How to get rid of cockroaches.

How do you do it in your home?

In my home, if a roach appears, the kids will stand around and scream: There's a roach!!There's a roach!!

And they will stand on the sofa and watch it. If it stops moving, they will still stand around and scream some more. As if the screaming will kill the roach. No active action to kill it. Not even with bug spray!!

I have observed others spray a whole canister of pesticide at the insect.

From what I know, 2 squirts are actually sufficient to kill the roach.

In my home, how much roach spray I use will depend on how  fast moving the roach is and the size of it. The faster and larger it is, the more I will spray.

Another method commonly used in my home, by yours truly most of the time, is to whack the roach with some old newspapers. That's bound to kill it. This method is used if the roach is fast moving and it will disappear into some corners by the time I get around to getting the bug spray.

But if your aim is not as good, or if you have poor hand-eye co-ordination, I would recommend dropping a pile of newspapers or magazines on the roach. This way, you have a bigger margin of error. But you will also end up with a bigger mass of mess that you have to clear coz by dropping those magazines on the roach, coz you will end up with a roach "penyet". (Penyet means flattened in Malay).

There are of course other ways to kill roaches, like buying commercial roach traps, which lure the roaches and then trap them with an adhesive. You just have to buy them and leave them in places where you normally find them.

There are also numerous homemade roach baits which you can make using boric acid, flour and cocoa.

But the best thing to do is to keep the home clean. Clean up spills and crumbs immediately, keep food away, empty trash frequently, fix leaky faucets (roaches are attracted to water) and leave some naphthalene balls around - roaches hate the smell!!

How are roaches killed in your home?

Sunday Best

Do you dress your best on Sunday? Or are you a dress down be as comfortable as you can on Sunday person?

Well, my hubs dresses formerly for work on weekdays, so when weekends come around, he much prefers to dress casually.

As I do not work but am a full time mum, I like to dress comfortably when ferrying the kids and on my errands. So my preferred dress-code on weekdays is bermudas and tees - ideal to brave the heat in this little red dot!

And on weekends, I dress to match my hubs.

One day, I realised that what I wear on weekends is exactly the same as on weekdays!!!

And I have all these nice clothes just hanging in the cupboards.

With middle-age, I have also noticed my waist line expanding. And some of these gorgeous clothes are being out-grown without being worn much - only on special occasions.

So I have decided to do something about my dressing. I have recently decided that I will wear my Sunday best when I go to church every Sunday. That way, my formal clothes will get some air time! And later in the day, I will change to my usual ensemble.

How do you dress on Sundays?

Blogging

Have you noticed that the posts on blogs are becoming less and less frequent.

Yes, I am referring to not only my blog but others too.

I think it's due to all the other social networking sites that abound nowadays - Facebook, instagram, twitter, etc

On those, we get instantaneous feedback / comments, as people seem to be more connected to those pages as opposed to blogger where many come only when they have more time to spare and want to read something.

But I will still continue blogging, tho not as frequently. I will still blog about those issues which I find less easy to share on the social networking sites, those which I ponder long over, those which I want to keep a record of for my kids to read about later in life, those regarding my daughter's medical condition.

So, do keep coming to visit, and please do leave a comment to encourage me to continue posting!

A big thank you to all who continue visiting this blog daily for updates.

Fear

We had another doctor's appointment just this week.

The other professor who takes care of my daughter's medical condition is back after her long leave of absence.

Somehow when I speak to her, I feel more comforted about what my daughter has to go through.

It may be her excellent bedside manners. Or maybe because she is more convincing and thorough in the way she explains things to me. Maybe she just just knows how to get her point across to this emotional woman! Or maybe I was just in a better frame of mind. 

I asked her one question. Not only did she address that question, she went beyond. She answered all the other questions I hadnt asked yet. She also went on to answer some questions that didn't even cross my mind. She even painted different what if situations. She did not tell me the right course of action to take.  She told me to go home and think about it. 

But given what she has told me, it seems like I have no choice but to go with their recommendations.

At the end of the day, deep down I know they are recommending the best course of action. But there is still that fear.  Fear of the down-time every two months.  Fear of the pain she has to go through. Fear of any complications that may arise. Fear of the side effects. Fear of the astronomical medical bills. Fear of the unknown. And of course, fear that I took too long to make this decision.

But what is fear?

It looks like its time for me to face it and pray that she will rise. I have to remind myself that: fear has a large shadow but is actually very small.