A little faith & determination

Had asked Twain to rate year 2007 on the scale from 1 - 10 and guess what, he rated this year a 7!

I was surprise. Totally out of my expectation as I was so sure that the best he could do is to give it a 6 for this year or the worst 5 but here he is giving it a 7 for a year that is actually unpredictable, volatile and tough for his business.
I felt pleased, that although things and business is so tough on him and there are just so many things going on at the same time now but he is still feeling optimistic and still think that all these are only for the better. He thinks he can sail thru the rough sea.

FAITH and DETERMINATION makes a lot of difference...

The 3 of us will pull through, I know!

With God's will, hope everything we went thru prove to be worthy one day down the road.

(*Renee holding tight to mommy's hands)

Life before 2008

If I were being asked to rank 2007 in 1 out of 10, it will be 7.
I would not rank this a fantastically great year, it is a reasonable good year. I guess it all depend on which area we are looking at, I think.

Life is certainly not a bed of roses where I am now. Life has been crazy lately. I feel like I am rushing with time everyday. Like I need extra 12 hours a day. Work has been crazy and hectic, traffic is madness, bills keep coming in, car service is up again...the list can goes on for hours. Trying to juggle everything at one go isn't easy. Having to deal with work, life, motherhood and all the other stuffs at one go needs better stamina then where my stamina level is now.

Having Renee is definitely the most rewarding thing for me this year. My 2 best moment in a day now is the time I see her at the sitter's place and my sleeping time. It is like she makes the world stops every min I spend with her. All worries fade away. It is strange how looking into her eyes and her little smiley lips just make my lips go wide open too. She is definitely a magician.

Twain have some business issue to solve himself. Fuel charges went sky high overnight few months back and that has definitely make business a lot harder now. Still trying to do damage control and keeping business transactions in place is the after effect from the unforeseen price change in fuel. He must be exhausted too. He might rank this year only a 5 for him. I will find out.

This definitely is not an easy year end for the household financially. But this is life right? Like it or not, life goes on. However, I would prefer to think of this that we are going thru now as a challenge. I believe God will never give a test to a person unless HE knows they can take up that challenge. Plus one never know what is in front of us, can we? We might be looking at a poor ugly looking dry desert now, but who knows if a nice beautiful waterfall mountain is just another 10km in front awaits us.

One thing for sure, we still feel blessed definitely, the fact that we still have all the important people and things in life at this slightly tougher time: Renee, families, friends... and that God has sent 2 angels all the way here to cheer us up so much during this season.

Farewell 2007; Welcome 2008!!
Celebrate Life as Life is too precious to give up at any point.

Christmas 2007

We spent Christmas eve having steam boat dinner and I am telling you dinner was nice and yummy. It was the right kind of food for the eve I think.
I can see that both Sue and Blair enjoyed the dinner too. Twain definitely enjoyed it.

We went grocery shopping at Tesco because we are having the Christmas lunch the Sue way. It was still quite crowded at Tesco. I guess there must be a lot of last min shopping. Sue & Blair are totally amazed at how everyone is still so awake and out here doing all sort of activities like it was during the day time at 11:30pm. From where they are, even the kangaroos are asleep during this time.

We then went to have the usual 101 rojak and fruit juice at the Explaned. That place was quite crowed too. There were strong wind and even the sea water splashed onto our heads and faces once in a while where we sit. There were some fireworks too. It was a very pleasant night.

The moment Renee met her Kai Ma Sue, she gave a huge smile and they got along so well ever since. And you can tell that her Kai Ma Sue is one of her favorite person now. She is alright with Blair too. Blair can carry her and play with her and she didn't start crying. I was so surprise that she did not cry or being cranky at all like what I thot she would.

Renee then started to play by herself in her 4 wheels drive during Chef Blair & Sue cook for us.
They cook like they are cooking for a village. There are so much food for only 4 of us as Min & Meg couldn't make it. But I will have to tell Min that she has missed out huge man as the meal was good!! This 2 cook are some real shit man. Not only they have the style, they can really cook! We had baked broccoli, a pan of nicely baked vege, grilled chicken that you probably can smells from houses away. It was a great lunch and we are honored. According to Sue, most people do Christmas lunch instead of dinner. Unlike here, we usually do dinner. And Christmas eve countdown celebration are definitely more massive here than in Australia. There, most people are already in bed so that they wouldn't bum into Santa while he is here to drop their gift in the sock.

We spend the later part of the afternoon at The Little India where I took Sue to tailored made her Saree as a Christmas gift for this year.
It is such a nice and lovely day overall.
Twain & I enjoyed ourselves. Renee has been happily following us around watching and observing. Just hope that Sue & Blair enjoy our company as much as we enjoy theirs.

Tree decoration done

Christmas tree deco done!

Will start all the present shopping for friends and family soon.

Ho...Ho...Ho...