Keukenhof, Lisse

Sometime last year at the end of April, we went to vist one of the many attractions here in Holland and that is the beautiful tulip garden in Lisse, at that time most of the tulips were opened so you won't get to see tulips in bulbs, I personally like the tulips in bulbs...The next opening season of Keukenhof is 19/03 - 21/05 2009 ~ www.keukenhof.nl The pictures that I will be sharing today are not new pictures but nevertheless I hope you will still enjoy the blooms.............

Island trip

This is Mataking Island where we spent some of our summer vacation last year....It's a nice place to relax and unwind....It was both mine and Tonnie's 1st time coming out to this island. Before this I never knew this island existed as I was a frequent visitor to Sipadan and Mabul islands but never have I heard of Mataking Island, so when a friend asked me if we wanted to join them, I jumped on the chance......

Speed boat trip to island

Almost reaching the jetty

Welcome to Mataking Island as the sign-board says

Part of the dining area

One of the luxurious chalet on the island

This was our chalet room

Mataking Kecil

During low tide, you can walk from Mataking Besar to Mataking Kecil

I sure love walking on this clean white sandy beach

Picture seems so unreal, it is just so peaceful out here

9 years

Today the 7th July, we are celebrating the 9th year of us together as husband and wife. It has been a straight road so far with some curves, pod holes and winding roads in between as well....but I don't actually have anything to complain about our marriage, no marriage is all perfect all year round, just like roads, there tend to be pod holes along the way and which needs mending from time to time and in this case with some tender loving care towards each other after that bikkering is always good. Some misunderstandings at times makes us love each other even more after that heart to heart. We tend to appreciate each other even more not that we take each other for granted but sometimes some excitement is needed to jerk each others heart, good for the soul....LOL...........

So let's see what we did for this wedding anniversary :

It's our 9th Wedding Anniversary this year, we sort of celebrated it on 6th July, I don't really call it a celebration cause we still had our girls who came along with us for dinner....In the afternoon we went out to town, had a splendid time walking and sight seeing around town, did some shopping and went home. Later that evening we wanted to have pancakes for dinner, went to 2 different pancake restaurants and they were all fully booked.....at the end we ended up at a Chinese Restaurant.....as it was close to 6pm we decided to just go for their buffet which turned out to be quite alright after all....food was good as it is not that easy to find good chinese food in this part of the country where I live, most of the time the chinese food would have been europeanise to suite the taste of the Dutch...

I am sorry that I don't have pictures of us taken at the restaurant, had to entertain the girls and at the same time being hungry, so I have only these 2 pictures below taken 2 days after our anniversary and this is how we look like 9 years later all wrinkled and grey........

So there you go, that was how we celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary......next year we'll be married for a decade......hope we'll make it?? I am sure we will :))

(Candid shot)

What's for dinner tonight?

Let me tell you what am I going to feed my husband and children for dinner tonight....

Well, a few days ago I decided that I wanted to cook soup for dinner, it's actually a Dutch soup and it's called 'groente soup' a.k.a vegetable soup.....but like the Chinese that likes to europeanise their Chinese food I too have turned the Dutch soup into Chinese style soup, sort of., LOL

For the Dutch, they normally put in pork, pork meat and meat balls with fine chopped vegetable (spring onions, carrots, cauliflower), they'll also add in maggie powdered taste enhancer, vegetable soup cubes and last but not least 4 liters of water....and they or my in-laws normally will boil their soup in a pressure pan...

2 years ago, I thought why don't I do it in the slow cooker instead, with all the above same ingredients I will put into the slow cooker and I will also add in red dates, 'kei chee' and dried longans and with the low indication simmer it over night...the next morning, I will add in chinese mushroom and taufoo as well and continue simmering for another few hours till dinner time.

(Sorry, almost finish then remember to take picture)

The result of the soup, wowwiieee, very yummy and sweet and very easy to prepare, cook a pot of rice and there you go, dinner is served......easy peasy for this lazy mammi....and the girls just love the taste of the soup.

A Wish I'd Like to Share

Recently, I overheard a mother and daughter in their last moments Together at the airport. They had announced the departure. Standing near the security gate, they huged, and the mother said, 'I love you, and I wish you enough.' The daughter replied, 'Mom, our life together has been more than enough. Your love is all I ever needed. I wish you enough, too, Mom. 'They kissed, and the daughter left. The mother walked over to the window Where I was seated. Standing there, I could see she wanted and needed to cry. I tried not to intrude on her privacy, but she welcomed me in by asking, 'Did you ever say good-bye to someone knowing it would be forever? 'Yes, I have,' I replied. 'Forgive me for asking, but why is this a forever good-bye?' 'I am old, and she lives so far away. I have challenges ahead, and the reality is - her next trip back will be for my funeral,' she said. 'When you were saying good-bye, I heard you say, 'I wish you enough. May I ask what that means?' She began to smile. 'That's a wish that has been handed down from other generations.' 'My parents used to say it to everyone.' She paused a moment and looked up as if trying to remember it in detail, and she smiled even more.

'When we said, 'I wish you enough,' we were wanting the other person to have a life filled with just enough good things to sustain them. 'Then, turning towards me, she shared the following as if she were reciting it from memory.
I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright no matter how gray the day may appear.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun even more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive and everlasting.
I wish you enough pain so that even the smallest of joys in life may appear bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.
I wish you enough hellos to get you through the final good-bye.

Then, she began to cry, and walked away.

They say, it takes a minute to find a Special person, an hour to Appreciate them, a day to Love them, but an entire life to Forget them.

TAKE TIME TO LIVE.....To all my friends and loved ones, I WISH YOU ENOUGH........

Hmmm, so it's Friday today and weekend will start in a few hours.....now that's how fast the days are going by, another week is over and we are now almost at the end of the 27th week of the year, so before it goes by let me blog a little here.

Let's see, I think I am going to talk about today's weather, right now it is gloomy and cloudy outside and it's 16 degrees celcius at this moment, it was between 20-21 degrees celcius yesterday and it was 30-32 degrees celcius the day before yesterday.....and it's gonna stay between 20-24 degrees celcius for the next few days.

I love the weather most when it's between 15 degrees to 25 degrees, beyond that it can be too warm for me sometimes. I know that I come from a tropical climate country where the temperature is as high as 32 degrees and as low as 25 or 26 degrees in the day time and it shouldn't be a problem for me, well not that it's a problem but the hotness here, you will feel as if the sun is piercing through your skin like pinching and burning, plus you will feel as if your face is about to crack from dryness here too as well....when it is hot and dry, it is really hot and dry and so humid....even Samantha by just playing under the sun, she'll turn into charcoal in a few hours....well I shouldn't complain, I should enjoy the sun and hotness as much as I can cause that's good for our body actually....plus we don't have so many hot days in a year, just that few summer months.....It's still not too hot now, the hotter months are yet to come, it is most hottest between mid August till mid September here where I am then it will start to cool off....anyway it is time to go to the beach, must make a trip there one of these days, need to make use of all these warm hot days to do these kind of activities......so to all bloggers, have a fantastic summer ya all and I am sure I will too......:)

5 months

Greetings my fellow bloggers, happy July to all of you, hope this month of July will be a good month to all of us.

Anyway I am gonna blog about the title above, 5 months, why 5 months? Am I right if I say that some of you will be thinking that I am already 5 months expecting, nah, that is not it, anyway that will never ever happen.......my days of expecting (a baby) is over, not gonna happen anymore in this life time......

Alright let me continue, right now I am so happy that I can shout my lungs out but oooppss can't do that, Nicole is sleeping next to me.....the reason for my happiness is that I received an e-mail this morning from my uncle saying that he has earned a scholarship from EU to do Special Education Need in London, Amsterdam and Prague. His time in Holland is for 5 long months, isn't that wonderful, my uncle will be here that long.....never have I a visiting relative staying here in Holland for such a long period, I think my parents stayed here the longest when they came to visit a few years ago and that was only for 2 weeks.......so from now till the time that my uncle is gonna be here, we will be busy around the house, getting as much work done as possible, there's still a lot of things that we want to do in the house......right now I am so smiling......