get.away

had a nice break over my extended weekend. it wasn't as tiring as i thought it would be, since we basically took it easy. but i think R was more tired than i was since he drove everywhere and he was also traveling for work a lot.

the hotel was lovely, and we had a good time food-hunting and doing some sightseeing and shopping. it was more of a relaxing getaway anyway. also managed to squeeze in some time to see one of my best girlfriends who lives in the area. so all in all, everyone had a pretty good time.

gotta remind myself to stick to my budget real tight this month. i've been doing okay financial-wise since i started my detailed budget this year. savings get moved to the investment account, and thankfully funds are never short before the next payday rolls around. but apart from all the normal monthly expenses, this month i've got all these additional stuff; the car is due for service, and we need to cover back the expenses that we paid for the building management fees last month. also trying to save up some extra moolah for december - in anticipation of the BigBadWolf booksale. i'm really looking forward to it. i know i'll be like in the last few weeks of my pregnancy by then, but i don't care - i'm sure people will make way for pregnant people haha.

i find that the one weakness i have in terms of keeping up with my budget though, are my grocery-shopping trips. i used to go to BIG all the time, but then i'd want to grab everything from off the shelves, so i try to limit my trips there to when i run out of imported goodies. we normally do our bi-weekly shopping trips at this supermarket in ttdi. everyone thinks its a bit far but parking there is very convenient and most importantly, i don't have to venture into a mall to do my grocery shopping.

now that work and life is a bit more balanced, i have more time to actually sit down and plan our dinners and google recipes and whatnots, which i enjoy a lot. we normally pack a light breakfast of sandwiches, fruits, or yogurts in the morning to eat at work, and i normally head out and have a sub for lunch and i'll be home in time to cook our dinner. so it all pretty much works out. what normally throws my budget is our impromptu dinners outside with family/friends so nowadays i try to make a conscious decision to stay at home more, and plan our outings.

boo.

well, hello, hello.

i havent been super-busy lately but just taking it easy in my last few months of pregnancy. the bump is getting huge now and i keep worrying about putting on more weight because then my gynae will keep nagging on me - but the thing is i don't even eat like crazy. i pretty much eat healthy most of the time, but i guess the bread from my almost daily subway sandwich is taking its toll. but i figured a subway sadnwich is better than just chomping on fast food or oily food for lunch right? and R and i always try to cook ourselves dinners on weekdays after work.

last weekend was pretty relaxed. i stayed at home most of the time. just went out on saturday noon to run some errands - which included picking up the yummy lemon cake with strawberry creamcheese frosting that my SIL made to order for a birthday party later (their business is actually doing really well!) - then bought late lunch and headed back home to just chill while R painted another side of the baby crib. yes, the project is still ongoing haha who knew it would take so much effort to paint a crib? but i like the new color (white) - it gives the crib a totally different vibe to it.

most of the other baby equipment is pretty much ready - we just need to assemble everything later on. but next month we still have to go buy the playpen and some baby clothes for jigglyboo (can you believe we havent bought a single clothing item for her yet? hehe) so maybe we'll do that one of the following weekends. i only want to go when we have the budget for it cos i know i'll fall in love with all the cute stuff and want to buy em all haha.and we should probably get all the remaining stuff in november anyway cos by december i'll be pretty huge to go out much - and i really wanna use december funds for the upcoming Big Bad Wolf booksale! can't wait to go crazy there - i had such a good time last year - i actually went twice.

anyway, been pretty tied up with work - not super-busy but it keeps the time from moving too slowly hehe - and i guess i gotta wrap up some stuff before i have my extended wkend off (i'm taking friday and monday off). we're heading back to the east coast - gonna spend a night in terengganu - my mom and youngest sis have been wanting to go for awhile - so i figured R and i would bring them. we go that area of the country on a regular basis for our food-trips anyway, so might as well go for an extended trip. now seems a perfect time for a lil R&R anyway.

well, gotta get back to work. and jigglyboo has been kicking and doing somersaults like crazy lately. i actually am looking forward to having her around in our lives soon enough. of course, there's the situation with childcare but i guess we'll have to solve that issue when we cross it.

world of our own

just a little something to share on why reading is important.

my parents brought us up with a love for books. we were always surrounded by books - they read to us and they always bought them for us.

so in the words of Mr Neil Gaiman himself...

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/oct/15/neil-gaiman-future-libraries-reading-daydreaming

dream. faith.

"it's true that you need a teacher for everything but one day you will be a teacher too. so what are you going to teach others when the time comes?"

if you're a friend of mine who's also connected with me on social media, then you would know that i tweet and share artcles on a lot of random stuff. one of the accounts that i follow is "twt_buku", which literally means, "twt_book". the above quote is something that was tweeted from the current curator (which changes on a weekly basis).

i found the statement to resonate within me.

yes, most of the things we have come to know in life was at one point, learned from or taught by someone. and so a cycle begins. if you had the fortune to be brought up by parents that were financially sound, chances are you too would be good at handling your personal finances. if you were sent to school that was dominated by mindless, law-breaking students, chances are you'd get mixed up with the wrong crowd too. if you were brought up by parents that taught you compassionate religion in practice, chances are that you would turn out to be someone who understood that kindness and religious teaching go hand-in-hand.

yes, the likely choice would be presented to you. the easy thing to do would be to just follow that path laid before you. but there is also another choice; another option. there is the choice that you would decide to go seek knowledge and perspective from others and learn to do critical thinking on your own. you would weigh the pros and cons of each choice and decide which best suited you. you would question, you would challenge. and you would learn that the easy option is not necessarily the best option.

and so whatever you've heard from your parents, relatives or just built-in knowledge that you grew up with - you would learn to mix that with things you would learn on your own via books, discussions and such. sure, if faith was an integral part of your upbringing - then you would use that as a basis of your foundation. but this doesn't mean that you can just forego additional knowledge.

anyhow, i'm going off tangent.

what i'm trying to say is, just because you were brought up in a certain way, doesn't mean you have to end up spending the rest of your life that way too. you shouldn't be held back by these confines and limitations. just because a person's parents are racist, this doesn't mean that you should end up being a racist too. sure, it would skewer your early perspective but once you start meeting more and more people and being involved in more discussions with different people, your point of view would probably start to change too. but in order for this to happen, you need to be able to approach the issue with an open mind. and by an open mind, i don't mean in a hippie, liberal sort of way; i just mean in a non-judgmental way.

all my life, i've never thought of being a teacher. but when i read the above quote, it occurred to me that in some instances, i am my own teacher. and once jigglyboo enters this world, i will be playing a part as her teacher too. and i worry so much about this. it's a huge responsibility. i don't want to bring a child into this world and go, "oh, whatever worked for me, will work for her too."

it's a different world nowadays. the challenges she will face will be different than mine. the things that might not be important to me will probably be important in her future. the world will keep changing and evolving. and i need to make sure that i change and evolve along with it. so i hope that i will be more patient and more understanding to take on this enormous responsibility of being a parent.

i want jigglyboo to be well-equipped to take on the world. i want to raise her to be independent but i also want her to be able to see other people's perspectives. i want her to be okay with her studies, but it's more important to me that she is aware of what is happening in the world around her. i want her to be able to stand her ground without forsaking kindness. i want her to be open to new experiences; and unafraid of what the world has to offer.

i know this seems like a tall order - and as a parent, we have to let our kids make their own mistakes. so at the end of the day, i hope to be a parent that allows this. and to be the parent that will be there to catch her when she falls. but most of all, i hope to be the kind of parent that teaches her that the best way is not always the easiest way. there is no subtitute to hard work. there are no limits of what you can achieve - limits are only what you impose upon yourself - anything is possible.

so dream big, work hard and have faith.

week.end

despite all the drama that pre-empted the extended holiday weekend, it was a surprisingly relaxed break. four days off never felt so good. well, for me, that is. rohe spent a lot of time traveling in between his hometown and mine, where i was at for the whole four days.

the original plan was actually for me to follow him but with my sis in tow and me not feeling very comfortable with all the traveling we'd have to do, we decided that it'd be better for me to just stay in my hometown while R would just come back to K after spending a couple of days with his family in M. we both knew it would take a toll on his energy but it was the best plan that we could come up with, both energy-wise and finance-wise.

anyhow after all the drama that my parents (along with the other sis) just upped and left us during the holidays - which i know a lot of people don't understand how it could happen, even my neighbours, but then we've always been an unconventional family - it actually worked out for the best. i got to just chill out at home without any stress from my dad - altho i did miss my mom- but R and my sis were a big help at home in terms of keeping the house neat and feeding the cats and fishies and watering the plants and all.

the journey back to K on fri night took us longer than usual - we eventually arrived at 3.30am saturday morning! after having breakfast together by the beach, R and his brother who had come along to accompany him, headed off on their journey back to their hometown. i spent the rest of my saturday basically doing nothing - just watching tv, reading and catching up with sleep. just went out for awhile to buy late lunch and had friday's leftovers for dinner. i conked out early and woke up a bit past midnight and then had trouble going back to sleep. bleugh.

after feeding the cats early sunday morning, went back to bed for a nap. brought the sis out for brunch, feeling starving haha. loaded ourselves with food and we were good for the day. after just chilling out at home for the rest of the day, met up with girlfriends who were also back in town for the hols in the evening. as usual, went to our fave laksa and keropok place. R arrived back in K rght before dinner time. so we brought the sis ou for dinner at one of my fave dinner spot. had my fill of chicken ceasar salad along with some pasta. topped it off with their yummy banoffee pie - i should really learn how to make those things.

monday morning, R and i headed off to the banks to settle my banking stuff. the first bank we went to was so full, even though it had only opened for like half an hour! so decided to try our luck at the other branch, and we got lucky - got attended to in a short while and everything was done quite fast. then headed off to another bank and managed to settle some stuff there too, without even having to go see anyone hehe. so happy that we decided to head out early and got all the stuff out of the way. we had kenny rogers take-away for late lunch - i was craving haha - and spent the rest of the day at home. went out later that night just to go to the drive-thru to grab some dinner.

i know, i know. i normally cook a lot when we're in kl. but when i'm back in my hometown, the feeling to cook just sort of deserts me, haha. or maybe it's just cos it's easier to eat out in kuantan. no traffic, and it's also not that expensive.

so on the day of eidul adha yesterday, when everyone else was stuffing their faces with lemang and ketupat and rendang and whatnot, i just went digging in the fridge to see what we had - and finally just cooked some scrambled eggs and hashbrowns for breakfast, teehee. oh well, it did the job. we headed back to kl sometime noon, and had late lunch before sending the sis off back to her college. then went to grab coffee (in my case, iced choc) with cake with A for some catching up. ended up at home around dinner time but we were pretty stuffed. but that didn't stop us from having some of the ketupat and rendang that R's mom had his brother pass to us later that night, heheh.

anyway, that's my recap for the last few days. pretty mundane stuff, i know. but i enjoyed it. this weekend should be a mixture of fun and relaxation - gonna be celebrating one of my best friend's birthday. can't wait for the cake and laughter that will ensue.

space.

took time off from work in the afternoon for my monthly gynae appointment yesterday.

prof said i need to cut back on my carbs and start putting an emphasis on proteins instead. he's worried jigglyboo will grow too big for me to deliver normally. fine. the thing is, i don't even eat that much rice. but i do love me some pasta and of course, potatoes are my downfalls. fries, chips, everything. sigh. so i guess i gotta start planning dinners of grilled chicken salad and steaks. back in aussie i used to love having salmon for dinner, easy and yummy - but its so freakin expensive here. double sigh.

anyway, apart from my pregnancy weight gain, prof said everything else looks good. trying not to think too much of the fact that we only have like 10 weeks left til we meet jigglyboo. it's exciting and intimidating all at the same time.

after our appointment, R and i had a movie date. went to watch gravity. such a good movie. i'm normally not into science-related movies, much less astronaut-related ones, haha. but the movie was really good that i even forgot to eat the snacks we bought. afterwards, had a dinner date of vietnamese beef noodles with A, a childhood friend of mine. we don't see each other often but we like to catch up once in awhile.

gonna drop by the old office today to see my old bosses; need them to sign some work-related stuff. need to swing by and grab some pressies before tho (since one of them just had a baby too) - luckily my old office is connected to a huge shopping mall. also got a movie date with friends from the old office - havent seen any of them in awhile. it feels good to be back seeing familiar faces. i know a lot of things have changed in the last six months but it still feels a little bit like home.

coming to my office now still feels a bit strange. not because of a lack of anything, it's just the fact that i don't have any emotional ties here. i don't have strong friendships here. i guess it'll take time but with the old team, we bonded pretty fast so we were pretty close. but then again, can't compare apples and oranges. the atmosphere back then was pretty informal - even our relationships with our bosses - but here, things are pretty formal and professional. which isn't necessarily a bad thing - work gets done.

it's only tuesday and i'm already feeling so tired. sigh.

silver linings.

my spirits have gradually started to pick up.

it was pretty busy at work last week. had a few overlapping assignments but i enjoyed doing them, feels like i'm learning something new everyday. and the fact that we're allowed to take the time we need to actually do some research on the stuff we need to do is great. also having some time to keep updated with current ongoing events is pretty awesome too.

was actually planning a quiet weekend at home this past weekend. but R's parents got into a minor accident so we had to drive back to his hometown to see how they were doing. then headed back to the city on saturday, just in time to throw together a last-minute football match-viewing/taboo-playing small dinner party at our place. i just threw together some penne carbonara and aglio olio with salad. luckily, R had made some desserts the night before so we had some ready-made choc chip bread butter pudding and brownies in the fridge to serve with ice cream that our friends brought. i can't believe everyone stayed up til 2am playing taboo, btw haha. all in all, it was a fun night.

then sunday was spent running errands, mainly a bit of grocery-shopping and a LOT of jigglyboo stuff-shopping. we had our budget for the month worked out so we managed to get some more of the items on our lists crossed off. everything seems to be coming along okay, thank god. i'm glad we've been saving up for the baby funds as planned, it's a relief to get a lot of the stuff that we need out of the way, without having to resort to taking loans from my mom haha. money is a bit tight these days with all the expenses that we have, but alhamdulillah we're managing for now.

R took the day off today to settle his study loan in the morning and to accompany to my monthly gynae visit in the afternoon. the great thing about working here is i don't have to actually take leave, i just get a time-off slip from my gynae for my checkups. also means that i don't have to squeeze my gynae apointments into my saturdays.

things are still a bit iffy on the family side, but you know what they say; fmaily will walways be family. things to look forward to today: possible movie sesh (been hearing great things about Gravity) and vietnamese beef noodles with an old friend for dinner. i'll take the rainbows where i can get em.