Day 3 in Auckland (11 Dec 2014)

Local fruits are pretty cheap  here.  Yesterday we spent over NZD90 just on fruits!

I wanted to buy everything that I liked at the fruit store from gigantic strawberries to blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, avocados, yellow kiwis, apples, oranges, apricots, peaches, baby plums and much more.

How could I not resist getting 5 of these avocados selling for only 50 cents each?!!

















And this is our loot from our fruit-shopping yesterday.... enough to last us all for a week.




I am in love with the beautiful flowers and trees  in Auckland, in particular with this Bohutukawa tree, also known as New Zealand Christmas tree.   These trees are seen everywhere and are such a sight to behold, along with the colorful flowers.  From afar, the Bohutukawa trees look like our Malaysian rambutan trees.

Alycia And Sherilyn In Auckland - Day 2 (7 Dec 2014)

Early this morning, A & S went to the Xmas tree plantation with their cousins, grandma, aunts and uncle to choose and chop their Xmas tree to be brought home for decor!  For the first time time of their lives!  When Cass saw the picture via Whatsapp, oh my, she was gasping and green with envy!   Hopefully when we are in Auckland, we will be able to bring the girls to experience fruits picking.






Despite being summer in New Zealand, the weather is cool and breezy - just my perfect kind of weather for outdoor activities!

Alycia And Sherilyn In Auckland - Day 1 (6 December 2014)

A and S are having a time of their lives in Auckland, though they only had 3 hours of shut eye last night this morning.

Their flight was delayed for 1.5 hours and by the time they were out of the airport, it was close to 2am Auckland time.






See you girls in 3 days!! :)
— feeling excited.

See You In Four Days!

My lucky girls - traveling with grandma again. This time to Auckland.  Five years ago it was to Hong Kong when Alycia was 6 and Drama Queen was 4.  They had a blast in Disneyland.

Five years ago, Cass was in dire need of a surgery and could not join her 2 che ches in Hong Kong.

This time, she won't miss the fun for sure. 

See you my babies... in 4 days... in Auckland!





 
And happy 11th birthday to you, my 'precious baby' Alycia!  I hope MAS will give you a surprise birthday pressie on the plane!  I am sure this birthday will forever be etched in your memory as it is extra extra special and expensive!  How many 11-year olds get to celebrate their birthday tens of thousands of feet in the air eh?

♥♥

High Drama Day

Today has been a high drama day for me!

After brekkie at the coffee shop, I dragged the drama queen into the hair salon to have her hair trimmed.  Her hair, which is thick and frizzy has been pretty hard to manage now.  It was already at her chest level.  And the speed at which she showers and washes her thick long locks everyday gives the MIL and I the shudder.  We have been checking her hair after each wash and we found out that she did not know how to wash and rinse it properly. So her long locks has to go - part of it.    But the drama queen, as stubborn as a bull refused to get inside the hair salon.  First episode of the drama was getting her into the hair salon.  Second episode of the drama was to get the hair stylist to cut more of her tress.  In the midst of getting her to return to the chair for the hair stylist to trim more of her hair, the drama queen scratched my hand while trying to push it away! Till the bloody skin came off! Yeah, it was bloody and painful! After a big hoo ha, I stormed out of the hair salon. Her father was fuming mad and dragged her back into the hair salon. She bawled and bawled till she almost puked!   We gave her  a plastic bag for fear that she would puke and there was a pile of soaked tissue papers... with her tears, goo and all!  Yeah, really sob story and an intensified drama - just like those Indian love dramas where the girl would cry and cry and attempt suicide when her parents forced her to marry another man - that kind of tearful drama.  Really malufying at the hair salon. Once back home, she stormed into the bathroom, locked herself in there and wailed the second round.

But there is something that I like about the drama queen. She recovers from her outbursts pretty quickly.  She can be bawling away  till she pukes but after an hour or so, she is all cheery and chatty again.  Like today, after she picked up her composure and accepted the fact that her hair is not as long as it used to be, she kept  mocking the hair stylist and kept saying "I hate my short hair" but she's A-OK. There is now no more tearful and emotional outburst. 

Next drama - in the afternoon.    I was driving to the mini mart as the MIL wanted to buy some locks for our luggage bags.  5 minutes into driving, someone with itchy hands wound down the window at the back-seat.  And what do I know?  The drama queen suddenly screamed out dramatically... as if I had just run over someone (which I thought I did, fark!)  "mummmmmmy!!!!  the the the.... that thing....it dropped!!!!  The reindeer's antler just flew away... there!!!!!"   She wanted to open the door while I was driving to pick up the reindeer's antler.  I hollered at her to "STOP and DON'T MOVE!  STAY WHERE YOU ARE AND DON'T OPEN THE DOORRRRR!!"  like a mad lady!  I made a U-turn, parked my car at the road shoulder, ran across the road and the drama queen brought me to the spot where the antler had flown to.  That was really another heart-stopping moment.  I really thought that the drama queen would jump out of my moving car to retrieve the antler.  And I gave Cass a big big shelling session after that.

With a big drama queen at home, I really do not need to watch any more drama.  Life is entertaining enough, naturally!

Landlady Stories From The Early 90s - Part 3

I remember that our landlady had a washing machine.  One day, I asked her if I could use her washing machine to wash my clothes.  She said yes BUT no clothes and underwear were allowed.  Only blanket and bedsheets were allowed.   And each time I used it, she charged me a fee for it. Fair enough.  One time, I placed some clothes hangers on her dining table for a short while and all hell broke lose!  She chided me and said that hangers (in general all hangers!) are very dirty because hangers are also used to hang bras and panties,  thus cannot be placed on the dining table! What??!  Where is the logic?  The clothes are clean what, no?!  *roll eyes*!!

Madam Yap was very protective of her son.  Her son, John was  not allowed to do any sports.  John was her golden goose and if she lost him, she would have no more golden eggs. Once when John was only 7 years old, he was run over by the school bus and have had surgery done on his legs.  This explains why John was so sheltered.  Every morning, my landlady would boil fresh cow's milk ordered from an Indian cow's milk supplier for John before he left for school with our Indian neighbor.  She would then take a taxi to bring John back from school in the afternoon.

Renting a room next to ours was this lady by the name of Jeannie.  Her husband had gone to work in the US for a 4-year contract.  She had to rent a room with her toddler son whom we all fondly call Bebe who was about 2 years old when I moved in.  Each morning, we would be awaken by Bebe's cries for his mother when Jeannie was in the bathroom.  He was our alarm clock.  I would sometimes help to soothe Bebe until Jeannie came out of the bathroom.   When my mum came to visit me in 1992, Jeannie was so kind to lend us her car so that we could bring my mum around KL. The last time I met Jeannie was over 10 years ago at her new house.  Bebe was about 8 years ago then.  Bebe would be about 31 years old now.  Jeannie would be in her late fifties by now.  I hope that I will bump into them one day.

After Jeannie moved out from her room, a young and newly married couple rented the room.  The woman was a teacher. My landlady had so much respect for her just because she was a 'lao xi' (teacher).  I remember that this woman kept having miscarriages one after another. I remember how forlorn and depressed she looked after each miscarriage. She had a very good husband who treated her with so much love, gentleness and care.  She finally moved out from the room into her new place. Just before I moved out from Madam Yap's house, I heard from Madam Yap that this teacher finally had a baby girl.

to be continued....

Landlady Stories From The Early 90s - Part 2

My roomie and I found out one day, that at 8 years old, our landlady's son still had to wear a diaper to sleep. That's because our landlady could not wake him up when he was already deep in his sleep and thus, had to wear a diaper to sleep to prevent accidents on the bed!

John had a weird taste-bud.  Throughout my 5 years living in that house, I had only seen my landlady cooked two or maybe three types of dishes for her son. He only liked to eat eggs and spam meat.  On most days, she would steam two slices of China-made pork spam meat for her son.  On spam meat off days, she would fry an egg for John.  Other days, she would make a quick-boil  mint leaves soup with egg drops.  Occasionally, there was a stir-fried spinach.  I hardly ever remember seeing her cook chicken or fish. Never beef or pork.  I had also never seen John eating any fruits throughout my 5-year stay in the house.  While John ate his dinner, he would be glued to the idiot box.   John never used any cutlery to eat. He only ate with his bare hands.  On festive occasions like Mooncake festival, my landlady would braise a big pot of mushrooms.  She would offer some mushrooms to me.  That was considered a real big treat from my stingy landlady ok!

When I told my landlady that I wanted to cook and boil water using her gas stove, she imposed a fee.  She asked me to share half the cost of the gas every month!  Fine, I paid for it, though I only cooked instant noodles, fried eggs, boiled water and occasionally stir-fried some vegetables.  I never cooked any meat.  One day when I told her that I was buying a mini TV to be placed in my room, she increased my rental by RM10 (or was it RM20?) a month.  That was 23 years ago.  For every electrical item purchased, an additional rental fee would be imposed.  I even had to pay a small fee to rent her fridge to store my fruits. 

There was another housemate (my college mate) who rented the smallest room  on the ground floor of the house.  That was meant to be a storeroom but my money-minded landlady transformed it into a room to rent out.  This housemate by the name of Soo Chin (from Johor) loved to cook and eat.  Before she left for college in the morning, she would discreetly throw in some red beans or mung beans into a mini slowcooker and left it cooking in her room.   By 10pm when our evil landlady went up to sleep in her room, it was PARTY time for us muahahaha!  Oh how sweet and tasty was the red bean tong sui, which we quietly savored in the stuffy small room!!   On some days, Soo Chin would cook Maggie Mee using her slow cooker and invited us to eat in her room after the evil landlady had gone to her room. Instant noodles had never tasted so yummy when cooked in a slow-cooker and shared among 3 daring young college-going girls living on a shoe-string budget, who knew that if caught, we would have to face the music. Pay or pack our bags and leave, knowing how evil she can get.  But my sixth sense told me that she somehow knew about our clandestine rendezvous every night but she kept mum.  So she wasn't that evil after all! 


to be continued....

Questions To Ask Before A Surgery

Before you have any kind of surgery done, you need to give your doctor a detailed medical history. This is especially true for those who are considering gastric bypass. The doctor will probably schedule a consultation so that he can determine whether you are qualified for the surgery as some people think that they are morbidly obese when they don't meet the requirements.

When you meet with the doctor, you need to tell him of all of the surgeries that you have had done and any complications that you have had. This will give the doctor an idea on how to proceed with the procedure. There are also some questions that you need to ask the doctor. Find out how much weight you can expect to lose and how fast it will take to lose the weight. Do the benefits outweigh the risks? This is one of the most important things that you should think about if you have had complications before. If you have any medical conditions, then you might need to get them under control before the surgery is performed. If something goes wrong with the surgery, are there any other plans to consider? These are all questions that you can ask your doctor before making a decision about having the surgery done after you give your doctor your personal information. Learn more today about what the surgery entails before going to the doctor.

Landlady Stories From The Early 90s - Part 1

This morning while driving back home from the mini mart, I saw a young lad. He was stout, short and had small eyes. I wondered if this would how John look like now.  Each time I see a young man of that built and looks, my mind would go back in time to the early 90s, back to the time when I rented a room at Taman Rainbow, Jalan Ipoh from a woman whom I called Madam Yap.  She had a son who was only 8 years old when I first rented her room.  Her son's name is John.

I will never forget the day when I moved into Madam Yap's house.  John raced upstairs just as I was carrying my belongings up.  He stood at the highest step of the stairs and stretched out his hands across the space of the stairs landing, blocking me from going up.  My landlady chided him and he moved aside.  Several days later, he tried to be funny with me.  He touched his birdie and smiled cheekily at me. Then he moved his hands forward and made gestures like he wanted to fondle me.  I was aghast and told his mother but his tidak-apa attitude mother ignored me!

My landlady was a mistress.  Her man was a  "Latuk" (Datuk - but my landlady pronounced it as Latuk) and wealthy timber tycoon trading in East Malaysia.  My room-mate Cheng Cheng and I always wondered how she could be someone's mistress with those looks and dressing! She looked no where near a mistress.  To anyone, she was just an ordinary looking 'ah soh'  in the market who was in her mid forties.  She did not bother  much about her appearance and frumpy dressing.  But a man is not so much hooked to a woman by her looks but by how "willing and good" she is in the room!  That's what one of my male colleagues told me once.

John used to sleep in the same room with his mother.  One time Cheng Cheng and I overheard John saying this to his mother in Mandarin -  "mummy, can you let me touch your breasts please"!!  He was pleading his mother but his tidak-apa mother just remained silent.

Each time my landlady's man came for a visit (once a month), John would be sent out of the house to cycle on his bicycle. My landlady and her man would be in the bedroom for an hour or two.  After her man saw me once, my landlady instructed me not to come out of my room if 'John's father' (that is what she called her man) was here. She also instructed me not to wear shorts as John's father was ogling at me!   She was just insecured, fearing that her man would leave her for me.  Oh puh-lease!  They knew then that I had a boyfriend.

Madam Yap installed a lock to the house phone but some how, my then boyfriend (hubs now) managed to dial out  muahahaha!

Each time Madam Yap went out, my roomies and I would open our landlady's photo album cabinet to look at her photos. That was our cheap thrill - to discreetly go through our evil landlady's albums and have a good laugh.   Her photos told many stories.  We saw many cut-out photos of Madam Yap where the other half were missing. We surmised that the other part was her ex-husband. She has an elder son from her estranged husband.  We also deduced that Madam Yap was once a 'bar girl'  (the term used for GRO in the sixties and seventies) from all the photos.  And we figured that she managed to catch this 'big water fish' timber tycoon from the bar.

Oh yes, she also had double eyelid  surgery done on her eyelids, which she proudly told us.

I have not seen Madam Yap or John for 18 years.  I always wonder how John would look like now.  Is he married with kids? Did he go to university?  Or is he still a lazy slob who only liked to watch TV?   I guess that he would still look stout, fair and clumsy as he never did any sports throughout the 5 years I stayed there.  And he would be in his mid thirties now. Most of all, I am curious to know how Madam Yap is doing now. I used to send her festive cards for many years until I got married and got too busy with my own family.  She would have been in her late sixties now.  I wonder if she is still with this timber tycoon.   And I wonder if she still lives in Jalan Ipoh. I would love to meet up with her one day.  I even dream of her all the time. Yes, I kind of miss her despite her flaws and her muddled background.  After all, I lived with her for 5 years.  And I miss my room mate, Cheng Cheng and my other housemate, Jeannie too. I wonder if Cheng Cheng is still in London or back in Malaysia.



... to be continued.

Magnetic Bracelets

Last week, the hubby spent over five hundred bucks on some ankle guards and titanium knee brace from a well-known shop that sells sports and wellness products. With his hefty purchase of only 2 items, he was given free membership and also a free session of oxygen therapy in a special tent. My jaw almost dropped when the sales manager told me that the tent costs RM80,000!!   Yup you read it right - eighty thousand bucks!! The tent looked like an ordinary plastic tent from the outside but in the inside, it looks likes some kind of chamber. Only one person can fit into the RM80k tent when the oxygen is being administered. I think I am going to claim the free oxygen therapy session from the hubs coz I think I deserve it the most! :D
While at the shop, I was tempted to get myself a health bracelet as I am still having pins and needles on my hands every morning. But upon checking out the price tag, I had another jaw-dropping moment! I rather try those magnetic bracelets  that many have raved about for healing carpal tunnel, arthritis and tendinitis. And these magnetic bracelets are way more affordable.  You can click on the link here to get more information for magnetic bracelets.

School Holidays Activities

Apart from the mega holiday Lego Project that my 3 girls are currently working on, they also found a new game to play together - Heads Up!

Alycia who had watched her all-time favorite talk show host Ellen DeGeneres playing Heads Up during one of Ellen's talk shows downloaded the app onto her iPod Touch.

Today is the third day the girls are into Heads Up and they are having so much fun at it!   I join them too when I have the time.  Today their grand aunt played with them and got hooked too!




What's Heads Up?
Ellen DeGeneres has released an iPhone version of a game she likes to play on her show called Heads Up. It's simply a word guessing game where your friends try to get you to say the word on the screen by giving you hints. Only with Heads Up, you hold the phone above your head and it records video of your friend giving hints. You have sixty seconds to guess as many words as you can. Since you'll be holding your iPhone above your head and you're not allowed to look at the screen, Heads Up includes some great controls for new cards: tilt your iPhone face down when you get a word correct and tilt it up to pass. At the end of the 60 seconds, Heads Up will show you a list of the words you got correct and passed.

Heads Up includes 18 themed decks ranging from celebrities, movies, animals, accents, characters, and more.









And from this game, I realized that I am so so outdated!  My girls are so advanced and knowledgeable. They are so well versed with the names of celebrities, movies and characters and I actually had a hard time keeping up with them in this game.  I am officially an aunty facing mid-life crisis. Suddenly I feel like my mum, ha ha ha!

Our Thursday - 28 November 2014

There were gloomy skies with thick grey clouds, floating and bouncing swiftly in the windy skies yesterday afternoon. It's been raining almost everyday lately. Bliss!   I could not resist snapping a picture of the KL Tower and KLCC covered partially in the grey clouds.  I think the backdrop of where I stay looks awesome, with an excellent view of the two famous landmarks of Kuala Lumpur.




Can you see Menara Maybank to the left of KL Tower? 
 

The MIL cooked beef bolognese for lunch, using 4 punnets of lean minced beef.  While the girls happily tucked into their favorite food, I noshed my bowl of salad with beef bolognese.  I can never ever go wrong with cooking beef bolognese.  The sauce is so versatile and can be eaten in an array of styles.  Seeing how delish my bowl of salad  was, Sherilyn taxed a quarter portion from me!

 

The mil also boiled a pot of barley with pumpkin to nourish  everyone who is not in top form but the kids were not used to drinking barley in that concoction!







But I think it's very soothing - just perfect for giving my bladder a good cleanse while getting my does of antioxidant from the pumpkin.

 

Cassandra's Last Day Of Pre-School

I am definitely going to miss all of Cass' classmates, some of which I have known for 3 years including their parents. Oh yes, the caring teachers there too.  They all know Cass' health issues and have always been very sensitive to her needs. 


All the kids here are such cuties!   All of them but one will be going to a different school as Cass.  But I am pretty sure I will bump into some of the kids here since we all live in the same neighborhood :)



Pictures here were taken on the last day of school by one of Cass' classmates' mother.   She and I have become good friends with each other.  And we stay just opposite of each other.  It was a very memorable day for these 6-year olds as it was the day that they had  to say their good-byes to each other and perhaps never see each other again! *sob sob*




And so with this, the kids here had ended their chapter on pre-school. A brand new chapter begins in the flick of time.  I wish Cass and each of her classmate here a very happy start to their new journey.  May their year ahead be filled with only joy, laughter, excitement to learn new knowledge and may God bless them all always.

Three Compact Equipment Choices For A Healthier Office

Imagine if you could lower your employee health insurance expenses, reduce office stress levels, cut back on the number of sick days your employees have to take and even draw in potential hires all at the same time. Promoting fitness in the office is the perfect way to help your employees stay healthy and provides a way to work off some stress during the day. It even encourages more restful sleep.

Forget about absorbing the high long-term costs of gym memberships or worrying about how to fit a gym into limited office space. These three commercial fitness equipment options offer an excellent range of workout choices without dominating valuable space or eating into your budget.

1. Weights
Strength training is the foundation of a good workout and an excellent way to combat the stiff, weak muscles that an office environment can cause. Different systems can provide a range of potential exercises to keep muscle groups in shape and can reduce the likelihood of injury to muscles, tendons and ligaments. Either pin or plate loaded weights are ideal, but don't jump into a choice. Asking your employees which they would prefer is a good way to make them feel involved in both the creation of the office gym and in their work environment overall.

2. Treadmills
Cardio is crucial for physical wellness and goes hand-in-hand with strength training. Running is one of the best forms of exercise, and the number of treadmills in Sydney offices speaks to running's popularity. These machines let your employees choose their own pace. For a few minutes on their lunch break, they can take it slow and steady, try out interval training or maximize their calorie burn with inclines. Treadmills take up minimal space, and some models can be folded up and stored if the area has to be multi-purpose.

3. Rowers
Running can be a passion for some but loathed by others. Offer an alternative in the form of a rowing machine. Rowing machines offer the same cardio impact as treadmills in less space and with less impact on the lower body. They're perfect for anyone that finds running unpleasant, suffers from pain in back or knees or wants to tone both their upper and lower body. Rowers are comparable in size and often even smaller than treadmills. If you have the elbow room, offering both lets your employees change up their exercises for fun and a well-rounded routine.

Establishing an on-site health centre is an ideal way to promote a healthy office environment and lower your overall healthcare expenditures. It's less expensive than a gym membership, more convenient for your staff and an attractive perk for prospective employees.

If you're concerned about the costs or space requirements of an in-office health centre, Fitness Equipment King can lay your worries to rest. The variety of commercial fitness equipment options available can be fit into any office's needs. Visit http://fitnessequipmentking.com.au/ to learn more and explore your office gym choices.

Cassandra's Last Day In Kindy

This is my baby girl today.

She had made this bunny face mask in school :)    And in one of her hands is a big bag of JUNK FOOD and stationery items!  The snacks will be kakak's present today :D




Today is officially her last day in pre-school.  And I am going to say it again - HOW TIME FLIES!!! I still remember her very first day in that kindy when she was just 4 years old. That was over 2  years ago.

This morning when getting ready for school, she spontaneously put on her school uniform.  I told her that she had forgotten that today is casual wear day for the school party.  I told her that I would be giving her uniform away but she hugged her uniform tightly and said "mummy, can you please let me keep this uniform as remembrance?"  *sobs sobs*   I felt emotional.  My baby girl has thoroughly enjoyed almost 3 years in the kindy and has made many good friends.  To think that she may never see her bffs again made me even more emotional.

Anyway, I am sure that Cass will make more new friends in her che ches' school given her amicable and cheery personality.

To all the parents with school-going kids, HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!  :)

Lighting Does Strike Twice At The Same Place

I cannot believe that my www.healthfreakmommy.com blog has been injected with malware again, barely 3 days after it was whitelisted by Google and cleaned of infection!!  I thought lightning does not strike twice at the same place?  It is not true. It does strike many times at the same place and same person too!  Bugger!!

I have done all the preventive measures like changing passwords to really strong ones and getting my blog host to scan my domain but still??  Fulat!  I really don't know what to say except to accept that this year is just not a good year for me. I am under attack from top, bottom, left and right in every aspect of my life. Shit!

I really have no time to waste to fire-fight issues like the ones affecting my blogs. Communicating with some of the domain host technical staff is stressful.  They have a pool of technical staff (mostly foreigners) and different staff looks at my problem throughout the day. Some are plain lazy and annoying while some of them would go all out to help me.

As I am typing this post now, the Indon workers are clearing up debris and the mess from our kitchen. The renovation is finally over.    Our kitchen is in a very, very dusty condition now. Every single freaking item has to be wiped.  I don't think we can cook in the kitchen by today. We have been eating out for the past 5 days - twice a day and I am so sick of outside food now.

So yeah, it is back to square one now.  All my time and effort to salvage my blogs have been thrown out of the window.  My babies are down-and-out again. It will take another 3 days at least for them to be resuscitated *BAWL and PULL HAIR* :( :(

Video Of Sherilyn's Hip Hop Dance Performance At Setia Alam Eco Park - 15 Nov 2014

Here's a video of the drama queen, also the artiste wannabe doing a hip hop dance performance at a restaurant @ Setia Alam Eco Park yesterday night. It was her maiden public performance.  Sherilyn is in a purple jacket and dark blue legging at the front row in the video.

For someone who has joined the hip hop dance class for less than half a year, I would say that her performance was  pretty good, thanks to her 5 years of training in ballet.

I may upload another dance piece when I have the time to convert the video from my phone.

Enjoy! :)

Resuscitated and Alive Again!

I hope you are just as happy and thrilled as I am that you can finally see white and not red in this blog!   Finally.... after 3 days!  Though it is only 3 days, it felt like 3 months to me!   I was on tenterhooks for the period my blogs were dead, feeling darn anxious on the fate of my 2 'babies'.   I did not know if I would lose them forever or get back only parts of them and lose parts of them.  I was hopeful of getting them back safely in one piece. I prayed fervently and PTL, I got my 'babies' back.   Yeehaw, Health Freak Mommy is out of the woods finally (singing to the tune of Out Of The Woods by Taylor Swift!) :D

My blog will now be white since I am now whitelisted by Google. I had to rid the old purple colored theme anyway.  According to the 3 'doctors' who treated my domain, the virus stemmed from the blog theme.   Words cannot describe how happy I am to have my 'babies' back and in one piece, albeit the domain host did some modification and upgrading.  Thank you to the 3 fantastic guys at Exabytes  who have so kindly helped me recover my blogs by removing the virus, did some procedures on them and then helped me to submit my blogs to Google for verification and whitelisting.

Thank you to all my blog readers  who took the trouble  and time to send me messages and emails to inform me that my blogs had been infected by virus.  Thank you for coming back after all these years to read the crap I write.

Cass is sending a flying kiss as a gesture of appreciation to the 3 guys who helped me resuscitate the blogs and to everyone who likes to read her stories :)

Back But Not Out Of The Woods Yet

Hey peeps, healthfreakmommy.com is back after being in the pits for 2 days!   But she is not 100% out of the woods yet. My domain host has already cleaned my blogs of virus. So the blogs are safe to visit now.  However, my site is still flagged by Google as my host has just only cleaned my site yesterday.  We have already notified Google to whitelist the site but this will take several days for Google to review and to whitelist the sites. When you hop to my blog, you will still see the red Malware notice, as shown below. Click on details and click on 'Visit this unsafe site'. No doubt it says unsafe, but it is now clear of virus.  It seems that the virus stemmed from the blog theme which we have now removed.

  

SIGH!!  This is the umpteenth time since late last year that my blogs have been injected with spam, virus, malware and possibly hacked.  I cannot even recall how many times my blogs had been compromised. Enough of  my blogs being hacked.  See my kitchen below.  It was hacked today!  Hacking continues tomorrow. We have to engage a contractor to hack down all the kitchen wall tiles as the tiles are starting to bulge out from the wall, no thanks to the contractor who did a very shoddy renovation job to our unit 6 years ago.  Everything done by the contractor had to be redone by us at our own expenses now from the bathrooms and now the kitchen.  If we do not do anything about the tiles now,  the tiles will one day collapse onto someone unlucky who is in the kitchen. We definitely do not want that to happen.  And I. Hate. Renovations!  Our kitchens are in a mess and very, very dusty now.

 .

So yup, my situation is one of messy now.   Blogs are in a mess. House is in a mess.  And my mind is in a mass of mess with too many issues to straighten out.   My non-stop emails with the domain host (my mind is boggled reading so many IT jargons!), messages to customers and suppliers, cleaning up the mess in the house and groping in the dark in the kitchen as the light switches are all yanked out too.  But I am certain that this low point is just a passing phase.  Life is a roller coaster.  I will surely reach the top again, soon :)

FrogAsia - A one-stop shop for all your educational needs

Hear ye hear ye everyone with primary and secondary school kids in Malaysia's public schools! Your kid(s) may have already told you about this educational website but if they or you have not already known yet, let me introduce you to FrogAsia.

FrogAsia, a YTL company, is the first company in the world to connect an entire nation through a single, cloud-based learning platform. You and your child will not be charged any data costs while accessing Frog on their network, so everyone can enjoy unlimited access to their world of learning anytime, anywhere!

Through the 1BestariNet project, FrogAsia is bringing the future of education to every student, teacher and parent in Malaysia. Combining high-speed 4G internet access, a world class learning platform and access to ‘best-in-class’ resources and technology, Malaysia is the first country in the world to bring its entire education community together on a single converged network designed specifically to meet the needs of teaching and learning.  1BestariNet is a project initiated by the Malaysian Ministry of Education in line with the government’s vision of providing quality, Internet-enabled education for all.  Over 10,000 government schools around the country will be equipped with this awesome solution, bridging the digital divide between rural and urban students.

I first got to know about Frog Asia when Alycia and Sherilyn came home from school one day some time early this year and told me that their teachers had instructed everyone to log into this website. The students were required to explore the website and try out the apps and features at www.frogasia.com.

Your child will first need to register at the FrogAsia website. For Alycia and Sherilyn, they were given a set of log in data by their school (they are in a cluster school).

The website is pretty kids friendly. It is Sherilyn, my drama queen who taught me how to navigate around the website.  And boy was I impressed with what I found in there! Everything that is available at the FrogAcademy is on the left side bar of the Frog Store from resources to documents, books, images, videos, audio, question banks and much more.

Your kids can even gain access to their school text books at the FrogAsia website! So worry not if your kid has forgotten to bring home an important text book for revision. She/he will be able to read the text book by hopping into FrogAsia.

Here is a sample of how the eText book looks like...

Alycia and Sherilyn have added over 50 e-books into their 'My Library' at the FrogAsia website. They can read them on their iPad or lappie during their free time.

This is how the eBook looks like...

They were jumping with excitement when they found Diary of a Wimpy Kid from the Fun Brain app, in eBook form!

Interesting eComics are also accessible for free!

Parents can buy questions for their child to work on from the FrogAcademy at a minimal cost of only a few Ringgit per subject. Since the Question Banks is still at its Beta stage, only Form 4, Form 5 and SPM questions can be purchased at the moment. But very soon, questions for primary students and other levels will be readily available for purchase. You can pay via M2U or credit card. There will soon be sample UPSR questions for purchase as well.

Parents can check their kid(s)' work from the questions that they have bought from the Question Banks and monitor them, as shown below...

Educational videos can be added to your 'My Library' and they are free to view!

Under the Resources category, you can add flash cards, free images, free sounds, Funbrain (my girls love this category) and much more to your 'My Library'.

FrogAsia has a partnership with Google, which means that your child can assess to a buffet of interesting education materials from FrogAsia, which will bring them over to Google Apps to assess the educational materials. So make sure you or your child has a Google Chrome account as well.

FrogAsia is probably one of the best and most comprehensive local educational websites that I have come across. If your child's school has not been introduced to this website yet, you can help your child register now and start letting him/her explore FrogAsia today. This is definitely a must have website bookmarked in all your electronic devices!