Giveaway - Hot Wheels Wall Tracks Starter Set

I am so pleased to be hosting a giveaway for this mid term school holidays, 2012.

What Am I Giving Away

I am giving away one (1) Hot Wheels Wall Tracks Starter Set to one lucky reader of this blog. It comes with one (1) die-cast Hot Wheels car, 3M Command Strips for mounting plus an easy instruction poster. You will need to help your child do the initial set up. After that your child can use his imagination to create different pathways for his track.

How Much Is It Worth?

The Hot Wheels Wall Tracks Starter set is worth RM159.90

About The Hot Wheels Wall Tracks Starter Set

The Hot Wheels Wall Tracks is an innovative range of tracks from Mattel. What makes it different from other track sets is, this track is mounted on the wall! This wall mounted track play system lets your child take his play to new heights, off the floor and onto the wall. The track is mounted on the wall using adhesive 3M Command Strips which won't damage your walls.

What I Like About The Hot Wheels Tracks Starter Set

1. It encourages creative and imaginative play. Children can use their creativity and imagination by experimenting various ways they can twist and turn the tracks into the perfect racing circuit in their minds. 
2. It improves cognitive skills. Building new and different path variations enhances cognitive learning in children as children fix and snap the parts together to form different paths and racing routes.
3. You don't have to "pick up" after your kid since there will be no tracks left all over the floor. The tracks can be left on the wall as part of your room decor.
4. It can be expanded using other Hot Wheels Wall Tracks Set to create more stunts, speeds and actions. I like expand-ability options in toys because it saves me the headache of thinking of what to buy.

Giveaway Instructions

This giveaway is open to Malaysians Only (East and West Malaysians included).

I am using a form powered by Rafflecopter to make it easier for me to monitor your entries. All you need to do is follow the specific instructions on the form.

• You do not need to have a blog. 
• You do not need to sign up to rafflecopter
• You will need to fill in a valid email address so you can be contacted if you win the giveaway
• You will need to reply to the winning email within 48 hours, otherwise another winner will be selected

There are 5 ways you can submit entries. Please use the form to submit your entry. Click "Do It" then click "Enter" to submit your entry. It is very important that you use the form at the end of this post to submit your entries, otherwise it will not be counted. Thank you.

1. Leave A Blog Post Comment in the blog comment box (Compulsory).  Then Click "Do It" in the Rafflecopter form below followed by "Enter" to confirm that you have left a comment. You may then move on to submit the other optional entries below. Remember, the more ways you submit your entries, the higher your chances of winning.
2. "Like" The Blog Post
3. Tweet About The Giveaway
4. Share This Giveaway On Facebook
5. Blog About This Giveaway

Only the first "Leave A Blog Post Comment" is compulsory. The others are optional. 

You will see entry points for each way of submitting an entry. More entry points are allocated for the more difficult ones. For example the "Blog About This Giveaway" option will earn you 5 entry points. This means your blog post will be considered as 5 separate entries for the giveaway giving you more chances of winning. Click on the "Blog About This Giveaway" option within the form to get the instructions for your blog post.

Winners are picked by random. If you are not familiar with how to enter a rafflecopter giveaway. Here is a rafflecopter video demo to show you how. If you prefer, you can ask me a question directly on my Facebook.

This giveaway contest ends 15th June 2012, my birthday. It's a nice birthday present to myself to be able to give away something to my readers.

Good Luck!

UPATED: This giveaway is over. Congratulations to Joanna.N and her little boy who is in for a surprise!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Homemade Teacher's Day Gift Ideas

First a very big thank you to the following online mommies Montesorri Mum, Chinnee, Sasha, Jaclyn and Melinda for allowing me to use their beautiful images and ideas for this post. In fact, it was their creative Homemade Teacher's Day Gift Ideas that gave inspiration to this post. :)

Here are the Homemade Teacher's Day Gift Ideas that inspired this post.

Here's one from ChinNee who blogs at Demoments.net. Talk about creativity. These little colorful birds are amazing. Do you know what they are made of? They are made of Mama Patch Flannel Cloth Wipes.

Amazing isn't it? I think they are amazing, amazingly creative! They look so adorable. Add a little card with the words "Thank you, Teacher" and what have you  got? A beautiful and adorable Teacher's Day Gift that is lovely to look at as well as useful.

These lovely paper quilling design bookmarks are perfect as a Homemade Teacher's Day Gift. They are simple, yet they look marvelous.

I just love how the string for the homemade bookmark for Teacher's Day completes the look. You can read how the Teacher called up to thank Elaine of Montessorimum.com the next day.

A simple but sweet homemade Teacher's Day Gift like this is always appreciated.



Little Pots of plants whether real or artificial make a nice gift for Teachers on Teacher's Day. Look at how Sasha from Sashablablabla.com has decorated her little pots of plants with ribbons, butterflies and caterpillars.  It is beautiful isn't it?

You can include a message that says "Thank you, Teacher for helping me grow like this plant." or "I know I will continue to grow with you as my teacher."

Here's another potted plant gift for Teacher, this time using real plants.

Just wrap the plant up in transparent paper, add a card and you are done. Quick and Lovely!

You can stick the card on into the pot, add some ribbons, or just slip the card in together with the plant. Anything goes. This gift will grow with teacher and Teacher can keep it for a long time. Image is with courtesy from Elizabeth Law.




I tried to copy Montessorimum by making bookmarks for Teacher's Day this year. I figured that Teachers will always need bookmarks so it will be a useful gift for Teachers.

While, Montessorimum patiently folded her quilled flowers, mine was a quick job. I added some beads from my girl's bead box to give our Homemade bookmark for Teacher (link shows you how to make the bookmark) a little bit of blink blink.

We always keep a craft cupboard at home so crafts like this can be completed in 10 minutes flat.

It would seem like I am always rushing. I am amazed at how Montessorimum with her 4 kids can find more time than me to make a paper quilling bookmark whereas I am so rushed, all I can manage are quick homemade cards like this one we did last year.

Last year, we did a pop-up Teacher's Day Card, also right at the very last minute as an appreciation gift for Teacher on Teacher's Day.

When the kids were younger, we did more simple cards like this cut and paste flowers in a vase card. This Homemade Teacher's Day Card is really simple to make for little children.

All you need to do is cut out simple flower and leaf shapes, then get your child to paste the leaves and flowers in a hand drawn or cutout of a vase.

This Homemade Teacher's Day Card is suitable for young kids. Older kids can cut out their own shapes.

You can also make crepe paper flowers and present these homemade flowers to teacher for Teacher's Day.

One year, that was exactly what we did. We made crepe paper flowers in various colors, then wrapped them up with transparent paper and tied them with colorful ribbons.

The homemade flowers for teachers looked as good as real flowers!

Moms who are bakers can bake up a Teacher's Day gift like this clever mom, Jaclyn Lai. She has baked up boxes of cute Teacher's Day cupcakes.

Each box is decorated with a ribbon. It's all in the presentation.
You can bake these cupcakes as a gift for anyone, not just Teachers. Just package them nicely like how Jaclyn has done and it is the perfect homemade gift, not to mention, it's yummy too!

I really admire those mums who can bake. Cute cupcakes are the ultimate gift for any occasion. Just decorate them according to the theme for the occasion.

In this case, this mommy blogger from Family First Confections has created a wonderful and delicious way to say "Thank You" to Teacher for Teacher's Day.

I wish I could bake like that!

Finally, even if your child is very young, you can still encourage them to make their own Teacher's Day card for Teacher.

Just provide them with pens, punched out shapes, glitters, stickers and anything else you can think of.

Then let your young child decorate his or her Homemade Teacher's Day gift.

Children's art are masterpieces and will always be loved by Teachers. Thank you so much, Melinda Low for sharing your child's masterpiece with us. Her 3 1/2 year old son made his first Teacher's Day Card all by himself. She only provided him with the materials.

No time to make your own? Then you might have to shop online for some last minute Teacher's Day Gifts.

SHOP FOR LAST MINUTE TEACHER'S DAY GIFTS

Homemade Teacher's Day Gift

Teacher's Day is round the corner. We have been so busy with so many other things. In addition, the kids were having their end of term tests. Suddenly, panic! Teacher's Day is in the same week. What shall we do?

We went to the bookshop and grabbed some cute Teacher theme post it notes for Teacher. However, they look so impersonal and worse still, cheap! What shall we do?

Let's look in our craft cupboard and see what we've got. Ok, we've got string, beads, ruler, scissors, a cute punch out snowflake thingy, colored papers, glue. I think that should be good enough to make a last minute Teacher's Day Gift.

We made a bookmark for Teacher's Day this year. All we did was cut colored paper using craft scissors, then we pasted the soft colored paper into the harder one. We wanted to use our cute craft puncher to punch a cute hole at the top but it didn't work out because the card was too hard so we used a normal punch instead. Finally, we stringed in some cute glass beads to give the bookmark a little bit of bling bling.

Ah, let's see. We have some transparent paper and some shiny gold ribbon in our craft cupboard. We can wrap the bookmark together with the post it notes for Teacher

Tadaa! We have a last minute Teacher's Day Gift for Teacher. Not as creative as some of the other amazing moms in my next post but hey, it's the thought that counts right?

Go here for More Homemade Teacher's Day Gift Ideas

Parenting - You Know You're Doing The Right Thing When....

My Boy: Mummy, you know the kids that were bad to me last year? Well, they are not bad to me anymore?

MG: Why?

My Boy: Because I taught them to be nice. 


I'm glad he remembered my message to him not to be afraid of people who are being bad to him but rather, he should teach them to be good like him, instead. :)


My Boy: Mummy, you know yesterday one of the kids used the word "Idiot". We were playing shop and then they got angry with each other. One of them said that she won't buy anymore handbags from his handbag shop and he got angry and wrote "Idiot" on a paper. I'm sorry I called you and cheh cheh (sister) idiot last time. What does idiot mean?


MG: Well, you didn't know the meaning of the word but you still should not have used it because you know it means something not very nice, right?


I love hearing funny stories from my boy about his school day. One day, he told me that he was discussing about eating junk food with a girl. The girl told him that her parents allowed her to eat a lot of junk food and he told her "No, wonder you're fat." He asked me why the girl was mad at him. Lol.

The Power of Imaginative Play

Kids really don't need to have expensive toys. Kids do not need a portable dvd. Kids do not need a tablet computer or a cellphone with games. Kids no not need handheld gaming gadgets. Why should they? Kids come with an auto manual. All kids have the power of imaginative play. All kids need are some erasers and highlighters and .....

 then there is a secret hideout from bad guys

or a a peaceful temple

or a palace with a fountain in the courtyard

or ruins from an old building

or skyscrapers and tall buildings in a city

Well, at least that is what the kids tell me. That is the power of imaginative play. So keep away that tablet computer for a day and give yours kids some erasers or a paper and a pencil or some blocks or old tissue boxes or used toilet rolls. No, we don't have a tablet computer but it is on mummy's wish list (not the kids). 

Home Science Experiment - Growing Plants From Stem Cuttings

One of the easiest and most fun home science experiments you can do with your kids is growing plants. Previously, we had done a home science experiment on Germinating Bean Seeds. I posted the images of our Bean Germinating experiment on this blog so that the kids can remember it better. Today, I am going to post up the images of our home science experiment on how to grow plants from stem cuttings. The girl is at the moment studying the various ways plants grows in school. One of the ways is through stem cuttings.

Here are the images of our plant grown from stem cuttings.

Day 1 (1st April 2012) - We stuck the stems into the soil

Day 3 (3rd April 2012) - The shoots are appearing from the stem!

Day 4 (4th April 2012) - You can see the leaves of the shoots opening up now from the stems

Day 4 (4th April 2012) - Close up view of the new leaves on the stem cuttings

Day 15 (15th April 2012) - By now almost every stem has new leaves growing from it

Day 22 (22nd April 2012) - The leaves are growing bigger now

Day 38 (8th May 2012) - The leaves look luscious now

Day 38 (8th May 2012) - Closer look of the almost fully grown leaves with more and more shoots and leaves appearing

Practical and Simple Home Science Experiments like growing plants from stem cuttings are easy to do and a wonderful way to teach kids about life and science. It will help them in their school work and they will remember it better too. 

Now, if I remember, I will post updates on how the fully grown plants look like. This plant is an edible and very tasty vegetable (Unfortunately, I don't know what it is called), so we will harvest it and eat it (yum yum) when it is fully grown. Then our experiment will be complete. We have harvested the same vegetable and cooked it in the past. You can see a picture of the cooked vegetable here. 

The Importance Of Play

These days I often see many children hunched over some device, totally engrossed in it, while the parents dine peacefully. It never used to be like this but with digital and portable devices like portable dvds, games on iPhones and iPads or other Android Tablet computers, it would seem as though we have forgotten how to play with our children.

Perhaps we have not forgotten but rather, it is easier to let the children play with the interactive device, games and stories instead of interacting with our children ourselves. For those of you who are interested to learn to play again with your kids, you may be interested to know that there will be a workshop on The Power Of Interactive Play brought back to you by popular demand.


The workshop is brought to you by Fisher Price. It will be conducted by child development expert; Ms. Carrie Lupoli, Founder of Live & Learn (Singapore). 


Here are the details of the workshop. The workshop will be held on 16th June, 2012. 17th June, 2012 is Father's Day. I think that is very timely for Fathers to learn to play with their kids again. Mothers too. Just nice for a family outing. You'll receive RM100 worth of door gifts when you participate.


Those interested can contact 03-7803 5310/012-292 1378 or email admin@mamababyworld.com.

The Power of “Interactive” Play Parenting Workshop:

Date:  16^th June 2012 (Saturday)

Time: 10.00am – 1.30pm

Venue: Grand Ballroom, Empire Hotel Subang,

                   Jalan SS 16/1, Ss 16, 47500 Selangor.

Entrance Fee: RM60 per person plus over RM100 worth of goodies.