Building a Christmas Tree with recyclables

This is our first year celebrating Xmas at Byob Subang.

One day, my sis  sent me a visual via mms.

No wonder I saw so many green bottles hidden in a box at BYOB.

So she called me few days ago and asked me to go over and help to set up and decorate the tree.

All items used are recyclables material such as PET bottles, boxes, twines, rafia string, rubberbands, tubes cover and styrofoam packing balls.

We rushed off cos the kids need to attend a class. This is how it looks like when we left.

30mins later my sis MMS me again and she added more stuff to te Xmas tree. Yeah, how can we forget the "recycle" stickers?

I must say "great job" to my sister cos to plan this, it need alot of preparation. The PeT bottles were tied together in a formation so that it's steady and holds perfectly. To string the styrofoam Balls is another task. To collect the bottles and also the rest of the items is also another task. And she did it all by herself. Me? I just come to decorate and take picture! *lol* (halo, busy with kids lah....!)

Of Fish and Fishing

Since he was very very tiny dude, he liked fish. When he started to talk, he started to talk about different kinds of fishes, its name and its kind. My neighbour then taught him "Justin...say FISH.." He said "Puffer Fish, Angler Fish, Dolphin" pointing at book and it shocked my neighbour.

When we go to the bookstore, JD would go to the comic section and this lil boy will look for fishing magazine. And this is him (many months ago) reading a fishing magazine in the bookstore and that puppy eye look is asking me to buy a book for him. Of course I said no. Who else reads about fishing magazine?

And if he come across any fish toy, he'd stand there and not move until someone buy it for him. Usually it's my sister that will surrender and buy for him. And this is his latest toy, a moving fish with annoying music. *pull hair*

So when he overheard that my parents went for fishing last last weekend, he asked me if we can tag along the next time they go again. So off we went to a fish pond in Rawang last sunday.

There's 2 reason to why we went; one is for my kids to spend time with my parents cos they just adore the kids very much. Two: is for my kids to be exposed to outdoor activities rather than just ipad games.

Pic: JT kept asking my mum and dad "why so long? Where's the fish?"

They manage to catch only ONE fish in that one hour. The previous week, my mum manage to catch 40 (yeap...forty) fishes. It poured one hour after we arrived so we packed up and left. Although it's just that one hour, I can see all of them (my parents and my kids) enjoyed themselves, all with their  own reasons. And I'm just happy that everyone is happy :)

My Cheeky Luigi

When I bring him out to meet my friends (cos they hardly see my fb - it's all about kids. who wanna read anyway?) and also relatives (they claim that there are too many to remember, *lol*), they will ask him "what's your name boy?".

And he would say "My name is Luigi".

And usually the people's reaction is ..."Huh?"

And he would teach them to pronounce it "Lu......Eeeeee.....Gie...."

And people will repeat after him and they really think that his name is Luigi. *lol*

And I'll be around to say "hahah he's a joker la. His name is Justin".

And he'll smirk and bounce off.

p/s: he is Luigi when he is wearing green. Other times, he is Justin.

My and my Luigi last sunday :)

What to do during school holiday?

This is a very back dated post. Many many many months ago *lol*

Anyway if you're looking forward to do some craft with your kids, this could be one of it.

A print, cut and paste to create a boxed-up taxi for your kids.

Easy to do and fun for the kids (and it will occupy then for at least half a day)

Source: From here

Building your own passionfruit trellis

One of my favourite fruits is passion fruit.

Sweet and juicy passionfruits, that helps me go to toilet, faster.

So when my garden was ready, my first fruit tree that I wanted to plant is passionfruit. My previous passionfruit died cos  I stayed at an intermediate unit and there wasn't much sun and space for them to crawl. SO when I moved to my new house, I decided I want to build an extra tall trellis for my passion fruit. A 7 ft tall trellis. *gulp* I know, I am a very greedy gardener. Make use of the space ma...right? *lol*

So here's what you need:

A big pot (if you want to plant them in a pot)

Plastic Pipes ( i bought this 20 ft pipe at rm9 from hardware shop)

A plyer

A passion fruit plant (of course)

Cable tie ( not in pic) OR Garden wire (refer to pic below)

Heavy duty wire. I bought from hardware shop about 20ft for Rm3.50

I bought this garden wire from Ace Hardware about rm5.90 for 100ft. You can tie alot alot alot of things with this.

Place the plant in the middle of the pot and then fill it with soil.

And arrange the pipes surrounding the plant like this. It will be better if you have more pipes.

Since the heavy duty wires are already coiled into circle, i just put the entire wire around the pot and pull them up. They just go spiral and you just secure the placing with cable tie or garden wire. Sorry no pic of this cos , who else wanna snap pic of me when I'm always the official photographer?

And this is the outcome. Fuh! I nearly fainted while preparing this cos I'm only 5ft 1 tall and this trellis is 7 ft tall.

Looking forward for the leaves to fill up the entire trellis and hopefully I can harvest some passionfruits soon :)

When Mami is working at BYOB

A very common sight if I'm at BYOB with my kids.

But luckily I wasn't the victim when I took this pic. Victim, was my sister.

That's JD under her shirt while she was refilling detergent for the customer. *slap forehead*

And we can't scold him in front of the customers, so we just "tahan".

Another common sight if my kids are there;

Someone would be snoozing vertically or horizontally.

*lol*

Starting A Worm Compost

I went to visit my mum to pass her some BYOB stuff and I casually asked her "Ma, can give me some worms ah?". You see, my mum has this compost garden where she dump all her kitchen craps and cover it with soil. She let the worm do the work. The compost can be used as fertilizer for your plants. And every Monday she would go and harvest some and bring to the workshop, where she takes care of my dad's workshop. There, she will sometimes ask her staff to help her to put the worm on the hook (because she is scared of worms!) and she goes fishing at a nearby river (longkang la...). Anyway when I asked she said "FOR WHAT?" I said I wanna rare worms and she laughed. She tapped the container that she filled it with worms and said "TAKE LAH!". I nearly fainted upon seeing the amount of worms in it.

And she used a stick(cos she is scared of worm mah..) and selected some fat ones for me. *shiver* JT ran and hugged my dad and refused to go into the car after that.*lol* So, I went home and started to search for a container (with proper lid) which I can use as a compost bin in my kitchen. Ah... found a toy box! Sorry boys! Mama's got to play with worms!
I read from tanamsendiri.com about this and so i followed his way. I started shredding newspaper and damp it up, and form them into balls and arrange them like this...

and this is how it looks like when its full, first layer.

Then you began filling up your first layer of dirt/earth/whatever you wanna call it.

I filled it up with 2-3 inches of soil and then add in another layer of newspaper and again another layer of dirt.

And then the worms are added to their new home. Supposedly, you should add in the topsoil (the soil where you found your worms) so that the worms won't get "culture shock". Cos suddenly they are in a new surrounding and doesn't have their smell or something they might go into shock. Don't ask me what happen when they are in shock, i suppose they just die?. But then since it was given to me, try la. what to do right?

There you go worms. Enjoy your new home!

And here's their first food. Yum...Yum.....A well blended banana and apple smoothies.

(rotten banana and half eaten apple *lol) 

(why blend? Worms don't have teeth! So by blending it, it makes them eat easier, faster, and you get your compost faster. That's why)

There, that's what my mum gave me on my birthday.

Worms!

And I started a worm compost bin on my birthday.*lol* 

P/S: food you should avoid putting into your compost : Orange, Lemon, Lime, Garlic and Onion, Bones, cooked food. 

P/S: since I am putting it in my kitchen, I sprayed the outer layer of the container with OMG insects to prevent ants from going into the container.

My playground

The kids got their new playground, our garden with grass and ample space for them to run around with our dog.

And mami also has a new playground, her vegetable garden.

Everyday, after I send them to school I'd hang out in my garden. The sound of cars passing by and my dog's breathing sound nearby is really a soothing sound.

It's been a rainy season, and although i have prepared my raised bed i still cannot plant much cos the rain might drown the baby plants. But I have been germinating seeds and these are some of the ones that I have germinated.

And this is my Purple Bean French Bean Plant.

Left: the day before , Middle: the next day (woah!) and right: few hours after the middle pic (woah woah!)

And this is few days later after i have transferred it to my vege patch.

Climb baby Climb!

And this is my Cherokee Butter Wax bean.

Watching them grow each day.

Ah.. if only it didn't rain everyday then I think they would have grown much more.

You've been warned that you will see alot of green (and purple) pics in this blog! :)