My Two Girls – All About Zara and Zaria

Guess who stays over at our place this week? King’s Wife and her daughters!
Guess who’s the happiest of the lot? Zara! She’s so happy to have her cousins play with her, especially Sam.

The house is noisier, busier, merrier.

During the day, she no longer shouts for me, it’s always, “Sam jiejie, come!” “Sam jiejie, play with you (me)!” “Sam jiejie” here “Sam jiejie” there.

She wants to dress up like Sam, wants Sam to sit next to her when she watches her TV program, wants Sam to watch her brush her teeth, wants Sam to bath together with her, wants Sam to accompany her wherever she goes etc.

Luckily Sam is a girl with full of patience, and she gives in to Zara’s demand. That’s also probably why Zara loves her to bits!

a glimpse of her with her cousins (she’s always so affectionate with Sam)

She’s going to oh-so-miss-them when they go home!

My stomach is extremely huge, I have slightly more than 3 more weeks to go.

Resting is no longer possible. Laying on the right or left no longer feel comfortable. Sitting hurt my back. Standing tires my calves. I wake up middle of the night with eyes wide opened, trying hard to go back to sleep.

Baby is still active although with not much space for movement, we can see the tremors she creates when she moves, skin stretching before our eyes.

I’d sorted out all the necessities for the arrival of the baby :
1) ordered my confinement herbs and herbal wine from my Chinese Dr.
2) confirmed with friend’s mum who will be supplying me with home brewed rice wine.
3) signed up with Stemlife for baby’s cord blood banking
4) bought a few new pieces of clothing to welcome baby’s arrival (the rest will be wearing her jie-jie’s clothes)
5) checked that we have enough bottles/milk storage bag to store breast milk if I need to pump out
6) bought new Dr Brown bottles for her during occasions where I cannot breast feed directly
7) rearranged the furniture in the room to accommodate the cot (Daddy has yet to raise the cot and fixed its railing)

And yesterday, I’d even packed my bag for my hospital stay. So now, I’m just waiting for baby’s arrival.

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On the other hand, Zara has been bugging us to bring her to the beach, to Morib, to Penang, to Cowboy Town. We had to explain to her I’m too big to be traveling now, and we have to wait for Mei-Mei’s (Chinese : Little sister) arrival before we can travel again.

So over the weekend, besides bringing her to the mall, we let her play in her wading pool. She was very very happy, since her last dip was actually in Phuket, quite a while back.

Zara has been calling Daddy other names other than just Daddy.
When we are going home from my sis’ place, she would announce, “I’m going home already, to see my Old Man, Bob The Builder.”
When she has shouted for Daddy many times and got no response from him, she’ll start using his name (first and last name together), “XXXXX LOW! XXXXX LOW!” Just like I would address him when I don’t get any response from him.

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She started to have some sense of time, and started using words to describe the past. However, she’s still confuse with the usage, and it’s cute to see her attempts.
E.g. “Just now we went to Cowboy town, the pony kick kick Zara right?” (although it wasn’t just now but some time back.)
“Last time Zara saw reindeer in Ikea, and point(ed) to Mummy and Daddy.” (although it was something that happened the day before)

Me : “Zara you shu-shu (Chinese : Pee) is it?”
Zara : “No, I didn’t. I (am) lying down only” (she was on the bed trying to get herself to sleep).

Me : “How are you today? Do you still have runny nose?”
Zara : “No I didn’t (don’t). I’m feeling better already.”

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She likes to help Tuyam with her pronunciation or us when we can’t find the right word to use.
Me : “Remember in Phuket, you saw the lobster in the restaurant, hmm.. what are those things on the lobster’s head? *using my pointer to make the ‘horn’ on the head* antenna?”
Zara : “Mummy, it’s fillers mummy! It’s fillers.” *grinning happily*
(Is it really called fillers? I actually don’t know, but that’s what Daddy told her during the trip and she remembers.)

Tuyam : *Pointing to a bee picture on her book* “See this ‘beh’ flying flying.”
Zara : “Bees lah. Kakak, Bees”

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Yesterday, she was crying so much for me before her nap. Wanted me to give her milk and nap with her. After her nap, when she was in a better mood :
Me : “Why did Zara cry just now? Kept asking for mummy?”
Zara : “……..” (she always doesn’t like to talk about embarrassing stuff, and crying is one)
Me : “Tell mummy, why did Zara cry just now?”
Zara : “Because mummy pregnant (I started wondering what has this got to do with her crying) . *She paused then continued* (obviously trying to find the right words) Zara wants to sayang sayang (Malay: TLC) mummy.”

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On a loving day,
Zara : “Zara is mummy’s ?? (precious). And mummy is Zara’s ??.”

Little Miss Engineer has been mixing too much with her cousin Norman and playing a lot of his toys when she’s stationed there at my sis’ place.

She gets very excited as well when Daddy has to do some DIY stuff at home, she calls her Daddy, “Bob The Builder” (and other names, which I’ll talk about it later); and herself, “Little Bob The Builder”; and starts singing the Bob The Builder Song when Daddy takes out his tool box.

She knows the name of some of the tools used like hammer, screw driver, spanner, screw, saw; and always keen in lending a hand to Daddy when he has to work on something at home.

‘Drilling’ my dad’s table; All geared up to be Bob The Builder; Working on her own ‘project’; Helping Daddy to put up the storage box for her toys.

My sis’ maid was so curious that I allow her to play with such toys and even thinking of getting a tool set for her for Christmas. This is an exploring stage for her, so I just let her play with whatever toys that interest her, be it boys’ or girls’.

That reminds me, I have to start doing some baking, to expose her to some of the girlish’ activities.

Daddy installed the Ikea chest of drawers we bought for the girls’ clothes in our room, and a new toy storage bench for Zara’s toys, with lots of interruptions help from Zara. Now the girls will have proper place to store their clothes (I used to store Zara’s clothes in Ikea bought boxes), and later, a proper play room (we planned to convert one of the rooms to a play room so that Zara can stop messing up playing in the living room).

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We have a big family dinner at Eat Work Shop on Saturday, in honour of my nephew, Nick, and niece, Ally, who got 5As each for their UPSR (Primary 5) exams.

Zara was happily occupied by her favourite Sam jie-jie and Norman kor-kor (her 2 younger cousins), and I have Tuyam (who rarely goes out with us) to run after her. It means I could stuff my self silly with all the sumptuous food (And Eat Work Shop does serve very good western cuisine).

She kept sticking to Sam jiejie

Zara with her favourite 2 younger cousin, Sam and Norman; Sam with Tasha; The dinner table; The 2 As scorers with the dinner sponsor, my dad.

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Daddy insisted that we go visit an Ostrich Farm (he thinks I’m still super mobile in my 9th month pregnancy) on Sunday and decided to go to the one in Klang.

For RM15/adult, it was more of a ‘mini zoo’ than an Ostrich Farm. We saw some sickly ponies, bald ostriches, skinny horses, ugly pythons and other small unhealthy looking animals in a smelly and muddy environment. Zara wanted to leave the minute we stepped into the ‘farm’, claiming it was “So smelly!”, and she refused to walk about, saying the ground is “So dirty.”, and complaining the ostriches are “So ugly.” In and out, it took us less than 30mins.

Daddy said, “Give me another hour, and I’ll bring you to the one in Semenyih, which is supposed to be bigger and better.” But I said that’s enough of Ostriches and smelly animal dung for a day. So we went home instead.

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For dinner, we went to Benkay Japanese Restaurant in Nikko Hotel, since I got a RM50/- off voucher.

Dinner was absolutely lovely. Zara ate some softshell crab maki, a whole prawn tempura, and a bowl of chawan-mushi. It always gives us a good feeling to see her enjoying her food (which is rather rare).

After dinner, we spent sometime enjoying the Christmas Deco (We forgot to bring the camera, what a waste). Daddy purposely drove passed the busy Jalan Bukit Bintang to look at the Deco put up by the malls and the hotels. However, the decorations were pretty lame.

Knowing someone loves you and cares for you, especially your 2 year old is oh.. so.. precious. Here are some precious moments of mine.

Zara : *fussing and did not want Daddy to brush her teeth for her* I want mummy do! Mummy! Mummy! Mummy do.
Me : *from the bed room, giving excuse* Zara, mummy stomach painful, cannot brush your teeth. Let Daddy do.
Zara : I want to go out, I want to go out
Daddy : Brush your teeth first. Then you go out.
Zara : I want to go out, give mummy medicine.
(She probably thought the Multivits that I get her to feed me nightly will help with my (fake) stomach ache.)

Me : Mummy cannot carry you so much because mummy’s stomach so big, carrying you will make mummy’s back painful
Zara : *points to my massage oil* Mummy give you (me) the oil?
Me : What oil?
Zara : The oil to massage mummy. I want to massage massage mummy’s back.
(Daddy gave me a massage once for my shoulder ache, and she was ‘helping’ out. So she thought she could help relieve my back ache with a massage.)

Me : I love you Zara
Zara : *big lovely grin* I also love you mummy

After a week of celebrations (another birthday song singing just within the family, a trip to Kidzsports and Gymboree) and not being well (sore throat from all the nasi lemak and little fish, fever, cough, flu), finally the birthday season is over. 😛

Here is just for my record, her 2year old development.

~ Weight : 10.2kg (taken during her fever)
~ Height : 86.3cm

Emotions and Character
~ I’m not sure if it’s a two year old thing or it’s because our 2nd one is coming, she’s extremely clingy to me. She prefers me to tuck her to bed, even for her afternoon nap (she’ll cry if I don’t do it but I just ignored it), she only wants me to bath, she’s always asking me to look after her instead of working, “Mummy look after Zara, don’t want mummy to work”
~ She’s expressing her love, by kissing us or by saying, “I love you Mummy” (almost every night before she goes to bed), “I love you Daddy” (occasionally).
~ She is becoming a handful especially when we go out shopping, and she goes wild running here and there, climbing this rack and that.
~ She loves going to the super markets (Giant is her favourite because of the free kiddy rides)
~ Very stubborn, especially if she has set her mind on something (e.g don’t want to take bath, don’t want to have her meal). However, my ultimate weapon, ignore her or send her to the naughty corner, or sometimes smacking (I’m really trying to avoid smacking her, but there are times when she’s really unreasonable even after much coaxing, and I sometimes blame it on my raging hormones.. I know it’s just an excuse).

Language
~ She is doing very well in this respect
~ She’s making up the lyrics of songs she knows spontaneously, e.g. when I can’t find my car keys, she’ll go “Where oh where is mummy’s car keys, Oh where oh where can it be?” (singing to the tune Where Oh Where Has My Little Dog gone)
~ She started picking up Malay and Mandarin words; speaking to Tuyam using some Malay or to us using some Mandarin. E.g. “Kakak, this one very sedap (tasty)”; “Kakak, Zara tak mau (don’t want)”; “Zara is mummy’s ?? (precious)”; “Mummy, Zara ?? (don’t want).”

Toilet training – I wonder when she’ll be potty/toilet trained
~ She’s getting adversely affected by the smell of poo and urine. Especially her own. She vomited once when I got her to pee in the shower cubicle before her bath and she smelled her own urine; she also vomited when I got her to flush her stool away and refused to do it again (normally I flush her stool even when she did her business on the diaper)
~ She once said, “I don’t want to poo poo already. Poo poo is so smelly.” when trying to control her bowel movement
~ She knows to be a big jie-jie (Chinese : big big-sister), she has to stop wearing diaper, but she doesn’t want to use the toilet bowl or her potty because she said, “Shu shu and poo poo is so smelly.”
(Tips anyone?)

Food
~ Very fussy with what she eats and has very acute sense of taste. Just a speck of coriander on her steam fish, and she’ll spit out that piece with the coriander mixed with it.
~ Doesn’t eat a lot of things, and doesn’t eat much, and it’s making us worried. We’re trying to psycho her into saying if she doesn’t eat, she’ll be very thin like her mama (Chinese : paternal grandma), and won’t have muscle like daddy or have body shape like mummy, and it helps sometimes, saying she wants to have body like mine (Ha! Wait till she’s older, but now, I’ll just savour this).
~ Loves ice cream, sausages, chocolate, pop corn, cheese. For real meals, she likes rice or porridge with ikan bilis (Malay : little fish or anchovies); macaroni and cheese; garlic bread.
~ Have 3 or 4milk feeds : 6oz in the morning upon waking, 6oz in the afternoon before her nap, 4oz in the night before bed, and sometimes 6oz in the early mornings which started recently (she’s preparing me for my night feed)

I have slightly more than a month to go before No. 2 arrives. There are 2 things which I’m cracking my head with.

1st : No. 2’s name
Daddy and I can’t decide on a name for No.2. We wanted a two syllables name which starts with Z and ends with A. That doesn’t leave us much choice. Daddy doesn’t like my choice of names, and I don’t like his choices.

Anybody has any names to recommend?

(Some jokers have suggested Zebra. Well, even if they named their kids Hippo or Oinky, we still won’t name ours Zebra)

2nd : What are we to do with Zara when I have to be in the hospital to have the baby?
When Zara was born, Daddy was in the hospital with me the 2nights I stayed there. Now, Zara has never slept without either one of us at her side. I’m not sure what we are going to do when I have to be admitted this time.

1) Have Daddy stay at home with her, so I’ll be alone in the hospital?
2) Have her stay with us in the hospital together?

We asked her if she would be ok to sleep at home with Kakak when mummy goes to the hospital. She said, “Cannot. I want to sleep with mummy only.”
The only person she’s willing to sleep with without mummy is Sam, her favourite jie-jie. She said, “Can sleep with Sam jiejie, mummy stay in hospital.”

For those who have two kids, what do you do with no. 1 when you were in the hospital giving birth to no. 2?

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Zara is getting more and more clingy even with Tuyam back. They can play together, Tuyam can feed and change her; but when it comes to nap time, Zara would be whining for me, “I want mummy to sleep with Zara.”

When it’s time for her evening bath, and if Daddy wanted to bath her, she would say, “Don’t want Daddy. Want mummy do only. Mummy do, mummy do.” followed by crying if we don’t oblidge.

At night, only I can sleep next to her. If Daddy stayed on too long at her side after saying good night to her, she would say, “Daddy sleep there (pointing to Daddy’s side of the bed).” or “Daddy go down (from my bed)” If Daddy lied on her bed.

Yesterday, when Daddy got her things ready and wanted to brush her teeth (most days I do the brushing), she told Daddy, “Daddy brush la. Use Zara’s toothpaste, use Zara’s tooth brush. Ok? Daddy brush la, use Zara’s water to rinse mouth. Zara don’t want”.

I wonder how I will be able to cope with a clingy 2 year old, and a new baby.

Today is Zara’s actual birthday, I’m supposed to write about her monthly development, but I’ll do that later. I want to write about her negotiation skill and how good she’s getting at it.

Zara : Mummy, I want to watch TV. (she started using lots of “I” instead of Zara now)
Me : No, bed time already, go and brush your teeth and change to your pajamas.
Zara : Mummy, one time only.
Me : No, it’s bed time.
Zara : Mummy, please. One time only. *puting out her pointer to show ONE*
Me : Ok then. One time yeah.
Zara : Ok. *happily sat down and wait for me to put on her program for her*
After finishing
Me : Ok, time to get ready for bed.
Zara : Mummy, one more time.
Me : No. Enough already.
Zara : Please. Last time. Last time only.
Me : No. Just now you said one time only. So, you already watched one time, so get ready for bed now.
Zara : Last time please. *looked at me with Bambi eyes*
Me : Ok ok.. one last time.

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She had fever yesterday, and started recovering today.
Zara : (for lunch) I want to eat nasi lemak (Malay : Coconut rice) with little fish.
Me : No, you still have a bit of fever, cannot eat nasi lemak with little fish.
Zara : I’m feeling better already.
Me : No, not today. When you are all well ok?
Zara : Little bit only. Please.
Me : No. (not this time)

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Tuyam got her a set of toy bathing set from Indonesia which came with hair dryer, shampoo, comb etc. After opening up Tuyam’s present, she wanted to try it on Sam, and ‘wash’ Sam’s hair.
Sam oblidged, but after the N-th time, she wanted to stop.
Zara : Sam jie-jie, I want to wash your hair.
Sam : No thanks.
Zara : You must wash your hair. *pulling strands of her own hair to show Sam* After sticky. Got cockroach in the hair. Got bugs. Got lizard. I wash for you, ok?
Sam : ……

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When she asked for me, and I’m in a meeting, she would wail and cry for the whole duration of my meeting. So I asked her :
Me : Why Zara always cry when mummy is in a meeting.
Zara : Because Zara loves mummy.
Me : *melted* Mummy loves you too, but why you cry?
Zara : Because Zara don’t (doesn’t) like mummy to close the door
(I always close the door to the study when I have a meeting just in case the people on the other side of the line can hear her)
Me : Oh.. But mummy needs to close the door because mummy needs to talk to uncle and aunty on the phone. It doesn’t mean mummy don’t love you.
Zara : *look at me like she understood*
Me : Mummy will always love you ok? Even when mummy is upset or angry, mummy still love you. Mummy love you very much. But mummy just can’t carry you or have you sit on mummy’s lap when mummy have meeting ok?
Zara : ok. (not sure if she understood though, but she loves being re-assured that I love her)

We have been planning for Zara’s birthday party for a while, and when we asked her what she wanted to do for her birthday, she recalled my friend’s daughter’s 1yr old birthday party in the hotel and she said, “Like mummy’s friend, party in hotel. Got clown one. Got many balloons one.”
We were kiam siap (Chinese: Stingy). We did the finances, and thought it would have been better to keep the money saved (from having the party in a hotel or restaurant) in the bank for her. Instead, we have a small party at home, invited just our immediate family members. None the less, it was fun, and the food was good.

The guests : My friend’s kids’ Jensen and Yen Mae, who dropped by in the afternoon to drop off their presents for Zara. Eldest sis’ daughter, Tasha. Youngest sis’ son, the shy Norman.

We had Nasi Lemak for dinner, prepared by Tuyam and my sis’ maid KC. Daddy said this can beat any best nasi lemak in town, I would have to agree with him. It’s absolutely delicious. Zara loved it as well, although all she took was nasi lemak with ikan bilis (Malay : little fish or anchovies) and fried chicken.

I ordered a cake from A Piece of Cake, with Zara specifying the design, “Want got cow girl one. Got pony one. Want dog dog” This is the cake that comes with a cow girl riding on her pony with her pet dog.

The beautiful and yummy-licious cake; The kids were all waiting to attack the cow girl and the pony while Zara munched away the candies on the cake; Zara busy stuffing herself with the sugar beads and stars on the cake; The cow girl and the pony after the kids’ attack.

For the album : Our family; My dad with all his grand children; With my in-laws; Zara with her cousins

A very happy birthday girl: She loved the part where every body sang Happy Birthday to her; she was scared of the fire from the candle so she stood far away from them while trying to blow them out, and eventually just shouted for help.

She had a good time and slept only at 12am, 2hrs passed her bed time.