Fahira : My curious lovely girl

Some questions can't be answered

I've graduated from school. My mark is not bad. I feel like I'm quiet clever ---- but I still can't seem to answer some of my daughter's questions, frankly, google is needed.

Well, what are the questions?

I know the answers of school lessons questions, like maths or english. I know the answers of basic science questions but it requires a lot of explanations and she doesn't even understand sometimes. I know the answer of sexual questions but I am embarrassed to say.

By showing Fahira's question that I'm unable to answer here, will somebody advice me how to reply her properly?

1. Mom, you are the who gave birth to me and breastfed me, how can my face be like daddy? (While seeing her father pic when he's her age)

My answer was, because he is your father. Hhhhhh.

2. How can the baby be in your womb? (When I was pregnant)

My answer : God sent her here

3. Why we cry when somebody is died if you said she is already happy with God?

My answer : Because we're not able to see her again until we died.

4. Why it's snowing in the western and it isn't here?

My answer : 'showing a ball'. This is the earth, we're in the middle. We have the bright sun all year so it's not cold enough for snowing.

5. How does a fish sleep?

My answer : I don't know

6. How do they make a plane?

My answered : There's a factory where planes are made

Fatimah : My straightforward girl

It's as impressing as it is challenging.

Sometimes, I feel I don't give as much attention to Fatimah as much as I did to Fahira when she's her age. It's a guilty feeling to me because Fatimah was 2 years and 1 month when Farisha was born while Fahira was 4 years and 2 months when Fatimah was born. My husband keeps telling me to not feel that way, because we all love and treat them the same. Yeah, I think I shouldn't.

The obvious acts we demonstrate to show them that we love them the same : Buying the same amount of clothes, feeding the same meal, kiss them all before sleep, take them all when we want to go out, etc.

I'll do a lot of things to make them understand that I balance my love for them, I do not want to cause anyenvy that might lead to hate the sibling. But, off course, there are some different reactions to their actions because of their different characters. Fahira is a very helpful girl when she is alone and doesn't play with friends, Farisha loves freedom and doesn't really like to stay still, while Fatimah just want to do what she wants to do. Fatimah is a straightforward person, she says what she wants and what she doesn't. The impressing side? Well, she never lie and I don't have to dig for what she feels inside. The challenging part? Hhhhh, It tests my patience to the limit when she doesn't want to take a bath, or eat or wear proper clothes when we want to go out. Things like that does make me lose temper sometimes.

One day, she didn't want to eat the whole day, she just had some coconut biscuits and sweet tea for breakfast. I tried to persuade her, asked what she liked to eat, offerrred her to eat while playing until I forced her, but she kept saying she didn't want to. I gave up. And at 3 am she woke up to say she was hungry and asked for food. And to my surprise, I was not angry. I was happy that finally my daughter would fill her stomach with food. The thought of she might have stomach ache if she didn't eat beated my sleepless night. It must be because I love her so much.

We never knew our patience limit until we become a parent
-- Hijriatul Laila --

Farisha : My early riser, my social butterfly

Also,she's my morning alarm.

Little baby, less sleep. Whenever my friends discuss on Facebook about super interesting tv programs that air past 8 pm, I have no idea ; I'm asleep.

Farisha wakes up at 5 or 5.30 In the morning, then takes a nap at 10 for about 2 hours long (which is my time to do chores). She'll have her bed time at around 8 pm, and I,  consider myself quiet tired to take care of my three children and a home during the day, and the estimation of 3 wake up at night to breastfed, I made 8 pm as my bedtime as well. :-)

Sure, being a mother is such a bless, but it's the job that makes you pray to God to bless you with patience. If that makes you rethink of being one, you should know that lots of people are releasing their good side since being a parent (lazy be dilligent, childish be mature, etc), and that's including me.

When I look back to the time when I was a girl, I was not a very dilligent girl, I can't cook, I am just that cool with dirt, I don't know how to handle a crying baby. But, being a mother force me to do all those things I can't, and for me, it's "learning it the hard way".

Having three children ages 7, 3 and 1 year old is the beautiful bless for me and as I am thankful, I must be responsible too. Less sleep is in the package off course.

All of my children are early risers when they are under 2 and becoming less early when they grew older. My 3 year old Fatimah will wake up about 8 am while Fahira must wake up early (with whatever effort) as she has to go to school at 7.

And this one year old Farisha will wake up the earliest and ask me to play.


She likes having breakfast outside.


We take her sister to school.



And when she's finally asleep, I must do chores quickly.

And, being an early riser is not the only thing she is that consume my energy, she is also a social butterfly ! She always asks me to go out to play with our neighbours after taken the afternoon bath. We Indonesians commonly taken a bath twice a day : in the morning before school or work and around 4.30 pm.

And she drags me out like saying "Sorry, it's not time for a lazy afternoon". Haha.


But, it's actually a good thing that she has social skill. Who knows what she will be in the future.

Being thrifty : Other use of patch

These are my mother in law's pillows that she gave to us. They usually are used in the family room when we relax reading a book or for the children to play as a kingdom or anything else. These pillows are so heavy that when I wash them by hand, I need my husband to take them outside to dry, because I'm not strong enogh to do that myself. What makes the pillows be so heavy? First, they're quiet big and second is because of their fillings. My mil had a taylor to be her neighbor years ago, and she had a lot of leftover patches to throw away, then my mil saw cushions, made it to be pillows and filled them with the patches.

I read simple life blogs telling about recycling things and making new, usable things out of the old, unused or leftover ones. One of them is doing patchworks. I love seing the beautiful patchworks and I love the idea of recycling, but I really can't sew although I used to see my moher saw our own clothes when I was little.

And if you are like me, and have patches t
here. You can just fill the pillow with it, nosew is needed. Ha.

Or, if you are queit talented but want to try other thing with your leftover other than pathwork, you can do what my sister did with my mother's :

She made them be barbie dresses.

Fatimah : Help in the kitchen

Fatimah is already 3 years old now, and could perform help sometimes, not all the times.
Like when I am about to cook, she helps me take the spinach off the root.

Play time

So, we have no tv at home. We have a plan of buying one but keep delaying it when we see or children play more with one another. It's been half a year. Ok, they still watch downloaded videos from youtube, but it's not as often as they watched tv back then. Their favourites are Barbie: life in the dream house, upin ipin, coco mong and children songs. So, what are they doing during the day?

Playing teacher

The box that keeps the house tidy of toys

Playing with balls

Playing bike

Messing the house

Learn to read the arabic

Take a nap

Playing doctor

Fahira: Apologizing

Fahira is in the second grade now and has a lot of friends. She plays with her sisters at home, plays with children her age in our neighborhood, plays with her friends at school and plays with children in her grandparent's neighborhood when she visits them (which is very often). Sometimes, one or two of her schoolmates come to our house after school to play until evening. I let them do so, but my regulation is that they must come back home first to tell their mothers. I don't want their mothers worry of where their children missing after school.

And when children play, there will always be things to start a fight among them. Whether it is about the toys or one wants to be the leader or whatever, fight amongs children while playing is usual.

The question is what we should do as parent when we witness this happen? I myself will let them cope their problems by themselves. But if the problem was quiet serious, I would ask what happen and listen to both sides explaining the situation. Then I would try to find the fair solution and make them be friends again. Usually it was just about "selfishness" little children do have (we all have been children and know what it feels). The hard part is just asking the child to apoligize. But with good words and right attitude, these children will sure be tamed. 

Just one thing I would love to tell new parents :  just as quarreling while playing is usual, they forgive and forget the quarrel way faster than we imagine. So just don't involve too much. Your words might hurt other parent if you blame her child. And surely it will last longer in her heart while your children already act like nofight ever happen.

Farisha : Mimicking

Farisha is already 1 year now. And she is learning to copy what her sisters do.

She will pick up the phone and says "ya"  and she loves disturbing her sister eating.

Hugs

When I was a young girl, I remember my mom always hug and kiss me before sleeping at night saying "selamat bobok ya nak" (Have a nice sleep my girl). And to me it was so comforting. I do the same thing to my girls now to ensure them experiencing the same comfort like I did.

I ever read that touch is more than words expressing love. I agree. When I was a single, worked, far from parents, rented a room. I felt like I was free. Yes, I was free to do what I like, eat what I want, go wherever I loved to. I didn't think I miss a thing.  But, I did miss those touches. Sometimes, I just didn't know what to do. I lost direction. I need to be touched, hugged, loved. Then I got married, have children and then I found out why it is said that marriage will make your life complete. I hug and kiss my husband and children everyday. We even kiss and hug one another when we just wake up in the morning and still that smell. At this stage I think touches as the expression of acceptance. You don't need to be somebody else to be loved. You even don't have to take a bath first, ha!

I know, not every family has a routine of hugging and kissing as an expression of love. But if you are the mother of the house, I encourage you to start now, even if your children are already a big person. Sometimes they experience rejection out there. Why don't we hug them often to show that  they are loved nomatter what. It will booze self-confidence.

And anyway, hugging your husband everymorning, even when you just had a quarell, will show forgiveness and add romance. I tried it before. It felt awkward first, but it did fix the relationship. :)

Farisha

Farisha Ramadhani, our youngest girl. 8 months old. She can already sit, crawl and try to stand. But she doesn't have anytooth yet.

She drinks breast milk and eat solid which I change every couple of days. Because the solids keep changing, she will eat the first bite suspiciously, taste it first before deciding to like it or not.

Here is a picture of her first bite of everymeal. Hahahaha.

Fatimah

Fatimah Maysarah. Our second daughter. Almost 3 years old. She is the most active of my three daughters. The fearless one. She is the one who is brave enough not to say sorry to us, her parents, when she made mistakes and doesn't feel like saying sorry. It's not that she's naughty, she is just being frank with her feeling. I know, I must figure up better way to treat her with her unique character.

One thing about Fatimah that tests me as parent. She always wakes up at night, crying loudly. It has been since she was a baby. I've checked everything, whether she is hungry, too tired, not comfortable clothes or bed, or if there's an insect bites her. I'ved checked it all. And then I found out that she has itchs all over her body mostly legs. We went to doctors to get medicines to cure it. They said it's alergy, but we must find out, what thing is alergetic to her.

I started finding out from food. I took some food that I thought migh be alergetic, out of her daily meals per week. But, the itch was still there, even when she was already vegetarians.
We went to the doctor again, he said then probably it was not froom food, might be the air or water then he gave us a kind of cream to reduce it.
Well, the air is probably right, I thought. We live in Indonesia, a tropical country, where the average temperature is 18-32°c all year long. It's the heat.

Then I tried to make the room cooler by swithing the fan all night long, but didn't place it right towards her and applied the cream given by the doctor after bath and before sleep. The cream did make the watery little bumps dry, but it didn't make the itchs gone.

Until just a few weeks ago, when I had a chat with my neighboors, fellow homemakers, one evening. We talked about children, food etc. Long story short, they suggested me using 'Karo oil' for Fatimah. Karo is a name of one of the ehnic groups in my country. My country Indonesia has a lot of ethnic groups with their own languages, cultures, traditions and alternative medicines.

I tried to apply the oil on her when she is asleep. And, it really works like magic. She doesn't wake up and cry that very night. I don't know the ingredients of the oil, but I can smell the mix of pandanese leaf, clove and ginger in it. Now, I apply it on her after bath and before sleep, it dry the watery little bumps on fatimah's skin but mosturize the skin in the same time.

Now, I'll try to eliminate the scars left on her skin.

Fahira

Fahira Azzahra, my eldest daughter. She is almost 7 years old now. I keep wondering a lot of times, how time flies so fast. Sometimes, I still remember her as that tiny baby. And now, she is in the first grade already. She can read, write, count. Hmmmm, my big girl. I'm feeling kind of old. :-P.

The other thing that makes me proud of her is that she loves cleaning. She likes to offer help when I'm doing house work. 

Like this afternoon, I took candid pictures of her sweeping and scrubbing the floor of the little terrace. Ours is very tiny one. We rent this house 4 months ago. A small house, unlike when we still live with my mother in law's house. But we're okay with it. Starting small is a good thing. My daughter will learn to clean small space first before stepping to a bigger one when we can afford to buy a house.

Her work is quite tidy, not perfect. But I adore her, adore her willing to do. I always say great job, even if l will redo it later (but not in most cases). This little girl needs support in this age. She will learn to fix her own mistakes if she does it frequently. As Indonesian proverb says "Alah bisa, karna biasa" "You can, when you make yourself used to it".