Jamie's Italian

I am determined to try as many new cafes and restaurants over the next few months as I can. Especially since Mr Ng says that we will be moving to HK towards the middle of the year..but more on that later.

Although I've been there for dinner once before, I'm glad I finally managed to take Mr Ng for a meal at Jamie's Italian. This place doesn't take bookings for less than 6 people so I highly recommend going as soon as they open to avoid the long queues. Also lunch time seemed to be much less crowded than dinner and since the lunch and dinner menu are the same, I would probably stick to lunch.

Mushroom ravioli, 'posh' chips and prawn linguine

Tiramisu (which was too strong according to Mr Ng)

yummy Brioche dessert

Not much variety when there's only the two of us dining but satisfying nonetheless. Jamie's Italian is open Monday-Saturday from 11:30am-late.

Shoe Craving

It seems to be that time of the month again where I'm craving a new pair of shoes! Most likely due to the fact that I have just finished re-organising my shoe closet and am quite happy that my once boring-mainly-black collection is now starting to show a bit of colour. But it still needs much more..

It actually looks pretty bland in the above picture, how sad.

My favourite pair at this very point in time has to be these gold glitter You-You pumps which I actually originally bought as a back-up pair of wedding shoes but ended up wearing for the entire wedding day since they are so damn comfortable:

I'm glad I ignored Mr Ng and also bought them in patent red - see how well the red ones turned out at the tea ceremony? I am now in the process of tracking down the silver glitter pair which I originally tried on, but my sales assistant in HK still hasn't responded to my email humph..and Mr Ng has only made one weak attempt at contacting him by phone to date. This after he kept begging me to buy a pair of shoes on Net-a-Porter to make up for the sad Valentine's Day present that wasn't! Note to self: when offers like that are made by the husband, seize straight away..

Sad Day =(

Valentine's Day 2012, the first one as husband and wife but oh what a disappointment it was! Mr Ng had hinted to me a couple of days beforehand that I should be expecting something 'in' from him and so of course I got all excited (hot pink nano?!). But at 6pm on Valentine's Day evening I received a call from him saying he will not be back for a couple of hours since our jeweler (who will henceforth be referred to as 'Mr Jeweler') was in "big trouble" and he had to see him ASAP. Fast forward to 8pm and Mr Ng comes home and presents me with a box which I proceed to open eagerly only to find it containing a pearl necklace. Sorry to disappoint but I never wear pearls! I took one look at it and said my mum will like it (which she did). So, what happened??

Apparently, Mr Ng had ordered a blue sapphire to be made into a pendant but as Mr Jeweler was doing a final buff of the finished product he managed to crack it! My first reaction upon hearing this? If it's able to be cracked so easily then sapphires must be pretty crap (but apparently it was a bigass buffing machine). Second reaction was why the pearl necklace then? In their desperation, Mr Ng and Mr Jeweler were desperately searching for options (at 7pm on Valentine's Day night..) and these were the ones they decided not to go with:

• giving me the empty pendant setting and hoping I wouldn't notice the actual jewel was missing


• giving me an empty box and hoping that the box alone would make me happy


• giving me a right hand ring not even worthy of a left hand

In the end, Mr Jeweler rushed Mr Ng next door to the office specialising in pearl jewelery and told him to pick one (as Mr Jeweler put it, "you have to go home with something!") much to Mr Ng's protests that his mother-in-law was the pearl person, not his wife. He knows me too well..

So there you have it, our first Valentine's as a married couple and no gift, no flowers, not even a card to commemorate the occasion. What a sad, sad day indeed.

A blue sad face to represent the blue sapphire that wasn't

Cafe Sydney

So we finally got around to trying Cafe Sydney but after going, I'm a bit unsure why it seems so impossible to make a booking here. Admittedly, there is a great view and the food is pretty decent but it's just so much more casual than I was anticipating! Although I suppose the word 'Cafe' really should have given that away.

Crumbed crab cake appetiser

Quail appetiser

Pork belly main course

Barramundi main course

Dark chocolate terrine dessert

Rhubarb tart dessert

(please excuse the extremely poor quality of the photos, first my camera died then my phone battery was too flat to enable flash!)

Service wise? We were a little put off when the lady at the reception asked us to keep repeating the booking name before saying in exasperation "I can't hear you!" probably due to the fact that she had an earpiece in her ear der..but thankfully it was uphill from there. All in all, I would definitely go back if/when we next have vistors in town although I would probably opt for lunch as opposed to dinner since I think the beautiful Sydney Harbour Bridge view can be enjoyed better during the daytime.

Happy Valentine's Day!

If I ever had a daughter, I would advise her firstly to not have a boyfriend until after high school (ok I would force her on that one, not advise) and secondly to not get with a boy on a day close to her birthday, Christmas or Valentine's Day.
The downside to having a dating anniversary the day before Valentine's Day? Mr Ng feels it is completely fine to roll everything together - so one bunch of flowers and one nice meal to celebrate. Gee, he really knows how to make a girl feel special.

Incidentally, I used to loathe Valentine's Day since it's also the date of Mr Ng's not-so-nice ex-girlfriend's birthday and so the main reason I wanted to get together with him on the 13th of February instead of the 14th. Funny how such a small decision when you are younger really stays with you for the rest of your life huh.

Anyways, enough about ex-girlfriends. I had a feeling something like this would happen and so I treated myself to a little online shopping on Shopbop last week in anticipation of today. And lucky for me my order arrived yesterday so what wonderful timing :)

Red Imperial Lace Boatneck Dress by Tibi - 30% off and the last one in my size yay!

Flamingo (hot pink) Emma Legging Jeans by DL1961 as recommended by Bagsnob Tina here.

Both perfect for a hot Valentine's date, no?

Speaking of red and pink, I would have LOVED to have gotten these:

Masako silk-satin pumps by Charlotte Olympia

but as usual, Mr Ng took one look at the price and immediately said they weren't very nice. SO typical..

9 Years, And Counting..

Roses Only to the rescue yet again

Today marks the day 9 years ago that Mr Ng and I officially started dating. Took me a while really considering that we actually formally met on NYE but I didn't decide to 'get together' until one and a half months later. Who ever would have thought that by 2012 we'd be husband and wife?
Although a recent episode of Dr Oz has convinced me to cut down on my alcohol intake for the sake of preventing wrinkles, I would love to celebrate the occasion by cracking open a bottle of Dom Perignon Rose. BUT i will settle for Perrier Jouet or Laurent Perrier given that Mr Ng claims he is still recovering from the whole wedding thing hehe.

Happy Anniversary babe! Oh and just because we're now married doesn't mean that the dating anniversary gets thrown out the window ok? ;)

Mr and Mrs Ng :)

After an eight year relationship, an almost two year engagement, one and a half years of planning, two trips to New York and more than a few trips to Hong Kong in between, the wedding is over and life as Mr and Mrs Ng has officially begun!

The wedding itself was a truly beautiful day, made even more beautiful by all of our wonderful family and friends (many of them from overseas) who took the time out of their busy schedules to witness and celebrate as we became husband and wife. It was so much fun and I would do it all again in a heartbeat.

Of course as with any wedding, there are SO many photos to go through but here are just a few highlights from the day..

The dress (minus sash) captured by our wonderful photographer

The awesome view from the Garden Suite (with my nephew in the middle), best decision EVER to have our ceremony there

First kiss as husband and wife

Lucky red soles for the tea ceremony

Rehearsing

Reception room

The cake

We've only actually seen a small portion of the professional photographs and so really looking forward to seeing the rest. Will also hopefully also be able to do a more in-depth post about the breathtaking floral decorations once we receive them - hopefully the photographer captured them well on camera!