Chinese New Year 2015

The first CNY for Baby Orange!

CNY At Home

Papa cooked the CNY eve dinner this year at home. That's because usually we have to be on time for dinner outside during CNY time, and that is lacking. So it is better he cook for everyone even though he just amateur cook. Some dishes he "cheated" like rendang and kangkung belacan he used packet mix :) The stir-fry roasted pork he bought the porkie from stall. And the salad prawn batter is just store-bought type. The only help I gave is making the salad for salad prawn, using Kewpie mayonnaise haha.....

We did a Sakae Sushi lou sang takeaway at home :)
Didi got scalded by hot kettle during CNY visit to Ah Kong house, see the scald mark on his arm?

Our CNY eve reunion dinner cooked by Papa.
I didn't post adults photos as Papa took it badly :P
Missing Cousin Ally this year as she was in UK.

Children in their new pajamas for CNY eve - all cartoons again

CNY At School (年初六回校庆新年)

The children had a week's holiday from school. On the 6th day of CNY, they go back to school for CNY celebration at school. This is the school's tradition every year to have children come back to school in new clothes or traditional costumes. They got angpao from their class teachers too.

Cherry in cheongsam and Didi in his traditional costume.
He match it with jeans as this was his costume for 6 years old kindy concert.

Didi shake hands with Ms Chan and getting his angpao.
Second year he gets angpao at school. 

Cherry in her cheongsam getting angpao from Ms Tenh.
Fifth year she gets angpao at school.

Going home after CNY celebration at school

CNY shopping and makan 

What is CNY without more shopping and makan right? Went for many shopping trips and makan on the side. Remember that CNY is extremely crowded at Penang, so we try not to go those tourist spots. Traffic is bad at all main roads too as our roads are really much narrower compared to KL.

Irrawaddy Fine Foods brunch, Cherry had Egg Omelette Sandwich and hot chocolate. Didi had Chicken Schnitzel.
I had Full English Breakfast,  and Papa ordered Pasta Carbonara set. Baby Orange shared with us. 

Gurney Paragon red lanterns. Love the blue sky!

Lunch at Angus House. Only I had steak :P

Outside Angus House, Gurney Paragon

12 Animal Zodiac CNY decoration at Queensbay Mall.
They took photos with all our Chinese animal zodiacs.

Queensbay Mall CNY 2015 decorations

More Queensbay Mall CNY decorations. Really elaborate.,,,

Children at Daorae Korean Restaurant.
No mood for Chinese food during CNY due to overcrowding.

Baby Orange dancing and trying watermelon

Baby Orange: More, more mum mum!

And that sums up Chinese New Year 2015! Same every year hahaha......

Chinese New Year celebrations 2014

Another year of celebration, this year the children didn't have a week long holiday but the good thing is they didn't need to do Saturday school replacements. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Definitely like holidays but if need to have Saturday school replacement, might as well we don't have holiday for all the trouble it gives.

This year, 大姑 and family came to our home for CNY celebration. 爸爸 cooked a simple dinner for 除夕CNY eve dinner :)

After dinner, we had a celebration for the January kids in the family.

Posing with cute cupcakes from Thung's mommy - My Wonder Cake Fantasy

CNY eve dinner kids' style

On the first day of CNY, it's the usual visiting relatives round for my side of the family. Then, it was dinner at Straits Quay and 拜拜 at 玄母殿.

One of the eateries that opened at Straits Quay on first day of CNY

See the beautiful lights at 玄母殿 floating temple during CNY :) Kek Lok Si Temple is always so crowded, so alternatively we came to 玄母殿 floating temple.

This is on the way to the 玄母殿 floating temple

On the second day of CNY, 大姑 cooked a delicious lunch for us. We also had 捞生 at home, with a takeaway pack from Sakae Sushi.

School reopens on the 5th day of CNY. The children get to wear traditional costume or new clothes to school. They get an ang pao each from school PIBG. Before CNY holidays, they were given a mandarin orange each.

弟弟 wears light green chinese style shirt with jeans, and getting his angpao from Teacher Ang

姐姐 showing her angpao, she wears cream coloured cheongsam

She's in the second row in the middle

Going home after CNY celebration at school. 

Chinese New Year visits and activities

A minimalist approach to Chinese New Year. Not as heavy traffic compared to yesterday where everywhere was almost a standstill.

On CNY eve, we had buffet lunch with 公公, 婆婆 and Ah Kong at Cafe Laurel, Evergreen Laurel Hotel (公公 likes it there as not so crowded). The children enjoyed desserts, ice-creams and lemon tea from the coffee/tea counter. Main dishes were just side dishes to them :) We only took one photo as too busy eating and they got too messy for photos.

Mains - The oranges were decorations but 公公 took for them :P

I wanted to give the children something they like during CNY eve so they get to choose their breakfast. It's home-style fried eggs and sausages haha. I'm not a traditionalist and couldn't make them anything traditional for CNY, so I'm pretty happy with their choice. Otherwise if it's up to 爸爸, we'd be having hawker fare breakfast - which is not my style at all.

The children in their new pajamas.
姐姐 in Hello Kitty pajamas and 弟弟 in Cars pajamas.

姐姐 got a mandarin orange for good luck from PIBG on the last day of school. She's one of the temporary class monitors so she and the other class monitor counted and carried the box of mandarin oranges back to the class for distribution to her classmates.

She appreciated the mandarin orange from school a whole lot, maybe because she laboured to select and carry them to her class

Chinese New Year eve dinner prepared by 爸爸。Everything is nice except the 炒沙葛 was too sweet :P

Hehe our homecooked CNY eve dinner

On Chinese New Year 初一, we went to 拜拜 at Guan Yin Temple 观音亭 after lunch. So crowded, part of the main altar is under repair so everyone's squashed to the side. 姐姐 and 爸爸 犯太岁 this year so they had extra prayers.

Another year of 拜拜 at Guan Yin Temple 观音亭

On the way back we saw a Marking George Town sculpture "Untrained Parakeet" on King Street near to where we parked. We actually missed one right at the junction of Lebuh China.

Untrained Parakeet sculpture on King Street

At night, we visited Hean Boo Thean floating temple 玄母殿 along Weld Quay. We followed the big sign to turn as we came from Jelutong Expressway. The children loved this place as it is breezy and cool. It's decorated very brightly and nicely for Chinese New Year. See them smiling brightly for the photos :) Of course it's 拜拜 first before taking photos and sight-seeing. There's numbering on the 香炉 and indication how many joss stick to put, very thoughtful for visitors.

On the platform facing main altar

The main altar

Sight-seeing around 玄母殿 Hean Boo Thean floating temple.

Facing the sea

On the first floor where 南海观世音菩萨与金童玉女 prayer altar is housed.

There are many pots of chrysenthemum as decorations around the temple - lovely!

View from the first floor

Komtar in the background

These are statues depicting 二十四孝之故事

View from the temple.

Komtar in the background again, and there's a boat taking visitors from the temple to the heritage clan jetties

Interesting finds inside the temple.

Dragon pillar and lanterns inside the temple. There's a lighted mobile prayer altar that looked like from past procession.

CNY decorations

The second day 老姑 visited with the children's cousins. Everyone's growing up so fast.

姐姐, 弟弟, cousins 靖, 纬，裕

At the playground where the aunties, uncles and cousins are staying in Penang.
And lunch with 捞生 (爸爸 only got the back of the children's heads :P)

With Cousin Rachel, she's 14 now

Around the playground