Happy Chap Goh Meh!

Today's the last day of Chinese New Year (CNY) and I'm only updating our CNY celebration now. Well, there wasn't much activities this year. Was back in hubby's hometown 3 days before CNY. We ate as much hawker food/local favourites we could before they close for the new year. But actually some shops are already open on the 1st day of CNY. Looks like people are more business-minded in this current economic situation.

We had steamboat and some dishes for reunion dinner. Sorry, no pictures to show coz still haven't gotten the photos from my younger SIL. PIL cooked a great meal (as always) and this DIL didn't help much (excuses : hopeless in the kitchen and got to take care of kids) but only eat and eat. Terrible or not? :p Luckily we have maids to help out with the preparation and cleaning up, although not up to MIL's expectation. Our previous maids were much more 'capable'. It's so nice to be back in PIL's place. We don't have to think about what to eat. All the meals, from breakfast till dinner, are planned out and we're never hungry.

We usually gather at hubby's 2nd uncle's house on the 1st day but this year, they're not back yet as they've moved to KL last year. Moreover, hubby's maternal grandma was out of town, came back on the 3rd day. So we didn't go visiting while in hubby's hometown. Most of the relatives came over.

XY's very good at wishing people. She just loves to receive the red packets, with her standard speech, "Gong Xi Fa Cai, xie xie." She slings her new bag around to keep her ang pows. But when she's busy playing, she'll just shove the ang pows to me or leave them lying around. As for didi, he's been trained to say "Gong Xi Fa Cai" and when prompted, he'll say it ever so softly, sometimes with hands covering his face. He felt very shy saying it. I wondered why. On some occasions, I saw him checking out if the person's holding any ang pow before greeting him/her. :-|

~ pretty bag and hair accessories from koo koo ~

The kids only got to wear their kai kai (going out) new clothes on the 5th day when we visited my aunt in Bukit Jelutong. Then at night, attended a gathering at BIL's house with some friends. Didn't stay too late coz I haven't even packed for our Penang trip the next morning.

~ CH, XY and friend's niece ~

6th day, in Penang. Had a gathering with my Uni-mates at Perut Rumah. A bit disappointed with the food, especially their fish coz it wasn't very fresh. Maybe due to the festive season and crowd, so the food wasn't up to standard.

7th day - went to visit some relatives with my family. Then had a gathering with school friends (and kids) at my place in the afternoon. It was great catching up time coz the 4 kids (aged between 8 and 12) were well behaved while snacking or busy playing PSP. Well, XY and CE were napping. Guess that's the major reason why it was so peaceful. hahaha

8th day - went to Queensbay Mall for lunch. The mall's quite deserted during office hours but the restaurants were packed during lunch hours. So it was a very nice change from the forever-crowded malls in KL. And I managed to buy more clothes for myself. :-D

On the 13th day, we had a small bloggers get-together at Wen's place. Met Jo-N, Paik Ling and Chanel for the first time, Jacss and Wen, the 2nd time. The kids were well entertained in the toy room (they turned it upside down of coz), taken care by the maids. The ladies got to catch up over a wonderful potluck meal while the husbands (Wen's, Jo-N's and Jac's) kept themselves occupied with man talk. Thanks again, Wen, for having us over at your lovely home.

Just now, we had a simple dinner (chicken with peanut and dried scallop soup, fried beancurd with minced meat, fried vegetables and steamed fish) at home and asked SIL and CH to join us, as BIL is out of town. The kids, as usual, made a lot of noise playing among themselves.

~ CH asking CE to play 'gun' softly ~