Celebrating hubby's birthday!

We celebrated hubby's birthday this year at Monte's, BSC. Time really flies! Birthdays always seem to arrive so quickly. What, another year gone already? 

Yummy pasta...

Happy birthday to my dearest hubby! You're absolutely the best!

Trip to Putrajaya!

We wrapped up 2011 with a 3D/2N stay at the Pullman Putrajaya. The kids had never been to a beach before, and I found out that there was this small man-made beach at the Pullman, and so we decided to make a trip there. Haha, sad I know. But there really aren't that many beach destinations that one can go to at the end of the year, no thanks to the monsoon season.

We had lunch when we arrived at the hotel, since the room was not yet ready. Food at the restaurant- named B's- was not very nice. Expensive, and yet not nice. :p

When we finally got to see our room, I was really rather shocked. The floor looked old and dusty- and there were stains everywhere! I think it wasn't really 'dirty' per se; it just felt that way because there were stains and the room just felt really really tired. It did feel rather yucky to be walking around barefoot, and I was beginning to dread staying there for the next 2 nights!

While waiting for our luggage to be sent up, I thought about it and decided to make a call to the front desk, asking the guy who checked us in (who was really very nice and helpful) to have a look at the room and to check if it had indeed been cleaned. I hoped that we would be given another room; and to our delight, we were upgraded to a suite at no extra charge! Fabulous! That really made all the difference. Praise God!

The kids really enjoyed themselves at the beach. The sand was coarse and the water looked rather yucky; but I guess everyone still managed to have a decent time.

We had dinner the first evening at 'The Village' and the food was really good. Very expensive, but at least it was yummy! All 3 main courses were superb. Thinking about that meal makes me hungry!

Clock tower at the Pullman Putrajaya

The next day, we opted to go on the Putrajaya Lake Cruise, which was quite nice. Our little girl was charming everyone on board, and our little boy was so excited watching the captain steer the boat! Haha. We saw some interesting buildings and structures on the cruise as well, such as the 'steel mosque' below.

In the late afternoon, we went to the beach again, but it started raining only after a while so we had to leave. We decided to head to Alamanda Putrajaya (the only shopping mall in Putrajaya I think), to have dinner and walk around a bit. I even managed to do some shopping, and the kids enjoyed themselves on some kiddie rides so all was well. 

When we got back to the hotel, we had some fun at the pool table (it was free since it was still early), and that was a great experience for the kids. We plonked our little boy on a high chair and gave him a cue, and he was happily pushing the balls into the pockets! It was so cute watching both of them at the pool table.

All in all, we had quite a nice trip, mostly thanks to the upgraded room, which made our stay a whole lot more comfortable. We couldn't do that much- since we were travelling with young kids- but I'm quite sure they had fun nevertheless!

Christmas chow...

I made smoked salmon pizzas for Christmas Eve dinner, and they turned out really well! Was so pleased :)

Blessed Christmas everyone!

Christmas at Pavilion

Pavilion usually has one of the coolest Christmas decorations- perfect for photo opportunities! Isn't this just so sweet?

We took the kids for a ride on the carousel; so that was good fun. We wanted to ride in the teacup but some other kids beat us to it. Drat.

Publika playground!

There's a new shopping mall in our area! Publika is the name. I'm still wondering why we have 3 malls in such a small area, but that's another story I suppose...

Check out this cool playground! We bought the kids there the other day, and it was their first time on a swing (yeah, sad I know :p).

Arty-farty playground, eh? :)

5th Wedding Anniversary!

We celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary recently; time flies- 5 years already! We took the day off to spend some time hanging out- just the 2 of us. I was very excited at the thought of our outing and spent ages planning what to do that day, as well as how to use some of the vouchers that I purchased online! Haha.

Hubby got me these- I love the perfume, and isn't the bottle just too cute? He sent the flowers to my office the day before our anniversary, so that was a sweet gesture. :)

We started the day with breakfast at Jalan Imbi- yummy bak kut teh! We were sooo stuffed after that though. We then went to Pavilion to do some shopping before heading off to catch a movie. I was so disappointed that there weren't any shows that we really wanted to watch, so we ended up just choosing something that hopefully wouldn't be too bad. And so.. we watched Petaling Street Warriors. Hmmm. I certainly wouldn't watch that again. :p

Next up was a late lunch at Tenjin, Grand Millennium hotel, where we used the Groupon I purchased. The food was really delicious. The sashimi was very fresh, and even the simple green tea ice-cream was superb! I would certainly not hesitate returning to Tenjin to dine.

We had a spa appointment at Solaris Dutamas next; again, we made use of some vouchers. Hehe. Overall the experience was quite ok; although I probably wouldn't go for a body mask again- it just feels too sticky and uncomfortable. We were pressured to sign up for a package after we were done, but we managed to 'escape' in the end, so that was ok.

For dinner, we initially considered trying out a luxurious degustation menu at Millesime, but since it would probably take too much time, plus we weren't sure if Chef Max Chin would be cooking, so in the end we just ended up having a simple and quick dinner at OverTime. Hardly romantic, and the food was so-so, but we were quite tired and my tummy wasn't feeling 100%, so I guess it was the best choice.

A rare day out just by ourselves! 

Thank you dear God for 5 wonderful years together; and we humbly ask that you grant us many many more blessed years of walking with each other, and with You. Amen.

Trip to Ipoh- Nov 2011

We made a trip to Ipoh in November to celebrate my grandparents' birthday (yes, both of them); it was my grandfather's 90th (Chinese) birthday!

We stayed at the Tower Regency hotel; the apartment we managed to book was decent and spacious, although I have to admit the hotel is rather run down for a place that is relatively new (about 2-3 years old).

The birthday dinner was quite good; and we had a nice time catching up with the relatives. I hope my grandparents enjoyed themselves; I'm sure they were happy to have so many family members celebrating with them. There were 4 generations there that day! 

The next morning, before we came back to KL, we decided to visit the Kek Look Tong Cave Temple, a tourist attraction situated in the natural and picturesque area of Gunung Rapat in the south of Ipoh. It was pretty nice walking around and exploring the area for a little bit. The air in the cave was cool, and there were many stalactites and stalagmite formations to admire.

A short overnight trip; but well worth it I would say...

16th East Asian Actuarial Conference

Nothing much to blog about the conference, except that it was a great opportunity to catch up with friends.

Check out the menu for the farewell dinner! The food that night was dismal, though.

Trip to Genting Highlands!

Hubby’s company organized a trip toGenting recently and we brought the whole family along. Actually, it was more of me helping hubby to plan the trip and everyone just followed the plan! Haha.

The drive up to Genting was surprisingly short, and it took us only about 45 minutes or so to reach Gohtong Jaya.We stopped to visit the Genting Strawberry Farm, where we had a great time showing the kids how strawberries were grown. Armed with a pair of scissors and a basket, we also had fun ‘plucking’ strawberries, which we later purchased (about RM 6.50 per 100 grams I think). The strawberry farm is a great place to visit with the family, I would say. 

We also had lunch in Gohtong Jaya beforemaking our way up to Genting itself. Lunch was ok, although we did find a tiny worm in the vegetable soup! Yikes. Ah well, can consider it as protein.:p

Crystal fruit

Mushrooms

Giant pumpkins

We managed to get an early check-in,and we were pleasantly surprised to find that the Family Room was quite new and nice. It had 2 double beds, a couch, and plenty of space to walk around, so the kids could run around a little bit. Our room was right next to the Outdoor Theme Park though, so while it provided an interesting view, it was quite noisy with all the screaming from the thrill rides.

We had a fairly nice break in Genting although we did not get to do much. It was raining a lot, with strong winds and a LOT of mist; at times it really felt like we were in some English countryside! Visibility was so low that we could not even see the theme park from our window most of the time. At night, the wind howled and moaned, and it was a tad scary, to be honest. The Outdoor Theme Park was also closed since the weather was so bad, which meant that everyone just congregated in the Indoor Theme Park making it terribly crowded! :( 

We paid for an All-Day Pass for the IndoorTheme Park, but only got to go on 3 rides! Gosh, what a waste of money! I thought we could do more rides, but with kids, it's hard to do much,really. They get tired and cranky easily, and everything just takes more time when you travel with young children. Ah well. 

One big gripe I have with the 'resort' (if you can call it that), is that it is AWFULLY unfriendly to young kids (who need strollers) and people with disabilities. There are stairs and escalators EVERYWHERE, which makes getting around a real nightmare. After the first evening, where we had to haul our 2 strollers around (thank God we had help from from hubby's colleagues), we learnt our lesson and from then on, we only took the lighter one out instead. It was a whole lot easier even though one of us had to carry one kid at any one time. 

Guess the kids need to be older to enjoy Genting a bit more....

Glow-in-the-dark bowling