that ambitious and the last thing I want to do is stress my kid out just as she's heading down the long and winding path of lifelong learning. Two of her cousins are also there and they seem pretty well-rounded and what was that damn tagline they were feeding us... oh yeah "every school is a good school", I could.not.agree.more. Its all about the kid's attitude anyway, isn't it. Or so I thought.

Enter the illustrious Rosyth Primary school into the picture, about 7 mins walk from Mum's house and offering afternoon sessions- a very attractive package indeed for someone who lives 20mins from Mum's house and has been dreading the 6am wake-up call. Until 2013 that is, when they move back into their newly-renovated school compound in Serangoon North.

"Rosyth is a very good school tau Rin," says Mum and my MIL.

"Ya every school is a good school but primary school is the foundation aper! If you send them to a crap primary, they go to a crap secondary and then they get nowhere," comments a cousin.

All I'm picturing is Arissa turning out to be a cashier at NTUC Fairprice where the prices aren't all that fair and the remuneration benefits will see living in a cramped 74sqm house in Jurong Extension. Horrors!

I feel obliged as a good parent to start her out right. And stress is part of the Singaporean life so let's start her early so she gets used to it by the time she's 20. True?

So as my whole plan disassembles before my eyes, and my brains tries to come up with a brand new, spanking mad 6-year strategy involving temporarily changing my I/C address to Ang Mo Kio and buying a flat in Serangoon North by 2013.. I am taken aback by my kiasu-ness of this whole exercise. Its supposed to be that simple, why am I making it so damn hard on myself?

The husband used to laughed it off but he's slowly starting to get involved in my numerous mad-hatter plans- A, B, C through F. Lets see how it pans out in July. In the meantime, I could really use this holiday:

Pastries & Pastels

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xoxo

P is for Potty Training

I'm so proud to report that the baby of the family is settled well into her childcare routine and absolutely loving the experience (unlike Big Sis who still clings and tears every Monday/Tuesday morning, but that's another story). She has always had the independent streak and 9 solid hours without Mummy...? Pah, not buggered.

Every morning, she rabbit hops into the centre cheekily. She kisses me with gusto at the door then runs off to chuck her bag and bottle into the cubby hole and join her buddies in the music room.

Her vocabulary is also growing, mostly in English/Singlish at this stage although Arissa and I do converse to her in Malay: Daddy, where are we going? / This is yours / No!! That is my one.. are the most common phrases. The rest are a mish-mash of gibberish and actual sentences which no one fully understands.

She has also learned to put on her shoes all by herself. I was bursting with pride when she pushed me away and sat down to figure out her Lacoste mary janes with its complicated loops. I'm not sure how long I waited, must've been a good 4 minutes but she did a great job of putting the shoes on the right foot and pushing the velcro end through the loop and fastening it properly.

Her A to Zs are coherent, 1 to 10s are perfect, even 一 to 十 is making sense to me!





And among all these milestones, the one that made me throw up my hands and clap in sheer delight is when she daintily perches on my toilet seat and lets the flow come through. At first, she looked mildly stunned then grinned hesitantly at the new experience. Wheeeee! Toilet training in the works soon enough!
ps: if I have the ..energy.. to toilet-time her. otherwise, let's wait til she's 3 please..

Tribute to Whitney

Warning: the next post is narcissism in full swing (pun intended).

Everytime I go to Omar at Tresses Couture, I hyperventilate at the cost of a haircut.


I come back, whine and whinge on Facebook and always get amazing responses..


Whether its a 'Whitney' or a 'Halle', 26 'likes' is good enough reason for me to keep going back. Now, if only I wake up to a head of voluminous hair every day!!

Catching Up

I got lazy filling out the last day of HK where we visited Ocean Park. It wasn't as exciting to me, perhaps the weariness from a full day expedition to Disneyland hadn't worn off before we had to drag ourselves to another amusement park.

Even the dolphins at Ocean Park shared my sentiment and refused to perform that day. In the end, everyone decided we've had enough of amusement parks and instead headed off in search of other (gastronomical) pleasures.

These 2 places were our salvation, finally I got to delight in some Hong Kong food proper.

ISLAMIC CENTRE CANTEEN serving dim sum + Cantonese cuisine
40 Oi Kwan Road
Wan Chai

MA's RESTAURANT serving Northern Chinese cuisine
::address tba::

For once, even the kids seemed to truly enjoy their meal asking for doubles and triples. Maybe I should starve them more often at home, so they learn to appreciate food!

The one thing we created on our HK trip is a theme-parkaholic. Big Sis just couldn't get enough of it. Sapna convinced Arissa to join in on her company's Family Day at USS right after we unpacked from our holiday..




but no... not in Paris. *i wish*

For someone decidedly timid, whose most-used phrase is "...but I'm scared", she surprise me with her display of courage the moment we get past the park gates. I get sick easily so theme parks and me, we never get along but she convinced Mousey Mummy to get on the 3D Transformer Ride and some crazy roller coaster where I was yelling my lungs out. I should've just hung out with Anish while she takes Godma along with her, my mettle is not made for any vomit-inducing thrills.

When Godma is on a roll, she gets nutty on big adventurous outings- next she promised the kiddies a zoo trip. It was Arissa's fifth trip to the zoo, Sofia's second, Anish's third (seriously they average 1 zoo trip per calendar year) but the first time actually buying the tickets for me, and I felt cheated that a whole day at our award-winning zoo costs less per child than an hour at Kids Explorer. And they learn more too!


**Last photo with the Helper before she goes home?! :(

And with January, comes the most important day of all- the husband's birthday. He turns 36. THIRTY SIX.. omg, neither of us could come to terms with it- we kept counting and recounting until finally he admitted that yes! he is an old fart. The conversation during dinner centered around our soon-to-be-set-up retirement fund.. *pah*


Then comes one exciting Anderson Secondary School Class of '93 reunion, in time for Lo Hei. We celebrate one school mate coming home from the States (for a holiday) and another leaving for Canada (for good). Someone decided it was funny to look at old photos of our prom night and I almost died laughing!



Since we enjoyed the gathering so much, Aisyah decided to organise another one in quick succession as a 'going-away' dinner for our dear friend, Siti Aminah, who is relocating to Perth. Perth!! Sigh..

one with the boys..

And so....with the start of a new year and the end of CNY, its crunchtime (read: building on that retirement fund). C'mon water dragon, take me on a thrilling ride this year (just make sure I take my motion-sickness pill beforehand).