Love, Life and the World Cup....

OMG!!! I can't believe that it has been so long since I blog. It's kinda weird because at the back of my mind I draft what I plan to blog, but with all the things that has been happening the last few weeks, I just didn't get a chance to actually jot it all down on this blog.

Not wanting to summarize all the exciting moments of my recent life, I'm just gonna talk about what comes to mind naturally at this time.

Well, right now I am actually staying up to watch the World Cup!! It's Uruguay vs. Germany and it is the half time break with the score being 1-1... Oh what a nail-biting game. It's early Sunday morning and I still have the whole day to rest and relax before the finals tomorrow (I'm not sure how I'm gonna survive 8+ hours of work on Monday!!).. Part of the reason that prevents me from blogging this last month is the World Cup itself.. I would be at my mum's for dinner and we would stay there until the game is over. By midnight we would start heading home to rest for the night, and obviously there's nothing else you would want to do as you arrive home other than sleep.. hehe.. My neighbours, who we met at a gathering one of the weekends, actually asked us if we are still living in this house, cause they don't see us at all. The porch lights are only on after midnight, and by morning they have left before we are out of the house.


This is definitely the song of the moment.

Naufal is having fun too. He loves singing the chorus of this Wakka Wakka song :) Not only that, whenever he sees anyone wearing a jersey, he would ask to change into his. Not just the jersey, but he wants to wear the full kit.. shorts and even shoes. Luckily he had a couple of sets to change into, but we had to buy him a new pair of sports shoes cause he doesn't fit into his old Nikes'.One day he woke up and insisted that he change into his football jersey for school. He even had his WC ball with him.
Even on our morning jogs on the weekend, he wanted to wear his football jersey. Btw, for all you ManU fans out there, you can get the kid's football kit (jersey, shorts and socks) for as low as GBP14.99 (50% off) from the official website right now!! So if you know someone living or visiting the UK right now, get them to get your son one.. hehe.. I'm thinking of getting Naufal the away (black and blue) kit.

Anyway, I have recently fulfilled another one of my three new year's resolution recently... Yes, you guessed it right, the new car is here!!! I ordered it on the first weekend after I return from the last offshore campaign in April and because I wanted a white one, I had to wait 2 months to it's arrival..

At first I wanted to get a CRV to which Norman was trying to convince me otherwise. After checking it out, I was not quite satisfied. Norman shifted my attention to the Accord, and after a test drive I was convinced. The funny thing is, the CRV and the Accord costs the same, but you get so much more comfort with the Accord.

Next, we hesitated on whether we want to pay so much for the number plate.. We had to do a little bit of homework to figure out how much we are willing to spend and where we would find a good deal. We ended up tendering for a number in Penang. It was just the number that we really cared for, the latest one with a KL registration number was on the brink of a 5 figure digit (money-wise) and any other state could go down by almost 50% less. I guess we were lucky, we checked to see if there are older numbers not registered, and there was one in Penang which we immediately took at less than 10% of the latest KL plate number.

When we found out that our car has arrived, we started surveying for accessories. We found out the store that the dealer would send new cars to install the free paddle lock, and went there to check out other accessories. We met a guy who was installing something to his new car. Norman was intrigued at the limited edition Honda Civic Type R..

Interesting interiors.. note the push start button in red under the driver's side aircon..
Norman wishing that it's his car!! Manufacturing stops in August 2010, so you still have time to own this limited edition baby...
Look it matches my handbag...

We got our car, the week after this.. and man, we were excited!!

First stop at the Honda dealer, to submit the car registration.
Then off to the tint store, we choose WINGARD Royale.
Next to the accesorries store to install our number plate, we paid extra to upgrade the plate.
Paddle locks installed for added security..

As a plus we also installed front and rear camera to assist in parking. (don't wanna scratch the car)...

With our car dealer, Ms Zizi.. at this point we are minutes away from walking away with our new car, Mr. Nakamura :)
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What's cooking tonight?

When it comes to cooking I am so not the right person to talk to.. but tonight I am planning to try out a new simple recipe, so I shall share the recipe for now and the next post will have a picture of the end product.. (if it turns out right!! haha)

Recipe : Spaghetti Aglio Olio

1 portion of spaghetti – Cook according to instruction

Meanwhile… stir fry a few cloves of chopped garlic and 2 stalks of dried chillies with generous amount of olive oil. You can either break the chillies into flakes or leave it in huge chunks if you don’t fancy chewing into them.

Do not let the garlic brown. Add in the cooked spaghetti and flavour with salt, black pepper and herbs (optional).

If you have chicken stock, then the taste will be better. Otherwise, just use Maggi chicken cubes.

You can also add in portobello mushrooms and yellow capsicum plus parmesan cheese in the cooking process. Depending on what's in the fridge.. Don't forget shrimps and squid for seafood style or chicken strips for a little protein. The spaghetti will be a little moist but not soupy.


Let's see how well this recipe turns out tonight. I told you it is an easy recipe right? Give it a try..

THOMAS CUP

Wow.. it has been so long since I last updated this blog. Everyday I have (at the back of my mind) plans to update it and ideas of what I wanted to write about, but lately 24 hours in a day is just not enough for me to do all the things in my TO-DO list. Regardless my recent busy schedule I've decided to update it today.. atleast with what I'm thinking at this moment.

You cannot be in Malaysia right now and not talk about BADMINTON... Why badminton? Well, the Thomas Cup is what's going on...

Even Naufal is excited about it, it seems to him that everyone is also excited about "THOMAS" as he is.. everytime he heard the word "thomas" mentioned on the radio and TV news/game commentator, he would turn to me excitedly and said "dia kata thomas, ibu?"...

Naufal's idea of the THOMAS CUP

It was very satisfying watching the Thomas Cup quarter final match between Malaysia and Denmark last night. After an unexpected beatings with Japan the night before it is such a refreshing match to see the Malaysian team suddenly raising from defeat..

Malaysia beats Denmark 3-2
Lee Chong Wei (MAS) bt Peter Hoeg Gade (DEN) 21-17, 21-17
Jan Ø Jørgensen (DEN) bt Wong Choong Han (MAS) 22-20, 16-21, 21-18
Mohd Hafiz Hashim (MAS) bt Joachim Persson (DEN) 21-12, 21-10
Koo Kean Keat/Tan Boon Heong (MAS) bt Carsten Mogensen/Mathias Boe (DEN) 21-17, 21-19
Lars Paaske/Jonas Rasmussen (DEN) bt Mohd Zakry Abdul Latif/Hoon Thien How (MAS) 24-26, 21-12, 21-19

Good Luck with the next match with China!!

May Day.. May Day...

Yes, May is approaching fast.. make sure you do your income tax declarations before time runs out. I just did mine yesterday at 5am, on my way out of the house to the airport for my regular day trip to Kuantan.. I'm quite surprised that my "cukai terlebih bayar" is almost equivalent to one month's basic salary!! Can't wait to get the cheque from LHDN. It would feel like getting a bonus :) I'm thinking of buying a new DSLR camera if I get it.. My dream camera is the NIKON D90.. I had a chance to play around with it while I was offshore a few weeks ago.. and I fell in love with it instantly... (I promise I'll do an entry on my offshore trip sometime soon)..

With 1st of May being the famous Labor Day, and a Saturday, my company has given us all Friday off (tomorrow) in lieu of the the public holiday on Saturday. Hooray!!!

HOMEDEC expo started today at the KL Convention Center but this year gonna give it a miss cause I've been going to too many home expos for the past 2 years. Instead I'm gonna stay home and paint our fence and gate.. Norman started it already on our side fence, but have stopped for some time (enough time to allow our next door neighbour to start and finish off all their fence and gate).. I hope the weather will be good tomorrow..

So the plan is to wake up and send Naufal to his playschool, jog afew rounds at the Kelana Jaya park, then come back home to paint the gate, stop by at mum's house for lunch, go to IKEA (buy a table for Naufal cause he loves drawing and coloring nowadays), to SSF (to buy flowers and other indoor decorations), stop by at the car dealer to drop of some documents and then pick up Naufal from playschool...

Big plans for a fine Friday, let's see how much will be accomplished... hahah

Quarantine No More..

What a great feeling :) Naufal is now back to his old cheeky ways and we are no longer under quarantine!! Just in time for a double birthday celebration :)

Other than Nora's birthday on the 20th, we also have another April baby in the family. My other sister Husna's birthday is on the 23rd. She drove all the way from Kerteh to enjoy the weekend with us.

So on Saturday we all drove to Equatorial Hotel in Bangi for some dim sum at the Golden Phoenix restaurant..
Norman and Naufal wearing a matching father and son Manchester United football jersey. Naufal is wearing the full kit, socks and all..


Norman, me, Aisyah and my mum.. waiting patiently for our lunch.. (we skipped breakfast for this big meal..)

Naufal and Sofea reunited again.. these two cousins greatly misses each other as they haven't met each other in almost 2 weeks..

Look at how excited Naufal is...

I really like this picture, reminds me of Beckam and Posh Spice in a candid shot by the papparazis... hahha

This orange juice is sour mummy... My brother and his family..

My parents with the two birthday girls.. Husna on the left and Nora on the right.

Me and my family.. the triple N's..

The meal was quite good (sorry no pictures of the food, everyone was too hungry and dug in as soon as anything was placed on the table), and the price is not bad too.. Although I'm much more familiar with the dim sum at Mandarine Oriental, which I would rate higher than this place.

Welcoming a new addition the family..

Early last month, my loving husband got a new job. However, the location of his new office has the worst parking system available. Not only is it difficult to get a parking spot, the charges to park your car is horrendously high. Traffic heading to and from his office is as bad as it gets, so he decided to ride a motorbike. He already has one that his brother is borrowing, so on the day before he starts his new job, his brother sent the bike back to him. It is an old bike from his single days and is prone to breakdowns.. so he decided to buy a new bike.

After much research, he decided on the model that he liked and he started to tender his number plate. The regular 2 digit number that he was aiming at is much much more expensive for a KL number plate in comparison to the Melaka registration number. He checked with his friends who are working with JPJ, and other states have also become expensive. So he decided to tender for he number below... the motorbike was just made available to us on Thursday. Naufal is also overjoyed at the new addition to our family. So I made sure that Norman gets a SIRIM approved toddler's helmet..
Just look at how excited he looks.. Me on the other hand is not a motorbike gal. Have limited experience on a bike (I think maybe 3 times only in my whole lifetime, if you ask me all bikes are the same), so I have no plans to get on a bike. Naufal's bike riding is also limited to the Subang Galaxy residential area only.Hold on tight.. keep your hands and feet in he vehicle at all time..
Bye ibu.. we'll be back in a jiffy :)

What is it with men and their machines? My husband refuses to let go of the old motorbike. Sentimental value he says.. what are we going to do with 2 motorbikes? Anybody want to rent a bike?? haha....

On the same day that Norman bought his scooter, I also bought a car. We'll talk more about that when the car is in our hands in June. For now, we are in the process of tendering for the number plate. My ideal 2 digit number costs more than 2 months graduate starting basic salary!! What a big NO-NO!!

I could get used to this

As this week I am a stay at home mum, I wanted to do all the things that I haven't had the time to do on a weekend. One of it is to wake up early for no particular reason (usually if it is a weekend we would only wake up early if there is an early appointment). Today I wanted to make a special breakfast, and even top it off with dessert. Since yesterday was Aunty Nora's birthday, Naufal had mentioned cake a couple of times that he wanted to have some cake. Since we can't leave the house, the only way to get cake is bake it!!

So I woke up early to bake a cake.. all the ingredients are readily available, so it didn't take long to get started. My initial plan was to bake the cake for Norman to bring to work but as Norman is leaving early to beat the morning traffic and there's so way to speed up the baking process, I had to bring myself back to reality and keep some for dinner's dessert.

The oven haven't been used in along time. So I decided to bake two cakes, one of which I would send to my mother's house (via Mr. Norman)..

By the time Naufal woke up the cakes are ready and just cooling out of the oven on the cooling rack. He could smell the bakery-like smell arising from the kitchen.
He's overjoyed that he will be getting a breakfast dessert today. Lemon cake..
I pretended that it was HIS birthday and sang him a birthday song.. I guess he's expecting presents too..
No candles but he's still excited..
Nyum.. nyum.. let's eat ibu!!

Staying home with Naufal is much much more fun now that he's recovering.. After breakfast he would help me with the laundry (well most of what he folds need to be refolded), a quick shower then he would watch Play House Disney while I would sweep/vacuum the floor and prepare a little lunch for the both of us. After the meal and his medicine, I would read a book with him and he would fall asleep for his after lunch nap (maybe due to drowsiness from the cough syrup). This would give me some time to go online or clean up the rest of the house and prepare dinner.

It is really rewarding cause I would get hugs and kisses whenever he's feeling happy.. I could really get used to this :)