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.