A-Z April Blogging Challenge 2012 begins tomorrow!

The A-Z April Blogging Challenge (ABC) 2012 is starting tomorrow. *Our home called Kunatan* is all geared up and ready to begin. Since we are in Malaysia we will be one of the first blogs to complete our "A" post since we are half a world ahead of American time, where I'm assuming the majority of bloggers will be based.

I hope you've been enjoying viewing some of my A-Z posts from last year, over at the left side-bar.

And now for my 2012 A-Z ABC details:

I have prepared 26 paragraphs, each consisting of 26 words, each word beginning with a letter of the alphabet, in alphabetical order, beginning with the day's assigned letter. It's like a short story through the alphabet each day. 

It was challenging and I called upon the help of a vocabulary website to give me some tips on "X", "Y" and "Z" words so that I wouldn't be using the same words over and over again. I also didn't want to bail-out by using words such as "x-citing' or "x-tra" which don't really begin with "X".

I will also be posting a photograph of Lauren holding the day's assigned letter on a piece of paper.

One final feature will be a short video clip where I'll be dictating a sentence where every word begins with the assigned letter for the day.

I hope you'll follow me through my A-Z during April. I'm certainly excited to get moving with it. I'll also be taking on the 2nd challenge within the A-Z ABC 2012 which comprises visiting every single participant in the challenge and leaving a comment. There are currently over 1,400 blogs signed up, a little more than I expected, which pushes up my average blogs to visit daily to around the 50 mark.

If you are following my blog but not taking the A-Z ABC 2012, still feel free to hop over and make yourself at home, drop in a comment or tick a box. 

Don't forget to pay a visit to the official home blog of the A-Z challenge to see the latest news.

Enjoy Earth Hour later today wherever you are and see you tomorrow with my "A" post!

Fidelia's Friday - children having fun at the pool and beach

Welcome to Fidelia's Friday. We were happy to welcome our friends to Kuantan on Wednesday. They are from America and currently reside in Kuala Lumpur. We stayed at Vistana Hotel and the children had great fun together. Lauren had a lovely time with Zoe, and Leah played on the beach with Xavier. We hope you enjoy these photos of the last couple of days activities!

Our lovely 2nd home - Vistana Hotel Kuantan

Leah's first time swimming. She enjoyed it so much!

Lauren and Leah, with our friend, Zoe

This is one-year-old Xavier with his mum, Karisa

We went to Teluk Chempedak beach for lunch. It was a glorious day.

Lauren and Zoe playing at the beach

Lauren and Zoe are best friends!

Vistana Hotel Kuantan at 7:30am

Yesterday we went out to Batu Hitam beach. Unfortunately it was a high tide so we didn't get to see all of the amazing black rocks, but the children had great fun anyway!

Goodbye from Batu Hitam . . .

. . . and Teluk Chempedak . . .

 . . . and Vistana Hotel Kuantan

This will be the last in the series of "Fidelia's Friday". We hope you enjoyed these Friday fiestas!

Do you want some pleasure?

Really, do you want some pleasure? I believe Magnum has the answer. If you've never eaten a Magnum you are missing out on one of the finer pleasures of life. The chocolate is heavenly, the ice-cream soft and tasty. I enjoy treating myself to a Magnum whenever I'm on a bike ride somewhere in Kuantan. A quick pit-stop at a petrol station turns into a heavenly moment of pleasure with a Magnum.

If you're not eating chocolate however, do not fear, you can still get some pleasure out of Magnum!

The other day I paid a visit to the Magnum website http://www.mymagnum.co.uk/ and came across a great Magnum adventure called "Pleasure Hunt". Go ahead and click on this link. A virtual Magnum lady will lead you through the internet, collecting chocolate truffles along the way!

I think I'm going to play it again right now!

A-Z fever hits *Our home called Kuantan*!

What a great Monday we're having in Kuantan! The sun is shining and it's just great to be alive, something most of us take for granted each and every day.

A-Z fever is here with under one week until the start of this blogging extravaganza. A-Z ABC 2012 already has over 1,200 participants signed up, and my task of visiting every single one of them during April becomes more daunting with each passing day!

I have added my A-Z posts from the blogging challenge of 2011 along the left sidebar if you want to see how I approached this challenge last year, or refresh your memory of some of my letters. A few of those posts have become very successful and famous posts, generated great discussion and brought back great memories.

I think my A-Z ABC 2012 will be a collective great memory. You'll see with my 1st post on Sunday the style of posting I'll be approaching this blogging challenge with. Just to let you know, there will be some text, a photograph and a short video for each of the letters through A-Z. It took some dedicated time and huge brain racking to finish all the preparations, and now I'm excited for the start!

Here's a couple of pictures of Lauren at Vistana Hotel Kuantan recently, along with a couple of friends she made:

Sunny morning in Bukit Sekilau, Kuantan

I took Lauren out for a walk at 10am this morning. It was a dazzlingly beautiful and very hot Sunday morning in Bukit Sekilau, Kuantan. We only walked around for 25 minutes before we headed home - it was just too hot and bright for Lauren.

Bukit Sekilau is a beautiful area of Kuantan and I've had many an adventure here for the last 5 years of living here. Even walking the same roads of Bukit Sekilau springs many a surprise with the ever-changing plants and flowers decorating each house and street corner.

This morning was no different as we sauntered around a handful of streets about 200 yards from our apartment.

Bukit Sekilau is named so due to the large hill which looks over the area. "Bukit" in Bahasa Melayu means "hill". Part of the hill named Bukit Sekilau can be seen in this photograph:

During our brief walk we managed to capture these delightful images of flowers dotted around Bukit Sekilau, Kuantan. Hope you enjoy them :)

Wishing each and every one of you a happy weekend and an even brighter start to the new week!

Strange tortoise species

Here are some nice pictures for you. Our neighbour found this strange species of tortoise the other day and invited us to have a look. She's keeping it as a pet now and it's fascinating!