Before the Raya mad rush, we took a week off and headed North for our once a year trip to Penang.

The night before, Daddy asked, “You sure we need to bring along Jelly?” (he was thinking of bringing his dad instead).
Imagine we’d been having this bring-don’t-bring conversation since August, and made a decision and now this?
I was ‘tulan’ (Cantonese : annoyed) and replied, “If you can feed the girls, bath them, wash the bottles after their feed, then no need to bring.” Grrrrr…
Of course Jelly came along eventually.

We took off on Saturday, with a car choked full of things. It’s no joke travelling with 2 young kids.

When we had a pitstop at an R&R some where near Tapah, we kidded with Zara and told her that we’ll be staying in one of the outdoor pavilions; nearby, some goats were bleating. She was worried, and when she was convinced we were staying there, she said, “I think we better go home.”
Daddy still teasing, “We thought both of you like farm stay, that’s why we chose this hotel.”
Zara replied, “I don’t like farm stay, I like home stay more. We go home better.”
I pretended to cancel this hotel and told her we’ll try to get another room in Penang. She was relieved, but still added “If no nice hotel, then we drive back home ok?” o.O”

First stop of course is St Anne’s (church) at Bukit Mertajam.

In the old chapel, Zara said her prayer while all Zaria wanted to do was blow off the candles at the alter (of course after Happy Birthday singing). -.-”

While looking around, Zara stopped at the statues showing Jesus’ crucifixion looking very sad and asked me, “Mummy, why the people so wicked they want to nail Jesus on the cross.”
Seriously, for me who still have questions about my religion, I don’t know how to answer her.

We stopped at Bukit Tambun for dinner, the restaurant that we went to last year was closed to public for a wedding so we had to go to another restaurant (some fishing-floating restaurant). Food was lousy. Phhhhbbbbbt…

We arrived at Bayview Beach Resort at 8:30pm. Zara was so happy and relieved when we stepped into the room. We took the L-shaped family room again. The room is spacious and clean; 4 of us took the king bed, and Jelly took one of the single beds. We had an early night although I was tempted to sneak out to start my DVD shopping.

Sunday morning was spent at the pool and at the beach. Zara preferred the earlier, while Zaria the latter.
When we brought Zaria to the pool and took her to a deeper end where her feet couldn’t touch the ground, she said, “I’m scared.” or “I don’t yike(like)”. When we asked Zara to go to the beach, she said, “I don’t want, the sand is so rough.” So we had to split into two groups. 1 to the beach, 1 at the pool.

For lunch, the girls had Pizza from Papa Pizza at Tanjung Bunga, while we had char kuey teow (Hokkien : fried flat rice noodle) behind Papa Pizza. I think the pizza was better than the kuey teow.

Love this shot of the girls, just up from their naps and attacking the left over pizza.

In the evening, we headed to the Botanical Gardens. Zaria, the adventurer, tried to get close to the monkeys, and a few times almost got attacked by them. She was a bit disappointed to know that the monkeys were ‘not-friendly’ and ‘naughty’.

They loved the place, the flowers, the plants, the space.

A lot of people were crowding around this guy at the entrance of the garden. He was selling curry puffs, spring rolls, wades, samosas. What made it so special is after you’d chosen what you want, he’ll cut them up and pour asam laksa soup over them. I had a piece of ‘asam laksa’ spring roll, and it was quite good.

Dinner was at Nonya Breeze (we never missed it). Still so good, still so reasonably priced.

Monday morning after breakfast, we visited Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion. We missed 30mins of the guided tour, and still, the girls were getting a bit restless following the guide for the rest of the 30mins. This place is beautifully maintained, but girls have no appreciation for all these.

We had char kuey teow at Lorong Selamat. Yummy but very expensive. RM14 for 2 plates and even the boiled sugar cane water cost RM1.70.

After the girls’ nap back in the hotel, we split into 2 groups and let them chill out at the pool and beach again.

Guess what we had for dinner? Papa Pizza was so good we went there for dinner (actually, it’s also because the Phang Hainanese Seafood Restaurant we wanted to go was closed).

Tuesday morning, we finally managed to see a horse at the beach (horse riding was one of the reason why we chose to stay in Batu Feringgi). After agreeing on the price (RM50 for 2 rounds), I took the girls. Poor horse had to endure the weight of the 3 of us. Zaria was really happy to finally get to ride on a horse. She kept patting and saying, “Hello horse.”.

(Some sad fact : This horse used to be a race horse, and retired after 5 years of racing. It became a horse for holiday goers to ride on at the beach until it reaches 10years old. What happened next? The owner will sell it to some Chinese who’ll turn it into horse satay. Humans are so cruel. -.- )

Zara spent more time at the pool after the horse riding, and I squeezed in a foot massage by the pool. Zaria went back to the room with Jelly for a nap. Before 1pm, we checked out and left the hotel. On our way out, we had a very tired Zara snoozing, and a very energetic Zaria singing.

Zara used to be a wailer, you know the crying-for-1hr-like-a-banshee kind? The no-matter-what-you-do-will-not-calm-her-down-once-it’s-started kind?

She was at her worst when she was around 18months~30months old. Not that it was’t bad when she was younger, but that time I thought she was still a baby (and a high need one) and I could tolerate it better. This so stressed me out.

When she started her wailing;
I used to hug her, didn’t work.
Talked to her and tried calming her, didn’t work.
Put her in the naughty corner, didn’t work.
Once, when she was standing right in front of the study screaming her head off (while I was working), I got so angry, I lifted her like a sack of potato, brought her to the room, placed her on my lap gave her 2 big smack on her buttocks. It didn’t stop her crying but instead made her cry even louder, and made me feel extremely guilty and lousy.

Daddy kept telling me it’s her state of mind, and nothing we did would stop it, so we should just let her cry it out.

Eventually, I took the approach. I just told Zara I won’t hold her or hug her until she stops. She can wail or shout or scream, I won’t touch her. “If you are upset, or angry, crying is ok, but you have to control yourself and not cry and shout like you are crazy. Mummy will hug you when you calm down.”

I’m not sure if this helped, or she is just growing up and went passed that phase. Nowadays, when she cries, it will be only for a short while. Sometimes, the crying is replaced with a sob, and she’ll come over and say, “Mummy, I can control myself already.” occasionally adding, “Because now I’m 4 years old.”

I have been telling her, I’m really very proud of her. I really am.

TV can be so useful, to ‘baby sit’ the girls, and for the girls to pick up new words, some of it good and some may not. And I also saw a lot of reaction from the girls, which in normal day to day life may not surface.

Zara being the sensitive girl, held my hand tight with tears forming in her eyes when she first watched Mulan and heard Mulan singing the song Reflection.

~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~

My sister told me when we missed the return ferry out of Pulau Ketam, Zara kept saying, “My mummy will kill me.” to my sister. When I asked her where she learnt that from?
Zara said, “Ariel (from the Little Mermaid) said that when she missed her concert (musical debut). She said her daddy will kill her.”
o.O (Thanks Ariel)

~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~

Zara asked Daddy, “Daddy, do you know what is San Diego?”
Daddy replied, “It’s a city in America.”
Zara said, “San Diego is a beach with lots of sand.”
I looked at her and said, “How do you know?”
Zara said, “The zebra in that zoo show said so.”

~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~

When she saw her cousin’s lantern which is a horse with wings (I would have called it that), she said, “I want to play with the flying pegasus lantern.”
(This she picked up from Barbie’s Magic of the Pegasus show).

~~~~~~~~~~~ . ~~~~~~~~~~~

And we have Zaria, watching the war scene in Mulan, shouting excitedly, “Oh Gosh. Oh Gosh. Oh Gosh.” o.O

She also started calling Daddy, “Papa”. Obviously, picked up from Mulan too.

We went over to King’s Wife‘s place on Saturday so that the kids could play with fire lantern together with their cousins.

Before dinner, it was jamming time. Guitar is getting so popular all the older kids know how to play it.

Love this shot of Sam

This nephew of mine has joined a band. This can probably be his cover shot if he produced an album.

After a take away dinner, we all went to light the lanterns and strolled to the park to enjoy the night. It was a hot night but the sky was clear. The kids upon seeing all the candles litted by the other kids, left their lanterns totally and joined it. Blowing candles after singing Happy Birthday, lighting more candles, etc.

Zara and Zaria had their first taste of ‘playing’ with fire, and even though occasionally the wax dripped on their fingers and they yelped in pain, they went on.

Tasha blowing off the candle, of course after the Happy Birthday singing

King’s Wife’s nephew, Wei Hao, lighting candles.

Zara playing with sparkles

Zara blowing off candles, also after birthday song was sung

Girls love lighting the candles, I didn’t stop them as it’s good for developing their dexterity

More birthday song singing for Zaria to blow off the candle.

Sam lighting candle

When it was time to leave the park, Zara protested. Mummy I want to do some more grave yard thingy.” …. It took me a few seconds to realise that she was relating lighting candles with graveyard because that’s what we do when we pay our respect in my mother’s grave.

(Daddy took all the photos while I spent time gossipping with my sisters/sister in laws.)

When we bring Zaria out for meals, she normally will try to stand up on the high chair to reach for things on the table. We’ll deter her by telling her, Uncle or Auntie in the restaurant will scold her if she did that.

At home if Zara and/or Zaria wanted to get me to do something or spend time with them when I’m working, I’ll tell them that my boss will scold me.

In one of these occasions, I said, “Mummy cannot play with you. Mummy is working. What will mummy’s boss do if mummy don’t work?”
Zaria replied, “Scold scold mummy.”
“How mummy’s boss scold mummy?”
Zaria said loudly, “Hey you! Sit poh-plee (properly)”
(the exact words we used when we told her how the uncle or auntie in the restaurant will scold her)

Yesterday, we were doing sounds that animals/things made.
Me : “What sound does the rooster make?”
Zaria : “Ko-ko ko-kOHHHH”
Me : “What sound does the snake make?”
Zaria : “Sssssssssssss”
Me : “What sound does the lizard make?”
Zaria : “tsk tsk tsk tsk” *clucking her tongue*
Me : “What sound does the door bell make?”
Zaria : “Ding Dong!”
Me : “What sound does mummy’s boss make?”
Zaria : *loudly* “Hey YOU!”

😛

Zaria signature smile she kept only for cameras

Shame on me. I’d been so busy at work since returning from Houston, I have no time to write her development post. Today, she’s 20months, 2 weeks old.

Here is a quick update before everything is ‘stale’ news.

Taken on 17th July –
Weight = 9.4Kg
Height = 81cm
Teeth = 16 pearly whites. She cut her upper and lower first molars almost the same time in June.

Zaria flashing a smile

♥Dexterity♥
♥Jumping♥ – She likes jumping, and can lift herself off the ground pretty high. When she’s asked to dance, she normally does a jump instead.

♥Running♥ – This girl can run. Sometimes Zara has a race with her friends in the park, and she will join in too. Although not as fast, she can finish the two loops (~200metres) the other bigger kids are doing.

♥Climbing♥ – She likes to climb. Ladder, furniture, slides which are meant for sliding down, she does it.

♥Tossing a ball♥ – She’s quite good at it, although sometimes backwards. And she just loves balls.

♥Language♥
She is able to express herself very well, although sometimes it takes a keen ear (like mine) to decode what she’s saying.

♥Vocabulary♥
Naming most of the shapes, animals, items in her picture books. Count 1 to 10 sometimes. And sometimes she gets the colour right too, e.g. yellow, black, green, orange. Knows the difference between, breakfast, lunch, dinner. E.g. In the morning, “After bake(break)fast, watch Baby Einstein.” At lunch time, “Want eat Mac (and) Cheese (for) lunch.” After park, “Go home oh-di (already), dinner time!”

♥Alphabet Recognition♥
She can recognise the Capital A and occasionally letter Z too. She knows they are “ABCs” when she see letters.

♥Pronunciation♥
She has problem pronouncing some sounds. K sound is replaced with T. E.g. “Go Tai-tai (“Kai-Kai” in Cantonese). And her L sounds like Y, E.g. “Um-be-yah” (Umbrella).

♥Singing♥
Can sing a few songs on her own : Happy Birthday, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Baa Baa Black Sheep, I Love You (from Barney), Old Mac Donald, ABC.

♥Language Structure♥
Talking in phrases now.
Mixing the “me” with “you”. E.g. “Mummy hug you (me).”
Skipping the Is or Tos. E.g. “(I) Want (to) go there.” “(I) Want (to) wear this shoes.” “Cheh-cheh go (to) school oh-dee (already).”

♥Mandarin♥ – She can understand a wee bit of Mandarin, and able to reply “要” “不要” to answer my question in Mandarin.

She likes to play with cars.

♥Temperament♥

♥Ah Ngao/The Bull♥
We call her the ngao or ‘bull’ at home – head strong, charges at things and not deterred by obstacles, very unlady-like.

Up till today, we still have to ‘tie’ her on the high chair when we have meals because if we didn’t, she would be climbing on the table, putting her hands in the dishes, or pulling the place mats off the table, spillng soup/sauces. To her, it’s a ‘belt’, and after dinner, she’ll request, “Take off belt now. Finished dinner oh-di (already).”

When she’s unhappy, she smack the person that made her angry. If I scolded her for that, she’ll instead use her hand and beat her head or thigh. o.O”

♥Vain-Pot♥
She’s getting vain now. Sometimes, she refuses to wear t-shirt and pants, and her reason, “Zah-yah Pin-ses (Princess), want wear Pin-ses (Princess) Baju (Dress)”.

Every time after she’s taken her bath, she’ll ask to see me or Daddy. “Daddy look. Zah-yah wear Pin-ses Baju” or “Mummy look. Zah-yah’s hair so nice oh-di.”

Princess Zaria

♥Tough but Soft♥
She can stand pain, but she’ll cry if she’s not getting what she wants, or being scolded, or feeling sad.

♥Food♥
Willing to try new food but getting very difficult to get her to eat her regular meals, especially when it’s rice. A few times I had to put her in the naughty corner because she spit out every thing we fed her. Now, she wants us to applaud when she eats and not spit out her food. “Za-yah eat oh-di. Mummy clap clap hand. Daddy clap clap hand.” o.O”

She’s eating what we’re eating now, and if we can, we’ll make her portion salt-free.

♥Favourite food♥
Macaroni & cheese, chocolate, sea weed, banana crisp (“Banana Krop Krop” that’s how she says it), fried chicken.
(the junk I feed my kids.)

♥Milk Intake♥
Only able to take 4oz per feed, about 4 to 5 feed per day. She’ll ask when she wants, and we don’t fix the timing she takes her milk.

♥Toilet Training♥
Since early this year, we try to get her to do her business on the toilet bowl, and half the time we are successful. When she feels like it, she’ll tell us she wants to “she-she” or “Poo Poo”. She doesn’t want to use the toilet for big business because she said her “Bum-bum pain pain” (from hard stool).

She’s starting toilet training earlier as Zara only started to use the toilet to do her business when she turned 2.

♥The Things She Likes♥
TV – Sesame Street (she calls it Da-di-da di-da show, because of this song in that VCD), Noddy, Baby Einstein, Barney, High-5, and sometimes she’ll also sit and watch Barbie show with Zara.

She loves books – picture books, short stories for toddlers.

She loves soft / huggable toys.

She is very close to Daddy and loves him very much. Unlike Zara at this age who didn’t allow Daddy to sooth her, sleep with her, feed her, Zaria loves Daddy doing all these for her.

Only Daddy allows her to play with the computer

She likes princess stuff – she loves crown, dresses, click-clock shoes (heels that make that sound)

She loves playing with water and sand – that’s why she’s always asking us to bring her to “Ah Lang Ah Lang“.

She loves her sister Zara, but at the same time likes to annoy Zara by snatching her things, messing up her things. o.O”

Kissing one of her favourite soft toy – Pootle Bear

And we all love her.

Last weekend was a long weekend, my sisters, their kids, my dad and our family decided to make a trip to Pulau Ketam.

To take the boat over, we went to the jetty which is at South Port, Port Klang. A ~30 minutes boat ride cost us RM7 for adults, and RM4 for school going kids.

It has been ages since I last went to Pulau Ketam. It’s still very charming; every thing is built on eleveted ground, with small narrow cement streets (only bicycles allowed) and colourful houses in different shades of turquoise.

For the kids, Pulau Ketam has not much to offer, but for us adults, it was the food : sea food, lala (Malay : clam) omelete, cendol (one of the best I’d tested), and fried prawn dough (some kind of cucur udang).

Ok, my sis told me to mention this. We had lunch at the first restaurant that faces the jetty (can’t remember the name), recommended by a local we met on the boat. Food was so so, the waiter was rude. Only the gong bou har gou (Cantonese: spicy crayfish), and steam red snapper are worth mentioning. RM190 for a set meal for 8 adults + 4 kids. My sis said, “Make sure you write this in your blog, the waiter is damn rude, food is not good, don’t ever eat here.”

I’m not sure about the other smaller restaurants further down the busy main street, but you can probably give this big one a miss.

After our early lunch (we were warned wait time in restaurants can be more than an hour on public holidays when people start flooding in), we went exploring. The kids have their cousins to play with, that kept them happy. We didn’t go far though, because my dad was in a hurry to go (always the case), and a storm was also brewing.

We left at 3pm, after snacking in a coffee shop. The boats between island and mainland operate like busses, there was a long queue when we reached at the jetty. When a boat arrived, every body was like trying to squeeze themselves forward to get into the boat so as not to miss it. Such is the way of Malaysians, sigh.

When we got back to the main land, my sister asked, “So, whose bright idea was it?” o.O

The guilty man claimed we’ll go back again another day, when there’s no rain and no rush to go home so he could take more photos.

Here are the photos taken.

For Sale – Dried sea food claimed to be produced by home industry.

Zara all messy eating her pre-lunch snack.

Daddy is very proud of this shot he took.

Shops in different shade of turquoise.

At the back of the main street, looks like every one owns a boat.

Zaria enjoying the breeze and checking out the boats from a bridge.

Turquoise rules.

A window to a Senior Club.

A dying trade, a barber ‘grooming’ his customer.

Tasha sheltering from rain with an umbrella hat.

Zara having a good laugh (aha, she’s also in turquoise).

Zaria about to doze off.

Love this shot of my sister and Tasha.

We still co-sleep, the 4 of us. Daddy, Zaria and myself on our queen bed, and Zara on a single bed which is parked next to my side of the bed.

It started with either Daddy or myself had to stay with the girls, and only after both of them fall asleep could we leave the room. I always fell asleep before they do.

Later, after Zaria had fallen asleep, I would tell Zara I had to shower, or I had to shut down my computer, so that I could leave her bedside. Most of the time, she would be asleep when I finished showering or blog hopping shutting down my computer.

When she started being able to reach for the door knob and could get in and out of the room on her own, she began to allow me work in the study while she slept; knowing she could see me from the bed room (our room has a window which can look into our study) and able to get out of our room to come to the study if she needed me.

So we only had to wait for Zaria to fall asleep before we could leave the room to do our own things.

Yesterday, at bed time, I told Zaria I would leave her to sleep with jie-jie, while I get some work done.
Zaria : “No! Mummy lie down (with) you (me).”
Me : “Mummy still got work to do. Jie jie sleep with you ok?”
Zaria : “No. Mummy lie down here.” *patted her side*
Me : “Jie-jie will sleep with you and take care of you.”
Zara : “Jie-jie will take care of you, don’t worry.

While Zaria was still protesting (more like complained), I sneaked out, and the 2 of them kept each other company. When I went back in to check on them 30mins later, both were soundly asleep.

YEEEEEEEEEEEESSSS!!! Hope this will be another mile stone.

♥Zara has to sleep with her children (that’s what she calls them) : Fifi, Mr Blue, Mr Blue’s twins, Lamb, Toffee the bear (from Simple American) every night.♥ (photo taken early Jul)

♥Zaria on the other hand doesn’t need anything to hug, but lately, she insisted that I lay the ‘sarong’ for her to sleep on♥ (photo taken early Jul)

We always think that Zara is advance with her speech development, but come to her penmanship, we were getting a bit worried.

She could write numbers, but not alphabets. I thought her to remember my mobile number (just in case she need to use that info one day) by singing my number to her, “ZERO ONE doot, doot dooot doooot, doot dooot doot dooot (*censored*) mummy’s telephone.” to the tune of Twinkle-twinkle Little Star repeatedly.

She could recite/sing out the number quite a while back and a month ago started writing them on papers. Woooooot!

During the 1 week school holidays, I got her to start practicing to write the letters A, R, Z. Although she can recognise the letters, she had difficulty remembering how to write them.

To make her remember the stroke of the letters, I have to say,
A is like a tippee
R is like half a lollypop which is wearing a skirt (P = half a lollypop; that strokes -> |\ is a skirt); if the skirt is too tight, the lollypop will not be able to walk, if the skirt is too wide, the lollypop is making a split.
and
Z is a lightning, or a zig zag.

It may not make sense to others, but she use that info and started practicing, and on the 2nd day, she managed to write her own name. Wooooooot!!

And then we also started seeing her putting more details in her drawing. Woooooooot!

This is one of her work. Our family with her ‘signature’. I guess you can kind of make out who is who.