Farewell Jeff and Shir Lin

Sunday School will never be the same again without Jeff Kor Kor and Shir Lin Cheh Cheh as they will be moving to Singapore soon. Jeff and Shir Lin are Alycia and Sherilyn's Sunday School teachers. What motivates Alycia and Sherilyn to go to church every Sunday are these 2 very dedicated teachers. All the kids will surely miss Jeff Kor Kor and Shir Lin Cheh Cheh.



The kids from Sunday School celebrating the farewell of Jeff and Shir Lin.


Shir Lin -- If you are reading this, all the best to you and Jeff in Singapore. Take care of yourself and your little one too!

Braxton Hicks Contractions

I've been getting quite a bit of Braxton Hicks contractions and tightenings on my tummy lately. I am 31 weeks preggers today. I hope this is not a sign of preterm labor. I've also experienced these contractions and tightenings for both my previous pregnancies but thank God, I did not go into preterm labor. When I was carrying Alycia though, I had to be on partial bed-rest when my cervix started to shorten at week 20+ of my pregnancy.

Really Frustrating

I have just published a paid post in my blog but I have problem submitting the post to the advertiser. I keep getting a message stating that the link is not properly placed in my post. I have copied and pasted the codes to the link countless times from the advertiser's website to my blog post and have even switched the mode to Edit Html but still kept getting the error message. This is really driving me crazy and I have many posts with deadline expiring today and tomorrow.

Practise Makes Perfect

Alycia finally knows how to write her name and all the numbers from 0 through 10, though some strokes are not correct and some are quite out of shape. I must thank my mum for being so patient coaching her everyday. The heavy load of homework from her pre-school also helps as there have been lots of exercises on writing from school everyday. While her writing has improved, she really needs to get down to do some exercise in the evening. Her evenings are now bogged down rushing to complete the homework from school which is quite unhealthy for a 4-year old toddler. I may ask her teacher to reduce the homework so that she has time to play and exercise in the playground.

Malnourishment Or Plain Lazy To Remember?

I am talking about my Cambodian maid. I just can't believe her forgetfulness. I wonder if her terribly poor memory resulted from malnourishment as a child in Cambodia or she's just plain lazy to remember things. I have lost count on the number of times she has forgotten to close the kettle cover after pouring hot water into the kettle. In my house, after the water is boiled using the electric kettle, the hot water will be poured into another kettle for it to cool down. From day one till today, she has forgotten to close the kettle cover - twice a day. Last night, she left the kettle uncovered and water exposed throughout the night. This morning when she woke up, this blur sotong did not even notice that she did not close the cover until I saw it and reprimanded her for her forgetfulness. From today onwards, I am going to list down the number of times she forgets things and will threaten to show the list to the maid agent, which I will. I hope this will bring her presence of mind back and make her buckle up.

Desperate Times Call For Innovative Ideas

There was a burst water pipe outside our house last week and the water supply was cut off the entire day. Since hubby's cook had cooked some chicken chops for us for lunch, we had to eat them and could not eat out. I was searching high and low for paper plates but there were none. My mum and I thought of this idea :

To line our plates with aluminium foil. With the plates all lined with foils, my maid needs not have to use so much water to wash the plates. However, we had to be really careful not to poke holes on the foil when we ate.


Alycia enjoying her chicken chop


and Sherilyn who eats no chicken enjoying her fried egg sandwich.

Beer Pong Game

Have you heard of the game beer pong? I read about this fun game from the FHM magazine that hubby bought the other day. This game is very popular among young adults and is mostly played in college parties, bars and tailgate parties. How this game works is interesting. It involves 4 people, teams of 2, where a ping pong ball is thrown across a table aiming at one of the opponent’s cups. The cups are shaped in a triangle on the other side of the table. When the ball lands in the cup, the cup is removed. The team that sinks all of the cups on their opponent's side wins the game. Originally, this game is played on an actual ping pong table but it is best played on beer pong tables.

Pregnancy Problems - Leg Cramps

People say that pregnant women are more prone to leg cramps. I think it’s quite true coz I am one of the victims. Last night, I had another attack of leg cramp, my second attack in 1 month. When the cramp attacked, the muscles on my leg (it always happens to my left leg) hardened and I could not move my leg. Leg cramps are terribly painful and each time I have an attack, I would be screaming in pain… in the middle of the night. Thankfully dear hubby would always be by my side to massage my leg to release the tensed muscles. I wonder if my body is lacking in certain nutrients.

Cool Reading Magnifiers

My dad’s eye sight has been deteriorating as he ages through the years. However, he is still wearing the same old pair of conservative looking eyeglasses with huge thick lenses that he had bought almost a decade ago. My dad is very frugal and stingy with himself but extremely generous with spending money on his loved ones. I have seen some cool and trendy reading magnifiers from firststreetonline.com. One of them is a powerful digital, hand-held magnifier that connects to the television or any monitor to magnify words, pictures, etc. I am sure my dad will love this cool gadget if I got it for him.

If Only Granny Could Stay Longer

Each time my mum is here, I get a respite from having to entertain the gals. I get to spend more time on the computer, some time to file my documents and to do other things. My mum would read, sing and play with the gals. Best of all she could coach Alycia in her homework as my mum (being a retired school teacher) has lots more patience than me. Too bad she can't stay here longer and when's back to Ipoh, I will have lesser time for myself and to blog.


The gals singing with granny



and playing 'London Bridge Is Falling Down' with granny.

Lovely Disney Cookies

When my mil came back from Hong Kong last month, she brought back several tins of cookies from Hong Kong Disneyland. The tins are really very attractive with colorful and cute pictures of Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse and friends.




Even the cookies have prints of Mickey head on them and they taste good too. Not only do my gals love the cookies, even I love them!

A Chocolate Affair

Read more about this chocolately affair here.

Desserts At Toh Yuen

These were the desserts we had at Toh Yuen Chinese Restaurant @ PJ Hilton on Chinese New Year's eve :

'Lai Sar Tong Yuen' (glutinous rice balls) with black sesame filling.

Sea coconut with longan.


Mango pudding.


Deep fried 'lin koa'.

We also ordered a 'kuai leng koa' but it tasted as if it was burnt, so we have it returned to the kitchen.

There were 4 adults and 2 toddlers and we had 5 dishes plus 2 small bowls of sharksfins soup. The bill came up to a whopping RM400++. I think this will be the last time we have
our CNY reunion dinner in a hotel.

It's Only A Dream Dear

Just a moment ago, Alycia who was having her nap on the mattress on the floor jumped up and said in a panick tone "mummy, I forgot to brush teeth and wash hair!" I knew she was having a dream but I played along with her and said "wash hair to go where?" Alycia who still had a panick look on her face kept saying "forgot to wash hair, forgot to brush teeth!" I then told her that she's just having a dream and she appeared more calm and now she's gone back to nap. That was really funny.

My Mum's Going Back Soon

My mum will be going back to Ipoh soon and when she's gone, I just don't know how I am going to cope. She's been a great help to me now, especially in coaching Alycia in her homework everyday and entertaining the gals whilst I am busy on my computer. Without my mum's help, I doubt I will have the time to even type 2 posts in a day. I don't have an efficient maid anymore and my super blur and slow coach maid is driving me up the pole.

Alycia's pre-school has been giving her loads of homework to do everyday to the extent that I don't even have time to bring her out to the playground in the evening. I know it's good for Alycia since she's very much lagging behind her peers in terms of reading and writing as she had missed more than 7 months of classes last year but all work and no play is really not too good for a 4-year old toddler too. I guess we can't have the best of both worlds, can we?

Bad Habit

Sherilyn has a bad habit of picking her nose despite us threatening her that we will plaster up her nose. When she was at the hospital yesterday to have the wound on her forehead cleaned, my mum jokingly told the doctor about her habit and the doctor joked backed and said he will plaster up Sherilyn's nose if she does not stop picking her nose. Sherilyn was really scared and promised that she will not pick her nose again but back home, she started digging for boogers again.... till her nose bleeds sometimes. Do you have a good way of stopping your child from repeating a bad habit?

What's It With The Nappies?

Sherilyn has always been obsessed with nappies. At one point of time, she was obsessed with making super capes with her nappies. She still is crazy over those nappy capes but her latest craze is making 'tudung' or head scarf with the nappies like this :

Rummaging the laundry basket to look for more nappies like a scavenger.

Doing her routine things at home wearing the ridiculous looking head scarf.

Sherilyn stopped wearing the head scarf ever since she cracked her forehead on Valentine's Day and has a bandage on her forehead.

I've Had Enough

I've had enough of my temp. Cambodian maid. I called the maid agent today and told him that I can no longer tolerate her and asked him when my new permanent Indon maid will arrive. Now he is telling me that the new permanent maid may arrive only in April! I feel so cheated by this agent. When we selected the maid and paid the agency fee in October last year, we were promised that the new maid can arrive in January 08. Now, the bugger is telling me end of Feb, then March, now April! I won't be surprised if she will never arrive and I have to keep paying RM800 per month for a rejected and incompetent maid.

Anyway yesterday and today, this super blur Cambodian maid of mine really made my blood boil. She never seems to remember things though she has to do the same chores every single day. Yesterday, she had forgotten to turn off the water faucet again and left the water flowing out at full blast for 3-4 hours until we went upstairs to bathe the kids at 9pm and discovered it. She also left the kettle cord attached to the wall socket with the switch turned on and no kettle attached to the cord. I can't imagine what would have happened if my kids touched the dangling cord and this is not the first time she has done such a careless and dangerous thing. I was so mad with her that I have threatened to cut her salary and send her back to the agent. Last night, I told her to watch the kids when I brushed my teeth but she gave me another heart attack when she played catching with the kids and Sherilyn knocked her cheek on the air purifier machine and had a slight cut on her cheek. Her right cheek is now bruised and she really looks like an abused child now - a bandage on her forehead with a cut and bruised cheek.

My maid agent told me that he will send me another rejected maid (from Indon this time) next week. I have no confidence in this agent anymore and I can only pray that whatever it is, my next maid will be good.

Easy Peasy 'Lap Mei' Rice

If you are a 'lap mei' lover, here's one easy way to cook 'lap mei' rice. There is no frying involved. Just put in the washed 'lap cheong' (Chinese pork sausage) and 'yoon cheong' (Chinese liver sausage) into the rice cooker (uncut) about 15 minutes before the rice is ready. Within minutes of putting the sausages into the rice cooker, the mouth-watering aroma of the Chinese sausages will fill the house. When the rice is cooked, remove the sausages from the rice cooker and cut them into slices. The rice will have the aroma of the Chinese sausages, from the oil of the sausages. This easy peasy to cook dish is really delicious but not quite a healthy food and definitely not a dish for the weight-watchers. Anyway, I only eat this dish once a year.

Sherilyn's 3rd Birthday Dinner

Read more about Sherilyn's 3rd birthday dinner here.