Transitory States
Edward:
David S Leyman:
Hisham:
Luke:
James Kight:
king:
Hisham and Sila has been writing stuff down on this weblog since 2005. Sometimes they post photos of family, sometimes they talk about film, books and music, sometimes there is artwork and stuff about tabletop gaming.
Here are a couple of pictures of Yaya's Adik from this morning's ultrasound. Adik is now 20 weeks old - halfway there! Adik weighs 12 ounces (which is apparently normal for this age).
Tell us, based on these pictures, do you think Adik is a boy or a girl? We'll reveal the answer later 
.
So on Sunday July 24th (Vin's birthday! Happy birthday, babe!!!!) we had Yaya's birthday party. As in previous years, we had invited the neighbors and our friends and planned a cook-out. The house was clean and there was a bunch of cooking to be done! Mandy and I had stayed up assembling Yaya's present the night before (I hate assembling toys!) and Papa went to play baseball in the morning.
Not too terribly late this month! And here is the 3-year-old Yaya on the morning of her birthday!
Before we start, just a note that this is going to be the last of the long monthly blog recapping her entire day. While I'm torn about the decision, I think three years of this has been a lot. I'm not going to stop blogging on her birthday, just not quite as long an entry just chatting about what she's done or accomplished, and maybe one or two pictures. Three years is a long time. I'll miss it. But there will still be long entries when we have stuff to say. Plus with Yaya's Adik's impending arrival, inshallah, in the interest of equality I will try to do a monthly blog for the new little one when the time comes and Yaya will no doubt be prominently featured in those. Right?
I meant to share this a lot earlier but time got away from me. Yaya is getting an Adik (little sibling)! This was taken on 28 June 2011, when Adik was at 13 weeks and 1 day old. Adik was definitely active and having a dance party in there while we looked on. (S)he seems to be doing fine so far. Next ultrasound in a few weeks.
We are all very excited (well I don't know how excited Lily is) but the rest of us are psyched to welcome a new addition to our home and family (EDD 2 January 2012). Wish us all luck in the upcoming months! 
Can we just pretend that this is on time? Or at least not so late that the girl is almost 36 months old? No excuses really. Anyway, here is our 35 month old Yaya (almost 3 years old now!!!! wooooo!).
A couple of weeks earlier, Irfan, Atok, Opah, Ain & I went on a three-day vacation to Langkawi, where I had been on work assignment before twice since 2006 but never had the time to relax there and enjoy the sights. And it ultimately freaking hurt!
But thanks to previous journeys to the island, I called a contact and booked a homestay bungalow, the one we rented during LIMA back in December 2009. I had thought back then that it was a great location, and promised I would return there with the family to enjoy it. Usually when tourists travel to Langkawi, they would find a chalet or hotel near the beach. The homestay we rented was situated on the side of a hill, surrounded by a kampung and overlooking a spectacular landscape, not far from the Langkawi Airport.
Note: Mouseover the photos for extra descriptive text.
This might be a new record in the tardiness of the monthly blog entry. The same excuses and the same apologies, but here she is our 34 month old Yaya. In less than two months (from today) she will be three! Unbelievable, right?
One activity Irfan and I did this school holiday was to take the Light Rail Transit (LRT), the city-wide train network. He rarely gets to ride on it, since we drive everywhere which is sometimes cheaper depending on the situation. So we thought we'd go to the Mall.
We set forth to the station after lunch and soon train came along.
I'm just not even going to mention how late this entry is or the reasons why because they're all the same boring reasons recycled month after month. At any rate, the girl is now 33 months old! 2.75 years old already!
Honestly, I like the picture above because we rarely see this expression of calmness and peace about her.
* As usual, mouse over the pictures for captions
Well, this month I am (yet again) late with the entry. The girl is now 2 years and 8 months old - she's 2 and 2/3 years old! Not long to the big 3! She's quite the character:
I have no real excuse - sure, lots of work and all that. But it's both work and procrastination I suppose.
It's a miracle! Only a few days after the girl's 31 month birthday, this entry is being written? What's gotten into me? Anyways, this past Tuesday the 22nd, Yaya turned 31 months old. Here she is:
We all went for a trip to Petrosains Discovery Centre located at the fourth level of Suria KLCC today for the first time.
It was quite an informative and entertaining jaunt with a lot of interactive scientific experiments that children can participate in. There was even a Science Show where kids (well, one kid from the audience) participated in. There was even a short 3D film in a small theatre they had. It was quite an elaborate set-up and it took us three hours and forty minutes to complete the entire circuit.
I tweeted bits and pieces of our visit to Petrosains with photos. You could sift through the timestamped tweets here to the posts in question. But I thought this blog post would be a great way to consolidate all the posts (with photos) and insert untweeted photos as well. We started off in a ride through a dark tunnel which took us to imaginative displays to introduce science and nature to the visitor.
But writing about the visit does not do it justice. You just have to bring your family and friends there to enjoy the whole experience.
Here are photos from today's excursion. Mouseover the photos for captions.
Petrosains' entrance from within the Suria KLCC mall.
Plasma tube sent crackles of electrical energy to Irfan's hand who then powers a fluorescent tube by holding it.
So the girl is now two and a half! Years!! How crazy is that? Time really does fly. Especially in 2011 since suddenly I am so very very late with this entry. Yaya's getting close to 31 months. But my excuse is work commitments. It's been a very busy 2011 with work deadlines and working on weekends and such. But enough on my excuses - let's just get to it.
Oh also, Happy Belated Birthday to Yaya's Wan Yong and Pak Yope!
And so it came to pass that I had to drive pass Petaling Jaya toward Klang during the holidays, and we met up with Ivan for teh tarik. During the course of our hanging out, Ain flicked a bug off my neck and it fell onto the banana leaf on the table. It looked like an ant - except it was colossal, and was green in colour. Then we realised that it had a smaller red ant attached to it. At first we thought it was a battle to the death between the two insects, but we discovered that the little red ant was dead and a lifeless husk.
An even closer inspection yielded a stranger observation: the dead red ant had its mandibles tightly bitten into the base of the green bug's antenna. Light prodding by us did not help loosen it from the larger insect.
So, with nothing we could do we bid farewell to the winner of the fight - but a loser in some ways - and watch it scramble away to look for new adventures with the dead ant still attached to its head.
Also, the first post of 2011.
This year, Irfan began his proper Islamic classes; three hours in the morning, ending about two and a hours before regular afternoon school starts. It was not as difficult as I thought it would be for him. He appeared to like going to the new school, and several of his regular school friends are there. But that seems to be the way of things normally anyway. Here in Pandan Indah, he has more friends and acquaintances than his parents considering the number of other students he socialises with at school.
Another month, and how quickly it passed! Granted, I only fairly recently wrote her 28 month blog (cheating and dating it earlier than it was actually written, but whatever). At least this month I'm able to work on this entry only a few days after the fact (hooray to client holiday shutdown period!!). Here she is, saying hey y'alls:
I am very delinquent this month (and cheating by dating it a little earlier - it is actually much later in December that I'm writing this entry but I'm fudging the posting date to make myself feel a little better). But I will try to faithfully capture what's happened until her 28 month birthday rather than going further than that.
Well the girl has been progressing steadily, and is now speaking in half-sentences! It's crazy! We are amazed by how far she's gotten in just one month. But first she says hi:
And yes, she can actually say that!
Once upon a time, Irfan's Pak Alang got married. Yesterday, we all visited them at the hospital to see their new baby Mia who was born a couple of days before.
When we first arrived, Mia was located in her bassinet in the post-natal ward's nursery with perhaps half a dozen other screaming babies.
Irfan poses with his second cousin, once Mia was transferred back to her mother.
Last year a buzzy bee baby graced us at Halloween. This year, we went with mammalian and feline, an inspiration from the zoo visit at Allie's 26 month birthday, and since Allie does love cats so much. So...
In the jungle, the mighty jungle
The lion sleeps tonight...
Just keep that song going while you read the rest of this entry, ok?
And lo, the child speaks!!!!! Seriously, Allie finally started talking! It all happened starting about two weeks ago - but hey, better late than never, right?
The smile-grimace hasn't changed though.