Europe pilgrimage

Westminster Cathedral, London

Here are some photos from Dad's Europe pilgrimage. They went round Europe (Italy, Ireland, London, Paris, Portugal...) and attended a 'Family conference' in Madrid. My MIL went on a similar pilgrimage a week later and she said that she heard some people from Dad's group were robbed/ pick-pocketed!

We asked Dad whether it was true, and who it was, and he answered, "Yes", and "Me!"

Hahahaha... this Dad of ours has always been a man of few words, and never tells us much unless prompted. Sometimes even when prompted, all you get is 'grunts' in reply!!

So he explained that someone is his group got his camera bag stolen and another's knapsack or was it a pouch, disappeared. As for him however, he was only nearly robbed a few times. Each time it was women and they would pretend to talk to you, or create havoc, a few of them with babies, and get close to you and try to put their hands into your bags/ pouches!

Luckily each time Dad's friends spotted the sneaking hand, or Dad himself kept his distance. This was in Italy and apparently it is a very common occurrence! What drama!

Tower Bridge? with dunno who?

With Fr.Hanrahan (I think) who was in Kuching for many years and is now back in Ireland

Dad at various 'holy places' :)

Gorgeous scenery

 

trees covered with rosaries!

dance concert 2012

Annie's ballet school had a fund raising concert at the end of last month. It was to raise funds so that they could send some senior girls to a dance festival at Macau.

I only bought 2 tickets at first, and in the end everyone wanted to go, but there were no more tickets left. So I asked Taiku and Uncle Dylan to go instead.

The concert consisted of dances from around the world. Annie did a Thai dance, whereas Allyson did an Australian one. The girls are very pretty and they did very well that night.

Andy & Athena's wedding

The very tall and gorgeous couple!

So Athena, or Nana as we affectionately call her, is our cousin. One of the 'littler' ones, who just got married, which means we are getting old!! *scary*!

Anyway, Athena and Andy got married at Holy Trinity Church last Saturday and prior to that, we were all busy with the preparations. Sis no.2 was making the flower girls' dresses, while I was doing the dessert table and wedding cake. Hubby and I also had the honour of being their witnesses.

It was a grand and festive affair with lots of family and friends; it's always wonderful to meet up with mum's side of the family again. There were uncles from Canada and KK, and Aunty Jo (mum's BFF) from KL and Cousin Ann Ann from Penang. Sis no.1 even came back at the last minute and surprised everyone. Kung Kung took a while to register when an extra grandchild suddenly appeared! (only Benedict came back with mummy)

Anyway, here are the photos of the wedding at church, the tea ceremony at home, and the dinner reception at the Hilton.

The girls were excited to be flower girls! (Sis no.2 made all those amazing dresses!)

the pretty little girls with the beautiful bride!

Splendid photography by Edwin Lay at edwinlay.com

The traditional Chinese tea ceremony

went to the hotel to set up the dessert table ( notice my assistants in the background)

the wedding cake on stage

It was a fun night! The kids enjoyed themselves!

The Aunty club! lol!

The loudest and longest 'yamseng' from our table! Hahhaha...

Congratulations Nana and Andy! Here's wishing you a long, blessed life together, full of love, joy and laughter!

Sibling rivalry

Eva and Solomon are my two youngest and they are only 2 years apart in age. It is therefore understandable that they bicker all the time.

They fight over everything and anything. From the more obvious; toys and stickers, to a piece of string found on the car floor! (serious!)

Is a piece of string that fascinating? Or is it the sense of rivalry that propels them to challenge the other for ownership?? Most likely the latter; for when I offer (read threaten!) to give them 'a piece of string' as a present for their upcoming birthdays, as if by magic, nobody wants it anymore! lol! Try it! Works like a charm!

I suppose this rivalry is a natural and healthy part of growing up, and I just have to make sure things don't get out of hand. They are after all siblings, and even though they may seem at times irreconcilable arch enemies, under all the fighting, you can be sure that they do love each other.

I was assured of this the other day when Eva told me something.

You see, Solomon and Eva are the only two siblings who are still in kindergarten, so they go to the same school. Every morning, when I drop them off at the entrance, without fail, all rivalry is put aside and Eva brings Solomon, hand in hand, to his classroom before going to her own.

I thought all she did was to lead him to his class and then leave for her own, but one day she told me that she would bring him to his class, then they would give each other a 'huggie', then kiss and high five before he went in! This was their daily ritual! *awww...* Who would've thought...

I think that's so sweet, and I'm so proud of them! *beaming*

Chinese, Indian, English??

Here's a funny conversation I had with Claire the other day...

Claire:      You know my friend in class?
                 He is Indian but he cannot speak Indian!
                 So funny ho? *giggles*

Mummy:   Huh? But you are also Chinese and cannot speak Chinese?!

Claire:      I am not Chinese!! *genuinely surprised!!*
                 I am English!! 

Mummy:   LOL!!

Here's another case of, "I am English!" Just like Annie when she was younger! Hahaha...

They all think that if you speak English, you are English, and if you speak Chinese, you are Chinese and so on!

*sigh* Identity crisis....

:)

Mid-year hols 2012

So the kids had their mid-year break during the last week of May and the first week of June. Sis no.1 and no.4 plus kids came back from Singapore for a week, so it was full team (17 grandkids) in action!!

Sis no.2 had gone to China with hubby and friends, and Kung Kung went to Europe for a pilgrimage. So Sis no3 and I were the only ones around to welcome the Singapore gang, and after that even Sis no.3 had to go for a short work trip to KK! So it was just me and the Singapore sisters tending the whole brood of 17 (just for a few days until everyone came back)! Think 3 mother hens with 17 littles chickies running amok all around! Lol!

To be fair, some of the bigger chickies didn't need tending, just throw them an iPad.... ;) In fact, the older ones can now help with the smaller ones... when left with no other choice, that is!!!

Anyway, the whole gang decided to surprise Kung Kung at the airport when he got back from Europe. They made a 'Welcome Home' sign and waited outside the arrivals gate! People were amused to see them and some even stopped to take photos.

Anyway, here are some photos of the things they did over the holiday...

Sis no.2's kids came to sleepover for 4 nights while mummy and daddy were in China! It was fun for everyone to have their BFFs over, and so cute to have little Adam toddling around the house.

Ohhhhh.... fek!

Playing on the road like we used to! Though we played "mata liak chat" (police catch thieves), whereas now they play "fire and ice"! :)

All 17 kids plus another 2 of the neighbour's kids!

The trusty ol' swing where we used to do our acrobatics!! :) It seemed so much bigger then!

There was a lovely family (Mum's side) gathering to celebrate Ee Poh's birthday.

And of course... bowling...

Solomon brought his own set!

There was of course Ethan, Amelie and Amanda's birthday celebration...

We actually didn't go out much, mostly the kids enjoyed each other's company playing at home. It is also getting harder to bring out the whole, ever-growing gang!

Before we knew it, the week was over and it was time to say goodbye! :(

The usual havoc at the airport!

See you guys again at Christmas?? ;)

First visit to the dentist

A couple of months ago, I made an appointment for the kids to visit the dentist again, as I noticed Claire had a cavity. This time,  I thought it would be good for Solomon just to have a check to get him used to the dentist. It would be his first time.


Little did I know, he already had two cavities on his molars. He was initially very brave when the dentist checked his teeth. I suppose he was not prepared for filling, as I told him it was just a check. When the dentist said he needed to do two fillings, I just told him and should have explained more, because when the dentist started cleaning and drilling, he screamed and cried and struggled and ran off!

So we only managed to do one filling, and I will slowly psyche him up for the next visit when we do the other one! *fingers crossed*

Get married?!

So the other day, I had just picked Solomon up from school and he said,


Solomon:  Next time I want to get married.

Mum:       (Taken aback) Get married?!
                 Marry who??

Solomon:  Neh... like last time hold candle walk on the road one ah...



Oh.......

I then realized what he meant.

You see, recently, Sis no.2 and I have been busy with preparations for our cousin Athena's wedding. Alaena, Claire, Eva, Amelie and Asa are all going to be flower girls. So I supposed he heard us talking about flower girls, 'getting married', etc..

And a couple of weeks ago, it was the feast of Corpus Christi, and we went to St Joseph's Cathedral. The kids experienced a candlelight procession on the road for the first time. It was fun that they got to hold candles with real fire and walk right smack in the middle of a large road!

In front of the procession were flower girls leading the way and throwing flowers on the ground. So I suppose he figured; "Flower girls = getting married!!"

So it seems, the poor boy thought he got married!! lol!

Ben & Von finally got married! ;)

Took this lovely pic off your FB Von, hope your friend doesn't mind! :)

We have a couple of friends, Ben and Yvonne, who, like Hubby and I, were high school sweethearts! Since they have been together for so long, everybody have of course been wondering when they would finally tie the knot!

So last month, everyone was excited when they finally got married and held a wonderfully fresh and casual reception at Damai beach that night. Quite a few ex-high school classmates from good ol' St Teresa and St Joseph's came for the event, with a few travelling from KL. It was nice to catch up with "teenage-hood" friends and reminisce the good ol' days as well as marvel at how fast time flies!

Anyway, a lot of the guests spent the night at Damai Beach. In anticipation of alcohol-induced incapacity to drive (among other things), we also booked a room for the night. Kids stayed over at HQ, so we had the night to ourselves.

At first we had a hilltop room, but found out that they still had a Baruk suite left, at a special rate for the wedding party, RM300. The Baruk suite usually goes for around RM4-500 I think.

I used to work at Holiday Inn Kuching, as a First Choice Club telemarketer, (that's a whole other blog post right there!) so I've seen the Baruk suite before during a room inspection. It's a gorgeous round shaped bungalow, in the style of a Melanau round house. The beds face glass doors which look out onto the sea and there is even a jacuzzi. So we changed to a Baruk suite, even though they only had one with two queen sized beds left.

First thing we did when we got to the new room was to push the two beds together, then promptly went to sleep! (It's not often that we get to have afternoon naps!) Oh yes, before that, I got stung by a wasp on the balcony! Luckily it was not Hubby who got stung, because the last time he was stung by a wasp at the golf course, he ended up in the ICU!!


Anyway, during our afternoon siesta, the doorbell rang twice, and both times, there was no one at the door! After another mysterious ring, we called maintenance to come and have a look. A guy came and could not find the problem, so we requested that he just disconnect the wires of the doorbell button.

Even though the day started out gorgeously sunny, it soon started raining and quickly escalated to a strong, windy storm! The doorbell went crazy (even after disconnection!) and even the lights flickered! With the 'poltergeisty' activity, the high ceiling and creepy enormous urn behind the bed, the room was beginning to take on an ominous feel...

Then, I noticed that the doorbell ringing coincided with lightning, so I mentioned it to Hubby and he figured it was a short circuit somewhere and then it dawned on him that we must have disturbed something when we moved the beds!! Duh!

So we pushed the beds aside, and sure enough, there was the stupid doorbell speaker, among other wiring! Hubby happily pulled out the wires of the speaker and placed it on the bed head. Now, if that wireless speaker rang again, it was definitely time to change rooms!! lol!

After all that doorbell drama, the room never felt comfortable again, and I don't think we'll be staying at Baruk suites in the future! (We both had nightmares the next night at home.... coincidence??)

I digress... back to the wedding...

So they had a wonderful set up of tables at the clifftop poolside for the dinner that night. It was a beautiful location, with a magnificent view. Unfortunately, as I mentioned earlier, the weather took a sudden turn for the worse! So everything was moved to an indoor location a little further down the hill. It was still a lovely place anyway.

At least the weather didn't turn into mini typhoon proportions as it did the night before! The night before, there was a storm with winds so strong that trees were uprooted, and there were flash floods and electricity blackouts everywhere! Even the big old mango tree behind my dad's house was uprooted and crashed into the fence and neighbour's awning!

Daddy's poor mango tree

So luckily it was just a normal rain which let up when the dinner was about to begin. Here are some of the photos of the fun night:

Looking decent (-ish) pre-alcohol...

with the gorgeous (and very tall) bride :)

Bride & groom with the St Teresa gang. This is right after Hubby (taking the pic) called us "Aunties"!!

and so it began...

nope, definitely not a conference meeting...

these little boys always love a good party...

Congratulations Ben and Yvonne! You guys make a dashing couple! Here's wishing you a wonderful life together, filled with an abundance of love and laughter!

Mother's Day 2012

It was Mother's Day a couple of weeks ago, here's my stash this year!! ;)

Missing my own Mummy too... wish she were here to see all her grandkids. She would be so proud!!

Happy belated Mother's Day and God bless all you supermums out there!!