Eating Out With Kids Nowadays

Remember when I said, no more eating out a couple of months ago? Because I truly can't handle both them being playful. 

We have loosen up a bit lately where I will consider to eat out, but with one rule of thumb - a third party has to join us, doesn't matter who they are, family or friends, as long as not only just two of us. We still taking care the kids throughout the meal but the burden is lifted a little bit when there are extra hands. If family, we can split the kids' attention to many so won't have this thumping heart every time they climb chairs, and if with friends, they will behave...slightly better, so we can eat in slight peace hehehe.

Below is our recent rendezvous with my parents in law, where we had lunch at Subang Ria, PJ. It's hawker style restaurant where all hawkers in their carts sit under one roof. This place can be very hot and stuffy sometime (and the kids will be restless) but thank God it was raining that day, so no extra sweaty armpits there.

Hensem boy stays with mommy, and Zahra with daddy...

Only for a while. I haven't finished the mee kari and the kids gone wild already. Hensem boy as usual, can't sit still and the big sister doesn't want to miss the bandwagon. She stacked the chair and doing all sorts of actions. 

Zahra is a fussy eater. She hardly eats anything, which I still don't come to any conclusion, either she doesn't like my cooking, or she just doesn't like to eat. So we have to insist and persuade her, we even bribe her (well, it doesn't work anymore as she will ask back what kind of gift we will give her if she eats, that cunning little one!), praise her (kalau makan cantik and clever macam barbie *sigh*), etc. 

Most of the time it will be MrComot's task hehehe...and his favourite one will be this one

"Ok Zahra buat mulut shark"

And he has to open his mouth as wide as he can, being a shark too!

Well, it can be quite lonely for a shark to eat alone right? So two sharks it is.

Picture of the day

Thank you hubby..without you, people will mistaken my daughter as some pelarian, where food is scarce for them.

Another place we went was Fatty Crab Taman Megah for dinner. You know that place right, impossible to bring kids (well, my kids in this case). Our hands will be dirty with crabs and I don't think I will have appetite to eat any, with them being this active.

So we went there with my parents in law and my sister a few weeks ago - that will be 3 extra helping hands and things still got out of control.

Daddy's little hero in mischief department!

They can't sit still until end of dinner. In fact, they've been running in the restaurant and playing by the longkang next to the shop, admiring the cockroaches and all the dirt. Ughhhhhhhh! Emir siap kejar lipas ok. He took a dried leave and poke the crawling cockroach. That guy! At first I marah jugak, but in the end layan je la. I just make sure he didn't touch anything unnecessary. 

I wonder how other parents train their kids to behave. Kalau bagi tablet or phone pun tak jalan. There is this one table next to us, with a toddler who sleeps peacefully inside a carrier, despite of all the noise and hype. Kagum ok kitaorg tengok.

Last but not least, his photo eating a chicken wing, with his long hair! 

He looks so girlish and we call him tomato-man/watermelon-man because of the roundish hair hahaha. This is before I cut his hair, which the after-cut still looks a girl. Well, I wanted to save few bucks...but seems like we have to bring him to a proper barber later. MrComot has been chanting to me that Emir looks like a girl with that haircut which translate to my haircut skill is bad haha.

A Little Drama

MrComot had a whole week training at The Gardens last week. I picked the kids first then pick him at The Gardens. Zahra was very excited and keep on asking

"Mommy, ni tempat apa? Zahra nak pergi, Zahra suka"

I just replied solemnly

"Ok..nanti mommy bawak"

But on Wednesday she threw tantrums and cried begging me to bring her to The Gardens, keep on telling me that she loves The Garden (as if she remembers she ever been in The Gardens pun) so I decided to stop by on Thursday.

On Thursday, everything went well..except for the traffic. We reached quite late already, almost Maghrib time, so we play around the food court area (they have new spacious surau there), had our Maghrib there, ate claypots at the food court since I don't feel like eating anything fancy.

Then we off to Baskin Robbins for a treat for the kids. I ordered 3 scoops (chocolates, cotton candy, love potion) with fancy wafer cup dipped in colorful sprinkles. Everyone seems happy, have mouthful or icecream the kids start to move around, a sign of hyper-ness, I let Emir run around, was about to take out my phone from my handbad, because I want to snap the pretty icecream and upload it to instagram, and then BANG! 

Emir fell, head flat into the ground, with his hand holding one of the queue divider rod.

Something like this:

I quickly ran to him, lift him up and lift that rod, oh myyyy..it's real heavy. Thank God it didn't fell on his chest.

My little boy cried his lung out and it was a real drama that time. The crowd stunned to silence. MrComot was carrying him trying to calm him down and I was watching over Zahra and that is when suddenly Emir let this waterfall vomit out where we can see all his dinner and icecream smacked on the floor, right at the corner of BR seating (thank God, it was at a little corner, I am embarrassed enough). The vomit has some strains of red color and MrComot asking me if it's blood.

My heart skipped too, but I was thinking, how can it be blood, because there is no injury in the stomach. Unless it's from his head. That must be something he had during the dinner, then I remembered "aha! Emir minum sirap bandung tadi".

I was so calm that I think I pissed MrComot a little bit. I know I'm weird like that, I can be really cool for emergency case but turn upside down on normal situation, really kalut. Maybe I was too shocked, so I decided to cut my emotion off and become stoned cold.

After the vomit, I hold Emir while MrComot cleans his shirt with tissue paper (vomit all over him too), pat Emir softly and insist that we stay for a few minutes so that Zahra can have few more bites of the icecream before I pack it up. So calm right? I also can't believe myself.

Emir bounces to normal like, right after and sibuk tolak kerusi boleh? That little man la..memang boys mcm tu kot. Ganas and tak insaf *sigh*

After a while, I went to the counter to pack our icecream and the worker asked me if Emir's ok

"Kak..ok ke? Darah ke tu?"

I was having this imaginary burst of laugh in my mind, imagining that they must be thinking I'm such a bad mom, anak muntah darah pun boleh lagi makan icecream macam biasa.

"Oh tak..dia minum sirap tadi. Nampak macam ok, nanti malam akak kena monitor tengok macam mana"

I'm not a bad mom, just a cool mom ok? Hahaha

Anyway part of the incident was my fault too, because I was busy holding my phone instead of being alert when he was playing with the divider. Mommy so sorry Emir :(

Alhamdulillah he is fine, until now. No concussion or sequence vomit after the incident. 

Tips of the day, if your child fell, just monitor if he vomits within 24 hours, or acts funnily, quickly bring him to hospital. Macam Emir tu dia vomits right after he fell, because he's crying so hard, not because of the concussion. So I just monitor him throughout the day and nothing alarming, so I didn't take him to the doctor. Well, doctor will tell me the same thing too "balik tengok ur anak muntah ke tak" ;)

A picture of them having fun, just before dinner and the incident.

I'll train myself to be more alert after this, and won't clutch to my phone that much!

My Little Zorros

Ok this is about the second iftar that we had last Ramadhan. It is a birthday party at Denai Alam Recreational Club hosted by a friend of mine, celebrating her daughter's 1st birthday, lucky kid! They got this iftar package with free horse riding and archery, throughout the night.

It was Zahra's and Emir's first experience with horse. I dah imagine Zahra will cry and I have to pujuk her riding the horse but surprisingly, she was very excited and keep on tugging my shirt asking for horse riding when we reached the place. 

I had to calm her down and force her to eat and keep on saying 

"Zahra kena makan, nanti Zahra takde energy nak naik kuda"

Then she'll eat just a bite and ask when we can ride the horse again and again.

Emir as usual is the brave one. He didn't feel intimidated with the horse and willingly riding it alone! My little Zorro.

Zahra on the other hand, even though she is excited, she only willing to ride it individually after saw Emir doing it. Nampak sangat takut jugak sikit. My scaredy-cat Zorro hehe..

I wanted to snap a better picture of them with the horse (it's a pony actually) but MrComot afraid the flash will scare the pony off and it will fled and the kids jatuh. So all the picture is above the pony's head (to escape the eyes). Okaayy..mommy sibuk nak amik gamba tak terfikir menda2 macam tu.

Anyway the kids had soooo much fun and I'm quite happy that they taking the horse riding pretty well. Naik sampai beround-round. And Zahra been raving about the horse riding for days after that! Thank you my friend for this lovely party ;)

Iftar @ Tropicana Golf Club

Finally, after a month lacking with update, here I am trying to get my lazy fingers typing. Well, I do a lot of typing in between but only not for my blog. Oh well..

Anyway salam Syawal everyone!! Selamat hari raya, maaf zahir batin. 

How was your raya? We went back to Terengganu and it was awesome, like a-w-e-s-o-m-e. The kids had so much fun (since they are bigger now) and I'm going to share lotsa stories with you, insyaAllah.

By the way, this is super late entry, about our iftar last Ramadhan at Tropicana Golf Club. Nothing to shout about, only that we didn't eat outside at all during last Ramadhan except for 2 days (this one and another one, a birthday party hosted by my friend). Mula2 teringin jugak nak makan luar but come to think, breaking the fast with these 2 combo (zahra and emir) I rather stuck at home. There are at super active phase and can't sit still especially Emir. 

But then, my uncle invited us, including my younger sister so it will be about 10 of us with 5 kids with around their age, I think ok la kot, I can use the extra hand and guards. Kalau 2 orang confirm I tanakkkkk.

The food quite nice especially their sup keting and gearbox, nyum nyum! The best thing is they don't crowd the place to maximize the profit. You know, with kids, I need a lot of space. But not that spacious so that we can walk freely but still contained, so takdela risau sgt. So since space dia besar, boleh minimize accidents like bumping into each other butts and splattering broken glass. 

First round 

 My greens that night, mushroom with kailan oyster. I love this this but it will be tastier with chili padi. This one normal one, chinese style.

 Grilled seafood

 chinese style sweet sour clams. Super tasty! I had 3 full plates of this thing only!!

Emir with his satay

Zahra running in the surau. It was a ballroom I think, splitted into two (for men and ladies). The wallpaper looking so posh with the embossed gold design. Anyway, my kids were super hyper that night and they've been running here and there in the surau. There wasn't so many people in it but hopefully the makcik2 won't be so uptight about it :-S

Admiring the koi pond 

The highlight of the night was live band show! Well, I didn't know the singer, or the band but apparently they are some artist who always perform on kopi-O show. Emir enjoys is sooo much, so so much that he wouldn't budge even though I was saying goodbye to him. He sit still and doesn't even care when I started to walk away.

The coffee house was about to close already and the band is packing up but Emir sit still so she said, "oklah..one more song for the kids, 'sayang'" - shae's song and she request the kids to sing along or dance. But my kids..only poyo in front of the parents, dekat public pemalu la haii..so terus jadi batu duduk diam2 dengar kakak tu nyanyi hahaha.

Overall it was a good night. The kids behaving quite well (except the hyperness in the surau), ate some food (despite of being fussy eater), enjoyed the show and the most important thing, they fell asleep easily! Putting them in bed is such a hard work nowadays and I really appreciate it when they sleep before 12midnight!