The birthday party preperation started quite a while back, thinking whom to invite, what food to serve (cook? cater? fast food?), what cake to order, what should be included in the party pack, and how to accomodate all the people in our small house.

Last Friday, I woke up at 6am from Stress!
I got changed, and went to the wet market to buy some of the ingredients still missing from the dishes that we’ll be cooking for Zara’s birthday celebration.

We had about 40 guests. 12 kids, and 28 adults, mainly family and the neighbours whom Zara has been playing with. The party was last Saturday, 4 days before her actual birthday.

The preparation (chopping, peeling, seasoning etc), cooking and baking started on Friday. I did those that do not required time at the stove, e.g. cup cakes, coleslaw, grilled chick wings, garlic bread. Tuyam cooked the curry, fried chick wings, fried noodle and rice. We bought some Char Siew (Chinese : BBQ Pork) and Pizzas last minute, worried that there may be not enough food.

Heaps of cupcake baked. Items in Party Packs meant for majority of the kids (babies and older kids have different items) bought from Shanghai 

I baked, cooked, decorated the house, coordinated the re-arranging of the furniture, packing the party packs, confirming with guests if they are coming, etc etc. On Saturday, what did Daddy do huh? He was reading newspaper, when I was working hard at the kitchen and at the same time trying to entertained the girls. He stopped only when I gave him the icy cold stare, and told him to get some baloons blown up. He got the cheek to complain our pump is not the right pump!! Then when I nagged him, he said if I was so stressed out, I shouldn’t throw any more birthay parties at home! Grrrrrr! To give him some credit, he did the last minute shopping and picked up the cake and the pizzas. Oh, and he paid for most of the things.

We had way too much food when every thing was placed on the table (so buzy running around, didn’t even have time to take photos of the food), and lots of left over after that.

When the guests started arriving, we could feel the house was really crammed. We didn’t have enough chairs, so pepole have to sit on the floor.

All the younger girls were admiring Zara’s cake, ordered from A Piece of Cake, just like last year, but this year’s theme is Princess!!!

Zara and her friends from the neighbourhood

Zara and her favourite cousin, Sam (with Zaria looking a bit lost); Zara & Zaria with cousins; Zara making sure I didn’t burn the cake; Zara blowing her birthday candles

After cake cutting, it was game time. I got my two older niece and newphew, Ally and Nick, to organise the games and they did really well. With the help of Sam and Norman, the younger kids have a blast!!

I must really thank Nick, Norman, Ally and Sam for helping with the kiddos, and making sure they have a great time!

Here’s one for the family album

We used to worry that Zara was going to be a bit tom-boyish. She wanted only to wear pants or jeans previously. Bob The Builder was her idol, and she aspired to be a cow girl.

This year, she’s into princess, tiaras, anything frilley (yikes), if they are pink even better.
She would remind us to apply her face cream on her face, so that she’ll be ‘fair’.
She likes to put flowers behind her ears.
She wants to wear dresses or skirt even at home.
She’s always checking herself in the mirror.

She’s after all a girl.

Jackie Cheung was in town a while back. Because we were going for his concert, we played quite a bit of his CD at home.

Zara like 2 of his songs most and always listened to them.

Here is she trying to sing one of the song.. take note, this is a girl who doesn’t speak Mandarin, so she’s just remember the “sounds” of the words.

I don’t know why the expression, nobody taught her that.

What do you think? Not entertained at all? How about if I added a background dancer?
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My girls rock, don’t they?

Zara is very clingy to me, especially when she knows it’s a weekend, or it’s after working hours (I normally declare by shouting “DING DONG“ to the girls to indicate I’d finished work), and I’m supposed to be the one who ‘jaga’ (Malay : Take care of) her.

I tried training her to sleep on her own by giving her milk, wait for her to finish, and then conning telling her I need to take my shower first, before I join her in bed.

If she’s willing, she’ll agree, and will tell me, “Mummy, you take bath, but don’t close the door ok?”
Most of the time when I’m done showering, she would have fallen asleep.

There are times when she’s not willing to sleep first, and she’ll say “pat pat me first” or “You sleep with me first, then only take bath.” At times like this, when I insisted that I needed a bath, she would say she’ll join me in the bath.

What she’ll do is, she’ll pull a stool and place it outside of the shower cubicle, and then watch me shower; after that, she’ll pull the stool and place it near the sink and watch me brush my teeth.

Yesterday, I wanted to use the toilet and she told me she wanted to come with me.
So I told her, “Mummy want to poo poo la.”
She insisted, “But I want to come!”
“Very smelly la. You don’t follow me.”
Her response, “Never mind. I stay in the toilet and do like this..” And she pinched her nose.

o.O”

After rain in the evening, Daddy went for his jog, and I brought the girls out to the park.

Me : Can mummy go jogging with Daddy or not?
Zara : No no no.. Cannot. You bring us to the park.
Me : Mummy always never get to exercise, mummy will become fatter and fatter.
Zara : I don’t want mummy to be fatter and fatter. You go jogging la.
Me : I go now ok? Aunty Jelly will stay in the park with you.
Zara : Cannot.
Me : I thought you say mummy can go jogging?
Zara : The road so wet and slippery, after you slip and fall. You don’t go now.

o.O”

Yesterday about 7:30pm, after we’d gone to the park :
Me : Can mummy go jogging now?
Zara : No no no.. Cannot..
Me :  Yesterday you said mummy can (could) go?
Zara : It’s dark outside. It’s dangerous. After you cannot see, you bang on the pillar how?

o.O”

Me : Then mummy go tomorrow morning then.
Zara : No no.. I want you to sleep with me.
Me : I’ll sleep with you in the night, but in the morning before you wake up, I’ll go for a jog.
Zara : *pondering*
Me : Can or not?
Zara : Daddy jaga me?
Me : I don’t know, if you wake (woke) up too late, maybe Daddy has gone to work.
Zara : You don’t go la, you stay at home with me la.

My reason to be fat.

Weight : Unknown
Height : Err, 64cm? (Daddy measured with me pressing her down)
She took her first flight this month, and she enjoyed it.

Wee! I’m flying, and I can’t sit still!

She’s picking things up real fast these days:
1) She started crawling back and forth earlier this month and can go very fast now. A few times she lifted her body to attempt crawling on her knees but then after her while, she slumps back down, preferring the comando style (Zara never wanted to crawl on her knees too).

2) She’s able to sit herself up from a crawling position; pull herself up to a standing position, and then sit back down; and she has also started cruising. This means, the house is for her to explore!

Cruising… exploring

4) She raises her hands up when we say Hip Hip Hooray!

Hip Hip Hooray!

5) She recognises and remembers objects. When we asked her where the aeroplane is, she’ll look at the sky.
When we asked her where the fan is, she’ll look to the ceiling.
Other items she’s able to recognise or know its location and names are :
~Her Baby, Boo! book (“book”);
~the cat figurine that’s hung on our door (“cat”);
~the Santa Clause in our living room (“bell bell” as there’s a bell each on the Santa’s legs);
~banana;
~her bowl for eating (“mum-mum”);
~her cup (“cup”); etc.
She’ll look towards the item and utter “Ugh” as a confirmation she’d spotted it.

She also knows Daddy’s tea cup is not touchable as it’s hot. She’ll move her hands closer to herself when we bring it near her.

She response to the name Zaria and knows Zara is referring to her sister.

6) Just like Zara, she learnt how to give kisses through the Baby, Boo! book. She’ll lean forward to kiss objects or people she likes.

7) Signing No More (by turning her palms down than up); Scared (by patting her chest)…Ok ok, we didn’t really teach her the ASL or British standards, it’s really whatever that’s easy for her to do, and for us to differentiate.

8 ) She says Mum-mum when she sees food, her bowl, and sometimes me (or was she calling me mama?…. dream on).

9) When she hears singing or music, she ‘sings’ along, bounces and waves her hands in the air ‘dancing’.

10) She understands “NO” “CANNOT”, and will stop what she’s doing or where she’s going when we raise our voice and say these words.

Eating :
This girl really loves food, and she’s now having about a bowl (Chinese rice bowl) of cereal each for breakfast and dinner. Lunch is a little bit of fruits or biscuits. She doesn’t like sour things like cherry tomatos, berries, yogurt.
She’s still fully on breast milk, drinking when she demands, which is about 3 hourly.

Emotions :
1) Still an easy going child, forgives and forgets real fast.

2) She prefers me over others but can be easily ‘tham-ed’ (Cantonese : convinced) to accept others.

3) She cries always for a reason, e.g. in pain, frigthened, or hungry; sometimes, she cries when she sees Zara crying; and very easy to pacify. And when she’s happy, she squels, makes funny faces (e.g. strethes her lips to the side and bears her teeth or just winks).

4) She loves water, to swim in, to bath in or to drink. Nowadays, she’ll crawl to the toilet if she knows someone is taking a bath as though she wants to join in.

I love water.. and err… grass too

5) She likes to dig into containers, drawers, baskets, takes everything out and throw on the floor. Another hurricane in the making.

Hee Hee, I’m going to throw out e.thing from the basket once I get my hands on it!

Time really flies, and it’s just amazing to see her grow!

Zaria was playing, and lost her balance. She fell down and knocked her head. While comforting Zaria, I asked Zara : “Why didn’t you catch meimei when she fell?”
“Because.. because….”
Me : “Because what?”
Zara : “I’m not super man” o.O
Me : “You don’t have to be super man to catch meimei”
Zara : “Because.. because.. (probably working on a better excuse) I’m not a safe-ter.” 😐
Fair enough I guess.

She woke up at 7am.
Zara : “Mummy I want milk”
I wanted to sleep for another 10mins so I told her to wait for a little longer.
Zara : “But, Mummy I want milk!”
Reluctantly, I got up : “Ok, we go she-she (Chinese : pee) first.”
Zara : “Mummy, I’m tired, don’t want to she-she.”
Me : *About to lay back down on the bed* “Since you are tired, then you have your milk later then.”
Zara : “I’m tired, but not that tired, mummy. I want milk. o.O”

She has also started using, “anyway”, “Oh Well”, “It’s like”, e.g. :
When I don’t entertain her when she comes to the study “Anyway, I’m going down stairs now.”
When one of her toy doesn’t work “Oh well, never mind. I’ll do this then.”
When asked why she likes the potong ice cream “It’s like ermm.. very creamy, errm.. cold and sweet”

I don’t know how she picks up some of the words she uses and applies in her day to day speech. Maybe it’s from us who speak the Queen’s English Manglish at home, maybe it’s from TV (my limit is 3 shows a day, and no, we don’t have Astro or cable TV at home. She only watches my selections of DVDs or VCDs).

She uses “Me”, “I am”, “You are” pretty well these days. She doesn’t speak that well all the time. Nowadays, she is trying to use feminine and muscular form in her speech… so some of the phrases can come out like this :
She name is lamb
He name is Mr Blue

And then past tense for her means adding “ed’ at the end :
The car spoil-led
I stand-ded on the naughty corner
The milipede died-ded.

It’s fun to see her development in this area, and sometimes it’s amusing too. Daddy and I can never have enough of this.

On a day when she had flu and she knows she can’t have anything cold :
“Kakak you warm up the ice cream for me la.”

On Daddy’s drinking in the restaurant :
“Daddy, you don’t drink beer la, after you mabuk (Malay : drunk) laaa.”

On her not able to handle her umbrella (kid’s size) in a windy, drizzling day :
“Mummy, I cannot handle any more. *Passed me the umbrella* You help me la.”

On me choosing her a DVD to watch (as she kept asking for the same one to be played in the evening for the past week) :
“Mummy, why you so stubborn one? I said I want to watch this show la, not that show.”

On Daddy blocking her in the toilet (Daddy brushing teeth and she needed to use the toilet bowl) :
“Excuse me Daddy, your big back side blocking me la.”

On me not wanting to bring her to the mini market :
“Mummy, you don’t be so selfish, you bring me to the mini market also”

Thanks to Leap Frog, we saw her using phonics the other day (nobody prompted her, she just picked up a book and did it):
*Referring to a picture of cat* Ke-ke-ke-ke Cat
*Referring to a picture of fish* Fe-Fe-Fe Fish
*Referring to a picture of a yo-yo* Ye-ye-ye-ye Yoyo
*Referring to a picture of a diamond* Die-Die-Die Diamond
The last bit made me laugh!! But, anyway, she got the concept right.

Notes : I’m the culprit who speaks with all the ‘la’s at home. Daddy has been ‘advicing’ me not to use so much la in my conversation with her, as she’s picking up all these from me. But I’m Malaysian la!

Occupation
Me : “Zara, Maisha’s (our neighbour’s kid) daddy is a pilot you know. Do you know what a pilot is?”
Zara :“Pilot fly(ies) plane.”
Me : “Maisha’s daddy so clever right?”
Zara : “My Daddy even more clever. My daddy is a driver.”

My personal Trainer
In the park, Zara : “Mummy, come, chase me.” *started running away from me*
Me : *stayed put*
Zara : *turned back and stood in front of me* “Chase me mummy.”
Me : “Mummy lazy.”
Zara : “No mummy, you must exercise. Make you strong. Come, run with me.”

Nursing
During dinner, I was telling Daddy, “I need to quickly finish my dinner, so that I can nurse Zaria.”
Zara : “Use stethoscope?”

Don’t be fooled by the face, she’s very capable of driving you up the walls

The whining started on Friday.
“Tomorrow we going cinema?”
“Yes.”
“The cinema turn off lights one?”
“Yes. But it won’t be very dark, because the big screen like a big TV will be very bright.”
“I’m scared, I don’t want to go.”
“But mummy and daddy will be going with you.”
“But I don’t want to go.”

We brought her anyway, and in the cinema, she sat between Daddy and I. Mid way through the show, Ratatouille, she started saying every now and then, “I want to go home!” “I don’t like the cinema.” “It’s too loud.” “It’s too dark.” “I want to go home”. Luckily, the whole cineplex was booked by our company, I allowed her to walk up and down the stairs next to the aisle, she was entertained until the movie was over.

Then on Saturday, she started her whining again.
“I don’t want to go to school.”
“You just go and have fun.”
“It’s not fun la. I don’t want to go to school la.”
“You go and learn new songs and read new story books. Maybe you’ll get to play with sand and water this week.”
“But I don’t want to go to school.”
Daddy even said, “Maybe we should stop her, she seems to be traumatised by the whole thing.” (Whining == traumatised? *roll eyes*)

We brought her anyway. I was supposed to have 15mins play time with her in the class (parents are allowed to be with the child the first 15mins), but when she got into the class and I was getting seated, she told me, “Mummy, you go out and wait. You don’t stay here.” o.O

After class, we met with Chanel and family in the market. Zara was whining the whole time, “I want to go home, I want to go home.” Even crying pitifully. But when we brought her to Wisma Bakti for a warehouse sales (the place was full of slides, see-saw for sales), she was happily playing and forgot that she needed to go home.

In the evening, Daddy asked where she wanted to go.
“I want to go One Utama.”
“What do you want to do there?”
“I want to go buy something.”
“What do you want to buy.”
“……. I want to go look at people walk here walk there.”

In the end, we just went and had dinner in a Chinese restaurant some where in PJ and Zara was whiney again, chanting “I want to go home” the whole time, even while enjoying her fried fish.

It’s really getting very difficult to bring her out these days, she only wants to do her own things, or else, she’ll be chanting ‘I want to go home’ throughout. Very annoying, very ‘fan’ ?. Haih.