DIY: DogHouse + PlayHouse (part 1)

I went around hunting for a dog house for my dog, and my jaws dropped. Rm1.4k for a doghouse.

Although it's high quality and can last for 10years, its rather small for just one dog. I'm planning to have 2 dogs so if I were to order a house that fits 2 dogs, it's gonna cost me a BOMB.

Initially I wanted to recycle the woods from our renovation to build a doghouse. But after I tried to saw one pc of it, I gave up. It's too thick and at the end we called our construction worker to come over and help us build raised bed for my veg patch. I thought I'm just gonna scrap the doghouse idea off until one night at11pm, I found my dog wet. He saw me working at my kitchen and he accompanied me and he was soaking wet cos my kitchen door doesn't have a proper awning to block the rain. So I decided, I'm gonna build a dog house for him, myself!

So I began sourcing for wood sizes and prices on my birthday, 12th November. To start things off, i bought myself a hammer on that day. *lol*

I tell you, the people at the hardware store is pissed with me. They must be thinking this crazy woman is wasting our time. If 8ft how much? if 10 ft leh? if 12 ft leh?

After I got the measurement of the woods and the prices, I went home and began sketching the house plan. My son call it the "blue print".

And I calculated the $ involved, and again I was stunned. My initial costing came up to rm700. I was upset and was about to give up. My husband asked "Rm700, how many days to make? Is it better to just buy?"

The next day, I began sketching again. And I modified the plan and recalculated. Ah.. This time is within my budget

So the next day I went to the hardware shop and ordered the wood. It came in 8ft, 10ft and 12ft. You need to calculate the measurement and tell them exactly where to cut. I measured the wood myself (yes, cos they are not gonna be responsible if they cut it wrongly and you will waste your wood) and monitored them while they cut the wood shorter so that I can transport them home in my sedan car.

I went home and my husband was surprised that I'm serious about it. But he left me alone cos he knows that when I'm doing a project it means DND mode.(do not disturb)

I started to saw, joined and hammer the frames together. My JD came and asked "are you a Handy mummy? (after handy manny cartoon) and I said I guess so? "Can I help you mami?" Of course!

When I was done with the frame, I was quite dissappointed with it cos the frame looks flimsy.

*sigh* I thought about it that night and I thought "worst come to worst, I can reuse the wood and make something else", right?

To be continued...

You've got mail!

Just before I head out to send JD to class, I peeked into the mailbox and to my surprise, I found something.

A mail from my lil boy. He colored it earlier and went out to put it into the  mailbox for me.

I said "wow! I have a mail!" and he said "yeah! It's for you! From me! Angry bird mail!"

How cool is that?! But he doesn't know how to write much now, so perhaps maybe next time he'll know how to write my name on it :)

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 :)