HEALTH FREAK MOMMY – Page 285 – The joys and throes of motherhood…

A Fun-filled and Food-filled Week Ahead

Next week we can expect a fun-filled week as my eldest sil from Hong Kong will be here in KL with her 1.5 yo son and my hubby’s heart surgeon uncle from London will also be coming with his wife and 6 mo son. I’m sure my gals will have lots of fun playing with their new cousin and little uncle. There’re also bound to be lots of makan in restaurants and more durians to eat as everyone is just as durian crazed as me, more so for these visitors from overseas deprieved of good quality durian. Today, I’m sure my hubby will buy durian for my mil from the pasar malam as my mil is also a durian lover. I have actually gained 1kg over the last 1 month resulting from eating too much of durian and sitting in front of my computer for long hours. Sitting for long hours is not good and bad for one’s tummy.

I can never resist good quality durians, especially the Musang King, XO, D24 and dunno what it’s called the deep orange colored creamy durian. Fuiyoh, i can just eat 10 seeds of them in 1 day. Yikes, i better have better self-control over my eating habits. I hope no one buys mooncakes too coz if I see them, I will surely indulge in a piece or two of these fattening empty calorie sinful grub.

No. of times viewed = 189

Goong Goong’s Birthday Celebration

We celebrated goong goong’s (my dad) 64th birthday at a Chinese Restaurant last Saturday. We had a real sumptuous dinner and these are some of the dishes we had :

Stewed lamb with radish.

Crispy dried pan-fried prawns with superior sauce.

Steamed fish.

Double-boiled free-range chicken soup with ginseng, flower mushrooms, bamboo fungus, wolfberries and red dates.

Crispy roasted chicken with prawn crackers.

Alycia and Sherilyn enjoying their meals.
Sherilyn giving the thumbs-up to the fried longevity noodles.

There was also a huge delicious chocolate fudge cake and the gals had such a good time gorging on the cake laced with chocolate and sandwiched with rich creamy toffee in the middle. Since it was a holiday, I allowed them to indulge in some sinful food. I too indulged in some sinful food and even skipped my daily morning exercise regime for 2 days.

No. of times viewed = 192

Lucky Day

The early bird certainly catches bountiful of worms. I got up at 5:30am today and saw a bunch of offers on my browser from my favorite advertiser. There were 7 of them but I only accepted 6 coz I know I may not be able to complete them within 2 days. The most difficult part about writing for this advertiser is that there must be 2 non-paid posts between each paid posts, which means that I must have 12 non-paid posts for these 6 paid posts. Now, let me crack my head on what to write. I really need lots of brainwave now to get the ideas surging. Let me go jogging later for that’s when all my writing ideas keep flowing out from my head. Anyway, I must thank my favorite advertiser for giving me these offers, for the prompt approval of my posts and for the prompt payments too.

No. of times viewed = 174

The Gals Are Sticking To Mah Mah Like Glue

Yes they are. Since my mil came back from Hong Kong last night, the gals have been sticking to her like glue and didn’t want to be separated from her. Before bedtime last night, the gals went to mah mah’s room and played on her bed and insisted that they wanted to sleep with her but that didn’t happen as it was already very late and we didn’t want to carry the heavy queen-size mattress from the gals’ room to mah mah’s room. The gals only slept after midnight and woke up at 8am to stick to mah mah again. They were so happy to have a breakfast of fishballs, noodles and kuih with mah mah as I seldom serve them these food for breakfast.

No. of times viewed = 200

Mil is Back

My mil is back from Hong Kong last night and will be staying here for a few weeks before she flies to New Zealand to help my sil with her twins toddlers. Now, I have an extra pair of hands and eyes to help me with the gals. The gals are crazy over their mah mah and are sticking to her like ants to honey. Now that’s good news to me, at least I can work on my computer in peace.

I shall post pictures of the clothes and goodies that my sils in Hong Kong bought for me and the gals. My sil bought soooooo many beautiful and branded clothes for the gals from Hong Kong that I think I don’t have to buy them anymore clothes until next year. There were also lots of Disney and Barney sticker books and colouring books, washable magic colours, a huge bubble-maker gun, ELC educational toys, organic crackers and organic chocolate milk and much more. I also got a trendy Le Sport Sac handbag. The gals are truly blessed to have such a good koo mah and koo koo. Next Monday, this koo mah from HK will come to KL with her 1.5 yo son and maid and stay at our place for a week. It will be the first time Alycia and Sherilyn are meeting their cousin brother and I think they will all have so much fun playing with each other like a house on fire.

No. of times viewed = 199

Sweet and Sour Minced Chicken Meat

This is another simple and very tasty dish for kids and adults too. Alycia loves it very much.

Ingredients :
Chicken breast, coarsely blended and marinated with soya sauce and pepper
3 ripe tomatoes, blended
1 Bombay onion, cut into rings
Chopped garlic
Freshly chopped spring onions
Around 2 tablespoons of tomato sauce
Mixed herbs and Lea and Perrin sauce (optional)

Method :
Fry the garlic and bombay onions until fragrant. Put in the blended chicken meat. Stir fry for another 5 minutes. Add in the blended tomato paste and tomato sauce. Fry for another 5 minutes and add in the spring onions after the fire is turned off.

I normally make one big batch and store them into individual tupperware containers and deep freeze them. The following day or days later, I will cook spaghetti or pasta and use this as the sauce or make pizza bread using this as the topping.

No. of times viewed = 184

New Books From Granny

My mum bought the gals lots of new books, jig-saw puzzles and foam puzzles when we were in Ipoh and the gals had fun reading the new books and playing with the new puzzles with granny.

The gals love the series of books under Thematic Reading Scheme, a local publisher. It is also easy for me to read to them as the words are big and on one page whilst the pictures are on another page, so the gals won’t get distracted by the pictures when I read to them.

Hello Kitty and Mickey & Minnie Mouse jig-saw puzzles.

Foam puzzles.

No. of times viewed = 390

Alycia Is Off Diapers During Naptime Today

As I was in a good mood this afternoon, I decided to try letting Alycia go diaperless during her afternoon nap. After the naptime story, I asked Alycia if she’d like to sleep without her diaper today. To my surprise, Alycia nodded and said “I don’t want to wear diaper”. I then praised her and put her potty next to the mattress on the floor and told her that if she wants to wee wee, she has to do it on her potty. I also placed a piece of water-proof paper on top of the water-proof plastic mat, just in case of accidents.

An hour later, I woke Alycia up and brought her to pee in her potty. She wasn’t cranky at all but was smiling proudly as I gave her lots of praises, hugs and kisses. An hour later again, as she was still deep in her sleep, I whispered this into her ear “baby, you are not wearing diaper, please don’t wee wee in your pants ok?” to which Alycia nodded with her eyes closed. She woke up half an hour later with her pants still dry! I am so proud of her. Hopefully Alycia will be diaperless too at night real soon. That can save me so much money on her expensive XXL Mamy Poko diapers and XXL Drypers diapers.

No. of times viewed = 273

TigaP Issues Again

One of my posts which got rejected by TigaP was rejected again, the 3rd time on the same post. The first time, they said I used sentences from the web release and advertiser’s site. The 2nd time, they said I didn’t put in enough links to the advertiser’s site (i think they imposed this condition after i had submitted my post, from 3 links to 5 links) and the 3rd time, they were really nit-picking on me. They said I posted this post after a paid post. I never knew they dont even allow TigaP posts to be posted after a non-TigaP paid post. I thought we have to include a non-paid post after the TigaP post but now, looks like the TigaP post MUST be sandwiched between TWO NON-PAID posts which cannot be tags or scraps or any posts which do not look like a non-paid post. Is that a known rule for all TigaP posts to be sandwiched by 2 non-paid posts? Just so pissed off with TigaP, wasting all my time just fixing one post.

No. of times viewed = 272

Tag : 8 Random Phats About Moi

Why is everyone so into the phat (8) tags lately? This is already my 3rd tag related to phat phat phat. Thanks to this slim mum for this tag. Here are the phat (8) random facts about moi :

1) I was born and bred in Ipoh and have been living in KL for 16 years.
2) I started to learn piano at the age of 6, swimming at the age of 7 and ballet at the age of 8.
3) I was awarded the Best Secretary award when I was in Secretarial College and was a Dean’s List holder for 2 semesters. I can also type very fast and can take shorthand at 150 words per minute.
4) I learnt life-saving techniques and took a Bronze Medallion test in swimming when I was 14 years old.
5) I had a terrible honeymoon in Phi Phi Island 7 years ago where I stepped onto a school of sea-urchins whilst snorkelling and hobbled for 1 month+. I finally underwent a minor surgery on the sole of my foot to have the spikes removed.
6) I crashed my very first car onto an office building when I first learnt to drive. Luckily the insurer took care of the cost of repair done to the building and my car.
7) My sense of direction sucks. So, please never ask me for directions.
8) I drink at least 12 glasses of plain water everyday and am very fastidious about my health and vanity.

I’m now passing the phat choi tag to these 8 great mommies:

Hui Sia
Baby Shern
Lovely Mummy
Mummy In Vain
Chin Nee
Mummy to Chumsy
Rambling Moo
Shireen Loh

No. of times viewed = 208

They Love Noah’s Ark

Alycia has always loved the story Noah’s Ark. She liked it even more ever since she watched the movie Evan Almighty, a rendition of the modern Noah’s Ark. Yesterday as Sherilyn was sitting on her potty doing her poopie business, Alycia took out a cloth book on Noah’s Ark (which I had bought for her years ago from my church), pulled out a stool to sit next to Sherilyn and began ‘reading’ to her sister. Alycia certainly did a good job as she even mimicked the way I normally read to them, i.e. pointing to the words as I read.

No. of times viewed = 259

New Books

It’s been almost a month since I bought these new books for the gals and so far, they’ve still not shown any signs of boredom with the books. In fact, they love the books and would plead with me to read each of the book to them everyday before their afternoon nap. It’s the gals’ routine now – before nap in the afternoon and before bedtime at night, they would insist on being read to.

This book gives simple and easy to understand illustration on addtion and subtraction.

A book on simple grammar.

This book teaches sounds made by different objects and animals.

This is Sherilyn’s favorite book and is all about Teddy and its balloon coz Sherilyn is balloon-crazed too.

No. of times viewed = 220

Sweet Memories

As promised, when I was back in Ipoh, I’d taken pix of hubby’s love cards to me during our courting days. Most of the cards were DIY cards by hubby who, I must admit is quite an artistic person.

This is my very 1st Valentine’s Day card from hubby, received when I was barely 14 years old.

Hubby made this card himself to send me his best wishes for my SRP exam when I was 15 years old.

Hubby made this Valentine’s Day card for me, which was my 2nd Valentine’s Day card from him, when I was 15 years old.

Another DIY Valentine’s Day card from hubby to me, when I was 16 years old.

I’m sure many of you would be curious as to when I first met my hubby and when we first started dating. He met me in my old house in Ipoh when he came to visit my big brother (they were classmates) and it was love at first sight for him. I was only 12 years old then and he was 13+ years old. We only went out for our first date when I was 17 yrs old and we got married 10 years later.

No. of times viewed = 306

Back in KL

Just got back from Ipoh a moment ago. I have had a good break back at my hometown. Didn’t do much blogging, aside from posting 2 paid posts as the due date is today. Anyway, I took a lot of pix of hubby’s DIY cards to me during our courting days, some even date back to 20 years ago! Shall be posting those pix soon, as well as some of my old pix taken with The Imperfect Mom 20 years ago when we were 14 years old.

I also ate quite a bit of good Ipoh food and my dad’s cooking, woke up at 7am on two mornings straight (which is quite a rare event), didn’t wake up at crazy hours to check for offers and even skipped exercising! Gotta get back to work tomorrow – both exercising and blogging.

When I got down from the car, I saw that my letter box was filled with mail. I was actually expecting a cheque from Review Me and true enough, the first letter on top of the pile of letters was indeed from Review Me. Thank God it didn’t rain yesterday or today, else my cheque would have been soaked. Though the cheque is only for the amount of USD160, I am nevertheless very happy receiving my first cheque from RM. When I was in Ipoh, my brother also gave me my money which was transferred from my PayPal account in Singapore to his Singapore bank account. It’s really great tasting the fruit of my own hard labour.

BTW, this post marks the 500th post in my blog!

No. of times viewed = 195

Fun with Sculptured Balloons

After daddy had sculptured the sausage-shaped balloons into animals, flowers, a disfigured Pink Panther and swords for the gals several days ago, the gals had fun playing with them for the next few days.

The stalk of the flower-shaped balloon had burst, so I transformed it into a flower-shaped balloon hair clip for Sherilyn.

Alycia decorating the disfigured Pink Panther balloon with magic color. This is quite messy though as the ink comes off easily from the balloon, thus staining everything in contact with it.

No. of times viewed = 206

Video – Sherilyn The Wannabe Musician

No. of times viewed = 190