I'm a full-time mummy

Our 4.5 years old boy loves maps! So when I received an email pitch on this app, I immediately requested to review it as I could definitely see the potential in our learning aspects! Without further ado, here goes my feedback...

* Title: There’s a Map on My Lap!
* Price: $3.99
* Category: Books
* Released: 28 Aug 2013
* Version: 2.3
* Size: 49.2 MB
* Language: English
* Seller: Oceanhouse Media, Inc.
* Rated: 4+
* Requirements: Requires iOS 4.3 or later. Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Description from the product page:

"Come along with The Cat in the Hat as he travels the world to teach Sally and Dick all about maps. Learn the many uses of different types of maps, including city, state, world, topographic, temperature, terrain and more. Find out about various map formats (flat, globe, atlas, puzzle) and tools used to read them (symbols, scales, grids, compasses)."

* It is engaging and interactive and I love that we can also touch the objects in each page on the screen and the words pop out to tell you what it is!

* I like how we get to learn the many types of maps and how to interpret the symbols and legends on the map.

* I can imagine the possibilities of using what we learned from this app and applied it to the world map we have in our kiddos' playroom. Exciting!

* I find myself learning new things from this app too! An eye opener!

You can purchase the "There’s a Map on My Lap! " app from the iTunes App Store.

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the promo code to redeem the application for free from iTunes Store in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine. And if you'd like to read my previous iPad Apps reviews, you can do so by reading this post of mine called "My iPad App Reviews"

We went for a short family trip over the weekend recently and travelled up north in a rented car! Why renting a car when we have our own car?

Reason 1: We are bringing MIL along this time and with 3 adults (and me being 8 months preggy now) and 2 kiddos in a car, it is better to travel in a comfortable and spacious car this time. Of course, we can use our current Sedan car but it will be crampy and tiring (less leg space) and travelling 4-5 hours straight is no fun.

Reason 2: We are looking into buying a family car (MPV) sometime next year with our coming 3rd child so we thought this is the best time to rent an MPV to travel up north and try out the MPV we are planning to buy too!

So after googling around for days, I managed to find an affordable car rental company, Mesra Car Tour & Travels, one that specialises in MPV as well! Woohoo! Thank you God for pointing us to the right direction! I immediately wrote an email inquiring the rental price for an MPV for the dates we are travelling and promptly received a reply from their staff.

The rates offered are good and insurance are covered, I love it! I also like that the rental rates of the vehicle is on a 24 hour basis. Meaning if we collected the car at 9am today and returned it at 9am the next day, it is considered a full day rental rate. Other than this factor, I also like that the delivery charges (for the car to be send to our house and collected from our house) is very low compared to others.

With these plus points on hand, we went ahead and booked an MPV for our trip. The car was delivered right in front our house at 9am sharp on the day we are due to leave for our trip up north. Very punctual and the staff politely explained and guided us the interiors and functionality of the MPV.

Personally, I like this MPV as it is spacious and at first I sat with our 4.5 years old at the last row, leaving our 2 years old girl in her car seat at the middle row with my MIL while hubby enjoyed his solo front driving. I like that we can control the aircond setting for all 3 rows in the MPV and we can put in all our luggages, snacks and swimming stuff at the back boot. Nice!

A few hours into our journey, I received an SMS from the car rental company staff reminding us to adhere to the speed limit and even provided the exact GPS location of our car and the speed we were driving at! Whoaaaa... creepily awesome! I quickly informed hubby to slow down his driving and not to exceed any speed limit! Kudos to the car rental company for being professional and disciplined as well!

We were supposed to return the car by 9pm but we were caught up in a terrible traffic jam halfway (a 4 hours ride turned into a 6 hours ride!!) and I quickly SMSed the staff from the car rental company to ask him how much is it to extend the rental as we most likely will not make it home by 9pm to return the car. Surprisingly, the staff is sooo understanding and replied telling us no need to worry, to take our time.

At 10.30pm, we were still about half an hour journey to our home when the staff called me up and said he will come to collect the car from us tomorrow morning since it is late already. Thank God and I am so happy to say that we did not get charged for returning the car late. Kudos to Mesra Car Tour & Travels! Excellent service! Needless to say, we really do enjoyed our holiday and the journey with our rented car. Wonderful experience!

I came across this pitch months ago (before I decided to stop all future product review pitches) and this product just arrived last week! It takes about a month + for this product to arrive Malaysia, anyway, decided to do a review since I already received it and I do intend to try it out and see whether it works or not!

Description from the product page:
"Just a Drop Personal Bathroom Odor Eliminator is the revolutionary eco-friendly way to eliminate personal bathroom odor.  Place 1-2 drops into the toilet BEFORE you go and personal bathroom odors disappear BEFORE they enter the air.  All you leave is a fresh, clean smelling bathroom.  So say goodbye to aerosol sprays that only mix with the odors! Just a Drop was featured on The Dr. Oz Show (Dr. Oz is a regular user of the product) as well as The Doctors TV Show. Available in 7 great fragrances and also in multiple sizes."

The Just a Drop that I received for my review comes in a nifty little blue colored bottle (eucalyptus fragrance) which fits nicely into the palm of my hand. It also comes with a cute little stand holder where you can peel off the double-sided tape to secure the holder to a flat surface.

The product cames with description on what it does and how it works and some warning information on the product (if it gets into your eyes etc).

I immediately went to my hubby's office room (next to our bedroom) and proceeded to drop one into his toilet and explained to him what I just received for my review and told him to let me know if it works. Hahaha.. I then went back to our bathroom and did the same. Just drop a droplet of this before you do your business and leave it there.

Our bathroom definitely smells of eucalyptus now and few hours later, our 2 years old ninja girl started giving me signs that she wants to poop. So off we go to our bathroom and I propped her up in the toilet seat and let her do her business. Flushed it away when she's done and yup, no icky poopy smell lingering in the bathroom.

I wished we received this before we went off for our Penang family trip recently because with 3 adults (hubby, myself and MIL) and our 2 kiddos sharing 1 bathroom, this little nifty product will come in handy to eliminate odor. I shuddered when I think back how we have to fan off the stink and pray for faster air ventilation to clear off the stink after an episode of MIL stinking up the bathroom with her ermm... business..  -____-

Come to think of it, if you are self conscious about leaving odor after you do your business (especially when you are out in public) this product will be really handy to have!

You can get more info at: http://justadrop.net/

I received one or more of the products mentioned above for free using Tomoson.com. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers.