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Showing posts with label deardear. Show all posts
Showing posts with label deardear. Show all posts

Monday, May 01, 2017

Chinese New Year 2017 -- Year of the Rooster




It is 3 months after the Chinese New Year and I am just done with editing the photos. I say 3 months is a pretty good improvement as compared to the previous years. °˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖°


IMAGE HEAVY
Loooooooong picture-ful post. Go get your drinks and popcorn while waiting for the images to load. You could even savour your main dish in front of your computer. Those viewing this on your smartphones and other hand held devices, I suggest you skip reading this post till you get home or you might risk jamming your device and cursing at my blog in public. I know my turtle friend did that once minus the cursing in public. =P



~*Pre CNY*~

The Year of The Rooster is my hubby's year (and nope, he isn't 24 years old so figure how OLD he is.)

My MIL who doesn't usually buy chinese zodiac decorations bought rooster CNY decorations for us since it is her son's zodiac year. The boy boy and girl girl chicken with furry tummies are just too cute! I love them and love how festive they made our home look. Now after CNY, they are sitting idly in the cupboard only to be gloriously hung up 12 years later. _へ__(‾◡◝ )>




I looked like I was posing casually with the chicks but check out what went behind the scene. I had to prop myself up on the chair to reach tat level to stick the decoration up. And one of my gal pal who saw the above photo asked me if I was wearing my CNY clothes coz it looked so pink. Well, I was in home clothes -- my VS Love Pink pajamas and FBT shorts. LOL.



Presenting my CNY 2017 nails to welcome the year of the Rooster! Because roosters are not that cute in general, I decided to do a baby rooster instead. I asked the nail artist to modify from a chick nail art and had its hair replaced by the red lines for a baby rooster. 🐔🐓🐣🐥




I did my CNY2017 nails way early as I couldn't stand the ickiness of how long the Christmas nails had grown with the edges flipping up. But after doing so much housework, my CNY nails are starting to show signs of colour lightening at the edges.




After moving to our new home, my OCD nature peaked. I'm constantly cleaning the house largely because of Miyo too. Her fur is too soft and smooth that when they shed, they float everywhere, contributing to 90% of the dust and dirt in the home.

Here are 19 out of 26 household tasks checked! I was surprised by how much the hubz and I could do over the last weekend before CNY and how much we could accomplish when we divide and conquer. Although we did not complete all the tasks, we felt proud of ourselves and had an enjoyable time having people visit our home.




The kitchen counter looked so festive with all the goodies, a nice basket of mandarin oranges and a silly mascot cat who seemed to think it is HER YEAR.




"This is my chilling place ok?"




"Humans, you do not put 2 mandarin oranges in front of me and make me your CNY mascot."




We did not snap any family photo this year during reunion dinner with the in laws coz it was the first time we were seated outdoor where it was too dark. This was what my FIL snapped.





~*CNY Happenings*~


All decked in maroon for Day 1. I suspect this dress would wind up being my Xmas dress too.
I was also  trying to snap my purple, blue and green hair but all the camera could capture was the blue.




When you have an uncooperative cat with a resting bitch face and you just want to take a decent CNY family portrait, you realize that you need to invest in a tripod... or a new cat.




Day 1 would be spent at my family home for lunch. I always LURVE the food that my parents prepare. Yes, both my mum and my dad are good cooks! We had steamboat lunch this year and the soup base is pig stomach soup. They make the best pig stomach soup in the world! We also had the usual CNY dishes like ngor hiang, leek and white-spotted rabbitfish.




As usual, we would have the tradition of taking The Loh Family portrait shots on the sofa and the anigif of various shots on continuous snap timer mode that would follow.







After that, it would be at The Ng Family for the same portrait shot on the sofa and the anigif. Both sofas are getting really old.
(‐^▽^‐)







My paternal grandma whom we always find really cute hasn't been doing well these 2 years. She doesn't recognize anyone anymore. I missed this family photo with her while I was paying respects at the in laws' side on Day 1.
(⌯˃̶᷄ ﹏ ˂̶᷄⌯)゚




I forgot which day it was when we had the usual steamboat dinner with the hubz' paternal relatives. I always love all these home cooked Chinese food and kh's eldest uncle and his wife whip up really fabulous home cooked food.







Great home cooked food should be shared.
The best black coffee in the world too!









This pair of yellow birds would come every new year to build their nest at the exact same plant outside kh's uncle's place. I spied a little blue egg in there! So exciting! I guess for a tropical country that does not experience the 4 seasons, this is indeed a tell tale sign of spring's arrival.




A yellow bird also attempted to build a nest on our swing. I wondered if it is the same species of yellow bird. Can you spot the bird and the curious Miyo?




After a good lunch feast, it was dinner feast at my paternal relatives' place. There was a mixture of Chinese and Western food and they were all so delectable too! What a day of lots of good food and family warmth.




Best Japanese sake ever!




There are lots of new addition in this family photo as the younger cousins are all taking their partners along. The youngsters are all growing up and the not so young are all growing old but still keeping our hearts young.




There seemed to be 2 CNY lunches with the the department as one of the day was the actual CNY lunch while another was a CPR workshop day coupled with National Education tour at the Battle Box.




Instead of taking a whole dept shot, we decided this would do when we asked the other table to join in the wefie.




The unofficial 2nd CNY lunch with the dept after our CPR renewal course. We are all certified to perform CPR.










Anywhere also can take photo... Gals... This is in the ladies btw.




The Battlebox tour at Fort Canning may not be cheap but it is worth every cent. This is currently run by a private company and the guides who are volunteers are excellent. If this private company had not stepped out to manage this, the Battlebox would have been closed by the government for the next few years. That would be a huge part of Singapore's history being closed to the public.




After the battlebox tour, a few friends from work headed over to my place to see Miyo and to gamble. What's CNY without some gambling?




The Banker who kept winning sought Prophet Miyo's divine answers.




Everyone loves Miyo even when she has a resting bitch face.










The VIOS decided to replicate the atas CNY BBQ from 2 years back.




Just look at the premium ingredients!




Dot was surprised by the birthday cake for her. Check out the scaredy cat Miyo cowering under the sofa in the last pic. She was freaked out when we switched off all the lights and sang the happy birthday song.




This is what goes on behind the scene when you are the cutest diva RBF cat in the world.




And as the years go by, we continue living young and doing youngish stuff like age didn't matter. Ending off the night with failed 三连拍 which nobody followed and THE silly DAB pose which everyone did!




The last CNY gathering was the Hubz and his uni frenz' annual mahjong gathering. That was the first time we had it at our new place coz everyone wanted to see Miyo too.




The boys plan to take a shot like this for the next few years to come until everyone becomes old uncle and old grandpa.  °˖✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧˖°




And we deep fried for the first time in our open concept kitchen coz everyone had craving for luncheon meat fries for supper.




I thought of scrapping the idea of posting a late CNY post  but felt that it would not make my blog complete if there is a missing post for this year's CNY, and the hubz' year too. I sure hope you enjoyed joining me on my CNY 2017 happenings through these photos whether they are late or not.

It is the Labour Day public holiday here in Singapore and I was supposed to be working on my work laptop for an event we are organising. It would be a real busy month of May this year but hey, I've promised myself that I want to blog more and I'm honouring my word to myself. It feels really good! I realise that the only promise I always break is the one to myself. I will break that habit and continue to keep promises I made to myself from now on.



Monday, July 25, 2016

猴 Seh 猴年 Chinese New Year 2016

Goodness gracious! It is 5 months after Chinese New Year and here I am writing about Chinese New Year 2016. This post, together with a few other posts, has been on draft mode till spiders had already begun to spin web on it.


Let's start with my CNY gelish nail art. Some of you would have seen this photo on Instagram.




It is the year of the Monkey and I contemplated doing monkey nail art. However, it is more difficult to draw a monkey and hence also more expensive, so I decided on Fortune Cat instead. It is cuter and easier to blend in with the glittery red CNY colours for the rest of my nails.




It is the usual practice for our department to have CNY lunch together before the 2-day CNY public holiday starts. Lunch was yummy but what was more memorable was the good time spent with these friends from work. Another memorable event that happened that day was how I injured myself while playing Bubble Bump.




We would usually have reunion dinner with kh's family on the eve of CNY but since he has overnight duty on CNY eve, we had our family dinner at Canton Paradise on the CNY eve eve.




Compare the length of the chopsticks for tossing Yu Sheng with the normal chopsticks.




Raw fish slices used in Yu Sheng were replaced with abalone slices at Canton Paradise. It was during the period of the raw fish scare when there were a few cases of hospitalisations and that the Ministry of Health (MOH) said it found a link between the consumption of raw fish and Group B Streptococcus (GBS) infections.




I haven't Lo Hei with a group who knows exactly what to recite for each ingredients so this was the guide in many people's mobile phones to refer to.




I love Chinese food and I always dislike how they could never look appetising in photos like their Japanese or French or Italian or whichever Non-Chinese counterparts.














Bob Marley photobombed our family photo. Facebook actually had a face recognition tag for him!




Before I got married, we would gather at my paternal grandma's place for home cooked reunion dinner on the eve of CNY. It has been years since I had reunion dinner with my family and relatives and it was great to spend time with my relatives on CNY eve.




Just look at the home cooked food spread! Delicious and comforting!




My grandma is getting senile but the things she says still makes her so cute and endearing.




I'm never into flower arrangement so I'm pretty pleased with what I've done with this vase of orchids.




And this vase too. (Yes, they are different. Check out how horizontal and parallel to the table these orchids are.) I had some help from my youngest BIL as the flower stems simply would not stay put even with those "pebbles" or whatever you call them. It was a funny sight with 2 people trying so hard to hold the flowers in place.




I took the mini flowers free from Gardens by the Bay. Some flowers had wilted by CNY but I was glad that majority of them held up well.




All decked in red for Day 1 of CNY.




I never had a red dress in years and I bought this red dress for CNY, Christmas, National Day... Be prepared to see this dress being worn to death.




I love the collar zip of this skater dress. I could achieve different styles with zipped up mandarin collar, zipped down into a V and zipped down with collar folded.




Wefie with hubby




It is a tradition to go back to my family home for lunch for CNY Day 1 and I absolutely love my parents' cooking!

A variant of Buddha Jumps Over the Wall soup.




Leek and tofu.
Leek is an auspicious food to eat during Chinese New Year because the character “蒜” in its Chinese name (蒜苗/大蒜) sounds like count (“算”) in Mandarin. Due to the similar sounds, it is believed that eating leeks is an auspicious symbol of wealth (lots of money to count) in the coming year.




White-spotted rabbitfish.
The white-spotted rabbitfish is highly sought after for eating during the Chinese Lunar New Year. At this time, the fishes breed and their roe are particularly relished. Called 'Pei Tor', the Chinese believe that eating it brings abundant luck.




Ngoh Hiang.
I have never ever eaten any ngor hiang that tastes like the ones my mum makes. Pure meat and prawns and no flour in the filling at all. She also adds water chestnuts for the crunch. This dish is many of my relatives' favourite dish too. During reunion dinner, some of my relatives would actually wait for my family's arrival just for my mum's ngor hiang. LOL...




I'm so glad we could continue the tradition of The Loh Family portrait shot on the sofa. We did not have one last year because of my eldest sister suffered from a stroke and was in ICU. This year's CNY period marked her one-year survival mark!




The animation doesn't seem to be showing on my blog. Click here to watch.




Ng Family portrait.
Note to hubby and self: Lean forward when taking photos and we would look short and stumpy.




Click here to watch if the animation isn't showing on my blog.




I forgot which day it was that we had steamboat dinner with kh's paternal relatives. We also visited other relatives just that these visits aren't captured in photos.




Yummy steamboat with pig stomach soup.








CNY dinner with the VIOS gang at New Ubin Seafood.




















Super belated CNY in March with my other family (Cyn and godkids Jase and Mia).




So many happy wefies! Though there would always be one with bad angle or when somebody was blocked or did not look good. It was hard without a selfie stick.






Sweet and pretty Mia with her hair all tied up, sporting a sideway ponytail and fringe framing her cutie face by bimbotic Godma.




Jase was and is always the good older brother to his sisters Charmaine and Mia whom he loves dearly. Mia thinks the world of her beloved older brother too. To him, his half-sister Mia is his treasured sister and there is no such thing as half sister in his dictionary.




Hugz and kisses to my 2 little rascals.




Who loves doing the Asian peace sign?




Jase attempting to take a wefie.




Ending this post with a wefie with Cyn, one of my bestest gal pal ever. As I'm typing this, Cyn and the kiddos would be emigrating to the UK to join Patrick as a whole family in a few days time. It was a long and tough decision for them but everyone was glad that the whole family could be reunited after so many challenges.

I would miss you!




I thought of scrapping the idea of posting a late one but felt that it would not make my blog complete if there is a missing post for this year's CNY. I sure hope you enjoyed joining me on my CNY 2016 happenings through these photos whether they are late or not.

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