How Juan Or Plays With His Tools Playset

Remember how Mommy bought a tools playset for Juan Or from the most recent Litt Tak Toy Warehouse Sale? This is how the tools playset looks like.

However, the packaging did mention that this playset is not suitable for children below 3 years old. Beause of this, Mommy has removed the bolts and nuts from the tools playset before giving it to Juan Or to play with.

Basically, this is how Juan Or plays with his tools:

1. Flexing the plier handles

2. Twisting and turning the adjustor of the clamp.

3. Putting on the safety goggles (Mommy has to put that on on him, but as soon as Mommy puts it on, Juan Or takes it out again - that's why the photo is blurred!)

4. Biting and chewing the clamp's adjustor.

5. Shoving the plier's handle into his mouth.....

.....and swinging the plier from side to side using the mouth!

And last is....

6. Throwing the tools everywhere all over the floor! (No photo for this...just use your imagination!)

P/S: Sorry....most of the photos are blurred because Juan Or just cannot keep still enough for Mommy to capture his photos :P

Totally Weaned Off!

(This is a recent photo of Juan Or at 1 year 3-and-a-half months old. Haha...big boy already...don't wanna suck from Mommy's breast anymore!)

It has already been 1 month since Juan Or weaned himself off from suckling at Mommy's breast. During that 1-month period, Mommy had tried offering him to suckle on the breast, but Juan Or refused. How did he refuse? This was how it went - Mommy first asked Juan Or whether he wanted to suck Mommy's ne-neh (breast in Hokkien). Juan Or would then respond by shrugging his head. Then to make sure that Juan Or really understand what Mommy meant, Mommy would lift up the blouse and offer the ne-neh to him. Then Juan Or would give Mommy a sheepish grin as if to say,"What!? I'm so big already, some more still want me to suck from your breast?"

There was another occasion when Mommy was lying on the bed and Juan Or was crawling and playing on the bed. Then, just to test him out or to tease him, Mommy would lift up the blouse and offer it to him. Juan Or would respond by going near Mommy, as if he has the desire to suckle again, but when he got near, he gave Mommy a kind of sheepish grin as if to mean that although his heart wants to suckle on Mommy's breast, but he felt himself too old for all this!

Some history about Juan Or's auto-weaning process: Mommy had been breastfeeding Juan Or (and pumping breastmilk as well!) regularly for 1 year. After one year, Mommy stopped pumping breastmilk because Juan Or's intake (directly from the breast) started to become irregular. There were occasions when Juan Or didn't suckle from Mommy breast for a straight 3 days. During those 3 days, Mommy had offered him the breast when he was still sleepy but partially awake, but the moment Mommy put him near the breast, he struggled and protested. So Mommy didn't pursue further. However, after those few days of not suckling, finally Juan Or suckled again. This went on until about 1 month ago when Juan Or didn't want to suckle at all from Mommy's breast. As of now (as in not suckling for 1 solid month), if Mommy is to use the fingertips to squeeze the nipple, some milk will still ooze out. However, Mommy has not felt any breast engorgement at all during the 1-month period even though milk production is still on. Mommy guess Mommy's desire to breastfeed Juan Or is still very strong although Juan Or doesn't want to be breastfed anymore. Oh.....Mommy definitely misses those tender moments when Mommy was breastfeeding Juan Or!

Mommy's New Handphone

Remember how Mommy's previous Motorola W510 handphone went short-circuit due to a leaking battery? And mind you, Mommy bought the Motorola handphone just about almost one-and-a-half years ago for RM499! What a waste! So, no choice, Mommy has to buy a new one with camera and videocam function as well so that Mommy won't miss out capturing Juan Or in action. This time, Mommy went back to using a Nokia candybar type (Mommy's first handphone was also a Nokia candybar, but monotone type). Mommy bought an original Nokia 2700 Classic for RM380 from a handphone seller in Sri Petaling's The Store. This time, Mommy is not willing to spend so much money on handphones considering that nowadays colour handphones have a lifespan of about 1 year plus only. Another nearby handphone seller in The Store was offering the same model for RM480!

So here is a photo of Juan Or captured there and then at the handphone seller's booth....

.... and another photo when Papa and Mommy brought Juan Or for a stroll in the supermarket after buying the handphone.

How's the photo quality like? Well, Mommy found that although the photos seem to look nice on the handphone's screen, but when viewed through Mommy's laptop, they don't look nicer than the ones taken by Mommy's old Motorola. In fact, the photo quality all looks the same. As for the video picture quality, Nokia's appear to be worse than Mommy's old Motorola - very pixelized look.

It's the Litt Tak Toys Warehouse Sale Again!

Yay! It's the Litt Tak Toys Warehouse sale again! For the past 3 days, Mommy was attending a scientific conference (that's why Mommy had been so quiet for the past 3 days!) held in Saujana Hotel, Subang Jaya. On the final day, which is today, the scientific conference ended earlier (but not too early either if you factor in the time for getting stuck at the Federal Highway traffic jam!), so Mommy dropped by at Litt Tak to see what's in store.

When Mommy reached Litt Tak, it was already late afternoon and there was no crowd at all. The parking is free because it is an SMI area, so Mommy merely parked at the side of the road. There is only one cashier counter and credit card is only accepted for transactions worth RM50 and above. The kinds of toys sold in Litt Tak are Power Rangers, Tomy, some Disney infant and children toys, China-made toys and those Japanese robot toys such as Ban Dai and Gundam. Here are what Mommy saw:

(The entrance to the Litt Tak. Notice there are boxes of toys at the corridor.)



(A closer view of the boxes of toys at the corridor. The wobbly-head figurines/toys at the lower box costs RM20 each.)



(Some funny Japanese figurine toys, each at RM10.)

(This Thomas and Friends sets costs RM120 each.)

(Tomy's Disney 'masak-masak' set with toy vegetables, each at RM15.)

(Ultraman figurines of about 8 inches tall, each at RM22.)

(Power Rangers robot at about 4.5 inches tall at RM5.)

(Tricycle for toddlers, made of plastic, each at RM50 which is not cheap!)

(Gundam self-assembled robots, more as collector's item, each selling for at least RM50, if not mistaken.)




(More wobbly-head figurines/toys, each at RM25.)

(Rattles meant to be worn at the wrist for infants, each at RM1, which is very cheap! The brand is Tomy.)

(Another 'masak-masak' playset, meant to look like non-stick cookware, selling for RM15.)

So what did Mommy get for Juan Or this time? Ta-dah, here they are!

(A press-button musical keyboard with songs and animal sound, RM8.)

(A Power Ranger toy handphone, RM10, with robotic music when the buttons are pressed. Mommy thought this must be suitable for Juan Or now that Juan Or's latest craze is the handphone. Unfortunately, Juan Or has no interest in Mommy's spoilt handphone because it has no 'life'. But of course Mommy dare not let him handle Mommy's old monotone Nokia handphone because he has the habit of throwing the handphone onto the floor!)

(Disney's Mickey Mouse pop-up toy at RM9. The brand is Playwell.)

(DIY tools playset at RM13 - boy's version of 'masak-masak' set. By the way, the tools look like real.)

A Night's Out Without Juan Or

Remember how Mommy joined the Nuffnang's District 9 Contest for Glitterati members? Well, Mommy won a pair of District 9's Premiere Screening movie tickets! So, on 12th August 2009 (i.e., on the day Juan Or turned exactly 1 year 3 months old), after coming back from work, took bath and ate dinner, and of course saying goodbye to Juan Or (Juan Or was cool about it, surprisingly!), Papa and Mommy headed to Cathay Cineplex Damansara (formerly Cineleisure, Kota Damansara) at about 6.45 pm (the show started at 9 pm), hoping to be able to beat the traffic jam to reach there in time. So Mommy did the driving because Papa cannot stand driving in traffic jams. However, the surprising thing was the roads were all smooth and clear - no traffic jams at all! So Mommy thought this must be the sign that the day was meant to be that both Papa and Mommy get to watch a movie! What's more, Mommy won this pair of tickets out of 60 pairs of tickets out for grabs and there were 256 blogger participants vying for it!

By almost 7.40 pm, Papa and Mommy reached Cathay Cineplex Damansara and immediately headed to the cinema's lobby to collect the free movie tickets. Nuffnang had informed Mommy that the Nuffnang booth would only start giving out the free tickets from 8.00 to 8.45 pm. So, turned out, Mommy was the first Nuffanger in line. After getting the tickets, Papa and Mommy walked to Ikano Power Centre to browse some shops there and by almost 9 pm, we were back at the cinema's lobby. Then Mommy noticed that apparently the movie ticket stated that the show would only start at 9.30 pm, so Papa and Mommy decided to just hang around the vicinity because 30 minutes was definitely insufficient time to browse some more shops. The waiting time was very boring and noisy as well because there was an indoor dodgeball match going on. At one stage, Mommy noticed Papa's eyes almost closed. Then when Papa woke up again, Papa reminded Mommy not to join this kind of contest anymore as we do not have the kind of energy and alertness to rush to a shopping complex after work and stay up late to watch a movie. Hahaha....we are no longer in our twenties anymore!

Finally, we were allowed to enter the movie hall and shortly after the movie started. The initial part of the movie was rather boring - there were certain moments when Mommy accidentally dozed off and woke up, and dozed off and woke up again until when the moview almost reached the middle, then did things and action start to pick up. That was when Papa and Mommy, no matter how tired, couldn't help staying alert and awake to watch it because the movie became exciting and action-packed. In a nutshell, District 9 is about a district where aliens, who are stranded on Earth, are designated to stay. Later on, the government assigned a young man to execute the relocation of the aliens. During the process of relocation, the young man was spurt with some alien liquid and as a result, some DNA transformation happened, causing him to gradually turn into an alien. During the time when he was still half human and half alien, the government actually used him as experimental subject to operate and research on alien weapons (the government was already secretly using aliens as experimental subjects then, which cost the lives of many aliens.). He was against such deeds, so he escaped as the government hunted him down. So he seeked solace and shelter in District 9, where he 'befriended' an alien who happened to be one of those intelligent and master mind type of alien. So he made a deal with the alien that he will help the alien to go back to their place of origin and the alien in turn must heal him completely to become a human again. But before the alien could go back and heal him, he must get back the canister of liquid (that spilt on him, rememeber?) which is now in the government's keeping. Finally, he got the canister of liquid and after some scuffle with government soldiers, the alien managed to get into his spaceship to go back home (together with the alien baby), while he stayed behind to use the alien weapons to fight back the government soldiers. And the alien promised to come back to Earth to change him back into a human again (is the producer hinting that they are going to come out with a sequel to this movie?). By the time the show ended, the man had already fully turned into a full-fledged alien.

Although Mommy enjoyed watching the movie, but during the course of the movie, Mommy can't help thinking about Juan Or. Some questions kept running in Mommy's mind: Is Juan Or happily playing with his Grandparents and Second Uncle? Is Juan Or sleeping already? Is Juan Or OK with Papa and Mommy going out without him at night? Anyway, by the time, we reached home, it was already 11.30 pm and Juan Or was already sleeping soundly in the spring cot. Mommy asked Father-in-law how was Juan Or when we were not in and Father-in-law's reply was that Juan Or was happily playing all the way until it was time to sleep. Mommy heaved a sigh of relief.

By the way, Mommy didn't capture any photos during the movie outing because the day before, Mommy's Motorola handphone went short-circuit due to leaking battery. So the handphone is spoilt already and is now a play item for Juan Or. Mind you, Mommy only bought the handphone some one-and-a-half years ago for RM499! What a waste! What to do! Tonight, Mommy is buying a new handphone so that Mommy can continue to capture Juan Or's candid moments and put them up in this blog.

Tag from Cynthia Wong

Mommy is tagged by a fellow mummy blogger, Cynthia Wong. So here is Mommy's tag about childhood memories - there you go....





This I believe is the best time in our lives, childhood. Our deepest concern only is how we’re going to finish our meal or what we’re going to play today. The simplest of things makes us laugh, and everybody wants to kiss or cuddle us. And so let’s try to be the kid that we were even just for a few minutes:



1. Ever favorite nursery rhyme: Ten Little Indian Boys



2. Pet name: Basil



3. Favorite treat: Kam Kam



4. Milk in your bottle/Sippy cup you miss most: Milo


5. Favorite TV show: The Twilight Zone


6. Place you love your parents take you the most: To the beach to dig for lala


7. Adult thing you used to mimick: Masak-masak


8. Most embarrassing to recall: Fell down onto the road when walking to the Sunday school bus simply because my shoe has an 'open mouth'


9. Game with a sib you reminisce most: Hide-and-seek in the house


10. Most unforgettable candy you used to take: Bubble Yum






Now, since it’s fun to spread the tag, and I am spreading to the following 5 persons :-

• Small Kucing
• Merryn
• Geok Bee Law
  
• Broccoli Ginger


• Little Prince's Mummy
  

Buffalo Power (Kuasa Kerbau!)

This post is an outdated post. On 6th August, Mommy finally got the chance to record Juan Or showing off his kuasa kerbau (buffalo power - a term his Papa often use to express a sudden gush of physical energy) by using his full strength to hit his toy hammer onto the floor. Mommy rarely get the opportunity to videoshoot Juan Or doing this because usually, by the time Mommy is ready with the handphone's videocamera, Juan Or has already lost interest in doing his hammering. By the way, Juan Or started to be able to hold and hit the hammer when he was about 9 to 10 months old. Watch this video:

Joyride Trip to Kuala Selangor (Part 2)

After having seafood lunch at Restoran Tian Wai Tian, we headed off to a newly built (and beautiful and colourful!) Chinese temple which we saw along the way to the restaurant. Here are some snapshots of the Chinese temple:

(Colourful Chinese temples with cave structures)

(Front entrance)





(Chinese paintings on the wall)

(Cave-like structure of the deity's altar. But Papa and Mommy do not know what deity is that.)

(Carving of a deity on the wall.)

(One of the side deity sculpture at the roof structure of the temple)

(Juan Or and Papa at the front part of the temple)

("Hey, Juan Or! Don't run away! Come take your photo first!")

There was one notable thing though, happening to Juan Or at the temple. When Mommy walked down the stairs of the cave structure to leave the temple (of course carrying Juan Or as well), Juan Or fretted and cried, and kept pointing his forefinger at the upstairs direction, as if not wanting to leave the temple. And Juan Or cried all the way while walking back to the car. This made Papa and Mommy wonder whether Juan Or 'has fate' with the deity of this temple? Or Juan Or's past live has something to do with this temple's deity? Mommy can't help wondering about Juan Or's reaction although Mommy is a Christian.

(Juan Or was crying and struggling while coming down the stairs that leads to the cave structure of the temple. This photo was taken when Mommy and Juan Or were about halfway down the stairs.)

Joyride Trip to Kuala Selangor (Part 1)

After leaving the Hytex Warehouse Sale, Papa headed back towards the Kepong town centre direction. From there, we came across the part of the road where you can either head to Sungai Buloh on the left or Kuala Selangor on the right. Part of Mommy wanted to go to Sungai Buloh because recently, Mommy has gotten the urge to plant vegetables for fun and for own consumption. So Mommy was keen to check out prices of vegetable seeds and packets of black soil. Another part of Mommy wanted to go to Kuala Selangor because the last time Papa and Mommy went there was on the day before Juan Or was born, which means we have not been to Kuala Selangor for 1 year 2+ months already! Finally, Mommy decided to go to Kuala Selangor since we were already far away from Sri Petaling, Juan Or had slept in the car and awaken already, and the time was 11.15am, so might as well make the best of the outing.

After passing through Rawang, finally we reached Pasir Penambang in Kuala Selangor at about 12.15pm. Pasir Penambang is a fishing village and houses many Chinese 'tai chow' seafood restaurants. Some restaurants here operate both in the afternoon and night and some in the night time only. So we headed straight to a restaurant first since it was already lunch time. The restaurant we went to was the same restaurant Papa and Mommy went to on the day before Juan Or was born. (Mind you, it was only about 3 hours after eating in this restaurant when Mommy's water bag burst!).

Just a sidetrack here: During the last visit to Pasir Penambang, Mommy went to the Pasir Penambang wet market to buy fresh tiny lalas - 1kg for RM1.50, to stir-fry at home. After buying the lalas, Papa and Mommy went to eat lunch in this restaurant before going back to Sri Petaling. We reached home was about 1pm plus. Then, at about nearly 3pm, Mommy went to the kitchen to prepare to cook the tiny lala. Just before stir-frying, Mommy went to the toilet to urinate first. That was when Mommy's water bag burst! Immediately after that, Papa rushed Mommy to the hospital and the next day at 4.35am, Juan Or was born. So in the end, Mommy never got the chance to eat those tiny lala!

OK, back to the track again. The restaurant we went to was Restoran Tian Wai Tian. Papa noticed that this restaurant seems to be frequented by the local Pasir Penambang residents because we noticed there always seems to be a group of senior citizens having their brunch there at any one time we eat there.

(Juan Or was waiting for the food to arrive.)

(Never mind, pose for Mommy first while waiting for the food....)

(.....and another pose for Papa to capture!)

Anyway, the food didn't take long to be served. Here was what Papa ordered:

(Kong poh mantis prawn. The mantis prawn was well-coated with the sauce, and the insides were moist. Very tasty! Can't remember the exact price of this dish.)

(Hot plate oyster omelette. The sauce was something like sweet and sour and the amount of oyster given was a lot. Very tasty! Cost RM13.)

(Sweet potato leaves stirr-fried in belacan - very tasty and fragrant! RM5 only!)

(Kam heong lala. The lala flesh was not sweet at all. Probably the sweetness was affected by the storage. Can't remember the exact price of this dish.)

All in all, Papa paid RM40.50 for the entire meal (reasonably cheap!) which includes 2 plates of rice and a pot of Chinese tea. Also, we were not charged any government tax or service charge.

Buying Things for Juan Or (Again!) at Hytex Warehouse Sale (1st August-13th September 2009, weekends only)

Today, Mommy managed to persuade Papa to drive Mommy to Kepong for the Hytex Warehouse Sale. As most of Mommy's close mommy bloggers will have known, Papa is not a fan of warehouse sale because warehouse sales tend to be crowded and parkings are difficult to find. So Mommy was quite surprised that Papa agreed but Papa did caution Mommy about the risk of Juan Or crying in the car due to disturbed sleep or lack of sleep.

To go to Hytex in Kepong, Papa used the Jalan Kuching way. Since it was a Sunday, there was no traffic-jam at all, so we reached there just within 30 to 40 minutes' drive from Sri Petaling. However, 10 minutes before arriving at Hytex, Juan Or started to doze off. So Papa merely parked the car at the main road off Hytex and suggested that Mommy walk there to do the 'shopping' while Papa stayed in the car with Juan Or who was still sleeping. So all Mommy had to do was to shift Juan Or away from Mommy's lap as slowly as possible without waking him up and then placed him back onto Mommy's car seat with the backrest reclined. Luckily, Juan Or remained asleep after all the shifting!

(Sleep, Juan Or, sleep!)

After that, Mommy walked into Hytex. At a glance, there was no crowd at about 10.15 am, and there's also no banner indicating the warehouse sale. Basically, the warehouse sale is divided into 3 sections: baby/toddler, children and adult clothes. There are 2 cashier counters dedicated to the baby/toddler section only whereas the children and adult sections share the same cashier counters. Only cash terms are accepted - no credit cards allowed.

(The Hytex factory)

(The chidren clothes section.)

(This warehouse sale is not crowded.)

(The baby/toddler section somehow has more customers than the children and adult clothes sections.)

(Here's the rack for Winnie the Pooh toddler T-shirts and shorts, sold at RM5 per piece.)

How are the prices? Basically, the prices are the same as last time. Most of the items offered are the same as the previous time, except for Winnie the Pooh toddler T-shirts which are of different designs now. Other notable changes in the baby/toddler section are:

• the non-spill sippy cup is no longer offered now, instead the food grinder container (RM5) is. However, in Mommy's opinion, the food grinder container is more of a gimmick plastic container which claims to allow food grinding to be done in the container itself. Apparently, it merely has a rough patch of surface to allow you to have more 'grip' when smashing the food!


• there are way lesser toddler shoes on sale now although prices remain the same as last time. Mommy only spotted one new design put up for sale, but the design is similar to one of the toddler shoe designs offered last time.


• no more cheap small bottle baby toiletries on sale this time, but the Looney Tunes family bath (1 litre for RM10) is on sale.


• on the whole, the variety of things offered this time is much more limited (and in smaller quantities) compared to last time.


• for the cloth type of baby car seat which is hung over the adult car seat, the price is now lowered to RM10 (last time was RM15; My Dear was selling for RM46!)

For prices of other baby/toddler items, please see here because the prices remain the same.

Here are the things that Mommy bought for Juan Or from this time's Hytex Sale:

(Three Winnie the Pooh toddler T-shirts for age 3, each for RM5, and a plain toddler shorts for RM1.)





(This baby pillow comes with a pillow cover, costs RM5. Mommy noticed that the Looney Tunes tag indicated that the pillow is made in Suzhou, China).

(Disney checked shorts, both for age 4, each at RM3 only! Very cheap! Mommy saw from the old price tags that it was originally sold for RM23.90!)