A Day At Ikea

Jia Wen, Kyle & Kaelyn

Just see how much they have grown

This pic was taken when there were hardly 1 year old
(you can always tell which one is my daughter)


Look how beautiful they have grown up to be

Congratulations May

My sister recently graduated with BSc (Hons) Chemical and Pharmaceutical Science from University of Sunderland, UK. Congratulations May - we are so proud of you!!

My parents' proudest moment

Jia Xiang on the phone

Today's Dinner

Cut up cherry tomatoes

Pasta boiling

Season tomatoes with Olive oil, black pepper & salt

Mixed up and a little squashed cherry tomatoes

Roasted chicken with lemon

( While my bread got done while I was cooking dinner)

Tada, dinner!

26 July 2008

What Jia Wen did yesterday at Sunway Pyramid

Colouring event by HSBC

This must be one of her worst colouring attempt. She isn't used to using crayons.

Posing for the sponsors. Received a certificate summore.

Body painting & Sand Art by NTV7

Watch a bunch of Smart Reader girls perform @ NTV7 promotional event

Watch some Chinese celebreties play Deal or No Deal

Try out all OSIM products at the OSIM roadshow

Sex And The City

Thanks to Mix.Fm (again), I got tickets to the premiere of Sex And The City. It was my first time going for such an event and I was so excited. Got Nicole and An to go with me.

They served cocktails and finger food.

As this is my first time to such an event, I wasn't sure what to expect and all but after going for it, I thought it wasn't too big a deal.


There were a few celebreties there that night - not as many as I expected. From the time we got there to the time the movie started was a little boring. Of course the Mix.Fm deejays were there and there were a few giveaways but nothing too exciting. Of course the exciting part was the Christian Dior shoes to be won and obviously I didn't win it lah. I did win a bottle of Sarah Jessica Parker's Covet perfume - for answer a very simple question and for putting my hands up like a hooligan.

An & Nicole

Mix.Fm deejays - Pietro, Serena C, Jay & Jojo

Us and Mix.Fm's Sham

(Sham was also one of the contestant for What Women Want)

The RM2800 Christian Dior shoe
(what would I do if I had won?)

Me with Sarimah Ibrahim & Jojo Stryus

Mix.Fm jocks

Elaine Daly

The movie was good. I cried (and I shall leave it at that in case you haven't watched it yet). Girls, go watch it!

Sleepy JX

CAUTION: This video is long and may put you to sleep.

I have been meaning to put this up for a long time but only got to doing so now. Jia Xiang was sleepy one evening when he was with us at the dining table. He was so sleepy but yet he still wanted to eat his biscuits. It was very funny. I wanted to add a lullaby song to incorporate with this video but it was too much work so forget about it.

Isn't She Lovely

Isn't she lovely

Jia Xiang + Durians The Video

Menara Taming Sari

The new revolving tower in Melaka


Let's go up

Jia Wen looks so sweet in this picture

Views from the top

Jia Xiang was a little scared of the heights - first time so high up

JX + Durians = YUCK!

Jia Xiang eats / tries almost anything you give him but when we gave him durians - he really really hate it!

Durian Weekend

It has been quite a while since I've really had durians. These were good and my throat is now suffering

19 July 2008

Jia Wen doing the "Fiona"

(Fiona is SW's cousin who loves to do this for photos)

Happy Birthday Nai Nai

Jia Wen made these for Nai Nai's birthday

It was Nai Nai's birthday last week so I brought the kids to the office to surprise her


JWJX & Grandma

What Jia Wen wrote in the card

The kids having fun in Nai Nai's office
(Mum, I did attempt to bake a cake for you but it failed thats why I had to buy a cake)

11 July 2008

Enjoying ice cream with the kids

Food Galore

Roasted chicken thigh & pork chop meal

This place is in Puchong (opposite IOI Mall) and it has 2 steamboat stalls and a few other thong shui stalls. Superb supper place.

Yummy

Our favourite - see ham

Fatman's chilli sauce is to die for!

Had dinner at Pasta De Gohan a few weeks back at Sunway Pyramid. It's a Japanese restaurant with an Italian twist

Most of the food here are made of this thing called "wafu" which we guess is tofu based or something along that line.

The Musical

Oh yes, I forgot to mention - since the hall was so so empty, we made our way to the most expensive seats!

Beauty & The Beast

Jia Wen and I went for the Disney’s Beauty and the Beast The Musical last week at the Plenary Hall, KL Convention Centre. It was good although I think it could be better.

I know we Malaysians haven’t been exposed to too many musicals but I have been to a few here and there to know that this latest musical experience could be better.

Perhaps it is unfair to point fingers at the production crew but the location in which they chose to do it isn’t the best. While the Plenary Hall is new and modern, the stage was too small for this kind of musical so that’s why I think the props were not at its full scale i.e. it didn’t seem grand enough for a Disney production. They could have done better at the Istana Budaya.

The other thing was the sound system wasn’t superb. As far as I could tell, there were not surround-sound. The sounds were only coming from the front huge speakers. So that lack of strength in the sound didn’t give the performance the impact that it should.

As for the performance, like most musicals I have been to, it was good and it makes you want to stand up and sing and dance with them. They tweaked the story a little to make it more interesting and longer. They added a few other scenes to highlight a few other characters like Maurice (Belle’s father), Lefou (Gaston’s little henchman) and Babette (the sexy duster). There were good additions but the Beast’s character was overplayed and almost out of character, very unlike the Beast you see in the cartoon. My favourite character played was Lumiere (the candlestick). He made the play raunchy!

Overall, it was a good experience for Jia Wen and I thought she might not last through the 2.5 hours, she did but my daughter isn’t easy please. She definitely didn’t applaud at finale.

Adopt A Dog

OK I am a self-confessed non-animal lover. Don’t get me wrong, I do not hate them that I’ll kill them but I’ll be the one cursing and swearing at noisy barking dogs that disrupt my sleep and I do not like to be smothered by them. I will be the one who will spray water at cats who come into the house / porch and probably the last person you’ll see at the pounds. I am sorry but sometimes I cannot understand how people can love and care for their animals more than anything else in the world.

However, watching Oprah this evening on illegal dog mills in USA and how the people at dog pounds have to euthanise (put to sleep) dogs for space brought tears to my eyes. I hope I am not being a hypocrite by writing about this.

One dog that was featured was a female cockel-spaniel who has had <>150 puppies over her lifetime at such a illegal dog mills. These dog mills are very poorly maintained where the sole purpose of these hundreds of dogs are just to breed and breed! They keep like a few hundred female dogs and only have like 10 male dogs to literally screw the females to death. All of these dogs are kept in cages that too small for them to even move with their babies being stepped on and their health is not at all a top priority. Some are left in cages outside in mud pools and in the cold. Most of these female dogs have nipples so swollen that it is constantly bleeding. Some of these dogs have on them the same leash the got since they were born so when the dogs grow, the leashes get embedded into the skin!! Almost all of the dogs have not ever walked outside of their cages and have never felt grass before so when some of these fortunate dogs are rescued, they wouldn’t walk on grass and most of them become reclusive and worst of all, they die after they are rescued because they are just not used to love and care. Why is this happening? Just because the so called “pet-lovers” want designer dogs and are not aware of the origins of the dogs they see in the pet shop.

And the reason why there are so many dogs being put to sleep everyday just so that other rescued dogs can be housed in the dog pounds is because dog owners do not spay their dogs hence stray dogs – dogs that are not cared for and then end up at dog pounds and then put to sleep to create space for other stray dogs.

I do not know what the situation is like in Malaysia but by looking at the amount of stray dogs in the streets, I can only assume that the situation here is just as bad. I do not know whether there are illegal dog mills here though.

So what can pet lovers do? Spay your dogs / cats and go to the pounds (SPCA) to adopt your pets. They too need love! I may never take on a pet but I am hoping that those who do to adopt one.

http://www.oprah.com/about/press/releases/200804/press_releases_20080402.jhtml

http://www.spca.org.my/

http://www.mlar.org/home for some idea of what they do to the dogs at the puppy mills.