My Advanced Birthday Celebration In Ipoh

The main reason for my trip back to Ipoh from 13-15 March was to visit my parents since the timing was right.  It was Sherilyn's last day of SPM and Cass had a few more days of school holidays before school reopened the following Monday.  After sending Sherilyn to school on Monday morning, I booked a Grab car to bring us to the KL Sentral station.

Back in Ipoh, my parents told me that they had ordered my favorite cempedak cake from JJ Cakes & Swissrolls. They had also booked a table at Sushi Zento to celebrate my 50th birthday 💓.  What a sweet surprise!

It's been yonks since I last celebrated my birthday with my parents because my birthday hardly ever coincides with the school holidays and also, no thanks to the pandemic. This year the celebration was totally unplanned.

After fetching Cass and me from Concubine Lane, papa brought us to JJ Cakes & Swissrolls to collect the birthday cake.

Birthday dinner at Sushi Zento @ Festival Walk Ipoh.

Everyone thoroughly enjoyed the food at Sushi Zento.  The food was lip-smackingly delicious, the service was excellent with polite waiting staff and the prices are reasonable.  Cass and I think that the food is even better than some of our favorite Japanese restaurants in KL.

Everyone loved the super fresh and highly addictive cempedak cake, with generous amounts of fresh cempedak flesh wedged between the layers of sponge cake with light cream.  JJ Swissrolls' cempedak cake is always a treat for all the senses, from its appearance to its flavor, texture, freshness, and aroma.

50 years young but always papa & mummy's little girl and I still received an ang pow each from them 💗

Dad is a member at Sushi Zento and got a 10% off the total bill.

Cass and I had evening walks around the neighborhood every day.

On one of our walks, we saw a troop of monkeys at the hillside and they were eating crispy tosei!

Cass and I could hear the crackling sound of the crispy tosei as the monkeys bit into it.  I think an Indian family nearby must have made the tosei and fed the monkeys. There's a kind Indian couple near my parents' house who would feed stray cats and dogs every evening.

Bidding each other goodbye at the Ipoh train station.
Mum could still snap pretty clear photos of me with her fractured right hand 😂

My Life In Photos The Past One Week

School reopens today after a one-month-long break, phew!  School holidays are suffocating for me.  My me-time, morning exercise, peace, space, and freedom at home are literally gone.  The littlest one can be such a handful though she's already 15.  

Besides making a trip back to Ipoh for 3 days and 2 nights, Cass was mostly at home or at the skating rink.

Now that school has reopened and the pandemic is almost behind us, co-curricular activities are back to normal.  Cass will stay back for the first time in high school this week.  CoCo activities were conducted online for the past 3 years. Cass also has to sit for her UEC exam this year. And a few more tests on figure skating.  Cass is going to be one very busy girl this year.

Me at the loo at Pavillion Bukit Jalil.  After sending Cass to the skating rink, I had nothing to do.  To kill time, I did a selfie and rambled around the mall with nothing in mind to buy.  Cass' classes are now from 8-9pm on Fridays 😩

Even though I had absolutely nothing to buy, I still ended up with some stuff from Guardian Pharmacy and a bunch of unnecessary snacks from Food Merchant.  Sherilyn texted me and asked me to help her buy make-up removal oil and I bought a bottle of expensive body shampoo simply because it was on offer and the scent is irresistibly fruity - a mix of grapefruit, apple, peach and all my favorite fruits. That's the reason why I hate going to the mall when I have nothing to buy as I will always end up buying unnecessary things 😁

While window shopping at Guardian, I stumbled upon this - sheet mask for your bust, butt, and belly.  Seriously, would you buy this to nurture your assets? 😆

Ever since mum fractured her right arm two months ago and was down with Covid a month ago, my 80-year-old papa has been taking over all the chores at home in Ipoh.  Mum even taught papa how to bake bread using the breadmaker.  Here, he's removing freshly baked bread from the breadmaker and slicing it, for me to bring it back to KL the next day 💗

The smell of freshly baked bread is heavenly!

Papa also made his signature pandan kaya for us. He stood next to the stove for over 1.5 hours, patiently stirring the santan+egg+sugar+pandan juice mixture, turning it from liquid to a thick kaya paste.  His kaya is the best in the whole wide world. 
This is my air-fried homemade whole wheat bread spread with papa's pandan kaya. It's so delish!

Cinnamon rolls baked just an hour ago - Sherilyn's first bake, post-SPM!  

'Tai Yee Ma Kar Lui' for dinner tonight. 
Hairy gourds are currently on promotion at our neighborhood supermarket @ RM5 for two.  I bought four and gave one to the girls' grand aunt.  Today the MIL cooked all the hairy gourds. Dinner for tomorrow is also settled!

Besides braised hairy gourd, we had steamed free-range chicken with ginger paste and steamed pomfret fish (tau tai chong) for dinner tonight.

This Week In Photos ~ Food, Family & Pet Cat

With 6 papers done and dusted, the SPM girl has 3 more papers to conquer.  Nine more days to go and she'll be free!  

After her SPM exam, Sherilyn will resume dancing, cook for us again and work part-time at Front Room  Cafe again.  She previously worked at the cafe for about half a year before taking half a year's break to focus on her SPM exam.

We will only discuss the course to pursue in college and university after Sherilyn's SPM results are out.  Colleges and universities have been sending letters to offer her courses to pursue.  Last month she received a letter from a college that provides training to students aiming to be cabin crew and pilots, inviting her to attend an interview.

Yesterday Sherilyn received a letter from Unikop, which offered her a list of 'interesting' courses to pursue.  Unikop is a college owned by the Royal Malaysian Police Cooperation. Some of the 'interesting' courses are Diploma in Police and Investigation, Investigation Services, Corporate Investigation, Law Enforcement, Psychology, Pharmacy, Cyber Security, and many more.  

Letter from Unikop

I thought that these courses are not what Sherilyn would like to pursue but to my surprise, she told me that she doesn't mind pursuing courses in forensics, crime investigation and even being a detective or CID in future 😂😆

While I know that this daughter of mine is a dare-devil and tough inside out, I would not want her to be in this field that is more apt for the opposite sex. We had a good laugh over this and were talking about how her life would be if she were a cop or detective and investigating cases like Abby Choi's gruesome murder 😆

I took Sherilyn and Cass out for brunch on Thursday as the SPM girl didn't have any paper to sit for on that day and also the next day.  We went to The Lion of Punjab, a restaurant in our hood that serves delicious North Indian cuisine. Our family loves Indian food.

We ordered the Thali sets, which are value meal sets at only RM10 for a meat-free set lunch and RM15 for a set lunch with chicken.  

Sherilyn and Cass each ordered the set lunch with chicken curry.  It comes with three different types of lip-smacking curry, two pieces of Tandoori Roti, a bowl of rice, and a sweet wheat dessert (Halwa).

This is my vegetarian set.

The food was superb, though they were only budget meals.  The curries were thick, creamy, and full of aromatic herbs, spices, and ingredients.  The Tandoori roti was simple and delish. We were even served long-grain Basmathi rice, which is costlier than regular rice.  All the spicy food was washed down with a hot cup of aromatic Masala Chai tea. We will definitely be back for another round of set lunch before school starts again for Cass in two weeks.

The vegetarian set.

And non-vegetarian set.

I'm going to try their different types of stuffed Naan bread next week and will get the food delivered to our condo as the restaurant is offering free delivery to those staying in the hood.

Our sweet girl Haru's new favorite spot. She loves to sit here so that she can look down to see the world below her. 

Haru knows that grandma is not around (currently in Penang and Ipoh) and has been more daring around the house - she climbs up the kitchen island to inspect the toaster oven, jumps up the kitchen counters to sniff our food, jumps up our beds, and feels so at home when her grandma is not around to scold her when she's naughty 😸

My Week In Photos: Cass and Figure Skating

It's only the first week of the four-week school holidays.  It's business as usual for me with my early morning Grab duty, sending the SPM girl to sit for the most important exam in her life.  Her SPM schedule is pretty wacky and I have to be around to fetch her back from school at different times every day.

Cass has been hounding me in all my waking hours with her figure skating matters and stories, from attending extra classes (extra classes = extra money!) to attending class on a weekday at NIGHT now.  She talks so much about figure skating techniques that I now know what some techniques look like and how difficult it is to perform them.  Figure skating is just like gymnastics and ballet on ice and Cass has no background in any of those, yet she managed to pull off some of those 'stunts'.

I told Cass that when her dad agreed for her to learn figure skating five months ago, we never agreed for her to attend weekday classes. And never a night class as this would interfere with my bedtime at 9.30pm, as well as her dad's work.  On top of her night classes, Cass also wants to be at the skating rink on Sundays for practice.  And today she told me that she even wants to attend an extra class on a Saturday -- which means being at the skating rink on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday!  

NO!

As Cass has now passed her first test, she has progressed to the next level and has to be put in a class with students of her level. And this class is on a weekday NIGHT.  Her class would start at 8pm and end at 9pm.  The distance from the skating rink/mall to where we stay is about 15km and almost twenty minutes to half an hour of drive time one way. No way am I going to chauffeur her to and fro on a weekday night.  And I have problems with driving at night with my high astigmatism power and night blindness.  I cannot rely on hubs 100% to fetch Cass as he most likely still has work to do.

SIGH!! 😪😩

I have now arranged for something which is quite workable but would still interfere with my bedtime. And I'm always the one who has to sacrifice my sleep for someone. Sleep is very important for me now as how I feel the next day is dependent on how well and how much sleep I get at night. I also realize that getting sufficient sleep is very crucial for my overall health.

This year I realized that Cass is just like her second sister - she's a very competitive girl by nature who likes competing. As she has had issues with her health since birth, her talents and passion have been largely subdued and restrained.  Now that she's in better control of her health, getting fitter, more sporty, and more mature, her passion, interests, and talents are slowly starting to unbridle.  

I still have to nag this girl over many things pertaining to her health and she keeps reassuring me that she will take care of her health. Yet, I am still not convinced and worry a great deal about her health. Dealing with her recurrent UTIs, kidney infections, surgeries, and hospital stays since birth has made me a super paranoid mom.  I still cannot let go of her as how I do with Alycia and Sherilyn.

Besides aiming to compete in figure skating, Cass has also signed up to compete in athletics events on her high school sports day. This is another worry on my mind now. 

Besides having to listen to Cass prattle on figure skating the whole day, another activity that we do during the school holidays is cooking. This week I taught Cass how to cook bolognese sauce. 

Cass is thrilled that she now knows how to cook yummy bolognese sauce and very glad to know that it's actually pretty simple.

A simple bolognese sauce made using Ayam brand tomato paste, lots of Shimeji mushrooms, carrots, onions, frozen veggies, a can of Ayam brand tuna, and loads of dried herbs and spices.

Cass' meals for 3 days. Bolognese sauce is her absolute favorite as it goes well with everything.  Cass ate the sauce with konjac noodles and crackers.

Throwback Food Snaps

On Chap Goh Mei, which is the last day of CNY, we had dinner with the Yaps (hubby's extended family members) at Restaurant Rue Ee Teochew Fish Pot @ Overseas Union Garden. 

I didn't really have a proper breakfast or lunch that day as I had an appointment at my gynae's office for my yearly pap smear and ultrasound scans in the morning.  When I got home, I rushed off some house chores, dolled up, and left the house at 5.45 p.m. for the 6 p.m. dinner.  We were informed by the restaurant staff that we had to leave by 7.30 p.m. for the restaurant's second round of diners.  It's very common for Chinese restaurants to have two or three rounds of lunch and dinner during CNY with scheduled timing.  The customers have to leave the restaurant by a certain time to make way for the next group of customers.

Thus, I was really famished when the food came.  Fortunately, the dishes were rolled out really quickly as we were expected to quickly eat and leave by 7.30 pm.  Every single dish was delectable and there wasn't really any fault to find in the dishes.

Must-have yee sang.

This was the first dish after the yee sang.  It may look vapid and 'white' but it's the most scrumptious and my top favorite of all the dishes that evening.  It's a seafood salad, comprising generous portions of crab meat, fish meat, topped with crispy fried anchovies in a moreish salad dressing.

Pan fried prawns in a sticky thick sauce.

Stir-fried kailan with Chinese wine and ginger strips. It looks like a no-frills veggie dish but it was delish.

Claypot herbal chicken with wolfberries.

Claypot grouper fish.

Stir-fried ramen with seafood.  This looks like run-of-the-mill starchy fried Hokkien noodles but looks can be deceiving.  For someone who doesn't like starchy noodles, I actually liked this very toothsome dish with generous amounts of squids and prawns.

Braised pig's trotters.  Not my kind of dish (high in fat and collagen, which is not good for my cholesterol and fibroid) but everyone enjoyed it.

Lunch at Kooky Plate @ Jalan Yap Ah Shak, Chow Kit, 50300 Kuala Lumpur

After sending Cass to the skating rink a few Sundays ago, hubs, the mil, and I had lunch at Kooky Plate.  We were actually heading to Yut Kee @ Jalan Kamunting, Chow Kit for the much-raved-about Hainanese chicken chop but they were still closed as it was the 8th day of CNY.   Yut Kee has been around since 1928 and serves traditional Hainanese favorites.  So we wandered around that area to see which eatery was open and chanced upon Kooky Plate.

The items on the menu were a tad limited. I picked a fusion Nasi Kerabu to sample, just for comparison with the Nasi Kerabu from hubby's kitchen 😜. I prefer the latter as his Nasi Kerabu has more veggies, herbs, and spices.  Nonetheless, the Ayam Percik smothered in luxe Percik sauce is full of flavors and yummo.

The Shakshouka is mediocre. It's not bad but I think I set my bar too high as I have a great teenage chef at home who can whomp up an impressive Shashouka that everyone loves. 

Big Breakfast. 

Sherilyn Turns 18 In A Day

Four more weeks to go and SPM will be over!  And I would come to the end of my chauffeuring duties for my middle child.  No more tuition, no more school runs, and no more Grab duty until 10pm.  

Tomorrow (16 February 2023) Sherilyn turns 18! She will reach the age of majority and be a full-fledged adult with rights and responsibilities. She will be able to vote and sign contracts. Tomorrow she will be able to have a bank account opened solely in her name as this is something that she has waited for a long, long time 😁. But this will have to wait until her SPM is over on 13 March 2023. 

I have not decided on which college to register Sherilyn in as this would largely depend on her SPM results. She, too, hasn't decided on the course to pursue.  All the decision-making will depend on her SPM results, which would only be out around June. But she will most likely begin her Pre-U or Foundation course in January 2024.  She will have to work part-time for nine months to save up some money for her college expenses. 

I've bookmarked a list of recipes for Sherilyn to try after her SPM and can't wait to try those new dishes!  This girl has taken a break from cooking and baking for almost half a year to focus on her SPM.  

We had Yee Sang for dinner at home four days after CNY. 
Hubs had several corporate CNY events last week and prepped extra Yee Sang for us. 

The girls were delighted when they got home from school and saw a box of Yee Sang on the dining table.  Cass quickly assembled the Yee Sang on a platter and the two of us tossed it to our heart's content and chanted all our wishes for the year.

Mess-Free Way Of Eating A Sandwich

During the pandemic and lockdowns, I learned something from Cass.  She invented a mess-free way of eating her sandwiches while attending online classes.  On a messy tiny desk with her laptop, books and stationery items on it, she managed to gobble down her breakfast while attending online classes, the mess-free way.

Instead of using her hands to hold the sandwich, she cut them up with a pair of scissors and ate them with a spoon!  What a genius!  Forget about the aesthetic part as everything goes into the tummy within minutes.  This is what my very practical girl always tells me. She loves cooking and baking but only for herself and she's not bothered with pimping up her food for social media bragging rights.

And here's my air-fried whole-wheat sandwich with fried egg, chicken floss, drizzled with mayo and tomato ketchup, cut into bite-size pieces.  I enjoyed the sandwich very much without messing up my fingers and mouth as I ate it with a spoon.  And I can even savor it while catching up on news from my subscription-based online news portal.  Bliss!  

Shape Up After The Festivities

For many women, it’s always hard to stay in shape from the months of December through February because of the festivities.  From Christmas to New Year’s Eve celebrations to Chinese New Year and Valentine’s Day, it takes a steely determination not to over-indulge in all the good food during the celebrations.

With all these festivities ongoing almost back-to-back, you may find it hard to exercise and get enough sleep.  A lack of exercise and sleep deprivation are the bane to weight gain. But fret not.  With a little determination and discipline, it is possible to shed the unwanted pounds piled up over the last few months.

Here are some simple tips:

1.  Be Mindful Of Your Food Portion

Size does matter – the smaller it is, the better it will be for weight loss. If you usually chow down a plate of rice with three pieces of chicken, reduce the portion to a quarter plate of rice and one piece of chicken. Better yet, forget about the rice and eat more vegetables and protein to satiate your hunger. Stay away from the fried stuff.

 

2.  Consider Wearing a Body Shaper

Find the best affordable body shaper to help you in your battle of the bulge. Big meals will make you feel uncomfortable when your midsection is under compression from the body shaper. With a waist trainer or body shaper, you’ll likely feel more comfortable eating smaller meals rather than large ones.

 

Sculptshe High Waist Tummy Control Thong Bodysuit

Sculptshe Butt Lifter Tummy Control with Adjustable Strap

Sculptshe High Waisted Body Building Training Shorts

3.  Be Active And Move More

Keep yourself fit and trim by aiming for 10,000 steps a day. If you do not have the time to do ‘proper exercise’, you can incorporate more steps into your daily life such as walking the stairs, doing housework, getting off one bus/train stop earlier, walking to the shops instead of driving, and much more.  All these activities will burn more calories, keep the metabolic rate ramped up and get your heart rate up every day. Whether you’re working at the office or at home, get up and move around for every half an hour of chair time.  Sedentary time is related to excess weight, independent of physical activity level.

If you’re a plus size, try wearing a plus size waist trainer when you exercise as the compression makes your muscles work harder and burns more calories.

Daily activities such as walks around the neighborhood or mopping the house can help you burn calories while wearing your waist trainer.

 

Sculptshe High Waisted Zipper Butt Lifting Shorts

4. Drink lots of water

When you don’t drink enough water, your body is unable to correctly tell the difference between dehydration and actual hunger pangs.  Your thirst can sometimes be masked by hunger pangs, leading to unwanted snacking when you could simply fix it with a glass or two of plain water.  The next time hunger pangs strike, try drinking water.

5.  Exercise

It is easier and faster to reach your weight-loss goals if you make an effort to exercise regularly. According to the Mayo Clinic, to lose weight or maintain weight loss, up to 300 minutes of moderate physical activity a week is needed, which averages to about 60 minutes per session, five days a week. Wear a light-control waist trainer during your workout sessions as it will help you sweat more, especially around your waist area. With that extra sweat, you will lose some water weight and calories.

I hope these tips help you to get rid of some pounds after all the binging during the recent festivities.  When worn sensibly along with the above tips, your waist trainer or high compression shapewear can safely help you achieve your everyday body-shaping goals.

Ayam Brand's Green Curry Paste

If you have a hankering for green curry but are too busy or lazy to prep it from scratch, reach out for a packet of Ayam Brand's green curry paste and coconut milk and pimp it up with kafir lime leaves, basil leaves and coriander leaves. It tastes pretty close to the real deal. 

Green curry chicken cooked using Ayam Brand's green curry paste and coconut milk is surprisingly pretty good and very easy to prep.  Just simmer the chicken thigh and brinjals in the green curry paste for 15-20 minutes and serve.  It would taste better with added lemongrass, Thai basil leaves and kafir lime leaves but we had none of these at home.

Besides brinjals, carrots, long beans, snow peas and other veggies can be added, making this a wholesome and delish one-pot dish.

This delish dish goes well with rice, noodles, or bread.

New Disposable Face Masks

The girls' face masks were running out.  And someone was pinching her sisters' face masks secretly as she had utilized hers and didn't want to use other brands, designs, and colors. She's really finicky when it comes to her face masks.   Of course, her two sisters soon found out and were not happy about it.  Soon, there was a 'mask war' at home and I had to quickly replenish their supply to stop the war! 

Mind you, these fussy girls complain about the cheap masks that I bought. They claim that the cheaper face masks have ear loops that hurt their ears, make their nose itch, and cause maskne (mask acne) on their face.  I think I  have to agree too.  They have to wear masks for more than 8 hours each day, almost every day. 

After trying out more than a dozen brands of KN94 face masks over the past three years, the girls unanimously agreed that the brand MediShield has the best KN94 face mask.  These masks are individually wrapped and are not as expensive as Medicos, Yukazan, and Neutrovis.  After buying this brand of face mask for almost half a year, these masks in neutral colors are now sold out everywhere, leaving only bright colors like wine red, dark green, and dark blue available, which are too gaudy for daily donning to school.

After days of browsing Shopee and Lazada for face masks, I found another brand of good quality and individually wrapped KN94 face mask at Lazada. It's a Japanese brand, not too expensive, and comes in soft pastel colors.  However, I think they're manufactured in China. Nonetheless, the masks are soft and the ear loops won't hurt the ears.

I also bought another brand of 4-ply medical mask (Icon Protective) and a pack of super cute Yukazan Hello Kitty masks for myself.  Both of these are sold by Touch Pharmacy on Lazada.

Our stockpile of face masks. These can last us for another month.

I super love this Yukazan Hello Kitty duckbill mask @ RM8.80 for a pack of 10 pieces. These days, I only wear duckbill disposable masks or Uniqlo washable masks as they're thinner and more breathable.  These HK Yukazan masks are washable and reusable for a couple of times and won't turn cottony/furry after a quick wash. However, I don't recommend washing your disposable face mask after you've worn it to a crowded place or hospital.