Cleaning Up Mish Mash

1. We didn't get that flat. So now I'm looking for carpenters for the girls' wardrobe. Recommendations, anyone? Must be cheap and good.

2. I have also been cleaning out our third bedroom which is, honestly, our huge store room. And I have now banned myself from buying books, toys and clothes (for the girls). I finally managed to squeeze all the books into the bookshelf when I turned around and saw one stack of books. So, I stacked and squeezed the books in the shelf again. Just as I was admiring my organisational skills, I saw another stack of books which escaped the first two rounds of shelving! How on earth did I manage to amass so many books? And where do they come from?

There's absolutely no space for kids' books anymore. No space for assessment books also (not for the girls to do but they were useful when I was working and I keep them because they may be useful when I do some moonlighting later in the year). And in the adults' section, there's only enough space for maybe one or two more novels. 

I wrote the above on 13 March and saved it for updating later but never got round to it.

3. Farah was so well-behaved in her early days. In those first few weeks, I fed her, put her in the cot, fed her, back to cot. It was so easy taking care of her that I actually felt guilty because I was so free. She still is all good now. Except that she wants to be carried all the time. All. The. Time. That's why my pet Hufafa in Pet Society (in Facebook, if you are wondering what Pet Society is - no relation to Pet Semetery) has been neglected. I'm busy carrying my little pet. I should put up her photos soon.

4. The lift at my mom's place is ready and I had loads of fun going up and down the lift. (Yes, I'm deprived.) I'm making lots of plans for the day when the lift here is finally up and running. Like, I will use the stroller to send Huda to school because I plan to walk there and back and that will be my daily exercise. (HAHAHAAA!) I'm just saying that because the lift is not ready yet. I'll be singing a different tune when it's ready, I'm sure.

5. I think Huda looks like an ah lian in this photo. But she's a cute lian.

6. It's a super-duper humid day today and I am melting.

7. Edward Cullen is soooooo good looking (even though I really hate the Twilight movie - where do I even begin?).

8. My search for professional-sofa-cleaner-people has ended. Two different companies have told me that the spots on my sofa are meant to stay there forever. Those are things which occur naturally in leather and nothing can remove them. Nothing. My heart sank all the way to the ground floor when I heard that. Whey did I insist on buying a white sofa?! (Oh, I remember - so that lizards can't camouflage their shit on it.) So now I'm looking for nice throws to use over the sofa. Anyone seen any nice ones? 

Home

1. I am back at home.

I should have called one of those part-time cleaners to clean the house before our homecoming 'cos I spent the first 2 hours at home vacuuming and mopping and wiping. The house was just sooo dusty what with the lift upgrading project that somehow has not seen much progress since I last saw it one month ago. Now I'm having back pains. Lovely.

2. Today, we saw an ad for a flat in the area we've been looking for and for the first time since our search began, both of us like the unit we saw. Should we get it? We would have to go into debt all over again to service the loan for the house. We would have to take a bank loan. However, the loan amount that we need is not too big so will banks bother to lend a small amount to us? Is it better to be cash-rich or asset-rich (especially if the asset is your home meant for you to die in and not an investment piece)?

3. I was planning to start on the girls' room this week - looking for contractors for the wardrobe, think about the furniture and perhaps a coat of paint. But with this latest development, the plan is shelved again. If we get the flat (and we may very well know about it by the end of this week), I shall just get a cheap cheap chest of drawers for the girls' clothes as a stop-gap measure. If we don't get the flat, the girls will get their room by end of next month.

4. Not related to the topic at all - how do you make your children sleep? I find myself having to scold Huda to make her sleep. She would prefer to talk (to herself if I refuse to entertain her) or play with whatever she could get her hands on or pretend to need to drink water etc when she's supposed to sleep. The Husband is normally the one on Sleep Duty but occasionally, I have to make her sleep if The Husband is busy with something else. I really dread this because no matter how pleasantly I start it off, I will end up barking at her and scolding her. I'm quite sure that I don't have the tenacity to do the supernanny thing.

5. Farah. She has some phlegm problems, all thanks to the generosity of her older sister. But, she's way too young to be put on medication so I can only hope that there's something magical in breastmilk that will drive the phlegm away. And I need something to boost Huda's immunity. She's getting phlegmy coughs way too frequently. It has something to do with her going to school, I know. Small kids who just start school tend to fall ill frequently but she also is more susceptible than most other kids because of her prematurity. Are there any effective supplements which are delicious, taste like sweets, highly appealing to kids and, most importantly, can boost a child's immunity?

6. It's now 11pm and I am so sleepy. I missed breastfeeding when I stopped doing so but now that I've started again, I wonder what I missed. The interrupted nights? The engorged breasts? The blocked ducts? The $%&# pain from the blocked ducts? The leaky milk?

Sigh. I must remind myself that this is the best food for Farah and I should be so grateful that I have some milk to offer my daughter.