Mid-Autumn Festival

We did not not do anything fancy on the Mid-Autumn Festival last Monday. Parents in law just came back after a week of shopping trip to Thailand (Haadyai and Samui Island). MIL fried beehoon and we ate the 'steamed salted chicken with Chinese herbs wrapped in paper' that they bought on the way back from Ipoh. (I do not know that actual name for that dish)

The weather here was quite hazy and luckily I had already let the kids play with lantern a few days ago.

The girls playing lanterns with neighbours' kids last Saturday

On the actual Mid-Autumn night, we just brought out some kids tables and chairs and had some moon cakes and Chinese tea. The girls carried their lanterns around but they got bored after a while and would rather eat.

About moon cakes, we did not buy fancy and over-priced moon cakes with weird ingredients from those advertised famous bakeries and franchises. However, we did have some friends who gave us moon cakes.

'White butter skin pandan sweet corn paste' moon cake given by MIL's friend. It was exchanged through some points for going to Sentosa's Casino in Singapore. It was nice, fragrant and not too sweet.

However, we were used to traditional flavoured moon cake like red bean paste and lotus paste with egg yolk. Therefore, we bought from a bakery in Kluang. The moon cakes there were so popular that people from far would go there and buy in boxes, not to mention they were cheap too. No gimmicks, no advertisements and simples boxes that consumers were just paying for the moon cakes. There was also no preservatives added and we had to put the cakes in refrigerator after 3 days if not consumed.

Red bean paste moon cake that cost only RM13.00 for 4 in a box

Lotus paste Shanghai moon cake with double salted egg yolk that cost RM24 for 3 in a box

Tian and Tao's Birthday!

Today is Tian's 4th Birthday and Tao's 2nd Birthday two days later but we celebrated the girls birthday together last Sunday.

I had quite a hard time planning their cakes as I did not want them to share a cake for candle blowing (superstitions?) so I had to find a way to buy a cake for eating and another 'spare' one just for candle blowing (My hubby and his parents do not like sweet stuff so I know I will end up having to finish up 2 cakes and it would be a waste if I was not able to do so). Tian mentioned she wanted princess cartoons on her cake and Tao was into anything Mickey Mouse at the moment so I decided to order a black forest cake with a Mickey Mouse as decoration and I more or less forced the bakery to sell me a sugar/ icing thingy with princess cartoon. Then I bought a normal sponge cake from another bakery, did some chocolate frosting for the sides, sprinkled some colourful sugar rice onto the cake before pasting the cartoon on the top. So I got another cake for Tian according to her request at a cheaper cost and to her satisfaction. Heh!

I cut out their names from coloured A4 paper and it was too tiring so I decided to print the 'Happy Birthday' wordings from computer and cut them out.

Tian's Princess birthday cake. She thought I made the cake for her but in fact I only decorated the sponge cake.


Tao's Mickey Mouse birthday cake.


Jelly made from Dutch Lady strawberry flavoured and chocolate flavoured milk. I wrapped the packet drinks with coloured paper and pasted Disney cartoon stickers and the girls were happy to drink from their favourite cartoons.

'Mee Suah' in red yeast wine chicken soup. Foochow people in my home town practise cooking this for birthdays and we have adapted to that culture.

Tian and Tao getting ready for candle blowing.

My 2 sweet girls: One is 4 years old and another one is going to be 2 in 2 days time. I hope they grow up happy, obedient and healthy.

I *heart* Valentine's Day!

I start to love Valentine's Day but not because of

TEDDY BEARS;
CHOCOLATES;

OR EVEN A BOUQUET OF FLOWERS;

BUT because of

THIS;

AND THIS;

I received a few larger orders for cut leaves last week from my florists to cater for Valentine's Day demand this Monday. I was so HAPPY because I could compensate for some lost some orders due to Chinese New Year holidays.

I have always told hubby not to send me flowers on Valentine' Day (I know, how unromantic!) because as we are in plantation business, we know almost all the cost price for flowers and leaves and I will get 'heartache' if hubby needs to pay so much for a bouquet of flowers. However, I do hope there will be more and more men who will order flowers for their girlfriends and wives. It means I will have more business. One day, perhaps, when we have money to burn, I might want to receive flowers just for the sake of nice packaging and feeling of being in love.......

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!!

Happy Chinese New Year!

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!!

I decorated the above yesterday. I bought all the flowers and leaves from Singapore, shopping centres and florists.

'Hakka Phoon Choi' was one of the dishes cooked by MIL. This required lots of layering of several seafood (prawn, abalone, sea cucumber), dried seafood (dried scallop, dried oyster, fish maw), bacon, duck, mushrooms, Chinese cabbage, yam, broccoli.


I wish everyone a Happy and Prosperous New Year!

Christmas Break

We went back to hubby's hometown for a few days as SIL and her sons were back from KL for holidays. My 2 girls were having a great time there due to PIL's house was a corner house with a spacious yard.

Tao was trying to taste an orchid leaf. Yucks!

Creating havoc on grandma' garden. Occasionally, we could hear shouting from their grandma, 'Don't pluck this!', 'Don't touch that!' etc.

We went back to our house before Christmas because I planned to go to Singapore to celebrate Christmas with my ex-colleagues.

In fact, Christmas is also our wedding anniversary but we never seldom have chance to celebrate together. No chance to celebrate with hubby only. But hubby did compensate with a gift which I will write about it when I have a chance.

A mini sized Christmas tree that I put up on 24th night with small gifts and tit bits for the kids.

A very nice chocolate fudge cake bought by my ex-boss for our celebration in one of ex-colleagues house in Singapore.

Tian's 3rd Birthday!!

Yesterday, we celebrated Tian's birthday a few days after Tao's first birthday so it was made simpler. We invited hubby's eldest brother who works in Singapore to stay overnight at our place. As we were planning a BBQ, we thought more people would make it merrier. Furthermore, Tian likes her uncles a lot.

We bought her a cake with cartoon and flavour of her choice

Presents from us: I bought her a book on animals and a recorder (which she refers as 'magic flute' as influenced by Dora the Explorer), my MIL bought her a bike, angpows from my mum and hubby's eldest brother.

Bike from her doting grandma

I feel that she grows up very fast especially after the birth of her sister. Sometimes we are more impatient in disciplining with her as we have a younger toddler to deal with (guilty!) but we love her all the same.....

Ler Tao's 1st Birthday Celebration

We celebrated Ler Tao's first birthday two days ago following Chinese Calendar date.

We did not do anything fancy. I bought a birthday cake, invited hubby's brother and my MIL came from hometown bringing traditional food that they had paid respect to ancestors like 'Ang Ku Kueh' (glutinous dessert containing either green bean paste, peanuts or coconut flakes), eggs (dyed red), roasted chicken, glutinous rice cooked with dried oyster, beancurd and shitake mushroom. I ordered curry fish head just to add some variety.

We let Tao stepped onto the 'Ang Ku Kueh' and it was believed to bring luck to her that she will have food to eat wherever she goes.
We let her choose a few items placed on the floor just for the fun of it. There were calculator, pencil, ruler, thread, book and chicken drumstick. That greedy little girl crawled to reach for chicken drumstick and started to munch away. I would prefer her to pick either pencil or book though :)
We bought 'nest and stack' cups for her (reason not to buy expensive toys was that it would end up to be her sister's toy). My MIL gave her a gold necklace with a pendant engraved with cow cartoon and my mum gave her a big ang pow (red packet), a set of dress, anklet and shoes.
Tao had just recovered from flu and she was on her suprisingly good behaviour that evening.

We will be celebrating Ler Tian's birthday this Saturday. She has been looking forward her birthday (she had even chosen the cartoon for her birthday cake) and we are planning to have BBQ.