MeetinG Cn, Therry & SyL

I met Cn, Therry and Syl for the very 1st time today. And only one word to describe them : awesome! Hehehe... The last time I met up with new people I know thru cyber... hmm...that was sometime ago. I mean on and off during gatherings there are bound to be people I never meet before but usually it is with people I know so I'm not entirely clueless on how I should react coz if I don't feel comfortable with the new ones, I can still talk to other friends. This time, it felt like years ago when I went on my 1st gathering with IC members. Nervous and excited.

When I first arrived, Cn was already waiting outside Sushi Tei. Therry was the 1st to arrive actually but she went somewhere else. So Cn and I waited for Therry. She came with her boyfriend but he left after we said our 'hellos', saying he doesn't want to spoil the fun for us. They really look so sweet together. My 1st impression of Cn is she's the same as her pic and she's actually more gentle in reality. Oops...I hope that doesn't sound sarcastic coz I'm making a compliment here hahaha.... She's really sweet and she smiles a lot... I mean a LOT. So u can bet she's just as friendly as she sounds in her tags. Therry... I wasn't expecting she was that tall. I mean she looks petite in her pic but she proves me wrong today. She is really easy to talk to and also smiles a lot. In fact they all smile all the time! Cn has to be the most cheerful of us all coz her happiness is really infectious I tell u. As for Syl, she is the perfect figure of how u view a teacher should be. She's the quietest among us but still, she can crack u up with her jokes. And they are all awesome in their own different ways! I'm really glad we met up today coz I did have a blast. I want to do this again sometime. One thing they all have in common: love for dogs and they all own at least one *if I'm not mistaken coz Sushi Tei was damn crowded just now and they are all soft-spoken... so opposite of me!* Now it makes me wish to have a dog. Thanks for the good time, ladies ^.^ So nice to finally meet the writers behind those wonderful blogs I love to read. Kinda reminded me of what Han told me earlier today during our chat in YM. He said Therry's blog made mine look so plain. Hahaha... Yeah, don't u all start comparing mine to hers or to any of theirs after this please coz I do admit I have limited vocab inside me. While in mine u might find errors here and there, it's hard to do so even u try to look for the flaws in their blogs.

L-R: Therry, Me, Syl & Cn

Not to forget, these are the food I ate just now:

Yaki Udon

Hotate Miso Mayo

Hmm...can't remember the last one but it's like california roll with soft-shelled crab. My advice, don't order these 3 if u go there. The roll is okay and the Yaki Udon is still edible even though it's so not like the normal fried udon I ever tried. Even Casey wouldn't want to eat it! As for the scallop, expensive and too salty! Yucks... I never eaten scallops that taste that bad before. Well, now I have.

From Plaza Indonesia, the girls and I went to Grand Indonesia. Planned to watch "Alvin & The Chipmunks" at the Satin Lounge in Blitz Megaplex. It's Rp 20K cheaper than Premiere so I was curious enough to want to try it out. We bought the 4.30pm show and then went down to Kinokuniya. Kids bought their books and I bought mine. I bought a couple of books about photography. Even though I'm not planning to buy an SLR cam but I think I want to know more about it.

Wanted to look for school shoes for Casey but it was a long walk to Planet Sport (or whatever it is called) so we decided to look for it in Plaza Senayan instead right after the movie. while going back up to the cinema, I saw Forever 21 Boutique. Finally now I know what kind of clothings they have. All this time I only know that brand through Xiaxue's blog. Forever 21 supposed to have 2 floors to themselves but only the one at 1st floor is opened at the moment. Went inside to look around and was kinda surprised coming home with 2 jackets, 1 cardigan plus 3 blouses.

I deserve it!!! I've been deprived of shopping for so long! Then when we went up one floor, there was this Guess Kids Boutique. My FIL promised the girls they can buy clothes from there and he's paying so we did go inside to look around. I bought 1 identical dress as theirs.

Can only buy 1 coz my FIL will wonder why the bill adds up to that much if I kept buying the same stuffs as them. We did get vouchers and it all adds up to Rp 700K! Too bad can't use it to minus the bill. Can only use it on our next visit there.

We waited at the carpark for the driver since we got a lot of plastic bags on our hands. By the time we reached the cinema it was 16.25pm, 5 mins before the show starts. I was disappointed with the Satin Lounge. It's so not worth it even though it's cheaper than Premiere. Yes, u can straighten your legs up but that's about it. No blanket, and u can't push down the back of the chair like in Premiere. It's just like normal cinema except u watch it from the top part. Total waste of money.

Now about the movie, I just love it. I mean, who wouldn't want to see talking chipmunks in real life? I do!!!! Theodore is just so, so adorable. It's a "MUST BUY DVD" on my kids' list.... and mine too of course hehehe....

So right from Grand Indonesia, we went to Plaza Senayan. Finally found an Osh Kosh shoes for Casey. While on our way out, passed by Agatha and I bought this cute hair accessory :

Okay, time to hit the bed now. Dead tired and tomorrow we're going to the church. I don't want to go to 10.30am mass. It's just too late. I won't be able to catch my nephews in my dad's house if I arrive later than 12pm and I don't want that.

The New 'En' LooK

Kinda annoyed coz yesterday we didn't watch movie as planned. The sermon at the church took longer than usual yesterday coz there was an adoration sacrament carried out. We got out of the church at 12.10pm and reached home 20 mins later. By the time we reached EX, it was already 1pm and we haven't had lunch yet so kids said they will just wait for the DVD to come out.

Had lunch in En Restaurant. At first, we were confused coz the En we used to go has been replaced by Pho 2000 Restaurant. Then realized that it has moved to just opposite F Bar. It looks so much nicer now plus they have TV everywhere!

These were what I ordered:

Wakame Salad

Buta Tumire Nabe

Honey Bread Ice Cream

The Wakame Salad is my favorite. I really love Japanese salad dressing. As for Buta Tumire Nabe, the minced meat ball is so, so, so soft. It has such a texture that it melts in your mouth. No kidding! I don't really enjoy the kim chi soup though. But overall, it's okay thanks to the meat balls.

Then Sam took the kids to buy shoes since Casey complained about her shoelaces keep getting on the way. Later on, I went to look for a purse. It was me who planned to buy actually and I didn't intend to ask Sam to pay for it since he already bought me so many stuffs. It's crazy though that the price of the purse itself costs only a little cheaper than the handbag my MIL gave me last year. Still, my Burberry purse looks kinda worn out already so I bought it anyway. They do have some on sale but I don't like the design. I'm surprised that Sam offered to pay half of it ^.^ And he said if he wins his soccer bets, he'll pay all of it! Thankfully I paid it with my credit card so I still have 3 more weeks to see if he wins other bets hahaha.... If he does, then I really hit the jackpot. Well, not jackpot but still, paying half compared to not at all is quite a big difference so let's all cross your fingers and pray that he wins :P

On our way back to EX, kids asked for cupcakes so we bought another 4. This time I only got 3 pics coz one of the cupcakes is oreo which I've posted before.

Chocolate & Lemon

Raspberry

Before going home, we stayed awhile in Gloria Jeans to have coffee first.

2 nights ago, the girls n I watched "Sydney White" on DVD starring Amanda Bynes.

It's a chick flick and I think it's pretty entertaining although it's not my favorite. I like Amanda Bynes even if her acting isn't really that good. She just looks so sweet. The leading actor, Matt Long, is like the younger version of Brad Pitt except he's lack of that sex appeal though hehehe...

As for tomorrow, don't wait up for my blog in the morning. I will probably be in Ertien's salon cutting my hair. Yup, very soon, I will go for smoothing again and then color my hair too. I really want to cut my hair short but after so many hair disasters, I think I'll stay with long for awhile first.

MakinG PasteL TutuP

I made my first pasta tutup today ^.^ Of course it's something to be happy about. I now have a new recipe to add to my book. My recipe book only holds recipes I've tried and I like. The ones I haven't are in another file. Anyway, don't except mine to be like the one Irene's mom makes. Come on, I'm an amateur in this. I found these 2 recipes online a couple of days ago and decided to try it out. Leaving some ingredients intact while omitting some out and adding others in. 2 recipes combine into one. This was how it looks like before it's baked :

And after it's baked :

LOL...I know, I know it's a little burnt at the sides. That's the reason why I think I should stay out of the kitchen as often as possible :P I was too lazy waiting for the cheese to turn into golden colors so I just have to be a smart ass and turn on the burner on top. Not much damage done though except if I am to sell this one, it's a no-no hahaha.... The taste however isn't a letdown. I would say I'm satisfied at how it turned out although I did make a mistake by using beef sausage instead of chicken sausage like Irene's mom did. Oh well, it's my 1st so there's room for improvement. And I was surprised that it's quite an easy thing to make. It isn't as troublesome as lasagna. With the recipe, it's hard even to fail. I guess it just takes a person with patience to make it perfect. And of course practice makes perfect too.

Makes me happy when I can cook something I love eating ^.^

Oh before I forgot, I watch "The Ten" last night on DVD.

Please spare yourself from the torture. Don't watch this movie! It's so freaking stupid! It's about God's ten commandments but each was made into a story. Sam kept saying it's a silly show and wondered why I still kept watching till more than half of the movie. The reason was plain. I was gullible enough to think that maybe, just maybe, there're some good parts lie within the movie itself. And I was so very wrong. The story got worse and worse. I was fooled with the fact that Jessica Alba, Paul Rudd, Winona Ryder and Liev Schreiber were in the movie. Thinking to myself "Wow...it must be interesting. So many famous celebs there." It's one of the worst movies I've ever watched. It will disgust u to your roots when Winona acts like a psycho there first falling in love and then making love to a ventriloquist's puppet while her hubby was just next door. Aaaarghhhh... I will never watch her movie in admiration again....eveeeerrrrr!!!!

Down With Sore ThroaT

Kids are back to school and I'm somehow a bit relieved. But that also means more time at home now which kinda sux. Not that I'm fit to go anywhere at the moment. Yeah, I'm officially sick right now. I finally got the sore throat except it's not so bad this time round. Just need to take CDR and eat medicine a couple more times and I'll be up and running by tomorrow *cross my fingers* Sometimes, when people asked me how old my kids are, I myself find it hard to believe. Not that I think I don't look that age. Mind u, I'm not that self-confident hehehe... Just that I can't believe how times fly. Just a couple of nights ago I took a pic of Casey in a party dress :

And when I looked at the pic, it was still hard to swallow the fact that she's a big girl now. Well, almost 7 is a big girl to me. And she looks more mature than her age in the pic, don't u think? I'm really content with my life now. There's nothing else I want.

I just found out yesterday that it was Valentine's birthday. What a bad auntie I am! Will get her birthday present within this week though. Yesterday, we went to church at 9.45am coz there are 3 masses in the morning now. 1st at 6am, 2nd at 8am and 3rd at 10.30am. Kids couldn't possibly make it to 8am (even when it was at 9am it took me like forever to make them eat breakfast and get ready) so we took the 3rd session. We finally got to sit inside and feel what MKK is like with the air-conditioner. It was nice coz yesterday weather was bloody hot. I took a pic of the place :

Just found out from Wiwin's blog that that's the church she went to on Saturday. Yeah, it's a really tough church to find. When I got married last time, my friends had trouble finding it too and most of them arrived only when the ceremony was over LOL

Went to dad's house as usual and we did go out to Chandra to find some DVDs with my dad. Just him, Casey and me though. Cecil was too lazy to go out.

Came home and watched "Daddy Day Camp" with Sam and the kids. It was a sequel to "Daddy Day Care". It was hilarious but the 1st one where the leading actor was Eddie Murphy was so much better.

In the evening, Suli and Gina came over to drop some cupcakes they made. They are sooo pretty.

I took one cupcake and my sore throat got worse LOL but I just can't resist the temptation. It's moist and so yummy!

That night, we had dinner in Coca Suki. I didn't eat much coz all I can think of is the bed. And when I did get to bed which was at 9pm, I didn't wake up until 5.30am this morning. Was still sleepy but when I got home from school which was at 7am, I slept for another 2 hrs 30 mins hihihi... Now I'm really refreshed although I'm still having this irritating sore throat.

The GoLdeN CompaSs

Turned out my dad couldn't make it to lunch today so it was just the 4 of us having lunch in Pepper Lunch today. Kids asked Sam if we could watch in Premiere and to my surprise, he said 'yes'. We bought the 12.45pm tickets. Standard Chartered is having a promo so it's buy one, get one free for the Premiere tickets. What a great bargain, isn't it? Rp 200K for 4 people. Sam said if the promo goes on, we'll watch in Premiere everytime hahaha...

If u love "The Chronicles of Narnia", you are definitely going to love "The Golden Compass". I think it's a great movie but I kinda get upset when I searched for news about the pre-production of a sequel to that and found none. The ending was kinda hanging the viewers in mid-air. Seems like the leading actress still has a long way to go before the story ends. Maybe I'm missing something....maybe that's how the story supposed to end =.=

When we finished watching the movie, I went to The Time Place to get my watch strap shorten and now it fits just nicely. Went to Kinokuniya where the kids bought books. Told them that they can buy only 1 book actually but they asked me if I can pay for one and they pay for another one so each one gets 2 books. I said 'okay' and said, "I'm only going to pay for the cheaper one, whichever it is." A few eyes stared at me. They probably pity my kids for having such a cheapskate mommy LOL... Went to Next later on where they bought some blouses. I got nothing today except some bread from Crystal Jade. It's funny how a shopaholic like me kinda lose interest to shop these days. Maybe as u aged, it kinda died down too....or maybe it's just a phase I'm going thru. Still, it's one of my New Year resolutions, right? To cut down on shopping. So I'm doing a pretty good job at it but hey, it's way too early to tell. It's not even past January yet. I still have a long journey.

Looks like I'm not going to the wedding after all tomorrow. Afen called me up to tell me it's my dad's birthday tomorrow. Before any of u accuses me of being an unfilial daughter, it's his birthday in CHINESE calendar. I never keep track of that. So, my plans to celebrate with Sam's family has to be postponed to later that day and spent the afternoon at my dad's.

I just found out last night that we can change the DS themes. I found some really nice ones but this morning, the themes won't work on Casey's DS so she exchanged hers with mine. I was pretty upset actually coz I don't really like the blue one Casey has. It just doesn't match with the pink casing I bought yesterday. Then later this evening I tried and tried and in the end it works. Hooray!!! Now I have my DS back and have downloaded 12 themes to put into my DS.

Time to watch some DVDs.

MegaMaL...cHange of SceNe

Was dying to get out of the house today coz I was stuck at home the whole day yesterday. My FIL was using my driver and I was told to use my MIL's driver but I just don't like it coz he always goes back giving my MIL a full report about my activities. Not that I have anything to hide but it just disturbs me.

Went to my dad's house to fetch Damien. Had lunch first in Orchard Mandarin. Wanted to ask Suli to join us but she already had hers. We then went to MegaMal. It's been ages since I went there. Accompanied the kids to play in Timezone. At times like this, I wish for a maid I can bring so I can enjoy a cup of coffee in any cafe while waiting for them to finish playing. Anyway, they didn't play long. We went to the game spot (kinda fuzzy what's the name of the counter :P) and I bought NDS casings for the kids and one for Yon. Poor her. Medan is so lousy....they don't even sell the cases LOL I also finally got myself the R4 card. Can't believe TA is selling at double the price there. Daylight robbery!! And as I just realized 10th is a public holiday, I decided to change the kids' schedule to 10th instead of 9th so that Damien can join us.

Left Megamal and reached Pacific Place at almost 3pm. The queue wasn't so bad today and thank goodness we can change the tickets to the 10th. But since it's a public holiday, we are all being charged at Rp 150K per person. Kept telling myself that it's okay. It's not like I have to fork out that much every week or every fortnight. Another week till school re-opens. How I long for that time to arrive soon. Making up my mind to join FF (Fitness First) for sure. Just hope I have that motivation.

Had to send Damien back to Pintu Kecil when we were done. Reached home at 5.30pm. There's a gathering in TA tomorrow actually but I can't go coz Sam won't have to go to the warehouse. We'll be having lunch with my dad in Plaza Senayan and proceed to watch "The Golden Compass".

Last night, I watched "30 days of Night" starring one of my fav actor, Josh Hartnett, on DVD with the girls.

I think it's a pretty good movie. I love the storyline & the ending (even though poor Josh had to die huhuhu....) Pretty suspenseful too and kids watched it with me till the end. I'm training them to watch more and more horror movies so I can bring them to the cinemas to watch what I want and not only what they want LOL

No updates till Monday then....Meanwhile, have a great weekend, guys ^.^

PresenTs From The Kids

Well, the BBQ yesterday was pretty fun except that Ayau and his family couldn't make it. Just Cin2 and his family with Hui's niece and nephew tagging along. 6 children in the house made the atmosphere lively. Valentine was exceptionally cute and loves to sing a lot. This is a short video of her singing a couple of weeks ago...

After the BBQ, we just stayed at home watching DVDs with the kids. First we watched "Mr Magorium's Wonder Emporium" starring Dustin Hoffman and Natalie Portman.

It's about this girl Molly Mahoney (Natalie Portman) who works in a magic toy store. Well, I don't really dig the movie. Kinda boring in my opinion. Natalie doesn't look her age though in there and it's not one of her best acting I must say.

Then at night we continued watching "Nancy Drew".

It's an okay movie although the actings weren't really up to Hollywood standards.

Today, met up with Suli in Plaza Senayan for nail art. I wanted to do manicure and painting my toenails actually but in the end I just had the painting. Suli did manicure and nail art and this is how her nails look like:

She has really dainty fingers that Ami who was doing her nails took longer than usual. As for me, my toenails look like this now:

After that, we had lunch in Chatterbox. Once again, I made the wrong choice and the food taste horrible but I ate it anyway coz I was damn hungry =.=

Suli drove us to Pacific Place but I got down in the lobby as I had to line up for the tickets to Kidzania. I planned to let the girls play on Friday. Turned out tickets were all sold out. Only available one is the afternoon slot and it's impossible to go for the 2nd session like I explained before. In the end, bought the tickets for next Wednesday as that's the day that the kids don't have tuition. Casey's piano lesson starts again next week. Took me more than half an hour to line up for the tickets. Business is so booming but wonder how long will that last? When I had bought the tickets, went up to 5th floor to meet up with Suli and the girls. Forgot the name of the restaurant...Coffee something I recalled. I ordered a glass of iced latte and it doesn't even taste as good as the one Starbucks has....but then again, it's not as expensive either hehehe....

At 4pm, we parted ways coz Suli was going to watch "I Am Legend" whereas we had to go back home. As soon as we arrived, kids told me to open belated bday presents from them. Was surprised coz while I was doing my nails, they went to Kidz Station to buy me stuffs. How sweet ^.^ These were what I got:

Left from Casey & Right from Cecil

Cecil gave me a photo clip; a bear with my horoscope while Casey gave me a mug. They are so adorable and I'm touched to the roots hihihi....