Dinner with Tsing and Michelle

07 December 2013 | Hisham | | ACS Memories, Family Pics
 

Tsing, Michelle and their kids visited us for dinner last night. Having us as one of their regular stops during their vacation never fails to warm my heart. The last time they were back there were two children in two. This time there's three! Unfortunately I did not take a photo of baby Ezra because he was busy playing the keyboard, then sleeping.

Looking at old photos with Ashley
Emma
Irfan still calls Ashley her cousin
33 years of friendship
 

Rafe's 23 Month Birthday

29 November 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

One more month before the big T-W-O! Whee!

Slightly amused at all the fuss

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64 Months

23 November 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

So we are now at 64 months!

Love this shot!

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An Academic Award

15 November 2013 | Hisham | | Family Pics
 

For the first time ever, Irfan gets an award for an academic achievement in school. I not just proud of him, but grateful to all my friends in meatspace and cyberspace who gave Ain and I suggestions and solutions to how to get Irfan interested in reading and to learn, even as I suspected of him having a mild learning disability. Some of them even sent books for him to read.

V is for Verisimilitude
Inline kids
Certificate!

Also, when Irfan played more tabletop games this year, he gets better at his studies. Coincidence? I think not!

 

Halloween Shenanigans

01 November 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

All Hallow's Eve, an event that was eagerly awaited in the Renstrom household - at least by one little girl in particular. And this year, Papa said we could get a pumpkin and carve it (after some begging on the part of the particular little girl).

Happy Halloween!
 

Rafe's 22 Month Birthday

29 October 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

Only two months until the big second birthday for the boy! :-)

Happy Adik!

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Irfan at the Game Shop

27 October 2013 | Hisham | | Family Pics, Role Playing Games
 
Purple polyhedrals from Comics Corner down the street from Wira

Earlier today, there was an Eclipse Phase game at Wira Games and Hobbies in Subang Jaya. Irfan came along for the ride. At first his plan was to buy his own set of polyhedral dice. His Own Stuff that he'll be able to use with games like Swords and Wizardry whose quickstart he'd printed out. Then he planned on reading or watching us play. However, Chang, the owner of Wira Games had a better idea.

Base paint for the High Elf mini

He and his staff taught Irfan to paint Warhammer Fantasy miniatures, starting with a High Elf mini.

 

63 Months

23 October 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

Sixty-three months now!

Trying on her Bollywood Princess costume

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13th Anniversary and Raya Haji in KL

15 October 2013 | Hisham | | Family Pics, Food, Friends
 

It was Sitiawan's turn for balik kampung Aidiladha this year. But I did not get paid for a work I invoiced so we could not gas up to go anywhere far. So Atok and Opah travelled from Sitiawan to Kuala Lumpur for the holiday. Also, Irfan's exam week was looming. Coincidentally, Aidiladha was also the 13th wedding anniversary of Ain and I.

So we decided to scrape up something for the day.

13 years through... a lot of things. Amazing things. Not so amazing things. Unbelievably inspirational events. Events that would destroy the spirit of anyone not prepared. Things I do not mention even in this blog. I owe a lot of people a lot of things. My parents. Sila and Vin. But without Ain to prop against and support my weight in the worst of times, it would have been a different world today.

After solat Aidiladha, we took photos. As usual Atok's camera and photography skills produced some great pictures.

 

Return to Orange Beach - The Other Stuff

06 October 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

So now that we are done with the beach pictures and the pool pictures, here are some of the other fun pictures taken during our trip to Orange Beach.

Peanut buttery baby

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Return to Orange Beach - The Pool

05 October 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

So the beach pictures are done. Now for some pictures of the fun we had at the hotel pool in Orange Beach, AL.

Love this shot of Adik

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Return to Orange Beach - The Beach

04 October 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

Contrary to popular belief, the beach in Orange Beach, AL is actually not orange. In fact, the sand was beautiful, white, fine sand. Wheee! We loved it so much when we went there in April that we decided to go back there for a longer almost week-long vacation there in September. At the time of this entry, it has been almost a month since we were there, but given my track record it's a wonder it's only been delayed a few weeks. Hehe

The kids playing on the beach

We chose to go after the Labor Day weekend, so not only was it fairly quiet, and we had the beach mostly to ourselves, but it was still hot and summery. And with off-season rates, well, it was icing on the cake.

 

Rafe's 21 Month Birthday

29 September 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

And the boy is now 21 months old! 3 more months and he's two! Wheee!

Giggle giggle

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62 Months

22 September 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

Sixty-two months since the girl was born!

Artsy Yaya in her tent-fort

The hat was a gift from Pak Yope and Wan Yong way back in 2010. :-)

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Irfan's Eleven

21 September 2013 | Hisham | | Family Pics
 

Irfan's eleven now!

It started when we thought about inviting Emma's forthcoming family-in-law for dinner. It just so happened that it was on Irfan's weekend's birthday! So unlike other years, Irfan had more people over for his birthday than before, including the forementioned forecoming familiy-in-law of Farid's, Irfan's cousin Aiman and Zara, and his schoolmate Fikri our neighbour from the next tower (but the same arcology - so to speak).

Totally cut-up cake

Irfan sliced up his cake using his melee weapons skill.

Cake is a lie! KILL IT!

I got a photo of Ain with Irfan. But because everyone was busy with guests, no photo of me was taken.

 

Picnic at Sungai Gabai

15 September 2013 | Hisham | | Family Pics
 

It had been awhile since we went for a picnic at the waterfalls of Ulu Langat. So last Sunday, we went for a morning drive out to the country and headed for the Sungai Gabai picnic area near the small town of Sungai Lui. Ain had made mee goreng the previous night for the picnic.

I was worried that there would be excessive traffic because of the three-day Malaysia Day holiday weekend, but because it was early in the morning the roads were clear and parking was relaively easy. However, there were a lot of visitors already there at the picnic site.

We have been at Sungai Gabai once before, but I could barely remember the earlier visit. We would remember this visit as we got wet in the river and had mee goreng there. Also, because we took photos and there's a blog post about this visit. So yeah, it would be remembered. Unless the blog died for some reason and I lost all the photos and we did not talk about it for decades after. But I digress. 

Without using any sort of airborne drones we identified an empty spot by the river on the far bank, so we crossed the bridge to take it. 

I took a photo of the falls while we crossed the bridge. We did not approach the falls during this visit. Perhaps later.

 

Rafe's 20 Month Birthday

29 August 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

Our intrepid hero is now 20 months old! Whee!

Cheeeeeeese!

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61 Months

22 August 2013 | sila | | Family Pics
 

And so the girl is now sixty one months old! :-)

Let's ride the scooter!

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Pacific Rim Heroclix Battle

21 August 2013 | Hisham | | Board and Card Games, Family Pics, Friends
 

Ivan and Kai of the GOKL gaming group dropped by to visit us for Aidilfitri.

The Aidilfitri visit is of course an excuse for some gaming shenanigans.

L-R Slattern, Knifehead, two Gipsy Dangers, Coyote Tango and Scunner

Once upon a time - about a month ago - I asked Kai if he knew where to get any Pacific Rim Heroclix figures. At the time, there was none in town. When his order from Noble Knight Games arrived, he offered to sell two figures so Irfan and I can play! The jaeger I picked was Gipsy Danger and the kaiju I picked was Knifehead. This game needs more jaegers and kaiju. A Tacit Ronin clix would be awesome.

But since a host of clix were arrayed on the dinner table, Kai taught Irfan to play.

 

The Many Yops

20 August 2013 | Hisham | | Family Pics
 

Irfan's Atok and Opah came to visit over the weekend.

Yop 2, Yop 3 and Yop 4

Here's a picture of the three Yops together.

Apart from Atok's car having clutch problems less than 10 klicks from reaching our place, there were no glitches during the visit. They picked up Irfan from school when my weekday exam schedule did not permit me to do so.