DRESSES

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Heart Broken


~ Nada made Mommy angry ~

Nada : “I’m sorry la Mommy…..”
Mommy : ~ silent treatment ~ (B.A.D)
Nada : “Please Mommy, say (talk) la ….”
Mommy : ~ silent treatment still ~ (B.A.D)
Nada : “Mommy please……., you quiet later my heart broken, HOW ?”

~ She puts her tiny hands on her chest and show her heart being broken just like breaking up a piece of cracker ~

Mommy : KETAWA TERBAHAK-BAHAK…
Nada : “You can laugh louder, Mommy……”

Ya Allah, I can’t thank you enough for bestowing me this precious daughter. Alhamdulillah………


Tuesday, October 30, 2012

School works

Every now and then, Nada’s school would return the ‘works’ which were done by the kids to each parent. The works could be handicrafts, art-works, drawings, worksheets and stuff. I didn’t realize how much Nada had brought home since she started ‘schooling’ in 2011 until one day I decided to organise the works.

Overwhelming!



I spread out the stuffs to categorize them and I got stuck! I didn’t know where to start. Dang… no plans – shoot me.

Should I categorize according to the classes that she was in? The Baby Buttercup class, then in 3 year old Daffodil class and 4 year old Hibiscus class. Somehow I can’t do that because I had dumped all the works in few boxes before, they all got mixed up and I just don’t remember how to sort out according to classes timelines. Crossed the idea.

So, I settled for categorizing the works in which I think would be easy and appropriately stored by my standard. (not any ISO!) The A4 size worksheets and drawings would go into files, drawings of drawing board sizes into ‘handmade’ folders. (Thank You Daddy). Artworks and crafts into A3 size boxes of the same kind.

After couple of hours, I finally managed to have my living hall floor cleared. Fuhh !!!!

Nicely categorized and kept. There are also artworks that I’d like to hang up on our walls soon once we move to our new-old pad. Yeah, I am proud of my daughter’s silly artwork like that.

I was happy with my progress in organizing Nada’s school work. I thought I was done for the day……. NOT until I found this box full of the same stuff, all still jumble up. Drawings, art-work.. misc.
O dear.. I was not at all done – Shoot me again. How does other people handle more than one kid ?

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

In my mind

I'm at work. It's lunch time and I miss her.






Photos around Kyoto, Japan

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Eid 1433H

How’s Raya everyone?

My Raya this year was a mix of  joy and also sorrowfulness as I anticipated.  Even I tried so much to put the energy to the joy, the grief is still in everyone’s eyes. I do pray hard things would change.
 
Our new-old pad is getting it's way with us scratching our heads hard for the moo-lah.
Photo just before breaking off for Raya.

 Yesterday photo of our backyard view from dining.

Nada said : "But this house got no playground, Mommy."
Mommy : "Owh.. you'll play in the backyard. Mommy will get a trampoline for you."
Nada : "Got mosquito here. Later I scratch my hand here-here-here. And you angry me."
Mommy : "Mommy will apply mosquito repellant on you."
Nada : "What's that? Mosquito spray-spray one?"
Mommy : "Hmmmm... " (dalam hati : ha-ah.. elok jugak, Mommy spray Ridsect, kurang sikit songheh)


Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Make over

I have a special attachment to this modest house. It is a home that I frequent ever since I was a child until now. We had Nada's cukur jambul ceremony here too.
It is my cousin's, Mentibang Paku's pad.  

For the last five months or so, it had gone through huge transformation and I have been.... none other than a busy-body. Saturday mornings after breakfast, it became a routine for us to visit the house under renovation. Many times, I made way alone after having a meeting nearby I am scheduled to have fortnightly. 

I'd like to thank Mentibang's family for bearing with me. There were occasions that I found out the contractor didn't really built according to the way I pictured it was supposed to be. I quickly drove over to my cousin's house and made such big complaint to her.

~ "Why there's a column there? It isn't supposed to be there....." bla-bla-bla
~"Why is the ledge like that? It's not supposed to continue all the way at front......" bla-bla-bla

As always, Mentibang is a very patient person and I guess  my complaint reached the pay master. Somehow or rather, things were fixed !
I am not sure if both of them agreed with me because I did make noise or they just don't want any hustle from me.
But I really hope, they trust me that I want their house nice.

Mr Mentibang is accommodating. When asked by the contractor if he wanted the roof as designed. His reply was "Just follow..."
When the contractor informed they already went to 10 building material shops to look for the item that I suggested to be incorporated into the design and they still couldn't find it, he himself made the effort to scout for it.    

~ yeah, the railings aren't there yet....

Congratulation Mentibang for the make-over. It may be different, but the soul and spirit of the home that I've known for 20++++ years is still the same. 

Friday, July 27, 2012

grumbling

At times, I do wish that I am not such an independent person.

At times, I do want to see myself less 'smart' and hope somebody else takes the lead.

At times, at times, at times...

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Work in progress

After very much consideration, in between of go or no-go or paint and move or may be just move.. we finally made the decision. Two freakin’ months of uncertainty. Tiny renovation it will for our new-old house.   

This morning view of our backyard, where works had started on the 1st of Ramadhan.

Monday, July 23, 2012

Unhappy

I’m loosing it.
Loosing the interest in my office works, and I do feel perturbed by the fact. So stressful, I don’t know to whom should I talk to.
Tonite, I am going glue myself to Lady Gaga – my ever trusted companion and cry to her.  

Monday, June 25, 2012

Tokyo DisneySea

When we had our first Disneyexperience in Hong Kong, a friend of mine asked my opinion of the place. For first timer like me, my honest opinion was the place is GREAT to me. I had so much fun and a thrill plus roller coaster lover like me, Disneyland would be something that brings joyful moments.
She however has different opinion. She told me something like : “Hong Kong Disneyland to her is just a notch higher than the district on-the-go fun fair we usually have. It’s not at all comparable to other Disneyland, in fact it brings down the standard of Disneyland. The least of a Disneyland to opt is Tokyo Disneyland.”

I don’t get her. I was happy with our Disney experience in Hong Kong and I am sure I enjoyed district fun fair too during my childhood years.

On the 5th day of our holidays in Japan, we spent one whole day at Tokyo DisneySea. (Tokyo has two separate huge parks one called Disneyland and one called DisneySea)
Having visited Tokyo DisneySea, I now understand what my friend meant and for someone that had toured all the existed Disneys, she got her point.  

In Tokyo, the park is colossal, triple the rides and shows in HK ! .. I now wonder how is it in Miami ?

We queued to enter the park before the entrance gate to be opened at 8.00AM and left at 10.00PM as the gate is to be closed. Still, we couldn’t manage to cover all the rides and shows within the given day period.

O well, we moved around at the dictate of the tiny dictator – none other than our miss sassy : Nada.

If she decides to stop at every water cooler stand that she sees, be it, we stopped.   
If she decides that she needs a break, that’s it, we took a break.
If she decides to have her doze of addiction, no choice, on my lap she was.
If she decides to take a nap, willingly, Daddy's shoulder she rested.
If she decides to stand still and pop pop-corns in a middle of walking crown, grrrrrr, we braced and prayed she would not be stomped upon.  

As long as she is happy. The rest… it doesn’t matter.
milk stop
break
cooler

cooler again
who is the happiest?.. daddy !!!
pass for min 900mm ht ride 
first roller coaster experience for Dew, she's cool...
nap
cooler again..


it was magic...

Thursday, June 21, 2012

We love Japan

We had an 8-days holiday in Japan, covering bit here and there of Osaka, Kyoto and Tokyo.
It’s hard to visit Japan and not to love this unique country of more than 3,000 islands.

I don’t think there is any single word that can describe the place as a whole. But if somebody put a gun in my head and force me to do so, my word choice would be :

ORDER

And if I am given the luxury to blurt out words to describe the place and people of Japan, they would be the below words in no particular order :

- PRACTICAL
- EFFICIENT
- COMPACT
- SYSTEM
- COURTESY
- CUTE
- STYLISH
- PRECISE
- PERFECTIONIST
- SPECIFIC
- TIME KEEPER
- TRADITION
- HOSPITALITY
- TECHNOLOGY
- A+ PUBLIC TOILETS

It is a beautiful and ‘weird’ country, indeed a must visit destination. I wouldn’t be surprise if one day I wake up in the morning and news travel to me that the Japanese are not human but they are actually programmed robots! They’re too defined in whatever they do.

As though all words to describe Japan are the positive adjectives, I do have my displeasure. My only complaint was sometimes my sensitive nose could detect unpleasant surrounding smell every now and then. My guess would be, with all the underground drain and sewer system plus multilevel subways that keeps on gushing powered wind from the train rush, some stinky smell couldn’t be avoided.

Just my presumption.

I hope I’ll be able to write more about this trip that I did enjoy so much the company of one of my closest cousins, Feby whom is more like a sister to me.

There were a lot of laughter due to our silliness to cope with Japan amusing orderly systems and whine of how much sore we had on our feet that we walked too much, sore on our back that our backpacks weight are almost killing us.

~ Order ~
Inari Shrine
photo courtesy of : Isao Nagashima San

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Be wise with time

I was browsing through our photos in the hard drive and found this one captured by my beau.


Totally don’t remember the photo and also don’t remember mending this dress of Nada’s while on a drive – of course as a passenger. Good thing about crafting, it can be done on-the-go, and it sure help to have my girl strapped in her car seat at the back. I have my hands free of holding a kid and could be used to benefit time spent in travels.      

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Baju Kaftan

We usually make a trip to Pasar Siti Khadijah every time we return to my beloved hometown, Kota Bharu just before we head back to KL. There’re many interesting buys there. Fruits-fruits-fruits and thousands of nick-nacks. Love!
My girl however, is not so fond of the idea. She complains of being tired, sweating… and I just couldn’t get across her yet that it is how it goes when people go to market. It’s not Carefour or Tesco or Cold Storage for that matter!






The trip during Aidilfitri break last year, I bought her a caftan at Pasar Siti Khadijah. She was delighted, she thought Mommy and her are twins when we both wear caftans at nights.




Just after three washes, her very own first caftan frails. Ugly, Mommy can’t take it. I threw the caftan onto Lady Gaga knowing I would do something about it.


Not only upon four months I did take action, applying self made polka-dots bias at all sides. Frails no more!

Monday, June 4, 2012

"school"

Couple of Saturday ago, we attended the regular bi-term Parent-Teacher Meeting (PTM) at Nada’s school.
I guess, I do owe a write up la about Kindicare Montessori & Pre-school. In case, someone google to find out about it, at least my experience herein could be made as guidance. Like la this blog gonna appear at all in google search…, I’ll write anyway.

When I was looking for a school for Nada to attend last year, I had in my mind something like NO FRANCHISE!. I am not sure of my own reason, but I am also not saying SMART READER, Q-DEES or the like are not good. It’s just the matter of choices we have. I just don’t fancy the sort of chain for pre-school.

Kindicare was introduced to me by a friend. I visited the school before enrolling Nada and it just fit into my wants and needs. It is a modest, small scale school with homely environment. Each class contains small numbers of children. The big part of me actually, I don’t really want to send Nada to ‘school’ as yet. That’s why I was avoiding those with daily uniform schools.

I remember myself being a free kampong kiddo, unschooling until primary. It was a fun childhood I had, tagging along my big brother everywhere he goes. I played a lot. Underneath our on-stilt-home, climbing trees, running in the meadow full of ‘kemuncup’, sometimes in the woods collecting rubber trees seeds, when monsoon season came – we played in the stagnant flood water! My brother would catch fish (read : tadpole and worms) or even did some stunt, doing summersault into man groove. I was his most trusted and loyal spectator. Dangerous it may seem, but it was F.U.N.

I enjoyed myself playing back then - I wanted the same for Nada because PLAY is a child’s job.

Would I been a SAHM or a WAHM, she would most probably be a homeschool or an unschool child. The fact that I am a typical 9-5 (read 10-9, sometimes 10-10) office working mom, I just don’t have the opportunity of providing the luxury of homeschooling. Quitting my job is an option but not really possible, I have my mami that is my responsibility all my life.

The fact that Nada is sent to an Indon Nanny while I’m at work added more points for her to be in a place where she could play, interacts, make friends, exploring creative minds and develops or else she’ll just watch Indon soaps on tele all day long. She needs to be at least in a more conducive environment, I hope so.

During my visit to Kindicare earlier, these were my questions :

  1. Would there be homework ? Answer : NO
  2. Would there be ‘examinations’? Answer : NO
  3. Would there be grading of children, like No 1, 2, 3, 4….. in class? Answer : NO
All the NO answers makes me happy. I really don’t get it as to what is the need of homework, examinations and grading pre-school children? They are “babies”. It’s intimidating for me to hear parents telling me : “Ooo, my child got number ONE in his/her 3year old kindi”.

At this point, it’s not my objective to know if Nada is the smartest in class or less smart or least smart and I do hope it will never be my objective.

For now, all I want for her is to play like I used to. The difference would be the sorts of playing I had with her sorts and my play was free but hers is at cost! .. O, well…

I did ask a lot of questions and this one really got into me :

“ What happen if my daughter feels like taking a nap? ”
Aunty Jeane (the principal) gave me the most diplomatic answer : “Awwww… you’re not ready to let her go yet, don’t you? Not to worry, we have all the fun activities,  Nada won’t get sleepy.. trust me. Besides, a child shouldn’t be sleepy from 8am to noon. If she’s sleepy, that means her sleep routine is not right, mom! ” 

So, Kindicare offers the needs of what I was looking for in terms of it’s “syllabus”. But what actually captured my heart was the warmth of the teachers or all being called as Aunties. They are lovely, humble people, and they enjoy being around children, I can see. There’re a lot of hugs and kisses, dear and darling in their words.   

They also treat us parents with kindness no matter what car we are driving. J It so happen, every other kids’ parents drive or being driven in monsters the like Porshe, Beemers, Merce, Volvo, Audi, Vellfire bla-bla-bla. I am the cheapoket one, not wearing Christian Louboutin or Hermes… still very nicely treated.

Kindicare is also well-organized, Nada thus far never mistakenly brought back other children’s stuff or other way round such as bag, containers or water bottle. I don’t know how they manage it as no names written on any of the stuff being brought to school. What I do realize, they make it a habit to scrutinize every and each child every day. Example, when I hand Nada to them in the morning, there’ll be greetings like :
“Hi Nada.. Good morning darling.. hey look at you…..Today you are wearing plaid smocked dress. Did Mommy make this dress also? Is that new Barbie snack container you bring ?”…. Things like these, give me confidence.

I’ve experienced other nursery for a short period that I sent Nada when her Nanny returned to Medan, the very first day she came back home, all her stuffs were name written. Towel, milk bottle, milk dispenser, food container… yet they still got mixed up!

Nothing is perfect I would say. So far, there’s no big blunder that could make me angry except couple of small encounters at Kindicare. I didn’t receive school newsletter which in the later I checked, I was told it had been distributed. I couldn’t blame the school also, because it might had been given and dropped in the chartered car that ferries Nada after school or it could be at her Nanny’s. I don’t really know. It’s no big deal, anyway. Other than that, Aunty Jeanne is very-very careful and meticulous.

So, for this time PTM, we were briefed of Nada’s progress and what-not, which was fine.  

Until towards the end, Aunty Marie (the class teacher) told us, again in a very diplomatic way..

“Nada is an independent child, confident, she knows what she wants but……….. she’s rather BOSSY.” Toing! Tu… dia.

Apparently according to Aunty Marie, my girl has the tendency and very much successful in directing and ordering her friends around. She would get agitated if they don’t listen to her. OMG! whose DNA does she inherits here? I look at Harris…. Harris look at me.

OK-OK-OK –OK.. that would be Mommy.!

Aunty Marie also told us, despite her bossiness… she does have close friends (that she also directs around).  Three of them are clique. They play and learn together but they can never agree with each other. All have their own opinions. OOOOOhhhh.. This,……..Mommy like. Good!



My Saturday morning routine this couple of months. Inspecting my cousin, Mentibang Paku’s house renovation. I’ve been ordering the contractor, here and there, practically treating this house like mine. Mesti Cik Ripin berbulu dengan Mek.

Well, we have no money to renovate ours.. at least this feels like ours!.. hehehehe..

Harris sure can be awarded as Bapa Mithali. He let his daughter step on his foot not wanting her bare foot on the ground whilst little miss uses her slipper to play sand.
Could it be me, I would just shout : “ It’s OK !.. You sit on the sand, later wash your feet ! ”