2am

It’s almost 2am and I’m still wide awake. I’m tired. But my motor is still running. I think it’s because of the hype about the decorations that we did in the Parish Hall tonight. Hehe. Myself, Maggie, Diana & Audrey..and oh Jusip too were busy decorating and getting the place ready for tomorrow’s wedding. Vic and her bro, Donny, did came in to help out for awhile. Well we were there since 745pm and come to think of think, I have never stayed back in church til very late. We went back at about 1.20am! Imagine that! But no doubt we had loads of fun decorating especially the balloons and the signage (we are so proud of our creation!)...hehe! Audrey even suggested that we all quite our jobs and go into the field of event management, haha. And Jusip would become our balloon pumper, Diana the balloon tie-r specialist, Maggie the master of balloons arranger and Audrey the ribbon maker. We’ll make a good team. Hahah! Well, here’s a sneak peek of what we did....:p

Pump pump and snip snip


Balloons galore!


In the beginning

Will upload more photos soon to see the outcome of our decoration session..hehe. My bed is calling me and I need my beauty sleep right now. ;) Time to hit the sack! Good night (or rather good morning!)

Breathe in......breathe ouuuut

The past few weeks have been very much eventful….filled with works, meetings, band and choir practices, preparation for Holy Week & Easter and now preparation for Jo’s wedding. Whooh! It’s all full speed ahead! I wasn’t even able to take a pit stop after Easter. The activities for the week ahead were already waiting in line! There’s the Naim market study which causes me to have a certain kinda fit to which I barf out housing units (sigh), the "never ending journey" of valuation reports to do, the Miri Easter Celebration meeting, Youth Service meeting, band and choir practice (Maggie, Audrey & I will be wedding singers tomorrow…haha, and with only 2 practices I hope we don’t slaughter the songs! Gulp) and preparing the decorations for the wedding tomorrow (Maggie & I are far from done. We must get it all done tonight, yikes!) Oh, I also have some cards to make as well….oh dear! And come Sunday, I’ll be flying off to Kuching for my company’s annual dinner. I hope I won’t ‘pancet’ halfway through…haha. However, in the midst of all the hustle and bustle, I was met with two surprises, which, of course are the highlights of my week! It gave me that warm fuzzy feeling of great delight…yumm! First was that I found out that my Aunty Cia is preggers! Praise God. Whoohoo! After seven years, lil Latana & Keepat will be welcoming a new dedek soon! A new addition to our already huge family by end of this year! Hope that I’ll be buying pink booties! hehe. Christmas will be extra special! The next news is that, Jusip Willits is in Miri! He’s baaaack! I missed him. It’s been 4 yr plus since he visited Miri, where we all shed buckets of tears when he went off after his 8-month stay…and it felt as if it was just last year that he left. And now he’s baaack to attend Jo’s wedding. I was so shocked to see him with all those facial hair! Haha! He looks so familiar yet different. There’s a mature-ness about him, oh and he’s added some flesh to the once scrawny bod. But deep down inside he’s still the manchal Jusip we know. (yea, check out his FB and you’ll know why) p/s He wants to sing Kampung Love during the wedding reception. I can’t wait to see that. I hope he brings a suitable costume for the performance…! ;p
I’m glad those surprises came. They are much needed in moments like these. In addition to that, here’s a moment I would like to share.
This "took my breath away"! Haha..

Our very own Yang Dipertuan Ah Kong William underneath his royal payong with his butler.
p/s In conjuction with our company's 35th anniversary, everyone gets an umbrella each. It's soo blue..so unlike our company colour which is yellow and black

I guess that's all for now. So, here’s to an action-packed weekend! Bring it on! :p

Eek!

I know….it’s been waaay too long since I’ve last posted anything here! I’ve left it cold & dark….*creeepy*
So, here’s my attempt to put some light & warmth to my blog (finally)!

Last Friday, it was William’s (aka the colleague aka small boss) birthday…well it’s not his real birth date but it’s the registered date in his IC (identification card). I don’t really remember why his birth date’s different on his IC….I only just remember that it’s got something to do with him being born in the Solomon Islands. Am not really that good at remembering details lah…haha! Anyhow….. it was actually an impromptu decision to celebrate his birthday…and we surprised him with a cake in a shape of a red truck, (which seems to be more suitable for a 5 year old boy...but you know, it’s just perrrrfect for William!), specially bought from Our Daily Bread, a party popper, a nice flower chocker made of ribbon from the cake box (another impromptu creation) and a creative photo frame made from our company’s manila file adorn with red hearts. Aren’t we a creative bunch of people?! Our management should be so proud of us! Last but not least, we opened up the sparkling grape juice which has been sitting for much too long in the fridge. It was part of a hamper gift given to us last Chinese New Year…hahaha! (p.s. we did check the expiry date and it is still drinkable). It tasted rather sour though! Nonetheless, we had a great & sweet time celebrating & poking fun at the birthday boy. ;)

So I’ll just leave you with some photos which we took….enjoy ya!

The red truck cake

So happy....!!

Make a wish & blow! William trying his best to do a po-po poker face

Putting on the newly made chocker while William gorges on his truck cake. Cantek tak?

Party poppers

Dismantled truck

Our gift for William

Group photo a must!

And finally........

The birthday boy strikes a pose....2010 version! Mengancam tak?

Heheheee...that's all folks! Have a great weekend ahead!

xoxo

I'm back

And of all the days…it just had to be today that the internet connections go cuckoo…hmmph….sabaaaar jak lah. On those days which I’m busy…the connections are perfectly well! Yup, it’s only that when I’m free & have nuthin’ much to do in the office that it decides to just simply goes on “connecting” mode, for what seems like a verrrry verrrry loooong time. How awesomely ironic is that! (eyes rolling).

Well, I know that I’ve not been updating my blog since…err let’s see..9th October! Hah…about a month plus, well almost two! How ‘bout that? :p The word busy hasn’t left me since then. Am constantly swamped with work…gosh. Sue mentioned that she could hear crickets and occasionally a toad croaking in my blog. Hahahaa! It’s a swamp in here and I’m turning into the swamp thing…hehe…not. Well, it’s time to get it spruced up. Forgive me for starting off my blog with a whine. Blame it on the internet weather lah.

Moving on…I’ll share with y’all what I’ve been busy with the past month or so…here goes:-

My first creation for October was a wedding card for Rosty....

Next is a card for Sue, whose birthday was on 14th October. The first one I made was from a group of us friends and another one was the one I made personally for her. :)

One of my favourite cards...hehe. Should've taken her picture with the card...lupa lah...:p

Next are three cards I made for my aunty which she ordered for her three boys...hehe. The first one is for Josh who turned 21 on 19th October. The 2nd card is for Pat whose 24th birthday was on 4th November. Happy birthday, boys! :) And lastly is a card for Nick, who graduated last month. Congrats to ya, Nick!

My next project was a birthday card for Fr. Chua. He is also our FIG 3 choir conductor. Oh, we had a great time in Bandar Seri Begawan last month, where the FIG 3 Choir sang in a concert at St. Andrew's church. We actually planned to celebrate his birthday in Bandar after the concert but the timing tak ngam...so we decided to celebrate when we're back in Miri.

It's so hard to get him to give a decent pose with the card I made, and this is what the picture turned out to be!
Tsk..tsk...Fr. Chua...

Oh dear! p.s. He received a card, 2 chocolate cakes and a box of chocolates!

These two thank you cards/bookmarks were made for our speakers (Ven. Solomon, Fr. Chua & Subdeacon Augsutine) for the Young Adults Weekend Getaway at Soon Hup Villa on 30-31st October. I didn't manage to take a photo of the card I made for Ven. Solomon, though...huhu...tak sempat.

For Live.Love.Craft challenges, Sue and I had four weeks of fun doing cards of the 4 seasons namely Spring, Summer, Autumn & Winter. Here there are:-

Flowery Summery & frosty winter

Springy Spring & Breezy Autumn

And here are another two of my LLC Challenge cards...

This challenge was to use circle punches. This is my orangy bubbly card :)

The next challenge was to include kittens or puppies in our cards. I'm more of a cat person..hehe. So I chose kittens! I took time to colour the picture with colour pencils..hehee. Makes me feel so primary school. ;) Here it is:-

This Saturday, 28th November is my parents' 28th Anniversary! Whoohoo! This year, they have decided to have a party to commemorate the special day. My mum have asked me to make the invitation cards for the event. And guess how many I made? 55 pieces! Incredibly, I managed. Phewh! My mum wanted it to be simple, cream+pink in colour. My dad..ok jerr...no comment, as long ada kad. Hehe. :p

I used a cream coloured backing paper and for the invitation, I used a pink paper which I printed the picture of my parents on their wedding day as the background. And finished it off with two punched hearts at the top.
I should've taken a picture of all the 55 cards I made. Didn't think of it then...darn. :s

Yeeeaaay, I've finally reached the end of today's post...and it's a looong day of waiting & uploading (took me almost the whole day to get here!) and a looong post after a looooong absence.

Feels good to finally update my blog. I'll be back. :D

p/s My apologies for my broken English ..hehe. It's so rojak...i know.

A wedding, a birthday & a funeral

There's just so much to say, but just couldn't find the time to do so and there's not so much inspiration going on the past week...not wanting to talk about it though. It's just a really though week at the office. Found myself on the verge of tears several times at work. Sigh. So much for the first week of turning 27! Hah! Leaving that aside....yup, last Saturday was my 27th birthday & it was my friend, Rosty's big day too! She tied the knot! Whoohooo! A very happy day indeed. My friends and I attended the blessing at Holy Trinity Chapel Lambir and the night reception at Rosty's place. Everything felt as if it went sooo so fast..but we enjoyed every moment of it...being part of a joyous & memorable occassion that is! It does seemed rather surreal to see her as she walked down the aisle, beaming in her beautiful wedding dress...who would ever thought that this day would come so soon! :) Here's wishing her & her hubby a happily ever after. :)

After the reception, we headed for Marina Seahorse for supper but not before stopping at my place for a piss stop...hehehe. :p During supper, my friends suprised me with a cake! Hehehe...yay! And sang the birthday song. It still didn't really hit me that I'm a year older and to tell you the truth...i'm in a bit of a denial...still. Hah! And oh, I got some really nice pressies & cards (a handmade one made by Sue as well! Looove it!) from my friends & family! Am trully blessed to have had this moment. Thank you to my friends for a great time that night and thank you to my family and friends, who are "jauh di mata tapi dekat di hati"! :D

Well, it's time to head off home. It's been a long day & an even loooonger week. I attended a funeral this morning. Subdeacon Roland's dear mother passed on earlier this week. The eulogy by SD Roland was very touching & emotional and it left me teary eyed & sniffling all the way. I have never heard anyone talked so fondly of their mom before. My heartfelt condolences to SD Roland and his family. And I do believe that his mother is in a better place now. May she rest in peace...

Show & Tell

I've made some crafts & cards after the Raya holidays last month. It's time to show them off..hehe! And each of them has a little story to tell. Here they are...

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First off is a frame I decorated as a birthday gift to my friend Jo. I stamped the words 'Dance', 'Sing', Love', 'Live'...and then handwritten the words below it. Was a bit nervous while writing them down...takut salah spelling, hehe. I decorated it with some pink lace, fabric flowers & acrylics. Love it! :) And I had that feeling again...of having second thoughts to give it away..haha.

Next is my Ice-cream card, which I made for LLC's challenge with 'Food' as the week's theme. I intended to make a cupcake but look what came out from the craft oven....ice-cream! Haha. I used felt & corrugated paper for my ice-cream & a red button to top it off. I actually stamped 'Happy Birthday' at the bottom right of the card...but it bled & got all smudged up. Aiya. The 'birthday' didn't look that happy at all. So what I did was write "Happy Birthday" and paste it onto the stamped image. Tadaa...problem solved. ;)

Lastly, is LLC's this week's challenge. The theme was 'Indian' with henna designs! An idea given by Jo. The first thing that came to my mind was saree! But decided to scrap off the idea...seems a bit difficult. I ended up drawing an elephant (as they are considered very important to the Indian culture, so it fits the Indian theme...i think) & doodled some henna like designs on it. Do you think the look henna-ish? ;)

So there....a lil 'show & tell' session from my craft world. Time to head back home. Enjoy your weekend everyone! Til then, God bless! :)

My Series of Fortunate Events

A lot have been happening in the past two weeks….whooh! :) I went back to Kuching (of course!), on Friday for the Raya holidays!

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I got a chance to visit my secondary school, SMB St. Teresa. I spent 5 years of my life there. The place has changed so much! So many wonderful memories…sigh. Met with my Chemistry teacher, Pn. Foo, as well! It’s been 10 years since I left high school…waaah.

On Saturday, I attended Bishop Aeries’s consecration service & celebration dinner with my family. The dinner was a pretty grand one with various cultural performances and the 6.45am choir also preformed several songs…very impressive! Revd. Roannie entertained us with some songs and Jerry Kamit performed as well!. Such talent!

It was indeed a blessed & memorable day! I also met my Sunday school teacher, Uncle William at the dinner reception! Wow…it really does bring back lots of memories. Makes me wonder where my Sunday school friends are now….

The next day, I stuffed myself to the max during Raya visiting. Haha…don’t dare to step on the weighing machine dah. I went out lepaking with my friends & mi familia too. Got to see my little cuzzies play sand art…haha (I think it’s the new craze for little kids. Heck even grown ups play ‘em). Found out a new hang out place called BarSaga. Pretty cool! It was indeed a great time…and always NOT enough time. I didn’t get to do one thing, though. I actually planned to watch a movie at the new MBO cinema at Spring. But tak sempat…as usual. Haiya…

By Wednesday, I’m back in Miri. Work starts loading on my table. (am procrastinating quite a bit already…hehe.) And then there’s the AYC AGM which was on Sunday. The LLC’s weekly challenge's due as well. Whooh, so much things to do! Well, am glad I managed & went through the week in one piece, haha.

On Friday, the youths…Vic, Elsa, Tim, Lydia, Shannen & myself joined Revd Alfred, SD Julius, SD Jackson & the MWF to Sg. Liam longhouse. There’s a service at the longhouse’s chapel that night which was celebrated by Revd. Alfred. It started off with a Praise & Worship session and then we’re divided into groups. Elsa, Vic, Shannen, Lydia & I handled the youth group. Our mission was to reach out to them. Revd Alfred mentioned to us that the youths there are being challenged with problems as such as drinking, gambling & smoking. We even saw some of the boys smoking at the tanju just before we started off our session!
The session was at the ruai of the longhouse. We started with an ice-breaking game. They enjoyed themselves! However, we were a bit concerned with the decibel level going a lil’ too high that it might disturb the longhouse folks…oops. The sharing session was on how to prepare for exams. They were proactive… they asked questions & responded to ours as well.

We took turn sharing & I struggled with my ‘jako Iban’..oops! as I’ve never done any sharing in Iban before and found myself searching for words or rather trying to translate my words in the midst of my sharing….haha. Nama meh penyadi… :p And lastly, before we bersurai, we prayed for them & ended the session by encouraging them & challenging them to improve themselves and do their best. After the service, we had supper at one of the longhouse folk’s bilik. They served very yummy local dishes and also durians! Haha! But, am not a fan of durians. So I just took photos of ‘em instead.

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The next day, Saturday, was another busy day…especially in preparing things for the AGM and also Family Service. (It’s the youths turn to lead in Praise & Worship). I was up & running since morning….helping out the Teenz practicing for AGM’s praise & worship session, practicing for the Family Service & then choir practice for the Miri Xmas parade. Apuu..ka luput ku..haha. I ended the day with Maggie at Chilipeppers. A nice time chillin’, releasing the stresssss & laughing out loud…literally!

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Come Sunday, we had a Family service in the morning, which is held every 4th Sunday of the month. And in the afternoon was the AYC’s AGM. We’re very impressed with the number of youths attending this year. For the past several years, we have never exceeded 40. This year, in fact 50 youths attended! Praise God! All the various youth ministries handed in their reports, which was verry good indeed. Aiseh. We also distributed our new keychains in conjunction with AYC’s 40th Anniversary….designed by Mr. Chairman himself. The meeting went smoothly & we’re encouraged by words of wisdom from Ven. Solomon Cheong, Bro. Tommy (our advisor) and Bro. Bajeng (Mr. Chariman).

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Kudos to the Praise & Worship team..Zara, Lydia, Cyril & Shannen for the great effort. It was their first time & I could see that they’re nervous but they are very brave indeed to take up the challenge. The guitarists were Daniel, Bartholomew & Melvin. Very proud of them!

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After the meeting, we had some refreshments & fellowship, as usual…di bawah pokok. :) By 5.30pm it’s time to pack up & go home.

Finally! I can let out a bigggg sigh of relief & thank God for His endless blessings & guidance. :D