Azalia Suhaimi: In Between Her Photopoetry

Poet, photographer, creative writer. Here on some days. www.azaliasuhaimi.com on other days.

[azaliasuhaimi]

Unless squishing chocolate cream counts as sensory play (which actually does, by the way!), #OrkedsHand is taking a short break because it's Mommy-and-Dada's anniversary. 😊 That chocolatey goodness (SO AMAZING!) is by @kamibake by the way and you should totally try them. And, it has been exactly five years now since the night my husband and I walked down the aisle to All You Need Is Love. 💘 Alhamdulillah. 😊 To many more, inshaaAllah. Goodnight, folks! All we really need IS love (in ANY form). x P/S - Orked recently loved going "I want this" and "I want that", and ESPECIALLY "I want cake", hence that caption on the cake! 🍰

[azaliasuhaimi]

HAPPY NEW YEAR from us the #OrkedsHand team, our family, to yours! 🎊💕✨ Orked and I made our own fruity fireworks. 🌟 2015 has been a beautiful year I explored possibilities and chased dreams, alhamdulillah. I remember earlier this year meeting my poetry idol, Sarah Kay of Project Voice where we shared our thoughts and feelings and some of the things we knew to be true. I talked about wanting to spend more time with my daughter. By the will of God, a couple of months down the road, I left my corporate job to stay home with Orked and be what we are today. ❤️ We don’t know yet if this is permanent or temporary, but everything in this world is temporary anyway, and I do know that I’ve never been happier and more grateful for what we have now. And with its own set of ups and downs, I’ll make every moment count. ✨ I remember along the way too managing to compile my poetry and photography works that were published into special PhotoPoetry booklets for a cause I cared about. And then there’s the birth of #OrkedsHand and the unexpected award it received. I began collaborating with some great baby brands doing photography and some creative work I’m passionate about. But most importantly, being with my family throughout it all. These may not be amazing successes, but they’re ones that I really care about. ❤️ I pray that Allah bless these endeavors, and may 2016 be another fruitful year for all of us with lots of beautiful lessons to learn from. And what I’m hoping to put across is - we totally can work towards our dreams and achieve them! Here’s to more dreams in 2016 - CHASE THEM! 😊✨🌈🙌

[azaliasuhaimi]

We're doing the letter C today, and we did a paper plate cat art (that had its eyes fallen off), a simple messy food art and a chasing-the-cats session with the actual tabbies we have at home. When I showed her the letter C and went all "C for Cat", she swiped the Nutella off the plate with her fingers and offered them to my mouth going "say aaaa". More like asking me to shut up 😜 haha. Well it's always a good time for some Nutella! 👅 P/S - If you want to have some mommy-toddler fun doing easy colorful food art and toddler crafts like this 👆, come on join us for the Artsy Foodsy Workshop! We're taking the last few registrations now 😉 For more details, check out the other posts in the hashtag #artsyfoodsyworkshop. 💦🎨

[azaliasuhaimi]

Oh so much mess today 🙈 But anyway, do you remember making blotto art as a kid? Where we place large drops of paint on a paper, fold it into half and rub the paint all over to produce some amazing symmetrical funky-coloured prints? Oh I remember this activity with such fondness! 😍 Did it a lot in preschool and home back in the day. Special thanks to @munchkins_and_moms for reminding me about this activity through one of her lovely posts! So we made some "butterflies" today as I introduced the letter B to my 21-month-old babe. Although she insisted that wasn't the letter B...those were "glasses!" she said. 🤓 We'll come back to the letter B whenever you're ready then, missy. 😎 #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

#OrkedsHand has been busy with some pretend cooking and baking today at @gulacakery, our SUPER LOVELY VENUE for our coming ARTSY FOODSY WORKSHOP! Yes, I'm that excited now after getting all the vibes from the gorgeous pastel cafe 😍💕🌸 Speaking of which, we do have some LAST FEW SPOTS for the workshop which could be YOURS if you register QUICK! You'll get to do fun arts and crafts with your toddler AND some fun yummy food art! If you like the bright-coloured things I've been posting, here's your chance to DO THEM in a fun group! It will be held on 30th January 2016 at the lovely Gula Cakery. For even more details, have a look at all the previous posts under the hashtag #artsyfoodsyworkshop. SEE YOU SOON (IF you register quick)! 😉✨👌🌈🦄

[azaliasuhaimi]

Today we painted with a different material - thread! And instead of going our usual rainbow route, we went all monochrome today (reminding me of Aisya, @erinazahara)! I used a cardboard tube to work as a "rolling pin" and glued on some thread (okay, more of like some remaining strings we had around the house) on it. I painted them black and invited Orked to roll the tube across several papers, creating her all-time favourite animal print - the ABYA. Yes, that's Orked's current pronunciation for "zebra". She has been calling me "mommy abya" for a while now after seeing me in a black-and-white-striped pair of jammies, so we're creating abyas alright! The prints she produced were pretty gorgeous, they almost looked like some classy monochrome design on a 2016 organizer from a cute stationery shop. I'm thinking of doing this activity again on larger papers so we can actually use them as wrapping papers or so. But for today though, I drew actual zebras on her prints and cut them out...and amused ourselves going "Abya! Abya!" while learning the colour black. I attempted a few more doodles of a tiger and a giraffe, but they went a bit wrong. Plus, we're really all about the abya today. 😁 How was your day like?🦄 #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

Orked's attempt at arranging our Christmas tree food art for @babymoov_sg. Okay, she just wants 'em raisins. 😋🎄🍒 We hope you've had a jolly, merry day by the way! We sure did - we played with food and we played with bubbles! 💕💦 #OrkedsHand #meanderingtrees

[azaliasuhaimi]

I wasn't initially planning on making play dough today. But the little one, being a toddler that she is, decided to pull apart a bottle of baby lotion and have them all splattered across the floor. So a mama's gotta do what a mama's gotta do!🙅🏻 Nope, don't panic just yet. There's no need to scream at the toddler and there's definitely no need to sweat away mopping the floor. Bring on the corn starch instead, mamas! Mix some corn starch with 'em baby lotion (1 part lotion & 2 parts corn starch) and you've got yourselves the softest sweetest-smelling dough, mm! 🌸💕 Add some food colouring (in pastel colours if you're playing with me 😜) and you're all set. Another alternative to baby lotion is hair conditioner, which I think provides slightly better dough consistency. And, there! Playtime! 🎪 The best part is you've eliminated waste & created fun! I love toddler activities that just...happen. Like this one. Maybe making play dough has never needed to be a chore. Maybe it's all part of the process. 😉 #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

My phone died on me earlier this morning, hence my silence today. Managed to do a full-blown reset to it and brought it back to life after dinner. But the day couldn't be better. It was simple and unplugged, and it was pretty. I am staying a little late tonight like how I often do most nights just embracing my melancholic thoughts. Of late, I keep thinking and falling weak at the thought of a young child's beautiful innocence and purity. Maybe it's my days of watching my daughter grow that gets me feeling heavier over it all. There's a reason I'm so passionate towards early childhood education. While I have always been a child at heart myself who'd rather doodle rainbows each day than have a proper grown-up conversation, I am also hugely smitten over a child's beautiful curiosity and imagination. I love seeing children learn. I hope that every child gets the opportunity to embrace being a child and wildly curious. Some nights I look at my daughter's stuffed bunny lying on the sofa and my head keeps rewinding her innocence. The way they learn and grow from such purity and innocence is just too beautiful for words. Today we played and did nothing more. It was simple and unplugged, and it was pretty.

[azaliasuhaimi]

I read somewhere that one of the ways to teach colours to a toddler is to follow their lead. Like if everything is "blue" to them, then show them just that until you're seeing blue yourself. So I began today asking her "what colour is this?" as I pointed at something random before she went "blue". I then brought out all things blue to show her just that. She went "blue" a couple of times before suddenly going "orange". She was coincidentally holding a tiny pumpkin toy on her other hand that was orange alright. "Yes, that's orange, Orked. And this is blue. Now what colour is this?" "Apple." Class dismissed. 😜🔔 #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

Lesson for the day (pick one). 😁🎈 I'm not feeling well today so I just put out some paint and let her have an open ended art activity. I also noticed she has been picking up and recognizing alphabets lately, going "O-A-G!" when sees fonts on my jammies, so I thought I'd bring on our "A for apple" activity again...before I silently rest off this nasty flu. 😪 Have a great weekend ahead, guys! ✨ #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

Another junior-nasi-campur post. Mild fish curry and veges with 🍚💕. #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

That's some serious colour-mixing magic going on there. Our marble-painting activity this time uses shaving foam & paint, and the marble patterns & colours produced were absolutely BEAUTIFUL! 😍🙀🎨 This photo was taken after Orked had swirled the colours even further, but I even find this 👆 pretty too! And it was much much MORE beautiful before that. The set-up was really easy. I sprayed shaving foam all over a tray (I lined my tray with some sugar paper, but you may use foil for easier clean-up after that), dropped a few colours of paint (or food colouring), then passed on over some q-tips and paintbrush to Orked to finish the job. 🙅🏻 Just start swirling the colours around the shaving foam, and then ✨magic✨ happens! 😍 You can make some gorgeous prints by placing the papers over that 👆 magic foam, or you can continue swirling just for the fun of it. My 21-month-old enjoyed just swirling and playing with the coloured foam...although I panicked slightly when she suddenly exclaimed "ice-cream!" 😳 so yes, do monitor kids under 3 when doing this. Cos that stuff looks pretty yummy alright. Who knew ✨magic✨ was so easy to set up? 😉🎨 #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

Of course, she's the happiest assisting with food-related photography jobs. New recipe is up on @babymoov_sg by the way. 🍴😋 Goodnight from this corner of the world, everyone! 🌏🌙 #OrkedsHand

[azaliasuhaimi]

All the sensory experiences a child can learn from are in nature, gifted by God. ⛅️☀️🌾 I love being outside, under the bright blue skies. I hope our children will grow up with many opportunities to fall in love with nature. 🍃🍄

[azaliasuhaimi]

Here's a quick recipe of edible finger paint for adorable tiny little bunnies like this one.👆😍 Because the only thing cuter than a baby is a baby crawling around in only nappy & paint! Items: Corn starch Water Food colouring Yup, that's it, the end.💁😄 Okay, there needs to be a ✨LITTLE✨ bit of "cooking", but it's really so quick and easy, I managed to do it within minutes, on the spot when this lil' one was over at my place for playgroup. I put one cup of corn starch & one cup of water on a saucepan using just low or medium heat, stirred them together until I got a paint-ish consistency. You may then turn off the heat, transfer the mixture into several cups, and mix in different colours of food colouring into each cup. You may add on a bit of water if you'd like a lighter, watery texture. And, party on, baby! 💦🎨 *Suitable for 6-18 months.

[azaliasuhaimi]

This morning. Six kids (wait to the end of the clip to see all of them proudly showing their artwork 😍). #OrkedsHand is expanding alright. Haha. Orked started out alone with some bubble foam painting initially. When her friends came, she became all introvert-ish & decided to um, monitor them? Our next lesson is definitely socializing! 😁 The kids had fun by the way, stamping and making circles with cardboard rolls, painting with stencils, making handprints, mixing milk with paint (that's Orked 😑😑) and just some good ol' painting with paintbrushes. I managed to whip up a bit of edible blue paint for our youngest member, 9-month-old Izhar. He sure had a ball crawling around in just blue paint and nappy. THE CUTEST! 😍🎨💦 Thank you for today, kids! Here's to more artsy fartsy session (with @shshazana's amazing Nutella cheesetarts and goreng pisang USJ)! 🎨🎈 @idaharyani @erinazahara @shshazana 💕