Mommy nga!

Today, I didn't realize that I went to a lot of places - an Asian market, a Vietnamese restaurant, a gas station, a health store, 3 pharmacies, dunkin donuts (twice!), a frozen yogurt place, and the hospital (to visit R) - only to find out when I got home by the end of the day that I had a Cookie Monster sticker stuck to my chest all that time.

We had gone to the pedia dentist for Swe-cha's regular checkup and we had played with stickers. I'm not sure when Swe-cha (or hubby) put it on me or if it was a transfer from Swe-cha's shirt but I was sporting it all day since the dentist was our first stop.

I never noticed it until hubby pointed it out to me when I got home, not really sure if others noticed but were just too polite to ask or it might've been lost in the bright floral pattern of my blouse so nobody really noticed.

=)

Costume - check!

Got Swe-cha his Halloween costume already and I'm so excited for him. I showed it to him, he identified it and then hugged it. Hope he enjoys wearing it and becoming the character :)

Project Lutong Bahay

I've been making a more conscious effort to prepare home-cooked meals, we've been spending so much money on takeout / restaurants - it just is crazy, not to mention unhealthy. So let's see how long we can keep this tipid project up:

Monday night dinner + Tuesday lunch baon was penne pasta with tomato sauce.

Tuesday night dinner + Wednesday lunch baon was Stir Fried Chicken.

Wednesday night dinner + Thursday lunch baon was Stir fried beef, just because we still had leftover veggies from the night before.

Thursday night dinner + Friday lunch baon, is braised pork belly w/ adobo eggs. I've been braising this sweet-style adobo for close to 3 hours now and the meat is so tender that you can cut it with a spoon.

AC Good News

I'm not sure if I ever mentioned having trouble with our car's AC before... it started summer of 2012 and the issue was literally on and off. The AC would run fine one day and then suddenly stop working and it would eventually start blasting out HOT air - it got so hot at one point that I even had to stop on the roadside because I was getting dizzy enough to worry about passing out. It didn't help that the outside temps were at 102 degrees F.

We keep bringing it back to the dealership and to our local repair shop and they couldn't find it. The only suggestion we got from both was to load up the AC with freon mixed with a special dye. When it stops working again, we can bring the car in and they can look for traces of the dye and hopefully, find out where the leak is occurring.

By this time, it was already fall and we weren't dependent on the AC anymore so I asked hubby to push this off until next spring.

By Spring 2013, we brought the car back to the shop and had it loaded with freon and the special dye. While it was being tested, the technician happened to hit a wire and the AC stopped working again - that was the culprit! They tried wiggling the wires and found one that was loose and corroded, this was replaced and the AC worked fine after that.

Some months later, the AC started wigging out again. *sigh* Hubby decided to play with the relays one time and found that if he wiggled or pulled out and reinstalled the AC relay, it would jumpstart the AC and get it working. Last week, he dropped by the dealer to buy a replacement relay, it cost us $7.35.

It's been several days and the AC still works. Hubby's theory is that the loose / corroded wiring affected and damaged this relay. I hope this is the end of our AC woes (well, it should be... at least for 2013 as outside temps are currently in the high 60s so we really don't need AC anymore). It is not a good time to be spending more money.

Master Bath Sink

It's been a while since our last DIY post.

This weekend, we tackled the sink in the master bath. We replaced the leaky faucet and the sink drain, it had been missing the drain plug for the longest time and we've had to cover the open drain with a mesh strainer that we buy at the dollar store. The strainer gets pretty yucky so I'll spare my readers and not post pictures of that anymore.

This was a pretty straightforward job. I gathered all the tools and materials we needed days before:

- supply hoses $11/pair - I bought 2 different sizes in 2 different lengths, total of 4 pairs, to make sure that we have what we need on the day itself. I plan to return the unused ones.

- new faucet $26 - it was 2nd to the cheapest bathroom sink faucet I could find in our local Home Depot. We're moving out soon and don't need anything fancy.

- teflon tape $1 & plumbers putty $1

We had a rough start when we realized that everything was stuck - the water shutoff valves beneath the sink, and the locknuts holding the faucet to the sink.

The groovelock pliers (vise grip) and adjustable wrench which were adequate during our last sink faucet replacement just doesn't cut it here.

Furthermore, since we had to replace the sink drain as well, we needed a bigger wrench - a real pipe wrench.

We started the work yesterday (Sunday) and hoped to finish in an hour or two. We knew what we were supposed to do - my confidence level was really high - but if the locknuts and valves were stuck, what could we do ? I did some research and others suggested cutting down the locknuts if you don't plan on reusing the hardware anymore and as for the valves, the best suggestion was to shut off the main valves into the home but as we live in a condo, I have no idea where that is.

Sometime on Sunday night, hubby was able to turn the shutoff valves successfully. With that victory in hand, we decided to put the rest of the project off till tomorrow when we could drive down to Home Depot and pick up a few tools.

$-power

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Our trip to Home Depot earlier today yielded some good results. We got ourselves a quick-release vise grip (or locking pliers) for $14 and a 10 inch Pipe Wrench for $11

The locking pliers turned out to be the best solution for turning the lock nuts because the locking mechanism makes it easier to use and maneuver in tight spaces.

The pipe wrench just fit the sink drain lock nut *whew*, we thought about getting the 14 inch one as it was only $1 more and would have more use because of its larger range but as it was so much heavier and we thought it would be more difficult to use.

Now, the sink is done, I'm so proud of hubby (and our teamwork)! I had expected him to give up anytime and I wouldn't blame him but hey, now that he's completed this, I wouldn't let him off easy next time since he proved that he can tackle these types of jobs. Total estimated cost was $64, including the new tools.

Next up, painting the bathroom.
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I asked hubby to rate the difficulty of this project and he says it was fairly easy once we had the right tools =) I can't imagine why we we chose to live with a leaky faucet and a missing sink drain plug for a long time.