Happy Chinese New Year of the Ssssnakeeee 🐍

This year isn't a mad rush to get ready as the lion dance was to arrive at 11am. So we all got up, ate breakfast then got ready and dressed up.

Daddy in the meantime had his usual "job" to set up the firecrackers and the angpow with the lettuce. 

Hanging the firecrackers

Typing up both the lettuce and ang pow together

Hanging them up

I had also prepared the basket with oranges last night and got the help of the kids to set up the cloth and "gold nuggets":

And all too soon the lion dance arrived (before 11am!!):

Along with the "percussion":

Everyone loves the performance. Including this little one:

Took a photo of the "men" of the family while the lions were inside the house:

Neither George nor Alfred seemed afraid of the lion:

After the performance ended, we took a family photo:

And when they'd left, we also took many photos:

Then it was time to head to the kitchen to prepare lunch. Everyone had their role to do for the meal. This year's self-declared egg chef Evan, went MIA. So his "assistant" had to fry the eggs:

My job is to cook the mee suah (just the noodles).

And this is the amazing soup for the mee suah. And the chilies which has lime juice and soy sauce:

This is what the meal looks like:

We finally had the time to give ang pow to our babies:

And then everyone took more family photos:

And later in the afternoon, we found the time to blend up the ingredients for the seung wan yuen (peanut balls), then shape them:

While some cooked outside in the wet kitchen, the rest, including the kids helped to peel and cut up all the fruits for our lou sang. 

And then come up with idea to make the "snake" too. Can you see the snake's head along with the tongue and eyes? Ko-ko came up with the idea to use the apple seeds for the eyes.. good idea!

This "runway chef" from lunch also helped to fry up some stuff and later cut up the lobak (taxing some along the way too!):

And finally dinner is served after we have prayed to the ancestors. 

Our dinner spread

Everyone stirring up the lou sang

This time after cleaning up, the kids (and adults) went out to play with the fireworks. 

And to usher in the new year, we had TWO sets of fireworks. One was a smaller one, and another was a big and very impressive one:

Daddy setting up the fireworks

This is the larger fireworks:

After that, we all went in to have the "longan-lychee" dessert. Just nice after sitting in the heat outside. 

The evening (in true Ban tradition) ended with the usual evening alcohol session in the living room, with everyone chatting, drinking and snacking. 

Chinese New Year Eve

Today is another day of cutting and shredding of the veggies for the popiah. First, for breakfast as usual, daddy and I headed to McDonald's to buy breakfast for us and the kids. 

Then it was time to start the cutting and shredding of the balance veggies for tonight's dinner. 

Cutting the leeks

In between, I had also helped to shred the carrots and jicama. But today, I became a victim of the shredder. The carrot slipped and a bit of my nail and skin on my thumb got scrapped off. Owww.. 

When we're finally done, it's time to eat the roast pork porridge. Yummeh!

We also helped to decorate the house.. and while we were busy with this.. Mei-mei was up in the room, resting as you've not been feeling well since yesterday. Poor thing, having a fever at this time is on fun. Daddy and I also had to make a quick dash to the nearby pharmacy to get some medicine for you on standby (fever, anti-histamine, cough)

In the afternoon, everyone helped out with the preparation of dinner. 

Cook with the assistant chef, supervising her

Everything was fried up in small portions, then it will be mixed up later on:

For the combining of the many ingredients, we needed the muscle men to help mix them up:

Now it's Master Chef's turn to supervise the men and Ashley Kor-kor!

So many chefs

Inside the dry kitchen, we have the "egg master", frying the thin layers of omelet. This included some grumbling about the pan being too small, the stirrer too hard and thick and a whole long list of complaints! But, in the end, you finished your task. Good job, my boy!

Next in the production line is the ladies, who cut the eggs into thin strips:

And then it's dinnertime. We had 3 tables set up for the 20 odd family members:

Everything we need for our popiah

Et voila! Dinner is served!

After dinner and cleaning up, I made the "longan lychee" drink while daddy watched the kiddies play with fireworks. 

Daddy and mei-mei

So bright!

Then it was time to light the giant firework. Daddy says this is to usher out the Year of the Dragon. 

All ready to light it up

Then we were treated to a spectacular fireworks show (even the neighbors in the condo enjoyed it!)

And how do the Ban's end the night? With snacks and lots of alcohol!

Chek Kong was in a good mood, and he even brought out his very old bottle of whiskey to treat everyone:

Tonight's damage

Back to Ipoh

This year, we headed out to Ipoh with just the 3 of us. Ko-ko thought that it was too many days in Ipoh and he (claimed) wanted to stay in Penang to study. We decided to start the day early. So we woke up at around 6am, ate breakfast, showered, loaded the car and left the house at 7.30am. Wow! 

The boot is quite full (as always)

It was surprisingly quite a pleasant drive. This year, we took the loaner car from BMW (320i), so daddy took an easy drive to Ipoh. We still arrived in Ipoh by 9.30am.

Sunrise on the highway

We brought Hokkien Mee which we had bought the day before and kept in the fridge. So it was a "swap" with the folks in Ipoh, we had Ipoh curry mee while they had Penang Hokkien Mee. On top of that, we also had all these extras from K-10. 

Then daddy and I headed to Ipoh Parade to buy the necessary groceries from Jaya Grocer. It was difficult to get a parking spot. When we went home, it was time to help cut the cabbage for tomorrow's popiah.

Master chef cutting the veggies so finely

Daddy later went out with Chek Kong to get some lighting to change for the kitchen and living room.

2 workers (daddy and Uncle Ollie) and 3 supervisors

Dinner was at K-10 where they service claypot chicken rice and some cooked dishes. The original plan was for daddy to catch the 8.50pm train back to Penang and drive back to Ipoh with Ah Kong, Ah Ma and Ko-ko.. or sit next to Ko-ko while he drove on the highway (he has no highway driving experience prior to this). 

But while we were waiting for dinner, we spoke to Ko-ko and he said that he's fine to drive to Ipoh with just the oldies. Just that he doesn't know the way to the Ipoh house. Well, Ah Ma knows the way, so all is fine then. Daddy does not need to rush to the train station after all.

Dinner with the Yeoh's

Don't ask me why, but I have no photo of our dinner at all!! Not of the food, nor of the family!

Ahaha.. 

Anyhow, we headed back to BM after my hairdo. As usual, it was a long, long process. Mei-mei skipped ballet lessons for the day as Natalie Kor-kor and family were still around that lunch was in Ang Hoay Lor. Which I later learned that Goerged learnt to eat the noodles like how Mei-mei eats hers: with the dark gravy from the or bak.

We managed to reach Nanna's house a little earlier, then we headed out from there and met up with Ee-ee and Teo-teo who arrived at about the same time as us. The food unfortunately was not appealing at all and not worth the money we paid for.

So next year, we will need to pick the restaurant or we stick back to having steamboat!

But at least we managed to all meet up for a Chinese New Year reunion dinner. 

Dinner with the family

Lucky you that they always remember to invite you to dinner. Tonight is dinner with Natalie Kor-kor and family who have just arrived:

Two days in a row at JyuRaku, but who's complaining? 😜

First Period

I know that quite a number of your friends have already had it. So I had prepared a little "bag" with the essentials for you. Well I think that was a year ago. 

Today (while I was peeing! I cannot even pee in peace!), you told me that it is period. You had told me your panties stained yesterday and that you'd probably had scratched yourself on the bum. 

Ah well.. so I told you to wash up (it was after karate classes), and put on the pad. After you had showered, you came back to my room to say that you'd forgotten how to put the sanitary napkin ok. OK, no problem there. 

So you have finally started on your periods. I searched for a suitable period tracker for you to track on the phone on your own. 

Time to say goodbye

It must feel so short to be at home, since we spent 2 weeks of your holidays in Japan. But all good things must come to and end, and it's time for you to head back to KL for lessons. 

This trip, you will be going back by train and we'll drop you off at the Butterworth train station. 

Saying bye bye to Mei-mei

My baby is going off

Ah.. and you had to say goodbye to your brand new Onisutka's too. Leaving them in Penang as you have no plans on wearing them to school. 

Permed Hair

At long last, your hair is long enough to be permed. Well, we weren't too sure too, but when Uncle Austin took a look at your hair, he said it's long enough. 

The first thing he asked was "How curly do you want it to be?" and he got "Not looking like broccolli!!"

We left you there and less than 2 hours later, you called to say that you're done.

Looks nice. Not too curly, just as you asked for. 

Cheese and Ham Platter

We decided to have this platter tonight as we could not fit it in after the large barbecue dinner. 

So many types of cheese

Ham too!

Prosecco to go with the food

To our surprise, Mei-mei also enjoyed the cheese. We're glad that you're opening up your mind to try out new food. 

Baking Day

You've asked me so many times to help you bake something. So in the end, I agreed. But you needed to search for the ingredients and instructions for the brownie. So you did and sent it to me.

We bought the ingredients and started working on them. We first weighed out everything then you mixed them together:

Mix, mix, mix

All mixed up. I had to help you stir them together

Poured into the tray and topped with more chocolate chips

Popped the brownie into the oven and voila.. it's done. I love baking cakes/brownies.. it's the least work involved.

Forgot to take a picture of the end product. Lesson learnt, to cut the sugar even more and also don't get too excited with the choc chips!!