Starting My Homemaking Journey in Thailand

Hi guys, welcome back to our channel. I am so sorry that I have been missing from the past few videos that we've put out. In the past couple weeks pregnancy's gotten pretty real. I'll be completely honest. I started my third trimester a few weeks ago and pretty much since then I've been in bed or on the couch. It's been a little bit uncomfortable. Had to visit the doctor a few times so I've had to just take a step back from work and make sure that myself and baby are healthy but I'm feeling pretty good today so I'm going to take advantage. I've gotten pretty behind on like housework and just home keeping in general so I thought I would use this day of not feeling completely horrible to fix up the house and also just sort of just show you guys what my beginner homemaking looks like. Homemaking is not something that comes entirely easy to me. It's not first nature and I'm definitely by no means good at it but that's also why I wanted to make some videos about it because I think it's good to show the beginning and that you can progress and get better at something no matter what it is. So I have a lot to do. I'm going to prepare some food. I have some baking to do. Lloyd's just at jiu-jitsu at the moment but he might join in a little bit later. I've gotten really behind on housework. The house is pretty messy at the moment so I'm also going to do some cleaning. Just while I've been unwell and in bed things have just sort of piled up just and Lloyd's been absolutely amazing and helpful when he's also juggling taking care of our work and also his new YouTube channel. If you haven't subscribed to our channel or his new channel definitely go do that. It really helps us out to keep making videos for you guys but yeah this is sort of just a regular day in the life. You guys have been asking for more just relaxed day in the life videos so we could show you a little bit more of our place and later I might show you guys our studio and Lloyd's new office. He's been working like crazy in there and it's actually looking really nice so I want to show you guys that a little later too. So I think I'll get video like this today is because I found myself watching other people's videos and often comparing myself to other other women other moms that are usually a lot more experienced than me like that have been doing like homemaking and have had multiple you know four or five children and I find myself comparing myself to them. I don't know I think it's important to show that you can just start with what you have. What you have is enough and just do your best and try to build on what you already have. There's so many things that I wish I could could change or wish I could progress quicker but it just takes time. Everything seems to take time and to get better at it. Everything is overwhelming when you first start it even just being at home but one part of my job with our channel has been basically just the art of noticing. When we've been traveling I've been doing my best to you know notice what it is that makes places beautiful and try and document that about our travels and now I feel like the challenge for me is to try and do that from our home while we're here and it doesn't mean we're not going to travel in the future but just while we're here it's been really nice just trying to see the beauty in everyday life rather than feeling like I need to go to a different place or see another city or something. There's so much in the mundane that's actually really beautiful. I'm really enjoying just like the hard work that it takes to run a household and I feel like entrepreneurship and our business has even prepared me a little bit for this. There are a lot of things that I learned from running a business that translate over to running a household and it gives me encouragement like I feel excited that I'm going to keep getting better at this and we're going to enjoy being at home even more and then we already do. This is the first time I've ever loved a home like I feel like this is my space. I just want to take as good care of it as possible and I feel like the greatest gift that I can give my children and my husband is me being happy and us all having a loving, clean, well functioning home. Yep. It's okay, I won. Okay. Okay. I'm gonna finish tidying up this kitchen and then I'm going to order some groceries. I'm going to show you guys where we get them from. We have a few different options. I'm trying to show you guys more behind the scenes type things like this because I used to think that it wasn't important but you guys keep asking for weird things which I like seeing weird behind the scenes stuff too so I'll try and share more things like that. Okay I'm doing our grocery order from Lotus's. This is probably the most affordable option for delivery groceries and I think just like for big supermarkets in general it sort of seems to be the the main one. We also shop at Villa Market which is like sort of more international stuff so you can access that stuff here like we were able to find like shapes, those little crackers from Australia, we found like dark chocolate Tim Tams so they have like more international stuff but you do have to pay more premium price there so even like veggies and things are quite expensive from there and I find that the local produce at Lotus is pretty good like the veggies and things. When we can we buy fruit from a local fruit vendor just down the street I've shown that a few times on the channel we love getting fruit from there it's so fresh. So you can do delivery within three hours from one of the bigger supermarkets at Lotus or you can do like one hour just like quick like little things from a small market so I'm doing the three hour one and the prices are pretty good like definitely more affordable than when we were in Canada. One problem that I have found with ordering groceries online here is sometimes they don't have things in stock and they just don't bring anything so like if I have a recipe planned for something and then they don't bring something from it I'm kind of screwed a little bit and have to uh like if it's like a main ingredient but that's so that's happened a couple times which can be a bit annoying I wish like they actually just removed whatever the item was off of the website but it might just happen too quickly that they um they can't keep up with it so that's something to keep in mind. There's also like you can get fresh produce obviously from the markets and stuff here but just right now with me being pregnant and my energy being quite low going to the supermarket and going and searching for these things is not really high on my priority list so this has been a godsend having uh these groceries delivered and it just turns up right at our door someone on a scooter usually delivers it and um it's usually here pretty quick. Okay groceries are all ordered so I'm going to finish tidying the house before they get here and then we'll get into cooking and some baking. Okay so if you're planning a trip to Thailand or pretty much anywhere in the world really and you want to stay connected then you're going to want to check out Olifly eSims who just so happen to be the sponsor of today's video. Olifly provides international eSIM cards to over 190 destinations around the world so you can travel and use the internet without worrying about expensive roaming fees when you get home. We've actually been using Olifly eSims for over two years now in places like Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Mexico, Canada, the US just to name a few. And speaking from experience there's literally nothing more frustrating to me than getting off the plane and not having phone service especially if you want to order a taxi use Google Maps or Google Translate to get yourself to the hotel. And by purchasing an Olifly eSIM before you leave for your destination you can avoid all of these annoying problems and make sure that the first few days of your trip run completely smooth. And just in case your travel plans change and let's face it sometimes they do don't worry because they offer every purchase up to six months to request a refund if you don't use your eSIM. And the best part about Olifly eSIM is you can keep your current SIM card in your phone while you're traveling in case you want to receive text messages or phone calls while you're abroad. They've also just released a brand new app making it even easier to buy, install and keep track of your eSIM usage. Which means even more time to enjoy your trip and less time spent planning. It's literally never been easier to purchase an Olifly eSIM. However just a quick note before you do purchase your eSIM make sure you head over to their website and check that your phone is compatible with their eSIMs. Most phones are these days but just to be sure. So if you want to check out Olifly for yourself simply click the link down below in the description and use code LLOYDANDMANDY at checkout and you'll receive 5% off your order. So as someone who used to hate cleaning, I used to absolutely hate it. We actually got a lot of comments on one of our last videos when I was cleaning. A lot of people mentioning like obviously I can hire somebody here for quite affordable here in Thailand to clean the house for me. Why am I cleaning my house? And totally understand probably will be hiring someone in the near future when baby comes. But since being pregnant and moving into our home I've found that my mental health is so much better when I have it done my cleaning routine. For the day just a little tidy of the house I feel a hundred percent better about everything. But I did have to do a couple things to be able to enjoy cleaning. One thing I feel so productive when I have an apron on or and a dress. I never thought I would be one of these women who do this but I saw another girl on YouTube who inspired me to try it and I feel a lot more productive and just like better about myself than I do if I'm just like cleaning with no makeup and sort of like raggedy. I don't feel clean so then the house doesn't feel as clean if that makes sense. So getting a nice apron is a hack but also getting a cute cleaning caddy as well has helped me to actually get excited about cleaning instead of dreading it. Just to make it a little bit more fun. So that's a way that I've incorporated a bit more beauty into our everyday life and it has made a big difference. I don't know if I mentioned this before but one thing I didn't expect moving to Thailand was how much I would be battling with gecko poo. Seems to be the hardest thing about keeping this house clean. There are so many geckos and I really like them. They're actually really good for the house and take care of like the spiders and the bugs and stuff. They poop on the walls a lot and it's really hard to get off and it's always on the window sills. I thought it was moss or something. No it's um yeah it's geckos. I really like them in the house. They're really good. They're actually meant to protect the house as well. So I'm not complaining about them but yeah if you have any advice for what takes out gecko poo stains off of like window sills um let me know in the comments. He's so calm. All he wants to do is float. Oh bear. You like it? You're so sweet. So happy. I didn't realize how much I would actually miss just regular tasks like this just because of the last few weeks not being able to do much. You don't really realize how much you like value just being able to move and do chores and do regular things until it gets taken away from you. So I feel like that's given me sort of a new perspective um feeling more grateful for things like housework. Things that are sometimes looked at as irritating um feel like a gift at the at the moment. Okay so while I'm waiting on the groceries to arrive I'm actually going to make some bagels. This is the only bread that we've actually been eating now since I found this recipe. I've just I love them. Lloyd loves them too. We've been having them for breakfast and also using them to like dip in soups and stuff like that. They're awesome. So I'm just good I've just been prepping them and keeping them in the freezer. Uh they're they're great. So I'm gonna make some of them. Even though these bagels are incredibly easy to make um I really like them and I feel like it's a really good like introduction to making your own bread because it's such few ingredients but it just like gives that homey feeling. Baking really brings warmth and like happiness into our home. I just love baking. I've been doing so much of it. I've pretty much just been prepping things as well for postpartum. So I'll actually show you in our freezer. Um I've just been bulk making things um like soups and stews and that sort of thing. Um so in here you'll see and baking of course. Just so we have things uh when the baby comes we don't have to worry so much about food and it's been making me feel a lot more relaxed because having a hot home-cooked meal is really really important to me right now and especially for the healing process as well. I've read a lot about how um getting heat back into the body after giving birth is super important. So having hot meals on hand that take very minimal cooking this will just be like we just have to warm things up. Um I've got so far only like I've got a chili. I've got meatballs here. I've prepped the cookie dough. We've got all our smoothie stuff here as well. It's a bit messy in here sorry. I've got um banana bread and then um one bagel left as well. What I have been doing is just cooking these hot meals when I have the energy now but making heaps more and then just putting it in the freezer and it's making me feel so much more prepared for postpartum. Highly recommend doing that in the lead up with your third trimester. It just makes everything better or if you're blessed enough to have um someone else cook for you we probably will have a bit of help but it just gives you peace of mind knowing that you've got that there for an emergency or any time that you just really need a home-cooked meal and you can't cook it. I love the idea of doing sourdough and I think I will eventually in the future but it's just too many steps for me right now and um yeah I feel it's a good introduction if you're not ready to be sourdough mom yet to make bagels instead. Okay while those are baking I might just quickly take you guys upstairs. I need to go water Lloyd's plants and maybe give it a little tidy in his office slash our studio and just show you guys what that's all about. It's looking pretty good. I really like it up there. I don't get to make it up there as much as I'd like because of the stairs but um I feel like I can do it today. Lloyd's just put a lot of work into it and um it's feeling really nice and cozy in there. We're gonna be doing a lot more like sit down videos and he's been working really hard on his other channel and I mean there's just nothing more rewarding than seeing your husband like really happy on with what he's working on as a wife. I feel like that just makes me feel really good. Like I said go subscribe to Lloyd's other channel because he's been working really hard on it and he's really talented and he tells really good stories about like UFC and fighting and stuff so if you're interested in that sort of thing definitely subscribe. Okay I didn't know Lloyd is going to be in a meeting with our YouTube partner manager so I couldn't give you a proper uh little tour but we are going to do a proper tour of the villa I've decided. I've kind of been on the fence about it so um stay tuned for that. We'll show you that and I also have a bunch of stuff arriving for the nursery this week so that should hopefully be done um this week which would make me feel uh much more relaxed. This is my new rocking chair which I absolutely love that Lloyd got for me. He's so far been using it more than me and it's in the living room at the moment but it will probably migrate to the nursery. I'm sure everything's gonna move around a lot. I don't know how I'm going to do things but I'm still waiting on the groceries so when I when they do arrive we'll hop back in the kitchen and I'm just gonna take a little break and a little nap before then. get dinner on. I just finished having a little nap with Bear um the groceries arrived and wouldn't you know just like I said at the beginning of the video that um it sucks when one of the main ingredients doesn't um show up for a recipe that you want which was uh red capsicum or red pepper um so Lloyd had to duck out and go grab me a couple more of them which is nice. I I am starting to fade a little bit now that it's getting a little bit lighter so I'm super happy that I decided on this recipe because it is so simple. It's one of my favorite soups if not my favorite soup that I make and it's just so easy to make and it's really cheap to make as well and it makes a large portion so it kind of takes all the boxes. I also ordered another Tupperware because I'm going to chuck extra in the freezer for postpartum as well and um just knocking a lot of things off. So this recipe pretty much just calls for red capsicum tomatoes and usually I use a red for how long all the veggies go in the oven. I kind of do things different every time especially the amount that I'm cooking but um yeah if you want to make it at home just keep an eye on it till things get soft. Then I chuck it in just to a big soup pot and let it um cook down with some stock, coconut milk and a few more spices and then I chuck it in the blender and it's done and it is the best soup. I highly recommend it. We're going to have it with one of our fresh made bagels that I had today. We're going to dip in there and maybe put a little bit of cheese on top as well. Okay so dinner is finally prepared and so and dessert is just about finished as well. Thank you guys so much for spending the day with me today. I know this is sort of a different video than what Lloyd and I normally do. I just was really missing creating and making content and making videos so I think our content is going to look a little bit different while we're going through this massive change. Yeah let me know what you thought down in the comments. I'd love to hear from you. Hi honey. You did? Oh no. With your bare feet? Yeah. Anyways thank you guys so much for watching. Um as always don't forget to like and subscribe if you did enjoy the video. I hope it provided some inspiration maybe if you're a beginner like me to homemaking or maybe just if you want to try a new recipe or do something different at home. I hope I can offer some inspiration. I love you guys. Thank you for supporting us all this time and as always I'll see you guys in the next video. Bye.