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They say every pregnancy is different.
Well, that is very true indeed! In both pregnancy I faced and am facing, there are both joys and challenges during those weeks.
While pregnant with Rania, my asthma was at the peak and a lot of money was spent on medical expenses.
With Rania, I grew wide. With this little boy, I grew forward. Alfi can already the little boy's legs kicking up under my breast bone and many times, I feel uncomfortable sitting down and yet my legs are not able to carry my weight long enough.
Eating would mean that I need to feed small reasonable portions more often.
Reflux has been in my dictionary for the past few weeks.
I am already as heavy as my last day of pregnancy with Rania. I gave birth to Rania at 89.7kg.
I am now 88.6kg. (whoever counts a kilo!)
Technically I have 3 to 4 weeks to go till I hit 37 weeks.
My gynae gave me the heads up that I should be giving birth around this time frame since Rania was born at 36 weeks + 6 days.
My waterbag leaked and I was already at the delivery suite at 36 weeks + 5 days.
At 33 weeks, needless for me to say that I am no longer as mobile, my back is breaking all the time and working is now a chore because I need a short lie down after a couple of hours each time.
So most of the time, I am working from home because of the convenience of the bed when I need a short break.
For the past few weeks I started having sleepless nights only that the past few days have been worse.
I cant seem to sleep.
The pillows are too low. The pillows are too high. The stomach is an obstruction to turn left or right. The little boy doesn't like it if I lie flat. To turn is a chore. It does not help that Rania creeps up to me to sleep close to me. Stomach is too big that I cant breathe well. Night visits to the toilet is a daily affair!
It is frustrating!
Last night was an epic example where I slept at 1.30am, woke up 6 times till 4am to head to the loo to pee.
In those 6 times, the longest I slept was 45 mins and woke up frustrated.
That is minus waking up to Rania's pampered cries, her milk at 3am.
Then at 4am, I decided to watch TV. Just when I napped for 10 mins, the little girl was up crying and ate her cornflakes.
There goes Mummy's sleep till 6.30am.
The next thing I knew, I woke up at 10.30am.
Anyway, I was teaching a topic on Sexual Reproduction to one of the students and how sperms carry 23 chromosomes and so does the ova. How the nucleus carry DNA materials.
Then that night, I went out for dinner and bought my iPhone 5 casings at Cineleisure for $2 a piece!
After picking out the colours, I realised, the colours didn't differ much.
Later that night, I told Alfi,"This is how it will look like when we have 5 kids."
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Some will have your character, some will have mine. Some will have your stronger character. Some milder.
But surely there will be at least one who will probably be more colourful.
Then I said, "Guess what, in every family, there will always be what we would call a black sheep. So I am not sure if this permutation will happen to us."
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Yes, as much as I am excited to see our male by-product, I am very anxious about having to handle two children and their respective antics.
The thoughts did not go away since I got pregnant. There is definitely an element of fear and anxiety.
I pray Allah will give me the strength over the next few weeks to hold the pregnancy to full term and more strength to take care of the children after giving birth and showering them with so much love - equally.
Urgh~
The biggest challenge.
Till the update on Week 34!
xoxo
Everyday I have there is always the same thing I am thinking about.
What kind of mother I will be when I have 2 little ones with me.
Apart from the joy of receiving another tiny pair of hands and feet in my arms, as parents, I also realise that this tiny being is relying on Alfi and I for the next 25 years (I am estimating growing up + education + getting married)
It is the same fear we had when I was about to give birth to Rania but we prove to survive wonderfully with our first child.
Then I started anticipating what kind of mother I will be.
I have seen mothers who show favouritism, whether or not they are in denial and I do not quite fancy it.
Like I mention in my previous post, I see a lot of mothers putting their sons on the pedestals and turn a blind eye on what is wrong.
And I was also very upfront about how much I despise such mothers and yet here I am having a son.
Many weeks pass and I wonder if I was going to be that typical mother.
Not the typical type which has favouritism of the son but favouritism of my daughter. I wondered if I will be fair and just to my two children.
I wondered if I am able to embrace each of my child's shortcomings and be there for them equally.
But I think that is hard.
Very hard.
It will be very challenging to be a fair mother.
In that sense, it's easier when you have only one because your focus will only be to one.
If things go as I anticipated, I will be delivering in 5 weeks, once I reach full term.
Things in the office are still as busy and I am starting to handover a few things before I head off for my maternity leave.
Tuition has kicked off nicely now that the Eid fever is over and kids are having their exams.
At this stage, I do get overexhausted and sometimes I will sleep without knowing what happens to Rania.
Things slowed down because I am not as capable to do things as quickly and efficiently as before.
I swear it sucks.
Rania is craving for a lot of attention and there is only so much of energy I can spare it.
It is when she is asleep at night that I will hug be able to hug her longer, stare at her face longer and kiss her (gently) more.
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When this came to realisation, I have planned out my time to balance work, tuition, home business and my family.
I also did not realise that I have not taken any child care leave this year and so it came timely!
I would love to spend 6 days with my princess (without her dad) and make sure she feels that mummy is always here.
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That is the least I can do for her. She gets to be the only child for just a few weeks more.
I am not sure if mothers share the same sentiments as me when they are about to receive their second child.
So yes, I am anticipating motherhood all over again.
I pray I have healthy children. I pray I will be the mother my children do not find it hard to love. I pray that things will fall nicely for me.
Insya Allah.
xoxo
So much has happened over the past 4 to 6 weeks that I have been pretty quiet.
I have put on much weight now. I may just hit the 90kg mark again.
Thank god I have not yet walked like a penguin but I am definitely walking slower now.
Entering into the third trimester now has been quite challenging and some of these challenges were something I did not forsee.
One big example was having Rania being extremely clingy with me.
While I enjoy her running to the door screaming "Mummy" repeatedly everytime I come home from work, it also means that I have to pick her up and carry her, kiss her all over and ask her how was her day without sitting down.
This is also the time when the 'nesting period' sets in.
So I end up cleaning my own room, packing and repacking, trying to make some space for the little baby boy.
It is really a challenge to maintain an upcoming family of 4 and Her Closet in the same room. Just that in mind makes me miss my home in AMK and the space I can potentially have.
But the hubby is also worried that I need those extra pair of hands to help me when baby no. 2 comes.
Over the weeks, I bid goodbye to Android (especially HTC), a semi-goodbye to Windows (because it is still awesome when it comes to my work productivity) and welcome Apple into my life episodes.
Hmmmm.. yeah.. finally.
I was very resistant to step into the Apple world but it is very key for me for get connected to the people in the social network. That is where I get my daily doses of chats and sharing among the sisters. My online business works very well with an iPhone apparently.
I love the photography apps available to feed my obsession. I love the fact that I do not need to carry my iPad around anymore. Diaper bags are an ease now.
So switching to an iPhone made me a happy girl though I must admit it takes a lot of discipline to put the phone aside.
Plus, I ended up doing more microblogging than blogging.
I think my Instagram pictures looked better. More of character.
You know how a picture tells 1000 words. Maybe I can do it not with 10,000 words.
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How I find it very convenient not to lug around my camera because I do it all on the iPhone.
Third trimester, back ache, sleepless nights, the iPhone keeps me company because Alfi bought me a 3m long cable wire where I can play with my IG, upload videos, watch YouTube and play Candy Crush while lying on the bed.
Pampered much?
Perks of being married. Bonus to be pregnant.
*lol*
So here is how I spend my Eid.
4 days of visiting and the body gave up on me.
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I'm in the 30th week now.
7 more weeks to go till full term and looking forward to the maternity leave.
It is probably no rest time for me since the newborn will feed all the time and give me sleepless night but I am looking forward to use this time to spend time with my children.
It's amazing how my hair stands when I use the word 'children'
First it was just me and Alfi. Then we had a little girl. Now another addition coming along.
Trust me, I swear there is still a lot of space in our hearts to welcome more.
Just the other day, I shared with Alfi that if I were given a choice between luxury and children, I will choose children.
He smiled.
One of the reasons why we got married was because we agreed to have a big family and having one just makes me look forward to grow old with him.
May Allah continue to bless us with so much love and joy.
It is truly a priceless gift.
xoxo
I was nonetheless estatic being among the 10 bloggers selected for the Canon Creativity Workshop.
I have always wanted to buy a photo printer but I am not very knowledgable about it and I will always end up very fickle of what to buy.
*lol*
Women!
I am honestly very clueless about photo printers and when I had my first few pictures printed out at the Canon workshop, I was in "ooohs" and "ahhhhhs"
So shameful!
But I was very impressed with my printouts. The picture was so clear and colours so vibrant that I fell in love with the printer all at once!
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What more, I brought home a damn sexy red Canon Pixma MG3170
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So here we are to share our creativity skills with Canon and I swear to you that I am one of the least creative people on earth!
But the workshop opened me to possibilities and gave me a new sense of motivation.
I sat down for a few weeks thinking what is it that I can do with all my resources. I went into the Canon Creativity Park for many days and really try to think through what I can do.
Then, just like Albert Einsten (chey!) I was gifted with a stroke of genius!
*lol*
As you know, I am living with my mom temporarily and it is filled with 7 adults and 1 little brat.
As a family with a child, our timing with the rest really differs! When I am asleep, they are up 'partying' and when I am up, they are asleep.
When I am out, the rest probably just woke up and when they leave the house, I am home tired.
So it is really understandable that they try to spend as much time as they can with Rania during the in-between timings, especially the weekends.
There are nights when I am trying to make Rania sleep and they just arrive home, knock on my door to take a peek at Rania. Then Rania gets all excited and her sleeping time gets postponed to another hour.
It is ok on weekends but on weekdays, the parents need to sleep too!
I admit, there are times when we sleep with Rania in between us, still playing and we are snoring away.
Damn teruk (terrible) la!
So here was my art project #1.
HOW TO MAKE A DOOR HANGER
Ok there is a twist to this one because I decided not to make a typical door hanger. I wanted to incorporate my scrapbooking ideas into it!
I have always loved scrapbooking but you know how these things are so expensive that I do not know whether I will get sick of it after a few months. It will not be able to justify the cost!
So I picked out a background colour from the website.
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This time around I took a dark background so that I can work on bright things on it.
Then I selected pretty borders to match the background.
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And then I selected the matching parts to scrapbook.
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I printed one of Rania's photo from Instagram. A nice 1:1 to fit onto the door handle.
Here is how we start.
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Materials required apart from the printed items:
- Glue
- Scissors
- Pencil
- Ruler
So I cut out the door label 20cm by 10cm because I did not want the label to be too long for a small instagram picture.
I drew a circle at the center and cut it out.
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I started by pasting Rania's picture at the center and then work on cutting and pasting the other parts together.
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I had an additional helper and could not work faster on this project but I managed to complete it at the end!
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Wa laa!
So now, my family knows when Rania is asleep and detour from knocking on my room door.
Isn't that awesome!
I am convinced and proven myself that I am not that hopeless with creativity after all.
Why don't you give it a shot?
xoxo
I am always worried if my child does not like reading or shun away from books.
I have always been a book lover, till today even though my time is filled up with everything but reading.
Many say that reading books improve the child's language. I disagree.
Despite me being a book lover, renting books every week back then, I still get C's for my english.
Many never believed me.
A lot wonder how can my english be so bad and yet I still blog.
Sure, there are grammatical errors and missing words in my blog but that is because I do not check whatever i have written. I will be mentally exhausted by the time I spend an average of 1hr writing up my post.
To my teachers in school, my creativity is a failure. I never scored high for Composition.
Equally terrible for Malay Composition.
And somehow, that instilled a fear in me till today about my sense of creativity and how I do not want my children to end up like me.
Then it struck me that being creative means using your knowledge and tweaking it to sound fun.
And knowledge comes from reading.
For Rania, I adopted both approaches of reading and watching TV.
I am a working mom and unkike a stay-at-home-mom, my evenings are spent sometimes distracted by my work emails, blog entries, tuition classes.
So I rely on the telly and the iPad. A programs which can make her learn educational songs.
I also inculcated the reading with Rania. Apart from reading books to Rania, I ensure that books are within her reach.
This is her pile of books at my bedside table.
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Today when I came home from work, she pull out a few books and gave to me. It makes communication easier and also I know the times when she is keen to read.
She looks for her books sometimes when she wants to drink her milk.
Apparently, she followed my character when I was at the same age. When my mom said,"Intan.. Tido."
I knew it was my milk time. I will go to my bookshelf and pick out a book and wait for my bottle at the kitchen entrance.
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I am not saying that Rania is a genius but it is always fun to see how the character of each child unfolds as they grow up. I have a steep development curve during my growing up years and then I stagnated.
Bahaha!
I just think that putting books where your child can reach is a very good idea. My mom did that for me.
I did that for Rania.
How do you encourage your child to read?
Do share your thoughts and views. I always love to hear.
Maybe it will help me and many more mummies out there!
xoxo
I am disgusted with myself about how much I lack blogging and it is not that I do not want to.
Time just does not seem to permit.
Sometimes (only sometimes!) I let Candy Crush decide the best of me.
Wakakaka!
But the days are really taking a toll on me. So many things in my head. So many things to execute but I just do not seem to have enough of 24 hours.
Then I question myself, 'Is this what the world is to me now?'
Then I am saddened.
I have long since took a back, enjoy the sights and the scenery or even bend down to smell the roses.
Ok.. all those are metaphors. Sure.
But that is what life seems to me now.
The new role I have despite being very interesting and something I enjoy just sponge up my time very quickly.
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If you think this is my typical work day, let me share with you that it is not.
This is one of the rare days which I get to sit in the office and work my emails on my laptop.
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Otherwise, I am constantly on the move, visiting and hosting customers. This was a picture taken on my birthday with the Japanese delegates. Looks fun but I swear it was exhausting.
I reply a lot of my emails on the move.
Whenever I am from one location and need to head to the other, I will use the time in the taxi to first do my work calls, then I moved on to calling my mom and daughter to see how they are doing at home. Check if she is alright and playing well. Listen to her antics from my mom. Then I will make a final call to my husband. Always a quick one to check on his schedule and tell him that I missed him.
And because of this, I have little or almost no sentiments of my pregnancy times, which is sad.
There was only a handful times where I sat down, rubbed my tummy hoping and trying to feel the connection with me and my little one inside.
Rania sleeps at 11.30pm. She cries for milk (yes, at 17 months) at 3am and 7am.
By 8am, I am up to get ready for work. If Rania is up and I do not have a meeting till the afternoon, I will have her showered and changed then I get ready for work.
I am lucky that work is pretty flexible and mobile in that sense (though there are monsterous days)
I buy or bring lunch before I head to the office so that I have good productive hours.
By 4.30pm I'm off.
Again, if I am in the office. Otherwise, if there are meetings and dinner appointments, it can stretch till late night.
By the time I am home, my home tuition classes start. One after another.
Sometimes if I am lucky, I have 1 class. On normal days, I have two classes.
And on really exhausting days, I have 3 classes back to back and will not get to spend time with Rania will about 10.30pm.
That is when my dinner is, shower, read Rania a book and I may end up dozing before her.
It is the same for the husband too.
Now that June is coming and exams are over, we start to see a slow down rate of classes. Which gives the family a little bit more space to breathe.
For a start, I am already at my 18th week of pregnancy! Yay!
How time flies this pregnancy. In the past, I will do my weekly reading of the baby's development, diligent with my multivitanmins, folic acid and fish oil.
This time around, I am very complacent with my prenatal care which makes me feel like a terrible mother and how I wish I can hold others responsible but then again I let fate take its course.
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So far, I have only put on 5kg and I was overestimating my size terribly.
Partly because I was really huge when I was pregnant with Rania. At the same time, being pregnant with an active 17th month old baby and working round the clock is really hectic.
But to say I am small is such a blatant lie. I was among the flourishing mothers who could not lose the last 5kg from the first pregnancy.
With Rania, I put on a total of 22kg. I WAS A WHALE!!!
But to lose 17kg was quite a good job, don't you think?
Today, I am looking out for a good massage lady for my post natal care. So if you know of any good ones, do share with me. I am looking for those who can wrap me up nice and tight.
There are times when I pity Rania who will have to share my time with her sibling at a tender age of 1 yr 10 mths.
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Rania can already help me with simple things. She understands instructions like 'take', 'give' and when I say 'please' it means I really need her cooperation. In fact, she has been helping out with her pregnant mummy take things in the room because I am too tired to move around.
I am also trying to spend as much time I can with her. It guilts me when she hugs me around my neck out of no reason or when she whines unnecessarily for me to carry her and her father would not allow.
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My advertising for Pampers was great! Not only did we have were on the OMY (a blogging community within Singapore Press Holdings) highlights
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But we also made it on My Paper, a bilingual paper which is given out for free!
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So yes, there has been a lot of things going on.
Work is work and family time is always the best to keep your sanity. So for all that is worth, I am still contented on the small little things He gives me despite I spend less time smelling the roses.
I will be back for more, definitely.
Just to quickly share, we got sponsorship for Canon Pixma and it has been awesome fun!
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June is the time where many spend time with their children over the school holidays and I will share with you fun and exciting things you can do as a family with a Canon Photo Printer.
xoxo
This will be the final lap for my sponsored post by Pampers Singapore.
I would like to thank them for giving me an awesome opportunity to share with my readers on the diapers and some of my usual posts. There are more than a handful that texted me and ask if Pampers was really that good.
So I asked them if they wanted to buy over my existing diaper stocks.
*lol*
Technically, Pampers Active Baby costs $0.36 per piece which is about $0.05 more than what I am pay previously. But I change Rania's diapers much lesser and of course I stopped waking up in morning and checking her diapers to see if it leaked.
No more putting a spare diaper at my bedside table.
I am more well-rested.
Pampers Active Baby pants has always been my choice when we head outdoors.
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This underwear-like pants has slim crotch shape which makes it more comfortable for Rania to be running around.
Anyway, it really suits her active lifestyle. There are little/no creases around the crotch are and even if there was, it was not read.
With extra locking layer keeping Rania's bottom dry. Also the diaper is so soft and breathable that I have see no redness at Rania's butterfly.
Suddenly, this little girl is so easy to maintain.
*lol*
Another reason why I love to use active pants when I am outdoors is because handling a 16-month old active toddler is not easy. She tends to wriggle her way out when I try to lie her down.
Pants is like a disposable underwear for her.
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The soft waist band also helps to prevent pressure marking on Rania. After trying a few brands, Pampers Active pants is the easiest to tear at the sides. It is holds so firmly and fits nicely on Rania without falling down.
Oh yes, I did try other brands with Rania and when the center holds a little too much pee, her pants diaper will go 'steamers' style. There was even an occasion it dropped down to her legs!!
What an embarrassment!
Plus, look at the difference in thickness of the diapers!
It surely saves space in my diaper bag!
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Thank you Pampers for meeting the needs of my happy & active baby. Her smiles are always precious.
She is less cranky with wet diapers and I have my family/outdoor/meal times all in peace!
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Trust me, Rania thinks this is a winner and yes sweetie, it will be a switch for you.
And here is Rania saying 'Thank you' the best way she can.
xoxo
Being a working mother and wife, I really treasure the times we spend together.
My weekdays are burnt.
Now that mid-year examinations is on the way, my weekday evenings are spent with the students doing revisions and polishing up their weaker topics.
By the time my day ends at 10pm, I have only enough energy to eat up my dinner and play with Rania for a while before I call it a day by 11pm. I can really sense my daughter missing me.
How she whines, grabbing my legs and look up at me wanting me to carry her.
I am under strict instuctions from Alfi that I must not carry Rania no matter how hard she cries. He does not want me to go through another miscarriage and the spotting was a scare enough to him.
But which mother can have the heart to do that. Whenever Alfi is not around, I will carry her as much as my body could take.
And it breaks my heart that whenever I do, she quickly lay her head on my shoulders as if afraid I will put her down the next minute.
So time is limited and weekdays are burnt.
Many will say weekends would be the make up time. But that is tough too. I have to split my time with my family, my in-laws and god in-laws. It is not troublesome but I wish the weekends were longer.
Maybe 3 days?
So whatever time I have with the three of us is really precious to me and Alfi.
It takes a lot of time management and managing the expectation of others. I think many of you will understand my situation.
And when we are out together, we challenge ourselves to keep our spending to the minimum. Say like about $50 per outing inlcluding parking and ERP charges and we feel a sense of achievement when we hit the target.
So we find where is the cheapest parking even if we need to walk a little further. We do not compromise on food but we do compromise on desserts and things that we need to buy.
Rania sharing a $1 ice cream potong with her dad and look how she is enjoying it.
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Us, sitting at the corner of a pillar finishing up our ice cream potong.
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At the end of the day, what matters most is that you have your loved ones around you and have happy times together.
The smiles captured are priceless and nothing can replace that for me.
That is family. We go through ups and downs but I always share with Alfi that it is ok.
It is not as bad as many other around the world have it.
I am just happy to have a great husband, awesome kid and with His Willing, another one along the way.
It's called building the love.
And that is how I would love to groom my family to be.
This post is brought to you by Pampers Singapore
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