Lennox & Me

Have you ever watched a documentary called What The Health? I think it's still showing on Netflix now. The show popped up when i was in Singapore having dinner with a couple of friends... they mentioned that they are trying to eat healthier (who isn't??). But instead of the usual 'less carbs less sugar etc', they were trying to eat less animal products. My friend Nai joked that he was trying his best but he was basically a "non-practicing vegetarian"... hahaha. I must admit i was pretty sceptical of the whole documentary while watching it and even after. I believe that if you wanted to find 'studies' to support any claim, you will be able to! But what definitely stuck in my mind were the people in the show who had so much improvement in their health just by eating vegan for 2 weeks. They reduced the amount of medication they had to take by half or more, and they just had more energy and less ailment. Granted, they were mostly the older generati

About 3 weeks ago Lennox started playschool. In Holland they can start with something called 'peuterspeelzaal' (toddler playgroup) from 2 years old. It is 2 times a week, about 3 hours each time. Since Lennox is bilingual and speaks Malay at home, he can also go 4 times a week when he becomes 2.5 years old. Although we have been going to playgroups in the past (since he was about 8 months old), i always had to stay with him for the duration. So for him and for me, it was a pretty big step to drop him off to the hands of the teachers (they call them ' jufs ' here). The only other times Lennox has been on his own is with family and one other time with a babysitter (when the birth of Sterling impending and we wanted to be prepared). His peuterspeelzaal has a pretty decent size, about 14 kids to 2 teachers. The kids range from 2-4 years old. From 4 years old the kids go to "Groep 1" which is like nursery (N1/N2) for us in Singapore. The first weeks have gone

Just the thought of flying alone with baby Sterling (then 3.5 months) and Lennox (exactly 2 years) was scary and intimidating. I even considered NOT flying to Singapore because i was afraid that i wouldn't be able to handle the 13 hour flight alone with them. But that would mean that my whole family (sister, brothers, grandma, nephews, nieces, uncles, aunts etc etc) and my Singapore friends would not be able to see the new baby... and it had already been a year since they saw Lennox. So i told myself i had to do it! And i did! Here's a few things i did to prep for the flight and to make the flight that much less scary: I chose a  night flight  instead of day time ones: obviously, to follow their sleep rhythm. I was lucky enough to have a choice of 9pm flight instead of a 11am one; I made sure they had a  'regular/boring' day  with naps etc, so that they were not overly excited or over tired; confirm my baby bassinet . Flying with KLM with a baby for the first

"You burn off so many calories breastfeeding!"... "i'm hungry and eating all the time because i'm losing so much weight breastfeeding!"... "it's so great i don't have to work out and i totally went back to my pre pregnancy weight!"... etc  I heard phrases like these everywhere before i gave birth for the first time. It was one of the things i was looking forward to before i became a first-time-mom with Lennox almost 2 years ago. I knew i would try to breastfeed if i was able to. And another selfish reason i wanted to breastfeed was because i've heard tons of stories of women who lost their pregnancy weight (and more) just like *that*. Ok let's back track a little here. I am always in favour or being strong & fit rather than thin & weak. All my life i've never been the small/skinny one and that's been ok. I've always been active since my teenage years with canoeing/canoepolo, wakeboarding and now crossfit. I h

I have been relatively active on social media after the birth of our 2nd son, Sterling, but i just realised we haven't made it official on the blog yet. Say hello to Sterling! And coincidentally he turns 8 weeks old today :) Sterling at a couple of hours old Sterling at 5 days old Sterling at 6 weeks old (and my left eye :P) Isn't he just the cutest?! :) I'm one proud mama here :) Birth story I was 39 weeks & 1 day pregnant, it was a Monday and i was feeling good. I went with Lennox to the library to return some library books and let him run around for abit. I was also hungry so i decided to drop by the McDonald's for a quarter pounder meal (Lennox had a healthier sandwich :P) since i figured i wouldn't have the chance to after the baby comes. We continued to do some groceries then we headed home for a nap. At 15:15 i had my routine check up with my midwife. That day Diana was there (there are 4 rotating midwives that are assigned to me).

Goodbye 2016, Hello 2017 We were all down with a cold so the Christmas and new year festivities were really kept to a minimum. Also because the fact that Jürgen's grandma passed away earlier in November, everything was pretty subdued with the Kloof family in Holland and Suriname. We basically just stayed home and had my mother-in-law stay with us and have a small celebration with 4 of us. On 30th December we received news about the EEG test which were HEARTBREAKING. The news was told me to over the phone by the doctor. Basically the doctor told us that it showed that Lennox did have epilepsy. Our whole world basically came crashing down. I ugly-cried and hugged Jürgen then immediately started researching on epilepsy. We still could not get an earlier appointment than 7 february with the child neurologist which drove me nuts (what the hell right?!). Things seemed to get better with Lennox and we got rid of the annoying cold. However, early morning on 11th january 2017 Le