Happy News

As some of you have already seen or heard or guessed, I am expecting baby number 2! Hehehe. Maliq will be a big brother soon ya'll, Insya'Allah. I'm more than halfway through and I have to admit, I made the second pregnancy seem like less important than the first. Although, I'm sure that's not the case.

- I don't really keep track how many weeks along I am.
- I don't download all those pregnancy apps.
- I skipped taking supplements more times than the first one.
- I don't avoid caffeine as much as I would like to, unlike the first one.
- I don't apply the stretch marks cream, I hope I won't regret this.
- I don't read/listen to 'pregnancy surahs' as much as I would like to.
- I don't eat as healthy as I should.

I'm feeling a little guilty for being complacent. :(

With the second one on the way, we had to pause our travel plans for now. Not sure until when though. Air tickets for us will be 4 times in 2 years. It's already going to be 3 times soon. The horror.

2016 plans:
March - KL trip
June - Fasting month and Zai couldn't get leave anyway.
September - Giving birth any time.
December - Not sure about bringing a baby (+ a toddler) anywhere far when he/she is only 2 months.
January '17 (during maternity leave) - Maliq will start school by then, but we'll see.

I may consider December or January for somewhere near, depending on how life will be with two kids. Haha. I am already thinking of which far country to go next and it'll probably be more than a year from now. Ho well. Give me some ideas on where to go with a 1 year old and a 3 year old. But then again maybe by then I'll be dead tired to even go anywhere eh? This thought of having two kids scares me quite a bit. Like I said we'll probably go somewhere near first, just to 'test' our endurance level haha. I still want to go Scandinavian and Nordic region but it probably won't be so soon because the kids need to be at least a few years old? And we need to save up? :/ That'll take a few more years. Maldives sound doable though pricey for just one week of stay and not sure if it's safe to bring a running toddler to a water villa.

With the news of the second pregnancy out, I must blog about this other thing because it's been a part of my life for over one year to actually pump 4 to 6 times a day until I stopped recently when I conceived the second one. The plan was to stop gradually over a few months but my pregnancy really decreased my supply significantly so it was quite a fast and painless (thankfully) process to stop pumping fully. Half of me was happy that I got my freedom back (yay!). It was kind of dreadful to lug my heavy pump and bottles whenever I had to be out of the house for more than 6 hours. I never get to carry my smaller bags just because I needed to fit my pumps and bottles in. Not to mention, some places don't even have any proper place for me to pump, I resorted to toilets a number of times. Zai would have to wait 20 minutes for me to be done. It was quite a hassle but I did it without complaints anyway because I rather go through the inconveniences than to battle with mastitis, engorgement and fever. Been through all that and really not pleasant. However, all these may start again soon if I choose to exclusive pump again for the second one. Which I have yet to decide.

Although I got my freedom back, we now have to spend quite a lot on milk powder (Zai is handling the buying part hehe). Maliq relies on milk still cause he doesn't really eat as much as I think he should.

Since I didn't go anywhere during the June break, I felt very productive spring cleaning the house! Like finally I can just spend hours clearing the wardrobe, store room, shelves, shoe racks. When else can I have the luxury of time to sleep late and do just that. The previous few holiday breaks were all spent on going on trips that by the time we were back, it was time to go back to work.

Also, I renovated both bathrooms during the June break and survived the noise and dust during the entire bathroom renovation process! The bathrooms are done now and I love them so much more than before because on top of being meh looking (ugly beige floor tiles what do you think?), the HDB tiles really do stain easily.

It wasn't an easy process looking for suitable tiles. We went to Hafary, Soon Bee Huat and White Horse Ceramics. I thought it would be easy cause I already knew what I wanted. But whatever I wanted turned out to be the smooth and a little slippery kind. I realised all those nice pictures of bathrooms I see on Pinterest are actually bathrooms with wet and dry area. Since I don't really have a dry area except for a very small area in the master bedroom bathroom as I have a glass partition there, it was quite a challenge to find a nice looking with rough surface tile.

 I really liked this but the hefty price tag made me not get this. This was like 5 times more expensive than the plain white one. Now I'm kinda regretting because this would stand out and look so much better next to the white tiles instead of the plain white one I chose in the end.

I liked this too. Best part was, this was not slippery so perfect! But it went out of stock. -.-

I managed to get two types of tiles for both bathroom floors at Soon Bee Huat after much thought of whether they'll end up nice. HOWEVER, one of them (pictured above) went out of stock a day before the reno was supposed to start. I didn't want to delay the reno because I really wanted everything to finish during the two weeks that I was not working. So I went online to search for anything that I could find, called a few tile shops then I remembered my sister worked in a construction and design company. I got her to check if the company has the kinda tiles I wanted and she came back with a sample! Okay, the tiles turned out to be the slippery kind but I was desperate so I just went ahead with it thinking that I'll just treat the floor with an anti slip treatment to make it less slippery. But when the tiles were done, the grouting made it less slippery so I decided not to do the anti-slip treatment in the end. Yay!

Subway tiles for master bedroom bathroom walls. Changed the mirror too. The basin, cabinet and hanging lamp were already there since last year's reno though.

Herringbone pattern for master bedroom bathroom floor. Despite warnings from the contractors that the water won't be able to flow to the drain properly with this grouting pattern, I went ahead and had no regrets! Been using for two weeks now and no problems with water pooling at all.

Also changed my shower head to the rain shower at a steal cause this was on sale. Only $100+ for one whole set when the rest averages about $300+.

Honeycomb tiles for common bathroom floor. This is the last minute one I got via my sister. Turned out okay in the end though it's grey just like the other bathroom. Wanted something very different for both but it's okay.

Honeycomb tiles for a small strip of wall in the common bathroom. Out of all the tiles we got, I like this the least cause it just didn't turn out as nice. I got this to replace a strip of green mosaic tiles from HDB. Like I said, the 5 times more pricey one would probably look better.

I think I got a good deal paying about $4k for the bathrooms. I asked around and most charged me $5k to $6k. I saved a bit too cause I didn't change my main wall tiles in the common toilet.

Raya's in a week and I am looking forward to the long weekend thanks to Youth Day, to actually run errands and clean the house. Not like there will be anyone coming except probably a few cousins and some friends in the second or third week maybe. But it'll be nice to 'dress up' the house once in a while. Got a few things from KMart Australia via a third party but they'll only reach after raya. And I am patiently waiting for Smeg small electricals like the kettle and toaster to reach Singapore cause they're oh so cute. Heh.