Destressing Mommy!

This is a paid review blogpost.


Ever since moving out from the in-laws' house (since 4th April 2010) to live on our own, Mommy has to do almost everything -  household things especially - all by herself. And things can get pretty stressful when household things such as laundry (plus the ironing), cleaning, caring for the baby of the family, cooking (or even buying food), and even buying groceries (Papa tends to get impatient with Mommy's style of shopping, so Mommy prefers to shop alone or together with Juan Or only) plus the unpacking and storage of groceries, all has to be done about single-handedly almost all the time. Compounding to the stress level is the fact that Mommy is working full-time outside, so work stress (remember the MQA documentation thing that gave Mommy mental stress for 7 long months?) plus traffic-jam stress are factored in as well.

To offset the stress level a bit, these are the steps that Mommy took:

• Wash clothes only twice in a week, usually on Thursdays and Sundays. For that matter, Papa and Mommy bought a big washing machine (10 kg load) to solve the problem.
• Iron clothes only once a week, but that also is usually done by stealing some time here and there.
• Stock up on perishable groceries on a weekly basis or fortnightly basis. If it is fortnight, Mommy made sure the vegetables are those kind that can stand a substantial storage duration with the use of special 'fresh bag' type of plastic bags.
• Cook dinner only on weekends or public holidays or if Mommy is able to leave the workplace earlier than usual. Other than that, Mommy merely buy economy rice for dinner on those usual working days.
• Cleaning the house only occasionally (*shy to say, but that's the truth!*), maybe something like once a month or when Mommy goes on medical leave.
• Turning a blind eye to the mess created by Juan Or, i.e., the scattered toys found all over the floor, behind and under the bed or anywhere that looks like a gap) until the next house-cleaning session or until the next scolding of Juan Or.

And this is the timetable of Mommy for today (which happens to be a washing-clothes day) which Mommy finds stressful:

• 4.10am - woke up from sleep; went downstairs to wash clothes
• 4.20am - Juan Or woke up from sleep unexpectedly; called for Mommy when about to start washing clothes; Juan Or refused to go back to sleep and wanted to come downstairs with Mommy then requested to wash Thomas and Friends on Mommy's laptop
• 4.30am - prepared Campbell mushroom soup for breakfast; Mommy started washing clothes (combination of hand and machine wash)
• 5.10am - finished washing clothes; drank the mushroom soup and milk
• 5.30am - prepared milk for Juan Or; supervised Juan Or in drinking milk because this boy has tendency to do 'funny things' when not being watched; Mommy accidentally dozed off while watching over Juan Or
• 6.15am - decided to cook bamboo shoots (bought from Cameron Highlands) before further spoilage, certain ingredients were already prepared from last night
• 6.45am - finished cooking, washed containers, basin, etc; aliquot some bamboo shoots to be given to babysitter, washed wok, clear and pack up rubbish (both dry and wet rubbish).
• 7.05am - hanged clothes to dry
• 7.30am - packed things and dressed up to go to work, then detected foul smell coming from Juan Or's buttock
• 7.45am - cleaned up Juan Or and put on fresh diaper, packed things (and Juan Or) into the car, checked the house for switches, lights, windows, curtains and then locked the house
• 8.15am - drove off from home; encountered traffic-jam
• 8.55am - reached babysitter's house
• 9.15am - reached workplace
• 5.20pm - left workplace
• 5.40pm - bought economy rice
• 5.45pm - picked up Juan Or from babysitter's house
• 7.00pm - reached home, 'entertained' Juan Or
• 7.20pm - eat dinner, 'entertained' Juan Or
• 8.30pm onwards - take bath, rest a bit while 'entertaining' Juan Or, ironed clothes, 'entertained' Juan Or while watching TV, 'entertained Juan Or again (and maybe dozed off somewhere in between), sleep (maybe at 12.30am or even 1.00am)

Next day wake up at 5.00 or 5.++ am and a similar routine starts all over again.

Because this kind of routine happens 5 days out of 7 days in a week and repeatedly week after week, Mommy is actually very tired - tired as in everyday lacking in sleep (even though Mommy has already taken steps to minimize housework). So perhaps one day Mommy must consider pampering herself with massage therapy to destress and rejuvenate. Mommy saw this website about Massage San Diego and Massage Hill Crest. These two massage centres are run by massage therapist, Eric Sjoberg, a Holistic Health Practitioner, who has been in this field since 1993. He is an expert in many modalities of massage such as deep tissue, circulatory and craniosacral. Now, how Mommy wish Eric Sjoberg runs his massage centre in Malaysia too! ^_^
              

Fedora Hats! Anyone?

This is a paid review blogpost.

Everyone knows what is a hat and how a hat looks like, but Fedora hats? Probably not many people know this type of hat known by the name 'Fedora'. Perhaps you have seen a Fedora hat before, it's just that you never knew all along that it's called 'Fedora hat' (well, Mommy is one such person! ^_^). You probably refer to it as just a hat. To give you a hint what are Fedora hats, remember the famous King of Pop, the late Michael Jackson? Remember the kind of hat that he normally wore? Yup, that's the Fedora hat.

(Photo courtesy of Emeryn)

You may be wondering then why the name 'Fedora' for such kind of hats. It all began when this talented actress by the name Sarah Bernhardt played the role of Princess Fedora in an 1882 stage play. Well, nobody even remembered about the stage play, but what stood out most was the actress herself and the hat that she wore (now known as Fedora hat)!

For Mommy, wearing a hat was not part of Mommy's fashion, but more for practical purposes. For Mommy's case, it's to protect the already headache head from the scorching sunlight. Mommy remembers buying Mommy's first hat from a hawker at the foothill of Kek Lok Si Temple in Penang Island (that was some time back in year 2005 when Mommy was still courting with Papa). That time was already afternoon and the sun was very, very hot (blame it on global warming!). Mommy's head had already been exposed to the sun for quite long (the sun was already very bright since 10+am) so much so by noon, the headache appeared. And too bad, Mommy didn't bring any Panadol to relieve the headache. So what's the next best option? Buy a new hat, of course! Luckily the place where Papa and Mommy went to is a tourist spot, so most likely you will see a hat on sale. So Mommy bought one and it has been with Mommy till today. The hat has been left in Papa's car so that Mommy can use it whenever Mommy go for outings that expose Mommy to excessive sun.

This is the photo where Mommy wore the hat at the Kek Lok Si Temple.

Can you imagine how hot the sun was? Not only did Mommy have to put on a hat, Mommy still had to carry an umbrella!

Later on, when coming back from Penang Island and heading back to Klang Valley, we decided to stop by at the Lata Kijang waterfall that is somewhere before reaching Tapah. At the waterfall, Mommy decided to put on the hat again. The sun was not very hot then but Mommy decided to put on the hat anyway merely for fashion purpose (*Ahem!*) (No, mommy was not having a headache either!)

Now when looking back at this photo, Mommy thinks Mommy will look better and nicer in a Fedora hat! Now that Mommy knows the existence of this online Fedora hats store (known as 1001FedoraHats.com), Mommy knows where to source for fashionable-looking Fedora hats to match the clothes that Mommy wear and the events or occasions that Mommy is in. This online store offers Fedora hats for women, men , unisex ones and even for kids (no wonder the company puts the number '1001' in the website's name)! Hehehe....now Mommy knows where to look for Fedora hats for Juan Or should Mommy want to take Juan Or for kid's studio photography next time! ^_^

For readers out there, even if you do not plan to shop for a Fedora hat yet, still, browsing over articles about Fedora hat's history, interesting facts about its history, celebrities who wore Fedora hats, interesting pointers about Fedora hats for men and women, how to select a Fedora hat to suit your style and personality, its popularity, and the first male to ever wear a Fedora hat make interesting reads during your past time and also as general knowledge. So, what are you waiting for!? Hop on now to 1001FedoraHats.com! ^_^

Trip to Cameron Highlands (Part 2)

This is a continuation of Part 1.

After the Lata Iskandar waterfall, we headed up to Cameron Highlands. On the way up, Mommy could see many Orang Asli stalls along the road side selling petai, honey and bamboo shoots. Mommy wanted to buy petai and bamboo shoots from them but Papa asked to do it only later because it would be too troublesome to stop the car halfway. Our first stop was at the Bharat tea plantation. We merely parked at the road side to snap some photos, enjoy the scenary and fresh air - no stopover to drink the tea whatsoever! ^_^

Our next stop was the Sam Poh Tong Temple at Brinchang. This temple is supposedly dedicated to the Chinese Muslim eunuch and admiral of the Chinese fleet, Zheng He (Cheng Ho), according to this website. Pictured here is Juan Or and Papa walking towards the entrance of the temple. Mommy's not in the photo because Mommy was busy trailing them from behind to snap photos.

Basically, this temple feels just like any other temple - nothing outstanding about the architecture or the ornate decoration. We didn't spend a long time at the temple, but just sufficient time to snap some photos for remembrance.

Typical scene at the temple.

Here's Juan Or getting himself comfy while waiting for Papa to come out from the washroom.

After the temple, we headed straight to the vegetable market in front of Kea's Farm - Mommy's favourite stop at Cameron Highlands simply because Mommy's loves to buy vegetables at bargain prices! Sorry, no photos were captured at the market because Mommy was too preoccupied with looking out for good bargains of vegetables! ^_^ Here's what Mommy got from the market:

Cherry tomatoes (4 packets of about 400g per packet for RM10) and strawberries (4 packets for RM10 - 1 packet is about that much that you see in the small basin).

From left to right: Shoots of a gourd plant unknown to Mommy (3 bundles for RM5), asparagus (iinitially was 3 bundles for RM10, but later the seller gave Mommy one more free bundle!), and choy tam (8 packets of about 200g each for RM5).

Our next stop after the vegetable market was a cactus farm, but Mommy has already forgotten the name of the farm. Many types of cacti were displayed for sale, even pitcher plants were offered.

The plants are the main attraction of this farm, well, at least for the adults, but for Juan Or, his main attraction at the farm would be.....

.......the kiddy rides!

There was also a small plot of strawberry plants at the back of the cactus section.

After that was time for lunch, so we decided to stop over at a popular Chinese restaurant which Papa googled in the internet before but Mommy couldn't recall the name of the restaurant. We found the restaurant but too bad Juan Or was already asleep, so we decided not to have lunch at Cameron Highlands because we did not want to wake Juan Or up from sleep and end up having a fretful and crying baby! So we went on to exit from Cameron Highlands via the Simpang Pulai way. On the way down, Mommy reminded Papa to make a stopover if he sees any Orang Asli stall, but distance after distance, we couldn't see any stall and Mommy's heart began to sink. Finally, after quite long, we spotted one stall and Papa immediately made the stopover to buy for Mommy.

Petai in 3 small bunches for RM5.  

 Six pieces of bamboo shoots for RM5 (very cheap!).

Once at the lowland, Papa decided to stop at a Chinese restaurant in Kampar for lunch. We have eaten at the restaurant before in a trip long time before Juan Or was born. Once there, again our heart sank to see the restaurant closed. So we went on down towards Bidor's direction and found many restaurants closed along the way. Finally we stopped at Bidor and was glad to find at least a Chinese restaurant open. By then it was already something like 2pm already. This was what we ate there.

Mantis shrimp cooked with salted egg yolk and sweet potato leaves in belacan.

Fish slices stir-fried with spring onion.

Papa also bought tau sar peah from the restaurant - 3 packs for RM7. This restaurant's tau sar peah has a limey taste to it.

We reached Kuala Lumpur again by around 4 or 4-plus pm, just in time before the traffic-jam started (we went on a weekday, remember?) and stopped over at Haji Samuri's satay stall at the KESAS highway to buy satay for dinner before heading back home to Puchong.

Overall, how successful did Mommy consider of this trip? Mommy would consider it a 98% success because Juan Or was able to withstand the long distance with minimal fretfulness (fretted when we stopped at Bidor in the morning), plus Juan Or did not vomit at all nor show any sign of dizziness. In fact, during the journey up, Juan Or teased Mommy by saying that he wanted to vomit, but he laughed after that, so Mommy knew he was trying to pull Mommy's legs! Since Juan Or has passed his first long distance trip test, so there will be more long distance trips for Juan Or in the future! Yippy!

Trip to Cameron Highlands (Part 1)

On 30th July 2010, both Papa and Mommy decided to take leave from work to go for outstation trip to Cameron Highlands We felt this is the best time to go to Cameron Highlands, reason being it is not a weekend nor a school holiday season, so there shouldn't be any traffic jams which Papa hates so much. This will also be Juan Or's first ever long-hour trip. Both Papa and Mommy were keeping our fingers crossed as to how much or how long Juan Or was able to withstand such 'long' hours of travelling in the car.

We set off from home at 4.30 am, went through Old Klang Road to reach Kuala Lumpur (Jln. Kuching area), then off towards Rawang direction, then went up towards Perak and headed to Cameron Highlands via Tapah. Before we reached Tapah, we stopped by at Bidor to have breakfast because we have been longing to eat chee cheong fun with prawn filliings in one morning market where locals frequent. However, Juan Or was still asleep, so Mommy tried to wake him up gently to minimize the possibility of him crying non-stop. Turned out, he cried and fretted which pissed Papa off, so we decided to cancel the plan and head straight to Tapah and then to Cameron Highlands. So Papa merely made do his breakfast with a frankfurter bun that Mommy had packed for him.

By about 8.00am, we reached Lata Iskandar - the big waterfall that Mommy had been telling Juan Or a few days before the trip and which Juan Or has been longing to see. Papa handled Juan Or all the way at the waterfall because Papa is known to be very steady in his movements (unlike Mommy who is known to be clumsy!). The moment Juan Or saw the big waterfall, he started squeeling in delight - his usual way of reacting to something that he likes very much.

We allowed him to dip his feet in the cooling waterfall water and he enjoyed the feeling very much! Well, Papa and Mommy enjoyed the dipping too!

And here's the waterfall.....

.....plus a video recording of the waterfall ambience.

Stay tuned for Part 2!

Looney Tunes Comforter Set for Juan Or's Bed

It all started when Mommy first saw a Home's Harmony advertisement in newspaper on 11th June 2010. The advertisement mentioned about 70% discount for Looney Tunes comforter set plus a free gift in conjunction with school holiday season. That got Mommy's saliva drooling because it has been Mommy's dream to get an under-licensed type of cartoon design comforter set for Juan Or's bedroom. And Mommy is fine if the cartoon designs come from either Looney Tunes, Mickey Mouse or Toy Story, plus the comforter set must be queen size and 100% cotton (if not, then it's going to be hot and stuffy to the skin). So, Mommy called up Home's Harmony to enquire about the price and the specification first. But before heading off to Home's Harmony, Mommy also consulted Aunty Small Kucing (who has lots of experience in sale prices!) and a close collegue of Mommy about the price of such item versus its specification. Both of them were of the opinion that for the price offered based on the specification, and considering that it's the under-licensed kind of product, the comforter set is reasonably cheap, but not too cheap though.

So off Mommy went to Cheras Leisure Mall (which is nearest to Mommy's workplace) to get one set for Juan Or. The price, after 70% discount was RM172.50, and comes with 2 free gifts of the same kind - 2 sets of Looney Tunes face towels whereby each set contains 3 pieces of face towels that are very much larger than the typical face towels. So all in all, there are 6 pieces of Looney Tunes face towels as gifts.

Although the Looney Tunes comforter set was purchased in June 2010, however, it was only on 28th July 2010 that Mommy took it out for first time use. Reason? Simply because it was time to wash the older bedsheet! ^_^ 

When Mommy took out the Looney Tunes comforter set from the cupboard, Juan Or was very excited. He seems to know it's something new! Look at his cheeky face when Mommy asked him to pose together with the set!

After Mommy had finished laying out the bedsheet and comforter, this boy seemed to be enjoying himself very much - rolling from left to right, right to left of the bed - so much so it was so difficult to capture sharp photos of him on the bed!

And our little conversation went on like this....

Mommy: Juan Or, got Bugs Bunny picture on your bed, song bo (enjoy or not)?

Juan Or: Song (enjoy)! (Spotting a cheeky grin)

Mommy: Juan Or, is your bedsheet and blanket nice?

Juan Or: Nice! (Still spotting a cheeky grin)

Mommy: You like this set?

Juan Or: Like! (Still the cheeky grin and happy smile)

Mommy sleeps on the set too, and it feels comfortable. By the way, it's 280 thread count. Just a few days ago, Mommy spotted Papa lying down on the set next to a sleeping Juan Or. Mommy asked Papa how does the set feel on him. Papa also said it feels comfortable. Ah, Mommy is very happy and contented with the purchase! ^_^ (By the way, this is not an dvertisement!)