Family outings – Page 3 – HEALTH FREAK MOMMY

Father’s Day Lunch At Bankara Ramen @ Avenue K

Today is Father’s Day and we spent our day at Avenue K.

In the morning, the girls gave their daddy their own-made cards and drawings. Sherilyn bought a pack of chewing gum for her daddy.

We had lunch at our favorite Japanese noodle house, Bankara Ramen at Avenue K.

Bankara Ramen is a Tokyo-based noodle chain that made its presence in Kuala Lumpur early this year. We first tasted Bankara Ramen’s noodles about a month back and have since fallen in love with their lusciously thick and rich soup-based noodles. For someone who tries to steer clear from the oodles of high-carb (and fattening) noodles, I tend to loose it and drown myself in Bankara Ramen’s noodles. What makes Bankara Ramen’s noodles stand out from the rest is the soup, which is thick, rich and very flavorful. Every bowl of noodles comes with a hefty topping of finely chopped spring onions. I especially love Bankara’s signature broth (RM27++ with four chunky pieces of chashu). The A+ rating soup (HFM’s rating) is made with pork bones infused with refined shoyu.

We ordered a bowl of rice specially for the rice-addict of the family!

On every table is a generous serving of complimentary fresh garlic that customers can press for themselves using a garlic presser, pickled ginger and a bottle of toasted sesame seeds. Thus, with these additional aromatic and flavorful toppings, our noodles were absolutely delish and tasty to the last strand!

After lunch, hubs brought the girls to Black Bull [Kitchen • Bar • Lounge] to play bowling, pool and darts, while I indulged myself in some retail therapy. Nothing gives me more pleasure than shopping kekeke 😀

After retail therapy for moi and play therapy for the girls, hubs headed to Library to wind down with some waffles with ice-cream and coffee. While I get my pleasure from buying stuff, the girls get their pleasure from play, the foodie hubs gets his from food!

Today marks the end of the girls’ 2.5 weeks of school holiday. Tomorrow will be back to reality. Back to the grind and rut. It is a fusion of emotions for me – happy yet sad. Happy that my days are more structured again and I get back my me time in the morning. And sad at the same time that I am going to be heavily indebted again – to my beauty sleep. That’s motherhood and motherhood is all about riding on a roller-coaster. You have ups and you have downs.

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Day Trip To Kellie’s Castle and Teluk Intan (4 June 2014)

It was an eleventh hour and impromptu decision to bring the kids to visit Kellie’s Castle. I casually asked dad on Tuesday night if he could drive us to Kellie’s Castle on Wednesday morning and my dad obliged without any hesitation. Muacks muacks papa 🙂

After the visit to Kellie’s Castle yesterday, my dad was in a mood to drive us to Teluk Intan to visit his sister. It was the kids’ first ever visit to Kellie’s Castle and Teluk Intan. It was also a maiden visit for my parents and me to Kellie’s Castle.

From the facade, Kellie’s Castle looked like a castle from the olden days of white knights and princesses. Indeed very impressive and grandiose. Inside the castle, everything is in ruins and dusty. We had a lot of stairs climbing to do and when we were at the top, Cass who has a phobia of heights screamed out to be brought down. There are also no proper safety measures and fencing to prevent accidents.

Our tour of the much talked-about Kellie’s Castle with paranormal sightings…

And yes, I did feel spooky when I toured the castle *sweats*!!

Now, who dares to partake in the Kellie’s Castle Paranormal Night Tour?

We saw a bride and groom doing their bridal photography at the castle. The pair climbed up to the top of the castle for their photography. Err, I would never want to do mine here, in a castle that is believed to be haunted, lest my photos get photo-bombed by some unwanted figures! And on a hot and sweltering day some more – my make up would definitely smear my face, making me look like a ghost LOL!

This was supposed to be the dining area. The castle was yet to be completed when William Kellie Smith passed on in Scotland.

After the visit to Kellie’s Castle, dad brought us to Tg Tualang in the hope of bringing the kids to see the famous tin mining dredge but unfortunately, the place was closed. The kids could only catch a glimpse of the humungous dredge from the car. I told the kids that once upon a time in Ipoh, their great grand father (their daddy’s grand parents) was a well-known tin-miner and philanthropist in Ipoh.

As my dad (who is 71 years old this year) was in a mood to drive around yesterday, he made a detour and brought us to Teluk Intan.

Upon arrival at Teluk Intan, we visited the Leaning Tower of Teluk Intan, then adjourned to have lunch with my aunt, visited the Teluk Intan River Front, visited the biscuit shop to get some famous Teluk Intan biscuits and then cooled ourselves down with coconut water before returning to Ipoh.

In this picture, the tower looked slanted to one side but from most angles, the slant is not really very obvious. We climbed to the top of the tower, which was only 3 storeys high but the stairs leading up the tower were very very steep and narrow.

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On our way back to Ipoh using the old trunk road, it poured cats and dogs shit. We stopped at Kampar to get some famous paus and reached Ipoh at 6pm. The kids enjoyed themselves very much but I found it quite torturous be be walking around under the hot scorching sun and climbing flights after flights of stairs the whole day. As I had said before, this is one of the sacrifices of a mother — to do things that you do not like to do all for the sake of your kids! Ah, the joys of motherhood! 🙂

No. of times viewed = 732

Mother’s Day 2014

It was two days straight of digging into glorious food at new eateries, starting from Saturday nite through Sunday. For the hubs, there is always no better way to celebrate an occasion than to do it and to show it with good food with his loved ones. On Saturday nite, he brought us to Muugu Garden Bistro, Off Bukit Bintang for dinner. It was a rainy nite and because it was pretty dark and wet that night, it took hubs about 20 minutes making countless rounds at the vicinity of Bukit Bintang to finally locate Muugu. This hidden bungalow restaurant was opened recently near Bukit Bintang and is set in a spacious and serene sanctuary amid the hustle and bustle of the city in the heart of KL. I shall post more pix of our dinner in a separate post, but here’s a picture of Cass and her daddy taken at Muugu on the eve of Mother’s Day…

On Sunday morning, Sherilyn woke up early to whip up a surprise for grandma and me. It was her signature egg dish with onions and cucumber.

She also bought me a stalk of fake rose from her school at 60sen a stalk and painted this picture in school for me ♥♥

After breakfast at home, we headed to Avenue K. This time, we decided to try Grandeur Teppanyaki at the Taste Enclave food court and there was not a bit of regret. It was a beautiful dining experience for us and by far the best food court experience sans the heat and oily smoke. Dining at Taste Enclave gets you to taste the best of hawkers fare and international cuisine in a nice and comfy ambience. Taste Enclave offers every one of all ages a smorgasbord of menu and taste. We enjoyed every dish whipped up by the Teppanyaki chef. Hubs also ordered items from other stalls and we had a feast of sort at the classy food court. Here’s Cass enjoying her seafood teppanyaki.

Errr, it was not my idea for Cass to bring along her Math book but entirely her idea as she’s going to sit for her mid-term exam next week. After lunch, we popped over at Popular Bookstore to get Alycia some books. I had promised her that for every 90/100 mark that she gets in her mid-term test papers, she gets a book. And the highlight of the day for the girls was their dinosaur-search experience at Dinoscovery by Dinosaurs Live at Discoveria. Hubs brought the girls to their dino adventure whilst the mil and I went our separate ways doing some retail therapy 🙂 These pictures of the girls at Dinoscovery were snapped by hubs and Whatsapp-ed to me while I was shopping 😀

After the dino-search adventure and shopping, we went to Johnny Rockets to sample their famed hamburgers and hotdogs but we left feeling a tad disappointed as there was really nothing to shout about. Had I closed my eyes and ate a burger from Burger King or McD and a burger from Johnny Rockets, I really couldn’t tell the difference o_O After we left Johnny Rockets, the foodie hubs then hopped over next door to Library to have waffles with ice-creams and coffee *BURPS*!!

Dinner was homemade Vietnamese beef noodles, made by hubs’ uncle. And the last highlight for Mother’s Day was the cake, which we only had room in our tummies to eat at 9:30pm, after which I hurried the girls to go to bed as it is a school day the next day. How was your Mother’s Day celebration? Hope you had a swell one too. Here’s wishing my dearest mother, MIL and all you fantastic mothers out there a very Happy Mother’s Day 🙂

No. of times viewed = 405

Siew Siew Restaurant @ Sg Besi KL

Yesterday being a public holiday, the hubs told us that he wanted to try something new. So he brought us to Siew Siew Restaurant @ Sg Besi. I was told that this restaurant has been around for quite some time already but I never realized that there is such a nice restaurant located just next to TUDM. Upon entering the restaurant, we were all taken by surprise by how spacious the restaurant is with Balinese style gazebos outside the restaurant. The girls were so excited to see a really huge fish pond with huge and well-fed carps swimming everywhere in the pond. We chose one of the private gazebos instead of sitting inside the restaurant, to enjoy the outdoor scenic view.

The girls ran everywhere round the zic-zac shape wooden bridge to look at the carps before the food arrived.

We wanted to order the signature melt-in-the-mouth char siew dish but was told that it was only available at night *bummer*! So we ordered the siew yoke instead, which was deep fried and tossed with lots of big onions.

Inside the restaurant were some huge fish tanks with huge fish swimming around, with a waterfall at the backdrop.

The stir-fried vermicelli with crabs was crabby flavorful. iLike it!

Harm tarn hai (salted duck’s eggs crabs), steamed kampung chicken with kailan and a plate of stir-fried fish slice…

Overall, the food was OK. I said OK as we bench-marked the crab dish against Unique Seafood Restaurant’s crab dishes, which we very much preferred. Also, the coconut juice was not fresh and cost us RM5 each! I think we would still visit Siew Siew again, to try out other dishes, as the price of the food there is still cheaper than Unique Seafood Restaurant 🙂

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New Year’s Eve & Happy 2014

Though I had a very turbulent time in 2013, I must say that the last few days of 2013 were one of my best for the year. I’ve had innumerable depressing days contributed by the kids, online business and family matters but I’m glad that I managed to surmount them all and my head was above the water during these turbulent times. Patience and acceptance of fact are the key to happiness. Though many of the problems seem to be dormant and subdued now, I know that they will erupt again, without warning. But since I have handled them countless of times, I think I should be able to deal with them as and when they spew out again 😀

On New Year’s Eve, we checked into Best Western Dua Sentral Hotel with our gang of friends. Upon check-in, the kids could not wait to join their friends to have some splashing good time in the pool.

After a dip in the pool and a shower, we went to Unique Seafood Restaurant to have dinner.

With good food, good wine and good friends around us, what more can we ask for on the last day of the year?

I love the grilled squids and that plate cost us a frigging RM80! Abuden, but it was New Year’s Eve, so just whack only la and recover later, haha!

The total damage for this seafood dinner was about RM2,400 for 12 adults and 8 kids.

We ordered crabs cooked in 3 delish styles — spring onions and ginger, sweet and sour and salted duck’s eggs. I like the duck’s eggs one the best and it’s the most fattening one too o_O The surprising thing about this holiday is that though I had indulged in so much sinful grub and slackened in my exercise so badly, my weight remains unchanged!! 😀

After a scrumptious seafood dinner at Unique, we went back to the hotel to count down, with more wine. From our room, we could watch fireworks display at the stroke of midnight from various spots. For over 10 years, this same group of friends and us would count down and celebrate the New Year together. Before we all had kids, we used to celebrate in pubs and discos. Now that most of us have kids, we would count down at either our condo or at a hotel.

After breakfast at the hotel on 1.1.2014, the kids headed for the pool again. What’s the best thing about a holiday to the kids? The pool of course, and nothing else! They were not even hungry when they were in the pool, though it was way past their meal times.

Hubs and I were too lazy to get wet in the pool and shower again, so we got J, who is still a bachelor and with a girlfriend, to babysit Cass in the pool haha! He passed with flying colors we told him 😀 While J entertained Cass and the kids played among themselves, we adults sipped coffee and juices by the pool.

Awesome view of the KL skyline from the 6th floor of the hotel…

And the hardest part about a holiday with this group of friends is to get the kids to get out from the pool!! They seem to have selective hearing and no matter how many times we hollered “last 5 minutes kids”, no one seemed to have heard us!

After checking out from the hotel, hubs brought us to China Town (Petaling Street) to hunt for street food. I almost wanted to strangle him for making me walk for almost an hour under the hot sun, looking for street food on a scorching hot sweltering day, aaargh! Didn’t he even know that his wife is allergic to the sun meh?? Abuden, couldn’t strangle him nor complain too loudly, lest I appear like a spoilt brat in front of our friends muahahaha!

First stop was at this unassuming and dilapidated stall that sells pretty good chee cheong fun. We had to sit on filthy chairs with sticky stained tables to eat. Some of us had to sit on an old wooden structure (as shown in below pic) to eat. The stall is located opposite the famous Air Mata Kuching stall and a stall that sells Hello Kitty merchandise. And our final stop was at Nam Heong chicken rice — finally a place with air cond to cool me down! The hubs had wanted to bring us for beef noodles but the stall was closed so we had to walk all the way back to where we were from under the HOT SUN!

That was how we spent our New Year’s Eve and first day of 2014. The kids enjoyed themselves to the max this school holidays. I am so glad that we are back to reality and back to the grind. Holiday = money. Oh yes, he also spent a few thousand bucks for the girls’ return-to-school fees and expenses as well as the usual monthly tuition fees and all that jazz in the first week of the new year. Hubs needs to recoup all that was spent. This year, hubs is planning for an overseas trip in November 2014! I’ll see if this materializes…

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Eventful Night At Marina Bay Sands, Singapore (15 December 2013)

On our second night in Singapore, we went to the world-famous Marina Bay Sands Integrated Resort to check out the spectacular night view of the structure as well as to watch the breath-taking multimedia laser show (Wonder Full light and water show). The spectators had to be seated at the door steps, facing the waterfront. In case you do not already know, the casino at Marina Bay Sands is billed as the world’s most expensive standalone casino property at US$5.7 billion.

I was awestruck with the magnificent beauty of the Marina Bay Sands structure and quickly whipped up my Samsung phone to snap pix but shit, I only realized then that my phone battery was already running low at 10% with a warning flashing each time I snapped pix. How wonderful!! So there I was standing at a foreign place, trying to wait for my phone to switch to camera mode at slow motion pace and lo and behold, when I was done snapping the pix, my hubs, 3 daughters and group of friends were no where in my sight! GREAT! And thanks to Miss Itchy Hands who spoilt her daddy’s handphone when she pushed him into the pool, I could not call the hubster! Double whammy! If you had been to Marina Bay Sands, you will know how gigantic this place is. I looked everywhere and all I could see was a sea of people swarming the waterfront, waiting for the laser show to begin. I panicked. I didn’t know where to walk to but just walked up and down anyway, trying my luck to spot familiar faces. Thank God after a panicky 15 minutes, I finally saw the hubs. I felt like hollering and cursing him for leaving me behind, aaaargh! @$#!!

A word of caution, if you are going to this place with young kids (and any crowded place for that matter), please please do hold on to their hands. Our friend almost lost her son that night. We were going to the washroom. She was with her 3 kids. The 2 younger kids were bickering and then the brother just left the sister and tried to walk back to the waterfront. At the washroom when we were queuing up, the sister suddenly cried. My friend became frantic when she could not find her son and asked the girl where her brother was. She was sobbing and sobbing and could not tell. Panic button was pressed. All of us in the washroom became panicky. My friend could not get through to her hubby on her phone and another friend also tried to call but in vain. Finally, the call went through and her hubby went searching for the boy. Thank God for watching over the boy and my friend’s hubby managed to find the boy *cold sweat dribbling down forehead*

Enough of drama ranting. Enjoy the pix taken at Marina Bay Sands. The first two pictures were copied from Google Images as my Samsung phone is not capable of snapping crystal clear pix taken outdoor at night.

The laser show at Marina Bay Sands…

After the laser show, we did some shopping. I bought a pair of Zara jeans for Alycia which cost me RM149 and today, I saw a similar pair of jeans at MNG online selling at a discounted price at RM49! Lesson learned. Never buy from Singapore when the item is not on sale.

Next, we went to Master Toast for supper and the finale was the 2 tubs of Haagen Dazs ice-cream that the hubs bought for the kids, which they enjoyed eating whilst watching this waterfall inside the mall at Marina Bay Sand.

We drove to Orchard Road to check out the X’mas lighting and decor at the shopping malls on our way back to Sentosa Island to our friend’s house.

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Singapore Trip (14 – 16 December 2013)

Our trip to Singapore was by far the best ever holiday for the kids. There were many firsts for the kids — first time to Singapore, first time on a privately chartered boat, first time having BBQ on a boat, first time really swimming in the sea and playing games with a group of friends on the beach, first time sitting on a sea hammock (as shown in the second picture) and first time experiencing a surprise birthday party! Cass was on the upper most deck of the boat, seated next to the ‘gwai lo’ captain most of the time. She really had a wonderful time trying her hands navigating the boat. She loved it up there, though it was pretty dark up there and it was drizzling most of the time that night.

The main purpose of our trip to Singapore was to give our long time pal a surprise birthday party. His wife organized this party impeccably, with perfection in the entire itinerary and made our stay in Singapore tremendously pleasant and unforgettable. A total of 4 families with kids, including our family made up the troop in the surprise birthday party on board the boat. All of us later stayed in our friend’s bungalow in Marina Cove.

Our friend stays at Marina Cove in Sentosa Island. Her bungalow is situated next to the sea. Her plan for the surprise birthday party was to charter a small boat with all her hubby’s male friends on the small boat berthing at the backyard of her house. From there, the group of friends sailed to the nearby wharf at Marina Club, which is minutes away from their house, to join another group in another bigger boat.

When the birthday guy saw us (the other whole jing gang — wives and kids of his buddies on the other boat opposite their boat), the expression on his face was priceless!! The group of guys then moved to the bigger boat to join us — as shown in the third picture.

We then sailed to a nearby beach to have some really crazy time playing like kids! One of the items in the itinerary was to throw the birthday guy into the sea with his clothes on and guess what? A ‘copycat crime’ was to happen the next day which was disastrous!!

We had a BBQ dinner on the boat, followed by tossing with wine, lots of snacks, cheese, grapes and lots of merry and laughter. The night ended with a very interesting ‘bidding/auctioning for gifts’ game. The presents that our friend bought for this game was impeccably chosen as well.

Despite all the fun on the boat, I was feeling yucky — had a very colicky tummy, headache (exposed to long period to the sun!) and worst of all — SEASICK!! Bummer!

At one point, I was on the verge of throwing up during the 5-hour ride on the boat. A nap on the sea hammock (where just below the hammock was the sea and above me was the sky) helped to ease the nauseous feeling.

From the berth where we were to walk to the beach, we had to walk BARE-FOOTED on hot and hard tarred road, uneven pavements and sand to the beach! Gawd, I have not walk bare-footed in such conditions for yonks! And it was the girls’ first time walking bare-footed in that situation — got some”ouches” and “I DON’T WANT” from Cass but after a short while, she was walking on her own merrily again.

After a 3-hour fun on the beach, we had to walk bare-footed all the way back to the berth to take the boat back to Marina Club. While walking back to the berth, we witnessed a very beautiful sunset and I just had to take this picture with hubs 🙂

To be continued…

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Breakfast At TedBoy Bakery @ Bangsar

We had a very early breakfast today as the hubs had to be present at the client’s site in the morning to set up for a mega Hari Raya Open House function for one of his corporate client’s on Tuesday.

So off we left the house at 9:15am for Ted Boy Bakery at Bangsar. Parking was easily accessible for us early birds.

TedBoy Bakery is owned by Edward and Patrina, who name their establishment after their baby boy – Ted Boy. Edward used to run a business overseas while Patrina has pharmaceutical background. The husband and wife team decided on a switch in career in order to spend more time with their Ted Boy. The cafe only serves wholesome and healthy food that Ted can munch on. Their breads and pastries are made with no preservatives and left over breads are donated to charity at the end of everyday.

This photo of Tedboy Bakery is courtesy of TripAdvisor

TedBoy Bakery in the media…

The couple who own TedBoy with their baby Ted. Lucky boy he is to have an awesome bakery named after him eh?

After spending about 15 minutes gazing at the trays of mouth-watering pastries, cakes and artisan breads, the girls picked a banana muffin (of all things, sigh!), a cheese stick and a creamy chicken quiche. The 3 items that the girls chose passed my strict standard in terms of taste and quality 😉

The girls were surprised to see Minion cuppies but they know they cannot get mummy to buy them food with artificial coloring as they know they ain’t good for health…

Scrambled eggs with toast on the left and egg and ham focaccia on the foreground. The healthy fresh Mint Smoothie, which composed of kiwi, pineapple, mango and mint leaves was mine. The egg and ham focaccia that I chose was a tad disappointing as the focaccia bread was not what I had expected. I polished off the ham and egg though and left 3/4 of the focaccia bread untouched.

American breakfast below. Using the ever popular Antipodean Cafe’s similar breakfast set as yardstick, this is given a 6/5 rating vs. 9/10 for Antipodean based on HFM’s food scale rating.

Mushroom soup and toasted bread got a 6/10 rating as well. Mushroom soup was pretty run-of-the-mill and tasted like canned ones. The girls like it very much anyway and they requested daddy to order another set later.

The Spaghetti Pesto got a 9/10 rating from us. The pesto sauce was fresh and the chef was pretty generous with the Pesto sauce. This dish inspired the girls and I to hop over to Village Grocer @ Bangsar Village after breakfast to get some fresh basil leaves and pine nuts to make our own pesto sauce!

The foodie hubs picked a slice of strawberry shortcake and a slice of Awfully Chocolate cake for dessert. We were all so stuffed with our breakfast that we did not really enjoy the cakes. The cakes are given a 7/10 rating on HFM’s food rating scale.

Menu on iPads seem to be faddish these days in many upscale restaurants and Ted Boy Bakery has joined the ranks too. They have iPads mounted on the wall for patrons to browse the menu and for kids to play games while they leave their parents to eat in peace. That was exactly what I saw — a couple who left their son of about 3YO to eat alone whilst he played with the iPad and they ate separately on another table!

Finally came the bill. For the quantity of the food that we ordered which left us stuffed until dinner (we skipped lunch!) and the location of the restaurant (in upscale Bangsar), I’d say that it is pretty reasonable and comparable with other cafes of this stature. Plus, with their loyalty stamp card, we are now entitled to a free cake and sandwich the next time we dine at the bakery! It is little freebies like this which pull the crowd back again.

As we drove past Antipodean after shopping at Bangsar Village, we saw several looooong bee lines outside Antipodean Cafe, located a few doors away from TedBoy! The crowd was unbelievably huge, though expected. In terms of taste and quality, we still prefer Antipodean but as fans of brunch, we want variety and are always hunting for new cafes to try out different menus.

I would foresee us going there again to claim our free items plus to try out other items on their menu 🙂 I am always game when it comes to healthy food.

Tedboy Bakery,
10, Jalan Telawi 4, Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur.
Tel: 03-2202-1312
Open 8am through at least 9pm daily

No. of times viewed = 1589

Our Hazy Sunday – 23 June 2013

We woke up to a house filled with the choking smell of smoke yesterday. I looked out of the window and could not see the KL Tower and KLCC. To escape the terrible smell in our house, we sought ‘refuge’ at Mid Valley Megamall / Gardens Mall and spent a good 6 hours at the mall!

Here’s a pic of the sky line taken on Sunday, 23 June 2013 around 7:30am…

Cass getting ready for her day out at the mall. Check out the smoggy skies…

While the girls, the MIL and the hubs watched Man Of Steel at the cinema, I had over 2 swell hours of retail therapy muahahaha!!

Sadly, we could even smell the acrid smog air inside the mall… check out the gloomy skies caused by the haze, picture taken from the entrance of The Gardens Mall…

After their movie and my 1st round of shopping spree, we had lunch at Korean BBQ. Actually, we had wanted to eat at Sushi Zanmai, but it was full to the brim yet again. Then we went to our second option – Fong Lye Taiwanese restaurant but luck was not on our side… third option was the Fong Lye Fusion restaurant but it was packed too… fourth option was Hokkaido Japanese restaurant but yet, it was full to the brim. So we had no choice but to try out the Korean BBQ restaurant. I guess everyone else was seeking ‘refuge’ at the mall, thus the full house scene at almost all the restaurants.

After lunch, I had another round of shopping, this time with Alycia and Cass at UniQlo as I wanted to bring Alycia to try on some cropped pants. Next, we headed to Alexis for some sinful desserts and coffee.

The pecan pie was generously topped with pecans and caramel, which was simply delish and SINFUL to the max!! The tiramisu at Alexis is our all-time favorite and one of the best we have tasted thus far. From RM10 a slice for their cakes about 10 years ago, the price has gradually risen to RM16 a slice now for almost all their cakes!!

The princess wannabe could not wait to indulge in her slice of chocolate brownie with vanilla ice cream…

A shopping queen in the making.. note how apt her mini tee was for yesterday’s occasion – which is a print of 3 happy shopping girls 😀

Check out the skies of KL today, picture taken at 9:30am on 24 June 2013.

‘Happy holiday’ to all the parents with school-going kids and do stay tuned to the news on when school will be reopened.

No. of times viewed = 2147

Father’s Day 2013

It was a day for the dads on Sunday but the hubs let his angels and me choose the venue for lunch. Since we were at The Gardens (well, our main intention was to go to Professor, the uniform shop to get Alycia some stuff), we chose Sushi Zanmai again. It’s pretty much a suspense whenever we decide to eat at Sushi Zanmai, from the moment we enter the car park right up to the floor where this restaurant is located, coz if we see a long queue (this is likely the case most of the time), all of us would be disappointed. If you are a fan of Sushi Zanmai, you will know how packed this restaurant is, perpetually! No matter what time or day we are at this outlet, we will never miss the sight of a long bee line. For someone with absolutely no patience waiting, I joined in the queue yesterday as I was really raring to get bites of all my favorite food at Sushi Zanmai. Finally, after a 15-minute wait (which ain’t too long as we were pretty early at 11ish am), it was finally our turn, yay!!

After lunch, the girls wanted to watch a movie with daddy while I was to go shopping but the tickets for the movies that they wanted to watch were all sold out. Instead, we detoured to Kids eWorld, where the X-Rider 4D Simulator ride was.

At RM60 for 4 tickets (there was an ongoing buy-3-free 1 ticket promo), we decided to watch a short movie instead!

Since only 4 pax were allowed into the mini cinema, the hubs stayed outside the cinema while watching us on a screen outside the cinema. It was Cass’ first ever 4D movie ride. Towards the end of the 5-minute ride, bubbles (supposedly snow) were shot out inside the cinema. We thoroughly enjoyed this Snow Coaster 2 ride cum movie and promised the girls another ride the next time we are at Gardens.

Photo: That's the 4 of us on the X Rider

This was what daddy got from the girls — home-made card in a bottle, which they made during art class on Friday.

As everyone was pretty bored of having cakes (which would end up in the fridge for days and finally into the bin!), we had something different to celebrate Father’s Day this year. Hubs ordered a giant size 4-flavor pizza from Itallianies @ Gardens. Note how huge the pizza was –teaspoon on the right for comparison. Shocking fact – despite the gigantic size, the 3 girls managed to finish off the pizza for dinner! The Mil and hubs are on a low carb diet too and staved off from this high carb Italian dish. I only took 1 slice — still on a low carb diet to knock off 1kg that I’d gained 🙁

How did you celebrate Father’s Day this year?

No. of times viewed = 758

What We Have Been Up To During The School Holidays

I just realized this morning that I have not updated this blog for almost 6 days! Busy, busy, busy!! School holidays plus being maidless. Just before the school holidays started, our part-time maid who comes in everyday sent me a text message to tell me that she wanted to stop working. Thankfully it was the school holidays and my most reliable daughter, Alycia was able to help me with some of the household chores like washing the dishes, moping part of the floors, cleaning up her own room and folding the clothes. Today, school reopened and I finally have my quiet me time again in the morning *happy grin*

Enough of ranting about how busy I have been (well, I never had the luxury of time anyway ever since the kids came along). I will leave you with some of the pix that we took during the 2 weeks school holidays.

When we were back in Ipoh, we went to Taman Rekreasi Gunung Lang, situated along KK Road. When we reached there, we were all awe struck with the beautiful scenery and serenity of the recreation park. My parents were equally surprised that having lived in Ipoh for decades, they never knew that such a beautiful tourist spot existed!

At the entrance of Taman Rekreasi Gunung Lang and it was sizzling HOT that day!

After the outing, we were all drenched in our own sweat! And then it poured heavily – my dad had to speed home to retrieve the laundry hanging at the porch but we were a tad late. What a day LOL!

The jetty – tourists can take a 5-minute boat ride to the other side to an animal sanctuary.

While waiting for the boat, Cass fed the fishes with fish food. There were tons of huge and obviously very well fed cat fish and carps in the lake.

Boat ride with granny. I wonder why on earth the boat operator did not ask us to wear the safety jackets that were kept nicely on a shelf on the boat!! Are they even aware of the recent fatal boat tragedy in East Malaysia?? What kind of mentality do they have? As usual, only tragedies will wake some people up from their comfortable snooze and shake them away from their lackadaisical attitude.

Over the other side of the lake was a mini zoo. We were attracted to a pair of ostrich, which were caged up together with some deer. The ostriches were taller than all of us.

Photo: ostriches n deer

We will definitely visit Gunung Lang again. The kids loved the boat ride. Cass loved feeding the fishes and Alycia vowed to climb to the top of the play tower on the rope ladder the next time she visits Gunung Lang.

Back in KL, we went to a friend’s apartment at Mont Kiara to have steamboat. This bachelor friend of ours who loves cooking prepared 2 huge pots of soups for the steamboat dinner for over 20 friends. One pot is chicken herbal soup and the other is shark’s bones with prawn shells. There was a huge spread of fish maw, an assortment of balls, assortment of mushrooms, noodles and lots of sliced meat and veggie. We were all full to the brim after the enjoyable steamboat dinner.

It is now back to the grind for the girls and me. The next exam for Alycia will be in August and the last one in October for the 3 girls. And next week will be meet-the-teacher and report card day for us! I just wish that exams will be abolished for primary school kids. It is just too stressful for the kids and the parents.

No. of times viewed = 4412

Weekend Getaway At Westin KL – 26 to 27 May 2013

Our stay at Westin Hotel KL has been a once yearly routine for the past few years as the hubs is entitled to a 1-night free room stay when he renews his membership with the hotel group. This will be our very last time staying at Westin as we have been informed that Westin is discontinuing the hotel membership 🙁 But the hubs is still maintaining his membership with the Hilton Group and our next stay will be at Hilton Sentral 🙂

Our short weekend getaway this time is mainly a shopping spree for me 😀 I went berserk at H&M and grabbed a bag of loot for Alycia. The next day, while everyone else had their swell lunch at one of the restaurants in Fahrenheit, I sacrificed my lunch to have another round of shopping and this time, at Uniqlo, woohoo!! I managed to grabbed all that I wanted for the girls and also grabbed some gorgeous built-in bra tops and built-in bra dresses for myself! I did not mind the least bit skipping a meal as I am now on a diet. I have to melt away the weight I have piled up before our next round of food binging begins this weekend in Ipoh!

Not so healthy deli meat, which I limited the girls to only 1 piece of sausage each. For Cass, it is half a sausage only, as usual with no limit on eggs and fresh juices.

After breakfast, we surveyed the swimming pool before heading back to our room to change into our swimming suits. When Aly agreed for me to have her pic taken, I fumbled with my phone to have this picture taken!

The camera shy girl finally agreed to have her picture taken provided she is covered by Wonder Woman’s body muahahaha! My sweetie pie finally had the chance to flaunt her pink fairy dress which I got for her from my online store.

No. of times viewed = 408

Short Getaway at Westin Hotel – 26 to 27 May 2013

We just got back from our short getaway at Westin Hotel, KL. Will do the updates tomorrow and more pix to come. I need time to transfer the pix from my phone to my desktop PC. Right now, I need to settle 3 loads of dirty laundry and reply to a long list of emails from my customers and advertisers.

First picture of our 2D 1N weekend short getaway…

My camera shy Alycia is as usual shunning the camera, sigh…

No. of times viewed = 2449

Getaway at Hilton Sentral (26 – 27 Oct 2012)

We got back from our short getaway at Hilton Sentral this afternoon and my batteries are now at full bars! We spent our 1.5 days eating and eating and watching TV. I had a good bonding time with Alycia and Sherilyn watching The Voice, US Season 3, for hours * bliss *

My 2 little earnest models, donning on clothes that mummy sells in her online store… These days, rascal #2 prefers to smile with her mouth closed as her 2 front teeth are still missing.

Hello Kitty gals! Alycia with her fake smile as she was forced by tiger mummy to pose LOL! Did I tell you that she hates to be photographed?

The girls having snacks of yummy cookies, cakes, sandwiches, assortment of chocolates, fruits, juices and pastries at the Executive Lounge.

Sherilyn enjoying her bowl of mushroom soup during dinner at the coffee house

View of the pool area taken from our bedroom on the 16th floor. Alycia and Sherilyn went up and down the S shaped slide for more than 50 times this morning. Daddy brought Cass down the slide for the first time yesterday evening and during landing, daddy and Cass went under water for almost 5 seconds. My heart beat flat-lined for almost 10 seconds. When Cass was finally out from the water, she was in a shock and told daddy that she wanted to puke. She must have gulped down mouthfuls of the dirty pool water. And daddy’s heavy body weight must have brought her down underwater together! Coz no one else went underwater during landing lol! Ever since that incident, Cass has now developed a phobia of going down the slide.

The 2 vain pots.

Cass in her pink rabbit swimsuit from mummy’s online store too.

Roaring mummy in a long leopard print dress with a leopard print handbag…. all from my online store too. Leopard print is in the vogue now! I should have brought along my leopard boots too, just kidding 😀

No. of times viewed = 10715

Sushi Zanmai @ The Gardens, Mid Valley City

I know I have blogged about Sushi Zanmai not too long ago but I have to blog about it again as this time, it was an eventful lunch at this Japanese fast-food restaurant with a reputation of serving delish yet affordable Japanese cuisine. First, we could not believe our eyes when we saw that the queue was for once not over 10 meters long, literally and there was no double queue outside the restaurant. So what made this lunch so eventful and unforgettable? Read on but first, pull out a hanky to dab your dribbling saliva ;p

Some of the pre tummy fillers from the conveyor belt whilst waiting for our yummy hot and piping ala carte dishes…

Don’t know what this is called but it tastes like some kind of sea shell. Very tasty and love the texture of the meat.

Must have California rolls for the 3 famished angels…

Health freak mummy’s fat-free salmon sashi — all mine. I was craving for something light that day and it was actually my idea of coming to Sushi Zanmai …

Grilled Saba fish, mine too, for a low-carb freak…

Seafood salad, all mine too!

Beef Sukiyaki…

Beef teppanyaki, which is hubs’ pick…

The girls beaming with joy when they saw that the queue was only this short as compared to the perpetual long queue and overly-packed restaurant that we always see each time we pass by this restaurant.

Though the food was delish and satisfying, I have to say that the super cramped small table that we got spoiled our entire meal at Sushi Zanmai coz you know what? First Miss Clumsy Pot spilled her full glass of cold green tea all over the table and seat. Waitresses had to rush over to our rescue to wipe the table. Minutes later, daddy’s elbow knocked onto a piping hot bowl of noodles with soup and 50% of the hot soup splashed onto his shirt and pants. Cass who was seated next to him was not spared and she yelped out in shock and pain when the hot soup splattered onto her thigh and hands. So the excitement of easily getting a table and having the food served to us in a jiffy all ended in an abrupt halt with 2 messy scenes, just within 15 minutes of being seated at the table. We were all knocking our elbows against each others’ elbows and the table, which was not even a meter long was filled with food, bowls, glasses and things right up to the edge. Well, I guess you can’t have the best of both worlds. You pay this price for good food, do not expect an environment and setting of a 5-star restaurant or hotel.

Sushi Zanmai
Lot T-217
Third Floor
The Gardens
Mid Valley City
Kuala Lumpur

Tel: 03 – 2282 1160

No. of times viewed = 532

Our Sunday – 12 Aug 2012

After lunch at Ishin Japanese Restaurant @ Old Klang Road yesterday, we headed over to Antipodean @ Menara Tan and Tan to have desserts with Alan Yun and Emily Lim, our 2 local celebrity friends. My hubs and I were pretty surprised that the Antipodean outlet at Menara Tan and Tan wasn’t as packed as the outlet at Bangsar. We needn’t wait at all and the restaurant had many vacant tables, which is just so not Antipodean. The crowd at the Menara Tan and Tan outlet is not a patch on the one at Bangsar, which is perpetually packed to the brim.

Here’s what we had at Antipodean…

Macadamia cookie, which was very nutty and not too sweet. My kids and I chomped down 1 cookie which was pretty large and ordered another one.

Ginger Snap, which was too sweet for everyone’s liking.

Lemon Meringue which the hubs picked. Totally not my kind of dessert and my kids didn’t like it either. We did not fancy the foamy stuff (which is egg white + sugar) on top of the lemon pie.

A picture with the stars!

No. of times viewed = 274