Bonding With Cousins

Today I’m relieved of my Grab mom duties as it’s a public holiday (FT day), thus there’s no tuition, no martial arts class and no piano class. And our dearest part time helper of 8 years is here to help me with the house chores, so I have more time on hand to update my blogs. I’m so happy 😊

Our CNY dinner with our friends at Overseas Restaurant starts at 8:30 tonight. The dinner time allocated by restaurants during CNY is crazy. You either eat at 5:30 p.m. or 8:30 p.m.   By the time the food arrives tonight, it would be 9-ish p.m. and serves more of a supper than dinner!  There goes my 12-hour circadian rhythm intermittent fasting. In fact, I’ve not been consistently practising my time-restricted eating throughout the week-long CNY break.  But with restricted food portion, I’ve still not stuffed up on my weight 👍



When we were back in Ipoh last week, our girls had a wonderful and fruitful time bonding with their cousins from Singapore.  The twinsies are now closer to our girls and even baby Raeanne who was previously very shy and would cry if any of us went near her, has outgrown her timidity towards us ‘strangers’.  Baby Raeanne has a special fondness towards Cass and baby Rayzen towards Alycia.

This CNY, our girls have mastered the skill of carrying the toddlers 🥰

Cass and Raelynne trying to pacify Rayzen who bawled uncontrollably when he woke up from his siesta and couldn’t find his papa who was out shopping with his mummy.


Playing with our neighbor/close family friend’s Golden Retrievers.  They have a family of four super adorable Golden Retrievers.

I was overly ambitious and brought 5 kids on my own for an evening stroll around the  neighborhood. It was not as easy as I thought as we had to cross roads and chase stray dogs away. Plus Sherilyn and especially Cass are still not very adept at carrying the hyper active toddlers.  I was hyperventilating when we had to cross busy roads and almost got chased by dogs 😵 Even snapping this photo was a feat for me as I was worried that Cass would accidentally drop baby Rayzen (who’s on the heavy side) on the road 🤭  Each time our girls carry the babies, visions of me accidentally dropping my 2-year old baby cousin brother on the road on a cold night in Cameron Highlands when I was 16 years old still haunts me.  And he had a bloody cut on his forehead resulting from the accident, which makes me feel bad till today!



No. of times viewed = 36

Chinese New Year 2020

It’s a ritual of the Yaps to go vegetarian on the first day of the Lunar New Year. And there will always be a Lion Dance ceremony in the earning morning on the first day of CNY at the Yaps’ family house.

Our girls are not fans of ‘jai’ but whether they like it or not, everyone has to eat this dish on the first day of CNY  😏  and we can feast on meat for dinner with my parents. 😬  For me, I’m more of a herbivore and have absolutely no issue eating ‘jai’ the entire day.




Lunch on Chor Yat at the Yaps’.


Dinner on Chor Yat at Kok Thai Restaurant with my family.


At almost 50, I still get ang pow from my parents ❤️

Ang pow from my darling.

On the 2nd day of CNY, we went to the Yaps’ ancestral house again for ‘hoi nien’ lunch. All the dishes were cooked by the great cooks of the Yap family, except for the waxed meat.

After lunch, we rushed back to my parents’ for another gathering, this time with the Yongs (my papa’s 8 siblings).


We stopped by the road side to get fresh coconut water as the weather in Ipoh was burning hot, so hot that we could literally feel our skin grilled.  Hubs waited under the hot sun for 15 minutes for the vendor to pack the coconut water as there was a long queue. Things that my darling would do for me 💓

Dinner on Chor 2 was at YMCA.  The dishes here tasted way better than Kok Thai. Though the restaurant at  YMCA is small and less fancy, the quality of each dish was top notch. This restaurant serves halal Chinese dishes.



No. of times viewed = 27

HEALTH FREAK MOMMY