Back to School SOOOOOON

Its just 1 more week before school starts all over again... I am having that mixed feeling, excited yet fearful that there are still so much things to be done!!

Went back to school today & all my staff are also back to set up the classroom, wash the toys & everything... We need to get our engine started!!

Hun Family Christmas Dinner

My family had our Christmas Dinner on the eve @ my place.

That evening being a special evening, I went & bought flowers to do up my place a little and they were so pretty & colourful!! We had a big Christmas tree with so so so many gifts under the tree. I also set up a mini Nativity scene to remind us the reason for the season is really about the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. He was and still is the greatest gift to me and my family.
We were up & abt busy preparing. I really need to blog abt the trip I made to QB food at Chin Bee. I was there fairly early like 9.30am.. boy the place was CROWDED. There were lots of Japanese, Americans & even Singaporeans.... everyone (including me) was pushing their basket carts loaded with sausages, chilled beef, cheese, frozen fruits, lamb chops. I ordered 23 ribeye beef steaks!! At checkout... my purchase was a grand total of $495!!

We had a western menu....
1. Walnut shallot bread with olive oil, pepper salt & vinger
2. Cold cut ham with cheese dip
3. Spicy squid salad
4. Smoked duck salad
5. Honey Mustard salad
6. Assorted beans with corn dip
7. Rosemary Roast Chicken
8. Beef steak
9. Lamb chop
10. Shepard's pie
11. Grilled sausages
12. Fruit salad
13. Red, white, fruit wines

Here a pic to showcase our FEASTBesides the food, the kids & even the man had a fun time playing WII. The kids were really mild but gosh when it was the man's turn.... they went all out!! Standing up, swinging that arm etc.... It was funny to watch them play....
The sisters as usual were enjoying each other's company, chit chatting and catching up on each other lives!!
Blessed Christmas everyone and May His grace and love abounds in us. Have a wonderful 2010...

Lazy Way of Posting

Haha Angie mentioned that I have been getting lazy with my posts & its always those "Happenings in the week!!" style... so i am keeping it this way for a while...

Ringbearer Experience
I mgt to dig out yet another set of suit for Ezra & it fits him to the T... so here's a peek at how he looks on James & Connie's Wedding. He was a little taken aback when he saw the crowd & so not too smiley... but he did a wonderful job of stepping forward when Pastor Richard called for the rings & the crowd laughed when they saw a little handsome boy walking out!! After his 'job' we gave him his loli as a reward (more to shut him out though the ceremony) Ezra with Nadya, his little bride Our family pic

A Visit to STPI Our friend Debbie had a art exhibition & we visited the gallery to give her some support. We were very blessed when Eitaro gave us a tour ard the STPI and show us where they worked and the history of printing & paper making.. interesting

Christmas Baking

One thing that took up a lot of time this holiday was baking. I tried bread for breakfast, gingerbread man for the little ones, Brandy fruit cake for friends, cookies for church and even a logcake!! Fruitcake Cookies Logcake (my 1st attempt) Gingerbread Man (2nd attempt) Bread

Ezra the Ring Bearer

We were very excited cos Ezra was asked to be the ring bearer for James & Connie church wedding on 12 Dec. I dug through all the bags of clothes passed down by Andre & Neville.. true enough I found some suits that we can use. I have not decided which to use.... They had the wedding rehearsal last evening & here are some sneak previews.... Here's the other suit I am considering....

Stylo Ezra on Berry kor kor's bike!!

Gingerbread Man

I was toying with the idea of baking gingerbread man for friends as Christmas gifts. So I better do some trial now. Got a recipe from a church friend... its really not so difficult to do but the rolling out & cutting the shape & transferring it to the baking tray takes some skills.

After baking, it must be cooled before I decorate the man with icing. It requires a little creativity.

Violia... My nicer ones.

The rest of the batch

The children pestered for some and they got their wish granted!!

Day 5 - KK

Day 5 - We travelled for 2.5hrs to about 1500m above sealevel to Mount Kinabalu. Our lodging was @ Strawberry Garden Hotel (aka. SGH - no kidding ok!) It was a very basic hotel but condition ok. On the way up, we manage to get some really nice durians (since we did not manage to get any in the city) at really good price. In the city, we were quoted abt $35RM/kg of durian where as up in the mount it was just $4RM/kg of durian! The colour of the durains here were generally more while & pale but it sure taste nice and yummy (and cold too!).

After we checked in and settled our things in SGH, we than proceed downhill to Poring where there a Hot Spring. It was fun as the children got to walk over hanging bridge across a stream. While waiting for the guide to help fill the hot spring pool, we went for the canopy walk. From the gate to the canopy was about 200m up. we were panting when we finally reach the start of the canopy. The children have a swell time 'swinging' and walking cross the bridges. It was a real experience where you walk across the trees on 'swinging' ropes! Another 1st time experince for the children & even some of us. After that, it was another 200m back down to the hot spring pools and a good workout. And what a relaxing time we had soaking in the pools! Well, at least some of us does. Well, we also managed to catch a view of the famous Rafflesia, world largest flower. It takes each abt 18 months to bloom and it bloomed for abt 7 days.

On our way back to the hotel, the clouds parted and we managed to catch a nice view of the peak basking in the golden setting sun! How beautiful the view was! No words or even my picture here can provide a close enough description of that majestic view we saw! God's beautiful creation!!

On our way back, we stopped by the road side veg and fruit stalls to buy some veg to stir fry for dinner to go with our maggie mee!! The vegetables were so fresh crisp and sweet!! YUMMY!! The night was COLD & in the morning it was a beautiful sight of the mountains that greeted us.


Well, so that's about it for our trip. Maybe, as Nana and her mommy make a promised to each other...In ten years time, we shall return to climb up the peak! Well, we shall see. =)

Day 4 - KK

Once again, we were blessed with good weather on Day 4. So its off to Gaya Sunday Market. There we saw the 'red' durian and the mummies got some bargains as well. It was an eye opening for the children as they got to see some live kitties, puppies, bunnies, turkeys, little chicks, and ducklings. They also got a treat of the cotton candy while waiting at the fountain till it got dropped on the floor (look at Nadya's sad face in the middle top pic). *awah...*

After the Sunday market, our 'tour guide' brought us up to 'signal point' which have a nice overview of the city. Then we went to Tanjong Aru beach where we had our lunch. It was a very hot day, so we ordered large drinks. When the drinks arrived , the large was really LARGE!! We had so much that even Nimrod (sam shok) also cannot tahan from the over dosage!

Evening time, we got Hainanese Chicken rice! The chicken was of cos gotten the day before at the market. It was yummy!

After dinner, we had a surprise birthday party for Nana who was turning 7 in 2 days!

Nana was so pleasantly surprised! This was her happy family photo, of cos Ezra decided to be the mischievous phantom.

Day 3 - KK

The 3rd day was also blessed with good weather. We were within walking distance to their local market and decided to take a walk and visit the market. Within a few mins from our condo is the waterfront walk. There we took some photos. Look at the cool grandpa and grandma (top right pic)!! Ezra took the opportunity to climb up his 'Sam Sok' (3rd Uncle) for a ride (top left pic).

Viv and mum went crazy seeing the cheap cheap dried food stuff like sea cucumber, fish maw, dried shrimps, dried cuttlefish, dried salted fish (by the whole) amnd many others!! They brought quite a few things. Aft that they went on to the wet mkt, brought more staff and decided to buy some food to cook diner instead. The chickens sold there were HUGE!! the size of a small turkey!!

While the mummies are taking their own sweet time 'touring' the local market, the daddies (well, actually it was me taking the excuse of looking after the children to prevent them from disturbing the mummies) took a break in the starbuck joint. Even the children enjoy the air-con and the frap!

In the afternoon, we cooked the seldom seen whole corn which the mummies bought so excitedly for snacks! The children enjoyed it even though these corns are a bit more starchy than what we are used to.

Dinner was at a local seafood 'resturant' (more like a coffeeshop type) which we travelled for around 30mins looking for it. But thankfully, the food was Goooood! Look at the satisfied facial expression and you can almost taste it yourself, right? =)

Day 2 - KK (2 of 2)

The children, except Nadya, enjoyed the boat ride. We joked that the boat ride was the only thing when Nadya can be silent!! It was a 1st experience on high speen boat for the children!! We all had a great time at both islands. The weather was great through the day till we stepped back onto the city, it started to rain a little.

As usual, Ezra enjoyed the sand alot and only managed to get dipped into the sea after much assurance from Daddy that he will be held tightly. Of cos, he got freaked out! after seeing the 'big' fishes swimming around him. There were so so so many fish, huge schools of them swimming freely and feeding off the bread from our hands!! It was an awesome experience.

The young adults (*ahem ahem* yours truely included) went for para-sailing. And enjoyed it throughly! Only disappointment is that the guide didn't allow me to go up together with my wife cos he feel my weight is abit beyond the limit. *sob sob*

(Para-sailing picture to be uploaded later)

Day 2 - KK (1 of 2)

We had a beautiful morning for day 2. So we decided to have a quick breakfast and head to the jetty and go island hopping.

And this is the view we have from our condo unit.

After breakfast, we met a nice freelance 'taxi-driver' (private car) who offer to take us to the ferry (which was about 10mins ride) for $15RM. And at the jetty, he introduced us to a boatman who was willing to offer us a whole boat for the day @ just $200RM.

The plan was to visit two island (Sapi and Manukan) and let the children enjoy some Sun, Sand, and Sea.

Day 1 - Kota Kinabalu

A picture of the junior & Senior Chuangs @ Changi Airport before the trip began. This is after all a first Big Family Trip consisting of 3 families.

After 2 hours of flying we have finally arrived at Kota Kinabalu (KK) Intl. Airport. We were still deciding how to proceed to our lodging place.

Finally, Viv managed to contact our lodging manager, Scott, to arrange transport for us. So we have to wait about 20 mins for the pickup. The total cost was about $70RM, which I felt was reasonable given there were 10 of us plus our luggages.

The children finally got bored of waiting and decided to have some wild time entertaining themselves.

Overall, day 1 went smoothly. The weather was good (a little of rain) when we arrived in KK. The journey from Airport to our lodging place (Marina court) was only about 15mins. We unloaded our stuff and went to the nearby shopping mall and had our 1st KK meal, Nasi Ayam. The mummies went and did some supermarket shopping while the daddies brought the children back to shower and rest. It only started to rain in the evening. By then, we had already settled comfortably in our condotel.