Up Close and Personal With The Lion

We had a lion dance at our office today. The management had offered to invite the lions to dance at our individual rooms. Amber skipped school to be with us at work today and she's very very excited waiting for the lions to appear. She kept asking 'why so long ? why so long ? telephone lion lah? ask lion to come faster lah !

There was another acrobatic lion dance at the lobby and we went down to peep (while waiting for the big lion show in our office). At the lift we bumped into a friendly lion on the way down. The lion stopped to play with Amber but my little girl was stunned. She never expected getting up, close and personal with a lion. Too bad I didn't take any pics of her then.

We got ready for the lion with some mandarin oranges and lye-see. Initially I wanted to hang up the lye-see but our room is so cramped, someone suggested better to place it on the table, otherwise if the lions climbs up and knock on our PC --- habis already. LOL !!!

And so, to greet the mightly lion :



Our front service area was also nicely decorated


My office, Room 5


I also had cookies greeting my guests


Then Mr Lion came a greeting at our company






Then came to our floor, everyone waiting in anticipation


What was Amber doing ? You guess ? After the encounter with the lion at the lobby, she was very timid and scared :

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then finally, the lion came to our room :


received the angpow and in return, redecorated the mandarin oranges on the table




then hubs caught a photo of one of the boys playing with the magnets. I thought this was cute.


The mandarins, arranged and piled up


HAVE A ROARING GOOD YEAR AHEAD !!!!


Our company treated us to a nice lunch ...


Then I got Amber to nap in the office. Since my office is still new, the carpet is still clean..


HAVE A ROARING NEW YEAR EVERYONE !!!!!!

Our Chinese New Year

Before I proceed, I'd like to thank familyfirst, eugene, merryn and barb for leaving comments on the cheesecake and cupcakes. Thanks for 'seeing me up' , lol ! I can't bake such nice cakes, those pics accidentally uploaded before I complete my post.

Few friends asked why I have not been blogging lately ? I am just simply tired and then I did not take a lot of pics during the New Year. No mood to take pic, all I wanna do is chill out and have a nice cuppa joe.

Since I've downloaded the photos today, I'll run thru the new year with pictures of what we did.

**Eve of the new Lunar Year**

I find anticipating the new year more fun than celebrating the new year itself. We balik kampung on the eve of the eve, keeping up with the family tradition of going to the night market with MIL to get roast pork, fatt kou and fishballs for prayers and reunion dinner. Our Chinese helper, nearly could not make it to cook reunion feast for us. Her father passed away and the funereal was on eve of the eve but the dear aunty promised MIL she'll cook for us on the eve. Bless her kind heart, else I really don't know what to do with a freezer stuffed full of kampung chicken, pigs' maw, trotters, sea cucumbers and lots more other stuff, enough to feed an army. ;o)

I helped what I could before going out for late breakfast with hubs and the girls. Yuen Wen Cheh Cheh followed us for breakfast. Handling 2 kiddos is a challenge and the naughtier one is none other than my own princess.


After breakfast we chilled out at Secret Recipe, the only place I could get a fresh cuppa coffee at Tampin. Wanna see what the kids were up to ? Read on :

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Shoes off, climbing over the display chiller..

and what did I do ? Scold them ? Nah... it's CNY !!! I need to chill out too.


Then to get them seated quietly (for a while, just a couple of minutes) I asked for a couple of candles and pretended to 'celebrate their birthday'.. LOL !!!



Some other snapshots of their funny moments on the eve :


Pretending to wear a hat with my sunshade cover


The 2 cutie 'pirates'




We had a big reunion dinner (no pics, too lazy to take pics this time around) but Amber was asleep and she only wanted 'Maggi Mee' when she woke up. Haih.. with a feast fit for a king, she had 'Maggi Mee' for reunion dinner


**The Big Day - Chor Yat**

Cooked our usual hinghwa misua for brunch. Yearly tradition of hubs family. The aunty cooked us a big pot of soup on the eve and we only needed to boil the noodles, add abalones and fishballs. Bless her again.. for preparing the yummy soup

Misua.. must have for the New Year.


Then we gave ang pow to Amber and the kids.

Then, we leave for BIL's house to 'pai nien'

Like their CNY clothes ?


BIL lives at grandpa's old shoplot and hubs showed Amber grandpa's pic. He is Papa's Yeh Yeh and also Yeh Yeh's Papa. I think the little girl was confused

In keeping up with the Ong tradition, we headed to Malacca to watch a movie (all 18 of us). Traffic was so bad, the jam started from Ayer Keroh , all the way to Dataran Pahlawan. We vowed to break the tradition and no more movie from 2011 onwards. LOL !!! After all , CNY is all about getting together, chatting, eating, chatting and more eating. Anyway, we watched True Legend, not too bad, much better than those non-sensical CNY movies like Alls Well Ends Well (which we've watched a couple of times previous CNY)


Hubs was soo sleepy from driving, we made a quick dash to Starbucks for our coffee.

** CNY Day 2 - Chor Yee **

This year we changed plans a little and went to Kluang Johor to visit hubs good buddy, we were again greeted with a feast of :


Homecooked lunch ! Nothing can be better than mom's own cooking. Amber loved it so much, she took 6 bowls of soup (yes, 6 bowls, no kidding)

Surprisingly, Kluang was not as hot as KL or Tampin and the little one was happy to be in a village home with chickens, dogs and vegetables

Running around the field.

Nice and warm homely feeling at our friend's house.

Then, at Kluang, must stop for coffee right ? I wanted to bring Amber to the original Kluang Station at the railway but was told it's no longer like before and the owner branched out to open Kluang RailCoffee, somewhere in town, and so that's where we went :


Set up like the original Kluang station


We had coffee and she had hot lemon honey. I must say the coffee is much better than Kluang Station. I hope they don't go franchise and end up like Kluang Station with lousy high acidity coffee

** CNY Day 3 - Chor 3 **

Hubs met up with his classmates and we returned to KL around 3pm after getting caught in a long crawl from Pedas to Seremban. My plants almost 'died-ed' from extreme heat. Watered the plants, fed the fish and off to my dad's place for dinner.

** Chor 4 - CNY Day 4**

Hubs went back to work and I went to my aunts house to 'pai nien'

Again, another homecooked feast with Hakka char yoke, misua and the lots... Yummy !


Amber didn't have such good appetite this time but she like Chiro, the house dog very much..


Then in the evening, hubs attended a party, spouse not invited and anyway, I grabbed the opportunity to hang out at Annie's, much more fun than going to some party, meeting people I don't know. She texted me and said she'll prepare steamboat.. Whoa... really grand dinner for just me and her family. I happily feasted again and must really thank her for a lovely yummy dinner and we had so much sambal chilly flakes - Tiens brand. Must remember to buy and keep !

** CNY - Day 8**

After feasting on Chinese platters of pork, noodles and chicken, we yearn for something local and spicy.. nasi lemak and teh tarik.
Amber likes ikan bilis and I coaxed her to eat some nasi lemak with ikan bilis.



Then I add in some fiery sambal, just a tiny little bit. She cried pitifully.. very hot ! lat lat ! HOT !!! Cruel mummy here wanna introduce slightly spicy food to Amber and she hates it.

Hot ! HOT ! I want water...

While visiting hubs aunty, I spotted these miniature Russian nesting dolls, Matryoshka . 15 in a set !!! I've only seen 5 in a sets but thise is indeed special, purchased from Russia. Anyone knows where I can get more nesting dolls in KL ? I'd love to collect them



We headed to Pavilion hoping to spot some lion dance but nothing. Amber was disappointed, she was hoping to see some lion dance around.

I had some dining vouchers at The Carat Club (yes, they do serve food, amongst the diamonds) I needed to cash out before the month ends.

Amber had the kids menu which was free for every adult meal ordered.



The dining area was overlooking the front entrance of Pavilion, we got a very good view


Then I spotted her legs. . notice how vain she is ? Apart from nail polish, she wore her bracelet over her ankles



Bling bling pillows in the bling bling shop

She scribbled and said it's her 'signature', she is signing something. I think she must have gotten the idea watching hubs asking his clients to sign documents.



Our food, we had pasta, pasta and pasta. Taste - ordinary but the ambience was good.

It was a quiet Sunday and I had time to finally organize things at home.

Since I didn't buy any CNY flower plants, I picked up some flowering pots from my garden and prep up my living room a bit.

Orchids... my favourite home flower. I can't tell what kind of species they are, too many names and details, all I know is dancing ladies. LOL ! Oh well, I hope to bring in more orchids to add to my collection.

Then I filled up the cookies and placed them in the living room :


Some cookies were homemade, some from MIL's purchase in Tampin. All are NICE !

I also placed 2 homemade nien gao to decorate my long table.


Then in the evening, my friend Josephine dropped by with a block of cheesecake. Really nice and thoughtful of her.

I accidentally posted these pics up and my blogging buddies thought I baked them. tenkiu ! tenkiu ! LOL !!!
Chor 8 came and went too quickly. I stayed home all night, we had friends over for beer and chit chat too.

** CNY - Day 9**

Hubs family gathered for dinner and MIL gave these beautiful cupcakes to Amber. She was at a relatives open house and plenty of niceties and sweets.


These cuppies are soo pretty. Too pretty to be eaten in fact..

And the momentoes.. chocolates for the guests.. nice isn't it ?


That's my CNY wrap for the moment. In a couple of days, we'll have Lion Dance at our office. Looking forward to that too !