I usually just read these kind of "predictions" for fun...but I have a strong personal connection with this one and I have a strong feeling this will be my ultimate setback for 2010. Hope I can resolve my issues early of next year. Anyway, HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL!!! :)

Year 2010 Overview
The symbol for Libra is Balance. In the next year, you'll find yourself doing even more balancing than usual; you're going to be pressed to decide if your internal sense of happiness should be the focus of life more than the outward signs of success. This may have been weighing heavily on your mind for the last several months, as far as work and the state of your love life. What you are likely to be weighing this year is a little more intangible (and a little more important) than those things. Specifically, in 2010 you'll find yourself weighing out the cost of the connections you've formed for yourself versus their actual value to you.

There's going to be a lot of pressure on you from within and without as to who you really are at heart and who you really are to those closest to you. This will be both in your personal life and at work. The natural Libra impulse is often to make peace with these kind of pressures, or negotiate your way around them. Your best bet in the next year though will be to recognize your own inherent value -- not just what you appear to be worth to others.

In the final analysis this is all good news, even if it's good news in disguise. No one is better than you at beautifying things or finding the inherent beauty in the mundane. Once you realize that you yourself are at least as shiny and pretty as any accessory -- in your heart and soul, where beauty really counts -- you'll have begun assembling a better You. Breathe through the difficult spots, and enjoy the results!

Source: http://shine.yahoo.com/astrology/libra/yearly-overview/20100101/

Recently I started listing down the invitees for my house warming coming New Year. As for my hubby and I, we agreed to have a small house warming and only invite those we are close to. However, it occurred to me I have not many close friends (the ones that I really keep in touch with). I have many friends, but not many close ones.

In my younger years, my family shifted around a lot (a total of 13 times for me!!). Therefore I never had any neighborhood friends or childhood friends. The first few years of my life was in one state, then 6 years in another then back to the first state. And now I am in another state because of work. This is just one of the reason. Another reason is (I am ashamed of admitting this) that I am one LAZY girl. Many of times I had friends inviting me for gatherings etc, but I do not want to go. I will give all kinds of excuses even though I know it would be fun. Deep down inside, I am afraid I would not have much to say at the gathering or I do not fit well with them or I do not dress right or..and the list goes on (I know, I know, I think too much). Because of me being a scare-dy cat most of the time, I loose out on being one of ANY of the "gang". But I am one lucky girl. I still have a few friends who never gave up on me :P. Some still calls me up for a chat or invite me to gatherings. Since I realised what kind of person I am previously, I will force myself to meet up with friends (sometimes it works and sometimes not..haha). After meeting up with them, I realised how much have I been missing.

Although at times I still go back to the old me, but now I will pull out the courage to invite my friends out instead. And usually things go very smoothly and all that I was worried about before never even appeared. I admit I am stupid in this sense but it is hard to shake of those feelings I had and still have in me.

Anyway, I would like to take this opportunity to thank those friends who never gave up on me even though I 'ffk' many times before. Don't give up on me and I will try my very best to change my ways :P

P/s Oh...and to my new friends, just ignore what you read here and just continue to be my friend..hahaha. I am trying to change, remember?? Give la chance...hehe

Christmas is drawing near. I am neither a Christian nor a Catholic, but out all of the Malaysian celebrations, I love Christmas the most. Compared to Chinese New Year, Deepavali and Hari Raya songs, Christmas songs are the BEST. It seems to lighten up your mood and suck you into the occasion even if you are not celebrating it. The other celebrations for me is too loud, too much work, too much of everything..and it does not help that most of their songs are unpleasant to my ears. Another thing I love about Christmas is their decorations. It makes me happy and excited just seeing the decorated Christmas tree.

I never really celebrated Christmas. At most, I join my cousins for mass on the eve of Christmas and visit them for lunch on the first day. But this was years ago. This year, my parents and brother will be coming down to my place for Christmas. I think like all celebrations, Christmas is all about FAMILY. I wish my sister will be here too but she is just too far away. At least this year I get to spend Christmas with my hubby, my parents and my brother in my new HOME. It is going to be a WONDERFUL CHRISTMAS!!

TO EVERYONE: HAVE A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Love,

Lyssa and hubby

My hubby and I decided long ago we would try this style of decorating when we get into our new home. This way of decorating is slowly becoming famous in Malaysia (especially in KL). Not many shops have this available to the consumers but we manage to find someone at Curve who sells this. All of her designs are made from Korea and it does not come cheap...although it is much cheaper than installing wallpaper. We loved the outcome of the design (after some hard work installing it since it is our first time trying it out).

What do you think? :P

First Step : Cut all the designs out (after "applying" the sticker on it)




Second Step : Planning the arrangements on the wall



Third Step : Stick the design accordingly and TA-DAAAA...it is all DONE



Another design: Under my stairs



p/s You can view more decorations sold by this person in
http://diywallsticker.blogspot.com/

I have been working like a crazy woman everyday after work to clean and clear our stuff. Worst part of it is that AK is not in for almost three weeks!! He only stayed in our HOME for one night and had to leave on a plane the very next day. AK told me to take it slowly...easier said than done. Once I get started, I could not stop..this is why I have started to fall sick (flu, sorethroat and a slight headache). BUT...I am partly glad I am this crazy after seeing parts of our home being transformed. I am falling deeper in love with our home day by day. Below are some of the latest updated photos. I managed to clean most of the area downstairs but there is still much to do. My storeroom is still filled with our stuff...lots to do till it's truly ready.


My dad "opening ceremony" (sprinkled some mixture of rice, salt and tea leaves)



Wet Kitchen: Sink Area



Wet Kitchen: Cooking Area



Dry Kitchen



View of Dry Kitchen and left part of Wet Kitchen



Dining Hall : Overall View



Dining Table : Coasters etc from Bali



Living Hall: Overall View (with AK's favourite LCD TV..hehe)



Living Hall: Table chosen by AK



Our "Love Nest"...:P (Bedsheet set chosen by ME! :P)



Wardrobe : (I took almost an hour to get this wardrobe cleaned!!)



One of our staircase light (This my favourite light :P)

So...WOW...below here will most likely be the last photos I will be updating before I officially move into my house this weekend. I have my hubby to thank, for his great effort on making our house as close to a HOME as possible :). Thanks to his patience and hard work throughout the two weeks I am away. Thank you dear...big MUAKSSSSS for you!! :) :)

From my last update, we have progressed into the installation of our electrical appliances and the delivery of all of our furniture.

We still have a few more things to settle before we shift in. Some touch up here and there, some appliances to install, some stuff to buy etc. One BIG problem that occurred was the scratches made on the parquet by everyone that did any type of work upstairs..sigh. Should have been more careful but what was done cannot be reversed. Hence, we had to hire people to polish and shellec the whole of upstairs and the staircase for RM1000!!!..something that we did not budget for.

Anyway, here are the progress photos;

View of living hall from our dining area (sorry about the rotation of the photo.could not fix it :P)

Close-up photo of TV cabinet

View of Dining Room from Living Hall

Dry Kitchen

Wet Kitchen (Cooking Area)

Wet Kitchen (Washing Area)

Family Hall

Master Room Built-In wardrobe

The new polished and shellecked staircase

I just took a seasonal flu vaccine, as I would be traveling to Australia soon. I know that now is not the winter season in Australia and I know that it is NOT a prevention for H1N1, but I guess it makes me feel “safer” by taking the jab which cost me RM74.80. The temperature at night in OZ is still cold (8-10 deg) and I would not want to be caught with any kind of flu once I get back to Malaysia. I would be too busy with the moving to my new home thing and cannot afford to get sick.

Anyway, I was asked to fill in a form (are you pregnant? When was your LMP? Are you allergic to any kind of drugs? Are you allergic to any kind of food? ). As I am not allergic to anything, I just tick NO to all without reading the details properly. The doctor who gave me the jab repeated these questions. And then he asked: Are you allergic to CHICKEN EGG? Huhhhhh???????? First thing on my mind was, it is soooooo delicious and why would anyone be allergic to chicken eggs? Then it came to me: What does chicken eggs got to do with the vaccination I am taking? Here is what I found:

http://foodallergies.about.com/od/eggallergies/p/eggallergies.htm



Well I guess I am very lucky I am not allergic to chicken egg. I love them but not as much as my hubby do :P

I work in a 20-storey building. You can only imagine how many people works in the same building. Hence, it is normal to NOT know most of the people that you share a lift with when you come to work and also leave from work. To have more than two people in the lift is alright for me. However, I do feel akward when there is only two of us because there would be this akward silence and none of us know where we should be looking. This gets weird especially when you greet each other before you go into the lift. It is as though I feel the need to "continue" the conversation after greeting the other person. But what can I talk about? The weather perhaps? Or the traffic jam? Or their children???

Follow up from the last update : They fixed the pipe..at last

They had to skim almost all the walls in our room because of the burst pipe (Water splashed all over the walls..even to the extend of the opposite wall)

Our window grill...nice? :P

Our main door's grill :)

Fence (forgotten the correct term for this) for precaution

Touching up work

Hard at work in painting our walls

The colour contrast that we chose. Nice?

Changing position of the sink's pipe

At last...quite a number of things were completed by the contractor (something that I am very pleased with). As you can see, our grills are all up and I really love the pattern. They have also started painting for at least half of the area in our place.

However, I am a little worried of the after effect of the burst pipe in our room. The contractor closed the main water pipe since the incident and will only open it when they have finished the rectification works. However, we were informed that while they were doing the rectification works, the management re-open the main pipe and hence my room was again WET. My worry is more on the floor as the floor finishes are parquet. Parquet will spoil easily (or faster) if it was exposed to water. Sigh..I only can hope it will last, at least for few years (can't afford to change the parquet to a better one)

Installation of our built-in furnitures will be done by the end of next week. Crossing my fingers that there will not be a delay in this (this is by a different party)

Anyway, I am quite happy and pleased with the contractor's work this week. They are a little slow in their work (because of having too many projects) but their workmanship is quite good. Hope they would not delay anymore works.

As I recall, the issue of buying pirated or original CDs or DVDs have been a topic of discussion with my brother long time ago (around 6-8 years ago). My brother has always been a person who will only buy originals as a respect to the artists involved. I, for one cannot afford to buy originals. However, I did mention to him that I will buy originals once I start working.

(note: I did have some originals at that time...but just a few..just one or two of my favourite korean drama series :P)

So, what really happened when I started working? I still hardly buy originals as I did not think it was worth my money (and I have so many other things on my mind such as clothes, shoes, food, haha). This changed quite drastically this year, when my hubby started buying quite a number of original CDs. As for DVDs, he will buy the originals if it is on sale (movies, animes, etc). Hence, I follow suit..hehe. The Mariah Carey CD I bought was the latest original CD added to our collection (it was on special priced item though...RM29.90). As for DVDs...well, we are cinema-goers...so it is alright la..hehe.

My say on this is that if YOU can afford to buy originals, PLEASE to go ahead. It is really important that we do this IF we still want to enjoy the beautiful music and movies created by these artists. But if you are not that well-off, you can just save up to buy one or two originals of your favourite artist/movie. You will then notice the satisfaction feeling welling up in your body and hence will then make an effort to buy originals again..and again...and again :) :) :)

It is not too often you would find a shop selling desserts (tong sui) with so many varieties in a shopping mall. They serve cold and hot desserts with a wide range of variety. I am sure you could find your favourite tong sui in this shop. I have not tried many of their desserts but so far the ones I have tasted are quite impressive. Some of it is shown in the picture above. Below are the details of the shop :-

Name : HONEYMOON
Venue: One Utama, LG 322, LG Floor Oval 1 (near Coldstorage)
Speciality: A wide variety of Hong Kong Desserts
Others: They have a few other branches (Kepong, Sunway Pyramid, Puchong and Low Yat)

All I can say is...for a girl like me who is not really into tong sui, this would be a place I definitely visit again.

Our Plaster Ceiling is up :)

Problem...problem...

There are some good news and some bad news. As you can see, my plaster ceiling in the living hall is already up (lightings have yet to be installed). The contractor have closed up neatly some of the holes that the alarm contractor 'created' to install the alarm wires. HOWEVER.....an accident happened. The alarm contractor accidentally burst our water pipe at the master bedroom (located above our room door as shown in the other photo). Sigh....hence our general contractor will have to spend some time to fix this mess before he can continue with his work. Hope all goes well after this.

Information:

Venue: Cinneleisure, e@Curve
Price: RM40 per person (GSC One Utama is RM45)
Facilities out of cinema:
Free welcome drink (self service), huge waiting area (with lots of comfortable chairs, tables, magazines, LCD TVs on movie previews, massage chairs, beautiful framed photos of celebrities)
Facilities in cinema:
BIG comfortable recliners, good sound system, blanket and pillow as per request

I really love this cinema very much, compared to the one in GSC One Utama (Gold Class). The recliners are more user-friendly and much more comfortable. The waiting area actually smells good (lavendar) and it is such a nice place to be in. My HB was enjoying the free massage chair there while watching some movie trailers. Would definitely choose this over Gold Class anytime..unless we found an even better place :P. Hmmm...wondering when will the next time be ($$$$...'pokai')....hmmmmm

I would recommend my friends to watch this movie. It is about how the human kind have evolved and relying a lot on surrogates to walk their life..even to the extent of doing your daily chores. A human will just need to use the power of the brain to control these surrogates that were created to avoid lost of innocent lives (through crimes or military mishaps..etc)

It does make you wonder whether things will actually get better with a surrogate being put out into the world to lead your life. Will it really help the human kind? Or will it make humans become a lazy bunch of people? See for yourself :)

p/s You got to close one eye on Bruce Willis's wig...it looks ugly...hehe

Trailer for the movie : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwTJ7mCcFoY