After Five Mama: April 2016

Saturday, 23 April 2016

Baby Milestones: 21 months

Imran's now 21 months and he's a handful yet a delight to be around. The Terrific/Terrible Twos phase has begun!! Quite a dramatic kid this one, always enjoyable to watch him follow the antics of his nursery rhymes characters and what not.

He runs around quite stably and is almost always on the move, except during times he gives in to his exhaustion.
He has not learned the sequence of his ABCs and 123s yet but he is able to recognize and say out individual letters and numbers.
His favourite words? Animals and animal sounds. He's forever reciting Moo Cow, Duck Quack, Hen Cluck Cluck, Sheep Baa and so on. Clearly he knows his animals.
His favourite rhyme? Old McDonalds Has A Farm. That's so gonna be his birthday theme this year. hehe.
When watching his play, occasionally you can spot a certain pattern / trend in the way he places his toys like animals etc. Loves to organize things in and out of drawers etc.
Hates to be told to go for a shower, but once he's in the shower, loves the water. He now loves and has learnt to brush his teeth, though it seems more like a love of his toothpaste rather than the actual brushing act. haha.
He enjoys going out to malls etc.
His appetite's quite good. Loves to eat and loves to try new food.
Enjoys to climb the staircase.
I bought him a mock up cleaner set recently since he loves imitating Nanny so much. He role plays well and loves to sweep, mop and vacuum when Nanny does so.
I enjoy how we can have small conversations with him now. Like "Do you know where Mama went today?" "Work" he'd say. Yesterday, Nanny and my mum went out shopping all day. When they came home, he squealed "Where you go?". So, so cute!!

Fitness and Wellbeing Plan

One of my goals this year was to get fitter and healthier through exercise. I've done bits here and there, but certainly nowhere near what I should do to gain optimum health.

So I have a new plan.

I've already signed up for my once-a-week Pilates session. Putting that on hold for the moment because of the coughing, but hope to resume in May.
Every morning, before work, I'm gonna try to get up a little earlier and do 15-30 mins of exercise.
On weekend mornings, I'll try to do 45-60 mins of exercise.
For wellbeing, gonna take time out during lunch to have a full body massage and a facial once a month.

Ambitious much? Let's see how much of these can be achieved in a few months time.

Wednesday, 20 April 2016

Desperate for sleep

Ok....I'm seriously getting desperate now. Desperate for sleep, that is. For practically the last week, I haven't been able to sleep much and not even get quality sleep at that. With the coughing and what not, it's become incessantly difficult to just rest - a basic human right. I'm in a dire state and exhausted. I'm practically a walking zombie.

I even asked my Dr for sleeping pills as an effort. But, unfortunately, even that failed me. I've been getting to bed early for the past 2-3 days after popping the sleeping pill in an effort to sleep better. But I'd wake at around 2 am and end up awake till 5-5.30. Then I'd probably manage to catch a short nap before finally waking up around 6 am to head off to work.

Need sleep....need sleep....now!!

Sunday, 17 April 2016

A Sickie Month

My posts have been extremely sporadic, it's pretty much a once-a-month entry these days. LOL! Guess I can really only blog diligently when I am off-work for a long period of time like when I was pregnant or when work is down like in December. Despite my hectic schedule, I'm really determined this time around to keep this blog running and ongoing. Guess it doesn't matter if I can't update all the time, but whenever I have something to say, at least I have a channel to turn to. So this time, I'm gonna keep this blog going. Not gonna do away with it even if posts are sporadic.

Since my last update which was about my HK-Macau trip, I had actually been planning for a family trip to JB and Melaka end of April. But, alas, that plan was not meant to be. 3 weeks ago, I had developed tonsilitis and had the worst tonsil and throat pain for about a week. I hardly had a voice and could hardly deliver my Board paper which was held during that week. Luckily, my work environment this time around is a way more understanding work environment compared to before.

Anyhow, just when I thought I was well, Zach was admitted into hospital for an infection for 3 days. Then, I caught the influenza bug and was also hospitalised for a week! What a nightmare! I was just thankful and bersyukur that Imran did not catch on to our germs.

I have been away from work for 2 weeks now and insha-Allah am now a bit stronger and fitter for work this week onwards. I'm still coughing like nobody's business that my ribs hurt, my throat hurts, and haven't been sleeping well due to the cough, but at least physically and mentally, I'm a lot stronger than I was last week.

Thank God for Nanny who has been taking care of Imran especially at night. He's a light sleeper, so if he slept with us, he'd definitely wake with my barking and hacking cough. Its better off this way though I'm quite saddened that I'm unable to care for my own son.

So, alas, my trip was not meant to be. I've cancelled the accommodation bookings and will spend Labour Day in KL instead. Guess it works out well, we can save the money and the bonus that I recently got for a family trip come year-end insha-Allah.