Christmas gifts

It started off with the Beh family turning up at our doorstep. We hardly knew them but we clicked so well. Janielle was meant to join the Youth lifegroup to make Christmas trees. Her little sister Janna needed to practise the piano for an audition. (Their piano & container load of things from M’sia had not arrived yet.) So that Friday night, Janielle joined us to make trees, Janna practised on our piano, littlest sister Jirene came along for good company, John & Jessica (parents) chatted with my mum. (commercial break: Yeah i know! they all have blogs!!! from the oldest to the littlest! what a cool family!) Before i knew it mum offered to host them at our house until their container arrives. The initial 5 day plan stretched to 10 days (which was awesome!). We did life together for 10 days…ate, cooked, slept (late… i mean very early, and woke up late), played with our hair (or rather got rid of Janielle’s- can’t believe she trusted me!), played dress ups, watched movies, sang, shopped, danced, put up with each other’s smells, talked.. (actually our mums did da MOST talking! OMG!!!!) with complete strangers who are now a good friend of the family. They became so ‘part of the home’ (like another piece of furniture) we had to have them over for Christmas dinner!

God has his timing! Hannah & Shona were away for the first 7 days the Behs were around (Hannah@Rosebud, Shona@India) which freed up both their rooms for the girls. God gave me 3 little sisters to fill my heart during the time H&S were away. What a blessing!

Two days before Christmas we got a call from Ivan, a surgeon who moved from London to the NZ South Island recently, someone i don’t ever remember meeting when i was young, who grew up in the same town as us in M’sia, and whose parents are friends of my parents. He said he’d be in Melbourne to watch the Boxing Day Test (Aus vs. South Africa) at the MCG (MCG=Melbourne Cricket Ground). So we invited him over for Christmas dinner! Quite an interesting gentleman he was.

Uncle Avta called us in the middle of our Christmas dinner. They’d got home a day earlier from holidays. We had more than enough food, so we had them over for Christmas dinner!

So that night, on a warm Christmas night, we had mum, dad, hannah, shona, Lena, Keng, Keng’s dad, Ivan, Uncle Avta, Aunty Chand, Uncle Kenny, Joanna, John, Jessica, Janielle, Janna, Jirene, and I for a lovely Christmas dinner.

Today, we were invited for lunch at Aunty Yit Mei’s (Keh See’s mum) house. She had friends who’d just arrived from M’sia and wanted us to meet them. Hannah, Shona and I have had the most fun & fascination with Jansen & Melinda (their new English names, which suit them very well i must say!), who’ll be starting Yr. 11 and Yr.8 next yr. We got to know each other over lunch, then went to Knox to show them the shopping life, how to say “Hi, how’re u doing?” and “no, thank you” and “good thanks” and “yeah” in good ole Aussie fashion. We had good laughs!

Friendship’s the best gift ever for Christmas.