I'm a full-time mummy

I have been cutting down on doing product reviews since 2014 and what more with baby #4 on the way this end of year, all the more I need to be particularly picky and selective with the products that I'm reviewing. Not that I'm trying to be hard sell, no, definitely not! But with 3 kiddos + 1 on the way, being a housewife at home with kiddos all the time and helping out with hubby's business, I just feel it is not fair to make companies and PR reps wait for my reviews while I slowly review and look for time to spare to draft out my feedback you know? But of course, like I said, I have to be selective, so products that we can definitely fit into our family dynamics (especially books on parenting or homeschooling stuff, family products, something along those genre) will be accepted!

When I was contacted to review products from Merries and Kao, I immediately remembered the pleasant experience I had 3 years back when I reviewed Merries diapers for our 2nd kiddo! So needless to say, of course I say yes!  

KAO, Japan’s Home Care Expert, has recently launched "Welcome to My Modern Parenthood" (WTMMP) to help new and anxious parents with minimal to zero know-how in transitioning into effortless, enjoyable parenthood through insights and education.

We received the following products for our review, they are basically the 3 ideal home care solutions:

• Japan’s No.1* Baby Diaper, MERRIES;
  

• Japan’s No.1* Home Care Range, MAGICLEAN; 
  

• Malaysia’s No.1* Laundry Concentrated Powder, ATTACK
  

After all these years, I am still impressed with Merries diapers. Just love their pants diapers and this time, I get to review the tape version as well (previous review 3 years ago was on their pants diaper version) Below snapshots on the tape and pants version - front and back view so that you can have a look at how they differ.

Personally, I feel both tape and pants version has their own pros and cons. I love the convenience of using the pants version and generally prefer to bring the pants version for our family outing. It is easy to take out, just tear the sides, roll up the diaper and stick the blue tape at the back to hold it together. For the tape version, if your child is still young and need to lie down to change their tape diaper, I guess this would be a better option but, yours truly here is a seasoned parent for 3 kiddos (4th on the way) and have over the years mastered the skills of changing kiddos' diapers while they are standing LOL so for us, tape or pants, no problemo!! So at the end of the day, it really depends on your skills as I see both tape and pants version are of equal quality and comfortable material (not to mention high absorbency!)

We received several Magiclean products for review and I have initially wanted my hubby to try out as well as he cleans the house more than I do hahahaha but in the end, I decided that being pregnant at 5th months now, it would be particularly handy if these products are able to help me out as I really do not want to just depend on other people to clean up my house unless my pregnancy really requires me to rest a lot, otherwise, I think I'm good and I also wanted to use the opportunity to get our kiddos to do the house chores as well heheheh...

Okay back to the Magiclean products... the one that I'm particularly very satisfied and thrilled to use is the Magiclean Wiper Handy Duster Extendable! It looks like a normal peachy colored woolly duster but then you realised you can actually adjust the handle to extend from 46cm to 95cm and then bend it to few angles which gives you the additional reach and convenience to clean high and hard to reach places... whoaaaa... I love it!

I'm also impressed with its high absorption fibres that effectively pick up, trap and hold even the finest dust! Cleaning is so so easy now!

The next item worth mentioning in the Magiclean range of products is the Magiclean Wiper Mop. It can handle wet and dry mopping where you apply on either wet or dry sheets onto the mop. I love the ultra-slim head which allows me to reach deep and narrow spaces and its 360° dust catching pattern improves overall dust trapping ability, you can easily flip left, right, front, back and I think because of this feature, our 4.5 year old girl enjoys mopping our rooms very much! She started out mopping our bedroom (despite my hubby mopping the room just the night before!) and you can already see how dirty it is after the mopping (our house is near the highway so the dust is horrendous at times)

Our girl was so enjoying her mopping that she happily volunteered to mop our staircase as well. This time, I changed the sheet to dry ones to try out. Ahhh.... so easy, even a little child can do it!

I'm also particularly impressed with the Magiclean Kitchen Cleaner Refreshing Lime Trigger. Very impressed with the instant stain-dissolving foam that easily removes the greasy stains in just 1 wipe. I demonstrated it to my mother-in-law and she went 'Whoaaaa... I always have to put some other cleaner liquid and scrub the cooking area real hard and this one is so easy?! Look at how shiny it is also!' Parents, get this mother-in-law approved product!

Some items worth mentioning in the ATTACK range of products are the Attack Ultra Power and Attack Detergent plus Softener liquid detergent. We've always been the powder detergent users (front-loading washing machine) and I feel that the liquid detergent is not bad as well. Smells good and cleans our clothes wonderfully. The softener also made our clothes smooth and soft.

To sum up our experience, I'm grateful for the opportunity to try out the wonderful range of products from Kao & Merries and believe that they will truly transform your parenting life and makes it way more convenient for you to do your house chores, even our young kiddos can do it easily!

Do check out Kao's website to find out more!

Btw, Kao is holding a "Parenthood Home Makeover " contest. You can stand to win a home makeover & KAO products worth up to RM30,000! To join the contest, you need to purchase RM38 worth of Magiclean or Attack products and a minimum of 1 pack of Merries diapers. Do note that the contest runs from 2 May to 31 July 2016. So hurry up!

Also, do note that there is an event happening from 13th July to 17th July at the Ground Floor Centre Court (Old Wing) in 1 Utama Shopping Centre. Do join the event for more great deals and promotions!

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the products in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine.

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost everyday) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.

I have been cutting down on doing product reviews ever since our 3rd kiddo came along in end of Sept 2013 and especially now with 4th kiddo due in mid of November 2016. I do still accept review pitches but only when time permits and if it is something that I can see it being useful and beneficial to our family. Also, as busy as I am with 3 kiddos, being preggy, home cooking, taking care of hubby's administration site of the business and swamped up with managing my FB page and blog, I just can't say no to reviewing awesome Lego stuff! Our kiddos (and hubby) are fans of Lego so all the more I gotta say yes!

About the company:

"Mighty Utan is a 100% Malaysian owned and operated Lego toy store. We strive to bring your/your child's favorite toys such as Lego, Funko Pop, Play-Doh, Fisher-Price, Playskool, Disney Frozen, Thomas & Friends and more. We love to let every child enjoy building LEGO and let his/her imagination run wild!

Our team share a wealth of experience, knowledge and enthusiasm for toys such as LEGO, Funko Pop, Fisher-Price, Thomas & Friends and are looking to bring in more variety of products. You can visit us at our retail store located in Dataran Prima, Petaling Jaya or shop online 24 hours a day. Our team would love to help you with any queries or assistance with your purchase, just drop us a message at customer service."

We arrived at the Petaling Jaya outlet at 11.30am after having a light breakfast nearby as we were informed opening hours on Saturday is 11am to 7pm.It was easy for us to locate the stores (using Waze) and there is proper signage that directs us to the correct tower and floors. When we reached the front of the store, the first thing we see is the toilet with the cute signage. Toilet is unisex, clean and bright just in case you are wondering.

Next, as we stepped into the stores, we were bombarded with the sights of TONS of Lego products.

E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E!!!!

You see them on your left,

you see them on your right,

You see many more far ahead,

Then there's a couple of big tables with lots of Lego bricks and some customers were holding a plastic container to store their bricks. Our kiddos ran off to the nearest table and started scouting for Lego bricks to build stuff. I went to check with the staff and explained the reason we were at the outlet.

Upon explanation by the friendly staff in the store, I found out that they have this concept of 'Pick-a-Brick' where you can choose whatever bricks you wanted from the 2 tables and buy them according to their weights. You can choose to pick loose bricks or build your own Lego creations and buy it after weighing them.

I relayed the information to my hubby and he got down to explaining to our kiddos to look for different type of Lego bricks that they don't see at our home and instructed them to put the bricks they like into the plastic containers he is holding. Of course, with kids being kids, everything looks new and special to them, so all sorts of Lego bricks went into the container LOL!! Hubby had to do a few round of filtering to remove those bricks that we do not want.

There are different boxes underneath the tables if you are looking for specific boats, wheels, or parts like those spaceship capsules or covers etc. You really need lots of time and patience to look through and get what you really want.

There are also some pre-packed Lego bricks in plastic pouches that clearly states the weight of the bricks (if you are lazy to choose and wants specific theme of bricks)

I managed to score an awesome find from one of these pre-packed plastic pouches. I saw some MegaBlock Halo soldier figurines inside and immediately grabbed it and showed it to our 7-year-old-boy. He goes crazy with soldiers looking stuff and when he noticed the plastic pouch contains Halo soldiers, he hangs onto the bag real tight. Some of the figurines are not complete (missing hands or legs or heads) but 80% of it are complete, nobody's complaining!! I am so very happy with this find!

If you are a beginner in Lego stuff and looking to get a starter set for your kiddos or as a gift, I would recommend you to read my "Tips on Buying Lego For Your Child" blog post first then to skip the 'Pick-a-Brick' section and opt straight for those ready sets.

I do notice there are some sets in the stores which I do not see anywhere else, even if other places sell it, they sure do not have so much variety as found in the Mighty Utan Petaling Jaya outlet. Many different sets of the Lego Education theme can be found here, as well as those Lego Technics sets.

There are some rare or old sets as well but some of them are not complete. I almost wanted to get the LEGO SpongeBob Heroic Heroes of the Deep 3815 but had to consoled myself after being told that the figurines are missing and they are selling the set without the figurines. Sigh....

We were given a complimentary voucher to exchange for Lego bricks from 'Pick-a-Brick' section so our final loots after almost 2 hours of digging, filtering and finalizing... we just need to pay extra RM2.50 for the additional weight from our loot.

Overall, we have a very enjoyable visit at the Mighty Utan Petaling Jaya outlet.

Friendly staff, lots of brands and options available, surely there will be something for everyone.

Do check out the stores!!!

There are currently 2 physical Mighty Utan stores which are located at:

• Petaling Jaya outlet (Address: Level 7, Unit 03, Menara A , The Tube, Dataran Prima,Jalan PJU 1/37, Petaling Jaya 47301, Selangor, Malaysia)
• Kuala Lumpur outlet (Address: Level 1-23A, Cheras Sentral Mall, Cheras 56000, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia)
  

You can also shop online at http://mightyutan.com.my/

Do note that I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the products in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine.

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost everyday) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.

I have been cutting down on doing product reviews ever since our 3rd kiddo came along in end of Sept 2013 and especially now with 4th kiddo due at end of 2016. I do still accept review pitches but only when time permits and if it is something that I can see it being useful and beneficial to our family. Also, as busy as I am with 3 kiddos, being preggy, home cooking, taking care of hubby's administration site of the business and swamped up with managing my FB page and blog, I just can't say no to reviewing good books, what more from a big brand name like Scholastic! Reading is my passion and coupled with books that are of parenting, children, family or religion or educational genre, all the more I gotta say yes!

Title: Scholastic - Bodhi and Friends series (Hello, Hey, Hi! and See You Later)
Publisher: Scholastic Singapore
ISBN: 978-981-47-2998-7 (Hello, Hey, Hi!)
ISBN: 978-981-47-2999-4 (See You Later)
Paperback: 24 pages (each book comes with a DVD)

Description from the product page:

"Scholastic, the world’s largest publisher and distributor of children’s books, presents a brand new book series “Bodhi and Friends” for kids ages 4 and up with the release of its first two sing-along books – Hello, Hey, Hi! and See You Later at its Book Preview Party held in Malaysia – the first across Asia.

This brand new book series is designed to provide a creative preschool educational program with adventure, music, fun, as well as the essential building blocks for early childhood.

The Bodhi and Friends books is a great series to be introduced to kids ages 4 and up as it is designed to help children to learn English phonics, vocabulary, grammar, listening skills while instilling a genuine love of language in them. "

We received a copy of 'Hello, Hey, Hi!' and 'See You Later' for our review and the first person being enthralled by the colorful sight of the book is our youngest kraken, who at 2.5 years old now is fascinated with books as she tried to emulate her older sister who is flipping through book at 4.5 years old and making up her own stories as she goes along and her older brother who at 7 years old can read books at his own pace. Each book comes with a sing-along DVD of the song, very very catchy indeed!

However, I'm not sure whether it is because of my Zoom player app or what, the song ends abruptly. Usually when we hear songs, there would be a few seconds of music lingering on before fading off, but the songs from these 2 books cuts off abruptly. I have yet to get other app to try the DVD again though.

Hey there, I’ll see you later.

S E E   Y O U later.

Even I find myself spelling out the letters as I sing along with our kiddos. Very catchy indeed!

As a stay-at-home mother who is ehem.. stuck at home with our kiddos most of the time, I find these books entertaining and educational as well. Apart from getting your kids to learn as they sing and enjoy along with the upbeat songs, I also can't help but noticed the subtlety in teaching children about manners as well. To say goodbye, to share toys, to greet others with good manners and so on. So these books are not just plain sing-along song, there's more to it!

The illustrations are cute and eye-catching. Reminded our girls of the Disney Palace pets characters actually. The wordings on each page is big and easy on the eyes.

If you are observant like me (ehem, ehem..) you can also make use of the books to teach your child to name the objects on the page, to count how many friends of Bodhi in a particular page, to ask your child what do they think Bodhi and its friends are doing on the page (Going to school? Playing? Having a picnic? and more), to tell the time, to pay attention to the sky (dark = night time, raining etc), to name the colors on the rainbow, so much more learning opportunities if you just pay attention to the details in the book!

Thank you to Scholastic for the opportunities given to us to review these books!

The book is available at all major bookstores.

For more information on the Bodhi and Friends book series, visit Scholastic’s website or Facebook page at www.facebook.com/ScholasticAsia

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with copies of the books in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine. And if you'd like to read my previous book reviews, you can do so by reading this post of mine called "My Book Reviews"

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost everyday) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.