Decorate…

Well, it’s finally here! It’s Chinese New Year’s Eve today!

My missus had been busy baking all kinds of cookies and we did buy a few too like the kuih bangkit, the lek tau ko and the pineapple jam tart, for instance and there are also the ones from Singapore, from my niece and my ex-student.

She did not make any cakes this year though as she never got used to the oven that we bought some two years ago. So far, she had never bothered to try and bake during ordinary times to see how she could get it right so we just went out and bought some and I still have the fruit pudding (including the smaller one which we never got to eat during Christmas) and also the butter cake in the freezer. I guess the pudding, with all the rum in it, would be fine but I am not to sure about the butter cake. We’ll see when the time comes.

Then there was all that cooking that she did and now, it’s all done. Hopefully, I will remember to take some photographs to share in a later post. Of course I’ve been busy too, cleaning and wiping and all and working on the decorations of the house. For us here, this is something like putting the Christmas tree in countries abroad and hanging up the wreath and mistletoe and whatever here and there in the house and outside.

I made a few of those ang pao lanterns but since they are made of paper, I decided to hang them inside…

…safe from the sun and the rain and the moist conditions outside especially at night…

 I also made two smaller ones and two mini ones to hang outside…

…together with the little lanterns and the mini bags that I bought from the shops here plus some ang pao packets for some additional red and gold colours. Then, I hung up two lanterns from previous years, dangling from the ceiling to fill up the space above.

My missus bought these Chinese paper cuttings from the mall near my house so I stuck them to the glass…

They are only RM2.50 each, real cheap, I must say.

Hello from the other side!!!

LOL!!! Initially, I stuck those ang pao packets from a bank in Singapore but I thought that did not look all that nice so I removed them…

…and seeing that it was a little bare, I took out my old strings of firecrackers…

…and there you have it! All done, and ready to usher in the Chinese New Year, the Year of the Monkey.

Qong Xi Fa Cai, everybody, 新年快樂!!! May God bless us all abundantly in the year ahead. Cheers!!!