This year, by wonderful coincidence, Chinese New Year falls on the same day as Australia Day.

Perhaps I hoped for a more creative combination of the two cultures – barbecued roast duck, mushrooms in vegemite sauce, crab and beer soup. But I suppose it’s best not to mess with tradition.

We had huge reunion dinner at my grandmother’s house, with my whole Chinese family! It was so much fun! So nice to see all the little cousins and grandchildren grow up.

I found the stash of Chinese New Year cookies. Some hand made by my aunties. It brought back so many memories of being a kid. We used to snack on this stuff for weeks. Until our bellies were full and our cheeks were raw from all the sugar and peanuts.

These days, I don’t give my kids any of these snacks as liberally as my parents did for us. In fact, I don’t eat of lot of this stuff anymore.

But today I couldn’t help it. I opened up each jar, one by one, savouring each one, remembering the weird and wonderful flavours. Remembering my childhood favourites – the love letters!

After dinner and dessert, my grandmother, the oldest and most senior in our family, made all the little grandchildren and great-grandchildren line up to receive an ang pow.

When Callum received his, he crept up to me with a very worried look on his face. He whispered, “I don’t mean to be rude, but I think Ah Tai forgot to put money in this ang pow! Should I tell her before everyone finds out?”

I had to laugh. “Dude. She’s giving you PAPER MONEY OK?”

Ah, it was a great evening.

A few weeks ago, I was in Singapore and by complete co-incidence, so was the incredibly popular Malaysian blogger, Kenny Sia.

We finally had the chance to meet up! Unfortunately, our individual schedules were pretty full and we only managed to chat for a few minutes. I would have loved to catch up over coffee – but it was not to be. Nevertheless, I was not disappointed. He is exactly like I imagined him from his blog!

Kenny writes about his adventures of being a regular, down-to-earth, 20-something Asian guy, feeling and living life to the full. From political satire, to random toilet humour, to extraordinary life experiences – his topics always put a smile on my face.

I love the fact that, although I am not Malaysian and I often do not understand some of the lingo or current affairs of Malaysia… nonetheless, he’ll just get straight to the point, and make me double over with laughter. Or, I might find myself peering a little closer at his photo-documentary-style account of some astonishing adventure.

His posts are superbly crafted. Whether he’s aiming for pure entertainment value, random hysterics, controversy, a cute little story, or a moment of thought – he seems to do it with a very natural and unique style, a very Kenny Sia style. He’s a very clever blogger, and he deserves the astonishing and loyal readership he has.

Although I don’t really know him on a personal level, I see him as a very real human, not “one of the world’s most popular bloggers”.

I know he has lived in Perth, my home town, and studied at the same university I did. I know his sister, and his nephew and nieces. I know about his father’s sickness and passing.

Kenny is tuned into all that life has to offer, and shows it to the world in his own, unique way. He’s brave enough to show us his heart, and to poke fun of his own celebrity.

So here are a few of my favourite Kenny Sia posts:

Three Years – where he writes a very touching letter to his late father.

Twenty Four – where he makes an enjoyable lists of things he has done at the age of 24. And you can’t help but be inspired to make a similar list.

The Making Of Mister Potato’s ‘Fish’ – the weird and wonderful life of being a blog celebrity. Hilarious strangeness.

Underwater Photography – a simple but charming commentary of scuba diving, which made me chuckle.

Kuala Lumpur International Marathon 2006 – where he has a crazy idea and pursues it. He admits he is overweight, yet enters and FINISHES a 42km marathon, with a very entertaining commentary.

I am actually looking forward to the time Kenny has kids. I am sure that his take on fatherhood and that amazing adventure of parenting will surely be the most entertaining yet!

Cheers Kenny!

Last night, 35 of my closest friends joined me to celebrate my birthday over a banquet dinner. I had such a wonderful time talking to everyone, laughing, chatting, eating, floating, taking pictures and just being me.

The company of great friends is priceless indeed.

I thought the photo above was just too cute – the lovely Annika and Ian are crouching down, because they’re actually a full head taller than me!

We stretched along one wall of the restaurant, spread over 3 long, narrow tables!

As with most large group dinners with a mixture of friends, everyone didn’t get a chance to mingle very much, so I was toying with the idea of making everyone shuffle along – speed dating style. But the food came out! So everyone was too busy eating.

My outfit for the evening.

Dress: Silk Smock Dress from Obvious
Earrings: From Pinc
Legs: Beige Fishnet Stockings
Shoes: Black pumps

There’s a few more pics at my “Doing The Karen Cheng” Facebook Group.

I was actually planning to wear another dress that I specially bought for the occasion, but I ended up wearing that dress to my other birthday function in Singapore.

I’m also sporting my new birthday present! We decided to invest in a DSLR Nikon D80 with a very yummy 18-135mm lens.

It’s a tad heavier than my little Canon A700, but I’m completely loving it!!

We don’t usually take our kids to the movies!

With my two boys and their insurmountable fountain of energy, going out to the movies is rather unwise. Think about it – jumping on the seats, running down the aisles, crawling under seats, shouting, laughing and carrying on like wet market vendors.

We prefer to have our own movie nights at home, with a rented DVD, homemade tacos, hot popcorn, orange juice and chocolate muffins. Mmmm.

But sometimes, seeing a movie on the big screen, with all the ritual of getting there, does make a nice change. And because it was the school holidays, winter, pouring with rain outside, and well, we were feeling lazy… we thought what the heck. And Sean has never been to the movies.

We watched Kung Fu Panda, and omg, it was so cool. We laughed and laughed. We all enjoyed it so much. And my boys actually stayed in their seats throughout the whole movie!

It was such a nice way to spend the afternoon. I was surprised. My husband and I were trying to teach the boys a bit about animation appreciation – story telling, art direction, animation. But they just wanted to do kung fu kicks.

I give it five stars. I was indeed “blinded by its awesomeness”. Haha.

Back in May, I began to think about my upcoming 30th birthday, and how I would like to celebrate it.

My first thought was – I WANT A BIG PARTY!

I wrote up a list of all the people I would love to celebrate with – family, extended family, close friends, family friends, old high school friends, old colleagues, mother-friends… and my list was a shocking 120 people.

120 people x $50 per head = $6000! Gah! I couldn’t afford that! It was like organising a wedding! So I had to cut down significantly. And I decided to split it up and have two birthday dinners.

One for family members, which will be held at my parent’s house. I love big family dinners! My extended family and my husband’s family comes to a total of 40 people.

And one for my close friends. Total of 50 people.

I picked a gorgeous, stylish Indian restaurant. The food is amazing, the set banquet prices are reasonable, the atmosphere is fantastic, and I get a semi-private dining area. I’ve asked all my friends for No Presents, but if they could so kindly give a gift towards the dinner.

As my husband and I worked out the details of money, I had a really hard time getting over the cultural oddity of this concept – inviting someone to your birthday dinner and asking them to pay for themselves??

The Chinese Daughter in me was spinning tornadoes in my head. If my father heard about this, he would be so offended! What an insult! How dare I discuss such things on an invitation! How dare I treat my friends in this way? What kind of birthday celebration is this?!

Ah, well. The custom is really common here in Australia. My friends are all pretty forward thinking and I’m sure they would all laugh at me if I tried to pay for them! I don’t need presents anyway. I just want to have all my wonderful friends in one place!

So the invites have been designed, printed and sent!!!

It’s all happening!!

I woke to the sound of little feet stampeding down the hallway. My boys ran into the room, jumped onto my bed and shouted HAPPY MOTHER’S DAAAAY, covering me with kisses, giggles and cuddles. It was all very cute.

They told me I was NOT ALLOWED to get out of bed, and that I HAD TO eat breakfast in bed. They were very persuasive about it, especially with their little frowns and waggling fingers. But I hate eating in bed. I convinced them that eating in bed would be a bad idea, because ants will crawl under the covers and bite me – so they let me eat breakfast on the couch instead.

From the boys in my life, I received Ugg boots, a bunch of flowers, a sunflower plant, and a photo frame. We went out in the morning, out for lunch, came home for a 2 HOUR nap, then had dinner at my parent’s place. We had a lovely day!

I organised a Girl’s Night Out dinner for all the mum’s at my son’s pre-primary school class.

We had 14 women turn up! It was sooooo much fun! I had such a great time. I can’t believe how lovely everyone is. I’m on this crazy high from being surrounded by so many nice women!

We laughed so much. First everyone rocked up with LOTS OF RED WINE. Then we giggled at each other – because you know, we’ve never seen each other in nice clothes, makeup and high heel shoes. Then we went into hysterics as we swapped stories about how our children insisted on dressing us, choosing our clothes and jewellery.

We were there for almost 4 hours. Talking, laughing, eating, drinking. We were put on a long table, and I made everyone shuffle seats to mingle and chat to others. Most of us ordered the set banquet and we just shared everything. It was great!

Best parts of the evening : The girly and motherly bonding. Strengthening a little community and forming friendships that will last a lifetime. Getting to know the parents of the kids that my kids will hang out with. Making friends with mothers in my area. And the HILARIOUS stories!

I got a few emails from women asking how I organised it, as they were inspired to do the same for the mums in their kid’s class. It was really simple! I completely recommend it!

I chose the time, date, place and format.
I printed out a text-only invite on coloured paper.
I popped them into all the children’s take-home pigeonholes.
I made a booking in a restaurant for 10 people.
The mum’s had to RSVP by the day before.
I would let the restaurant know the final numbers on the afternoon of the dinner.
That was it.

I worked out that the Friday night before Mother’s Day would best result in husband’s agreeing to babysit the kids.

I chose a popular restaurant that was local. It was pretty much 2 minutes drive from everyone’s house. Lots of women car pooled or got dropped off.

I also refrained from making it into a BIG EVENT. A big event with a set programme, door prizes, theme or whatever, usually expects the person to invest a lot of thought into it, they will um and ah about it, and then usually decide that it’s all just too hard.

I just wanted the evening to be A SIMPLE DINNER, COME AS YOU ARE.

Plus it meant, less organising for me!

After our last exceedingly stressful holiday, we decided to take a very, very simple and small trip to Rockingham.

Rockingham has a nice stretch of beach, lots of parks and playgrounds, a strip of cafes, a shopping centre, some nice walking trails, lookouts and lovely coastal views – it’s small and simple, and it’s only 30 minutes out of town.

Our objective for this trip was : hang out at a beach and sit in a cafe.

^ We arrived and ate lunch at a random cafe. As I was taking the photo, I said coolly, “Sean. I’d like you to put down that knife, right now.” Look at that hilarious expression on his face!

^ We took a little drive along the coast. Walked along some bush tracks, found some look outs.

We found a sheltered beach. The water was so still. The kids hopped about in the rock pools. I grimaced at the fact that the boys had no shoes on, but hey I did the same when I was a kid.

^ I sat in the shade and rearranged shells on the beach. Very therapeutic.

^ The boys went for a walk and found ingredients for Poh Poh’s (grandma) Chinese soups.

^ They also found a HUGE bundle of rope, which they dragged back to show me. “We found some treasure!”

^ My husband found a piece of wood, tangled amongst the seaweed. I suggested that he should tie some of the rope on it, and make a wake board thing.

And lo and behold, we all had the most glorious day trip ever!!

What I love about being in a small community, is that it feels like one big family.

You feel like you’re a part of something big. You go about your day and everyone knows who you are, everyone knows a bit about you, everyone looks out for you, and everyone accepts you.

It puts your life into a larger context. It gives you meaning. You forget about yourself. Your silly little problems. Your layers of burdens that revolve around you you you.

It takes us beyond ourselves and out of the present moment.

This year, as my sons begin to grow into little people, I have this burning desire to create a community for them. After all, I grew up in a big family and a strong community too.

I want to help my kids understand that sure, the walls of our immediate family are important, but there is a whole world out there. A world where a whole lot of people need a whole lot of help and love.

These last few days, I’ve been to a camp run by my church.  I got to know a bunch of people, whom I wouldn’t have otherwise met. And hey, they’re actually ok. I played team games with them. I washed dishes and cleaned floors with them. I laughed and cried with them.

They’ve inspired me in more ways than they will know.

The school holidays have arrived, and while I have often dreaded the idea of being stuck in the same house with two bored kids, this time, I’m actually looking forward to it!

For the first week, we’ll be away at a camp for families and young people. We’ll be gone for 5 days and 4 nights. I’ll be sleeping on a mattress, on the floor, in a dormitory, with my two boys.

I’ve volunteered to organise some art and craft sessions for the children’s programme. I’ve been told to expect 20 kids, between the ages of 3 – 10 years old. How fun!

The second week coincides with my husband’s holidays, so we’ll be filling our days with outings, trips to the beach, play dates, picnics and other fun stuff.

I’m sure it’ll be all over in the blink of an eye. And suddenly my kids will be grown up and leaving home.

Savour it while it lasts!

Callum turns 5 today, and as he requested, we had a big party for him and his friends. It was the first time I organised a kid’s birthday party for children only. We had 18 kids turn up.

During our planning, my husband and I decided that we would have the party at our house. Later on I started to have second thoughts and felt a growing panic over the idea of 20 kids in our house.

Why not have it at an indoor playgym? Or a park? What are the kids going to DO? What if they trash the place? What if they roam around and get bored?? We need to have some focus! What about a bouncy castle or something!?

My husband replied, Don’t be silly. The kids will be kids. They’ll just run around and play with each other.

Yet despite what he said, I organised 6 party games, some game helpers, prizes and a pinata. Nothing too complicated. However, I was considerably preoccupied with party preparations for the week leading up to the party.

On the day of the party (today), the kids played ONE GAME – Pass The Parcel. After that, they showed absolutely no interest in any more games… and preferred to just run around and play with each other! Imagine that!

We also had a pinata, which I stuffed full of popcorn bags and chocolate frogs. I made it from an old cardboard box. I cut the sides out and replaced them with thinner cardboard panels, to make it easier for little kids to open. Nothing is worse than bashing a pinata that won’t open!

It was supposed to be a ROBOT pinata, with a head, dangling limbs and colourful buttons. But Callum said it might look too babyish! Hmph. Whatever. So here’s the adequately cool Spiderman piñata I made.

My Spiderman City birthday cake turned out really well! I was so happy with it. You are looking at a 100% free food colouring birthday cake!

I made the grey by mixing crushed blueberries skins and spinach, with a bit of cabbage extract (from organic food colouring that I bought).

Overall the party was really simple and laid-back. But most importantly, my little guy and his friends had an absolute blast!

We spent most of the morning preparing for Sean’s birthday party.

The boys cleaned up the house and backyard. They tidied the patio. Pruned the vines. Swept the paving. Set up chairs in the garden. Blew up balloons. Strung up decorations.

I made food. Lots of it. I made chicken and eggplant curry, roasted turkey, sweet potato salad, an organic bean salad, a garden salad, and sausage cocktails. My dad made fresh satays and homemade peanut sauce, and my mum made an amazing platter of fried noodles.

I love implementing parties. But I’m not too keen on PLANNING them. Pirate theme or jungle theme? What kind of food should we have? What time should we have it? Should we have games? Can the Wong family make it? Maybe we should have it at a park this time? Which park? Will it have a lake? That might be dangerous for the little kids…. it can stress me out big time.

Haha. So in the end, it’s usually the same. Big family bash in the backyard, with lots of food. I don’t know why I bother to stress about it in the first place.

My roasted sweet potato salad with snow peas, sprouts, toasted pine nuts and sun flower seeds, tossed in creamy mild French dressing.

Also. In the afternoon, I brought our boys to another kid’s birthday party. I was considering to skip it, in case the boys got too hyped-up and sugared-up for our own party that evening, but it was for some good friends – and in our household, good friends are treasured.

The kid’s party was held at a warehouse sized, indoor play gym, with lots of screaming kids, party food and face painting.

You’d think that after an afternoon of running, jumping, swinging, climbing and sliding, that my boys would be tired? Not a chance.

My 5yo got his face painted like Spiderman. It COMPLETELY made his day.

I was slightly worried that he would look at himself in the mirror and freak out. But thankfully he loved it.

Then I got very worried that he would come home and throw himself face-first onto the couch and leave face-prints on the carpets. So the moment we got home, I made him wash it off. He looked as if he had a bad face rash for the rest of the day.

We made the kids take a short nap. Then the guests arrived.

We played an egg and spoon race – with these adorable plastic eggs and bean bag egg yolks. Sooo cute.

And we had bean bag races (Sean cheated).

And last of all, I made a pirate ship birthday cake!

It was actually supposed to be a TREASURE CHEST birthday cake. Bursting with gold coins, necklaces and yellow snakes. That’s what I planned anyway.

But as I pulled it out of the oven, I realised my mistake. Damn! I used the wrong cake tin! The cake turned out wide and flat, rather than slim and tall. It was 10pm at night. And after exhausting every possible solution to fix it – I decided to bake ANOTHER cake. But I looked at my egg carton. No more eggs. Damn! I can’t make another cake! Argh!
So the pirate ship was a last minute improvisation. I’m so pleased with it! No food colouring! And I even found a little toy pirate guy in the kid’s toy box.

Sean was very, very happy.

To my dearest little Sean.

Three years ago our little family was going through a rough patch. Dad was pretty sick. Things weren’t looking good. We didn’t even know if we could have you.

But you were our little miracle. You gave us hope in a time of darkness. I would lie in bed wishing the world would swallow me up, and suddenly you’d kick and dance across the walls of my tummy – making me chuckle with delight.

When you were born, my hormones weren’t right. I looked at you bundled up in my arms and instead of buzzing with joy and happiness, I was tired, sad and I cried a lot. It wasn’t you, it was me.

But now I can’t imagine life without you. You are the blazing rock and roll on our otherwise quiet stereo. You are the spicy chilli in our tandoori. You are the sirens, the fireworks, the drums, the sparkle. You bring so much joy and laughter to our lives. I hope you know that.

In you, I’ve discovered a child’s love that is so tender, so sensitive, so sweet and so whole-heartedly absolute. When you say you love me, I don’t have to search deep in your eyes to see if you mean it, because it’s splashed across your face – you really do love me.

When I say goodnight to you each evening, you take my face in your hands and you plant little tiny kisses on my nose, cheeks and eye lids. And you’ll look up at me with a sparkle in your eyes, like I’m the most wonderful person in the whole world.

I just love it when you smile. I love the way your face and nose wrinkles up. You look so cheeky and happy. It’s adorable, infectious and it makes my heart crumble into a thousand happy pieces.

This new year has seen lots of new changes in your life.

You love school. Starting Pre-Kindy this year has been amazing for you. You have your very own a teacher, classroom and bag hook. As I suspected, you thrived on the kindergarten’s structured activities, routine and rules. You’ve blossomed into a smart, sociable, confident little boy.

You love learning. It boggles me to discover how much you pick up, understand, and repeat. You ask me questions about bugs, trees, water, birds, trucks, elevators – how they all work, what they are for, what can go wrong, what to do when something goes wrong. You listen carefully to everything I say, and will repeat it back as if it’s your own.

You speak so well. I really am so proud of you. Your pronunciations, your sentence structure, and your expressions are all amazing for a kid your age. Some of the clever, random things you say makes me laugh and laugh.

When someone meets you for the first time, the first thing they comment on is your voice. You don’t squeak in a high-pitched, baby voice. Your voice is low and strong. You always sound so serious and authoritative, like a little man – but once you smile, you turn into a giggly little boy again.

Then there’s your eye lashes. And your puppy dog eyes. You make me writhe with jealousy.

You’ve got a big personality, a strong spirit and a whole lot of big ideas. You’re a wonderful and charming little person with a great big heart. I love you Sean, Happy 3rd Birthday.

I made a promise to the lovely Simone of EnjoyPerth!, that I’ll be joining her and a bunch of other people (that I know by name and profile avatar) for the Perth Bloggers Meetup.

It’ll be my first time at a blogger meetup!

I mentioned that I’d write about it on my site, but I forgot to mention that I don’t actually KNOW how many people in Perth read my site.

I know three. My husband, my mother and my Aunty Flo. And I’m not sure if they can make it. They’d bring chicken curry for everyone, I’m sure of it.

So please come! Would love to see you there!

Wednesday, March 12, 2008.

7pm

Upstairs at The Brass Monkey
Corner of James and William Street, Northbridge

Perth Bloggers I want to meet : Cellobella, TFP, Kitta, Mooiness, Rodney, Krissy, Bronwen, Duncan, Priscilla, Nat. (Ok I’ve met some of you before, but it’d be good to catch up!)

My husband loves to hike. Whether it’s a forest jungle, mountain, volcano, or glacier – he’s done it. He’s got this hiking bug that I lovingly refer to as : The Madness.

During Daddy-time, he takes the boys out on mini hikes around Perth. I suspect that he’s actually training them up to do The Kokoda Trail or something. And I just laugh as I imagine them sometime in the future, all with their backpacks and canteens of water, kissing me goodbye, “We’ll be back in 3 days. Don’t wait up!”

The kids are young, but they love these mini hikes. They come back with stories about broken trees, bee hives, low tide puddles and birds of prey. They make up names for beaches and secret locations. They collect beautiful, natural treasures. And no doubt they too have caught some kind of hiking bug.

I’ve never been to these places before. I love looking at their photos. I love hearing the boys re-tell their adventures in their own words, finding out what kind of things make an impression on them.
Past of me wishes I could join them, but the other part knows that they should have some special experience just with dad.

My husband’s passion has rubbed off on me a bit. I really enjoyed hiking with him through Scotland (in 2001) and New Zealand (in 2000)!

So I’m also keen to try out parts of the Bibbulmun Track one day – apparently one of the world’s great long distance walk trails, stretching nearly 1000kms through the heart of the scenic South West of Western Australia.

I also want to climb Mount Kinabalu (Malaysia) and Mount Fuji (Japan) before I die.

Today is the Chinese New Year, year of the Golden Rat. Yesterday we had our traditional family reunion dinner at my mother’s house.

The aunties spent the whole day preparing for the banquet dinner and making delicious Chinese New Year cookies and treats. The house was filled with the smell of grilled pork, chicken soup and roasted peanut pastries – it was sensational!

The kids and I decorated the house with red paper lanterns and other Chinese New year ornaments.

We played on the water slide. We swam in the pool. We munched on prawn crackers. We wrestled on the living room floor. The kids wore their slippery satin Chinese pyjamas and slid off the black leather couches with glee.

As always, we started dinner with lo hei – which is a celebration where everyone gathers around a special raw fish salad called yusheng. Everyone uses their chopsticks to help toss the salad, lifting up the ingredients as high as possible, as a symbol of great prosperity in the new year.

Just like Christmas, we ate until out bellies hurt. And it was good.

As part of my regular posts on Blogging, Photography and Design, I’m also reviewing some blogs that I love reading, and greatly admire.

In the blogging universe of Mummy Bloggers, Metrodad is my shining star. He’s my all time favourite Daddy Blogger.

Metrodad is written by Pierre Kim, Asian-American, ethnically Korean with a French name, fashion executive living in New York, with his wife and 3 year old daughter.

My goodness, he’s so funny. I love his snappy ramblings about his daughter and fatherhood. His writing is refreshing, wickedly funny, yet oozes with warmth and love. It’s all good.

My favourite posts (just so happens all of them are parenting posts):

The Lazy List of Fives

The Eight Types of Playground Parents

An Open Letter to All Toddlers

Tales of Future Past

5-1, I guess she really is my daughter

I managed to ask Pierre some friendly questions.

Interview

Karen: When you’re having a really bad day, what are some of the things that will definitely cheer you up?

Pierre: Hugs from my daughter, kisses from my wife, a plate of homemade gnocchi from my favorite local Italian restaurant, and a nice old-school bottle of Montepulciano table wine.

Karen: What kind of father was your father? How much are you like him now?

Pierre: My father was a traditionally strict immigrant father who was raised in an absolutely horrible home environment. He was mentally and physically abused by his parents until he ran away as a teenager. Like many other Korean men of his generation, he was very shut off from his emotions. Hence, his idea of playing a role in my life generally consisted of being a provider and a disciplinarian. We did not have a very close relationship when I was growing up. Now, as we’ve both gotten older and mellower, we’ve learned to coexist peacefully for the sake of the family.

Suffice it to say, we are not very much alike. However, because of his hard work and sacrifices, I was afforded luxuries in life that have allowed me to become the person that I am today. For that, I am forever grateful.

Karen: What inspires you?

Pierre: Travel. Seeing as much of the world around me while I’m still here on this planet. I’ve been to 56 countries during my lifetime and I hope to visit many more. For me personally, there’s nothing more inspiring than exploring a strange city by yourself and meeting people who are never quite as different from yourself as you might presume.

Karen: What’s your favourite way to spend time with your daughter?

Pierre: Without a doubt, going out to eat with her. Food is a great passion of mine and I’m constantly tasting the amazing diversity of incredible food that can be found in a city like New York. Sharing this passion with my daughter is incredible. When my wife works late, my daughter and I will go out to dinner together and these have always been some of my favorite father-daughter memories. Not only does she love having Daddy all to herself but she’s also loves going to new restaurants. Blessedly, she’s an adventurous eater. She’s the only 3-year-old I know who has eaten everything from foie gras to raw sea urchin to clams casino.

Karen: What are 5 things you are working on right now?

Pierre: Becoming a better husband, father, and son.
Getting more involved in volunteer work.
Learning how to cook.
A television show.
Quitting smoking.

Karen: I can’t believe you buy clothes for your wife! And she likes it! What is the one thing that you bought for her, that backfired on you?

Pierre: My overall track record of buying clothes for my wife is pretty good. However, I apparently lack the gene that gives one the ability to choose handbags. For her past birthday, I spent over a month researching Vogue magazines and scouring all the handbag sites. I was absolutely 100% convinced that she would love the bag I selected for her. Totally backfired. She hated it. Thank god for generous return policies.

Now, I’m in full training mode. My wife will show me a handbag and ask me whether she’d like it or not and I have to answer right away. It’s futile. I’m a lost cause. What is it with you women and your handbags?

In the spirit of celebrating all things Australian, I thought I’d give a plug to a new Aussie Bloggers Blog launched last week.

Run by a bunch of really nice people, passionate about blogging and helping other Australians, they seem to be doing some cool stuff at the Aussie Bloggers Forum.

Ah how I wish I had as much time to devote to helping others on the internet. I can hardly find time to reply my emails, let alone write a post! I still feel that my priorities are to being with my kids and family FIRST, and being a blogger SECOND.

But this year I really want to be a bit more active in the internet community. So hopefully I’ll be popping in and out of the forums. Do come over, join up and say hi!

This weekend, we went to the wedding of some really close friends. It was all so lovely and touching. I don’t know what it is, but lately I’ve been getting so emotional at weddings. Maybe because all my good friends are getting married, and it’s just another sign that we’re all growing up.

I kept having these flashbacks of when we used to make enormous whirlpools in my parent’s pool, go on bike rides around the neighbourhood, play crazy beach soccer, make ourselves puke from the roller coaster ride at Adventure World. Ah the good old days.

I was invited to join a small group of friends to sing a special wedding song for the couple. I haven’t been in a choir in years. I was embarrassingly rusty, but I think I did ok. It was a really nice wedding song, so I enjoyed myself.

The “choir” also had a dress code: pastel pink, apricot or yellow. I seriously had nothing in that colour range. So I had to open some old boxes, and dug out a really, really old dress (when I was going through an Alannah Hill phase) and freaked out most of my friends – I wore pink!

The reception was held at the Esplanade Hotel Fremantle. We had such a good time! The music playing that night was the funniest collection of old school 80s and 90s stuff – so fun to dance to!

A very amusing thing happens when we go to wedding dinners – my husband and I always end up on the “miscellaneous guests” table. Haha we don’t mind, it’s always good fun. We think it’s probably due to the fact that we like talking to complete strangers and we like to switch seats with people throughout the night!

So we chatted to heaps of interesting people, danced, took silly photos and enjoyed ourselves immensely!

My husband and I are not a Present Giving Couple.

When people ask me, “What did you get your husband for Christmas? Or what did your husband get you?” I say with a cunning and mischievous smile “Trust me, you don’t want to know…”

Truth is, we didn’t buy each other anything! We are not really into dropping hints. Or secret shopping and planning surprises.

I don’t ask my husband to buy me anything – because, if I wanted something, I’d just go out and buy it myself!

In fact, if my husband felt the need to surprise me, and bought me the designer handbag which he had noticed I swooned over while reading a magazine, I’d be SO ANGRY WITH HIM because I’d rather have a new digital camera.

And if he had bought me the digital camera, I believe our money would have been better spent buying a new couch.

So my husband and I made a sacred pact. No presents. Unless specifically requested.

This is what I received for Christmas. I consider them, with much amusement, to be a rather telling indication of my miscellaneous personality.

Pearl earrings

Environmentally friendly laundry care pack

Battlestar Galactica DVD series 3