mudik

like every pilgrimage who has to go home and visit his/her home village every year, i did too, go home and visit my home in jakarta. for almost a whole month! :D

the trip home (just me and son) was very tiring. i got a good seat with a baby bassinet in front of me, but decided not to use it because i thought my son's too big for it. silly me! i ended up having to hold him on my lap the whole 14 + 4 hours flight. GRRR. by the time i got to indo i was so tired i couldn't even stand up straight. thank God for porters.

needless to say the trip was great. i ate a lot (any new news here?), patrick had great fun watching all the traffic (busses, bajajs, motorcycles and all those trucks.. oh heaven), and at the end of the trip when hubby was there we went to bali where we had some more great food (dear me!) and great fun (camel rides, anyone?).

i love

i love how he looks when he wakes up in the morning.

i love how he lets me kiss his cheeks thousands of times even when he's busy watching movies / playing games

i love how he'd crawl up on my lap and push my hands away from the computer when i'm typing something

i love when he wants me to hold him up so he can see what i'm cooking

i love how he makes silly face when he smelled his own stinky poop

i love it when he runs, although not when he falls and cry

i love reading books together with him on my lap

i love his toes

i love giving him tickles and hear him laugh

i love watching him asleep

i love it when he plays with his dad, or walking somewhere holding hands

and i love it when he eats chocolate and make a messy face like this:

the best things in life are NOT free!

this second time around i found myself craving for noodles again. it was bad the first round with my baby so i hope it won't be as bad. but lately i've been thinking about these noodles i used to eat in jakarta.

1. bakmi pinangsari - pinangsia


guaranteed, this is the BEST bakmi ayam ever. the noodles are perfectly seasoned and the chilli/sambal... i could eat just the noodle with the sambal. Usually I'd order the usual chicken noodles with some pangsit goreng and bakso, plus sweet ice tea.


2. lomie kangkung pinangsia



my family was a regular to this used-to-be-really-dungy street noodle stall. but then they moved location and probably split the ownership so we didn't know which one is the authentic anymore. But lately we found out they opened near our house. so YAY...!!

the main reason we like this dish so much is the rich thickness of the gravy, the crunchy bbq pork (or chicken if you prefer), and the kangkung (watercress?) which is not a usual combination for noodle dish.


3. hokkien noodle 61



the reason we call it bakmi 61 is because it's located at jl. hayam wuruk 61. i don't actually know what it's called apart from hokkien mie. it originated (i suppose) from Medan. my dad loves this dish so much because it reminds him of home when he was little. i love it because of the variety of the condiments that they put in the bowl. the soup is not as flavorful but with all of the action going on in the bowl, the soup is kinda perfect to balance things out.

4. bakmi emi pluit



another sweet noddle dish. the gravy is so thick you could consider it gooey. there's nothing in the dish except noodles, some beansprouts, a quart of boiled egg, lots of fried onions, and lots of shrimp crackers and emping. you can see pieces of shrimp in the gravy (yes the gravy is shrimp-based) but that's about the biggest meat you can find.

oh man oh man i'm sooooo wanting to eat these noodles right now.


note: images are taken from:
1. http://luvmumu.multiply.com/photos/photo/21/23
2. http://avocadolite.com/expiration/archives/001823.php
3. http://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=143220922415461&id=58257844669#!/media/set/?set=a.152322524785795.31109.132589133425801&type=1
4. http://yummyfordummy.blogspot.com/2010_08_01_archive.html

sweet carolina

last week hubby had a few days off so we thought about flying somewhere. choices included washington DC (to visit my close friend), chicago (my sister), SF (another friend), NC (hubby's brother) or tallahassee, FL (hubby's oldest brother). Sadly the ticket prices to DC and Chicago weren't too friendly, so we ended up going to NC. Not a bad trip. We ended up visiting 4 states in 4 days: NC, TN, GA, and SC. that's some intense travelling.

a lake in NC's Chattanooga's national forest (at least i think that's where it is). I want to have a house there.... *yeah.. keep on dreaming!*

Tybee beach at tybee island, GA. way too crowded for my liking.

obligatory picture taken while baby's asleep in the car... lol..

anybody wants to go for a hike up to Maine (from NC)? seriously, this trail goes all the way to Maine. there's another entrance, which makes the trail goes longer than 1972 miles. it's amazing what the indians (or other people) did before cars or planes were invented.

While we're in Savannah, GA we took this video of our boy trying to get down from the bed. We've been teaching him how to get down from higher places but by far this was his highest. I'm not surprised he got stuck, but what made it so funny was how he'd smile to the camera while hanging on to the sheets like that. It's so funny it cracks me up all the time.

vogue

someone really likes to pose. one example:


another example:


i can't believe it's been 16 months since he joined our family. can't imagine life before him. well actually i do. lots of going to the mall, lots of (dvd-ing, going to the movie-ing, eating out-ing), size 6 jeans, and sleeping in.

and now?


*long awkward pause as i look at myself in the mirror*


let's keep the focus on the little guy. he's more fun to watch. :D

all in one weekend

- the girl married her prince charming.
- the bad guy is dead.

it's a disney happy ending.
meanwhile in the house i'm still stuck with a fussy baby. same ol' same ol'. :D

wok with mie

am starting a food recipes blog. nope, not because i think i'm the greatest cook in the world and therefore everybody should know my recipes, but more because i never follow any recipe closely (except in baking) and therefore could not create a successful dish twice.

most of the recipes are taken from either cookbook or other food blog and then adjusted to my taste. i say "adjusted" quite freely here, because on some occassion the 'adjusted-recipe' turned the dish into another - quite different than what was intended - dish. lucky my husband's not picky. :))

too bad i'm either too lazy or too distracted to take pictures of the food i made.

oh by the way, you can see the recipes over here.

you can look but you can't touch

after having a kid i rarely go to the movies anymore. not that i don't want to, but it's a matter of principal. the tickets for the movies cost $8 per person, total of $16 for me and husband. the babysitter, however, would cost around $20 for almost 3hour. thank God for netflix i don't mind sitting pretty at home waiting for the new releases and watch them at home. hence is why i've just watched the joneses last night.

strangely it hits home with my recent condition. i've never been the type of person who needs to buy or match what others have, especially when it comes to brands. but this changed when i and hubby went house hunting a few days ago. we didn't really need to move yet, but the need for a bigger space is growing, so we like to keep a look out. the first day we saw 3 houses and kind of like one of them. it's basically the same size with my current house but the lot is a lot bigger. and the house is surely prettier.

the next day hubby said his friend's house is being set up for auction, and asked if we wanted a tour of the house. sure thang. turned out his house was this huge house on an acre lot in a nice neighborhood right downtown at a neighbor town. . to cut things short i simply love this house. it's big, but it means more space for my son to play, place for hubby to put his fitness equipments and do some carpenting when he feels macho, even have some space for me to go crazy on my baking and cooking. HA!

anyway.. ever since i saw that house i haven't been able to get it out of my mind. crazy right? i didn't realize it at first but after watching the joneses it hit me what it can do to me. no wonder it's included as one of the seven deadly sin. tsk. i don't want to be larry, that's for sure. so help me God. right now my attitude toward the house is: if it's mine, then i don't have to worry about it. *sigh* it's hard being good all the time.

this is why i like dogs...

self explanatory, don't you think? :D

i tried to be like grace kelly.....

totally random, but here i am sitting in a half dark room watching tv and browsing the internet when a blog post somehow reminded me of something i read in a book a few years ago (actually i've read this book quite a few times before but then i always gave this book to friends - yes, it's a very good book - so the last time i read it was a few years back).

the book was called "what's so amazing about grace" by phillip yancey, and in it he tells stories he read or heard that was so incredible he just had to put it in the book. tonight i'm reminded of one in particular.

during the world war 2 this american soldier was called to a hospital. the nurse explained.. this german soldier was dying and he wants to confess his sin, talk to someone jewish. she couldn't find anyone jewish at that time, so she called him, an american, a christian. he didn't know this german soldier, but he went in anyway. but what the german soldier told him was so startling. he told him about all the unforgiveable things he did in the name of war. at one time he helped rounded up the people of a village, locked them up in a barn, and they burned the barn down, shooting everyone who tried to escape. the german was crying when he recalled this incident.

the american soldier felt so sick in the stomach that he didn't realize the german had finished and was asking him something. "sorry?" he said. the german had asked him if he could (in the name of the jewish) forgive him for the things he did. he knew he was dying, and he needed forgiveness so he could die in peace.

the american - the christian - didn't know what to do. how could he forgive him knowing all the terrible things this man did. so he left without saying anything, leaving the german to die alone. afterward he felt unease.. as a christian he should've forgive.. that's what God would've wanted him to do. but yet how could he forgive such a condemned act?

this was just one of the many stories i read in the book. have you read about babel's feast? or les miserables? they all speak about grace. how wonderful, how grandeur, how humbling, and yet how hard it is.

raise your glasses, people

aah. it's a new year again.

so what have i been up to last year? hmm. a lot. marriage, move to another country, baby, quit job, vacation to another country and spending almost all of my savings on that trip.. not necessarily in that order of course.

so far marriage life has been great. oh we've had our arguments and times when we (i, mostly) feel like biting each other heads' off but most of the time we're having a blast of a time. and baby's now turning 10 months. can't believe it's been 10 months since i huffed and puffed and pushed in the-rather-nice hospital room (my first hospital stay since birth). i can still remember that day like it was yesterday, thank God i can only vividly remember those first month of no sleep and feeling like a gorilla.

after moving here i developed a new hobby: trying out new cupcakes recipes. i've always been a bit obsessed with cupcakes but buying them seem so extravagant (they're so expensive) so now i have fun making them. hmm.. there's a thought. maybe i should share my cupcake project here.

safe to say in 2010 my life changed drastically, but i wouldn't say for the worse. quite the opposite, it's getting better. i'm enjoying every moment of it. let's hope 2011 is better than 2010. cheers.