Every time when I need to shower in the morning, and nobody is around to take care of Zara, I’ll put her in her tub at one corner of the bathroom, so I can keep an eye on her while I shower. These few days, to save some time, I placed her naked in the tub, and when I’m done with my shower, I’ll carry her and do a quick rinse for her (instead of filling up her tub and bathing her when we have more time).

To make things interesting for her, I tell her she will wait in her ‘boat’. I don’t believe she understands what boat is yet, but having a few toys to play with in the tub, and the occasional splattering of water on her, while I sing Row Row Row Your Boat in the shower, does keep her occupied and happy.

This time, she froze after playing with her stacking cups for a while, and her face turned red.

“Zara are you poo-poo-ing?” I asked while rinsing the shampoo off my hair. Too late, I could see her done with her business, and continued banging her stacking cups like nothing happened.

She did it, she pooed in her tub. This is the first time she did her business without her diaper on. I must say it’s easier to clean than a soil diaper.

While folding the day’s laundry, I kept Zara occupied by giving her smaller pieces of clothing to play with.

She was busy pulling pieces of her own clothing out from the laundry basket, checking it, flapping it (to see what sound it can make). When she’s done with one piece, she reached into the basket for another. This went on for a while, until she got hold of my breast pad in the basket. The minute she held it in her hand, she started sucking her thumb, a natural reflex, as this is her favourite comfort object.

She has this look in her face like she’s ‘high’ on something, like the Cantonese saying, “吹鴉片“ (taking opium) which depicts the addiction of a baby to the bottle, breast and in this case thumb/breast pad.

Maybe because I’m working from home, and she could hear my voice, and know I’m present; maybe she’s more choosy about who takes care of her, and where she is; or maybe it was just because she was ill the last week and still recovering; lately she had been extremely sticky, and preferred to glue on to me all the time than to play or to cruise when we’re in Karen’s house. She cried every time one of the maid came to carry her away so that I could work.

I tried to hide in the room to work today, so that she couldn’t see me or hear my voice at all, and it seemed to work. She only cried when I passed her back to the maid after nursing her.

Maybe next week, I can go back to the office to work.

Bought her a Leap Frog singing/talking Hug & Learn® Baby Tad™ Plush yesterday, but it didn’t seem to excite her as much as I would like to. After paying a hefty RM110 for it, I would at least like to see her show some enthusiasm or interest in the toy.

Here she is preferring to suck on her thumb, play with her tube of diaper cream, check out the wet wipes, examine the rubber mat (things she sees and plays with every day), and just not giving the huggable toy any attention.

At this age (coming to 9 months), I’m just not sure what toys to get for her any more. The ones meant for 12mths are too advance for her, while the ones meant for 6mths don’t capture her interest as much.

Maybe I should just let her play with normal house hold things, or just give her an old key board to play with, this could save me some money.

Zara was so happy when Jenny Ah Kim and Samantha che-che came over for lunch yesterday. She was just clinging on to Samantha and was all smiles! She was touching Samantha, leaning her head on Samantha, and was trying to get Samantha to play with her the whole time.

This morning, I took the day off, and brought Zara over to Jenny’s place. The minute she saw Aunty Litha (the Filipino maid), she was smiling from ear to ear. When she entered the house, she was so happy, she started making happy babbling sounds, and was trying to chat to Litha (the 2 of them always seem to understand each other with their own language).

I could leave her with Litha, and have a peaceful breakfast, and I did not need to carry or pacify her. What a holiday (for me)!

She seems to be facinated with balls, be it big or small. Karen’s excercise ball is something we can use to pacify her when she’s crying, and keeps her entertained and forget about whatever she was fretting about.

Here she is trying to figure out what the big ball can do compare to the small one she was playing with (which she used it as a teether even though we kept telling her not to put it in her mouth).

The other thing that excites her is the PC, when she sees someone at the PC, she would try to reach for the key board with all her might (use the human body as a ladder to climb near the key board).

I opened up a photo in her blog and showed it to her, and she got very excited, drolling onto the key board at at the same time hitting the key board furiously.

There’s something about balls and little buttons that babies like.

I started singing her the song, “If You’re Happy And You Know it”, 1 week ago.

I used the action “clap your hands”, “wave bye bye”, “give me five”, “kick your legs”, “stamp your feet”. In the beginning, she knew how to do the first 4, and when I stamped my feet, she got attracted to the sound, and looked down to see how I did it. She was quick to learn. After a few rounds of singing, over the weekend, she showed me how she ‘stamp her feet’.

She was holding on the the bed frame doing her usual round of cruising, and when we reached the part “stamp your feet”, she lifted one of her feet up, and stamped her foot. I sang the whole song, and she stamped her feet every time we reached the phrase with the action.

We were so pleased with her, and cheered and lifted her up to praise her. She was pleased with herself too, smiling her cheeky grin.

Now, every time when I sing her the song, she will follow the action phrase and do the action. Sometimes she’s a bit slow, and I have to wait for her a second or two, and repeat the phrase, or tell her “Zara, wave bye bye la”, or “Zara, give mummy five”, and she’ll carry out the action after the reminder.

These few days, she also started mastering opening and closing her hands while we sing “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. She’s trying to imitate the “Itsy Bitsy Spider” action as well, but I guess that will take a while.

Of all the Baby Einstein DVDs that I bought for her, she likes the Old Mc Donald one the most, and only the bit where the song was sung.

She enjoys children songs a lot, and especially like it if there’s some action bits which she can contribute. Sometimes, she sings too, but I can’t make out what she’s singing. She’ll be ‘aaaaah…. mm baaaa.”, then she’ll open and close her hands, and I guess she’s probably singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.

The whole of Klang Valley was hit with the bad haze (caused by burning of plantation in Sumatra), a layer of smoke enveloping the whole city, visibility was down to 500meters. Every breath taken outdoor caused a choke, and you can feel your lungs working extra hard. This situation caused lots of people with respiratory related illnesses prolong their suffering. Zara was one of the victim. Although she has recovered from her fever, she still has a quite a bad cough and a bit of runny nose.

When we’re in Karen’s place, she is so fretful, and wants to be near me all the time. I guess with me working from home didn’t help much, as the more she knows I’m around, the more she will ‘look’ for me.

Her usual excitement during bath time, had also turned into some kind of torture. The minute she’s taken to the bath room by Elizebeth, her shouting and screaming bout starts. Nothing can consol her. We have to resort to topping and tailing her most of the time.

When we’re back home (we lived in one of the worst hit area), we spent most of our time in our own room, with the aircon (with in-built air filtration and ioniser) on, and if we needed to be in the living room, we have the ironiser turned on full blown, and all the windows shut tight.

It seems the haze is going to be with us for a while until the wind changed directions or the monsoon arrives. We will have to endure more of this till then.

It was Zara’s turn to be ill. I had passed on the virus to her, not sure by being near her, or by nursing her.

She started just like me, a cough. We brought her to the Pediatrician on Tuesday. She was still so full of energy, trying to reach and touch all the babies, toddlers, older children in the waiting room. When it was her turn to see the Dr, she marched in (with daddy holding on to her arms helping to support her).

In the middle of Tuesday night, she started running a temperature. I was awaken by her moaning in her sleep, she was as though in some kind of pain. I was worried sick, taking her temperature every 15mins, trying to sponge her or keep a cold towel on her forehead throughout the night.

On Wednesday, I took the day off to look after her at Karen’s place as I need Karen’s maids to help out. Her temperature was a constant 38.3~38.5. She didn’t want to have anything to eat, and didn’t want to have any water. All she wanted was to nurse.

The whole day, she was glued to my breasts. She would be sucking and when I try to sneak off to go to the toilet or go for a munch, she would wake up crying.

Giving her medicine was another big challenge. She would wail and scream when we try to feed her the medicine. She would hold the medicine in her mouth and not swallow it, while screaming on top of her voice until her voice turned horse. When we try to close her mouth to force her to swallow, she screamed even louder with big drops of tears streaming down and face turning all red. After that, she would throw up, milk, medicine and everything else.

My breasts sore, my muscle ache (from all the carrying), my body exhausted (from lack of sleep) and my heart broken (to see her at this state).

I was so glad in the night, her temperature was back to normal. Her fever has gone.

When babies fall ill, mummies suffer more than when they themselves are ill.

While Tuyam is away for her vacation, I will work from Karen’s place and have Karen’s 2 maids (one Indonesian, and one Filipino) help me look after Zara.

Zara’s first day with Kakak and Aunty wasn’t very exciting, until Nicholas (my 11 year old nephew) came home and started strumming the guitar.

She was intrigued by the guitar. Nicholas ko-ko tried teaching her how to strum the guitar, but she just didn’t understand or know how to ‘strum’ the strings. Instead, she preferred to hit on the wooden casing of the guitar.