ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted August 26, 2016 @stray, @Lazyfatcat007 and @catt , OMG thank you all for the wonderful suggestions! I never considered that there might be more "natural" pest-control methods, am now reading up those for roaches as well as for ants (we have a slight ant problem in the kitchen as well ;_;) ! I've already taken the liberty of placing a bay leaf in each of my drawers (I had a lot of spares) and am looking into tea tree and mint essential oils as well. I love the suggestion of Dettol + water, am so going to fill up a spray bottle with that, hope it works! And omg I really hope it's not an infestation, we did have that one incident with an adult roach in that kitchen drawer which hopefully we stemmed, and some days before that I killed a baby roach. Two days later we saw another adult roach in our bedroom (OMG CRIES) which husband calmly dispatched again with a plastic bag on his hand (he said to his mother after that, that it got easier with practice. ;_; my hero), which we think hopefully got in from the MBR toilet window, which we usually leave open, so now we only open the window when we shower. I really really hope it's not an infestation weep I HATE roaches. With ants apparently if you wipe down countertops and walls with a mix of water and vinegar they will be deterred, so I'm going to try that over the weekend! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Mannequin 0 Report post Posted September 2, 2016 Hi You bought FUJIOH FS-890 hood, is it made in Japan? Thank you. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bykaraanne 30 Report post Posted September 3, 2016 I am freaked OUT reading about all the roaches stories. Poor thing!!! I can imagine the scare. u can buy BioX insecticide, safe for kids and pets! They aren't SUPER BEST on roaches but they work very well for everything else, esp ants. It can also be applied as "treatment" to the area to deter more insects. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
GreenPestServices 0 Report post Posted September 4, 2016 Green Pest Services is doing some exciting things in the Green pest control space if youre interested. http://www.GreenPestServicesFl.com Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted September 5, 2016 On 2/9/2016 at 8:36 PM, Mannequin said: Hi You bought FUJIOH FS-890 hood, is it made in Japan? Thank you. Hi @Mannequin! I believe it is made in Japan, though I probably need to go check the documentation to be absolutely certain. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted September 5, 2016 On 3/9/2016 at 9:31 AM, bykaraanne said: I am freaked OUT reading about all the roaches stories. Poor thing!!! I can imagine the scare. u can buy BioX insecticide, safe for kids and pets! They aren't SUPER BEST on roaches but they work very well for everything else, esp ants. It can also be applied as "treatment" to the area to deter more insects. Oooh! This sounds good! Do you know whether it would work on tiny tiny ants? We have been having a problem with the really small ones (they found a hole in the grout of my subway tiles for my kitchen backsplash and have been crawling all over my kitchen ;_;) but the usual ant food-bait things are too big for them (like the "food" is like 4 times the size of the ant itself!). If this works I'll be reaaaaally happy. Today I found some crawling around my utensil draining rack and had to wash my utensils all over again. So far the roaches have yet to turn up again so fingers-crossed! We think they might be coming in from the chute and/or the always-open top-hung windows in our upstairs bathrooms so we've closed the upstairs bathroom windows unless necessary (also just in time for the haze + zika scares) and renewed the roach combat we stuck inside the chute door... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted September 5, 2016 First floor housetour - 3 months later The thing I've learnt - you're never really really done doing up your home. Since my last housetour set of photos we've finally gotten the utility room windows changed, the utility room/storeroom racks up, the last two dining chairs and a display shelf in the living room for my husband's lego collection. There's also some changes with the second floor (shifted furniture around to accommodate the crib and single bed etc) but I will post those up once the curtains are installed in the nursery. Firstly, our front door/porch/recess area: Cough. We didn't buy the recess area but our ID tiled it over without us asking so haha *side-eyes* Anyway, I guess we will eventually buy it over and having it already tiled over makes that easier. The gate and main door are from the previous owner, with the door being repainted and new manual doorlocks installed for both the gate the door. Utility room window just has the window panes replaced with new frosted glass. Manual door-bell is my mini-obsession and affixed with 3M command strip lol. It makes a tinny high-pitched tinkling sound. I'm still looking for something much bigger and louder. Sometimes we hear it and sometimes we don't. Oh well. Most often than not we're not around in the house anyway. The "entryway" with a view of the main door (closed) and the open doorway leads to the utility room. It actually has a frosted glass sliding door but it's almost always open. Wall light on the left - very bright. Teal stool for husband to use when wearing his socks and shoes in the morning. The shoerack gets hidden by the main door when the latter is open all the way. Closer view of the shoe rack and our yet-to-be-used umbrella rack. My husband and I have almost an equal amount of shoes. I don't have a lot of shoes for a girl. Open shoerack keeps all our shoes well ventilated. Eventually we might end up replacing this with some closed door shoe rack when we have more and more shoes but for now, this works quite well. View of the utility room with our black Sim Win Liang boltless racks. We got them to customize it so that we could fit our big rolling luggage (if you squint you can see the pink and blue behind the stroller) underneath the lowest shelf on one of the shelves. The hanging cloth organizer is handmade by me to hold husband's and my socks in each of the pockets and the top long pocket holds the shoe spray. And a little photo frame. Cos we are too lazy to close the utility room door most of the time so this gives a nice feeling to the utility room instead of being rather messy (which it is). Showing off the rest of the utility room. There's enough space for a small single bed and a wardrobe if need be, though with only a small louvered window the airflow is not great. Nevertheless, we purposely made the room slightly bigger so that it can function as a bedroom (for a maid or if our parents want to live with us but can't climb the staircase) in the future. Our dining room, mostly complete. We added two more dining chairs (from Comfort Design) completing our sort-of-mismatched dining chairs concept (we usually end up sitting on the plastic bucket chairs and we sit opposite each other so we got lazy trying to shift the chairs around to make it look more mismatched) but all the chairs are quite comfy to sit on. Castlery sideboard in the background nicely filled with our first aid kit and random things we need around the house, and the Castlery shelf holds our toaster, telephone, ONT and my Click and Grow on the top shelf. Still missing some art on the wall on the right! The framers near our house disappeared! Then we got lazy to go look for new framers... Our living room in the day. With the balcony door closed. It's mostly the same from the last photo but with the new lego display shelf in the corner and some new cushions gifted from friends. My friends had never seen our house before and just appeared for our housewarming with the two long Ikea cushions. They work so perfectly in terms of colour and shape! If you squint you can see our Hitachi air purifier in white in the background. The view of the TV console wall of the living room. The display shelf (from Jottergoods) has glass doors in front and glass back, sides and bottom, and we use it to show off my husband's collection of childhood lego sets (there's some stuff in there that's close to 30 years old) including 2 castles, a petrol station, a fire station, a hospital, a Robin Hood secret hideout and several ships... I started repotting the mimosa I've been growing via my Click and Grow onto these cute Daiso pots which I hang at my balcony grille. They make me happy in the morning when I check on them and water them. Also, a sideways view of what my balcony shows me. Treetops and other HDB flats! Finally, a view of the first floor from the balcony, from the living room (and the lovely black Fanco fan) all the way past my staircase to the dining room. The middle is nice and empty right now, may change soon when the baby comes!!! We actually want to make the under-staircase area a little hideout for the kids next time, stick some low bookshelves and mattresses there etc. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bykaraanne 30 Report post Posted September 5, 2016 1 hour ago, ricepapergirl said: Oooh! This sounds good! Do you know whether it would work on tiny tiny ants? We have been having a problem with the really small ones (they found a hole in the grout of my subway tiles for my kitchen backsplash and have been crawling all over my kitchen ;_;) but the usual ant food-bait things are too big for them (like the "food" is like 4 times the size of the ant itself!). If this works I'll be reaaaaally happy. Today I found some crawling around my utensil draining rack and had to wash my utensils all over again. So far the roaches have yet to turn up again so fingers-crossed! We think they might be coming in from the chute and/or the always-open top-hung windows in our upstairs bathrooms so we've closed the upstairs bathroom windows unless necessary (also just in time for the haze + zika scares) and renewed the roach combat we stuck inside the chute door... Pretty sure it would. I had some ants in my home one day and was quite surprised cus I'm quite OCD my house usually can put food on the table till next day with no ants or insects. on the way out I realized one of my neighbor's doors had a pile of ants - think they dropped food and didn't clean or something. so I sprayed like a fence around my main door LOL literally an invisible barricade and when I came home there were no more ants in my house. hahaha I've been using Bio X for years cus of my bunnies - somewhat safer for them, plus it can be used as a treatment so time to time when I clean the house I spray it around my door and my windows too Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted September 5, 2016 33 minutes ago, bykaraanne said: Pretty sure it would. I had some ants in my home one day and was quite surprised cus I'm quite OCD my house usually can put food on the table till next day with no ants or insects. on the way out I realized one of my neighbor's doors had a pile of ants - think they dropped food and didn't clean or something. so I sprayed like a fence around my main door LOL literally an invisible barricade and when I came home there were no more ants in my house. hahaha I've been using Bio X for years cus of my bunnies - somewhat safer for them, plus it can be used as a treatment so time to time when I clean the house I spray it around my door and my windows too Hi @bykaraanne! OMG thank you. Will pick one up today and see whether it helps! I tried rubbing lavender oil over my kitchen walls and it worked for a day or two (and smells yummy) but it's not a long-term solution... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kstoh 3 Report post Posted September 6, 2016 On 5 September 2016 at 2:06 PM, ricepapergirl said: Oooh! This sounds good! Do you know whether it would work on tiny tiny ants? We have been having a problem with the really small ones (they found a hole in the grout of my subway tiles for my kitchen backsplash and have been crawling all over my kitchen ;_;) but the usual ant food-bait things are too big for them (like the "food" is like 4 times the size of the ant itself!). If this works I'll be reaaaaally happy. Today I found some crawling around my utensil draining rack and had to wash my utensils all over again. So far the roaches have yet to turn up again so fingers-crossed! We think they might be coming in from the chute and/or the always-open top-hung windows in our upstairs bathrooms so we've closed the upstairs bathroom windows unless necessary (also just in time for the haze + zika scares) and renewed the roach combat we stuck inside the chute door... I find that this ant gel which I bought works well: Although I initially bought from the shop, I subsequently bought similar product from hardware store at around half the price. There is also one cockroach gel. You may want to try it. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted September 7, 2016 13 hours ago, kstoh said: I find that this ant gel which I bought works well: Although I initially bought from the shop, I subsequently bought similar product from hardware store at around half the price. There is also one cockroach gel. You may want to try it. Oh I remember reading your post on this long time ago! Yes I should go look for something similar then! The gel is for the ants to eat? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
kstoh 3 Report post Posted September 7, 2016 Yes, the gel is for the ants to eat (and carry some back to their queen). Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
stray 12 Report post Posted September 8, 2016 @bykaraanne you are indeed the goddess of CLEAN!!! Thanks for the BioX tip! Good to know for the furries. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Mannequin 0 Report post Posted September 24, 2016 On 08/04/2016 at 9:16 AM, ricepapergirl said: Hi @alprakas ! Okay, just checked, we put in our order on 20 Feb and the order arrived around 10 Mar (I think it might have been one or two days before 10 March but 10 March was when I opened it up to take pictures). So around 2.5 weeks? Do take note I did order from the website mostly stuff that was in stock, I think only one item said it needed a 1 week leadtime. In terms of price differentials, the stuff I bought from Xtwostore.com + shipping is around 850 euros. After conversion with my credit card it ended up as S$1398.20. I paid another S$80 for import tax when it arrived in Singapore. The price available at Aqualife was the same as the one on the Hansgrohe website promotion right now (still ongoing!) http://www.hansgrohe.com.sg/27072.htm For example, for the basin mixer I paid around 48 euros each (I bought 3). Even dividing the shipping and additional fees evenly amongst all my items it's around 80 euros each. At the conversion rate (at that time) of 1 euro to S$1.64 that's around S$131 (around S$140 if you split the import tax by item again). If you stare at the website promotion the same single lever basin mixer 100 costs S$189 in Aqualife. Similarly, the bath mixer cost around S$150 via Xtwo and S$195 at Aqualife. Etc. I must forewarn that it really depends on how heavy your purchases are though. The shipping and handling was 299euros for me but when I had a slightly different product mix last time it jumped up to the next tier to I think 399 or 499 euros or something which might load quite a bit. Your mileage might differ from mine. But all in all I calculate I saved around S$400 to S$500 at least? Hope this helps! On 08/04/2016 at 9:16 AM, ricepapergirl said: Hi @alprakas ! Okay, just checked, we put in our order on 20 Feb and the order arrived around 10 Mar (I think it might have been one or two days before 10 March but 10 March was when I opened it up to take pictures). So around 2.5 weeks? Do take note I did order from the website mostly stuff that was in stock, I think only one item said it needed a 1 week leadtime. In terms of price differentials, the stuff I bought from Xtwostore.com + shipping is around 850 euros. After conversion with my credit card it ended up as S$1398.20. I paid another S$80 for import tax when it arrived in Singapore. The price available at Aqualife was the same as the one on the Hansgrohe website promotion right now (still ongoing!) http://www.hansgrohe.com.sg/27072.htm For example, for the basin mixer I paid around 48 euros each (I bought 3). Even dividing the shipping and additional fees evenly amongst all my items it's around 80 euros each. At the conversion rate (at that time) of 1 euro to S$1.64 that's around S$131 (around S$140 if you split the import tax by item again). If you stare at the website promotion the same single lever basin mixer 100 costs S$189 in Aqualife. Similarly, the bath mixer cost around S$150 via Xtwo and S$195 at Aqualife. Etc. I must forewarn that it really depends on how heavy your purchases are though. The shipping and handling was 299euros for me but when I had a slightly different product mix last time it jumped up to the next tier to I think 399 or 499 euros or something which might load quite a bit. Your mileage might differ from mine. But all in all I calculate I saved around S$400 to S$500 at least? Hope this helps! Hello I'm trying to purchase from xTWOstore, 1st time of purchase, is it safe? Total purchase EUR1,212.16 shipping EUR124.90, no indication of taxes? Thank you. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ricepapergirl 21 Report post Posted September 26, 2016 On 24/9/2016 at 9:48 PM, Mannequin said: Hello I'm trying to purchase from xTWOstore, 1st time of purchase, is it safe? Total purchase EUR1,212.16 shipping EUR124.90, no indication of taxes? Thank you. Hi! Sorry for the late reply. I also purchased from xTWOstore for the first time when I did it, seemed quite safe. There's even a Singaporean (living in Germany) who was working with them when I bought from them. Think they are quite reputable. Taxes will be charged when the goods enter Singapore, so I think there was a permit fee and a GST fee. They will call/email you when it arrives in Singapore. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
