A Walk Down the Aisle . . .

Jin's cousin, SM wanted bean to be a flower girl at her wedding..despite my sceptism that bean would walk more than 5 steps in a straight line, we decided why not (after cautioning aunty sm :)). So bean had her first flower girl "assignment" and we were off to Penang the weekend before we flew off to California.

The original plan was to have Bean hold her 2.5-yr old cousin Michael's hand but in the end, think we made a wise decision to have the best man's hand instead. I armed the best man (forgot his name but he was cute!) with the secret weapon to keep bean in check i.e. a box of sunmaid raisins and with the treats in hand, he did a pretty good job coaxing bean

down the dining aisle walk.

The only (small) slip was when halfway through, bean decided to take a 10-second squating break... guess she must have gotten tired. Never mind, Mr. Best Man managed to coax her with more raisins and viola, bean soldiered on and fulfilled her duty..what a champ! :)

with mummy b4 her big debut

daddy's girl :)

ah ma and ah kong all dressed up and looking good

lets hold hands!

eh, can share some raisins or not?

radiant bride and groom

and the party begins with say han chek

The wedding was held at the historical 19th century Cheong Fatt Tze mansion. I was amazed at how huge the mansion was and can't help but to envy how well the rich people lived in the past. High ceilings ornately decorated, huge airy courtyards and halls, tons of big rooms (each the size of a small HDB flat), retro/old style furnishings - we got a fun dose of nostalgia from this stay :)

some pix taken during lunch...



and i like this pix of bean with her grandparents at gurney drive..very serene!

Fun in the snow

This year, we managed to organised 6 families to get chip in to rent a beautiful cabin at Lake Tahoe. Jin did a great job finding the cabin and lyn helped out with the boring admin arrangements. The cabin had 2 floors with 3 bedrooms on each floor, snooker table, huge kitchen with an island (my dream is to own a home with an island kitchen!), outdoor jacuzzi hot tub and a steam room. It was just the right size to house all 12 adults and 9 kids ( 3 babies) and a little dog.

we skied, had snowball fights, took the kids sledding and here's an attempt at a poorly constructed snowman.

Tom & Jerry

Lyn and I were really excited at the thought of the two little cousins entertaining and playing with each other ..how wrong we were!

Sophie seemed to enjoy taunting her older cousin while Ryan could not stand her playing with his toys so she got pushed and smacked..like a few times a day. Days were filled with No No , stop pushing, no smacking, no biting (sophie's latest nonsense) and time outs followed by tears :p

Despite the above, I think sophie missed her kor kor lots after we left ;)

Here are the two of them at 18 months and 2 years respectively.