When one is too lazy to go to the gym...

You bring the gym back home! Finally gotten our workout bench after seeing a good deal online. Hubby went down to inspect and realised the quality is pretty good. The whole thing is very stable, which we guess is the most important aspect. Other things like the ease of adjusting the height was part of the factors too. We had seen several complicated bench that we felt were too much trouble to get them.

It was not perfect though, where there were some paint chipped and scratches, but overall it was great, especially for that affordable price. Am really glad to finally have a proper bench to work out on. Previously we had done it on the bed and floor which were definitely not as effective nor comfortable as this. We like how it could be folded up too, which allow us to keep it away easily should the need arise.

Workout could not be completed without the weights. Am so glad i had my handy trolley to help me move the weights from the car to the house. Side story, this trolley was a free gift, which made me spent extra $80 dollars on another appliances so that i could get this for free haha! But since i needed the appliances too, it was worth it.

The dumbbells were not of a quality that is worth raving about, but it does get the job done. Time to head to the bench to work out!

Workout Bench
Recommendation Rating: 4 stars
Positives: light, sturdy, affordable, comfortable
Negatives: scratches and paint chipped

Dumbbells
Recommendation Rating: 2 stars
Positives: aesthetically nice, get the job done, above average quality
Negatives: slightly more expensive, rather dusty and oily when first opened

Find them: Qoo10 GenConnect
Special tips: Go store collect. Aside from savings from delivery fees, the owner would give extra discount too! Remember to ask for it!

Settling down, Cooking and Cleaning

This above was not meant to showcase the things we bought, but they were just placed there because we were cleaning and mopping the tiled floor.Now that most of the renovation works are out of the way, and we are just a couple of steps away from taking over the house completely from our interior designer, we would probably start to talk more about living there and also share more on reviews and feedback on the things we have bought, as well as how we felt with our renovation and carpentry after really using it. Too often, there are many scenarios where we had been blinded with looking good aesthetically, that we forgo the practicality and functionality. Such issues would likely only rise itself after really using them for a while. *cough* dyson fan.

Although our renovation is reaching the end, the things we can learn from is just the beginning.

Just flaunting our purchases. We bought this vacuum cleaner at only $29. It was one of those super sale items in Gain City Expo Sales. Seriously, one of the best places to buy anything, be it food or electronics or beddings or sportswear is to go Expo. The sales are usually competitively cheaper than any sales elsewhere, and one could always get a free gift or additional discount along the way, which is absent in their neighborhood branches. Ignore the BHG member's only sale or Tefal clearance sales. Expo beats them all. Of course, one must do their homework to see what sales are happening there and when, but it is definitely worth the trip down.

Anyway, the vacuum cleaner isn't fantastic. The cord is only 4m long which means we have to plug in and out in every room, and it is quite a hassle. But this is just a temporary thing before we invest in a robot cleaner. Definitely need one to clean automatically, because otherwise we are always spending the whole weekend cleaning the house. By letting some errands run automatically, we could get twice the work done in half the time.

The blue chair? Nothing to flaunt about just that it looked nice with our door mural haha! Got it from IKEA during their yearly sales, and it is just for us to have a seat while wearing our shoes.

Renovation wise, we finally gotten our nice looking ledge for the soap bottles. We did not want the common steel racks which looked ugly in hubby's opinion, and we could not do a long ledge below the shower because of the pipes nor could we do it at the back due to our swinging glass door, so this is the best it could get. We thought this look great though, much better than those off-the-rack steel racks. Let's hope this holds well. Loved it!

 Another super deal at Gain City Expo Fair. Got this rice cooker at just $19! We were searching around for rice cooker, and were shock to see it priced at about $60 for a phillips brand to exorbitant price of $200 for some renowned brands. We have not heard of this brand before, but it seem decent, and we have gotten cooked rice nicely so far. so thumbs up!

Bought our plates and bowls from IKEA. We had always eyed their dining sets since long ago because they seemed to be very photo-worthy. They were priced competitively too so went for it straight away. Couple of other IKEA things there too.

And finally, this is cooking our dinner in progress. We are still very inexperienced in this area, and to make matter worse, they are all new pots and pans and stove that we had not used before. It is gonna take us a while before we could whipped up some great dishes, but for now, we are going to keep it simple and light. Till next time!

Adding the fine details now

At this point of time, the main bulk of our renovation had reached the end. The things remaining now are the touch-ups, minor corrections and a few missing elements. The clean-up of the house had also been completed, and although not exactly dust-free clean, but it's in a bearable condition. A few other stuffs happened today too.

Our ID came up to help us drill holes to install some towel racks and the IKEA mirror cabinet. It was hard work because the drill was the portable kind and not very powerful, but appreciate his kind gestures to help us get them up. The mirror is looking great, although Wifey commented that it was thicker than imagined, and expressed concerns that people may hit their heads when using the tap. Perhaps we will put a "Caution your head" sign on the mirror if there were to be anyone who hit their head on it.

Our ViewQwest was connected today. Say hello to WIFI! This is the heart of our home automation system, as well as the core to our projector streaming videos and tv channels. Hence we invested in ViewQwest, as well as the monster ASUS RT-AC88U. We had always admire ViewQwest for it's say no to traffic-shaping/throttling unlike the other competitors, and its excellent customer services, again unlike the other competitors. Furthermore, when we saw that their price were not that far apart from the rest during the IT Show, we signed with them straight away. The above speed and download/upload rate were with my Dell XPS using Wifi 5GHz on ViewQwest 1Gbps plan. Pretty impressive I must say.

Our blinds are up. We got a light colored one for the study room so that it would still be bright enough for any works at the table, yet keeping the glare out.

We gotten the darker shade one for the bedroom 3 just in case there are any guests that wants to sleep during the day.

The curtain contractor helped us to put up the Dooya track too. Really thankful because we did not have the equipment to drill all the support onto the ceiling. We plugged in the Dooya motors too, and our motorized curtain track is complete. Cant wait to put up the curtains and play with it after we did a thorough cleaning.

We had also pulled the wires for the projector to the mount in anticipation of installing the projector. However, there were some problem with the support structure that is holding this mount, and it was shaky when we fitted the projector. Hopefully our ID can solve this.

It would be terrible if the projector were to fall off halfway, and even disastrous if the entire false ceiling were to crumble and collapse due to the strain of the projector. In defence for our ID, he had actually planned for a support block in the false ceiling for my projector, but during the installation of the mount, we realized it was too near to the wall and we decided to pull it back to have a larger screen size. However, the new place does not have any support block within, but was assessed to not be a problem because my projector is relatively light at 1.5kg only.

Despite that assurance, we still feel a bit uncomfortable because there are 5 holes in close proximity which are stress points and could give way anytime. Let's see what our ID can do when he comes and take a look.

Awaiting our 3D Design

It has been a quiet week, mainly because it was the lunar new year period and work was at a standstill. It is progressing now, where we have just confirmed our choice of materials and colors, and is awaiting for our ID to show us the 3D images of our future home. Finally we will have our first glimpse at how our home will look like.

Meanwhile we have made more purchases, and is starting to have trouble finding places to store them before the carpentry works begin. Bought our Samsung fridge and washing machine from Courts at a low price thanks to the sponsorship of vouchers from my Mom. Signed another contract with a flooring company to overlay our house at a discounted price thanks to a recommendation from my friend. Ordered several items from Taobao today with free shipping thanks to some promotions taking place for 3 days only starting today. It's really beneficial to plan and start early so that you are able to get better prices when there are good offers for it.

We should be expecting the 3D images to be out by this week! Look forward!

First Purchases of JB

When we first saw this sofa, we fell in love with it immediately. We love how we are able to have a deep sofa for us to lie in while watching our movies. We then tried to find a similar one in Singapore to compare the prices but to no avail. Recently we found a similar one in leather but it cost over whooping $3000. Hence we went back to take a look again, and placed our order. Cant wait for it to arrive in April!

We bought our storage heater too! This marks the start of us slowly buying appliances and furnitures from JB and bringing them over one or two items at a time. This allow us to save a little, by not needing to pay the 7% GST.

To know how it works: Each person when visiting JB for less than 24hr is entitled to bring back $150 of goods without needing to pay any taxes. If there are 2 of us in the car, we are able to bring back $300 worth of goods without having to pay the 7% tax. So what we are doing, is making multiple trips and keeping our purchases below $300 so that we can avoid the taxes. It is actually more expensive doing multiple trips if the sole purpose is just to avoid tax because every round trip cost about $15 in toll. However since we are already regularly going in for our massage and loklok fix, it will be more cost-saving for us to split our purchases into multiple trips.

Looking forward to more purchases soon!