Kids' rattling

"Low resistance tyres can reduce usage of fuel".

Wyng apparently learnt this line from a TV commercial. Just to test if he knows what he was talking about, I asked the meaning of what he said. He went on to explain that 'this means you can drive longer, like 5 or 6 times without pumping fuel.

So, the commercial did manage to drive home some messages.

Good job

Just like his growth chart, he is within the top 10 percentile in his school in terms of academic performance this time. He scored an average of 92%, ranking 11th out of 218 students. He has improved by only about 5% in average score but jumped from a position of 67 last year.

For his commendable improvement, Mummy has promised to buy him a Transformer robot which he demanded to have it on the same day he brought home the report book. We finally agreed that he will get it only during the weekend when we take him to the store.

Good feng shui to keep the kitchen clean

I discovered this feng shui tip which I don't think anybody will hesitate to follow.

'Daily sweeping kitchen floor, keeping garbage bins clean and keeping utensils clean everyday brings amazing wealth luck.' No harm trying if this can kill two birds with one stone.

He loves barbequeing

Until the day we had our first barbeque at our home with family member, I never knew W is patient enough to sit at the scorching hot pit to grill yummy food. And, he wasn't stingy at all. He grilled not for himself, he offered to people around him.

He was at the pit long enough to be called a patient boy, unlike Mummy who despises the pit,especially when it comes to satisfying her hunger pangs. His rosy cheeks testified how long he was at the pit and notice he looked rather bored?

He makes me realise something. He is more patient than I think he is.

My kid's a great help

This was posted on 2 August 2009 and I am reposting it due to the loss of the original one.

He's doing much more than just showering Wyng. He's now frequently washing the dishes for me (not that Mom's lazy bones are playing tricks but Mom's sensitive skin can't take it anymore). Well, that's only if he has completed all his homework. Otherwise, I won't forgive myself for being a slaver to force her own son to slog while she folds her arm.

Apart from the dishes which is becoming more of a routine now, other tasks delegated to him apart from washing of his own school shoes, he's now given new tasks such as sweeping the floor, setting the table for meals, supervising his little brother on certain tasks, spring cleaning the house, helping to wash my car (when Mom wants to save a few ringgit) and tidying up his own room. This is not something to shout about for a lot of parents, but for Hoe who is a rather sluggish boy, these are something he should be praised for and rewarded.

When it comes to reward, his star reward system must come in.

Favourite chicken

Seems easy enough to prepare.

Like all nuts, cashew nuts are no exception when it comes as an excellent source of protein and fiber. They are good for the heart as cashew nuts are rich in mono-unsaturated fat as well as a good source of potassium, B vitamins and folate.

Phosphorous, copper, magnesium and selenium are also found in them. Just like peanuts, cashew nuts are usually salted and may contribute to increase blood pressure due to the added sodium. So always buy unsalted plain roasted cashew nuts.

Diced Chicken with Cashew Nuts Recipe

This is a great and healthy Chinese dish and the cashew nuts must only be added at the last stage of cooking to ensure that the nuts stay crunchy. A few quick stirs will do. Before cooking, roast the nuts in the oven to remove excess moisture.

Ingredients:

2 chilies

2 stalks spring onions (scallions)

1/2 green pepper (capsicum)

200 g Chicken breast meat

3 slices ginger

100 g Roasted cashew nuts (unsalted)

Seasoning A

1 tablespoon cornstarch

1 tablespoon dark soy sauce

Seasoning B

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon rice wine

1 teaspoon sugar

Method:

Slice the chilies. Rinse the spring onions (scallions), chop half and cut the other into sections. Slice the green pepper. Rinse and dice the chicken breast meat. Mix with seasoning A and marinate for 10 minutes.

Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a pan and stir-fry the ginger slices, chopped spring onion and chilies. Add the chicken and seasoning B, and cook until half-done. Then add the green pepper and toss well, add the cashew nuts and stir evenly. Serve while hot.

When can these problems cease?

When you get a new car, you may not be free from problems. Because there are manufacturing defects inherent in the car that you may be facing. There will be a period until all these are solved. You take it to be examined where lies the problems, they say 'they don't do inspecting on weekends'. So, another trip is required. When I am finally available to spend half a day at the workshop, Alas! 'We know your problem but there's no stock at the moment'. What else? Another trip later.

When you buy any new electrical appliances, you are also not free from problems. The culprit is defects in the factory. Is QC still practised?

So, one problem after another that we, those working from home, need to cope with, amongst other trillions of minute and major problems. Call them challenges, to be positive.

Only Lady Luck can help us.

Filthy kid

Did he look like he has just come out from a coal mine? Or has just completed his art painting session, with his knees? The answer is none of both.

He had just come back from school. He got filthier by the day. He has loads of reasons when questioned for coming back in such filth.

'We sat on the floor' which means dirty pants.

'Teacher asked us to walk on our knees during PE' which means dirt-stained knees.

He couldn't explain 'black' palms except that he must have crawled on the floor, or worse still, lied on the floor as his t-shirt was not spared from the dirt.

Do you know how stale rice looks like?

Here's the picture of leftover rice left in the rice cooker untouched for 3 days.  This was the deed of a busy work-at-home Mom who are preoccupied with her work that there was something undone in the kitchen.

The smell is that of honeydew. And the sight is that of cottony orangey rice.

Eeee... yucks! my kids scringed as I brought the rice cooker closer to them and when I asked Hoe to snap a picture.

Why do kids like holidays?

I posed this question to Wyng. Here are his answers:

Number 1: Because I don't have to do homework
Number 2: So that I don't get whacked by teacher. Naturally, I questioned how often he get whacked. 'Not always la', was his reply.

Things to do during school holidays

Yeh! It's holiday time! What I would like to do during the holidays? And the holidays is only a week for me as I will still be pre-occupied with my home venture during the first week.

* Go for my long overdue medical check-up. 'The most vulnerable part of a female' is at high risk for me as I've put this off for more than two years, as far as I can remember.
* Go for my hair-cut
* Fix the problem of my car. Even new cars have problems and this is a manufacturing defect, I suppose.
* Clean up the house. Some areas are not so visible to guests in my house and need cleaning or else they will turn to stubborn stain, cleaning while they are still fresh is advisable.
* Baking. I promise Wyng I will bake some cup cakes. I hope H can help me to do the tedious and messy washing after that.

If only I put in more effort

For the first time since he started school, he scored 100% in BM. Generally, it's no big deal that a primary student manages to score full marks in their test. But, for my kids, it is worth 'shouting' about it. Despite compliments from people close to me that my kids are smart, this doesn't show very prominently in their academic results.

He got 76% in BM in the first term. And that was without my 'interference' in his studies. Despite devoting full-time in guiding other children, I neglected my own kid.

So, setting some time for him, I gave him some guidance after the first term. I also gave him a few exercises as well as flash cards. Not to say that I am not giving credit to his tuition teacher who gave students many past year worksheets to do, if only I can spend more time with him, he would definitely be an A-scorer, a strong one.

Do you think Vista sucks!

When it comes to IT stuff, I am quite 'hopeless' despite having depended on it for more than a decade in my previous jobs.  We have been using Vista for about four years at home.  It was not until last year that its performance has been deteriorating. 

Hoe has been complaining because he isn't able to play most games using my desktop.  A lot of programmes have been quite slow running on Vista.  In fact, most of the websites take too long to load.  It came to a point when the desktop is unbearably slow.

So, we have decided to change it to Windows 7.  Hoe will be very happy about it, that is provided he is allowed to touch my desktop. 

How to get rid of these pests?

What kind of home we are living in? We've got uninvited guests, every minute, every day. They are none other than Mr Mosquitoes. I got their attention when I am hanging out clothes to dry in the car porch. There was an occasion when I got stung even when I was cooking something in the kitchen.

To get rid of them, we got ourselves a device which gives out UV light to attract them. How they are killed eventually is not important as long as they are dead. Having this device is not the solution as this only covers a small area. I have to mobilise this from room to room, too tedious.

Next thing my husband fell in love in is this repeller which emits a sound, harmless to humans and pets but hazardous to insects including lizards and spiders. It claims to even clean the air. Able to cover an area as big as 4,500 square feet, this is more than enough to rid these pests from my house.

Bye,bye mosquitoes.

Who keeps talking and nobody listens?

When Wyng popped this question, the answer that I gave was a very natural one. "Wyng!" I quipped, to his amusement and annoyance. He's becoming so chatty nowadays, that I have to stop him from his endless queries and babbling of facts and more facts.

"It's the teacher!", he retaliated.

How true! Nobody listens to the teacher when they are supposed to, then what are teachers for?

He likes details

As soon as he gets permission from his daddy to draw on the discarded business cards, he wasted no time. He diligently drew on the back of the cards. And I thought he was scribbling on them. Little did I realise that he was tracing the path on the roadmap at the back of the cards.

According to Daddy, he was showing the roadmap to his 'shop'.

And he did that on the entire pack of cards in probably about three days. What intrigued him? Only he knows.

Happy Mother's Day

It is just less than 10cm. Even though I don't really like the way the card is done (the message was written in pencil and the card is not cut neatly), the message is so real. I do hope he means what he wrote about loving mummy.

Yummy chicken

Chicken is Wyng's favourite meat. Nowadays, he eats with his fingers and sucking deliciously off the bone. He used to stay away from even touching the meat with his fingers. He will surely like this dish provided I don't include chilli in it.

This is a dish downloaded from Asian Online Recipe website.

Cashew Chicken

Although it is not native to South-East Asia, the cashew tree is highly prized in Thailand and the classic partnership of these slightly sweet nuts with chicken is immensely popular in Thailand and abroad. The Thais not only value cashew nuts, but also the "fruit" under which each nut grows. Although they are known as cashew apples, these so-called fruits are actually bulbous portions of the stem. They may be pink, red or yellow in color and the crisp, sweet flesh can be eaten raw of made into a refreshing drink. They have even been used for making jam. Cashew apples - and undried nuts - are rarely seen outside their growing regions.

Whatever it is, this is one delicious recipe that you should get your hands on.

Ingredients: (Serves 4 - 6)

450 g/1 lb boneless chicken breast portions

1 red (bell) pepper (capsicum)

2 garlic cloves

4 dried red chilies

30 ml/2 tablespoons vegetable oil

30 ml/2 tablespoons oyster sauce

15 ml/1 tablespoon soy sauce

Pinch of granulated sugar

1 bunch spring onions (scallions), cut into 5 cm/2 in lengths

175 g/6 oz/1.5 cups cashews, roasted

Coriander (cilantro) leaves, to garnish

Method:

1. Remove and discard the skin from the chicken breasts and trim off any excess fat. With a sharp knife, cut the chicken into bitesize pieces and set aside.

2. Halve the red pepper, scrape out the seeds and membranes and discard, then cut the flesh into 2 cm/0.75 in dice. Peel and thinly slice the garlic and chop the dried red chilies.

3. Preheat a wok and then heat the oil. The best way to do this is to drizzle a "necklace" of oil around the inner rim of the wok. so that it drops down to coat the entire inner surface. Make sure the coating is even by swirling the wok.

4. Add the garlic and dried chilies to the wok and stir-fry over a medium heat until golden. Do not let the garlic burn, otherwise it will taste bitter.

5. Add the chicken to the wok and stir-fry until it is cooked through, then add the red pepper. If the mixture is very dry, add a little water.

6. Stir in the oyster sauce, soy sauce and sugar. Add the spring onions and cashew nuts. Stir-fry for 1-2 minutes more, until heated through. Spoon into a warm dish and serve immediately, garnished with the coriander leaves.

First carwash,polish and wax

Even a four-wheeled needs a facial treatment,I mean body treatment. I also pamper it with a good polish and wax.

It looks so glossy and light after that. And so was my pocket, lighter by RM150.

My faithful blood-sucker friends

They have been with me since I was in pre-school, as far as I can remember from a very old photo of a young innocent me. They left marks which are visible enough to be seen on photographs. Yes, that is how 'attached' they are to me.


We never part since then

Childhood, from primary to secondary even til adulthood

Their presence, never fails to be noticeable

By only the 'priviliged' few whom they adore,unfortunately

And when they sting, they cling

Til we feel the itching, darn annoying

Relentless, I swear they are

Ugly red bloody marks, in numbers, they often are

An identity I loathed to have

For I got interrogated in school for inviting these creatures

Who seemed to adore me so dearly

Ironically only a few feel their presence

As most are unscathed by them

Pleasing blood,it seems I have

To entice these blood-sucker friends