Now!

I am forcing myself to update this blog. This is getting very trying, isn't it? I'm abandoning my previously half-written entry and will just write and write and write about the kiddies (and me. and also everything else that crosses my mind.)

1. First topic. Me.
I'm going back to work at the end of June and I'm feeling a little bit of trepidation. I haven't worked for 2 years and 3 months. I'm not sure if my weak heart can take it. I know that I do not mind the the actual teaching and classroom interaction. But, it's all the extras that's making me feel this sense of dread. I hope I will not become a weaker mother as a result of going back to work. I'm afraid of being too tired for the kids. And too tired to discipline them. We'll see how things go. This is not necessarily a permanent thing. If I can't take it, maybe I'll leave.

2. Accessories
This week, there are lots of cheap hair accessories available on gmarket. Heh. I started off buying for my girls but after a few clicks, I threw caution to the wind and bought a lot of hair accessories for myself, my nieces, my neighbours (or so I'd like to think. I might be greedy enough and hoard everything for myself)


3. Farah: Speech
Farah can speak very, very well. I can't help but compare Farah with Huda at this age. Huda took a long time to utter her first words but to me, the beginning point does not really matter. Some children can walk at 8 months while others only start walking when they are almost 2. But in the end, as adults, I don't think whether you're an early developer or otherwise matters much. All it means is, as parents, it might be simply be a case of convenience if your child can speak earlier (you know exactly what she wants) or sprouts her first tooth later (you don't have to start brushing her teeth til much later).

(Lest anyone thinks that I'm trying to say that a child is a genius because she can speak earlier, that - as you can see - is never my intention.)

Now, back to Farah.

She mimics what we say quite well. She can now say all the /k/ and /r/ sounds. She used to call her sister Tatak Tuta instead of Kakak Huda. Whenever she says Tatak, I'll correct her and tell her how to say it properly. Unfortunately, on the day she discovered that she could say the /k/ sound, all /t/ sounds were replaced with /k/. So, tangan (arm) became kangan, towel became kowel and so on. I have successfully corrected most of the /t/-/k/ switch but she still insists that tangan is kangan. As you wish, Farah.

She likes to talk and sometimes she just talks for the sake of talking. For example, she can repeat her one story about her encounter with Barney 2 million times a day. "Farah nampak Barney. Farah takut. Farah tanak ambik gambar. Farah sembunyi."
(I saw Barney. I was afraid. I didn't want to take a picture (with Barney). I hid."

Another of her favourite stories that she would repeat to me another 5 million times just for the sake of making conversation: "Mak tahu tak? Farah naik kapal terbang tau. Farah pergi Japan. Farah sejuk. Farah pakai coat, pakai gloves pink, pakai topi pink."
(Mak, do you know? [She learnt this "Do you know?" from her dear sister who talks non-stop also. My poor ears.] I took the aeroplane. I went to Japan. I was cold. I put on a coat, pink gloves and a pink hat.)


4. Farah: Eating

She now likes eating plain rice and plain noodles. With absolutely nothing added. Not even the humble kicap (soya sauce). :rolls eyes until eyes do somersault:


5. Farah: Making a Mess and (Not) Cleaning Up

This is an area that she is very, very good at. She has a box full of hair accessories (yet I'm buying more!). There's nothing that she loves to do more than opening the box and tipping out its contents. The clean-up process, however, is a long drawn-out process involving simple requests which almost always escalate into the appearance of an extremely upset, screaming monster of a mother.

This daughter likes to exaggerate the effort needed to pick up one tiny item. She will crawl to the tiny little rubber band, push it slowly with a hand that refuses to grip the rubber band and when the rubber band finally reaches the box, she will make it seem like the energy needed to pick up the rubber band and put it inside the box is equivalent to the energy produced when an atom is split.

Once, after throwing colour pencils onto the floor (and of course, she was forced to clean up the mess) she crawled very, very slowly to each offending piece of colour pencil and used her mouth to pick up each pencil.

How can I keep my cool?

Huda has been most helpful in this area. While she is also naturally averse to cleaning up, she knows better than to wait for me to turn into a volcano. So, if she can't wait for Farah to be done with her theatrics, she'll just do the cleaning herself. This, unfortunately, is not what I want. I desperately want Farah to clean up her own mess but sometimes, it's just so frustrating!


5. I need to stop for a while now but I know if I save this for later without publishing, I'll end up just ignoring this. So, I'll post this one first, warts and all. Chances are, I'm not going to make any edits (even if I promised to) so all the warts, the spelling errors, grammatical mistakes et al will still be here when you visit this page again. Let's pray for a continuation of this before the next General Election.