New Years Eve

This year we decided not to venture out and instead invited friends and family to help celebrate the end of 2013 and the start of 2014.

I invited the Cheong's, Tham's and Li's and Lily invited the Chans, of which only Anne's family came. Of course, the Seeto's were invited, but only U. David, A. Cath and Evan showed up.

Starting at lunch time, we ate our way through the day.  Everyone brought a dish of deliciousness and that was supplemented by our salads, Thai beef salad, potato salad, garden salad.

The Cheong's, Tham's and Li's left after lunch, with Marion coming back to join us for dinner.

Dinner was a continuation of lunch.  The tennis was on, so that's what we were watching on TV, until the countdown to the 9pm fireworks which we watched on tv.  There was suppose to be a special fireworks display at 10pm, but if you blinked you missed it...was over before you knew it. After watching the fireworks on tv, we had our own lighting of sparklers in the front yard. Woo Hoo.

Mar Mar, Lily, Anne and A. Catherine settled down for a game of mah jong after lunch and continued this after dinner. 

To while away the time, Evan experimented with cocktail slushies using Janet's vitamix blender.  Lucky we had a lot of ice left over.

When 12 midnight came around we counted down and took photos of Marion taking photos of the fireworks on the tv. I must say it went on for a while and was pretty spectacular, but it was good to be with family and friends and not have to fight the crowds to get into the train station.

We had our 12 midnight lighting of sparklers. They seem to go out pretty quickly, as soon as I lit one, it was time to light another and another, but we had fun..oh the simple pleasures one can get.

Anyway, HAPPY NEW YEAR and welcome to 2014!

Boxing Day

Boxing Day and it was our turn to play host.

More food and family photos.

Christmas Day

The day started with Darren cooking up a big breakfast for the family, with lots of help from Megan. There was scrambled eggs, bacon, sauted mushrooms, fried tomatoes, hash browns, chipolate sausages and croissants. Fiona was the first to tuck in, as she was up at the crack of dawn. The rest of the family ate their share in dribs and drabs.

This Christmas we went to Carl and Joy's for lunch.  Unfortunately the fine weather leading up to Christmas did not stick around and Christmas Day turned out to be wet and damp.  There plans to have an outdoor barbie turned into everyone squeezing into their garage and kitchen. We took out family shots with their tree, then had our lunch before heading off to Uncle David's for afternoon tea and dinner.

The Seetos (Evan mainly, since Bindy had made lunch) made roast pork, with baked potato, sweet potato, carrots. Ken and Angel made roasted lamb shanks with steamed zuchinni and beans - both over cook, but the lamb shanks were perfect.

I supplied a lemon, strawberry cheesecake for dessert which we had with fruit.

Christmas Lights

We took the train out to see the lights.

Got out at St James and enjoyed the animations on the St Mary's Cathedral, saw several loops and took lots of photos before heading back towards Town Hall station.

At Town Hall, we were taking photos of the light projections on the Town Hall facade, when we hear lots of police sirens, they start, they stop, then we see a taxi being pulled over by 2 police cars and stopped by at least 2 other police cars coming from the other direction.  We're guessing they were after the passengers in the taxi and not the taxi driver - poor fellow.

Didn't stick around to watch what happened, but caught the train home.