PTC II for 2014

All As?! For the both of them?! Subhanallah.. Alhamdulillah.. No words can describe my happiness. 

Although, it turned out when we checked the papers J had a C that was wrongly transcribed as an A by her subject teacher. But still. I am elated. Beyond happy. Amazeballs I tell ya. 

No suprise here for Kakak's average. But to maintain the 95-96 percent from Std 1 till now, I am impressed. 

[by the way; row 1 is first term, row 2 is mid term, row 3 is class average]

But look at this. Jannah's result. 

Look at her jump from the 1st term to mid term results. And to surpass her class average. Awesomeness!

(You can tell I am ecstatic about their results kan?)

But yeah. Alhamdulillah. Alhamdulillah. Alhamdulillah. 

Super duper awesome job guys.. Keep it up!

Now back to work! Finals are coming up soon! (Hahaha.. Kiasu much Mommy?)

Of Tahfiz and Hafazan

* I know I've been quiet a while, and there is so much to tell but this post is solely for Aliah *

A few days after puasa started, Aliah came home and told us she was selected to represent her school in a Hafazan competition. Saying I was proud and happy for her would be an understatement.

It was a last minute thing. And I was more nervous than she was. Hahaha..

Needless to say, she did extremely well. None of the shyness and unsure-ness I normally see in her. It was oh so good for her self esteem. I had goosebumps listening to her recitation. 

And she won 2nd place! Subhanallah. 

A week later, she was in another competition. This time it was play&pray event which she herself wanted to enter. 

It was a tougher group what with famous sheikhs' children also taking part. She didn't win partly because they based it on who has hafaz the most surah and I entered her up till At-Tariq only even though she has completed An-Naba'.

The whole experience was good for her. Getting her up on stage in itself is a big win. Hafaz the whole juz 30 is also a big win. 

But the biggest win of all, when her Papa said, "I cried." 

WW :: Reminiscing the 80s

Only an 80s kid would understand the importance of this. Back then, we didn't have the means to get a whole box of stickers to complete the book. It was a long and normally heart-wrenching effort to get those last few remaining stickers. *sigh*

I'd say the girls are pretty lucky in that sense. We (as in Hubs n I) bought a whole box. So yeah, hopefully we'll complete it. Although it -will- still be a long process for them as we'll be opening a max of 5 packs a day. :)

Belated Post :: GD 2013

Their GD was an emotional day for me. Especially Jannah's GD. She was extremely excited about it, as not only were she performing with her class, she also had a solo show and tell session. So excited I was that I took the front seat at the concert. Kiasu much Mommy?! I was so proud of her. This from the girl who at one point didn't want to go to school. She's just grown so much.

She delivered her performance well. Didn't falter. Didn't get nervous. And to think that she is just 6! *sigh* I know I didn't have that kind of confidence at that age.

[pictures were copied back from ig as the phone died on me before I could backup on the PC. hence, no pictures of her performance. learnt my lesson, now everything goes to dropbox :) ]

If you've been following the blog, you know that I don't put much emphasize on her academically. I know her capabilities. Imagine my surprise when they announced her as the Best Improved Student. It was such a big moment for her. And I was so overwhelmed. I cried. Like really really cried. Haha.

That was a major turning point for her. She actually started to believe in herself more. To emphasize, I don't have to tell her to study. Or read a book. At all. She would on her own, get a book to read or pick out any one of her workbooks to revise. SubhanAllah.. 

See how proud she is with her trophy. :)

Kakak's GD was done well this year. The hall was big enough to accommodate all parents. And most importantly, ada aircond! Haha. 

Look! Aliah actually took part! A major milestone for her too. She's turning out to be a pro at this kompang business. :)

But yeah, she's more comfortable in her part at the sidelines. You'd never get her to go up on stage to perform. Hehehe.. 

After all her hard work through out the year, it came as no suprise when she was nominated one of the three Most Outstanding Student of her Year. It is good to know that she received the acknowledgement that is due to her, after what happened last year. It's only fair they recognise the hard work these kids put in, regardless whether the top 3 came from the same class or not. 

Even though it was expected of her, I have to say I was still very emotional. Nangis bagai jugak. Haha. Ah well, I could always blame it on my pregnancy hormones kan. :)

Dear Aliah and Jannah, 

If Mommy does not tell you this often enough, do know that I am always so proud of the little ladies the both of you have become. I can only hope and pray that you will both continue to be successful in whatever you set out to do in your life. May you both grow up to be good caliphs and continue to make the family proud.

Mother's Day

  Last night, I fell asleep while trying to get the 2 boys to sleep. When Kakak n J checked on me and found me asleep; they turned off the lights, turned on the night lights, kept all the toys etc and went to bed by themselves. That by far is the best gift they could have given me for mother's day.

On a side note, I got RM1 from them with the card. Aliah said, "Umar helped too by keeping you busy. And Amir helped too by not disturbing us while we finished this"  Love you kiddos to the moon and back -- reposting from my ig

My doa is so that all of you will always be wonderful, brilliant, thoughtful Muslims.

PTC - Round 1

Right. 

So not freaking out.

Because; (1) exam was unexpected (2) both of them did well under the circumstances (3) Mommy is -slowly- learning to curb her kiasuness

Both received good reviews from their teachers. Alhamdulillah. They are obedient kids. No acting out. Being good caliphs. Listen to instructions. 

J needs to work on her writing. Not that her writing is unreadable, infact her penmanship is pretty good! She's still doing a lot of mirror writing; i.e. some of her letters and numbers are written mirrored-ly. Sometimes even a whole word can be mirrored even though she is copying the word from an example. In fact, a couple of her answers had to be marked wrong because of this. She could have gotten 100% for Maths if not for this issue!

I am impressed with the rate she is adapting and absorbing her new lessons.  8As and 5Bs is not a bad start. Her Bs are all for her PSRA subjects which was expected. But she keeps on suprising me with her ability to garner knowledge. Alhamdulillah. I believe she has what it takes to excel. She needs to be pushed in the right direction and her confidence needs boosting for her to believe that she can do it too. 

Kakak continues to excel. Alhamdulillah. 14 straight As from her. Although some subjects did drop from her usual average. But since it still is the beginning of the year I am going to cut her some slack. :)

Added responsibility for her this year is being the Asst Class Monitor. This is good. I want her to be more confident of herself. To speak out more. To learn this necessary skill of interaction with peers and elders. 

You know that I know that I don't have to worry about her academically. But I worry about her sense of being responsible. Of making judgement calls using her common sense and without prompting from adults. She worries me sometimes with wanting assurance before doing anything. So yeah, this ACM thing is good for her. 

Mommy has a lot of work cut out for her after this. Siap la korang! :)

WW :: Lego Craze

Exams!

So their first term exams began yesterday. And as usual, this kiasu mommy was freaking out. Mainly because we just found out there was to be an exam 2 weeks ago.

You see, under the PBS this first term exam was nullified since teachers would be busy with evidence and bands what not. But when the directive came that PBS was to stop while they studied it, the school had to scramble to assess the kids somehow. Hence, first term exam. 

I am pro PBS by the way, as I understand and like the idea and plan of ridding our kids from this exam based assessment. Do these people who are so keen to mansuhkan really understand the idea of PBS? Yes, some implementation ironing out needs to be done. Yes, the online keying system sucks. Yes, the student : teacher ratio needs to be reviewed and reduced.You only here from the teachers complaining all the way about how their workload increased etc, but does it mean the PBS idea is bad? Do the parents really understand the concept? What is there not to like about a system that lets your child learn / develop at their own pace?

OK, ranting about that was not the purpose of this posting.

Getting back to the exams.

"What?! You have exams?" *hyperventilate*

Studying has been lax since beginning of the year. Work books have yet to be taken out since bought 2 months ago. And I haven't even started coaching J with her Jawi! How is she going to even read the question to her PSRA papers, let alone answer them??

Udahnya, Mommy kena re-calibrate expectations.

Hopefully whatever they learn in school is more than enough to carry them through.

J came back full of confidence. Alhamdulillah. Because she is the one I worry most when it comes to accepting failure / setbacks. And the teachers help read their PSRA questions to the whole class. *phew*

As you can see I don't seem to worry about Aliah. I do. It's just I know her capabilities and I know she can succeed. Biiznillah.

Let's pray I will be OK no matter how their results are. Because we keep telling them it is the effort that matters most. And since I know they did try their very best. I should be OK kan?

WW :: SAIS Sports Day

I had to miss this :(

WW :: And then there were four

[nota tiada kaitan dgn gambar :: this is one of the many pictures lost when the old phone died. Lucky for me, saya instagrammer tegar. Haha. Now I need to screen capture those pix and edit them]

Updated Birth Trivia

Aliah

Time of Birth : 3.30pm

Weight : 3.10 kg

Length : 51 cm

Head circ : 35 cm

Blood type : AB +ve

Jannah

Time of Birth : 9.29am

Weight : 2.90 kg

Length : 47 cm

Head circ : 36 cm

Blood type : A +ve

Amir

Time of Birth : 7.34am

Weight : 2.82 kg

Length : 47 cm

Head circ : 34 cm

Blood type : A +ve

Umar

Time of Birth : 6.23pm

Weight : 3.53 kg

Length : 51 cm

Head circ : 35 cm

Blood type : A +ve

[side note :: Mommy's blood type is A+ve and Papa's is AB+ve]

Aliah is 9!

*sigh*

Time sure does fly.. (That has been the theme lately isn't it)

My eldest has grown so much. I am always at awe over her maturity. Her sense of calmness. Her soft spoken demeanor (doesn't mean she doesn't have a temper though) 

Many have said she has grown up to look like me. But I have to be quick to point out, not my temperament though ;)

Her loving care and patience towards her younger brother and sister is something even I do not have at times. How I don't have to tell her to do things. How I can rely on her makes me so proud. I have been blessed Alhamdulillah. Thankful for the opportunity to be her Mommy. She has taught me a lot.

While we were prepping for sleep, I pointed out to her that as it is now she needs to do her complete solat. You could see it in her face, how ecstatic she was that she now is older but at the same time how burdened she feels of that responsibility growing up. (because I was going on and on about how she's a big girl now and her solat is one of the things she needs to be responsible for)

Dear Kakak, Mommy knows I do not need to watch over you all the time as you've proven that you are quite capable of taking care of yourself. But do know that I am always here for you, to listen and to give you guidance when you need me to. All Mommy wants is for you to grow as a true Muslimah, be a good Khalif and strive to do the best in whatever it is you want to pursue. Love you with all my heart!

Aliah's New Look

Can you see it? Yup, she is wearing retainers now. Went to the dentist during the school hols for a different problem and was alerted to a more pressing issue of her front teeth. Her top two teeth has always been big and crooked. Problem is now it has "attacked" the bottom two and caused it to loosen. If it were not permanent teeth, it is ok. But since all her front teeth are already permanent teeth, more attacks might cause her to lose the bottom two teeth if not prevented. 

So, the dentist suggested we put on a preventive retainers to help the top two teeth align and stop harassing the bottom two. Haha. 

On the day of the molding, someone freaked out and had a tough time with the molding session. *sigh* Annnd as a result, when the retainers were done it didn't fit in properly. Luckily the dentist could fix the problem and after menggodek sana sini for a while, it finally fit.

Observations :: 

She's only been wearing it for 4 days, and yet seems like a pro already fixing it in by herself. (Day 1 was horrendous btw, what with Mommy lack her usual patience lately)

The teeth seems to be aligning itself at quite a fast rate if you ask me. I can already see some improvements. At this rate, I don't think she'll need to wear them for long. (Doc said anything between 1-2 years)

Somehow, her sleep teeth grinding has stopped too since she started wearing the retainers. That one I don't know if it is a coincidence or not. 

New School Year

I have two schooling kids this year! After a week, still need some getting used to not to panic at midday coz I haven't picked J up yet. Haha. Nampak sangat selalu lambat pick her up dulu. (oh, suddenly remembered a story to tell about the Friday I was late to pick her up that lead her to need 3 stitches underneath her chin - note to self : please remember to blog about it)

First day of school went of without a hitch. Dropped them of at 8. Took some obligatory pictures in class and left. I was slightly apprehensive about J, knowing how she is - worrying that she will want things done her way the whole time but apparently she adapted well. Made new friends on the first day and has not looked back since. 

She was put into Ibnu Qayyim, Kakak's class back then and has Teacher Gee too as her class teacher. I worry, because that is what a Mommy does. But I believe she will be fine. Need to remind her to chill and have fun while learning though. ;)

And I can't believe Kakak is already in Year 3! Oh man... I feel old! Hahaha.. They decided to jumble the kids around this year and thus she is not in the same class with her friends from last year. Even her bff is in another class now. I think it had something to do with the fact that her class performed so well last year, that they left a really big gap with the other 2 classes. Case in point, all the top 3 students from last year was her classmates and this year they were all put in 3 different classes. 

I think this move will do her good too. Make new friends. Keep her out of her comfort zone. See how far she can push herself without looking over her shoulder all the time to see (and compete) with her bff.

Whatever it may be, I do hope my two girls will enjoy going to school, have fun while at the same time gain knowledge. And of course for me to be less kiasu. :)

Updated Trivia

Seeing that Amir turned 2 a couple of weeks back.. we can now update the "how tall will they be" trivia.

Aliah was 80cm when she was 2

Jannah was 87cm when she was 2

Amir is 86cm currently

Hence,

Aliah will reach the height of 160cm

Jannah will reach the height of 174cm

Amir will reach the height of 172cm

Looking at this, J will be the tallest of them all.. Hmmm... Interesting...

School Updates

The reason I did not post earlier is because I needed to calm myself down first and reiterate over and over (the wrong sentence / word structure is intentional) that a hiccup is good. It helps keep things in focus. It makes us work harder. Stop us from being too bigheaded.

Sebenarnya, it was not at all bad. It was in fact pretty darn good. But since my expectation is always so high when it comes to Aliah, a slight bump had me frustrated. 12As and 1B, and no 5 in class. In fact, no 5 in the whole standard.

Pretty good kan?

Patut sujud syukur and praise Allah Alhamdulillah kan?

But yeah like I said, I had high expectations. So the syukur only came a bit later when I stopped myself from being such a kiasu mommy.

And I belatedly remembered to give praise to Aliah for a job well done. Which was followed by a "you've got a lot of work ahead of you little missy" speech soon after. What to do, once a kiasu mommy..

Kakak, if and when you read this much much later in life - do know the only reason Mommy gets dissappointed is because I know what you are capable of. And seeing you sell yourself short and not getting that target makes me slightly frustrated. Not at you though, because I know you have tried your best. And that is what matters most. The fact that you tried your very best. Mommy loves you no matter what.

[nasib baik J takde exam last sem - they forgo it as they didn't want the kids to be too hooked up on As and forget that learning is all about having fun]

WW :: YinYang

That many many hats

When Mommy is asked (read : forced) to help Kakak make a sock puppet for her English class today, of course J wants a piece of the action too. After a full day outing with them, prepping dinner for Hubby (nasib baik la fruits je dinner nya), getting Amir to sleep - baru la dapat buat the 2 creatures. 

All in all it took me 2 and half hours to finish up both these puppets. Basically the ideas and materials were all them, I just helped with the superglue-ing (for the eyes) and the sewing - seeing that neither one of them has been allowed to use the needle and thread yet. (of which, Aliah promptly asked me when can she start learning to sew - I replied when you are 9 - that got me thinking pulak on what should she start with - I was thinking on cross-stitching ok kan?)

Jannah's puppet is a cat called PomPom (though I think it could pass as a mouse). The blue pompoms by the ears are actually earrings - in case you were wondering. Aliah's puppet is a snake. With ribbons on her head (so yes, it is a she - nama dia Slytherin though - haha!) 

And yes, they slept late last night because they wanted to finish it of. And J woke up crying this morning because one of PomPom's earrings came off. 

Hubs asked me, how long does the support and maintenance last for these creatures.. I really have no idea.. *sigh* 

A Kidzania Birthday

The deal with the kids (or was it with Mr Hubs?), is that they will only have parties until they are 6. So for her birthday this year, after much discussion, Aliah decided on a trip to Kidzania with 4 of her best friends. And after much deliberation, the date was finally fixed.

On the day itself, only 3 friends could make it though. So it was a 5 girls outing including Aliah and Jannah. Honestly, I was on the verge of pensan-ing that day as I was still recovering from a fever.

A bit of drama also that morning when our trusted big car started making weird sounds. A short stop to the tyre shop told us we had a shaft problem so we had to drive back home, change cars and then be on the way.

Arrived at Kidzania around 10ish. There wasn't a queue - thank god!

So by 1030, the kids started exploring. As it was a Saturday, we had until 3pm to explore. Hence, we told the kids we should do a lot of stuff instead of queuing for over an hour for 1 job. (this was of course the Air.Asia job booth / counter)

[for those who have no clue what the hey Kidzania is all about; its a make believe land where kids get jobs to earn some cash - called Kidzos here. They have over 90 jobs offered - as mentioned in the fliers, maps, etc. Kids start off with 50kidzos in hand because for some jobs opportunities they need to pay to play]

So, because Mommy is ever so kiasu in squeezing a wholeee lot into that 4 and half hours, we managed to do 8 different jobs! Pretty awesome according to others who have gone.

They managed to do (or be); in order - a travel agent, make a burger, work in an oreo factory, a nurse, a painter, a beautician, a firefighter and a chocolatier. Jannah's fave was the firefighter while Aliah's was the chocolatier.

All in all I would say it was a good outing. The kids had loads of fun. They ate their own burger, had fun doing each others' faces, help put out a fire, made oreos and chocolates.

Even J has hinted she wants a Kidzania party too. *pensan*

[entrance fee is RM35 per adult; RM60 per child (they increased it as of 1 Feb 2013) for Malaysians and RM50 per adult; RM75 per child for other nationalities]

WW :: 3 Angels

Will there ever be a perfect picture again?