Hotsprings Retreat

 photo taken from Banjaran's official website

Exactly a week from today, my parents, sisters, hubby, Renee and I will be heading to the Banjaran Hotsprings Retreat in Ipoh.

Reason why we're going on a family holiday is because my youngest sister, Sarah, will be back from London for 3 weeks and the parents wanted to go somewhere where the family could....erm....bond. 

So mummy chose this place. 

From their website, I could tell that this is quite a high-end, luxurious place that without my parents paying, I doubt I would ever be able to afford to go there on my own. I mean, it's stated there RM1,800 per night per villa! Now, WHY IN THE WORLD would I want to part with RM1,800 just to go to this place? I'd rather use the money and do something more interesting....like go to Perhentian and spend a month there. 

Anyways, in a way, I was kindda looking forward to going so that I could spend some time with the family but when I also found out that one of their policy was "No children under 8 years old allowed", I was a little taken aback.

Ok, so you are a high-end, luxurious spa retreat whatever and you don't want noisy children running around for fear of disturbing your other guests who are actually there to meditate bla bla bla so you don't allow children under 8 to be there. Ok, I understand.

Mummy managed to get them to make an exception for Renee cos we're taking 3 villas for 2 nights each so just do your own calculation to see how much they are gonna be earning from my parents for just next weekend alone and NO, FOOD IS NOT INCLUDED.

By the way, food served in the spa retreat is nothing that would satisfy a hungry pregnant woman. Because they are all into wholesomeness and health, of course, the food there is organic healthy stuff. I'm talking "light, healthy & nutritious dishes" here. Adding to that, their restaurant is not 24 hours so I don't get to order in-room service after 10pm.

10pm!!!

I GET HUNGRY EVERY 2 HOURS!!!

So now, not only do I have to deal with their "light, healthy & nutritious spa cuisine", I also have to starve myself??? I'm gonna be smuggling in A LOT of instant cup noodles and chocolates. And please don't give me the whole "instant noodles not nutritious for your baby" crap. I'm gonna be eating NUTRITIOUS, HEALTHY, LIGHT food all day long so yes, I get to enjoy a little junk at nights k. 

I've also told hubby to drive me out to Ipoh town after 10pm to have supper and tapow whatever I can back to the retreat. Hopefully I dont get caught smuggling unhealthy food in. Worse, hopefully they don't LOCK UP THEIR GATES to the outside world after 10pm!

Anyways, putting the food aside, I was really looking forward to going and dipping in the hot pools cos I do so love hot water, but then I was told by my gynea that I'm NOT ALLOWED INTO HOTSPRINGS FML!!!!!

Apparently, anything above 39 degrees in temperature will send my baby into a high fever and spasms because although outside temp is only 39, my core temp is always 1 or 2 degrees higher. 

So, let me list it all down here:

1. I am pressured to run after my 3-yo the whole day to make sure she doesn't run around, scream / laugh / cry too loudly so that she doesn't disturb other guests,

2. I have to put up with 'light, healthy dishes' which is only served 3 times a day and starve in between meals and at nights, and

3. I am not allowed to enjoy the hotsprings.

Erm....remind me again why I'm going there?

Oh yah, to BOND with the family.

You know, seriously, I'd rather have the money and spend a whole month in Perhentian, and I might even have balance to spend on shopping!

At least at Perhentian, I get to spend 1 month there, EAT ALL I WANT ALL DAY LONG, and Renee is free to behave like a 3 year old without me having to thwart her every action. 

Having said this though, I appreciate that this trip is paid for. That's all.

Prawns in Chinese Rice Wine

Had a few friends asking me how to make this dish since I tweeted about it.

It's actually very simple and I got this recipe from my late yeh-yeh.

It was his favorite dish to cook and each time we went back for family dinners, this dish will definitely be there. 

So here's the recipe.

Ingredients:

• About 20pcs of big prawns (cleaned and heads removed but still shelled)
• 2 cloves garlic - diced
• 3 tablespoons white soya sauce
• 1 table spoon Chinese Rice Wine
• 1 teaspoon brown sugar
• 2 tablespoon cooking oil

Method:

1. In a small bowl, mix the white soya sauce, Chinese Rice Wine and sugar together.
2. Heat up the wok with the cooking oil.
3. When wok is hot enough, stir fry the garlic until golden brown. Add in the prawns and stir fry till prawns are cooked.
4. Turn to slow fire and pour in the mixture of soya sauce, rice wine and sugar. Slowly stir fry for another 5 - 10 minutes.
5. Serve hot.

See. Easy peasy!
And taste good.
Well, I like it anyways.
Hope you do too!

Asthma

About 2 weeks after our Perhentian trip, Renee was admitted into hospital for having lungs infection which then confirmed her as asthmatic. She had to be on the neubalizer every 3 hours for 3 days and 2 nights to clear up the congestion in her lungs .

At the same time, I was sick myself. Had the same problem, lungs congestion (so now we know who Renee takes after), nose was so totally jammed up I had to breathe through my mouth and I lost hearing in my right ear. I was also on the inhaler to clear my own lungs. 

So imagine what a great condition we both were in during that time.

Entertaining herself with the cartoon channels and the iPad

Had her finger pricked for blood sample

Being a good girl holding her own neubalizer

Almost a month after being discharged, her condition has improved a lot. Although she is still on the inhaler at home and on some other medication to ensure that her lungs are kept clear, she's stopped coughing, and she's back to her active self again.

I have also stopped giving her Vitagen and ice-cream but then again, she is just a child so being the bad mummy that I am, I occasionally sneak her an ice-cream cup or two as treats.

Other random pictures I took:

Renee sunnies shopping while her mummy was shoe shopping

At the playground

Being her usual cheeky self

Painted my toe nails purple with silver french

The stupid frog that jumped on my right feet giving me a fright

I Saved A Life Today

Found a little baby catterpillar on my greens today.

What should I do with it?

Should i kill it?
Should i drown it?
Should i keep it in a jar for Renee?

Hmmm...just drown it, I thought.

I started running the water n while waiting for the container to fill up, I watched the little caterpillar.

It crawled up and down the leaf, trying to find a way out. And then i thought, what am I doing? It's just a baby. If I gave it a chance to live, one day, it will turn into a beautiful butterfly.

Afterall, God gave it life. Who was I to take that away?

And so, i turned off the tap, took the leaf with the caterpillar on it and brought it out to my garden.

Here you go, I told the little baby caterpillar as I watched it crawl from the leaf onto the leaf of my bamboo plant. Go live, survive and come back and visit me one day when you've all grown up.

Island Getaway

We're leaving for a short island holiday tomorrow night. Our destination - Perhentian!

Both SK and I have never been there before so we're kindda excited. Apparently, almost all the people I've spoken to claimed that it's far better than Redang and Lang Tengah, and I do so love both those islands.

I've been to Redang twice. First time was back in 2003/4 (can't remember), to Berjaya Redang with the ex-boyfriend. My second time was with SK where we stayed in Laguna.

I've also been to Lang Tengah twice, both times with SK. The first time was before we were officially dating so it was like a 'scandalous' getaway *naughty grin*. The second time was last year May, just after my stupid maid pulled her 'runaway' stunt.

Both islands were...ARE gorgeous, so for friends to tell me that Perhentian is way better, I really cannot wait to find out!

We've decided to take a drive there instead of flying, which is really fine by me cos I love long car trips. I even drove to Koh Samui once back in 2004. 15 hours drive non-stop except for meals and loved every single minute of it!

But this time, because of me being pregnant and having Renee with us, we'll be making a stop overnight at Kuala Terengganu before starting off for Kuala Besut jetty early next morning.

Bags are all packed and Renee is as excited as me, so we're just waiting to push off our journey!

Can't wait to have my tan back! Before motherhood, I used to be known as 'the girl with the permanent tan' cos Sk and I would go to the beach like every other weekend.

Hopefully, i get that 'title' back again!

A Lazy Sunday

After an eventful Saturday yesterday - eventful meaning me busy checking my Twitter and Facebook updates on the Bersih rally going on in town and surfing news channel to see if there were any coverage on electronic media as well, followed by a rushed Pasar Malam visit to tapow my favorite snacks and food and then another rushed dinner where Renee fell asleep halfway through with a mouthful of noodles, and then followed by a rushed grocery trip to Tesco *phew*, we decided to take it easy today and not do anything.

Well, not literally do nothing.

The hubby and daughter are outside right now, washing the cars while I'm inside attempting to copy the Rio movie and a few other videos onto my MacBook so that I can later sync it to my iPad. This is, of course, all for hoping that these movies and videos can keep Renee occupied during our long drive to the East Coast next week. 

I'm hoping I don't screw anything up on my laptop and ipad as well as the DVDs while attempting to do this 'copying'. It's my first time and I'm an IT idiot.

Anyways, while waiting for the files to copy, I've posted some pictures of dishes that I cooked over the pass month. 

We actually tried catered food for about a month, paying RM200 per month for 2 meat dishes, 1 vege dish a soup but after 2 weeks of eating it, we got bored. Same taste, same style of cooking....eeks. So we cancelled it and I had no choice but to start cooking at least twice a week because eating out is oh-so-expensive!

 'Black rice' - a mixture of vege, meat, rice and black sauce all cooked together

 Sour & spicy chicken gizzard with cucumber

 Baked marmite pork ribs

Home-made wantan noodles with stewed chicken feet and vege

Nothing spectacular la, I know, but coming from someone who couldn't even boil rice not too long ago, I take this as a vast improvement in my culinary skills.

I've even made chicken rice a few times and will be attempting to make my own Nasi Lemak this coming week. Hope it turns out yummy.

I never really know if the food I cook is yummy or not because hubby says everything is delicious. He has to. He don't have a choice. Else I mengamuk and stop cooking and we have to eat out every night....which is really fine by me. But not to him. So he'll have to continue loving the food I cook and I'll never find out if its really that yummy unless I have a party come over.

Maybe soon?

June '11

With this blog post, I hope that I can actively start blogging again - at least one post a week, if not one in two weeks?

Life has certainly been very busy for me, even with Renee spending most of the hours a day in daycare, I would have thought I would be able to have much more free time, but I guess I was wrong.

The more time you have on your hands, the more things you'll find that you have to do. Apart from trying to maintain a company, handle freelance writing jobs, keep the house clean and finding time for my own social life, I now also have to deal with the occasional morning sickness, nausea, body aches, hunger pangs - the oh so normal symptoms of a pregnant woman.

Yes, as of this week in July, I am already 19 weeks pregnant. But we're talking about the month of June here so let's move on.

Was almost 4 months pregnant in this pic

First week of June, I turned 31.

Godma threw a BBQ dinner for me and my cousin Chris (who's birthday was a day before mine) at her place and all I had to do was show up. Birthdays these days are not like how I used to have it anymore....unless I am willing to leave Renee with someone and go out and party. But I'm not. I'd rather stay home and have a boring birthday.

Towards the end of June, the three of us, hubby, Renee and I, decided to take a day trip down to Melaka because I was craving for their Sate Celup.

But instead of a 'day trip', we ended up arriving in Melaka only at 5pm!

Ya, blame it on the pregnant woman who didn't want to wake up earlier.

First pit stop was at the Melaka Zoo for Renee!

Seen here taken with the Mandrills

Renee had a blast!

She kept going on and on about wanting to see the monkeys, and the elephants, and the giraffes. Well, life was easy for her since she was carried most of the time where else I ALMOST FAINTED from the heat, the uphill-downhill walk and having to keep up an active conversation with her at the same time!

BUT I MADE IT!!!!!

And so, to reward myself....I had an eating spree!

First meal for the night was this!

Jonker Walk

Nasi Lemak. Assam Laksa. Nyonya Laksa. And Mango Cendol!

The Nasi Lemak was SK's. The rest was MINE!!! Hahahahaha!

So yummy!

After putting some food in my tummy, I wasn't so cranky anymore so we took a walk around Jonker Walk, bought snacks here and there to munch on, bought more knick-knacks for Renee to play with, bought some Angry Bird t-shirts for Renee and Zach and my Godson, Roy. Unfortunately, the shirt I bought for Zach was too small and the one I got for Roy was too big. But oh well, he can grow into it. And it was also because of this shirt that Roy called me 'Godma' for the first time!!!!

Not once but many many many times!!!

After Jonker Walk, we took a drive down to the Portugese Settlement for the St. Pedro Festival.

They had live performances going on on stage and the dancers were cheering on for people to join them and the music was soooooo loud the base was practically shaking my body up and down and I think the baby inside my tummy was dancing to it as well.

We stopped for our second meal of Portuguese Grilled Fish.

Actually, SK was't hungry but I really wanted to eat so he had no choice but to eat it with me, else I would not have been able to finish such a huge piece of fish. But then again, even with both of us eating, we still had to tapow half the fish home...so I had it for dinner the next day. Hahaha!

Right after that, we went for our Sate Celup.

The restaurant that we wanted to go to had a queue so freaking long that if we waited, we wouldn't be able to eat till the next morning, so we opted for the next best one...

Didn't satisfy my sate celup cravings though....but better than nothing. Gonna take another drive down one of these days to have the sate celup that I want.