Tightening a Mother-Daughter Relationship

Image taken from www.ummulhasanaat.co.za

As a working mom, I should realize that I might have limited time with my little daughter, which often make me blame myself of an unintended situation between me and her. However, a  regret would not change it unless I do something matter. It then pushes me to gradually deal with my ego, which previously make me always sad when my daughter preferred to be with my mom rather than me. Although I am conscious that my melancholy is a natural emotion of a mother, this must be relaxed. And now, I am still trying to enhance the relationship.

First and foremost, finding the right time to be with her has been a proven way. For example, in the last lebaran holiday, I decided to have quality time with my daughter as I started my course break by allowing my mom visit my sister in Pekanbaru earlier. The result is that she became reliant to me, so it eased my next journey to Bengkulu when there would be only me, my husband and her, without my mom.

Another good way to tighten the bond is spending my time to play with her, which do not need to go to some places, instead, staying at home during the weekend will be more effective. Sometimes, going out could reduce the boredom, but it would also lead to distracting your child's attention. Indeed, children would only be focused to what he/she sees in malls, for example, rather than to the parents. In contrast, when I was staying and playing just at home, we could have a more intensive conversation in addition to some games we played together.

Lastly, it was bedtime session, which I can use to easily talk to her about anything, let's say, how to pray before going to sleep. Meanwhile, touching her forehead and caressing her hair during that time would make her comfort and thus she would fall asleep simply.

Thank you my daughter for teaching me how to deal with myself, be patient and remember me that you are the most important present in my life. Hopefully, there will be better situation in the future that we as a family will have more time being closely together.

Bengkulu for the Lebaran Holiday

Being our routines in the last four years, we go to Bengkulu during this Lebaran holiday. Differently, my husband only took three days work leave whereas I was luckily given the two-week break from the course so I could use my work leave deposit in other occasions. Therefore, I started the holiday earlier and had time with my daughter while my mom went to Pekanbaru to visit her other grandchild. 

We went to Bengkulu on Thursday morning, early morning to be exact since we had to leave our house at 5 a.m. to reach soekarno-hatta airport. Initially, I planned to have more time to spend there and feed my child for her breakfast before the boarding time. Unfortunately, there was a long queue at check-in process and so we finished that lately. It resulted in an unfinished breakfast for Kiki as we only had around 30 minutes before the airline called us. Alhamdulillah, the flight was on-schedule although we had to wait to take off due to the heavy air-traffic. Similarly, the flight was also enjoyable as three of us could fall asleep during that flight hihihi. Arriving in Bengkulu at 10 a.m., my in-laws were already there in the airport to pick us up. After finishing with our luggage, we met them.

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the Lebaran Day

The day is just a day after we arrived in Bengkulu. That's why when we touched down at oma-opa's house, there were so many foods available, from any kinds of snacks and pempek to the food that usually prepared for lebaran day, such as lontong, gulai, etc.

Early in the morning at the day, we all prepared to go to the Ied praying place, which is quite close to the house but as we are in a hurry, we needed to go by car. I prepared Kiki's stuffs that keeping her calm during my praying activity. I also brought her mukena in case she wanted to wear that as all of the people going there would wear that. Alhamdulillah she stayed nice during the time and then we went back to the house afterwards.We then had our breakfast before visiting our relatives. We went to my parents in law' sister then to their extended family. At 12 we had finished doing those activities.

Surprisingly, she was pretty calm during my pray :)

Going to Lais Region

At the day after, we planned to go to Lais Region, which is around 1 hour drive from Bengkulu city. Unlike our initial plan, we went lately because we have to wait other family members who wanted to join us. Kiki fell a sleep during the journey, but woke up before we reached Lais. After arriving at Lais, she told me wanna have a pee...oh  my there was no toilet as we were in a village where the grave of my hubby's grandpa is in. Suddenly, I just decided to go to one house and ask the owner whether we can use their toilet hehe, and they allowed us...many thanks. We then went back to Bengkulu and had a short break seeing Lais beach.

Beaching at Pantai Panjang

Pantai Panjang is the most prominent landmark in Bengkulu, where most people spend their free time. Indeed, in each visit to this city, me and my family always go there. To be honest, this beach is even better than those in Bali, for example, because of the white sand, the cleanliness, and is also far less crowded compared to Bali's.

And, in this occasion, again we visited Pantai Panjang since Kinanthi loves going to beach. Just like the previous, she didn't want to end and go home, ha ha ha. Going there at 5 p.m., at that moment we simply enjoyed the waves, the sand and absolutely the beautiful sunset.  

Looks good yeah :P

Going Back to Jakarta
After spending almost 10 days in Bengkulu, we should go back to Jakarta, back to the reality, with the crowd and the traffic jam we never met during our stay in Bengkulu, but I think it was exciting for Kinanthi because she will see Uti again he he he.