Sharifah is in town so I met up with her and her husband, Olivier and most importantly...I finally met her cute baby boy, Mikael! Finally! I saw her when she was preggers at 4 mths and 8mths and when she gave birth, I saw Mikael's pictures on her facebook account and just fell in love with him. He is so cute and adorable! Like an angel! And he didn't disappoint in person! Such a happy baby. I like happy babies. :) Makes me happy too.

So anyway, I met her and her husband and baby for dinner and 2 of my secondary school friends, whom I haven't met since I graduated from secondary school also came along, Maz and Kamaliah. We all met through facebook. The wonders of technology. Man, everyone has changed. For the better. We were such dorks in secondary school and now, we are all working, fairly successful, looking waaaayyyy better than we did back in school. It was nice meeting them up and catching up on who's doing what from secondary school. Girlish gossip. It was a pity Kamaliah had to leave early but Olivier, Sharifah, Maz and myself headed down to Cannale to have dessert after dinner. And anyone who has been there knows that they have the best dessert. We had so much dessert! Overdid it, I reckon.

Maz, me, Sharifah and Kamaliah.





Olivier, Sharifah and me. He's such a great father and husband. Lucky you Sharifah!!





We actually had another shot of this pose but you could see all the way up into my thighs. ???!!!! So I deleted that and got Olive to take another shot. Better. :)



Then we walked down Orchard Road to take pictures of the Xmas light up. Been ages since I last took pictures at Orchard Road during Xmas. Probably when I was 21 or something.











At Cannale.



We went a little crazy with the cakes. We had the nougatine crepe, and 4 different types of cake and ..I cant for the life of me remember what its called but its like a blown up merengue. Look at the pics below.

Hazelnut with nougat.



Sinful and decadence. Caramel centre. Yum.



And that merengue thing I was talking about. It is super duper sweet but for some obscure reason, Maz loved it and she devoured the whole thing. ON HER OWN. Amazing.



Massiveness.



And all these while, baby Mikael was sleeping and then he finally woke up! Presenting Mikael Bonne! Cutie. I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE HIM!

He is too cute, isn't he? :) Only came home about 1230am. Sharifah's going back to Melbourne on Sunday so hopefully I can see her once more before she leaves.

So school starts late next week, and my meetings start early next week. Back to the grinding stone and start working hard again. But not before a few more outings prior to start of the school term. :)

Hope everyone had a good Xmas! I had a fab one and am looking forward to the new year!

I had a fairly busy week this week. The week started off with celebrating Hari Raya Haji. It was an opportune time for me to see all my aunts and uncles and cousins again after not seeing them for a whole year. And it was really nice to be able to eat Hari Raya food, without the hassle of actually having to cook them myself like what I did with Anri and Foiza for Aidil Fitri this year. So I dressed up in my kebaya, super uncomfortable but I had no choice, and did the customary visit of my two aunties places. And I had the best food. At my first aunt's place was chicken korma, beef rendang, sambal goreng, beef satay, satay sauce, fried chicken wings, serunding, ketupat, tomato rice..the works. I ate like a pig. At my second aunt's place was mee rebus, mee siam and chicken rice. Crazy eating again. My kebaya was bursting at the seams when I finally reached home. Super uncomfortable. But it was nice seeing my relatives again. They said I looked good and happy. Yay! :) Not much pictures taken cos I felt over stuffed so these are the only ones taken.

At home with mom, while waiting for my bro-in-law to pick us up. The kebaya fit was still good. Hadn't started on the eating yet.

At my first aunt's place. I had 3 rounds of food.

That's my first aunt and my uncle sitting down. And the one in the songkok is my cousin.

Me and my elder sis. I could barely sit ok.

Later in the week, I met up Yuhana and Diana. Haven't seen them for ages, since I last left for Australia. So Diana and I met up first and had brunch before going over to Yuhana's place. Hard for Yu to get out of the house cos she has 2 young kids so we went over. She cooked lunch for us. Man, she is so different now. Extremely domesticated. She cooks really well, and bakes too! She actually sells her baking to people ok! She made fried macaroni and baked a marble cheesecake. Impressive. And her kids were adorable! So we ate, we talked, played catch up and took loads of photos. I don't even remember the last time we took photos together. So it was really nice meeting them again. I can't believe I have known them for 21 years of my life. That's crazy long!

Me with Yu's kids: Ilyunisha (the girl) and Ilyan Hakim (the boy. Duh.).

The girl is so friendly!

Ilyan has the longest eye lashes in the world. Totally adorable boy.

With Diana.

I know. I'm bad. But he didnt cry!

That's Yuhana. She looks good despite having three kids. She says she's thin cos of the running around after the kids. Whatever. She still looks like a yummy mummy.

Diana, my ever-so-gentle friend. :) She's fab. My best friend in the whole wide world. I can tell her the worst shit ever and she will never ever judge me.

My closest and longest-term friends. :)

And I also had a hair cut this week. I had a 2 hr gap before I met a friend so it was either gym or cut hair and I decided to cut my hair cos I was too lazy to be huffing and puffing in the gym (I sound like a train.).So I wanted to cut about 2 inches off but my friend in Perth said, No! I like your hair long! So I said, Fine, I'll cut 1 inch, but again, he was like, That's like half a finger. Cut half an inch. I'm like, Half an inch? Might as well don't cutlah! So anyway, I went to my hairdresser, and asked him for his opinion and he told me I looked better with my hair long so he told me he would just trim and shape my hair for me and leave the length. And I'm happy with it. :) Cos it's still babe hair but neater babe hair. :)

TA DA! I know, I know. Ee Kia and Angela were the first people who saw me with my new hair and they were like..You cut your hair? Cannot see lah. Hmph. I can feel it neater and lighter. :p I'm going to color it next week. Too light for school.

I got my sis to take this picture of my hair from the back. Love the way Kenneth blew my hair so that my curls become more defined.

And I ended the week hanging out with Angela. We met Ee Kia for lunch, then he had to leave so she and I ended up watching Four Christmases. It's so good! I enjoyed it tremendously. Then we had coffee and gossiped. Very girly. But very fun. :)

And and and... I spent $150 bucks at Popular bookstore on school stuff. $100 on History & Social Studies guide books and $50 on stationery. Urgh.

Next week, I'm going to do something really exciting! Hee...I might blog about it. If I survive it. :) In the meantime, have a good week everyone!

The whole family went out for a family lunch today to celebrate my younger sister's birthday. We went to Grand Hyatt Strait's Kitchen. Wanted to go to Carousel at Royal Plaza but it was fully booked when I called last week. It was nice hanging out with my family again. We used to go out to eat a lot as a family given that there's nothing much to do in Singapore; birthdays, Mother's Day, when someone gets a promotion, or a big bonus, and we vary from eating at cheap eateries like coffeeshops to slightly more expensive places like mid range priced restaurants or to the exorbitant hotel buffets (Well, it's exorbitant to me. $45 per pax is expensive I think. Especially when my younger sister eats almost nothing and my niece and nephew don't eat much.) So this time round, my younger sister's bf came along. First time I think he joined us as a family. :) Here are the pics. And of course, when it comes to me, there were like a gazillion photos taken.



Me and my sister, her bf Rizal and my nephew.



Mom and me.



Farhan and Alysha.



My family.



My mom wanted a photo taken with the 2 men. I just put myself into the picture. :)



The women in my family.



My elder sister.



Alysha and me, being spaz. She wins hands down.



The Xmas Tree at Taka.



My $10 dress from Perth. I had it shortened cos I hated the length. It was slightly below my knees so I had it hemmed up about 2 inches.

And this week, I went to school to see my head and my other colleagues and went to my table in the staff room. I have a great seat in the staff room, with my closest friends all around me, I saw all the office people and had a blast gosipping with them, seemed like I never went away, saw some of the potential students I would be teaching and I would be lying if I say they don't make me a little nervous, got to know my depoyment for next year, it's a lot, then got my textbooks for next year. So I'm going to spend the rest of the December trying to plough through all the books and prepare my materials for next year. I don't want to be lost and confused when school starts.

What did I do the rest of the week? I gymmed twice this week, 2 half hr sessions each time so my body is gone after each session and I had my pt sessions too. I almost died!, I met up with Yati on Monday, she's giving birth in a month!, Ee Kia on Tuesday, went for lunch with him and did a major shopping spree together! He's like one of the best shopping partner, I swear. Between both of us, I bought 3 pairs of shoes, 2 bags, 2 tops and he bought a jacket and bermudas., then met Ezzy on Wed for lunch and then went Ikea to get school stuff and materials together and had coffee at the Ikea cafe, then Thursday I spent the whole afternoon pampering myself at the spa. I did a body scrub, massage and wax, and Friday I met up Farah and Maya and chilled out at this Moroccan Bar at Cuppage called Kazbar. Nice place. And yes, I am exhausted cos I haven't had a day of doing nothing. So next week I'll be a little bit more disciplined and try to get some work done.

It's Hari Raya Haji tomorrow so Selamat Hari Raya Haji everyone! Going to visit my aunts tomorrow. Haven't seen them since I got back!