words from their mouth

told the kids we were gonna go to Pizza Hut for lunch, so what flavor pizza would they like to order?

Dayana: "i want to order pepper ****** with the red chicken".
(she didn't know how to pronounce pepperoni)

Dinara: "i want the Purple pizza".

err okay. so which cartoon on youtube has been teaching her that purple pizzas exist??!

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there's was this time i asked Dayana what her ambitions were. do you remember back in school (be it primary or secondary), your teacher will ask you to complete your student book (Maklumat Diri Pelajar or something like that) and there's a section where you had to fill in three different ambitions that you would like to pursue when you grow up?

back then it was always: doctor, lawyer, teacher. nothing was more awesome-sounding than those three ambitions (at the time where got such thing as technologist? haha).

anyway, since Dayana would have to fill up that section in her book sooner or later, i casually asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up.

she tells me, "i want to be a BAKER when i grow up! so that i can cook you delicious food and serve you breakfast in bed!".

ooops. i wonder where she got that idea from, haha.

she thought summore, and told me her second ambition was to be a policeman.
.
.
.
.
.
i told her to choose another (safer) ambition.

she thought summore, then finally settled on being a teacher. i asked her if she wanted to become a pilot like Daddy, she said she did not. she's afraid of Daddy's simulator, so that option's a clear cut no-no, lol.

she didn't know what her third ambition was to be, so i asked her whether she wanted to become an engineer like her Uncle Amal. 'you know, the person that builds buildings and stuff'. she agreed, and even went to the extent of saying that she wants to build a big house for us later when she's able to. pun boleh lah. haha.

updated: she changed her mind about becoming an engineer, she wants to become a doctor instead. when i asked her why, she told me, "i have to sleep on the floor and there's no place to go toilet!". i was blur at first, until i realized she assumed that she'd be building a house from scratch so there'd be no bedroom or toilet and therefore she'd have to build a toilet first, hahahaha.

she loves swimming so much now she's become 10 shades darker than her original skin color X_X. and so far nobody has failed to notice this. haih. swim during midday when the sun is right on top of your head pun takpe. "i'll wear sunblock", she'll say. T__T. orang lain pulun nak qu puteh qu puteh. HAHA.

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Sophia's able to pronounce the word 'daddy' now. or more like 'dediiiiiii'. she says it whenever she sees Daddy, she says it in my face, she says it each time her Sesame Street episode has ended and wants someone to press Play for a new episode, she says it just because she enjoys saying it, you name it.
the Daddy was proud too, until i noticed that she started to overuse the word, which got me to wondering whether she actually knew what 'dedi' really referred to.

the Daddy was not amused. HAHA.

the closest word to 'Mommy' that she could pronounce was 'memey'. ahhhh whatevs. memey pun memey laaaa. there was this one night, she was yelling 'memeeeeeeeeeyyyyyyy!' while barging into our bedroom, i was such a happy camper.

but unfortunately for me she rarely says memey, even after jabbing a thumb to my chest and commanding her to say it.

"mamiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!!" i tell her. she completely ignores me. sigh.

she's the only child that happens to like to play with Mister Potato, lol. she particularly enjoys pulling the body parts out and randomly fixing them back on. she finds it fascinating.

now this little one ada harapan nak jadi pilot. HAHA.

note the eerie stare haha.

short snippets

Sophia counts:

while the elder two was brought up on Little Einsteins, Sesame Street and Dora (and as they got older, Hi-5 and My Little Pony), the youngest one was also exposed to Sesame Street, as well as Sofia the First (lol).

recently we've put on Disney Channel for her to watch (since the thumb drive keeps on playing the same thing over and over) and one of the daily current shows included Jake and the Neverland Pirates. i noticed that whenever the part where Jake counts his golden dubloons, Sophia would eagerly stare at the tv screen and count with them. 'sa! sa! sa! sa! sa! sa! sa! sa!' and then she'll look rather pleased with herself. hahaha.

i've got to get this on camera one day.

in Dayana's dictionary:

apple = fruit
strawberry = vegetable (now where on earth did she get that idea? -___-)
tomato = salad

bahahahahha i totally get that one. must be from watching Uncle Amal eating all that salads at home last time.

last weekend we dropped by AnW for a rootbeer, i overheard her telling her Atok that she went to the 'teddy bear shop' (no guesses as to where that is) to have a 'drink with the ice cream in it' T_T

brownie points for description though =P

Dinara oh Dinara:

she refuses to go to school until she gets a hug and kiss from bibik. she'll scream her head off until bibik helps her to put on her shoes, and will stand in front of the car door until bibik opens it for her (like a Boss, hmmmph). and then she'll put up a hissy fit if she doesn't get to close the door all by herself. 'I CLOSE THE DOOR!' she'd yell.

she also loves to ask, 'what about me?' in reference to comparing with her elder sister. talk about making a mom feel guilty. tsk. i have to buy things in twos now. just wait until the youngest pandai demand nanti -___-

my stuffed toy that i so cleverly named 'Giffy' (because he's a giraffe, obviously) was recently hijacked by Dinara and now she goes to sleep with it every night. she used to get hooked onto this Doll i randomly bought when she was younger until bibik hid it and eventually she forgot about it. out of all stuffed toys at home she chose MINE to hog, sigh. anyhow, ever since Giffy changed ownership, Dinara renamed him 'Dog', and then decided it looked more of a 'Goopy', and the most recent name of all, 'OWL'.

which part of Giffy makes him look like an OWL????

minah rempit at the age of 1

camera junkies =P

all grown up?

not so soon, i hope!

my three girls

Sophia is 10 months old tomorrow! she's been standing up a lot now in her 'enclosed area', she's been toppling over countless of times, she loves hanging out in front of my tv just because she can 'hang' there, she's been watching too many reruns of Sesame Street (and loving it too), her two lower teeth are fully out and there's no sign of new ones, she still sleeps more soundly on her tummy, she knows how to whine whenever we annoy her, she has this habit of poking at things with her finger and end up tearing into the fabric (she tore a hole in her pillowcase as well as her playpen floor mat homaigod), and a whole lot more i can't recall at the back of mind. Pia oh Pia T__T.

Dinara just had her passport done recently at the Immigration Department in SA. they take your photo ON THE SPOT - they have all these cameras mounted at each counter, so all you hafta do is smile and hope you look cute. cool eh? bahahahahhaha. i think they do this because the photos people bring to the counter don't fulfill the criteria (cannot see ears, bahu senget lah, baju not dark enough of a color, things like that perhaps). it sure was a hassle to take a photo, Dinara simply didn't trust the officer there to smile properly for the camera T__T. i dunno if this new method applies to other places, you might wanna check first before going.

one thing the elder two kids love to do in the morning when i drive them to school is they never fail to fight over who gets to sit in front, grrrr. take turns pun tak makan saman. i'm just gonna dump them in the back at this rate.

here's a story i just have to share about Dayana =P. i was browsing through one of her school exercise books yesterday, she had Bahasa Malaysia homework (suku kata) that she tried to complete on her own. so while there were some minor silly mistakes such as 'tigi' instead of 'tiga', or 'kurusi' instead of 'kerusi', or 'baja' instead of 'baju' (grrr) the following mistake had to take the cake:

otepes!

bahahahhahaha, i couldn't help laughing, i'm sorry X___X
i give her brownie points for creativity *high five*

another weekend with the kids

i've been trying to spend more time with the kids over the weekend because i barely have time to hang out with them during the weekdays. i don't want to wake up one day and realize that my eldest is 18 years old. hahahahahah.

Sophia loves pulling herself up at the edge of the kids' bed (or any furniture that she's able to get a hold on). she gets really excited whenever we bring her upstairs and into the kids' room, she assumes she gets to join in on the fun =D (having more than 1 kid is definitely da bomb!). the elder one was only interested in taking a photo, she treats her baby sister like a minion, boleh?

peace be upon you, fellow alien

i finally let them play with the blocks i bought during Dayana's era but didn't want to let them play with it because guess who's gonna end up having to clean up everything every single time (and counting them too to make sure none was missing)?

jambatan pulau pinang?

on Sunday i took the two elder ones for a haircut.

minahs gediks

they were not the only ones who got a hair trim, i ended up having one too =P. this Dinara really doesn't like to pose for the camera unless if it's by her own free will (tengoklah mata dia ntah ke mana T___T). and she still does the loser sign as a substitute for the peace sign. haha.

"loser, uolls"

a quick selfie with the husband while my pretty hair is still pretty.

with my comots

and we had dinner at this nice restaurant in Subang Parade with the in-laws and uncles and aunty (singular, lagi sorang aunty mia). we even brought Little Miss Sunshine along, who behaved really well throughout the dinner. 'behaving well' meaning i'm able to eat my dinner in peace without having to have her sit on my lap while rice falls onto her head =D.

dinner at SP

and who did i meet here but Kak June, who was also having dinner seated in the corner of the restaurant. how i recognized her? by all the bracelets draped around her wrist =P~~~~

of kids and food

happy Chinese New Year! here's how Dinara decided to usher in the Year of the Horse:

rainbow ponies!

notable Horsies: my sister Ashu =D

on the first day of Chinese New Year, we spent the morning at home, because nobody invited us anywhere HAHA. semua orang balik kampung agaknya. we spent the evening at Pak Long's house for abit.

i got to test hani's turkish towel wrap, which i really like because it wraps solid, despite not fancying stripey colors (it's red/fuchsia weft i think?). and because it wraps solid, i think i prefer it as a ruck wrap. Sophia seems to like being rucked with it too, she started cooing once she was up.

sleepy bunny at the back

the other two goons, found the princess costumes their Nana bought for them and despite almost outgrowing them, they decided to parade in them all around the house. the following photo is their attempt to pose for the camera. the younger one has yet to perfect the art of 'peace'; the fingers she holds out each time for the camera would end up depicting the 'loser' sign if anything. or better yet, it's like she's doing the peace sign rewritten: you better be peace, or suffer the wrath of my hand gun. bahahahahah.

reruns of Sophia the First in the background

i downloaded Frozen recently, and now all Dinara asks for is 'nak Elsa!' sometimes the kids fight about who gets to be Elsa. everybody wants to be Elsa, nobody wants to be Anna T__T. they can even sing along with the songs in the movie already.

if you look closely at the photo below, you'd see that her face has magic marker all over it. this one ah, not only does she color her coloring book, but also her fingers, her clothes, her face, and sometimes the occasional furniture T___T.

pink marker on her cheeks and face. igt blusher kah?

and the youngest? busy eating poop.

ok just kidding. she has a thing for diapers; give her a clean diaper and that'll keep her entertained for awhile. no need to buy expensive toys, good eh? the other thing she likes doing is flipping through books. not the board-like books, but the normal ones that are so freaking easy to tear into pieces with little grubby hands like hers. she doesn't seem interested in any of the board books i give her, except for the touchy feely ones. she enjoys tearing tissue paper into little pieces too. she loves putting her fingers into her mouth. that brings the word 'finger food' to a whole new level.

the other day at Pak Long's house she was so bored she ended up reading the paper. talk about bo-ring.

what happens when you visit a house w no toys available

no matter. at least she still eats her carrots to compensate for swallowing too much tissue paper. the eldest loves Sophia, despite being smacked at a couple of times each time she tries to shove her face in front of Sophia's line of vision.

i wuv my sister

that night while i left the two kids at Tok Ami's house while me and the husband got lost looking for Nilai Sports Centre, Dayana asked her grandma a curious question.

"tok Ami, why is your hair white?"
my mom simply answered that her hair was white because she wore the tudung.
she later told me that "tok Ami's hair is white because dia pakai tudung".
HAHA. then i asked her why Dayana's hair wasn't white because she wore the tudung to school.
she answered that she wasn't wearing the tudung all the time, so that's why her hair hadn't turned white yet.
bahahahhahahaha.

FOOD SECTION!

have you noticed that at some point in time, your timeline would be bombarded with a gazillion photos of phood food? mine was. first it was kangkung, then poppiah, and then sambal. LOL.

i was lucky to have won a random giveaway by #nomnompopiah, i got to choose the flavor (she offers 4 different types of flavors, i took cheese for f-a-t). you could bake it for a healthy kick or fry it (like i did). next time boleh order lagi yah. btw, thanks sanaa =).

so fine, no creativity in serving, janji masuk tummy suka hati

the ones below i got from Siti. she completed someone's order and had extras. her apams are the best. and Dinara's a cupcake monster, so i got the chocolate ones for her. yumm.

the last food i'm gonna crap about today (just in case you're wondering when my rambling would end) is the #samballetop, which doesn't move me in the least simply because i don't eat spicy to begin with but thought it would be a kick to get a jar for Significant Other to taste because he eats chilli padi like he's eating carrots (which is why his taste buds have gone immune already =P). i've seen dozens of photos people post online on ways they dine with the addition of this condiment, so i guess it must really be something in terms of adding flavor to your existing dish. i just got a jar today, so i'll let you know what he thinks of it. the smell is really nice though. i had one heck of a time trying to arrange a COD with this person hahah.

*update: Significant Other loves it. now putting fault on this sambal for overeating.

hijau benor

my girls

my girls...

have grown up alot.

d1:

we were worried d1 was behind in reading so after talking to Nedd during raya haji (congrats third time mommeh!) we headed over to MPH to buy a bunch of Peter & Jane books for d1. thanks to Daddy's teaching (and in her excitedness to be able to read back to us with no mistakes) in less than a week she's covered book 1a and 1b. hoh she was so excited to show off her talents to Atuk and Tok Ami last Saturday, she insisted i brought her book along during family lunch at kgns and gave a three-time rendition to her grandparents and Angah. Ashu and Pak Cik, just you wait, your turn next, haha.

she still fights with her younger sister though. people keep saying, oh girls don't fight as much as boys do. i reckon them wrong. the other day they were fighting over some petty little thing, and so...

me: dayana, how old is adik?
d1: two (salah, adik is 3 now)
me: and how old are you?
d1: five
me: so who is older?
d1: dayana
me: so who should beralah?
d1: (in a small voice) dinara
me and daddy: T____T

d2:

for d2, we bought a few Kumon books for her to work on. at her age d1 could already work her flashcards, something d2 hasn't mastered yet. even though she'd only be starting school next year, she's been having difficulty in pronouncing words, it's kinda like she's sucking a sweet in her mouth when she's pronouncing the words back to us. she can understand us, but we sometimes take awhile before we can understand what she's trying to tell us.

remember that LeapReader pen we bought for d1? d2 would imitate d1 (by means of observing) by pointing the pen to the individual words in the book and repeating after the pen, although most of the time she'd be enjoying the sound effects the pen makes by pointing at various places in the book. she does this only when i leave her to her own means, leaving her alone to explorer the book all by herself.

daddy is better at teaching d2, if she's with me her mind would wander away 90% of the time. the other day i found Daddy teaching d2 the 1a book, with d2 willingly repeating after her Daddy. see? she can learn if she wants to, she just think Mommy's someone she can joke around with, grrrrrrr.

she is obsessed with Barbie i tell you. i found her screaming her head off this morning because she couldn't get Barbie on youtube and bibiks didn't know how to do it for her.

d3:

i affectionately call her Pia now, haha. she would draw up a fuss most of the time we brought her out so instead of calling her Dira, we call her Sophia now, just for the fun of it. Daddy wants to call her Princess Sophie, like that character in Leverage (kewl show which ended too soon). we called her Sofia the First one time and d1 scolded us, saying, tu bukan Sofia the First lah, tu Dira Nur Sophia! T__T

what can she do now, you ask? she'd get on all fours and start swaying forward and backward. some kind of pre-movement before crawling, perhaps? she can succussfully cover the whole floor perimeter by just rolling, sometimes inching forward like a caterpiller due to her strong legs.

she's fascinated by the tv. or perhaps bright colors. she loves staring at her playmat, even sometimes talking to it. she will always look in awe at her sisters, provided they take the time to stop and chat. oooh, and lately she's been blowing alot of raspberries tu, ni mesti kerje the Daddy nih. where else would she have learnt this skill? bahahahah.

the older two people:
decided to revamp the room. since we couldn't increase space, we had to make space. so two new additional closets were added to the room, in addition to a new freaking heavy tempered glass study table, i think i overstrained my back lifting weights *&*&#$&*^@#. in the process we had to throw out alot of stuff because the furniture needed floor room - a great way to do forced spring cleaning. cons: store room's full, i have no idea where to keep some of the stuff we simply took for granted. sigh. i hope everything will be back to normal this week. i've already managed to misplace my hairbrush amidst the jumble.

would anyone like to buy a used computer table? can let go for cheap. PM me!

dollhouse

so the kids got a dollhouse for their birthday this year. although it wasn't exactly the ones i had in mind, the ones i'd be imagining about were the gigantic old-school traditional wooden ones that looked so antique that you'd be too scared to even play with. but then the dolls would also be old-looking at tiny and scary looking, wouldn't they?

(ok fine. i couldn't find the perfect dollhouse in Malaysia).

there were alot of children's wooden dollhouses for sale in the UK, which costs roughly about £100 (furniture sold separately hokeh) but they were too huge and too heavy to be brought back. i'd rather ship back my EBM if i could, haha.

since the girls had a small collection of barbies, i thought why not get them a barbie dollhouse?

they weren't into My Little Pony like iza's daughters were.
Polly Pocket had so many small parts D3 would be more likely to swallow them once she learns how to crawl.
they already had Duplo bought by their Daddy.
they also had a play kitchen with all the utensils strewn everywhere (but i wouldn't mind getting them one of those wooden sturdy ones from ELC or Ikea =P).
however their princess figurine collection set is under code red (what with loose limbs and a decapitated Cinderella).

so i guess the obvious choice would be a dollhouse of the sort for their barbie collection, wouldn't it? the kids' idea of a 'dollhouse' at the moment include parking all their small toy figurines all over the room - on top of the bookshelves, in the baby's crib, under the dressing table, on top of my storage boxes, etc. semak bilik!

so we got them a dollhouse each - to SHARE (bah. what a lot of hogwash that word is hahaha). the girls were so excited to tear open the wrapping paper (don't worry, i recycled the torn pieces =P). but who had the task of assembling them dollhouses? mommy and daddy lah. the one i had to assemble was a sort of summerhouse, complete with a kitchen and living room. this summerhouse had small parts that you could anchor onto the main parts of the doll house, which i think is pretty cool so you don't end up losing them. the dollhouse that daddy assembled consisted of a collapsible bed and a bathroom. you could fold the whole dollhouse into a compact carry bag and lug it around the house. the downside of this one is it had so many small tiny parts, i'm pretty much sure that the kids will be bound to lose them anytime soon.

the first thing they did after finishing assembling the dollhouses was to - you guessed it - fight over who got to play what. sigh.

oh let me show you the kids' barbie doll collection. the daddy loved to buy them barbies. each time we drop by toys r us, the kids will always manage without fail to pau a doll each from daddy so that the total number of dolls that they owned would be even numbered - except for one time when daddy came back from a business trip he bought Ariel for D1, and pooh bear for D2 T___T. pooh bear? seriously? haha.

so just before i flew off for my holiday i hunted around the house for those dolls. mind you they don't take care of their toys as lovingly as we want them to, no matter how many times i tell them to keep them properly. take Tinkerbell for one. uncle Amal bought Tinky for Dayana's birthday present and the next day it disappeared. like completely. i haven't found it until now. and you know what she said? 'it's gone! Tinkerbell flew away!' T___T. Dinara pulak has this thing about destroying the dolls by taking off their outfits reason being they want to take a bath T__T.

update: until now, no sign of Tinkerbell. di manakah??? @_@

amidst the jungle of toys they've managed to accumulate over the years, i managed to find all their barbie dolls and accessories, except for the first doll's miniscule shoes. and their crowns? couldn't be saved. i dunno how the toy manufacturer initially glued the crowns to the dolls' head, because each time i try putting them back on they just come back off again. the bad part? their hair were in total tangles. yarghhhhhh. especially Ariel, who had the longest of hair among them. the kids wouldn't play with the dolls if their hair were out of place. i remember how irritated D1 and D2 would get each time their hair got into the barbie's face.

L-R: newest to oldest

i read online that you could literally get rid of tangles with a water, fabric softener, and a comb. just dunk the doll's head in the mixture for 5 minutes, then dry off and comb. i have yet to try this tactic. another way to untangle dolls hair would be to massage baby oil into the hair before coming it out. but i think everything will end up oily, so i think fabric softener sounds like a much better idea.

i just got back from my trip, and guess what the Daddy decided to get them: more barbie dolls T___T. i stuck all 4 of them in the stroller box... eh wait got 5 - Belle, Aurora, Cinderella, Snow White, and Merida. yeah and guess which one noone took a fancy to? T___T. i think their Nana bought them a couple more barbies too, because i saw an unfamiliar barbie lying about in an outfit i don't recognize.

hmmm... now to get an updated shot of their collection. laters, ya?