Sunday break

My aunt came from Jakarta to stay with me for a while ( means 2-3 months ), just in time to give me a hand since we haven't find any maid yet. So last Sunday we went to Shangri-la Rasa Ria Resort, to have lunch at Tepi Laut cafe and we took the girls to dip in the swimming pool
Maya was so excited as you can see....
Maya screamed : Aquaa. Aquaaa and pointed to the sea....

Ind with her usual pose....while Maya started to get enough of waiting and decided to wandering around on her own

I am going alone whether you are going or no.......she said.I will walk to the sea alone...if no body want to join me.....she said again...



Whaaaat ma? ah another photo? wait....see there is a sailing boat over there
Let me touch this thingy .... Mamma said this is sand....what is sand anyway?
ok it feels sandy of my palm

My Mamma never finish with her camera...ok I will give her one cute pose , I hope she will leave me alone on this beach after this......
POSE!




Ok I think I am near enough to the sea....maybe I should try the pool now

aphoo....the water is cold!!
apeta apeta......( aspetta =wait) Maya ask Mamma to wait before going into the pool. She said aqua OT!......aqua OT! I think she mean to say the water is COLD but she said is HOT, and as me to wait until the water become not COLD . LOL

aaaah aqua not OT ......it is warm,. and yes I must also jump in with her...


here is Indy practicing the swimming moves , she missed 2x swim lessons due to the HMFD more than 2 weeks ago. But amazingly Maya didn't catch the virus... Thanks to the superpower of breastmilk!


Indy showing off her ballet move in her brand new tutu that I got custom made for her from US. The colors are so pretty, it is made from strawberry and cucumber organza. And here is my lil rascal with her double puff tulle tutu in cotton candy and lemonade shades. I think Maya was trying to do curtsy here....kind of .

She looks so tanned here after the 2 hours swim during that day.

I love the tutus. It is so puffy and pretty.... I think this will make a perfect birthday outfit for them.

What's happening in our back yard?

Since we were back from Italy. My husband got his old hobby back , he is into gardening. But most of the times when you are not surrounded by people that share the same hobby with you, you will get discourage as no one to share the passion with.

We use to lived in the house with the garden in Guangzhou suburb ( Panyu district) , China. We had rosemary bushes , basil, Papaya trees, tomatoes, chillies, etc. For vegetables or fruits that are easy to get maybe it doesn't excite us much, but to have a fresh imported herbs in our yard that will make a big difference. That was great for me, as I can make homemade pasta sauce with fresh herbs from our own garden.

So this time, my dh got some seeds from Italy. His brother is also into gardening. This time he plans some zucchini, giant tomatoes , Cherry tomatoes, Sage, Mint, Rosemary,
Basil. I hope all can grow well. So far the Giant tomatoes and Zucchini looks ok. They are still just a tiny buds. Tomatoes however are the tricky one, if not enough sun it wont have any fruits at all.

We never try to plant any imported plants at home in Malaysia. So we hope the climate, including the rain and the soil will be suitable at least for some of the plants. Though Rosemary will be hard to be grown from the seeds. At least I hope we got basil and sage. I love home made pesto sauce !!! Nyum...


2 farmers to be, digging out our back yard. My dh got help from his friend.
The soild here are quite good for plants and it is hard to remove the grass totally as they grow back in no times.
Kungfu fighters. Pardon me for the topless guys over here :)
My little gardener
How our garden look like now, the green net is to protect the plants from our dogs. The backyard were belong to them before , but now not anymore. But don't worry they still have the side yard and the front yard to dig and hide their bones and stuffs :)

My aunty who stay with me for the time being, helped to burn the grass and leaves.

Our lil's busy body who always yes ALWAYS put shoes in the wrong side.

These are the giant tomatoes plants( photo taken by Indy) and it should be move here later on :



I shall update here if we got more plants coming out here :-D

On the way from Japan this time

Hmm still can't stop, I need help. I received most of my bento from my last post today. That was fast! About a week. And I lost this items on ebay ( no stock) Hello Kitty Snack containers ,
so I replace it with My Melody round snack containers.

And this are on the way to me from Japan. CAN'T WAIT!! The shipping from Japan are actually much cheaper!

I found that for Maya's breakfast portion, since she normally already eat her breakfast at home ( milk and bread ) so the snack containers are more suitable. Ok that is just a perfect excuse for me to add more snacks containers right? RIGHT!
And I don't know why, I like to give Indy the Hello Kitty items and Maya the Cinnamoroll items :-D. But of course they can share and exchange.
Cinnamoroll Lunch box
Indy like to eat with Furikake ( is it correct? I mean The Japanese rice flakes) , I got it from my Aunty in Singapore. She sent me the Hello Kitty one. But I found also at Tong Hing KK , they sell the Hello Kitty one and also the Kerokeropi and the normal one ( no cute packaging). And I thought the Furikake stencils will be great to decorate plain rice. I still want the Hello Kitty one though. :-D
Ok so I made the rice with tuna mayonnaise with the rice molds and found that the rice look plain. So I thought this will make it nicer? I can put the cheese or ham on the top.


Ok I don't know why but I love foodpicks As I can do many things with that. Like to make grapes and cheese cubes skewers, to stick cherry tomatoes etc.And after I refer to Celine's blog....I realized that actually this one is available at Daiso KK, CHEAPER! *KNOCK HEAD*** And my sis also going to send me a couple sets of foodpicks!
And I also never get enough of Food baran/dividers. This will brighten up my plain bento.
I think this will be one of my favorite gadget? the sauce pencil! I am not a good drawer with pencil, so imagine how I will draw with ketchup, mayonnaise etc. Deana... could you help? hehehe

And this is what I am looking for. And this mama bento also emailed me about the same items. LOL. Our mind work a like! So without her permission I ordered 2 sets of this, one for me and one for her. And paksa her to combine shipping with me! *evil grin* Great value I think. Oh just in case you ask what is that, that is a sausage cutter. It will make a fish, penguin and crab shapes. I don't give too much sausage to my girls, but this is just nice to have isn't it?

So you see, I don't just buy things like mad. ( ehm) For each of them I got the reason why do I need them right? ( ehm read as : try to make my self feel better after this bento shopping)

OK , so if you want to see a proof that I really use the bento tools, here you go! I didn't take the whole bento as this is not for bento/lunchbox but just for afternoon snack for Indy and Maya at home.
This is bread filled with peanut butter and the face of Pooh is made using the Pooh icing sugar sieve /stencil. I use the choco-orange dessert (Fernleaf brand) , this is kind of dessert in a plastic cup and the consistency is much easier to use with the stencil comparing with Nutella ( too thick)
Oh and every time I made each of this bread, Maya or Indy took and eat it. So it is hard to take the photo of the whole batch. The are gone too fast !


For those who is not into bento ( yet) , just a reminder : never say never....
Just look at me now...

The latest photos sent by Corrado

Thanks to Corrado to sent me these beautiful photos from the wedding.
Grazie mile, Corra! Sono bellissime le foto!



Notice my " ugly" slippers? LROF! That was about 5 p.m and during the lunch , I secretly changed my heels to my "comfy ugly "slippers , since I must chased Maya every where and totally forget about it during this family photo shoot! LOL....

And here is the photo of the happy couple:

Ciao ciao....

Recents updates

So ok, my life lately is not just about bento ok , guys! hhehe. Well I tried to made a few but no photos. As I don't need to make a full bento for my girls , so the bento box looks so empty and unattractive! So far I just made eggs and bread for them. And Maya was so very happy this morning when she saw Winnie the Pooh bread, which I made with Cheddar cheese spread filling. Her favorite . She screamed in delight : POOOOOOOOOOOH POOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH....BREAD POOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH......I also thrown in some grapes and cut papaya. And I am still waiting for more bento tools to come.

And if you want to find the oshibori/towel for bento and the case, I found it at The Owe's ( 1st floor)at Karamunsing komplex. I got 2 Hello Kitties and 2 Cinnamoroll at only about RM 3.5- RM 5. The towel is a bit rough but the case is cute and I case put any cloth wipes that I got :-D

OK OK , as I said my life is not just about bento now ( I mean I am trying NOT to visit any ebay store and that is NOT EASY). Last week Indy had this hand , foot and mouth disease. She got ulcers and blister under the tounge , throat, and inner cheeks. No fever though. But my instinct told me that is not a normal mouth ulcer. Took her to see her paediatrician, and he confirmed that is HFM. Sigh....The rashes on her hand and feet are not that many. Mostly looked like small mosquitoes bites . And the doctor asked do I have other young kid at home? If yes, I need to completely seperate them for at least 6 days.
I said that is impossible for me to do as we don't have any relatives here. No grandparents, or aunt/uncle. So I said I will try to separate them but that will be hard as they still will be playing together. So I just must be prepare that Maya will have it soon.
Indy just got 2 medicines for the ulcers, and paracetamol and she doesn't need as she doesn't have any fever . No antibiotic was given as this is caused by virus.

Today is the 6th day after Indy showed the signs of HFM. From yesterday she was ok already. She still has a good appetite despite of painful ulcers , she ate porridge for 2 days and after that she just ate anything again ( no chips , no fried things of course) .Basically she is fine now but I still need to keep her home one more day just to be safe and not to spread more virus to others.
But swimming is big a no no until next week at least.

And Maya? touch wood...... until today she looks OK. I checked her tounge many times and no signs of ulcer yet. I told Maya if she will catch HFM also please have it the same time as Indy so I can take care 2 of them at the same time . Bad me....
But until now she is still ok. Hopefully she will.....I will update here if she get it sooner or later.
My hope is just she is still on Breastmilk and even if she has it, hopefully it will be mild one. Maya 's immune system so far has been good, she doesn't easily get sick or catch cold. So I hope she can resist also this time.

Another update that I WILL BE MAIDLESS VERY VERY SOON.
yeah my maid of 2 years officially will be leaving next Monday. sob sob
She will return to her country to try other job, she wants to try to work in a factory overseas or something else.
Maya will miss her badly, and I haven't get anyone to replace her yet!

HELP!HELP!

And I went to see one primary school in KK yesterday. We need to find a school for Indy next year. So far I went to 2 schools . We were planning to put her into Chinese school but I think we are just too coward to face that the Chinese school will have too many homeworks and it will be hard on Indy ( she is not the sitting and learning type, her principal also agree on this). We sound bad maybe for some parents that we don't want our children to have too many homeworks, we do want them to have homeworks, but maybe not too much? We want them to learn other things too not just sit and do homework every single day , We prefer to have them enjoy the process of learning as well . The academic achievement is important but we want something that is more than that. We hope we can find the right school.The school that can give academic learning as well as to build a good character . Do we ask to much?

I wish she can join the Chinese school though.They got the good reputation here, but again , from others advices since there are possibility for us to move to other country and the chance for Indy to go to Mandarin speaking school is not that much, they all said better to go to English speaking school and take Mandarin tuition. Imagine if we need to go back to Italy and Indy is only use to go to Mandarin speaking school. We don't want her to loose her Mandarin so I think the best option is to attend to English Speaking school and take Mandarin tuition.


Oh well before I go , here is Indy's lunch since she is at home this week.

So plain ! LOL, Actually I added cucumber pickles but I didn't take the photo with that. Here are bread with slice cheese, mini bread with mayonnaise, left over Mac & Cheese pasta with chicken, and grapes. Oh and she had it with chocolate milk.

Oh and I also made sandwiches with peanut butter and I use the Pooh icing sugar sieve's to draw the face of Pooh, but I use chocolate sauce instead of icing sugar. ( photo not taken...again busy....)
The second drawing is not that pretty, and Indy said : Oh I don't mind Ma, the most important is the taste , right? kekkeke...good girl...

Ok so here we go....the bento craze hits in!(edited)

This is the result of blog hopping and being so busy budy ! But I love it anyway! :-)
I saw more and more bloggers mom do a pretty cute bentos for their kids.
Actually I don't need to do this to feed my girls. They are practically eat everything I served them. Ok that is not true, they don't eat spicy as I do. But I will train them for that! I am Indonesian so we Indonesian love spicy food.

So the first thing come to my mind when I saw this blog .And saw all of her beautiful bento is : how can she manage to find the time to do that? and lucky my girls do not need to eat cute food!

hmm....Looks who's talking now!
Ok that particular blog , giving me the idea of trying it out. Ok what is the harm to give my girls a cute boiled egg? and a cute cut sandwiches? Ok, so I tried to browsed around and I was thinking just to try a few to start.

And again I was wrong...so very wrong. So I went to order a couple of stuffs from NST.
and with in days I made my second orders.

Want to see how serious is my new addictions?

These are what I have now ( got it from NST ) and Japan home center KK and I met this bento fan over there , and I know my collection will be more soon if I go to Daiso I Borneo , as my bento spy told me about what she bought over there via MMS.

Egg moulds

Hello Kitty lunch box
Hello Kitty bread cutter
Doraemon full body cookies cutters

Another food seperator, to make my plain bento looks better :)

Pooh veggetable cutters
Pooh cutter and icing sugar sieve

Rice mould
Got it from local store in KK ( photo courtesy of ebay store : hongkong outlet)
And these are the one on the way to me ( ordered from Ebay) so better order more , to cut down the shipping cost
Winnie the pooh egg mould , I think egg is the easiest thing to do . ( or maybe I was wrong?) beside my girls love eggs.


Winnie The pooh rice mould. This I can use for dinner at home as well. My girls doesn't need to bring rice to school,as the school provide food and my girls just eat everything they served.



My Melody die cut lunch box. This is just too cute!


A drink holder, Maya always bring Dwink box holder to school , And I think this is a cool and cute drink holder , and it is adjustable.


Small side dish container. Perfect for Maya


Hello Kitty veggie cutters and I think I will use it to cut sandwiches.

Hello Kitty food divider. It is just cute and I don't know If I need this, but anyway, I love it.

Quail eggs moulder! yay! Good for Maya's also


Hello Kitty sauce containers , to put cheese spread, mayonnaise , jam etc
Another sauce containers

Hello Kitty 's spoons
The stainless steel spoon

Hello Kitty food cups and food pick.. Just too cute!

Winnie the Pooh lunch box


Cookies cutters
Hello Kitty snack container, great for Maya.

So...since I just got a few of my tools last week. I only can make a hello kitty toast , i found the cutter is too big for one piece of bread. And I didn't take the photo for that.
So I just made this bento for the girls , it is very plain and unattractive kekeke...All are white and plain blah! Hopefully after my full equipments are here I can make it better!


Indy's bento, hehehe so plain, but she was so excited to see the Hello Kitty egg and showed it off to the whole class. The sandwiches are just plain bread with strawberry jam cut with my old metal cookies cutters that I bought from Consfood Damai Point long time ago. It has a good selection of bakery stuffs , they also got the chocolates moulds. The lunch box is the hello kitty one.


This is Maya one, A cinnamon roll egg with the same strawberry jam sandwiches. I use a small snack container from the first year ( I got if from Kids Avenue , Karamunsing complex)

I showed my sister that I am into bento now and she bought me these following stuffs from a Japanese store in San Francisco near where she works, the price are quite affordable about RM 10-12 each, and I will asked her to combine shipping for me as most of these are light:
Various foodcutters!
Sauce containers. I don't think I will need this much. But anyway.....
Rice Moulds
Sauce containers and ice cubes tray

Disposable chopstick , just because it is cute. Indy still can not use chopstick so I think I will keep this one first.


Sauce containers, Food dividers

Heart shaped egg cookes, non stick rice scooper and pot holder


Food cups/side dish cupsFood picks

Seaweed punchers
Lunch box straps, food and spoon, and chopstick.

Food wraps, sauce containers, and antibacterial wraps

So do you think I have enough to start? Is it too much to start? LOL
I am not sure yet if I will make bento every day. But I know one thing for sure I must stay away from ebay for a while!