in a few hours time, we’ll be lugging down a huge suitcase and two kids, like refugees in the dark, and off we go!

unfortunately, not somewhere which requires us to go to the airport and take a flight. just a really, REALLY short road trip over the weekend. a gorge-fest before monday comes.

the itinerary is set, or rather, a FOOD itinerary.

but for one person, only one thing mattered. his quest… for Carl’s Jr!

it better taste as good as he imagines, lol. :p

byebye and selamat bersahur in advance, everybodeee.

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We won a plasma tv in a lucky draw but since the good old projection tv is still working, decided to sell it off.

Notable features:

MODEL NUMBER : TH-42PY800H.

The TV is brand new, unopened with 3 years warranty. I think Courts is selling it for $3299 with free gifts.

Sorry, no wall mount installation provided, just the pedestal stand included.

I decided to sell it if the price is $2000 and above. cash and carry. any offers?

Those interested can email me at izadd77@gmail.com to discuss further, thanks!

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that’s the slogan i’m adopting, ha ha.

aanyway, the boy & girl are my favourite subjects. for photo-taking AND my royal kingdom.

“turn the page please, abang.”

maybe i can create some propagandistic poster out of them too, like that infamous poster of the two girls. (btw, can somebody explain what the umbrella, the rain, and the apple mean?? so enigmatic.)

ps: four months today! let’s hope it’s not too wet to celebrate with fireworks later. :)

“it’s ok, mum, i’ve got it covered. my bald head, that is.”

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so i missed out on the whole ‘wah, 16 weeks!’ hoo-ha, because i just HAD to give birth four months ago instead of like… NOW. (yeah they brought forward the starting date to aug 08 instead of jan 09 because some clever mums-to-be started a petition on a motherhood forum. gah!)

dang it. there goes one month’s worth of $alary i could have $aved.

and somehow the whole slew of ‘incentives’ or ‘dangled carrots’ didn’t send me to the moon and back either.

because, just what IF i do decide to throw in the towel and do the sahm thing for real (as opposed to fantasy, which is what i’m living in now)?

then, the extra childcare leaves, paid or unpaid, would have no impact on me.

i would have no income, so nothing in it for me there in terms of tax reliefs.

the extra cash gifts? too late for that too. bah.

and if i really were a sahm, no change in subsidies if i decide to send my kids to pre-school because, you know, sahm’s children don’t *really* need to have a headstart with an EC education since their mums have all the time in the world to do the ‘teaching’ themselves, like make their own flash cards and paste words on all the furniture around the house, etc. right? :S

so it was with much interest and enlightenment that i read a forum letter by a certain ST reader.

Mistake to ignore stay-home mothers

I WATCHED Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s National Day Rally speech and realised just how much the Government values the working mum and how little the stay-home mother.

I felt disappointed and discriminated against. The Government is simply not interested in persuading stay-home mothers to have more children, presumably because we are not contributing to the economy. Tertiary-educated homemakers like me have been chastised for wasting taxpayers’ money on our education. We are constantly reminded that as it is our personal choice, we do not merit any incentives.

Stay-home mums willingly give up their financial independence and put their aspirations on hold because they believe that it is worth it.

They do so despite the disincentives, not because of any pro-creation benefits. They need no convincing about the joys of parenthood and do not fret about lost opportunities.

Doesn’t that make them the perfect candidates to have more babies? And surely, they need less persuading.

Stay-home mothers are not asking for handouts, just equality. Give our husbands (the sole breadwinner in our household) the tax incentives you are dishing out to working mums.

With our burdens eased, we may consider having more children. It wouldn’t cost the Government as much as the two-month extended maternity payout to the working mums, and may yield far greater results.

Stay-home mums are neither quitters nor parasites. They play an important role at home and are often active community volunteers. Educated homemakers want to stay active and return to the workforce when their children grow up.

The Government should respect a woman’s decision to stay home to care for her children, and provide opportunities for her to re-enter the workforce later.

I am fortunate to have started my family early and have discovered other passions while staying home with the children. I am now pursuing a second degree part time in preparation for my re-entry to the workforce when my youngest child goes to secondary school. I shall be 45 years old then, and not too old to embark on a second career.

I urge the Government to consider a two-pronged approach to boost birth-rates. It is already bending over backwards for the working mums and should consider stay-home mothers too.

We are women, we can bear children and we are willing to do so.

Lee Sui Yi (Madam)

man oh man, i wish i’d come up with that myself! i really couldn’t have said it any better.

i mean, i’m not exactly… uneducated. i would, or at least hope to, raise educated children too. while a sahm may not directly contribute to the economy, wouldn’t this be a kind of contribution in the grander scheme of things? and wouldn’t sahms be the more willing women to devote more time to procreating and adding to the population level, if anything, to justify their existence?

never mind the single working bees – let the sahms be the queen bees and do all the multiplying for you! come on, i even have the child-bearing hips and the child-nourishing boobs as guarantee and added bonus!

but… no money, no honey lor.

now, who wants to start a petition for sahms? :D

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i had a pleasant surprise last week when i received a package from the postman. in the package was a book about malaysia. so what is so special about the book? well, for one, i got it free, hehe, but seriously, its because one of my pictures was featured in the book. i didn’t really expect my humble picture of the ramly burger could get published! but there it was, the picture of ramly burger in the publication, in what i must say, a really great introductory guide to everything malaysia.

coincidentally, since we are driving up to KL at the end on the month, the book would definitely come in handy! thanks to QuaChee for making it possible, malaysia boleh!

for those who are interested in getting a copy, you can check out the site at www.themalaysiapage.com. maybe after the KL trip, i’m gonna frame up my copy of the book or perhaps laminate the page where my picture is and frame it up :)

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with the World Breastfeeding Week around the corner once again, i realise that this time, i don’t have much else to say about The BF Issue like i did the last time. i guess because everything that can be said, i’ve said before.

things on the ‘udder’ front have been pretty much on auto-mode and a breeze, like second nature, that i’m barely reflective, or conscious, about it anymore. furthermore, the little one doesn’t seem to require as much nursing as her brother did when he was a baby. she hardly even asks for it, actually, which should make first-time bf-ing mums worried, but a second-time bf-ing mum (who is, like me, a little lazy) quite relieved.

ok, so i *think* she hasn’t been growing as chubby as her brother did in the first few months. the last we sneakily weighed her at the hospital during aniq’s follow-up, she tipped the scale at a rather ‘dainty’ 6.4kg. which is what… 1kg a month? is that ok? i don’t know. another thing about second-time mums (who are a little lazy) is that, they don’t bother looking at growth charts anymore.

and another thing that i’ve been procrastinating (due to said laziness), is the pumping. have been meaning to buy a proper pump to finally call my own (seeing how the previous pumps were hand-me-downs), with all the gift vouchers i’ve saved up (breastfeeding is, after all, about being prudent, no?), but even that has not been put into action. and note to self: please buy a few bottles for her too. that’s another thing i’ve been procrastinating, practising her to go on the bottle. simply because mommy’s boobies don’t need to be washed, scrubbed and boiled after every feed (ie. she’s too lazy to do the whole sterilising routine).

poor excuse, i know. i’m just trying to, erm, minimise my life, you see. and also for the fact that, i’m still contemplating on doing this… sahm thing a little longer. and no, this one is not due to laziness. i’m growing into a new routine with the kids and i realise that i REALLY like being The Big Boss to them. heck with the ‘let’s-bring-women-back-to-the-workforce’ thing. this IS work, dammit. a grossly-underpaid and under-recognised one. grrrrrr.

so, aaanyway, back to the World Breastfeeding Week. wasn’t that the point of this entry? aah…

as with the previous years, there will be a mass synchronised breastfeeding session.

Venue : National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre (NVPC) , The Giving Place,
6 Eu Tong Sen Street, #04-88 The Central, Singapore 059817
Located @ The Central, a shopping mall directly above Clarke Quay MRT

Date: 16th Aug 2008 (Sat), 2pm

there, i’ve done my part in advocating tek-milk for this year. will you join me? come on, melayu boleh! save the earth! save your children! and most importantly, save your money! :d

besides, clarke quay on a saturday sounds as happening as it can get to this mak-bawah-tempurung.

signing off,
The Once Self-Proclaimed Tit-Nazi who’s not so sure if she’s even doing it right anymore, with soggy + sagging boobs to boot.

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don’t worry about him, aunties, if anything, the fall only made him EVEN more mischievous. :p

during the follow-up at kkh last friday, his stitches were removed.

we thought the thread was the kind that dissolves, you know, like the kind they use *down there* after we give birth. so he had to steel himself for this, no sedation for you ha ha! padan muka.

afterwhich, he went on to do his usual stuff.

chop chop, mutton chop! cooked just the way daddy taught me, you know.

making a mess. making me mad. asking me gazillion questions, most notably, the endless string of “where?” (eg. “where daddy?” “daddy work.” “where?” “far, far away.” “where?” “you know when spiderman catches the naughty men and gives them to the police, then they put them in jail?” “where??” etc.)

after i stripped off the plaster on his brow, i was surprised to see that the scar looked… neat. not bad, Dr McSteamed Pau’s hands must be pretty good to do such a neat job.

he just needs to grow back some of his eyebrow hair, heh. macho much?

and speaking of hair (or the lack of it), this girl too didn’t escape from her own growing pains.

a fleeting fever, which she didn’t seem to mind at all, obviously. (yes, that bib’s almost totally drenched in her saliva. sigh.)

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peace! *drool*

(i’m only three months old so please forgive my limited vocabulary. and hair.)

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you’d think he’d been involved in a fisticuff, a bar brawl, or a gangsta gang fight.

but of course it was nothing as exciting or roguish as that. though, none the less mischievous.

it was sunday morning and i was still languishing in bed with the little one, only to be fully woken up by the sound of the boy’s crying, obviously in pain. “oh no,” i thought, “sounds like trouble…” and found the daddy applying pressure on the boy’s brow with ice, blood dripping down the collar of his shirt.

yes, he’d indeed attempted a daredevil stunt, evel knievel-style, down the flight of staircase at the common corridor, with his bright, plastic tricycle.

his daddy wanted to drive to a nearby shop and didn’t allow him to bring the trike, but the insistent (read: stubborn-nak-mampos) boy always had to find his own solutions to get what he wants.

and what he got was a tumble down the stairs.

he sustained a rather deep cut over his left eyebrow. not sure what he hit, but apparently he was still on his trike at the bottom of the stairs, so his head didn’t hit the floor, which would have been worse.

from the stories i’ve heard countless times of his daddy’s own ‘adventures’ as a small kid (stitches on his chin and his head on separate occasions), i knew this was a ‘rite of passage’. we were both actually just waiting for this day to happen! (a self-fulfilling prophesy prophecy, it seems.)

i wasn’t too worried coz he was up and running again within minutes (i think his pain receptors are impaired!), but we had to head to the A&E anyway to get it checked and prevent any infection.

of course, as murphy’s law has it, we discovered that the car’s battery had died, so we had to call for our resident auto-mechanic (thanks azfar! ;p) for help, and reached KKH more than an hour later.

the wound warranted immediate entry through the Red Door (if you’re familiar with KKH’s A&E, you’d know the Red Door, hehe), and the boy pointed out his head to the attending doctor (as well as his ribs, and his shins – by then, i thought he was going through the ‘head, shoulders, knees & toes’ song).

so the options were to either apply some ‘magic gel’ thingy on the wound to numb it and sew it up, or sedate him so he wouldn’t move during the procedure. since it’s pretty close to the eye area and we doubt he’d be able to sit still for anything, sedation it is.

he was more fascinated with what was happening around him than anything, trying to talk to the doctors and nurses, recalling the Hulk movie he watched the night before where the muscular green hero also had wires strapped on his body, and the X-Men movie where Wolverine too had sharp things coming out of his hands like that needle poking out of his own.

at this point, we were laughing at his plight and his dazed mumblings, his eyes glazing yet you can tell he was fighting the sedation meds.

but a while later, when we thought the stitches were done, the two docs came out and told us they’re calling down an eye doctor coz they were concerned that some muscles or nerves might be affected. so we waited, his eye was checked, and the cut was pronounced to be too high above the eye to be worried about. so now they called for a plastics doctor to do the actual sewing (i guess they’re more specialised for such delicate work), which we had to wait for some more, and another dose of sedation was administered. the boy was so high after that, i tell ya!

a few things struck me after that.

well, mainly, guilt, for letting accidents happen to him, coz if anything, it’s always the parents who are at fault, right? they’re supposed to warn him, nevermind if they turn into boring nags. eyes are supposed to be on him AT ALL TIMES, coz at his age, they’re impulsive, lacking in judgment, and not as physically adept as they think they are.

then having to account for the incident to his grandma, who’d no doubt blame us, with her “aku jaga dia tak ada pun kena apa-apa!”, at which i’d silently reply, “if you’d let things happen to us once in a while, maybe we’d be better risk-takers and not be scared of doing anything”, but of course, those were my issues. and her “bawak dia balik sini nanti!”, making me feel like a shite parent who can barely function myself.

then the thought of having given birth to this child, in perfect condition, a clean slate, only to eventually have him scarred, physically, and – just wait till he’s older! – emotionally.

and, the final thought, that if this is the kind of thing we have to go through with children, i’d rather not have any more. it’s too painful, and my pain receptors, they’re not so impaired.

so there, another ‘battle scar’ to, erm, add character to his face. six stitches, of which story he can regale others with, a great conversation starter if anything, a legacy he can pass down to his future sons: “daddy pun dulu jatuh kena jahit! tengok ni?”

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everyday i wake up thankful for being afforded the opportunity to stay home with the kids, even if it’s only for a few short months.

everyday i try to justify my staying home by thinking up of ways to enrich their lives, even if it’s simply sitting around and talking to them. yes, with the tv on in the background.

everyday i grapple with the dilemma of being a working mom versus being a stay-at-home mom, weighing out the pros and the cons, only to end the day with the question unresolved.

everyday i hope to discover a treasure map or a secret trust fund so that i don’t ever have to think of that root of all evil we can’t live without, ie. money!

everyday i wish for the days to not move so quickly by. :(

in the meantime, i’ll enjoy the little luxuries in my little life right now.

like a tall mug of milo with whipped cream at the neighbourhood prata joint in the middle of the day. my son’s happy mouth smudged with mini-oreo cookies. my daughter’s stringy saliva running down my hands.

coz these little things, they don’t come cheap.

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