Oh The Humanity!!!

One of my "thing" (among many many many many others) is nail polish. My toes and fingers are always painted. I got it from my mum though. For as long as I can remember, Mum has always painted her digits. So it's in my genes. As long as we are on the topic, my dad is a SUPER shopaholic. My shopping antics pale (PALE I TELL YA) in comparison to his. So again, it's in my genes. Resistance is futile. There has gotta be an obese ancestor with a crazy sweet-tooth lurking around on our family tree.

Pretty right?

Or is it? Haha, darn toe nail got caught in my jeans while I was getting dressed and the thing came off.

Sniff sniff. I am strangely fascinated by the grossness lurking underneath the nail. And yes, a closeup is warranted. Pardon my weirdly-shaped toes as they are deformed from years of heels-wearing. Again, my mother's fault. I used to clunk along in her heels in the afternoons (when she was safely having her arvo naps and couldn't tell me off!!) when I was 6 or 7.

Hope you weren't eating when you read this. If you were, well serve you right. Who asked you to surf while eating? This will teach you a lesson you so richly deserved.

Mum and Dad's Visit in June 2011

Mum and Dad visited us in June as it was Isaac's first birthday on June 2nd. Some of the big milestones he experienced while Mum and Dad were here included:

Learning to crawl properly instead of the weird breastroke thing he was doing:

Smirking (well he knew how to do this all along actually):



Hoisting himself up with the help of nearby stationary objects:



Getting used to having photos taken by the paparazzi:

The boy has expensive food tastes. He takes after his Ee Ee:

Family photo on his birthday:

Extended family photo:

First taste of birthday cake (right before he swelled up like a balloon because he's allergic to eggs):

Eating baby yoghurt (which tastes like crap):

First ride at the mall (yes, it's moving Ah Here. People actually put coins in these things, believe it or not):


Check out his death grip haha:

Mum cooked up a huge feast on one of the last nights she was here. Well, actually she cooked up a feast every other night for a month but this was even more OTT than usual:

Must-have dish - siew york:

Yummilicious fried noodles with oodles of ingredients (see what I did there???? Logan should be so proud of me.):

Don't let this dish fool you. It is not just simply chicken. No no, that would be insulting to Mrs Hii's cooking abilities. This was crispy chicken with a bottom layer of taro. Oh so good.

Oven-grilled prawns with cheese:

Squid stuffed with fried rice. Mum was inspired after watching a Masterchef episode. Only inspiration I get when I watch Masterchef is the constant need to eat. Hmmmm....

I also surprised Mel with a cake. Ok, Mum forced me to and so I half-heartedly made a Banana and Nutella cake. Hehe poor Mel was surprised with a homemade cake... to add insult to injury, it wasn't iced AND there was a gigantic hole at the surface. Meh.

Check out the super trendy super chic not-at-all-gaudy candles haha:

Uncle Jayden torturing Isaac with his puppy-like affections as usual:

Isaac: You looking at me, kid?

Isaac: WTF?

While ugly, the cake was yum! Half of it was gone pretty much straightaway. Ok I ate 2/3 of it. Shaddup.

The parental units then headed off to Melbourne to be slaves to the two brats.

Kompia - Yummy Foochow Goodness

I had a lot of kompia left in the freezer that Mum brought over from Sibu so I decided to attempt to make the fatty stewed pork with gravy that goes with kompia like salt and pepper, fish and chips, ice cream and choc sauce, etc etc, you get the idea. By attempt, I mean i found pre-mised sachet sauce mixes for the stew at Tofu Shop. Haha all I had to do was chop up some garlic, stir in some soy sauce and pour in some water. Turn the pressure cooker on, chuck the kompia in the oven and voila, manna from Heaven an hour later. Yum yum yum. Not as good as Mum's stew obviously but it will do.

Bit ugly and not at all artistic because i was more interested in shoving it into my mouth than documenting it. Heheh.

Whoopee Pies from The Caker

Whoopee pies are apparently the next BIG thing after cupcakes and macaroons so obviously I HAD to try them . I have been reading this Auckland baker's blog for a while now and she posted an entry saying she was making them for sale. So I jumped in and bought ummm .. a couple. I ordered half a dozen each of salted caramel and peanut butter. Yum! Jordan aka the baker was so sweet, she chucked in a few more for free. Great for my wallet, bad for my waistline.

Cuuuuttteeeeeee packaging.

Oh hello there, my little crumbly darlings. This was the salted caramel I think(!).



Whoopee pies are like a cross between a cake and a biscuit and look like a giant macaroon. They taste even better a few days' old, kinda like how spag bol and lasagne always taste better a few days later. All that yummy flavours needed a few days to soak through, I reckon.

Peanut butter ones....





I am pretty sure I ate half of these babies. Don't ask me which flavour I liked better. It would be like asking me which one of my nephew and nieces is my favourite. Shsssssh it's a secret. I can't tell you.

Mel's Birthday Cake

Heaps of entries to catch up on because I'm running about 2 months behind in my posting but this one can't wait. The cake I commissioned for Mel's birthday dinner with her mates. Andrew is too honest and fessed up about the cake so I am free to take all the glory for it. Freeeeeeeeeeeee. OH yeah Viv helped with the colour scheme because I have no imagination and couldn't imagine it in my head. I thought baby pink and black would look way too weird but it turned out very well. I should be a party co-ordinator. It's so purrrrrrrrretty.

I think Mel was happy with it. Hard to tell since Hii girls are so hard to please! A more in-depth post about the night will follow very very soon. I think.

Royal Easter Show + Dinner at The Mulberry

Back in Easter, I went to the Royal Easter Show with Damon. I haven't been since I was 16 on my birthday!! Verdict: Way overpriced and a waste of time. I did come home with bags of gourmet nuts that I bought from one of the food stands though so all is not lost!

Art exhibition:


Animal competitions:



What Mum must have felt like after popping out 6 kids in 12 years:

What Mum felt like while feeding Monica when she was a (big hungry) baby:

Kiddie rides:

Haha this reminded me of all the mind-numbing rides Monica had to go on with Lauren:


Then we headed out into the open where the adult rides and more importantly, where the FOOD were!!

Balloons......

Pony rides:

Rides galore:



Games that have been rigged so the most you'll ever get for your $5 and efforts is a $0.50 plastic junk. Probably.... carnies, don't sue me!



The obligatory ghost house/train:

I can never go past a Haunted House without thinking about the anecdote re Mel. She was in Singapore with Monica many many many maaaaaany moons ago when they decided to go to one. They got inside the front entrance and nothing had happened yet at that stage. Mel started screaming in the dark, closed her eyes and ran all the way to the exit. True story.

Anyway we were too cheapskate so we didn't go on any rides. We did stuff our faces with a giant bag of cotton floss candy and an overpriced hot dog though. After that we headed off to dinner at Mulberry as I got a good deal for a 2 course meal + a cocktail each. Yay for cheap daily deals.
Here's Damon with his girlie drink and my appletini.

Entree for Damon: Prawn cocktail

Mine was the pork belly... oh so good. Check out the thin crispy piece of crackling! Mopped the whole thing up. Yum!

Innards shot of ma pork belly:

I chose a healthier main : fish of some sort. Can't remember the details now but it was really good too. Nice and tender, flavoursome.

Damon's steak and mash:

We were big spenders so we got 2 sides too which weren't part of the (cheap) deal. Beans and mushrooms. They were ok.

I decided that dinner wasn't calorific enough so I got a cheesecake to share with Damon. I said share but really it was MINE. All mine. Twas good.