Living with Sarah

It was a day of errands. Sungguh penat. Sampai terlupa nak bekalkan Aliyah food for her tuition break (even giving her some money!). I feel so so guilty now. Insyaallah when she comes out of her class at 5.45pm, I will make up for it. The day started early - breakfast, then a short stop at the office to get an old calendar for Aliyah's school project, then sent her to her friend's place in Bukit Mahkota for her group project, then went back to the office. One hour later, went to fetch her, took her back to the office, lunch, then sent her off to school for her tuition. I had so many things in my mind I totally forgot to give her pocket money. Usually I would give both some cash and packed drinks and bread. (I totally forgot! What kind of a mother am I? Guilt, guilt....) Next, a short stop at Hj Tapah to meet my nieces to get new supply of telekung and a few other stuff. Then, back to the office - had to rush because our tenant Reza had my office keys as he forgot to bring h...

Now that Ramadhan is in just 3 weeks' time, we have activated our Kurung Cotton for Kids small business. Requests have started to come in one month ago and these few weeks have seen sale of a few baju kurung. Our "likes" have reached 802 this morning. Last year it was 600++. Linda and I went to scout for materials yesterday - in the heavy rain. Itulah dugaan orang cari rezeki kan... Tengah-tengah hujan lebat pun usaha juga :). So, we have some materials in our stock now - thanks to some nice suppliers. And to think that I started this small business as an experiment a few years ago - after we got a job to write a book on e-business. At that time, I know the theory but have not actually applied it. Thus, I started this because personally I have always make sure Aliyah wears cotton baju kurung due to her sensitive skin and knowing how difficult it was to find nice cotton materials. Nowadays, cotton materials are in abundance. The only difference is of course the pricing....

Keep swimming, keep swimming... I will never stop swimming... Allah tak akan menguji seseorang melainkan apa yang terdaya olehnya…. I might feel this unbearable weight on my shoulders now but I know I cannot stop praying. After one morning of panic, where I sat slumped in our surau with my head on my knees, I thought perhaps this is where I stop. I need to know where to stop. But then, I looked around and realised that even this small surau is the realisation of my dream. I have always dreamed that - one day if I were to have a bigger office, I will make sure there is a surau with pipe in it where people can take wuduk without having to do it in the toilet (like my previous company!). Should I just dump all these? After 2 rounds of solat dhuha, my head just cleared. I pray to Allah swt to give me ideas on how to solve this current problem. Alhamdulillah, as I sat at my desk, I raked my brains and started to strategize - most importantly short-term actions for now - and executed t...

Things are difficult these few weeks. We have been working without pay. That translation work gave me cramps on my thighs till now. The payment? Next month - after they are ready to publish the report. Then,  that agency pulak - we have completed all including conducting refresher trainings. But the person in-charged went off for 2 weeks leave without processing our invoice and when he came back, he got confused with the other invoices and finally we got word that it's just reached Finance yesterday. Almost 4 weeks of "perap"! This is really frustrating. Sometimes I thought of doing it the easy way = to just quit. And this morning I was prepared to do just that. I have all these drastic measures in my head to execute. But one of the first things I saw on my FB this morning was "Keep Going". I must clear my head and heart. I must keep going. Keep Going. No matter what you do, no matter how many times you screw up and think to yourself “there’s no point to ...

Aliyah came back from school with news that she topped her class - something that has never happened before. As much as I'm so happy for her, it's actually a mixed feeling. As I said before, she's not in the correct class. She didn't perform so well earlier in the year, plus there were new students coming in and the school opened 2 new classes. So, she got pushed down. I personally would rather her be an average in a good class. During my schooling years, I have always been in good schools and good classes. Only twice in my whole 11 years of schooling did I topped in class. My early years was at SRK Kg Tunku, PJ - one of the top primary schools in PJ. The school was packed - my batch consisted of 14 classes (A - N). My worst class was "F" (standard 1 & 3) and the best was "C" (standard 2). In between, I was in "D" or "E". When I got transferred to a kampung school in Sg Besar, I was in "A" (there were only 3 classe...

Smash season 1 has ended. There goes something I look forward to every Monday night! Now the long wait for season 2. The finale? It was awesome. The last song just shows how perfect Karen was  to play Marilyn. Ivy would have brought her unnecessary diva-ness with her and spoiled the effect. And she's not even a star - just another chorus girl. But Ivy actually sings better than Karen. Her rendition of White Baby Grand was amazing that I had that song in my head for days. We can just see that something might spark between Derek and Karen, now that the moody-talking-too-fast Dev is out of her life (I guess). Jack Davenport just nailed his character - this handsome proud and selfish guy  (when it's related to the show) with his sexy British accent. (Aliyah pun kata he's handsome!). And who would have thought he played Norrington in Pirates of the Carribean :). The final song - I think it's just brilliant that it summarizes the whole show.

We played host to Abg Ijam's birthday "party" yesterday. It started with his request to have my home-made pizza. Since his birthday was last 6th June, I obliged. Then (as usual) the menu started to add up, as was the list of guests. So, from a promise of pizza, it became a small gathering. The menu - pizza (5 batches), kuah durian (durian donated by Linda), mee goreng Mommy (bukan Mamak), carrot cake (served as the birthday cake) and chicken & mushroom puffs (just discovered the wonderful "Kawan" ready-made pastry puff). And yes, I cooked everything. Then, my SIL Kak Ros came with her delicious soto to add to the feast.  The night before Aliyah & I experimented with the pastry puff to make apple pies. Yummy... I think Aliyah can simply make her own. So easy!  Birthday boy. Dahi makin luas!  We celebrated Nizam & his wife Zura's birthday and also to celebrate Father's Day for the two fathers (Hubby & Angah) present. Also a warm...

It was a week of ups and downs. It started with Aliyah having this ketumbit at her eyes just the day before school starts. So, she was off school for 2 days. She seems to get it a lot these days. I was not so happy that she's not in school as the new term has just started. And I was anxious about her exam results. Now, her results - so far OK. Some very OK, some average. But even that average made her top in class. I told Hubby - Aliyah is not in the right class. I had a small talk with her - that she must not compare herself with those who got lower marks. She must put her standards high and try to achieve it. It doesn't matter if she's not in the top classes but she must make sure her marks are good. Comparing with the greats is how life should be led. Work wise - we didn't get the project in the East Coast we participated last month. A local company got it. Again - pricing is a huge problem for us who have to take traveling and accommodation factors into considerat...

A friend shared this on FB: "The couples that are 'meant to be' are the ones that go through everything that is meant to tear them apart and come out even stronger than they were before". I believe in this...

Our cats are really amusing...  Kucing takut ikan? That's our cat. Ikan-ikan dalam kolam tu main-main kan je dia. While Tabby drinks, they come near and pull his whiskers! Terus lari! Very good companions. These two are kaki tidur. Very close like brother & sister. (No problem - Eecah has been spayed!)

My good friend Enida once said - "...bersyukur itu susah...". I totally agree. Kita selalunya kurang bersyukur pada Allah for all His blessings. Why? Because kita selalunya tak nampak His blessings. Yang kita nampak ialah kesusahan. Frankly, things are difficult for us. That is the risk of both of us running our own business. I was so frustrated for not being able to take Aliyah for a nice holiday. But she is such a sweet and understanding little girl. And I am very grateful for that. Now, back to things being difficult - a lot of things are stagnant at the moment except for these few small projects we get from this particular insurance company that engages us for translation work. Other than that - people are waiting for election. So, nothing actually moves. And this is not good for people like us. So, at times like this one only see the difficulty. This morning, however, I got a knock on the head (well, not literally) for being too engrossed in my own difficulty. I cook...

Another movie this school hols. Another mommy-daughter outing. Another catch on the first day of release. Hehehe... but this time around, the crowd beat us to it. Managed to watch 12.15pm show but 4th row from the screen. It was full house. Good thing it was the bigger theater, so it was OK. And surprisingly Aliyah enjoyed the seat. Best sebab gambar besar, she said! Huh? I enjoyed this more than Show White actually. The power of animation. I love the scene when the four animals finally reached the zoo and found that it is not what they wish for anymore. Powerful message. And the Katy Perry song during the circus was really good. Never thought I would say that for a Katy Perry song! We had lunch at Sushi King and for the first time Aliyah didn't get her Tempura Udon. Believe it or not - udon tak da stock! She had to make do with soba. Even though she said it tasted good but she didn't finish up the bowl. She said the colour doesn't look appetizing to her. But she finish...

Pose tidur malam-malam sebelum disuruh tidur kat luar...

Susunan Allah sangat amazing. Just like what I've experienced last week. Sometimes we plan for things that looked very sure to happen, but at the last minute, they just don't materalise. Sometimes we are stuck at the very dead end with no idea on how to break the wall, but then one chance of meeting someone some time ago and a small little help offered opened another route. Subhanallah.  Hubby and I met up with this guy - a potential partner - last Friday. Our pitching session led us to meet an ex-colleague, who then introduced us to the guy who actually simply wanted help of another company to submit for a sebutharga. The meet was to discuss areas where we might be able to work together. It was interesting to see how our thoughts jive, so were our principles. And being impressed by the application developed by him opened many possibilities. He even said, "maybe Tuhan memang nak jumpakan kita...". And it helped that we actually know the same people. Small world! ...