Backdated Happenings and Recent Ones too

I am trying to put Arif to sleep but this time it takes longer than usual. It is past 10p.m and Arif is still awake. I came home later than expected all because of a stupid car that broke down at the traffic light next to my office. Now i have so little time to spend with my precious ones.

Wondering how can i be typing this blog when i said i was trying to put Arif to sleep? He's a bit calmer tonight so i put him down in his cot and wind up his cot mobile, a gift from moksu a.k.a Atu (by Aydin). I am hoping that he will fall asleep by himself but i guess i am just pushing my luck. i have managed to upload some nice pitures to share. Let's see if i manage to post a few before Arif starts to crank up. There are collections of pictures old and new. When i say old it is not older than a couple of months though :)

Above is a picture of my dream choc moist cake. I have been dreaming to bake the most delicious choc moist cake ever. I was very happy with the taste but not the physical appearance :p Give me some time and i will improve on my topping skills.

Above are some pictures taken @Saloma Restaurant for Johnson's Baby Pesanan Kasih Ibu photoshoot. Aydin had too much of energy so they distracted him by asking him to hold the board. He did a good job on that one ;)

Above is the hamper we got from Johnson & Johnson Bedtime campaign. I think we are good for atleast a year of supplies :)

Above : The Mischievious Boy, Aydin's attempt to take a picture but shooting from the wrong end and took his own face picture instead. One-two one-two (Aydin way of saying let's take a picture).

So, mummy had to help out and take a picture of one of his favorite toy, The Mater from Cars.

Above is a picture taken during Erina's birthday "party". This would be her last birthday before she becomes a MUM. Check out the green bear jelly cake i bought from qjelly.com. Don't ask me why green bear because that was the only readily available jelly cake when i visited the shop in Puchong at the very last minute. Here are more pictures taken that evening:

Today 05/05/2008 Happy Mother's Day from Aydin, Arif and Ayah

I had a surprise delivery at the office after lunch today. I received a bouquet of Ferrero Rochers and the card says: Dear Mummy, Happy Mother's Day and we love you very much. Lots of love Aydin, Arif and Ayah. I was so touched. The last time hubby sent me a bouquet was on our 1st Wedding Anniversary and now to receive it from the 3 men in my life makes it more special. This is one Mother's Day that will be embedded or "stored" in my "memory card" forever. Hahaha... typical IT person.

1st day of work and post-natal dilemma

Today is my first day of work and it also marks Arif's 2nd month. It was not a productive day besides the fact that today is a Friday which means a very short day. To make things worse, we were out the whole day yesterday and came back late at night. I was falling asleep while driving to work. So muh for safety!

The usual comments from colleagues and friends, trying to see if i have shed and lost all the pregnancy weight. Some thinks i lost it (obviously! if you are comparing when i was pregnant) and some think i look the same i.e: pre-pregnancy weight. What they do not know is i have a flabby tummy and my stretch marks are awful. If i can quote how a good friend describes her nightmare stretch marks as a scr*tum look alike... i can say she describes it well. I am currently using a cream supposedly to reduce the appearance of the marks and tighten the skin. It says to use it liberally twice a day for 2 weeks to see results. i shall say i have 1 more week to go and let's see how effective the cream is. I am also using the slimming machine from Ogawa at Mother's Day promo price. It better work or i shall be visiting the slimming center soon! I can't fit into most of my pants and it is depressing. I do not mind tops because then i will have some excuse to buy new ones ;)

Let's leave my post-natal depression and dilemmas behind. What has happened for the past couple of weeks:

1. Did the shooting for Nona/Johnson & Johnson Kasih Ibu shooting at home. Check it out on the first Sunday of June on TV3 Nona @2p.m.

2. Went for Johnson & Johnson Bedtime campaign @KLGCC. What i can say is the logistics was terrible. Mothers were expected to bring their kids to support the campaign but there were no access for strollers. What i mean is there were only stairs all the way to get to the function room. There i was with Arif alone in the stroller. Luckily there was a doorman to help me carry Arif in the stroller up the stairs. They didn't even have a prper place to change diapers. I do not expect the club to have a diaper change station but the organiser should have thought of preparing a small corner for it. I had to change Arif's diaper on the table top next to the sink. Thank God for changing mat.

3. Got a call from an ad agency asking Arif and i to come for a casting. So far, Arif is like a hot stuff! ;)

4. We got RM500 worth of J&J products which could last us for more than a year considering that Aydin and Arif hardly uses any powder, lotion or whatsoever after bath. I prefer their natural smell :) and it helps with eczema too. Less physical exposures to chemicals.

5. Baked an orange cake with custard topping and fruit cocktail. Planned to bring it over to Esma's for lunch on May 1 holiday. She is in town and we were supposed to have the usual small get-together do. Unfortunately, Isha was not feeling well so i really didn't know who was supposed to eat all the cake! Ended up bringing it to the office where i was sure or i will make sure i will only bring back an empty container.

6. Good news! My sis, Erina is expecting a boy. We blame it on dad for asking for boys and soon he will have 3 grandsons in total. Mum loves it because she already has 3 girls.

7. Update on Aydin's vocab: he can now connects 2 words to become a sentence i.e: Aweef cold (Arif cold), Aweef steep (Arif sleep), oh man!, bibik milk (bibik, i want milk) and lots more. He can also name his parts of body and can tell his alphabets... or atleast till F.

8. Arif recognizes few faces. He will smile and interact with people around him. He also has 2 strong legs that knock down a small bowl of water for changing his diaper ;)

To Nurms: i owe you nice and latest pictures of Arif but everytime i am entering my blog, it is always in the dark where Arif is asleep. I will try to do it soon. I like some pictures of him and Aydin side by side and i must admit that Arif now looks exactly like his Ayah with the forehead and eyes and the botakness.

Alrighty, gotta go to bed. Need to take Aydin for his playgroup tomorrow. I hope he behaves like last week. He has improved his attention span during his playgroup session. I think it's the teacher. I personally like Teacher Farra because she knows what a 2-3 year old kids love which is singing and physical activities (besides the fact that she was the singer for the song "Bagaikan Puteri").

The End of Happy Days?

It is exactly 1 more week before i have to go back to work. Life has been pretty challenging everyday. Besides that i have successfully baked the yummiest moist choc cake i have been dreaming of and mum's favorite carrot cake. In fact, she has requested another carrot cake for our pot luck at Aunty Ani's this Saturday. I have tried to enrol myself into the cake decoration class but it was full. Sigh.. takde rezeki. Will have to wait till the next available class.

Today, we had shooting for a TV3 Nona's segment on Kasih Ibu. Check it out! Not that i look good in fact i think my hair was a mess! It will be my first appearance on a national TV where i am not captured there by luck :) You know what i mean. Check out Arif as the main "actor".

News and updates on my kids (wow! Syawa has KIDS). I have yet rejuvenated and doubt will ever be for the next... few years?! Arif has definitely gained alot of weight. He has been trained to drink from the bottle though he prefers to feed directly from the boobies. I have been storing my milk and running out of storage in the freezer fast :) Bought more MLO's storage bottles yesterday.

Aydin has never lost his energy level... ever! He is getting more and more mischevious every day. His latest vocabularies: Noh (nose), Eye, Knee, Mah (mouth), Er (ear), To (Toe), Hair. I think it does makes alot of difference when you are around to help the kids with their learning. I have never heard Aydin learned as much as he does lately. He recognizes few letters as well. How i wish i can become a SAHM (Stay-at-Home-Mum).

Aydin has flu for the past couple of days and he has spread the virus to Arif :( Arif has got the signs of flu i.e: runny nose and cough but hope that's about it or there goes my sanity. Lesser amount of sleep and a 2-year old active toddler can definitely make you lose your mind.

Dang! i am supposed to go to bed early. I have a teleconference with my "dear supervisor" tomorrow morning....

Arif is 1 month old!

Happy 1-month old Arif!! (singing it like the typical bbirthday song)

Arif is 1 month old today and he has definitely gained weight.. he has actually gained his supposedly 1-month old weight when he was only 3 weeks old (oops!). Well, i like chubby cheek babies. Blame the mummy or blame the mcboobies (as my dear friend rena calls it). Arif is exclusively feeding from my dear boobies and i am very proud of it. It is definitely not an easy task i must say and i have been guilty for expressing my frustration this evening when Arif refused to take his nap when mummy needed one herself... desperately.

I think Arif is looking more and more like Aydin now. I confused myself sometimes when i saw Arif's picture and thought it was Aydin... I wonder how it is going to be if i get twins. I can't even tell my sons apart even when they are not twins! LoL

Oh no! There goes Arif again.. time for his next feed. Later!

Need more than 24 hours in a day

Finally i am able to log in. Life has been pretty hectic lately, adjusting with two kids at home and trying to get some sleep AND surprisingly i have been thinking about some office work lately (DANG!). I blame my supervisor for the thought of office work during my confinement. She gave me some "things to do and think about" before i left for maternity leave not knowing that i would go into labor 2 days later.

Anyway, just noticed that i had some typos and grammar mistakes in my previous blog. Any idea how i can go and correct it? I do not know how i could improve my writing by blogging but atleast i try kan?

Alot has happened since my last blog entry. I was busy trying to keep up with my confinement schedule i.e: bertungku 2x/day, berurut daily, mandi rempah besides breastfeeding the little one almost 24 hours a day! Arif feeds like a piranha and it is very taxing especially at night. I have lost 10kg but i am also eating like a monster! I eat constantly and almost everything so there goes my pantang :)

My confinement lady had to leave early because her son was involved in a serious accident so that leaves me and arif alone. Having a maid is not helping because Aydin is a handful. Aydin has attempted a series of tricks on his lil bro i.e: a (strong) pat on Arif's tummy and head but i am sure he did not mean it. It must be his way of showing his love for his lil bro.

Oh no! the lil bub is awake. Back to "Supermum"!!

Hello World!

It's been a week that i have been trying to find some time to share my happiness on this blog. It was on Sunday morning 02/03/2008, i gave birth to a cute and chubby little dude named Arif. Let me share with you the details here:

1 Mar, 2008 : I was hoping to go into labor on this particular day because it is Dad's birthday. Well, bub was not ready so i gave it a rest. As i said in my earlier blog, bub is quite heavy for me to carry so i am really hoping that it will come out soon before it reaches 4.0 kg and it would be too difficult for me to go au'naturel. Since it is a Saturday, hubby decided to stay home and relax. The opposite reaction compared to the last pregnancy where he practically dragged me to MidValley almost every weekend! I told him i want to check out the Sales Carnival so let's go to Alamanda since it's the nearest. That's what we did at 8.30p.m! Just for the sake of exercising and trying to induce labor naturally, i walked untill 10.00p.m and bought some last minute stuff i.e: hair rubber band. I was complaining of hunger because we didn't have our dinner before we left because of the time constraint. As soon as we reached home, i ate a little of rice and some soup. I was already not comfortable but i have been feeling this way for quite some time now. So i drank some organic tea to help with my water retention and blood circulation.

2- Mar : Still i couldn't sleep so i sat in front of the tv with hubby watching some football while eating some crackers. Suddenly i felt contractions but it was not a strong one and it lasted only for less than a minute. I thought it was another Braxton Hicks so i ignored it and i still could not fall asleep. The contraction got intense so i woke Hubby up and told him to be prepared. While he was taking his shower, i was trying to ease the contraction by kneeling on my bed and rocking myself when all of a sudden i felt like farting. POP! My water bag broke and water was gushing out and i quickly ran into the toilet. i obviously left a trail of water from my bed to the toilet :)

We drove to Gleneagles and reached the hospital at about 6.45a.m. I told hubby to drive slowly because every single bump and sudden brakes are not comfortable. In fact we are just trying to kill some time before the actual labor takes place. Admit myself at the A&E (Acccident & Emergency) counter (which cost us a couple hundred $$ for being 15mins early and they didn't even treat my case as emergency), i walked myself to the labor room and waited for the whole episode to begin.

Slightly after 9.00 a.m : More intense contractions begins. This time i could not even bring myself to walk around anymore and all i wanted to do was to lie down and rest. I was hoping to catch some sleep since i didn't even got any for the last 18 hours but failed. Suddenly i felt the urge to push. I was doing the breathing technic from Hypnobirthing and it helped until i almost lost control when the urge to push was greater. Doctor and nurse told me to breathe in the "laughing gas" to help me control the pushing urge because i was only 6cm dilated. At this point, i was not enjoying the episode especially when they had to do the internal exam. Yikes! it was painful!! I was trying to recite some ayat lazim and put my focus on something else besides the pain. Aydin was my inspiration and i had his cute face in my mind all the time calling me "By!". Then i was trying to tell my body to progress smoothly so that we will get it over and done with in the next few hours. No more 12 hours labor!

I pushed and pushed and relax for the next hour or so without any pain killer or drugs. It was definitely a stressful episode for everyone in the labor room. I was running out of energy to push and at this moment i surely would appreciate more stamina to help me push the baby out. I was a sprinter and sportwoman alright but i can hardly sprint or run more than 200metres!! I can feel the baby's head crowning and it was like that for God knows how long! I had leg cramps while pushing and i didn't use the stir-up because it would make my cramps worse. Doctor asked me to try giving birth sideways but it didn't work. I was not comfortable. I ended up giving birth with my legs up and wide open with the help from hubby and the nurses (imagine doing sit-ups to tighten your ab muscles with your legs up). God knows what i was thinking at that time: no drugs, no episiotomy... nothing! I almost gave up for that stupid decision on going natural. One thing that was beautiful and indescribable was when you can feel every single part of the body that came out. I can feel the head got trough the birth canal, the shoulders, the hands, the legs and even the cord! It was so amazing (and not forgetting painful) that i didn't know if i wanted to cry or laugh of happiness when they put the baby on my tummy to hold. Forget about screaming "Sakitnya!!" and whatever i said i can't remember... one look at my baby's face calmed me down. I was surely grateful to Allah for giving me the strength to go through the ordeal and i was so proud of myself. I could not stop saying Alhamdulillah in my heart and thank Allah for giving me this wonderful experience and a beacutiful baby and a very supportive hubby. Though i can say it was a crazy decision for a modern woman who lives in a world of science and technology but heck... can you handle it?

I had the opportunity to bond with him and breastfeed him in his first hour of his life. Mohamad Arif Eidlan was born at 10.55 a.m.

Eat your heart out!

Yes, i am still carrying the lil bub in my tummy. No sign of labor at the moment. Went for an unscheduled check up today and bub has definitely grown. Doc said i might be expecting an 8lbs baby, definitely bigger than Aydin who weighed 3.51kg. I blame it on my choc and sweets craze i have been having for the past few days.. or was it weeks? i have gained another 1kg since last week and i have taken a picture of one of the culprit: (the ice kacang)

Oh, after my check-up i promised myself that i will reduce the amount of sugar and choc intake but as a last retreat (yea right!), i indulged myself to a Dome Chai Latte while waiting for hubble to pick me up from the hospital *grin*. The evidence...