My 2008 Christmas Baking..

Cupcakes for a Secondary School Reunion

Arranged on my Ikea 3-tier serving tray..nice leh…

Mini Christmas cakes for my neighbour and for my Christmas dinner parties (Kieran loved this cake so much..)

Snowmen Cotton Cheesecakes for my nephews who came back from Jakarta (One of them just ate the icing!)

Pineapple tarts for my buddy who came back from the US with my Wilton pens and flower cutter set!

Now it’s time for Chinese New Year cookies…my oven will be very very busy from now on…

HAPPY NEW YEAR

*2009*

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

It’s coming to the end of the year and I have loads and loads which I wanted to say here but I simply do not have enough time!! So I shall end the year with this post first…

Here’s wishing everyone a very Blessed Christmas and Happy Merry New Year!! I’ve been hearing negative remarks that 2009 will not be a good year, bla bla bla…but I choose to believe it will be a good year, in fact not only, it will be a better year!!! What say you? You with me??? Lets work together to a better year.

My new year resolutions

• Start doing bento meals for my kids (in Kieran’s case, not so much decoration)
• Eat less (as if I will)
• Try not to scream at scold my kids so much
• Try not to whack scream at the maid so much (cos I notice Kylie starting to order/scold the maid like I do!)
• Not to shop so much (as if again..) as I don’t have anymore space in my already bursting wardrobe (I tried clearing some old ones out and still it’s too packed!)
• Not to talk negatively in front of the kids…(this will be the toughest…)

ok la..enough! I can’t be too hard on myself can’t I????

Tis the season to be jolly..fa la la la la la la la la la…

Penang Escapade

We did the unthinkable and left the maid at home and took off to Penang for 2 nights. Our first stop along the way was at Ipoh of course. We had our favourite Ipoh Hor Fun and the caramel custard which I bought take-away for Alice and also another for myself! Greedy me! (location: Thean Chun, Ipoh Old Town)

Upon reaching Penang, we drove straight to my customer’s place to drop off the load of stuff he ordered. Terrible, despite the fact that I drove all the way and saved him $$ on transport, he still wanted to hang on to my payment! Blek!

Then we saw a man selling the peanut Apom and I went to order some. I was waiting…waiting…n then some guy came over to collect his apom, then another person came to collect and I was wondering if the seller was kinda bias towards me since I didn’t speak Hokkien. After a while only did I realise those customers had presviously ordered earlier on and there was a long queue of orders! The seller reminds himself of the orders using coins placing them in order! So smart!! The apom was made over charcoal fire! Authentic & of course yummieee! I didn’t take a photo as I was not prepared with my camera! Shiats…(location:near the Pulau Tikus market, opposite the Police Station)

After that we checked in the hotel (supplied by APah’s company) and it was quite a big and comfortable room with quite a good view of the sea. It’s not a resort but a city hotel, go figure.

Alice came to pick us up to go to the public beach since the beach in front of our hotel is kinda not conducive for the children to play! Kieran was so excited and jumped in immediately with me screaming at him not to swim too far out. There were quite a lot of rocks and shells that he cut his feet. Both Kylie and Darrius were very happy with just playing sand and pouring water in the sand.

Then we found a crab claw and another smaller crab carcass which was huge and was immediately imagining it as our dinner….Kieran kept asking to cook it! hahahhaha…

Then suddenly we saw this couple taking their wedding photographs…very adventurous poses they made! The photograper was shooting from above the cliff with his terrer-menerrer zoom lens..but look at my shot with my miserable macro lens…booo hoooooo…..

Dinner was seafood not too far from the beach. It was tomyum cooked with coconut water..yummilicious! We had crabs of course…can’t help it can’t we?? (location: Along Ferringhi Beach)

On the way back to the hotel, I couldn’t resist stopping over at Gurney Drive Hawker centre to get my crispy Apom. It was indeed yummy and well worth the exorbitant price they charged! Sorry no photos as we gobbled em down in no time!

After Alice dropped us back at the hotel, I called Apah and told him I wanted to have my Pulau Tikus Char Koay Teow. He brought along his colleague and off we went. There was a Prawn Paste Chee Cheong Fun which Apah ordered one plate and the kids gobbled em down and asked for more! The CKT was great and after that we retired to bed very satisfied.

We kicked off the next day with Prawn noodles and more peanut apom but it was so so nya…We then drove to Lorong Delima to get my favourite Prawn Paste chee cheong fun before going to Alice’s place. (location: on the way to Penang Bridge, off Green Lane) Bought 2 packets, one for me, one for Alice. After eating & yakking  & packing..we went to the Aquarium at Teluk Maung, Alice correct me if I’m wrong about the location.

The kids enjoyed themselves despite the small size of the aquarium..

Feeding the fish..

Interesting star fish..

Very sad turtle in captivity….

Lunch was nearby and it was really good…look at the very satisfied customer…

After lunch (burp..) we went off to the hotel but detoured to get the famous cendol near Komtar and some banana apom along Jalan Burmah. The kids were tired, Kylie fell asleep first and then followed by Darrius. Upon reaching the hotel, the kids woke up from their very short nap and was all excited to get ready for the swim. It was such a hot day and the sun was blazing so we let the kids play in the bath tub first. They got carried away and we ended up with a very wet bathroom. Off they went to the pool and surprisingly the water was freezing cold despite the hot day. Kylie panicked after Kieran took her for a ride on the slide. She refused to get in the pool after that till I coaxed her and carried her along.

After the swim we took very quick showers and off we went for dinner at a Nyonya Restaurant. (Forgot the name..kakaka) and food was ok, liked especially the otak otak..After dinner it was kinda drizzling but our diehard urge to savour the charcoal fried Char Koay Teow overruled the rain. It was kinda oily but yummy nevertheless!

The next day, we let the kids go for another round of swimming and checked out after that. Aliced texted that she was down with diarrhea and couldn’t join us (no thanks to piggin out sessions with me la). We stopped over at Pulau Tikus for breakfast again and tried my luck at getting the cheque from my customer but he was not in! Rats!

We then left for more food before we leave. It was Genting at Delima again, had the rich assam laksa (only opens in the afternoon) and more Chee Cheong Fun. Kieran was hit with diarrhea at this point and completely made a mess on his underpants. This got Apah very upset and we had to throw away the underpants…eeewww..n double ewwww..it was quite a good & new one summore…bleah! Quickly ate and off we went.

Stopped over at Ipoh for tea and Kieran blasted another round and this time we decided to save the underpants! I can’t throw away 2 good underpants in one day! We hurried off and upon reaching home, Kieran again blasted the toilet and started throwing up too! It was quite a serious food poisoning episode! After they came back from the doctor, I too threw up and started purging! Kylie too had watery stool for the next few days and Kieran took 3 days to recover! Geez..we suspect it was due to the banana apom from Jln Burmah as Apah was the only one who didn’t eat those and he didn’t get hit at all!

And what was the maid doing without us around? Watching tv non stop (she was probably lying on my sofa with the air con on too!) of course, weyo? The tv was burning hot when we returned and chores were not completed!!

But after all that, I still felt it was worth it eating all those fantastic food! That goes to show how greedy this Amah is!

Updates…upcoming updates…

Hello everybody! Happy December! Time flies and I don’t have enough time of course to update my updates! Oh gosh what the heck am I babbling about. Anyways…my 10th Wedding anniversary came and gone in a flash and a pool of shi*ts while we were in Penang. And then Kieran’s 8th birthday..it was a blast but the poor birthday boy was still down with food poisoning!

Anyways, photos from the Penang trip is yet to come…sorry…it will take some time as I will be busy for the rest of the week..weyo?? Me and my big mouth generous heart, offered to bake cup cakes for our upcoming School reunion party this weekend. So, I have to start preparing the fondant decoration and of course start baking the cuppies and storing them in the freezer first.

The long weekend came and gone too. We spent the whole of Monday shopping for myself Christmas and ended up with a new dress, 2 tops, 2 pairs of 3/4 pants and a very sexy pair of heels! (I have not the time to even blog about my other 2 pairs which I bought out of frustration last month!! Bleah!) Ok ok…yap yap yap and no pictures..really no fun hor??? Ok be patient la! Just you wait!! Just you wait!! Wakakakakakaka…

Arghhhhhhhhhh….3 more weeks to school reopens…fai tit la…wey!