Sophia's Birthday Cake

This year I made a conscious decision to make all my children's birthday cakes. Shop bought cakes are nice enough and professional looking but they do cost a bomb. Growing up my mum used to get her friend (an amateur baker) to make my birthday cakes and I had really cool cakes. Imagine how cool I was to have a barbie doll cake in the 70s complete with a real barbie in it? So I figured if that was possible in the 70s in Malaysia how difficult is it now when everything I need to make a great cake is available so easily. 

I made a number 3 cake for Aiesha and Sophia wanted a ladybird cake for her 2nd birthday. The actual recipe called for a pudding bowl shaped cake but with the relatives I invited to Sophia's little party (with the unpredictable October weather we had to keep her party small just in case we have to contain everyone in the house unlike Aiesha who has a summer birthday so we have always been blessed with good weather), a small pudding bowl cake definitely wouldn't be enough. I baked two cakes and attempted to shape the top as much as I could but I was too freaked out to trim it too much so the cake didn't look as rounded at the top as it should. But I think it turned out ok for a novice like me. Everything except for the candles are edible.

I don't have a happy photo of Sophia with the cake as she was bawling her eyes out when it was time to cut the cake. She later explained that she cried because her friends were trying to blow her candles and get her cake. My poor baby.

Happy 2nd Birthday Adik!

Today, my little Sophia is finally 2. She's such a joy and we can't remember a time without her in our lives. She loves to sing and knows quite a fair few nursery rhymes. For her age, she speaks very well and has an impressive vocabulary. She's still my little booboob girl and I love her to bits. Happy Birthday adik!

Hours old

A year old in KL

She asked for chocolate cupcakes with 2 candles.

First Day At School

So, I've not had any entries for awhile......too busy and not particularly inspired I suppose. Apologies to those who've been kind enough to take a peek and a belated Eid Mubarak to all.

At their Aunty Fifi's

With their cousins Aidan and Ferran

Last Friday was Aiesha's first official day at school. I think I was more stressed and nervous than she was. My tummy were in knots from the night before thinking of how she would cope.....more to the point, how I would cope. Apart from leaving her with my mum, my MIL and of course their Daddy for a few hours, I have never left either of my children in the care of strangers. They go where I go. 

My worry was totally unfounded as she was perfectly fine. Actually she was more than fine and went straight into her classroom without saying goodbye to me or her sister. I had to ask her to come back out and say goodbye to us properly. She's even made a new friend which was great. They met a week before when we had a short visit to the school. All week long she went on and on about her new friend Olivia who is also 3 years old just like her. Yup, they were both amazed that they were the same age. Bless their little cotton socks! When we arrived at school Olivia was already there and also excited to see Aiesha. They started playing together immediately and poor little Sophia seemed a bit shocked that her Kakak was playing with someone else. Sophia was again very, very miffed when not only did Kakak have a new friend, the new friend went into class with her Kakak and she wasn't allowed to stay. Poor adik bawled her eyes out all the way home.

Excited about going to school

Finally at school

Skip, skip, skip

Look mummy, I can open the gate.

I'm oh so sad I have to go home with mummy.

Styrofoam Fun

I have some styrofoam to use for my gardening which is kept in the greenhouse and away from my girls. I took a piece out to use as I needed to re-pot my herbs. Whilst I was busy tending my pots and had my eyes off my girls, this is what I found when looked up. Little girls tearing the styrofoam to pieces!

After all the fun, I gave them both a bag each and asked them to collect all the bits. Although we didn't get all the pieces, we managed to get a substantial amount into the bags. If I left them in the garden it could possibly fly into my neighbours garden and I doubt they'll appreciate it. They're tricky little things and we've still got traces of styrofoam in the garden. I wonder how long it'll will take before they're all gone. 

Booboob Oh Booboob.

So last week was World Breastfeeding week and both my girls are (and in the case of Aiesha, were) breastfed babies, we nurse on demand and direct from source. I admit schedules, pumping and the like just do not appeal to me (Read : Mummy too malas and would rather go with the flow). I pumped for a bit for Aiesha but didn't see the point of it as I am a SAHM. I pumped once for Sophia and she rejected the bottle much to my relief. We once had to attend an evening wedding reception when my mum was around. I left a bottle of  expressed milk and my mum said she totally refused. It's direct from source or nothing at all I suppose.

Aiesha was a booboob baby all throughout my pregnancy and I was quite prepared to tandem nurse as she was 6 months when I found out I was pregnant again. Obviously still very much a baby and I felt it would be too cruel to cut her off (hardly her fault mummy is up the duff again). Knowing that my supply would dip/change we got a box of formula just in case. But we never needed it at she persevered with the dips and change in taste. However, a few weeks before Sophia arrived Aiesha weaned herself. I still remember the last proper nursing session we had.  She was almost 15 months old at the time. It was an emotional time for me as I just knew that it was the last time. You see with Aiesha, I didn't know what I was doing as she was my first. We had terrible latching issues and every feed was such agony for me. Even with the guidance of a lactation consultant, it would take us close to 3 weeks before it all finally click and our booboob sessions stopped hurting mummy. I was determined to have her exclusively breastfed so the end of our nursing relationship hit me quite hard. I knew that if not for my pregnancy she would definitely nurse for longer. She would still have the occasional nibble at bedtime but never again did she have a proper feed. And kept offering as I read that once baby arrives the older child starts nursing again once the milk supply is back to normal as it were. But it wasn't meant to be and the end was permanent.

By the time Sophia arrived I was already a pro at all this breastfeeding lark and nursing her was a breeze from the first latch. We would nurse on demand....anytime, anywhere. This was almost 2 years ago. Sophia will be turning 2 this coming October and our nursing sessions are going strong if not stronger. She speaks rather well for age and will ask for booboob. Recently she has become even more articulate and would actually say 'Can I have some booboob please, mummy?' How can I say no to such a lovely request from such a lovely little girl? As she is older her nursing sessions are usually confined to the home. We rarely if ever nurse in public anymore as she's always too busy when we're out and about. So she's quite capable of not having booboob all day long if we're out all day. But when we're home she can't get enough of booboob and recently it's as if all we do at home is booboob. What's up with that? A few weeks ago booboob was mostly during nap time and bed time with the occasional quick sip. Now the moment I sit myself down, Sophia will come over and request for booboob. And my little girl can nurse and nurse and nurse. :) Hope it's just a phase as I can't be booboobing all day long now can I? Unless of course I was booboobing a newborn.....my Sophia is almost 2, can ask for it and is quite capable of helping herself.

I of course plan to booboob my next baby. Whenever that may be. I'm hoping for sooner rather than later. InsyaAllah.

Burung Kakak Tua?

One of my bedtime rituals with my girls is to have them 'Baca Bismillah'. They know when mummy says 'Baca Bismillah' means to recite surah Al-Ikhlas. Depending on how tired they are they will happily recite it without much fuss and of course lots of praise from mummy helps. They know it rather well and very the sejuk perut when I hear them recite the surah as they don't really get a lot of Islamic exposure living in a non-muslim country. They are still little but I try my best to teach them the basics. I'm not an expert and I can just about teach them the basics and I'll worry about the heavier, technical stuff when they are older. (read : private lessons during our trips back to Malaysia)

Anyway, seeing that they are rather good at Al-Ikhlas I thought it was time to progress to Al-fatihah. It's a bit longer so we haven't mastered it yet but Aiesha knows about 50% of it now and again very the sejuk perut. She's keen to recite it all but gets a bit frustrated when she falters halfway through. But I'm sure she'll get it all soon enough as we didn't master the Al-ikhlas overnight. 

Sophia is not yet 2 so when recites the Al-Ikhlas I can make out what she is saying but not others. You would have to concentrate very hard to make out what she's saying but she does know it. She mimics everything Aiesha does so now she too is listening very intently to Al-Fatihah when I recite it. By my estimation she gets about 25% of it which is again a sejuk perut moment for me.

After Al-Ikhlas and Al-Fatihah it is time to sleep but not before Sophia does her rendition of Burung Kakak Tua. My little darling has somehow got it in her head that Burung Kakak Tua is also a surah that needs to be learnt for bedtime. I guess she hasn't yet realised that the surahs are in Arabic and Burung Kakak Tua is in Malay. She must lump them all together as not English so by her logic must all be the same.

Children truly are little sponges and given proper guidance they can learn anything. Case in point, my girls speak better Malay than their father who is now learning from them.

Beddy Byes

On most days Sophia has one daytime nap and Aiesha doesn't. I say most days because sometimes Aiesha will nap and on those days if she naps too late in the day it spells trouble later on. So a couple of days ago Aiesha had a late nap and of course she had trouble sleeping later on. 

Being a full time SAHM I'm pretty relaxed about bedtime. I normally stay with my girls until they are asleep and as long as they're asleep by a certain then I'm cool with it all. Usually Sophia will fall asleep first and within 10 to 20 minutes later Aiesha will follow. But a couple of nights ago Aiesha was still wide awake half an hour later. So I figured I'd have my shower and by the time I'm finished she'd be asleep. I took an extra long shower to be on the safe side but was she asleep after mummy's long shower? Nope still awake. I knew if I opened the stairgate to go downstairs she would call out for me. 

On that night I had to climb over the stairgate and went downstairs without her noticing. About 10 minutes later we hear little footsteps and a cry. I went upstairs and found Sophia standing on Aiesha's side of the bed crying 'I want my mummy, where's my mummy'. Aiesha was lying on Sophia's side. I then asked Aiesha what happened to which she replied 'I don't know'. I then proceeded to ask if she woke her sister up. To which she replied 'I don't know'. My cheeky little girl says 'I don't know' whenever she has done something wrong. She knows that she if she were to call out for me or her daddy she would get a telling off for still being up. So what does she do.....wakes her sister up, mummy or daddy will come up and then deny any knowledge of her actions. She knew that once mummy is upstairs mummy isn't likely to leave until she's asleep. Mummy's soft like that. Mummy will be a little bit cross but not for long. Luckily she fell asleep soon after even though she kept saying 'I'm not tired mummy' in the hopes of getting a free pass to go downstairs.

I seriously need to get Aiesha back into her room again. Oh yes, my girls now sleep on our super king bed and we sleep in the guest bedroom. We got Aiesha sleeping in her own room on her first birthday as I needed space in our bed being 6 or so months pregnant at the time. Once Sophia arrived she would mostly sleep in her own bed but join us around 6am. We then had both girls in bed with us after a bout of throwing up last November. However, we decided a couple of months ago it was too crowded and we left our bed. Now we play musical beds. 

Yes, we are a bit crunchy with our child rearing.