On our way out shopping, another squabble broke up at the back seat.
Zaria : Maaa.. jiejie lying down on the arm rest.
Me : Let her lie down then. What’s wrong with that?
Zaria : It’s a(n) arm rest, not a head rest! I want to put my arm there!
o.O”

Zaria made a big mess in the bed room, taking out most of the toys from the toy basket, one of them was an iguana stuffed with alphabets. I asked her to clean up, and put everything back into the basket or we’ll not bring her out for dinner.
Zaria gave a big sigh then said, “But the Iguana will be so bored in the basket!”
o.O”

Lately, she’s always use the word bored, boring. Like in Penang, she wanted to stay in the hotel all the time, when we said we had to go out for lunch or dinner, she’ll roll her eyes and comment, “So boring, always eat and eat and eat and eat.” And when she found out we’re going to eat char kuey teow, she feigned boredom and said, “So boring, always char kuey teow, char kuey teow, char kuey teow.”
o.O”

In the mall, she wanted to go to the book shop but it was lunch time. So I told her, “No, we are going to eat lunch now.” She replied, “After we eat, then we read. OK?”
🙂 Glad she loves reading so much.

I showered her one cool evening, and when I was towelling her dry she told me, “Just now it’s so cold, my teeth was chattering like a castanet.”
o.O”

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She wanted to do ‘homework’ when I was coaching Zara, so I asked her to take a paper, and write A to Z for me, without any help from us.

And here is her writing at 3 and a half. The J and S are mirror image, the K strokes are a bit out, but I think she’s doing good.

Zara gave her a star, and I gave her a sticker which made her so proud of her work.

I can’t remember since when this started. Probably some time last year, Zaria started getting extremely annoyed by the labels on her clothes.

Initially, she would tug on them, and complained. Then she started getting the scissors, and tried to snip them off herself. She gets frustrated when she struggled to reach the label with one hand, and trying to cut it with the scissors in the other; she’ll shout for help in frustration.

Reasons she gave, “The label makes me so itchy!” “It’s poking me.” etc etc.

She will only relax when we cut it off for her. So most of her clothes has the washing instruction tag as well as the label snipped off.

Then for a few months, she refused to wear her socks to sleep (As girls don’t use blanket, I let them wear socks to bed so that they don’t get cold feet and can sleep better). She said, “The sewing so not nice. Make me uncomfortable.”

Eventually, I let her wear a pear of socks 2 sizes bigger, and she happily wore them and said, “This one the sewing is nice.” o.O”

So this girl doesn’t like frills, laces, that sort of things.

If you are my Facebook friend, you might have seen my status asking for ideas how to handle the 2 Duracell Bunnies I have at home.

The two weeks school holidays started this Monday, I’m getting stressed staying at home whole day with the girls, who has no where to spend their energy.

The Duracell Bunnies (the girls) out lived all the other bunnies (the parents) with their long lasting energy.

On Monday, they finished watching 3 DVDs by lunch time.

Fully charged up (since I guess watching TV turns your imagination wild and you don’t really use much energy just sitting there), they started moving little furniture around the study and arranged them into some sort of adventure land. Where they could crawl under stools, hopped walked from furniture to furniture and see who won’t fall off.

After their naps (both still take a nap in the afternoon), they were playing a little, but most of the time squabling. So they took turns to come upstairs to lodge their complaints. “Maa, jiejie snatch my things, punish her!” “Maaaa, Zaria drew a line on my drawing!” yada yada yada.

By the time I finished work, the study, the living room, the play room were in a mess. Thank God I have Jelly to do the clean up. (Although I did scream at the kids to get them to tidy up a bit, but they did a sloppy job)

It was a gloomy day, so nobody was in the play ground, and the girls didn’t want to be there. Again no ‘exercise’.

After dinner, they played in the room while I did some bread baking and Daddy took a shower. I heard all the giggling upstairs, so I went to check on them.

They were probably playing some dame in distress game. Zaria used the rubbish bin as the stepping stool, climbed up to her chest of drawers (~100cm), then she jumped down. Zara was moving a big pillow on the ground, trying to cushion Zaria’s fall. o.O”

I don’t know how many times they’d done the jumping and catching game, but I immediately screamed and told them to STOP! Told them how dangerous it was. Both looked at me with dissapointment, as though I’d thrown a wet blanket on them.

Reading, doing some spy games, more reading, and at 12am, they were still so energised, but we just turned off the lights, and went to sleep. Don’t know who fell asleep first, they or us.

On Tuesday, same routine. After breakfast, DVD watching again. I brought them out for lunch, and got them to do some running outside the shops.

When we got back home, they didn’t seem to be tired. Started pillow fighting, and stopped only when Zara’s pillow hit Zaria so hard, she knocked herself on the corner of the table. *faint*

More shouting and screaming (from me), and finally got them to take their naps. This time, I limit it to 1hr.

When they got up, asked Jelly to do body painting with them. Which occupied them for an hour, and they were so proud of their artwork (most of it done by Jelly though).

When I finshed work, brought them to the play ground. Held a race and made them compete with their friends. After dinner, Daddy brought them out for ice cream and took them to some indoor play ground.

When they got home, I took over, showered and brushed their teeth and then did reading with them, and there wasn’t any more jumping around in the room. By 11pm, Zaria climbed up the bed and said “I’m going to sleep already.” Yee Har!

Lights out at 11:30pm, we all slept. Did better on 2nd day.

There’s still 8 more weekdays to go.. Have to find ways to tire these two Duracell Bunnies! (and I didn’t sign them up from any camps or holiday programs. Sigh)

We’d done quite a fair bit of travelling in the car during the long weekend, going here and there. Being stuck in the car with two boisterous chatterboxes for many hours requires a lot of patience, which I have not.

In the car, Daddy and I tried to plan for a get-away during the coming school holidays but constantly got interupted by the girls, for the smallest things, such as the below :

Zaria: Maa. Maaa. Maaaa. (Girls call me either ‘ma’, ‘mummy’ or ‘mum’)
Me : huh?
Zaria: Do you know what is kolam? It’s pond.
Me : Hm.

Zara : Maa. Maaa..
Me : huh?
Zara : I love you, you know.
Me : Hm.

Zara : Maa. Maaa..
Me : huh?
Zara : You know I can sing well.
Me : Hm.

Zaria: Maa. Maaa.
Me : huh?
Zaria: Jiejie teased me. You scold jiejie.
Me : Jie….

Zaria: Maa. Maaa. Maaaa.
(if still no answer from me) Mummy!!! Mom!!! Why you talked to jiejie but you’re not talking to me?
Me : Ok, what?
Zaria: Just now I saw a red car.
Me : (loosing patience) Oh kayyyyyyyyy

So after like 100 rounds of the above.
Me : Girls! Girls…….! Can you girls stop interrupting? I can’t even have a decent conversation with your Daddy.

All quiet… for like 15 seconds.

Zara : Maa. Maaa..
Me : *annoyed* WHAT???!!!!!
Zara : You are not having a conversation now, so can I talk?
*faint*

Daddy intervened : Can the two of you just sit back and relax?
Zaria: I cannot relax. I cannot feel anything.
Daddy : You are not supposed to feel anything. You are supposed to relax.
Zaria: But I cannot feel anything.
*faint*

Zara : Maa. Maaa..
Me : What NOW??!!
Zara : I think you are gumpy because you are having your period. (so they know, because I asked them to help get me sanitory pads from the cupboard)
Zara : When is your period going to be over?
o.O”

And Daddy said he feels like bringing the girls to Terengganu during the holidays. Imagine the looooong drive.

Last week, Daddy had the TV on after dinner to watch the Thomas Cup live telecast.
Zara : Dad, I want to watch my DVD.
Daddy : Daddy wants to watch badminton.
Zara : But I want to watch my show.
Daddy didn’t reply, eyes glued to TV.
Zara : *upset* Even my own Ah Kong let me watch Sponge Bob in Karen yiyi’s house!
(My dad who monopolises the TV in my sister’s place, allowed the girls to watch Sponge Bob from 7pm to 8pm on Astro every time we were there. Well, he didn’t have a choice. The girls begged and begged with all their PLEAAASSSSE, until he gave in.)
There’ll be more to come, when World Cup season starts!

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When dining out, despite having her own seat, Zaria loves squeezing her butt on our chair midway through dinner.
One of these occasions, I told her off, “Go and sit on your own chair!”
She raised her voice, frowned and said, “But we’re a family right? We should sit together!”
o.O”

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When we’re home, Jelly is the one who bathes the girls. But when we were at my sister’s, I did the bathing while Jelly did the dishes.
One day when were at my sister’s, I was at the computer working, and Zaria came and asked me, “Mum, you bath me now.”
I told her, “Later, mummy finish mummy’s work first.”
She frowned and said, “You can bath me first right? Then you can finish your work right?”
Clever to reason now, I see.

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

When the girls go downstairs, they like to jump from the fourth step before the landing to the ground, and laugh every time they did it.
I was worried that an accident will happen, so I gave them a lecture, ending with something like that, “You all think it’s fun huh? Wait till an accident happen. If it’s so bad, you have to be on wheel chairs forever. Next time if I saw who did it, I’ll bring out my big fat juicy cane to cane the person.”
Girls were silent.
I asked Zara, “Zara, do you understand what I just said?”
Zara was a bit upset with the lecturing, and replied, “You also did it last time right?” (I told her when I was young, I jumped once from the cupboard and sprained my ankle)
“You also didn’t listen to your mummy right? And it’s fun right?”
o.O”
I had to explain, I know it’s fun to jump like that, if they like jumping, we can bring them to Jungle gym or Kids Sport to jump on trampoline. Jumping like that is too dangerous, and I cannot let them do it, just in case they get hurt.
Since then, nobody did the jumping any more except on trampoline and well padded flour.

Zara was being picky during dinner, she didn’t want to eat the fish, didn’t want to eat the vege, only wanted to eat rice with soup.

Daddy said, “Wait till I send you to the desert.”
Zara put down her chopstick, glared at Daddy, and said very slowly “If you want to send me to the desert, you better send me tonite. I’ll pack my bags and go.”
o.O” <-- Daddy and I went I chipped in, “Your daddy is just kidding.”
Zara continued to glare at Daddy and said, “You don’t really mean it right??”
“If you say one more time, then I’m OFF.”
o.O” <-- Daddy and I went Daddy asked, “Off where?”
Zara clarified slowly, “Leave. The. House.”

Five year old already like that. Fifteen year old that time how huh?

The little one, didn’t like what Daddy said too, so she frowned and told Daddy, “Dad you are speaking nonsense.” and refused to speak to him afterwards.

o.O”

Monday

When I picked the girls up from school, they smelled of oil. So I asked them what they have been eating or playing with.
Zara : Mummy, we ate Mc Donalds nugget in school
Me : Someone’s birthday today?
Zaria : Yah. Fin’s (Fin is from Zaria’s class) birthday. See I got so many things in the party pack.
Zaria started digging into her bag to get out all her goodies from the party pack.
Me : Zara, did you get a pack as well?
Zara : No, only the 4 year old class have. 6 year old don’t get anything.
Me : How come you got to eat the nuggets then.
Zara : Zaria shared with me. She also shared with WY and JY (who are both from Zara’s class). I only ate little bit, WY and JY ate so many you know.
Me : Mei mei, you are such a good girl, you shared with jiejie and her friends.
Zaria : Yah. I let jiejie and her friends eat my nuggets and chips.
(Thinking of testing out her reaction) Me *pretending to be sad* : But mei, you never keep any for mummy. I’m so sad. You never share with me. And I’m so hungry you know.
Zaria : You are working wut, how to share with you? (Clever reply)
Me *still pretending to be sad* : But you can keep for me right? When I pick you up, you can give it to me.
Zaria : …. quiet

Tuesday

I picked up the girls from school, and when I was buckling Zaria up, she tried to reach for her bag.
Zaria : Mummy, wait. I got something for you.
30 seconds digging later, she found what she was looking for. She opened up the box, and gave it to me.
Zaria : Mummy, I share this with you. I only take (took) 2 bites, and then I keep (kept) for you.
This is what she kept for me.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

She normally empties her lunch box after school, eating or sharing whatever she has with her friends, while waiting for me to pick her up. It must have taken her a little effort and restrain to keep some cream cracker for me.

She put a big smile on my face all the way home. (I didn’t eat the cracker, b’cos I wanted to get home to take a photo of it.)

Zaria is very chatty nowadays, and very good in talking back, I’m sooo entertained by the things she said.

When she’s angry with us nowadays, i.e. for not giving her something she wanted, she would say to me, “I’m going to give you poison apple to eat.”
And to Daddy, “I’m going to put you in jail.”

When I raised my voice to her, she’ll ask me, “Why did you scold me?”

Once, she wasn’t eating properly during dinner, I kept asking her to just take the last bite. After some pestering, she reluctantly took the last bite, and then started coughing dramatically and said, “I think I’m going to vomit already, you better send me to the hospital.” o.O”

When she wants us to carry or piggy back her and we refused, she would say, But I’m very very very very very very very very…. very very very very tired.”

One day, we were out and I was piggy backing her, I have my hair bunned up, and when she wanted to lean on me, her face got pressed on my clip, making her uncomfortable; so she asked me to remove my hair clip.
I told her it was a hot day, and I preferred my hair bunned up.
“You know mum, you don’t look nice if you tie up your hair like that. Better you put your hair down” o.O”

When we went out one Sunday, Zaria sat in the front passenger seat, andＩsat behind. So she told us she’s now the mummy, I was the jiejie, and Zara the meimei.
To tease her, I asked, “You can be mummy meh? You don’t know how to write also.”
She replied, “I know wut, I can write my name already.”
“Ok, then you know how to read or not? Later must read bed time story you know.”
She replied, “It’s already late in the night. We cannot do any more reading. o.O”

Daddy normally does grocery shopping with the girls, and will give them an ice cream treat after shopping. I have been telling him off not to give them any more ice cream because they shouldn’t be eating ice cream so often.
One day, after grocery shopping, Zaria came straight to me and declared, “Mummy, today we didn’t eat ice cream!”.
Sensing a lie, I asked her, “What flavour did you eat?”
She replied without thinking, “I ate smarties flavour.”
Ok, for now, mummy is still smarter than her. 😛

I was meant to post this earlier, but so busy with so many things.

I think Zaria is very much influenced by Zara, because Zara draws a lot, Zaria too likes to join in and does her drawing, and I think she’s quite good for her age. I like it especially when she adds a story to her drawing, explaining what she’s drawing.

These were done by Zaria a month ago.
She said, “This is a princess with her beautiful bed. See the crown or not?”

“And then the wicked witch casting a spell, and the magic is zig zag zig zag coming out of the wand.”

And then during Chinese New Year, she started writing her name and adding ‘faces’ to it. Nobody actually taught her how to do it. o.O”
It’s become kind of like her signature.

She’s growing up so fast. And I’m enjoying her cute drawings and her cheeky conversations very much these days.

The little artist (the ‘crystal’ on her chest is a sticker ‘pendant’ Zara gave to Zaria. Since Zaria doesn’t have a necklace yet)