The Faux Leather Fiasco: A Lesson in Fashion and Laundry

Alycia has a love for leather jackets—their cool and classy look has always captivated her. However, genuine leather jackets come with a hefty price tag, so she opted for a more affordable alternative: faux leather jackets bought online. While they look stylish, faux leather items require special care, such as hand washing with mild soap or dry cleaning.

This is where the challenge begins in our household. My girls, particularly Sherilyn, are not keen on hand washing their clothes. Sherilyn’s schedule is perpetually packed with assignments and dance practice, leaving her little time for laundry.

The other day, Sherilyn borrowed Alycia’s faux leather jacket for an event. True to form, she didn’t hand wash it afterward. Normally, I would have asked Maria, our part-time helper, to take care of delicate items like this. But Maria hasn’t been coming recently due to her difficult pregnancy.

Left to figure it out myself, I decided to put the jacket in the washer on the hand wash cycle. Big mistake. When the cycle finished, the jacket came out a complete mess. The cheap faux leather had torn, and the material disintegrated into tiny black debris that scattered everywhere—on the floors, the balcony, and even in the washer. Fortunately, I put the jacket into a fine mesh laundry bag and most of the debris was left inside the laundry bag. It took me nearly an hour of vacuuming, dry wiping, and wet wiping to clean it all up.

As expected, Alycia was furious. She blamed Sherilyn for not taking proper care of the jacket and insisted that Sherilyn pays for it. Sherilyn agreed and reimbursed her. Thankfully, the jacket wasn’t an expensive one, but it served as a hard-earned lesson for all of us.

Never buy faux leather clothing unless you’re willing to invest in dry cleaning after every wear. It’s impractical, expensive, and not worth the hassle. I’ve learned my lesson too. Years ago, I bought an expensive faux leather skirt from H&M, only to have the fabric start peeling after a few wears. Since then, I’ve sworn off faux leather clothing despite loving their look.

Sometimes, the appeal of an item isn’t worth the headache of maintaining it. This little episode has reminded me to prioritize practicality and quality over fleeting style. And for Alycia and Sherilyn? Perhaps they’ve learned a thing or two about responsibility and the true cost of fashion.

Moments before binning the faux leather jacket.

The mess the faux leather jacket caused on the floor.

Random Thoughts

I just found out that one of my very, very old posts dated back to 8 July 2013 (exactly 11 years ago) has garnered 5,700 views as of today.  The title of the article posted on my other blog is "How To Dilute Crystalized / Thickened Homemade Marmalade Jam" and I still remember vividly the sequence of events on that day when the mil made the jam. 

When our girls were younger, we used to eat bread almost every day. Homemade jams were always finished off in days. I used to prep sandwiches with jam or kaya for their school lunch boxes. The girls loved Gardenia white bread or grandma's homemade milk loaf when they were younger. Having bread for lunch or dinner was also a norm back in the day. Fast forward to a decade later and the girls don't eat bread as much now.  Alycia doesn't like to eat bread with jam now while Sherilyn and Cass prefer sourdough breads. 

As for me, I've always preferred sprouted wheat bread which is flour-free bread and lower in carbs. I like my sprouted wheat bread air-fried and spread with light Lurpak butter and homemade lemon curd.

My stock of walnuts and hazelnuts from Signature Market arrived! When buying nuts online, Signature Market on Lazada is still the best place to get them. I've tried buying from other sellers but their nuts never satisfied me as much as those from Signature Market.

I like to add my favorite nuts from Signature Market to my Lazada shopping cart and then monitor the prices daily. When the prices are reduced to the lowest, I quickly check out and pay for them via Boost. That's how a housewife with no salary gets more bang for her buck -- by grabbing the cheapest nuts to earning points (free money) from eWallets 😁

Keeping Track of Our Girls' Extra CoCo Activities And Payments

This year I am even busier than last year with my chauffeuring duties.   Alycia has just started her martial arts classes, which means more trips for me to do.  The martial arts classes are not just once a week, but three times a week. Freaking THREE times a week that lasts until late evening.  On Wednesdays and Fridays she has kickboxing from 7-8:15 p.m.  and on Tuesdays, she has Muay Thai from 7 - 8:15 p.m.  Next year Alycia may want to drop kickboxing to learn yoga, which ends at 9:30 p.m.!   This year too, I may want to send Cass for BM tuition as I don't think I have anymore sanity and patience  left to tutor this kid who makes me vomit blood.

God, give me a driver pretty please!!🙏

To remember who goes where and at what time each day, I have handwritten down a very simple reminder for myself listing down the girls' activities.  This note is stuck to a cupboard next to my work desk. I look at it several times in a day.  This list does not include Sherilyn's tuition and activities in the morning. I don't write those down as her morning routine is pretty much etched in my memory after going through the motions with her for a year last year.





Payments
I also have a payment list in Microsoft Excel that lists down our 3 girls' tuition and CoCo activities and the fees for each.  I write the date on the payment column each time payment is made. I created this payment list as a reminder when I forgot to pay Yamaha for 2 months when Cass first attended piano lessons! What an embarrassment it was for me when the owner called me to remind me to pay. It made me feel like I deliberately evaded payment🤭

Last year, I received a standard warning letter from one of Sherilyn's tuition centres when I forgot to make payment for that month. I was only late for one week. I was only late for ONE WEEK and the kiasu tuition centre shot out the letter to me!  Last year too, I received text messages twice from Sherilyn's BM tuition centre when I was late in paying fees for that 2 months.

To prevent all these unnecessary annoying warning letters and text messages from harassing me making me feel like I am a loan defaulter, I have come up with some fool-proof reminders to remind myself to prepare the girls' fees each month. Since then, I have never once forgotten to make payment 😁😁

Easy reminders for myself on payment
To remind myself to prepare the various fees amounting to several thousands each month, I first key in  reminders in my e-Calendar on my desktop computer.
On the last day of each month, I prepare all the fees needed to pay the girls' school transporters, music centre, tuition centres and gym for next month.

The fees required for the girls' different types of activities will be placed individually in an ang pow packet or envelope with the name of the receiver written on it. Then all the ang pow packets and envelopes will be kept in a big zipper bag which I place in my handbag. Before dropping off the girls at the tuition centre / gym, I pass them the ang pow / envelope for them to pass it to the centre.

I also have reminders made in my e-Calendar to remind the girls to request for receipts from the tuition centres / gym. Not taking any chances of not filing receipts anymore when many yonks back, one of the tuition centres owner claimed that I did not make payment but payment was made and she was too busy to issue me with a receipt.  The centre owner even forgot that she told me that she would give me a receipt the following week but that following week, she had the cheek to tell me that she did not receive my money.  I got so pissed that I pulled Alycia and Sherilyn out from the tuition centre.

Do you have similar reminders too for your children's activities and payments?

Lazy Dinners Cooked With Help From Daughters

I definitely perform better under stress. During the school holidays, I tend to get lackadaisical.  I get 2-3 hours of extra sleep each day and when I wake up at 8 a.m., I tend to do chores at a slower pace, at my own sweet time. There is nothing to rush for  except that on some days, we have places to go to, I have errands to run and the girls have tuition.  I am even slacking in my daily morning exercise regimen.  I have not gone out to run or swim ever since the school holidays started 😳😴  But you know what, I didn't gain an ounce of weight. In fact, I lost about 1-2kg. That's because I only eat 2 meals a day during the school holidays.  We have brunch at 11ish a.m. and dinner at 7-ish p.m. vs two breakfast, lunch and dinner (total of 4 meals) on a school-going day.

Here are some interesting facts on sleep and body weight which all dieters must know!

Along with eating right and exercising, getting quality sleep is an important part of weight maintenance.

Even with the very best diet and fitness routine, if sleep is off, you're wrecked!

Not sleeping enough--less than seven hours of sleep per night, can reduce and undo the benefits of dieting, according to a research published in the Annals of Internal Medicine. In the study, dieters were put on different sleep schedules. When their bodies received adequate rest, half of the weight they lost was from fat. However when they cut back on sleep, the amount of fat lost was cut in half—even though they were on the same diet. What’s more, they felt significantly hungrier, were less satisfied after meals, and lacked energy to exercise. Overall, those on a sleep-deprived diet experienced a 55 percent reduction in fat loss compared to their well-rested counterparts.

See the connection between sleep and weight now? I can see and feel it now!

Ok, back to food talk!

For dinner, if Drama Queen is around, she would help around in the kitchen.

These are the two dinners that Drama Queen helped to cook:

Dinner #1
Roast chicken and blanched bok choy with soft, fluffy and pillowy pancakes prepped by Drama Queen:








Doing what she loves best:



I made extra grilled chicken thighs and Cass had grilled chicken with toast and tomatoes before she went to school to attend a STEM Lab holiday program the next morning.








Dinner #2
Grilled pomfret fish with turmeric, Teriyaki sauce and black pepper; stir-fried broccoli and sauteed portobello mushrooms with garlic and butter (both cooked by Drama Queen).






As we could not finish the fish, Cass helped to debone the fish. The fish meat was used as one of the ingredients in our fried rice the next day.


My girls are no longer physically challenging but as they are a little older now, they mentally challenge me every single day but they are definitely my most precious gems, my gifts from God 💗

Braised Chicken For Dinner And School Lunch Box

Ever since the mil left for Hawaii exactly a week ago, I still haven't found my mojo to cook yet 😩

I still dread cooking every day. But for the love of my 3 precious and the thought of eating outside food laden with oil, salt, sugar and MSG (SHUDDER!), I am trying to condition my mind to love cooking.

On my menu everyday are very simple dishes.  Yesterday, I dished out braised chicken with Chinese spices (star anise, cardamon, cinnamon, pepper) with soy sauce, thick sauce and sugar.  I used organic Kee Song chicken, organic soy sauce, organic thick sauce and organic brown sugar. This is an oil-splatter free dish.  I cooked a big portion and added some carrots in so that Cass and Drama Queen can have that for lunch in school the next day (today) as Wednesdays are CoCo days.

Veggie of the day was blanched cauliflower.





Today, I bento-ed the braised chicken drumsticks and brought them to school for Cass and Drama Queen. I also brought them each a packet of Izumio hydrogen water. They need the extra energy for a long and hot day doing co-curricular activities in school.




Cass has the tendency to leave her empty lunch boxes behind in school. Just last Wednesday, she left behind a stainless steel lunch box and only remembered to look for it yesterday after umpteen reminders from me.  When I opened the lid, OH MY GAWD, the stench of the mold was so overpowering that I almost passed out inhaling the toxic gas brewing inside for 7 freaking days!!  I soaked the lunch box for half a day with half a bottle of dishwashing liquid (almost!) and yet the stench was still lingering. I guess I will have to discard the lunch box 😓

So today, Cass and Drama Queen's lunch went into disposable plastic takeaway boxes.  And I stuck a note on the lunch box to remind them to bring the lunch box and cutlery home 😏

Miss Efficient

Lately, Cass has been pretty efficient at completing her homework, mainly because I have a 'reward plan' in place for her.  On her daily in-house timetable, she gets 1/2 hour - 1 hour of screen time on the phone IF she completes all her school homework, tuition homework, homework from tiger mom and practises her piano everyday. If she doesn't plan her time well, if she dawdles away her time, she gets no reward and goes straight to bed at 9:30 p.m.  Bed time on school-going days is set at 9:30 p.m.

This morning, she got up at 7 a.m. despite it being a school holiday. She must have been woken up by Drama Queen who needed to go to school for UPSR preparation classes. After downing a packet of Izumio, Cass poured out some organic passion fruit cookies into a bowl and began doing her school homework while munching on the cookies. This is a rare sight to behold. With a time-table  in place, Cass is so much clearer on what needs to be done everyday.




Cass has also been very good during Mandarin tuition class lately --  earning the 1/2 hour - 1 hour of screen time is subject to her behaving REALLY well during Mandarin tuition class.  So she has to earn her reward with no temper tantrums, no disobedience and no nonsense. Kids are just like adults. They need rewards to spur them to work hard and to behave well.

During the school holidays, Cass gets extra hours on her phone as long as she completes all that has to be done for the day. She's happy and I'm happy. Win win situation at home!  👍😊

One-Tray Grill For Dinner

My lazy, easy peasy meal on a Friday night last week...

A one tray grill consisting of  grilled lemon + dill + dried herbs chicken thighs,  carrots, sweet potatoes and sweet corns.



For the sauce, I used soy sauce, minced garlic, maple syrup, ground black pepper, dried herbs and half a cup of orange + apple + coconut water smoothie which I made in the morning.  I drizzled the sauce mixture onto the chicken and grilled them in the oven at 180C for about 40 minutes.

I rubbed black pepper, pink sea salt, lemon juice, garlic and maple syrup under the skin of the chicken and marinated the thighs for 4 hours.









There were 3 extra thighs, just perfect for lunch for the 3 girls the  next day.





When I cook dinner, I always cook extra so that the girls' lunch for the next day will  just be a touch of the microwave button away and a pipping hot home-cooked meal is ready!

Lunch For Cass - 22 April 2015

Lunch for Cass yesterday...

Smoothie of the day, comprising of oranges, green apples, white dragon fruit, fresh coconut water and Sunkist Pure Premium 100% orange juice (no sugar and additives added. About RM11 a box).
The orange juice is to mask the earthy and raw taste from the white dragon fruit.  I used dragon fruit so that the constipated ones can evacuate easier. Dragon fruits have a very good laxative effect. Cass poo-ed twice after this powerful concoction!!




The smoothie nicely stored in a glass jar with screw tight cap in the fridge. Do remember to fill up your juices and smoothies to the top of the jar and tightly close the jar or bottle to prevent oxidation from occurring. Everyone in the family gets a jar of smoothie every single day!




I made an eleventh hour decision to cook fried rice for Cass.  Since I had some overnight cooked white and brown rice in the fridge, I decided to fry them as Cass does not like plain rice.  I only used 5 main ingredients, with no meat in the fried rice, i.e. scallions, tomato, kafir lime leaves (yes, I still have some in the freezer!), 3 eggs and sweet corn kernels.  I was too lazy (and busy) to chop garlic or onions so I used scallions. Scallions are just as aromatic as onions and really handy dandy to always keep a bunch in your fridge. I add them to omelettes, fried rice, dishes and everything! After all scallions are the offsprings of onions, so they have pretty similar taste.  I hate peeling and chopping onions too. So scallions are my best alternative!




My result was a really aromatic and YUMMY plate of fried rice, ala Thai. And it's healthy too, with very little rice used. As you can see, the ingredients outnumber the rice.  You really got to give this super easy fried rice a try. No meat, garlic or onions are used yet the powerful natural fragrance from the kafir lime leaves and scallions add so much flavor to it. I seasoned the fried rice with sesame seed oil, garlic salt, pepper, a dash of light soy sauce and tomato ketchup.





The bowl of braised garlic soy sauce chicken with star anise, palm sugar and blackstrap molasses was leftover from last night's dinner.   Cass and I enjoyed our simple homecooked lunch very much and I even had enough of fried rice for Sherilyn to bring to school this morning :)

Easy Home-cooked Meals and Tips From HFM

No oil splatters, one-pot meals, steaming, grilling, sandwiches -- I am sure these are common words of busy mothers who prefer to squeeze out some time each day to dish out home-cooked meals for their kids. They are my favorites too and I have trained my kids to enjoy simple and nourishing home-cooked meals that are low in sodium, oil and sugar.

These are some of my simple and easy to prepare meals that I dished out two days ago.

Chicken bones soup with sweet corns and Chinese cabbage.  If you plan on only cooking this soup as a one-pot dish, you can even add in some minced meat, chicken drumsticks or fish paste into the soup.  I think this is good enough for the entire family. Get ready some organic soy sauce for dipping if your little one prefers some colors and saltiness in their food.  Or add in a teaspoon of organic miso paste into the soup. Or throw in some seaweed into the soup.  Be creative and throw in wholesome stuff into your pot! :D

You can also pre-wash the veggies on your free days and store them properly in the fridge. Buy organic veggies if you can so you don't have to do so many rounds of washing. Your kids can also help you wash the veggies.  On really busy days, just serve raw tomatoes, celery or cucumbers. They are just as good as green leafy veggies.




Steamed minced pork with eggs.  I prepared two plates of this.  One plate was for dinner and the other was for lunch the next day. I also cooked extra rice for lunch the next day. So, one less worry the next day :)




For busy mums, you can also pre-cook your meals and freeze them for future use. I don't like to freeze or chill my meals too long. I normally eat them within the same week.

You can also prepare a minced pork dish by chopping up some spinach or watercress veggie, carrots, mushrooms (you will have meat and veggie in one plate!) and add them to the pork.  Spice up the dish with sesame seed oil, garlic oil, pepper and salt or soy sauce.   Separate the meat mixture into a few stainless steel plates and freeze separately.  All you have to do is to thaw the frozen plate of minced pork in the morning before leaving the house and pop the dish into the wok when you return in the evening. And your entire family gets to eat a hearty and healthy home-cooked meal everyday :)

Just another tip for an easy peasy meal from a health freak mommy! ;)

The Girls' Duties At Home

The girls have specific duties at home.  Everyday.

The eldest has to mop her own room on days when our part-time maid does not come. She is also in charged of mopping the floor of the house entrance area. She has to ensure that all the shoes are neatly arranged everyday. The dining area is her responsibility too.

The middle child has only one task and it is the hardest - the  dirty dishes department. That's something which I loathe the most and I thank God that He sent Sherilyn to help me out!  Thank God too that Sherilyn loves cooking and settling the dirty dishes! :D

The littlest one is in charge of drying and keeping the clean dishes - the simplest job but yet require loads of care. This department is definitely not for those with butter fingers.

All hers to settle at the end of the day...

How I Almost Burnt The Kitchen Down!

And so this is the story of how I almost burnt down my kitchen on Monday morning.  What perfect way to start off my new week *roll eyes*!

The drama queen had promised me that she would get up 10 minutes earlier to heat up some pizzas to bring to school.  We had some leftover pizzas from Itallianies from our Sunday dinner.

As I had expected it, the drama queen was moving too slowly and still in a zombified state that Monday morning.  So I helped her to reheat the pizza in the toaster oven.   While the pizza was in the toaster, I went about to do other chores.

About 10 minutes later when I opened the toaster door, fire was spilling out. I was shocked!!  There were BIG FLAMES!!  My instant reflex action was to blow off the fire!  And I jumped and blew, jumped and blew like a delirious woman, while screaming out FIRE to the drama queen.  I asked her to wake her daddy up.  After a few blow jobs which obviously did not put out the fire, I quickly scooped out 2 cups of water from a pail that is in the kitchen and splashed it into hungry flames.   Thank GOD the fire was quickly tamed and then it died off, PHEW!

And guess what the drama queen's first few words were after the fire?  "So I guess I have to bring the bread and seaweed to school after all, huh?"

I had already packed bread and seaweed for her but the drama queen wanted something more fancy for recess and promised that she would reheat the pizza herself.  And so, she still had to bring her bread to school after all the trouble that I had to go through, ha!




I quickly cleaned up the kitchen and got the drama queen to help to clean up too.  What a way to start off my Monday morning!

And the moral of the story is:
Never ever ever use grease-proof paper in the toaster oven.  I think what  ignited the fire was that the piece of grease-proof paper was too big and part of the paper touched the sides of the inner toaster oven.   I had hurriedly tore off a piece of grease-proof paper that morning to line the toaster tray.

So peeps, learn from my mistake.  Use only aluminum foil for your toaster oven and if you only have grease-proof paper at home, do tear off a piece that is just fitting the toaster tray. Make sure the sides of the paper do not touch the sides of the inner toaster oven that is burning hot.

And check your toaster closely. Do NOT ever leave it turned on while you attend to other chores and forget all about it. 

Rose bud From A Bundle Of Siew Pak Choy

Today I discovered something amazing by accident.  After I cut the stems off the bundles of siew pak choy and was about to bin the stems, those cute flower-like stems caught my attention. At a closer look, they looked like rose buds!  Very intricate vegetables rose buds that looked exactly like a real rose bud.

Check them out...
 

I quickly salvaged them, washed them clean and used them as deco for my Chicken Adobo dish!
 

Here's how I discovered.  Lazy me always try to find shortcuts to do my chores. To save time having to pluck off the siew pak choy, leaf by leaf, I always use a pair of scissors to snip off the end of the stems (the right side of the siew pak choy, as shown in below picture).  Once the stems are snipped off the bundle, the siew pak choy will come off leaf by leaf.  I do not even bother to cut the stem off the leafy part. After washing and soaking the veggie a few rounds, I will either blanch them or stir-fry them with a meat, to make it a one-pot dish.



If you buy 10 bundles of siew pak choy, you will have 10 pretty green rose-buds to decorate your plate of dish. Or you can use the rose-buds to decorate other dishes. I briefly blanched the rose-buds, so that they will not turn soggy.

Beating Exam Blues

When it comes to revising for exams, Alycia can act like a small kid who needs loads of sweet talks, loads of rewards, loads of praises and tons of laughter to get her going. Yesterday, after Alycia and Sherilyn wasted half a day doing nothing, I managed to warm them up into doing revision by first having a quiz in BM and English. The winner shall share a Magnum almond ice cream with me. I knew that Alycia would win the quiz, so here she is, enjoying her Magnum ice-cream while working on her English workbook.

 

After the ice cream, this girl obediently finished off all that the work that I had set for her. Before I attempted to ask her to do more workbooks, I goofed around with the girls to crack them up. One incident got us all rolling on the floor laughing. I got Alycia to try on one of my super tight bra spaghetti strap tops. The bra top fitted her so well and she looked like a teenager with 'boops' and all LOL!! I joked that if any of her friends or relatives saw her in the bra top, their eye balls would pop out from their eye sockets seeing her morphed into a teenager overnight. All of us rolled on the floor laughing till our tummies ached.

It is not easy to get my girls to obediently do revision for their exam on their own.They do not have the zeal and drive to do it on their own yet. Well, I can't blame them as their daddy and mummy were not overzealous scorers in school either ;:P

Deep Freezing Uncooked Dishes For Future Meals In A Jiffy!

My girls and I love steamed pork.  Recently, I have figured a way to prepare delish steamed pork dishes in a jiffy. All I have to do is to spend some time on a day when I have free time to prepare the ingredients in the kitchen, store the raw steamed pork nicely and deep freeze them. On days when I ain't in a mood to cook but the girls want yummy and hot dishes to go with rice, I can easily remove this from the freezer, defrost it and steam it.


Here's what I now do...

1) Buy minced pork from the butcher. You can buy half-lean-half- fat meat and chop them yourself. I don't have the time, so I buy readily minced pork.

2) Here, I have minced pork with watercress veggie and prawns. Just chop up the watercress and prawns and mix them well with the pork. Add sesame seed oil, pepper and a little sea salt.

3) Then distribute the pork mixture into several stainless steel plates and bowls.  These will be ready to be steamed when I want to cook it.  I oiled the plates with some sesame seed oil too, so that the meat won't stick to the plate.




4) Next, I will place the plate of raw minced pork into an airtight container and store it in the freezer.

5) On the day when I plan to steam the minced pork, I will defrost a container in the morning. When the kids are almost back from school, I will then steam the minced pork.  In the pot where I steam this, I will put a couple of eggs so that the eggs can 'tumpang' to be cooked.  Thus, my girls will have a complete and well-balanced meal consisting of meat, veggie and eggs :D





How many of you do this? I am always trying to figure out how to dish out delish and hot meals for my girls, thus I came up with this idea.   Maybe you have already been doing this for aeons. But if you have not, do try this out. Your kids and family can have freshly steamed dishes on days when you are too busy to cook or just feel like doing nothing but warm your butt on the couch :D

Floor Cleaning Gadgets For A Clean Freak Mommy

Of all the brooms that I have tried, I must say that I LOVE the roller type with sticky papers the BEST (picture below)!  I do not have to use dust pan, I do not need to turn off the fan when I sweep, I do not need to wash the broom and dust pan after the dirty job is done and I do not need to keep chasing flying hair and dust when I am sweeping the floor!  And it is darn therapeutic to see those hair and dust get stuck to the sticker... confessions of a health and clean freak mummy muahahahaha!!  

Most of all, after the dirty job is done, I can just peel off the sticker and dump it. My girls find it therapeutic too, to keep rolling the floor and seeing dirt stuck  to the sticky paper.

I have an array of brooms in my house so that the girls and I can do the moping together.  Aly and Sher will be sweeping and moping the room floor and I will be cleaning the living room. Cass will help to roll the floor with stickers haha!    I like the roller broom with sticker  (the one in front, on the right) and the Kao Magic Mop (in front, on the left) the most. The cheaper version of Magic Mop (the one behind the blue Swash mop) is only RM5 and I bought it from 100 Yen Shop. We do not like it as the stick always dislodges from the mop holder and it is very difficult to fix it back.  The Kao magic mop costs nearly RM40 each.

The MIL bought the roller broom and the refill sticky papers from Hong Kong.  I have seen similar ones selling at 100 Yen Shop and Daiso here but I am not sure on the quality and how effective the cheaper versions are.

The blue mop called 'Swash' is also pretty good. I mop the floor with it after sweeping the floor with the roller sticker broom. The cloth for the 'Swash' broom can then be put into the washing machine to wash after use. The Swash broom is also over RM35 each.

I am not a vacuum cleaner person for I do not like lugging, pulling and pushing it around during use and absolutely hate cleaning the bag and machine after use. So I have resorted to these gadgets with disposable papers and washable cloth so that my dirty job gets done in a faster and breezier way and my sensitive hands are free from wringing and washing ;)




Everyone just loves to stroll and roll with this rolling sweeper! :)

Keeping Track Of My Kiddos' Books

Each of my daughters have at least 15 work books for tutoring by our Mandarin tutor.  In the past, they have so many books that the tutor and I could not keep track.  Many times, the books went MIA, which means homework was not done. It is always only months later that when I went through their drawers that I managed to fish out the hidden treasure... their long-lost work books!!  Now I am not sure if they had purposely 'lost' their work books or what!?

This time, the tutor and I came up with a new way of keeping track of their work books... by snapping pictures of all the books that they each have, followed by snapping close up pic of each book LOL!  I asked the tutor to store these pix in her smart phone for reference each time she comes.

Alycia's Standard 4 work books for tuition...




 Sherilyn's Standard 2 work books for tuition...






And even Cass has work books...





And I have this summary of who owns what written on a sticky note, stuck on my desk.  Now listen up girls, don't you think you can escape tiger mummy ok, muahahahaha!!





For those of you with more than 3 kiddos, how on earth do you keep track of their books? Especially if you are a busy working mum with no maids.  It's crazy, eh?

Throes of Motherhood... Of Checking School Bags, Tuition Bags and Homework

During the CNY holidays, I had the time to go through the pile of books and 'rubbish' in the girls' room. During the spring cleaning, I 'unearthed' one of Alycia's Mandarin tuition Math book. After checking the book, I discovered that the last homework that the tuition teacher gave to Alycia was in Nov 2011 and that the homework was never done and the book went MIA! The tuition teacher had kept quiet and so did Alycia. It then dawned on me that this could be just one of the MIA homework books. There could be more in the past. In the past, I was too busy to ever go through the girls' school bags and tuition bags. My new year resolution this year is that I must be more involved in the girls' academic side. I must know what's going on everyday. I hate to have bits and pieces of tiny rubbish swept under the carpet, which are only discovered many months later. As I went through Alycia's school bag the other day, I also discovered some of the things that she did not show me like her weekly Ejaan, Spelling, Ting Xie and Xiao Kau marks. Not that she failed or did not do very well but did not score a 100%. Anyway, I am glad that I realized where my mistake was in the past.

I must now take an effort to check their school bags at least 2 - 3 times a week. And ensuring that their tuition homework is completed and whether the tutor had marked the homework is very important. My mum used to sent me to the supposedly best BM tutor in Ipoh but this VIP and famous tutor was so popular and busy that she never marked our homework! I scored a C6 for my BM in my SPM. My mum never checked my tuition homework back then. Hence, I must ensure that this mistake must NOT repeat itself on my girls, ever!

So coming back to the Mandarin Math workbook that was MIA. I spoke to the tuition teacher when she came and highlighted this matter to her. I then suggested to her that there must be a 'Homework Message Book' for Alycia and Sherilyn each. Each time she comes to our house to tutor the girls, she has to write down the details of the homework in the Homework Message Book. This way, she and I can monitor the girls' homework and ensure that homework given is not missed out for marking / correction during the next tuition lesson. I find this very effective. I have just checked Sherilyn's Homework Message Book and found out that she had 'forgotten' to do a Math tuition homework -- 5 pages some more! She bawled when I reprimanded her. I was very firm with her and told her " finish everything or NO DINNER!" Yes, I am quite a tiger mum and I think this is more effective on my girls.

I wonder, for you working mothers with 3 kids and more, how do you find the time to go through your kids' school bags,tuition bags and homework everyday? Do you ever do it and if yes, how often? It's pretty tough to be a good mom, isn't it?

Ribena Ice Lolly

Here's another way of getting the kids to drink water in an enjoyable, healthy and tasty fashion - by making ice lollies from Ribena, Vitagen and fresh fruit juices. Best of all, it's fuss free, albeit you have to bear with wiping away the drips here and there.


Baby's treat for finishing her lunch quickly -- Ribena ice lolly.

Sure Way To Get Her To Drink Water

It's a chore and a big bag of stress for me getting Baby to drink water. She has now rebelled on drinking water. If not for my handiest tool aka the cane to threaten her, Baby wouldn't drink water, most of the time.

Recently I found a very effective way of getting Baby to drink water, gallons of it, without any fuss from her. All I need to do is to put one or two ice-cubes into her cup of water and tadaa.... it's like seeing magic right before my eyes AHAHAHA! Within minutes, this fella will chug down the cup of water and ask for more, of course with ice cubes inside.

My Morning Routine With Alycia

Though I hate the lack of sleep and having to force myself out from bed by 5:45am everyday, I nevertheless enjoy spending the 10-15 minutes one-to-one time with Alycia while we wait for the transporter to pick her up. During the short 10-15 minutes wait, we have 'real conversation'. I say 'real' coz I am actually listening and talking to her. When all 3 monkeys are at home and I am working on the computer, I sort of half-listen to them when they talk and ask me questions. I know it's bad but I just can't help it coz there are just way too many issues on my mind - work, kids, personal, household matters and all that jazz. I tell yer, it's a bag load of stress being a WFHM (work from home mum) with 2 young kids and an under 2 toddler who is as active as a monkey!

During the 10-15 minutes quiet time in the morning, I talk to Alycia about everything - reminding her not to follow strangers home, reminding her not to buy junk food in school, reminding her to memorize her weekly spelling / Ejaan / Ting Xie, among others. Lately, I have been reading the newspapers to her every morning. Our condo Management provides free issues of the Malay Mail and The Sun everyday. For the past one week, I will guide her to read the newspapers and explain meaning of new words to her. Her reading is improving and there is still lots of room for improvement. I think the 5-10 minutes of newspapers reading every morning will definitely help her improve her vocab and reading prowess.

After Alycia gets into the transporter's car, I will then go for my half hour run or swim or work out in the gym. When I'm back home at 7:30am, the real back-breaking, mental and physical tormenting job of a SAHM cum WFHM begins. I don't get to rest until midnight. Sigh.... it's really really tiring and I hope that I'll get to reap the fruits and enjoy them really really soon!