Look Who Greets Us With Her Smile Every Morning . . .

Its Worth it ....

After eating three meals out of plastic boxes with aluminum covers, 18 hours in the air, 2 hours walking in the freaking cold Chicago weather and 5 hours on the Amtrak train. We were greeted with the biggest smile a 7 month old can ever give! That alone makes that 30 hours door to door traveling time all so worth it!

We are at my sister's place!!! 3 YAYS for the next 10 days of vegetating, Whole Foods and Trader Joe's shopping, couch potato-ing over Food Network, sister bonding and sophie ogling!!! Woke up this morning to Nigella Express, a cuppa of Ghirardelli hot choc, home-made biscuits and a bunch of Sophie cuteness!!

We're off to the markets today to pick up ingredients for a steak dinner! Pictures to come once the hubs gets over his jet-lag!

My weekend in bullets

• Did work at 7am on a Saturday morning! - I'm officially crazy
• Got my 1st Hep A + B shot
• Treated my folks & sister to the best chirashizushi @ Yoshida! (although according to the younger Koh, the uni still can't compare to Japan's sushi-zanmai)
• Got myself 3 pairs of leggings at Uniqlo's weekend 'Leggings Special'
• Heard from the hubs the life story of our hairdresser! Apparently he's celebrating the 20th anniversary of his very special life this year in style - a holiday to New York & Vegas.
  
• Was told that I have features that scream 'She's a Teochew ah niah'
• Packed suitcase A for holiday to Ann Arbor & Chicago!!Yippeeee!!!
  
• Packed suitcase B for work trip to NY, Pittsburgh, LA, San Fran & Seattle. Not so yippeee.
• Curl up under my blankkie watching DVD on a rainy Saturday afternoon
• Woke up at 6am on Sunday, this time for a nice 6km run
  
• Celebrated YeYe's 87th Birthday! 7 children, 5 children in-laws, 17 grandchildren, 5 grandchildren in-laws and 7 great grandchildren. Definitely what they call 'hang fuk' in Cantonese! (translation: blessed and fortunate)
• Vacuumed the car cos the hubs was too lazy to do it
• Had home-cooked Teochew muay (read porridge with tua guay, fried fish and fried egg with chye poh) for dinner, the kind of comfort food after a weekend of feasting and before the next 1 month of what I imagine to be greasy American food!
  

Kitchen Sunday

Spent my Sunday in the kitchen today, starting with whipping up a breakfast of French Toast for the family. What can be better than waking up to the smell of butter, eggs, vanilla extract and cinnamon all rolled in one -uhmmm!

Come evening, anchovies and lamb were the order of the day. Tiny lamb cutlets from the friendly people at the Swiss butchery were marinated in a mixture of thyme, salt and olive oil than grilled 4 minutes on each side on a hot pan - its that's easy! Everyone *loved* it! Pair this with pasta tossed in a mixture of white onions, sliced in half-rings and sauteed in extra virgin olive oil till soft with slices of anchovy fillets incorporated nicely into it - carbo bliss!

The best part of cooking - hearing my dad say - "we clean up everything, dry man, dry"!

Fix Your Eyes on Him

Since, then, you have been raised with Christ,
set your hearts on things above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.
Colossians 3:1-2

This is my prayer today.