A Day Out Doing House Stuff

Sorry for the long silence folks. I was away in chilly Oz from 27th July till 4th August for a 9day 8 night getaway (in lieu of my impending shackles to Motherhood) and since we've been back in hazy KL, we've been busy with house stuff.

As many of you know by now, we will be moving into our corner terrace next Friday and you know what? There are so many things that still need 'tweaking', correcting and construction! It's mighty scary. We can't really postpone the move also due to many factors.

Anyway, yesterday the professional mover manager, Mr Kumar, came to take a look at how much barang we had accumulated over the years to give us a quote for our moving house. That was at 11am. He didn't stay for more than a minute after I brought him our our minute apartment and told him the items that were supposed to be moved.

Alan fetched me after work and we went to pick up quite a few things for the house.

Firstly we went to SS2 to try on the Elizabeth bed in Dunlopilo. We had purchased the Grandeur Luxury at the furniture fair a few months back but NOW THEN THEY TELL US they have no stock. So Alan was persuaded to upgrade to the Elizabeth bed for a couple of hundred ringgit more. :P

Before that, we had lunch at KTZ but it was disappointing and the quality of the food was lacking, unlike the outlet in Kepong. :( Our curry noodles were OILY to the MAX and the chicken inside was fillet :p

After trying the bed, we went to purchase lock sets of our new doors. We took at least an hour to choose lock sets for the main door, masterbedroom, toilets, guest rooms etc and were served by a very jovial Vivian.

We then headed to Puchong to pick up our switches (at Innova) and pay for our stove (at Benova - which we will collect after we move in) and pick up our kitchen pendent lights ( at Asia Lighting - they did not hv what we had ordered as the production factory in China had closed) so we made do with something else :P Malaysian service standards are quite quite bad , as u can tell :P

Then we hurried back to the house thinking that we could pass the items to the workers. But of course, they had knocked off already :P (The construction workers knock off before 5pm here in this country!)

Next stop : Desa Park City to pay for our entertainment system. Dinner was at Secret Recipe and I had the Viet noodles whilst Alan had his lamb shank. We shared a stale piece of White Choco Macademia nut cake. Then we popped into the art gallerys to check out some paintings for our house. I was super exhausted by then - lugging around a kid in the belly is no joke. How do kangaroos do it?!! :O

At the same place housed a Petsmore and that was great becos dog food was running out. We picked up Heartguard, vitamins and a pack of Natural Balance (for our fussy eaters) and then headed to Jusco to quickly pick up some fruits. There's nothing (sans birdsnest) in my fridge (mum don't nag) .

Last stop: Jansen Art Gallery. We had bought a huge Australian painting for a couple of thousand Aussie dollars and Alan had sent it for framing the day before. It was done! We tried to pick it up but then, it was too huge to fit in the Volvo. It will be delivered one of these days...

We went back home super exhausted and fell into a deep sleep before the clock struck midnight.

Ramblings of a Sick mama

Sad to say, I've been down with the flu for the past 4 days. GOod grief. There cannot be a better time ;P We are hopping onto MAS on Monday morning to get to Perth. I hope I will be in the pink of health then but how can I get better w/o any medication??? ArGHHHh! Maybe I should take another dose of birdsnest again before I leave.

Anyway, things have become hectic recently. My tuition frequency increased because of the school holidays and there are a million and one house stuff items to settle - not that I've been much help in that department. Alan the poor dear has taken it upon himself to do everything - yes , I mean EVERYTHING.

Our ID consultant, a young girl named Vivian from Yuan Designs is not a help at all. She gets pushed around by her own contractors etc and till date, has not even given Alan a work schedule (like OMG, we are slated to move in in ard 2 weeks time please!) Alan has popped by the house every single day to jagah the works and there has been a great deal of frustration. Well, one thing Yuan Designs is good for is their knack of overpricing their goods and services like crazily. Alan has outsourced many an item to outside contractors of his own lobang and we have saved quite a huge percentage of the predicted pricings. (E.g. they must be mad to charge us RM3,800 for the main door to the house when Alan can get it for RM700!)

I am also very excited by the proposed garden area. There will be little moulds with bonsais and the garden and living room will be flanked by bamboo plants. I think the effect will be very nice and enticing enough for me to sit outside, brave the heat and mozzies and read a book or two.

I am still sourcing for wall stickers, though, for Ethan's room. Need some inspiration - We have decided to paint his room (dark) blue and bright yellow - Gimme a C! Gimme an R! ..... :P
ANd there's this little area (with 3 walls) surrounding the room's window through which sunlight streams in and that little area is gonna be the designated play / reading area. :) So ExCiTiNG! Like a mini-project for me. ;)

We still have yet to go to Ikea to pick up other necessary / extravagant stuff. But that can wait. The move-in is slated for 14th August from 11am to 1Pm. Wish us luck!

crawl away

This week has been crawling past amist sprained asses and flu-like syndroms, the scolding of students and hearing the naggings of their concerned parents. I havent really packed for Australia yet. Have been very lethargic and slow in e'thing I do.

My ankles are swollen yet again and I tire even more easily than before. Perhaps it's due to the flu? On a brighter note, Ethan hasn't been kicking o-so-violently anymore - just once in a while, especially 3/4 way through dinner (as he savours all the good food). He is mostly starved during lunch as I make do with a sandwich or (like yesterday) when I had Korean Instant noodles (yuMZ!) Most of the time, I try to buy back my lunch during dinner the night before.

There's again absolutely nothing in the fridge sans the big big moulds of birds nest and some dried scallops. One can hardly have birds nest with scallops for lunch, can I? hahaha.

This morning, I woke up to Coco's vomit and diahoerra. *sigh* The poor baby is SICK! N his poor Mum (me lah) had to bathe him and clean him up immediately after she woke up. What a nice way to greet a Thursday eh? :P

I have tuition later with the twins and tomorrow I have two classes - one with Dania and the other with Hayden and that will mark the end of my 'work week'. and then it's time to pack my bags and fly to the land where cows roam. :D

A 3 hour Power Cut!!!!!!!!

Monday 20 July 2009

We went to our house again after Alan had knocked off from work. This time, the mission was to choose the colour of the paints for the various walls. Once that was done, we proceeded to Robson's for something Alan had been craving for in a while... CRABS.

We ordered two big, big (but turned out small small and insignificant) chilli crabs, deep fried buns and also a claypot toufu with veges and munched our way to the high heavens. We double boiled birds nest for the baby, mummy and daddy also as a nutritious dessert and to wash down the oil. hahaha

At 3am, I was awoken to a room of stuffiness and stillness. SHIT. The power supply had been cut. Now if you didn't know already, KL is well-known to have unstable power supply and during the wee hours of this morning, this cruel fact proved true.

I initially did not want to wake Alan and tried my best to keep still and not perspire but when he roused , we both went to check the circuit box only to find out that the whole neighbourhood was in darkness. (kinda scary, imagine) We both went back to bed after a while (and after opening the windows) and tossed and turned for all of 3 hours before the power came back on at 6am.

What a horrible experience. :P

Tuesday 21 July 2009

I just had Hayden for 1+ hour again, in my stupor. Luckily I had slept in till 9am but this did not remove much fatigue. I shall rest again later. I can only imagine how tired Alan is today, at work. Poor thing!

Another tiring weekend

Friday 17 July 2009

After Dania left from class, I decided to treat Alan to a nice meal since he had been working so hard on our new house. The poor fella is so haggard and tired-looking that the wife's heart is pained!! :(

We made our way to the crowded The Gardens Mall and had ourselves a yummi-licious mega meal at Tony Romma's. Alan wanted his coveted Pork Ribs but we again realised, to our disappointment that no pork was served in the restaurant, even though it's not halal and they serve alcohol. *sigh*

He settled for a combo meal, made up of 1/4 chicken and some beef ribs and I had half a chicken roasted to fill my belly.

Saturday 18 July 2009

Tired out from the whole week, we slept in this morning and only left the house at around 2pm. We each had a hot chocolate and shared a blueberry cheese muffin before popping into Cres for our monthly facial.

After the beauty regime, we walked around MVMM. We needed bedsheets/ comforter etc for the guest room (and we need them soon because my inlaws / mum is coming) but there was nothing nice at Jusco and even Aussino. :P

and went to purchase and pick up the baby's changing table. I used my voucher and got 25% off but it still cost RM524. *sigh. Having a babe is expensive man!

Because of our induced stupor, we were very very lethargic and decided to have a quick dinner at Subway before heading back home to rest.

Sunday 19 July 2009

We were at the park again at 930 - 1030am for Coco's weekly training. Mdm Yap, the nice trainer also allowed Jay Jay to join in the class for a refresher course. haahhaa. Both doggies did well and we quickly left once the class ended to dump them back at home, take a shower and then head down to our new house. (Coco tired out from his training)

We met Vivian, our ID there at around noon and after some discussion, treated her to d'lish at Bangsar Shopping Village for lunch. I had the yummy Vietnamese Phoa and Alan had his Sphagetti Marinara. Vivian settled for a salad as she was like 1/2 a vegetarian. ahahha.

After that, it was off to Jln Ipoh to choose our lights. We chose the downlights for all the rooms, and also a pendent light for our dining area and one big pendent light for our staircase area. Alan also chose this futuristic 3-bulb foyer light for our car porch. Time flew by and it was almost 4pm when we all left.

Our next stop was SS2 to pick up our electronic appliances. Before we picked out our items, we each had a yummy Secret Recipe cake next door. Alan finally decided on the Toshiba fridge and the LG washing machine. We also picked up a microwave together. All appliances will be delivered on 11/8 a couple of days before we move into the house.

Although exhausted, we headed next to Laura's shop in Sungei Besi. I needed to custom make a big cabinet for my tuition stuff (to accompany the tuition table in our living room #2) and Alan, Mr Perfectionist, discussed with Laura the dimensions whilst I stoned away in the corner, fatigued.

Dinner was at PJ and our usual Ipoh chicken rice haunt. Alan then popped in next door to pick up his prizes from a DVD shop which we had purchased some items from around 2 months ago. hahaha We had taken part in a luck draw and won the consolation prize of 1 dvd, 1 cd, 1 blue -ray and 1 mtv disc. quite cool huh? We picked up two more drama serials to join our collection - 1 about the HK immigration department (which Zesa says is exciting) and the other about a pyschiatrist (which Zesa says is interesting). My daughter is a dvd-addict!

After that, we headed home super zonked out but very fulfilled. zzzzzzzzzz

Fish Head curry wonders

Wednesday 15 July 2009

Happy Birthday Sharon!!! :)

After tuition at 8pm today, we went out for a feast at Robson's. Both of us were starving and we ordered a steamed fish, fried pigs intestines and also a plate of vegetable.

Thursday 16 July 2009

We headed out early to visit a nursery (NO NO NOT THE BABY TYPE) to try to get someone to do up our garden. However, the nursery at Klang Lama did not offer such services and specialises mainly in bonsais. hmmmm According to Lilian Too, one should not have bonsais in one's house because it represents stunted growth and little progress. Anyway we are looking for colourful and pretty plants which need virtually no maintanence (I am THAT lazy).

We visited our house again but I didn't go in this time because workmen were still there and drilling away. Alan did his bit of telling the workmen what to do and then we went off to grab a bite. He brought me to eat Indian fishhead curry and fried sotong opposite Bangsar Shopping VIllage. This stall is like a makeshift one along the roadside which gives you the impression that you might have the runs after savouring its delectable fare. But since Alan had feasted there before and his weak stomach did not display any signs of antagonism, we concluded that this preggers mama could follow suit as well.

The fish head was HUGE and we gasped as the Indian server laid it down on our table in front of our very eyes. All the same, we polished off every bit of meat and even had the stomach to enjoy the 4 fried squid that accompanied our meal. hahahaa. The bill (including 1 teh terik) = RM 50. Quite worth it , huh?

Friday 17 July 2009

I have 4 hours of classes lined up today and we have decided against catching Harry Potter this evening because after I finish class it will be already dark. Tomorow we will be going to MVMM perhaps to visit the furniture exhibition (again??!!) and also for our coveted facial at Cres at 3pm. YaY!!! My face needs salvation!!!!!

An irate child

I've just received a disturbing email: No no, please don't think along the lines of nude pictures and threatening chain letters. It was written from Mike, one of the care-takers in Mama Sayang, the orphanage in Jakarta.

For those who don't know, Alan and I are sponsering a child there and have been since 2008. We have even visited the orphanage and her last year to celebrate X'mas together and bring her (and a couple of children) out to a theme park in Jakarta.

To cut the long story short, this girl has managed to wrangle herself outta the orphanage and back home (to a place where no one seems to care two hoots about her). Apparently in those years she was staying at the orphanage, not one family member has called / visited her to find out how she was doing . The problem was that she is very reserved and quite a moody fella and did not have many friends in the orphanage as well.

She now loses the chance of a proper education and even a degree and now will be destined to a life without a future. Life at Mama Sayang is also very meaningful and really a haven away from the storms of the outside world. Very silly move! *sigh* As 'parents' of such an irate and unappreciative child, Alan and I are very shocked and disheartended, having read the news of her departure just this morning.