O' Christmas Tree

What can a Christmas tree cookie cutter do? Here're three things:

1) Christmas Tree decorations

Our Christmas tree was looking pathetically underdressed so I decided to hand-make some extra decorations using some green, red and white felt cloth. I bought a pack of kiddie craft glitters, beads and buttons and had some fun with KK and XX pasting the shiny beads onto the felt cut-outs.

This one's decorated by KK.

2) Christmas Card

Trace the shape on felt, sew on a few beads, glue on a glittering string and paste it on a card paper to make a special card!

3) Christmas Cookies

And of course, Christmas cookies! Drizzle some chocolate across the trees, sprinkle some hundreds and thousands and voila! A delicious and edible Christmas treat!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Christmas time is here

Christmas is drawing near and my sister asked me in an email how's our Christmas like in Australia. I replied that it's as usual, visiting friends who had invited us to their house, giving presents and children receiving/opening presents. When I had a chance to give it deeper thoughts later, I realised that I hadn't painted her the whole picture.

Sure, it is universal that during Christmas season, the shopping centers (and even some houses) are gaily decorated - Christmas trees, glittering lights, artificial snow flake cutouts and inflatable Santa Clauses. The tradition of presents (or pressies as they call it here) giving helps the toy departments generate their highest sales of the year and keeps the cash register merrily ringing. One can't help but get rolled into the festive mood as year-end party invitations roll in. But as far as Australia's concerned, that's where all the similarity ends.

Despite our four seasons, we are on the wrong side of the equator. So banish any childhood illusions about a snow-filled white winter wonderland and forget any fantasies about singing christmas carols by a warm fireplace or making Frosty the snowman outside your house. I just realised that all our favourite christmas carols ("I'm dreaming of a white christmas...", "In the meadow we can build a snowman...") were created for the people in the Northern Hemisphere and not very suitable down south. Even Santa Claus. The big old man would be suffering heat stroke in his thick beard and fur-lined red suit here. His reindeer is better off replaced with a Toyota 4-wheel drive and a trailer instead of sleigh.


Instead of arriving our hosts' houses in winter boots and wrapped in scarves, people will most likely wear slippers and bring chilled beers. Roast turkey and Christmas ham still feature popularly in the menus but it is more likely that people will do an outdoor BBQ, with sizzling sausages and a cold salad. The Aussies slap on the SPF 30+ sunblocks and head to the beaches and parks during this time of the year for picnics, BBQs and sun tanning.


Since I come from tropical Singapore, I hadn't noticed much difference between my past Christmases and now. But I wonder for people who had come to live in Australia from the northern parts of the world, how would they feel about the absolute difference in Christmas temperature and scenary. Is their Christmas mood affected in any way?


Despite all these, the Aussies for a fact enjoy their Christmas anyway. There might be a total fire ban, it's stinkin hot and there're lots of flies. But who cares. It's the end of the year, school summer holidays has started and what better excuse to have a good time with family and friends. The Aussies have a great sense of humour and to end off, I'll like to share a Fair Dinkum Aussie Christmas song by Bucko & Champs. It's rewritten to the tune of the Australian anthem. For those who know the tune, try singing it.

Australians Let Us Barbecue

Australians let us barbeque for Christmas time is here

A time to stop and rest a bit, and psych up for New Year

On patterned plastic tablecloth we'll eat our pudding up

And drink a Christmas cordial in polystyrene cup

Australians let us barbeque for Christmas time is here

The time we sing that silly song 'Pa Ruppa Pum Pum Pum'

We'll fa la la and ho ho ho, and all that Christmas stuff

We'll crack a gag with Pop and Gran, and chuckle our heads off

Australians let us go for broke in backyards great and small

With Christmas gifts and outdoor chairs, with cricket bat and ball

We'll pass the salad dressing round, we'll eat potato chips

And compliment the hostess on a great French onion dip

With sausages and coleslaw too, then let us barbeque

To all my readers, have a Merry Christmas and a wonderful new year!

Christmas Holidays

My Christmas Present to Hubby

Time passes really fast. After XX's birthday celebration, we attended another birthday party the next Saturday, then a few days later, it's Christmas Eve already. It was a quiet Christmas Eve for us. We had a simple dinner of Chicken Rice. No roasted turkey, but it's still a bird nonetheless...hee.

Christmas Day, the kids opened the rest of their presents from the Grandparents and aunties/uncles in S'pore. They merrily ripped away while it's constant collecting and crushing of loose wrappers and boxes for us. They were the happiest and luckiest that day as we attended 2 gatherings and they collected more presents.

After breakfast, I started to get busy, making 'Lo Mai Fan' (Glutinous Rice) for the lunch gathering. It was well-received and we came home in the afternoon so XX can have a nap. While he was asleep, I made some Gingerbread Man cookies for the evening party. In between, I also made some Min Jiang Kueh for tea as a pilot friend of Hubby was in town and he came over to our place.

We were dead tired by the time we reached home at about 11pm. But I still can't go to bed yet. As Hubby sent his friend back to the hotel, I started packing. Yes, we're leaving for a short holiday the next day and we've not even started packing. Procastination is the word. I think we went to bed at about 1am that night.

The next morning, Boxing Day, I got out of bed at about 8am, awoken by XX. Which was just as well. Cos I'm heading for the Boxing Day SALES happening everywhere! I found out at the party that evening before that over here on Boxing Day, retail stores everywhere slashed their prices up to 70% for some crazy 'Stocktaking' 'Clearance' Sale. Many big stores even open early. In downtown Myers, people will start to queue up outside the store as early as 4am to wait for the doors to open at 6am. It's that good that some of the friends there were talking at meeting each other for shopping at 6 or 7 in the morning!

Well, I didn't go down to Myers as there wasn't anything much that I was looking to buy there. But I did go to Spotlight to try my luck for a sewing machine that I've been thinking of buying. The store was having a 20% storewide discount. Still not good enough to meet my budget. However I did end up buying the rotary cutter, cutting mat and quilter's ruler at 20% less. I also got 2 kids sleeping bags at 50% discount over at Big W's and some good quality chocolates at 40% off.

By 1pm, we've started our drive to our holiday destination at Ballarat. I was so tired that I actually slept in the car. (I don't easily fall asleep in cars these days.) I thought that these few days should be good for me to catch up a little on my rest but the first night here proved me wrong.

Find out what happened in the next post!

A Transformed Christmas

How did you celebrate Christmas? In the last decade, the way I celebrated Christmas has evolved. From evangelising at 'Come Celebrate Christmas' and cell group parties, Christmas has transformed into a hectic schedule of gift wrappings and a time of fun for the kids and gatherings with family and friends.

From 22nd Dec, the merrying began. We met up with one of our favourite friend and his family, including 2 kids for dinner at Jacob's Cafe. There, KK and XX has fun dancing to the music of a guitarist playing Christmas songs. (See video below.) It ended with ice-cream and coffee at the Changi Village hotel.

The next evening, we gathered at my sister's place for more feasting of coca cola pork ribs, roast leg of lamb, chicken nuggets and salad including my contribution of spagetti cabonara. There, KK received his 3rd, 4th and 5th Transformers toy (Arcee, Swindle, watch) this Christmas. He had earlier received his 1st two Transformers (Bonecrusher and Landmine). This year is truly a 'Transformers Christmas' for KK.

Christmas Eve, KK woke up with a fever. We had no choice but to leave him at home as we proceeded to Hubby's sister's place. This turned out to be a hilarious evening. My brother-in-law's got a really bubbly and fun family, including a twin sister who's 7 months pregnant. Yet she's still sporting enough to dress up as santa claus (no need for fake tummy) to distribute her gifts. Even her 3 year old son couldn't recognise her! There were strange but meaning-filled gifts for everyone, like a carrot, peanut butter and even a pineapple!

On Christmas day itself, we headed to our long-time friend Melvin's house for another fun-filled evening of games for the children. We must really thank him and his wife for organising this party for the past 2 years. I know KK will have a great time as all his old friends (kids of our 'gang') will be there. This 'gang', we've been friends since uni days, when we were still single. Along the way, we've gotten married and had children. Nowadays, when our kids play, we adults will take this chance to catch up.

As the clock strikes twelve, the gift wrapper tearing will halt and the 'merry christmas' SMSs will stop. For the children and us, we are transformed back to our normal routine. But for KK at least, he'll keep busy transforming his Autobots and Decepticons.

Merry Christmas, Everyone!