The Boys

its been a while since i wrote about the boys' development. my next entry was supposed to be of amir & asyraf's Hari Kecemerlangan Pelajar, but it has been cancelled due to the MOE's directive. it would have been a nice entry, with both boys performing and getting number 1 for their recent mid year exam. so for now, it'll be an entry about the boys, in a different outlook.

amir - 4 years, 6 months
amir's so big, yet he's so small. he's big as he's progressed so far but he's only 4 years old. hubby and i are in awe of his developments. maybe because he's our eldest and we dont know what to expect when a child is his age. but he's small in terms of size. he's seriously just skin and bones. there's not an ounce of fat of him. he's turning off rice but is more into bread now. he loves cheese on toast and bread with peanut butter. last night he finished 5 pieces of doughnuts with asyraf in under 20 minutes.

amir can draw. i found a paper with scriblings in his school bag once. i looked at it and thought i saw a fish and maybe an orang lidi. so i called amir and asked him what the drawings were. when asking, one has to be calm and not make a big deal. children tend to get embarassed and would not open up. amir pointed to 2 orang lidi - that's mummy & daddy, and then a fish and said they have a fish in school (turns out to be quite many and not just 'a'), there was also stairs and 2 balloons and a very obvious 3 cirlces making out mickey mouse.

he's into ben10 now. we dont really mind...its better than ultraman or power rangers anytime. he has been asking for a ben10 watch even though hubby bought it a long time ago.

amir chooses his clothes. on weekdays, he just wear whatever i pack for him but during the weekend he would dictate what he wears. sad...no more matching clothes for my triplets. to avoid a confrontation with his mummy, he would run to his room and pick out his clothes for the day as soon as he wakes up in the morning. his first statement in the morning is, nak mandi. ahhh...i've trained him well.

at the moment, amir seems more into football than asyraf. he enjoys training with the coaches and the abangs every weekend. probably because he understands the instructions given and feels more part of the crowd than asyraf.

asyraf - 2 years, 7 months
this boy is such a joy. after all the suffering he put us through, he's such a delight. he's much calmer and can listen to reason. getting him to stop crying is easier now and he doesnt bawl out in the car as much anymore. he also doesnt cry out for susu as soon as he step into the car.

speaking of susu, asyraf drinks 2 bottles per day. we give him both bottles before he goes off to sleep. he doesnt need to sleep with a bottle as he used to do. once he finishes his 2nd round he would thrust the bottle to me and say, mummy...wash! i'm ever so glad that we didnt resort to pacifiers during asyraf's difficult period. we won the war!

if amir is into ben10, asyraf loves watching the shows on nick jr and playhouse disney. he's slowly moving away from mickey mouse and would watch animal mechanicals. every so often he would scream out 'clifforrrrrrrd' (stressing on the R) and amir would then scream 'ben tennnnn'. they absolutely cannot sit together in the car, else world war 3 would start.

asyraf's favourite line is 'mummy wangi, daddy busuk'. if he's having a good day, that's what he would say. if he's angry, he would scream out 'mummy busuk' or 'daddy busuk'. at least he knows how to express his feelings other than by crying, so its good.

he hates it when people call him acap. he would say 'ei...apa manggi acap, asyraf lah' when we ask what his teachers call him, he would quickly say 'asyraf'. shows how much he loves his teachers.

asyraf loves pizza. he can eat 4 slices at one go. he's very much into pasta as well.

ariff - 1 year, 9 months
if amir has lost weight, this boy has put on...if its possible! he's just so big! ariff is rough and tough. he's called "gem" in school but we call him "oso" at home, after special agent oso. he's so keras and huggable that whenever he passes by, hubby and i would grab and hug him.

he eats a lot. his taste is more towards malay food, rice. he doesnt like bread for some reason. of course cereal and cookies, jangan cakap lah, all children loves those. he has to hold food in both hands and would stuff them in his mouth at one go. hubby used to say ariff doesnt chew his food.

ariff is rough. dont ever mess with him. he would grab and bite and scratch and sondol anyone who upsets him. he's on a constant fight with asyraf. asyraf being the big brother would sometimes back down, not something he would do last time. ariff is very soft with akmal, though. he calls akmal, jekkkk...jekkkk.

ariff is starting to talk. he loves saying 'nak minum'. he calls hubby 'dad' (eleh mat salleh konon) and can say 'jommm', 'car tok', 'bawah', 'atas'. when we're about to reach home he would say, 'dah sampai'. he doesnt like to be left behind. its been amir asyraf ariff for so long. now that amir & asyraf is stepping up a bit with their outdoor activities, ariff's been excluded and he doesnt like it one bit. he would scream and run to the door, then to the windows when he realises abang long and abang has gone out with daddy and he's left with boring mummy and akmal izzat who doesnt do much.

akmal - 4 months
akmal's monthly jab schedule is not on track. it started when his 2nd month jab was due. he was under the weather and had to visit his pead for check up after check up. he finally was given his jab 3 weeks after he turned 2 months and his jabs for the subsequent months ran. tomorrow (a week shy of his 4th month) i'll be visiting his pead for his 3rd month jab.

akmal is getting better with his milk intake. he doesnt spit out so much. 1 towel can last a day. he's drinking a lot. when he wakes up he can gobble down 7-8oz at one go, and for his normal feed, he would drink 6oz. cant wait to feed him his first meal next week. i didnt want to give him processed food but i got some from a friend and may start with that. in school, he would be eating porridge. i've already given his teachers the permission to start feeding him next week.

akmal sleeps through the night. i cant stress how wonderful it feels not to have to wake up to prepare a bottle. at most he would require a diaper change but i'd rather change in the morning, as he would want a bottle to go to sleep if i were to wake him up. other than that, he's wonderful when it comes to sleep.

he likes to sit up and watch his brothers at work. its irritating because he cant last a long time lying down on the bouncer. at most it would be 30 minutes, then he would yell and yell till his voice breaks. once we pick him up and sit him on our laps, he'd stop and look around, watch the tv, play with his brothers. its ok...just another month or so before he can sit up and can be left to his own devices.

akmal cooes. he actually says 'coooo' when he talks. when akmal is well fed and dry, he would cooo and cooo and cooo. his favourite time to talk is when he's rid of his clothes, waiting for a bath. then he would cooo non-stop.

like asyraf, akmal is a bit attached to his bottle. in school, his teachers would leave his bottle in his mouth until he falls asleep. its irritating but still no pacifiers for him.i've gone through 3 boys pacifier-less and i'm not about to start now. akmal, daddy & mummy always win!

Story of Pangkor Getaway

planning this getaway was easy. we wanted to take the new car out of the city but we didnt want to go too far. i searched for a place to get away to and came up with pangkor. hubby wasnt to keen. he said its not nice and it wasnt so easy getting over there - the ferry crossing, mainly. i did some research, asked a few people and managed to convince him (not fully though but just enough).

so once the ker-ching came in, i made the bookings, printed the pictures, listed the clothes to bring and bought the necessary items (sunscreen, travel-size toileteries etc).

we didnt tell the boys as they'd be bugging us with 'bila nak pegi hotel' question. when they slept on saturday night, i started packing and hubby put the bags in the car. we travel extremely light this time - 1 small trolley bag, 1 backpack, 1 diaper bag and 1 bag of toys. i didnt even bring a lot of diapers and the dvd players. hubby wanted to bring a stroller but i thought it would be a nuisance instead of helping. so akmal was carried in a sling, which was much better.

we started the journey at 9:30am sunday morning (after 1 load of laundry...i cant miss that). we got to lumut around 12:30pm & had a quick lunch at kfc. syerah, en zainul & ms lana came by with some long-awaited cheesetarts (sungguh lah sedappp) we took the 2pm ferry and got to the island at 2:30pm.

when we got to the room, i unpacked and got the boys to sleep. getting akmal to nap wasnt as easy, so we sat on the balcony with him. when the boys got up, it was swimming time. we spent 2 hours in the pool before hauling them up for their bath and dinner.

the next morning was spent at the beach. ariff wasnt too keen but amir and asyraf were having the time of their lives. then its naptime, hubby and i managed to get some peace and quiet while the boys napped. after lunch, it was pool-time again.

the getaway was wonderful...it was so nicely planned. from the budgeting, to the timing, to the boys' mood, right down to the amount of formula and diapers brought. we came back even lighter than we left, rested, darker and with a full memory card.

next trip - tioman?

Pictures of Pangkor Getaway

in no necessary order. there's just too many pictures to upload.
journey to and fro...


























































at the pool...




























at the beach...




























in the garden...



















in the room...

Open Day 2009

my office had its 2nd open day today. last year none of my boys could join as they were below the minimum age limit. this year, they lowered it to 3 years, so both amir and asyraf participated.

the earlier part of the day was held in the office (the new office in sentral). i took the boys for a ride on the lrt. we could have stopped at sentral but i decided to go all the way to klcc instead. we met zu there and then took a bus to the sentral office.

then late morning, everyone went to klcc for a movie, lunch and a trip to the aquaria. hubby only joined after friday prayers (hence the big difference in photo quality).

it was a great day out. kudos to the committee. we (zu and i) like the part where they are so easily visible and are always in front of us. nice one. thanks zu for helping out. thanks andy for the skybridge plan that didnt materialise. the boys had fun and were tired out.