Cherryl Alya Abdullah

Cherryl on her last day

It is with a very heavy heart that we let Cherryl go today to pursue her career in Singapore and be with her mom. Cherryl is family. She has been with us since 2005 and we have gone through so much together. In the years that she has been with us, I've had the priviledge to watch her grow and bloom. Almost 2 years ago, Cherryl made a life changing decision when she embraced Islam. We were so proud of her. We still are. It is just too difficult to say goodbye.

Our lunch before Ramadhan

Dear Cherryl, wishing you the very BEST in your new place. May you have a lifetime of success and happiness, and always be in Allah's protection. Farewell my friend. We will miss you much. Take good care & keep in touch..

Anas's First Ramadhan

Anas managed to puasa for the first time ever yesterday. Alhamdulillah. 

When I told him that he could take a day off today & puasa every alternate day, his response was: I want to puasa for the whole month, Mama..

We are so proud of you, Anas (^_^)

PS: Adlina, mama is also proud of you & I know Anas is able to puasa because of your strength & encouragement. You are a GREAT big sis for Anas, darling <3

4 days to Ramadhan

It's 4 days to Ramadhan. Somehow this year has gone by so fast. It's the middle of August, with just over 4 months left to 2009. And the fasting month seems to come so soon.. 

Wishing everyone a blessed holy month filled with love and submission to Allah. Selamat berpuasa bersama keluarga tersayang (^_^)

Adlan the Cake Baker

There's been a flurry of activities in the kitchen of Danau Kaseh. Adlan has shown a sudden interest in baking cakes which is fantastic for everyone (we are a household of cake-lovers!).

Here are some of Adlan's creations in the past few days. The marble cake is soft, smooth & lovely. Adlina helped with the colours :)

The delectable blue, pink & cream Marble Cake

These cupcakes were baked yesterday by Adlan & decorated by Mama. Perfect with a cup of tea.

Adlan's delicious cupcakes

(Extremely easy) Recipes as follows:-

Marble Cake

180g butter

3/4 cup caster sugar

1 1/2 cups self-raising flour

3 eggs

1/2 cup milk

1 tsp vanilla essence

food colouring

Method:-

1. Cream butter & sugar until light & fluffy. Add egg, one at a time. Add vanilla essence.

2. Fold in sifted flour and milk in 2 batches. 

3. Divide mixture in 3 bowls & add food colouring to your liking.

4. Bake ring cake tin in oven at 180c for 40 minutes.

Cupcakes

1 1/2 cups self-raising flour

2/3 cups castor sugar

125g butter, softened

3 eggs

1/4 cup milk

1 tsp vanilla essence

Icing:-

100g butter, softened

1 cup icing sugar

1 1/2 tbsp milk

food colouring

Method:-

1. Cream butter & sugar until light & fluffy. Add egg, one at a time. Add vanilla essence.

2. Add sifted flour and milk in mixture. 

3. Drop 1 1/2 tbsp of mixture in paper cup cases.

4. Bake in oven at 180c for 20 minutes.

5. Mix all icing ingredients in bowl & beat with electric mixer until fluffy.

6. Decorate cupcakes only after cake has cooled.

The Chef & Sous-Chef 

(Adlan used a face mask when preparing his cake!)

Have fun baking (^_^)

Working from Home

I've been working from home for 3 days since Tuesday. Files are piled up on the dining table, mostly completed but some still needing attention. Since Adlan spread the flu virus to Hakim & Anas, my schedule has been chaotic. I wanted to be home to monitor the kids, but at the same time I had 13 sets of Agreements which were due to client by yesterday. It's been a nightmare! 

Alhamdulillah Adlan and Hakim are a lot better today. Unfortunately Anas is still struggling to keep his body temperature down. He has also developed a nasty cough. This morning I brought him to Pantai again when his temperature peaked at 39.2 Celsius. He is now on Relenza, an anti-influenza prescription. His temperature has gone down to 38 after taking the paracetamol. But he still refuses to eat. It's painful for me to see my little boy just lying down in bed not wanting to do much when normally he would be running around driving everyone crazy. Really pray that he will get better soon.

It's been quite good working from home. Yesterday Adlan, Hakim & Adlina joined me at the dining table with their notebooks & did their own things ranging from playing their favourite games on the Internet to working on their workbooks & test papers on Score A. Surprisingly, I got a lot of work done. Managed to email to my client all the Agreements within the dateline. The kids were so good, they knew that I had work to finish, and they were just happy to have me home. No disturbance. I'm comforted by the fact that I'm with all my kids & checking on their condition every now and then. Real peace of mind. 

Thanks to modern technology & the Internet, you don't have to be in the office to get your work done & communicate with clients. It's times like these that I am so thankful to Allah for endowing me with the blessing of having my own Firm, where I am able to decide and prioritize on what is important in my life.

Thank you God, for all your blessings.. Please take care of the residents of Danau Kaseh..

H1N1

Adlan was down with a very bad flu last night. Very high fever at 39 degrees celcius & terrible coughs. I started getting really worried when he started to feel lethargic and refused to eat his dinner (this is very unusual!). 2 days ago 18 students from his class were absent from school due to severe flu. So, I knew we had to take him to the hospital immediately.

Putra Hospital A & E was packed with people, mostly down with flu! It didn't look good. I was informed that the night before, 70 students from a college were brought into the hospital with flu symptoms & it was chaotic. When the doctor examined Adlan, he said that it was possible that Adlan might be having the dreaded H1N1 as the virus is just everywhere now, plus the fact that St David High School had a few suspected cases. I felt so weak when he said that. But he reassured us that complications only happen in 1 of 500 cases. In most cases, the virus will stay & die off after 5-7 days. He prescribed Adlan with some medication, some strong antibiotics & requested that he be quarantined at home. He finally said that if Adlan starts vomiting, we have to immediately send him to the General Hospital.

Apparently the swab test to determine whether or not one has H1N1 is only available in government hospitals. The test kit is expensive, costing about RM1,250 per person and it takes 3 days before the result can be confirmed. I guess this means that the numbers of people infected with virus in Malaysia must be so much higher than the 1,400+ as published by the government. I'm sure there are many more people who must have been infected but didn't get the chance to undergo the swab test to confirm their status! This is so worrying..

Well, at home, Alhamdulillah Adlan is feeling so much better today. His fever has reduced to 38.2. He is still coughing with some runny nose, but no vomiting. He has started eating again at lunch time, although much lesser than normal, at least he is eating. I hope he will completely recover soon..

Just pray that the rest will be spared from the flu.. Shoo, Shoo H1N1!!

Allahyarham Yasmin Ahmad

I have never met Yasmin Ahmad. And unfortunately I've never had the privilege of knowing her personally. But I'm a huge fan of all her TV commercials and movies. She touches my heart in the few minutes of short stories about love, life and respect in the commercials aired usually prior to festivals in the past few years. Strange how she can make me feel & cry in less than 2 minutes.

And don't get me started on her movies. Yasmin had that gift of seeing differently. Her movies are honest and true, so much so that all her work attracted controversies from the powers that be. Scenes were cut, some parts were banned and debated on. Her film Muallaf never reached the screens in Malaysia. But, kudos to her, she persisted on. She didn't live with a front so she would get public's approval. Yasmin was a story-teller who told simple, real stories about people, relationships, love and life. She was honest, without all the pretence and hypocrisies - and she touched so many hearts, mine included. 

The closest I got to Yasmin Ahmad was when I left a message in her blog yasminthestoryteller last year. I told her that I was in awe of her talent and she responded to my message simply by saying: Allah is generous beyond comprehension. How true..

Last night Yasmin was called to her Maker and we, as a nation has lost a remarkable person who had that rare gift of making people laugh, cry and think, all at the same time. Al-Fatihah..

It's strange how you can be so affected by the death of someone you don't even  know and have never met. But I feel so, so sad today. 

Please watch the clip below. It's to remind people that we are all "beautifully imperfect". It's one of her work in Singapore.

http://www.youtube. com/watch? v=Nw0s4C0g5SM