Playground Fun

Hubby and I brought the kids to the new playground at The Park Residence 1. Well, since we already paid up our service charge for the remainder of this year, we are entitled to use all the facilities. So, here we are at the playground located at the ground floor of block Acacia. Let the pictures speak for themselves.........

In case you are wondering, we are still in the midst of planning the renovation of our new condo. Site measurements were already done & now it's the planning stage. It's 2D and 3D drawings plus shopping around for fans/lights and furniture. Gonna check out the gym too one of these days......

Ninja Joe

Larry's colleague (who is also my colleague!) recommended this little burger joint. It's called Ninja Joe and is located in Tropicana City Mall. I think the interior design is very cute - especially Ninja Joe who looks like a burger.

Ok, their specialty is pork burgers - yup - non-halal. We ordered 2 burgers for RM9.90. If just 1, it will cost RM5.50. Cheaper if ordering 3,4 and more. Many flavours to choose from eg black pepper, spicy, oriental and original. We added a set of crinkle cut fries and green tea for an additional RM3.50.

The pork patty was succulent and the burger size is something like KFC's Colonel Burger. I enjoyed my oriental flavoured burger - the sauce was tangy and sweet with a lemony taste. Larry had the original which was equally delicious. There's a small selection of side orders eg tempura salad. Service was prompt and the place was clean. Do try it if you happen to be at Tropicana Mall.

By the light of the Silvery Moon

To celebrate the mid-autumn festival....... the kids get to play with lanterns by the poolside!

Took the paper lanterns out from storage....... plus 2 boxes of candles. The kids had lots of fun walking round and round the pool together with Joseph & Joy-Anne. Read Buffafly's account of the event at her blog!

I still remember the excitement associated with mooncake festival when I was a kid. My brothers and I get to parade our brightly lit lanterns around the 'neighbourhood'. We used to stay above a shophouse just by the main road, so our 'neighbourhood' actually refers to the five-foot way in front of the short row of shophouses. I still remember that I owned a battery-operated goldfish lantern - very cute. Most other lanterns were the standard fish, dragon, peacock and bird ones. Nowadays, the lanterns feature favourite characters & the variety is endless - not to mention those high-tech musical ones. One of my favourite memory of lantern festival was attending a lantern party at my ex-classmate's house. 

I am not exactly a great fan of mooncakes but give me jelly mooncakes or THE ice cream mooncakes from HD..... I would gladly eat them up! Still wondering how an ice cream mooncake tastes like - and does anyone know whether Haagen-Daz discounts them after mooncake festival?

View from the top

Received the keys to our new place last week. Took some pics from the balcony. Our condo unit faces Pantai Panorama's block 1, block 2, block 3 and the swimming pool directly - which is not too bad considering some other units face one of those blocks directly.

 

It's a more serene and peaceful road in front of my condo compared to the opposite side which faces a very busy road which may be noisy and dusty especially with Phase 2 - block Camelia coming up.

On the far right and far left, the view is rather unobstructed. Anyway, paying another RM100K-RM200K more for the KL view is too high a premium for me - I would gladly trade a view of Telekom's bamboo tower for extra cash to spend on renovating and furnishing the condo.

We do get the afternoon sun but it's not too bad as it's not direct but at an angle as shown. Probably will consider tinting the glass windows to block off most of the sun's rays. Pic above taken in the master bedroom. 

Quite excited about the prospect of moving to a new place within a few months!

My Snow Angel

Some pics of Marissa dressed up as an angel taken by me! Heheh.... only can do this to girls..... if boys...... I'm quite uncertain. Anyway, she was very fascinated with the 'star wand'. I asked her to kiss it and she did! Then I asked her to lift up her arms. She was reluctant at first but obliged finally - my fav pic - right at the end of this post!

 

 

Successful toilet training

Marissa is now quite pro using the toilet - all within 2 weeks since I managed to persuade her to 'wear panties' and 'use the potty'. She's graduated to sitting on the toilet bowl to urinate and defecate. Even in church, she will indicate to us that she needs to go. Since she wears pull-up diaper pants, it's very easy to pull 'em down for her to do her business.

Reminiscing

One of my favourite shots of hubby and I together waaaaaaaaaaaaay back in 2002! It was taken on the occasion of our engagement then.

Hubby proposed to me with a bouquet of Stargazer Lilies and over a romantic dinner at Avanti's. Oh, not to forget, the diamond solitaire from Selberan. Hahah.... otherwise how to accept his proposal ah?

Anyways, we celebrated our engagement with a photoshoot at Covershots formerly located at Jln Ampang. It was the first of many other photoshoots by Covershots. The pics were taken using those cameras with film. We scanned the contact prints into a CD for safe-keeping so some of them look blur-ish.

I had my graduation pics taken at Covershots too..... I didn't smile cos I was wearing braces at that time! What to do.... vain lor..... wanna look picture perfect in my wedding gowns!

Then came my wedding pics - taken in June 2003. I engaged Covershots for their event photography. Did not take any studio shots though cos we didn't think they were necessary and that saved us some money to spend on other wedding expenses.

Flowers & car decor by The Flower Cottage

 

Wedding gown custom made by Pretty in White

 

Groom's suit custom made by Lord's Tailor, BSC

My church wedding was held in Seremban Wesley Methodist Church in the morning, followed by a simple catered lunch at the church hall. Then, we had the tea ceremony and Chinese banquet dinner at Mandarin Oriental's Diamond Ballroom in the evening.

My parents savoring their tea

Specially ordered 2-tier butter cake 

 

Main banquet table

 

We also had 2 other photoshoots by Covershots after the kids came along. Now, it's been almost a year since the last photoshoot and we are 'itching' for another one! You can help make this a reality by voting for my entry to win a Covershots voucher worth RM500. Only the entry with the highest votes will win!

All you have to do is 'join' or 'like' Covershots at their facebook page, then click 'like' on my photo.

Link is here. The voting period is on now until 30th Sept. Thank you!

New Abode

UOA's The Park Residence 1 was launched about 2 years ago. I think I was either pregnant or in confinement during that time.  The development is just opposite the condo where we are staying now. We didn't thought much about it although we pass by it everyday! In fact, we didn't even think of moving out from our current place until much later..... when storage and space seems to be seriously lacking.

Larry & I contemplated buying a landed property but decided otherwise when  we looked at the prices of gated and guarded homes. For example, Duta Tropika at Sri Hartamas costs at least 3 million ringgit! As for new properties, the locations are too far and inconvenient for us. 

Then we found out that our current property's value has appreciated considerably - thanks to the newly completed condo just opposite the road. It was then we decided to find out more about The Park Residences and even visited the show units. After much prayer we purchased a unit there.  The sales person was actually surprised that we did not buy when it was launched as the value has shot up over the short span of 2 years.  Anyway, I felt that the timing now is just right for us. The location is great and I like the fact that it's brand new and unfurnished. This means that we get to customise it accordingly. We calculated that in order to purchase the new condo, our current one has to go and we were very thankful to God that our current unit was sold within a week to a buyer who only viewed it once! Now, I am praying hard that we will be able to move into the new condo by Christmas and the sale of the current one will proceed smoothly.

Floor plan of our new place! 1910sf compared to our current 1250sf. 

I've engaged an Interior Designer from Desigva Design to be in charge of the renovation works from A to Z. I've also paid a booking fee to Kuchenmatic TTDI for the kitchen. Looking forward to receiving the keys, end of this week!

Music Menu

My children love to listen to CD's while travelling in the car. My little diva princess also likes to 'dictate' what she would like to listen in the car..... and she almost always get her way.

Music CD's include Veggie Tales (about 10 albums), Gymboree and Putumayo Kids. Both of them like to sing-a-long with the CD's. Favourite songs include.... God is Bigger Than the Bogeyman, Wheels on the Bus and Gymbo.

They also like to listen to stories. Latest one is How to Catch A Star by Oliver Jeffers. Other audio stories include Mog, The Forgetful Cat and Mog and the V.E.T. - both by Judith Kerr, Ladybird classics eg Hansel and Gretel and The Magic Porridge Pot, Charlie Cook's Favourite Book and The Smartest Giant by Julia Donaldson. The audio CD's come together with the books.

Well, sometimes they just want to listen to the same CD again and again and again........whatever..... as long as they both sit down quietly in their car seats!

This is what they do when we go into a tunnel or down into a basement car park! YELL as if they are in an amusement park ride! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh!

Finally - a deposit

Marissa finally 'deposited' urine in her potty for the very first time! 

I've decided to intensify my potty training efforts as I was quite lazy to do it earlier. Evan was potty trained by 2 yrs and Marissa is now already past 2 years. I figured that if I leave it any longer, she will grow more and more dependent on the diapers and will not want to wear panties later.

Marissa does tell us whenever she poos in her diapers and also  sometimes run to the potty and sit on it with her diapers on. So, one evening, I decided to just ditch the diapers and let her wear her new panties. She was game for it and chose one cute purple one. I had bought a pack of 7 (one for each day of the week) from Gymboree some time ago. Suddenly I realised that she had ran to the potty and sat down there with her panties on! I then went to check on her and hurray! she had urinated in the potty! However, she wet her panties in the process as she did not pull it down.

I hope she will be fully potty trained soon! I already took out my bag of cloth diapers and will be using them instead. Can channel some savings from disposable diapers to my renovation fund instead!