Update on House Repair

After a week or so, with an increase number of 1 worker to 3 last week, they have helped to speed up the work a little. They managed to remove the bath tub from the master bed room and the shower tray from the common bath room, glad that we decided to remove them because there are leakages and water have been retained underneath, the downstairs ceiling are falling off due to the water sipping in over the years. To avoid same problem happen in the future, layers and layers of water proofing have been applied on the bathrooms floor before tiling can be done, normally takes up several day for it to dry up totally, some delay now to avoid future headache.

Floor tiles have been laid for the room downstairs, the tiles appeared to be a bit beige instead of cream, but it's ok. The dinner and living room fallen ceiling have been touched up, under coating has also been applied to the walls, just need to be repainted.

Our nephew introduced a good carpenter who will be helping to repair the built in wardrobe and kitchen cabinets which initially we thought of getting rid of them, actually the wood are in good condition, just need a good carpenter to reform them.

Inspected the house today, there are still a long way to fully get the whole house repaired. We will have to leave the kitchen, front and back yard for later. These areas can be done even when we have moved in.

Helping out with house work

My girls are willing to help out with the laundry whenever I ask them to, though with lots of "intervals" before finishing their tasks, they always fold the laundry and put them away nicely in the respectively drawers.

I have to come around to check on the progress every now and then, I always find them reading books, checking on their computer game or playing with their toys, that's what I call the "intervals", I will have to get them back to finish up with their job again.

With additional part time assignment on hand, I really need their helps on some of the house chaos, as they are still small there are nothing much I can assign to them apart from training them to tidy up the house, keeping their closet neat, sweeping the floor occasionally and some other light tasks. We do anticipate more house chaos after we move into our double storey home next month. Their little helping hands would definitely help me a lot.

Dad's 74th Birthday

It's a sleepy Monday for me, can't wait to head home for a nice nap but again that's quite impossible when I am working for a boss.

Our weekends have been busy and have not been able to have some rest.

We celebrated my father's 74th birthday on Saturday. I felt pretty exhausted that I didn't feel like baking a cake so I called up my colleague to order a cake thought I could get a good discount from them as a staff of the holding company, but the price quoted to me is too expensive even after discount. Finally I decided to bake a simple butter cake for my father, luckily I have all the ingredients that I need except 2 bars of butter which is easily obtainable with just a phone call away (Clet was just at the nearby shop). I managed to get the cake baked just slightly over midnight on Friday.

Ensond & Anneliese rushing to blow the candles

After more than a year break from taking any competitions outside the school since she started primary education, Crystal went for a fun and easy "Spot The Difference" contest on Sunday, that's yesterday. I do not mind letting her join in the competition as there is no preparation needed prior to the contest. She was ever so relax that she did not even bring any stationery (not even a pencil). The contest was held at Central Shopping Plaza. At the site, the parents were the ones busier than the kids, carrying their kids' tables, chairs, bags and kept reminding their kids what to do and what not before the contest. Needless to say much, I am also one of this kind of parent, rushing to find a pencil and eraser for Crystal in the shopping complex.

Contest in progress

The contest suppose to take 1 hour to finish but Crystal only took like 15 minutes to spot all the differences. She came all the way from the 3rd floor to Ground Floor supermarket to look for me where I suppose to spend the 1 hour to do some shopping. Giving me a shock!

The winners

She won herself a trophy from this contest, requested me to drive her home at a lightning speed to show her daddy and Pearl.

Part time work from home job

Just to extend what I am already doing in my current job, I am taking up part time book-keeping and accounting job to do at home. This part time tasks was passed over to me from my auditor friend when I indicated to her that I too would like to do some freelance accounting jobs.

Last week I went to my client's office and loaded up my car boot with over 10 files. I have got a dateline to meet, that is to complete and finalise the accounts by the middle of May in order for them to submit the taxes by June 2011. Very tight schedule for me to complete the whole year's accounts in just a month time, at the same time I will have to start packing get ready to move to our new home. I can feel the pressure now! Since I have agreed to take up the tasks, I can not let my client down!! Notice has also been given to our landlord that we are moving out by the middle of May, so there are going to be a major packing works to be done, all at the same time!!

Here comes the extra work, extra income and inevitable extra pressure and lesser free time, all in a package!

Purple Chilli

While busy washing the dirty dishes in the kitchen, Clet told me that he brought back a pot of purple colour chili plant from her sister, Monica. What Purple Chili? With curiosity I checked it out the next day morning. I found a tiny chili plant with purple and red chillies, this is the first time I saw purple chillies as far as my memories can bring me.

I took some photos and showed them to my colleague who likes to plant chili, I know she will love to have some purple chili seeds to add on to her home farming at her backyard. She is using fertiliser from worms' compose. I would like to see how this chili will turn out to be with her worm's compose.

If you don't like to eat chili, this chili plant can also be a good house plant, it is very unique to me.

Update on House Repair

Here are some updates on our house repair. Though we are trying to minimize the repair work, it seems that changing of roofing, piping, wiring and tilings are inevitable at some parts of this a couple of decades old house.

repairing work in progress at the living and dining areas.

parts of the roofing in the master bedroom has been taken off, notice that a water tank is sitting on that 3 pieces of wood, it looks scary to me (whose knows it will fall down one day :(, so we are removing the water tank away from the ceiling and will be replacing one at the back of the house.

chunk and pieces of broken wood taken off from the ceiling and kitchen cabinets

We have set a time line to get the works done by the 1st week of May in order for us to start moving in.

House repair

The tenant of our house that we bought last October has surrendered the keys back to us on the last day of March 2011. When we bought the house, there was a ready tenant, we let them continue to stay there until a couple of months back he was unable to pay for his rental on time so he decided to move out for good.

Last Saturday, I brought my girls to view the inside of the house for the first time (I have never been inside the house when we bought it) when Clet was clearing and cleaning up the mess there. A lot of cleaning up and touching up for this 20 over years old house. We decided to touch it up a little in an inexpensive way just to allow us to move in as soon as possible before another month is up to pay for our rented house.

We do not intend to do any renovation work at the moment, there is no budget for it. Clet will do the touching up of the house with the help of one or two workers . the work started yesterday. According to him, a lot has been done to remove the broken cement ceilings yesterday and today another worker came in to cut the long wild grass at both the front and back yards.

Clet is working his mind out to get the house in shape for us to move in. Will update on the progress again in my coming posts and I have a lot of catching up to do with my blogger friends as I have not been blogging and visiting their blogs for a while now.

Some update & rewards from taking survey

I have been taking a time off blogging lately due to heavy workloads both in the office and at home. I am taking on extra assignments to do at home that means the already little free time I used to have is diminishing. Anyway, hope the effort that I am putting right now will create more flexible and free time for me in the near future. This is just a little update on me!!

I am delighted to find a mail from Global Test Market in my post box this morning, a mail that I have been waiting for since 4 - 6 week ago when I claimed for my reward points. A RM148.63 cheque for taking surveys, not bad at all!!

Bills and dues come through the mail box most of the time, receiving money through mail box definitely gives a different kind of feeling, delighted and more!

This is the first time I received rewards from taking survey in a form of money. Taking surveys is just another form of earning some extra pocket money, it's will take a while to accumulate enough points to check out/redeem. The minimum redeemable points from Global Test Market is 1000 points which is equivalent to the amount that I received.

Gong Xi Fa Cai 2011

It's really been a while since I last posted on my blog. I have been and still pretty busy on my daily chaos that I have to set aside my beloved blog. It's going to be days long Chinese New Year holiday, I have got to make a point to update this special occasion and to wish all a very happy and prosperous Chinese New Year 2011, let's all of us enjoy a healthy and fruitful Rabbit Year ahead.

After having a half day work in the office on the eve of Chinese New Year, I came back home to find a registered post waiting for me on the table, it's a little Angpow that I claimed from taking surveys from one of the survey companies. I received 2 KFC redemption vouchers worth RM10.00 each. Taking surveys are fun and rewarding.

We had our Family gathering dinner at brother, Alfred's house, where my mum and SIL, Catherine cooked a table full of dishes. I did not help cos I am not a good cook, scare to spoil the soup :D, my usual task is to help clean up after the dinner, so I took a nap at home to refresh myself before the dinner.

Mum busy arranging the dishes even after long hours of cooking

We had a good dinner and looking forward to more food and gathering with family members and friends in this Chinese New Year!! Gong Xi Fa Cai everyone!!

Boudreaux's Butt Paste for your little ones

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Boudreaux's Butt Paste. All opinions are 100% mine.

The long hours of using diapers are the main cause of diaper rash for babies.  Their skin is so tender that even a mild diaper rash will cause much pain and uncomfortable for the little ones.

I still remember at one time my daughter suffered from diaper rash, she couldn't sleep well, lost her appetite and becoming very cranky day and night, it was a very tiring and frustrating experience for us.  The problem was all solved when I was introduced to using Boudreaux's Butt Paste.  It soothed the irritated skin after applying it.  To avoid the recurrence of diaper rash, I applied it on my baby girl each time I changed her diaper.  It goes on and cleans off easily.   I always bring along a flip top cap handy travel size whenever I go travel.  

Boudreaux's Butt Paste was specially formulated by a pharmacist under the direction of a respected pediatrician to treat diaper rash and soothes irritated skin.  This effective skin protectant contains Peruvian Balsam and 16% Zinc Oxide with very pleasant scent, I believe it can also be used by adults who are using diapers.

This product was featured on several popular talk shows like Oprah Show, Today Show and Tonight Show as well as the People Magazine.

There are various sizes to choice from, 1oz, 2oz, 3oz and 4oz tubes, and 16oz jar being the largest size.  Visit Boudreaux's Butt Paste website today to receive a free sample.  Boudreaux's Butt Paste is the best solution in treating diaper rash.

Blogging for Money

Majority of the bloggers are earning some form of rewards and some extra income through their blogs. Blogging is fun, and through blogging we are able to meet new friends whom have the same interests like us, the best thing is we are able to earn extra money just by doing the things we like to do, i.e. to update and share our interests through our blogs.

If you have a blog, why not start blogging for money? To find the legitimate sites that pay the bloggers for the efforts is hard to find. Recently I have found a site called YouSayToo. This site shares their adsense / amazon revenues equally(50/50) with their members, and for those who like to play online games, there are boxhead 2 and age of war for you in this site.

Check on YouSayToo now, I am sure there are good stuff for bloggers who are looking for additional avenue to earn some extra money.

Finding Free Online Learning Games with Educational Value

All a parent has to do is conduct a simple Internet search for children’s educational activities and they will discover that numerous free online learning games

Essentially, in order to recognize the educational value of free online learning games, you need to figure out what benefits each individual activity will offer your child. How can you make this discovery? The following are three tips you may find useful:

• A website that offers valuable learning activities will indicate the types of skills that are improved by the game (i.e. reading, visualization, counting, comprehension, memory, verbal rehearsal, attention and focus, problem solving, etc.)
• Look for games that have more than one level or stage. Children have different skill levels and in order for a game to be more than just entertaining it needs to provide kids with a manageable challenge. Kids need to think in order to boost their brain power.
• Choose interactive games. A game that is interactive is exciting for a child to play because it makes them an integral part of the experience as it is dependent on the choices they make and the actions they take. These types of activities automatically help to improve a child’s hand-eye coordination skills and thought processing.

In essence, make sure the free online learning games you pick are quality educational tools. This can be found out with a little investigating.

Dad is coming home

Just a short note to welcome my dad home today.

Yes, my dad finally received a green light from the doctor yesterday allowing him home this morning. I was delighted to receive this good news from my brother upon arriving home yesterday evening. Everyone show a sign of relieve, popping in and out of the hospital is over for us after a week, seems like a long week.

This morning, brother Alfred, happily getting ready to fetch my dad from the hospital. I am sure there are some waiting to get the discharge paper work done in the hospital, payment and collection of medicine from the pharmacy, my father will only be home around noon time.

Now it's time to get ourselves ready for Christmas!

When Parent is ill

All of us in the family are taking turns popping in and out of the hospital since last Friday. My dad has been admitted to the hospital again after complaining of diarrhea and felt weak, scare of any eventuality, we decided that sending him to the hospital is the best choice, though my dad refuses to do so.

We hope my dad will be discharged after a day or two of observations but now into the 6th day there is still no indication of letting him out from the hospital. He has started to feel very uncomfortable, impatient and gets annoyed easily because of staying too many days in the hospital. No places are more like at home.

I noticed that many of the sickly old folks are taken care by the hired maid in the hospital now. The family members will only come visit whenever convenient due to work and family commitment. These maids are very eager to take care of a few of the sick people at the same time, basically they stay, eat, bathe and sleep in the hospital. We were approached by a couple of them who wanted to offer their service to take care of my dad, and their charges is RM70.00 a day (24 hours) which is pretty high. The nurses also encourage us to hire the maid so that their work will be lessen or no care needed from them because the hired maid will do most of the stuff for the patient. The nurses will only come round to take blood pressure reading, blood sugar test that kind of routine. A lot of cares are being neglected by the nurses.

I am surprise to know that some nurses do not even know what treatment the patient is going through at this point in time. For example, they just leave the pills on the side table asking my father to take his medicine after breakfast without knowing that his left side body is paralyzed, the pills on the right side table is beyond his reach.

Just hope that my dad will be discharged by tomorrow. We know that he misses his grand children at home very much and they miss their grandpa too..

My birthday 2010

I baked a birthday cake 4 days ahead of my birthday simply because my birthday falls on a working day, I would have no time to decorate the cake, I just want to relax and get myself ready for a birthday dinner at Pizza Hut right after I get back from work today.

My girls wanted to help me out on the cake. They did a good job though messed up a little. They are picking up the skills while I am pursuing my quest in baking and decorating cakes.

This is a Chocolate and coconut with peach layer sponge cake. A combination of chocolaty and tropical flavour in one, decorated with gum paste flowers. The cake is moist and soft. Recipe here.

We chose to dine at Pizza Hut because my girls love the food there, I like it too!!

My birthday is celebrated in a quite way, as it has always been, only the four of us. I am touched with lots of birthday wishes coming through to my sms and Facebook till the last half an hour of my birthday today, I really appreciate and thank all of you, my friends and cousins, for your thoughtfulness and taking the time in sending me your birthday wishes. Thanks once again and looking forward to many more birthday wishes from you in years ahead.

continue with more stories about my birthday (click, click)