Etna Italian restaurant & pizzeria

First post of 2013: coming pretty late.
went on a sunday date with joy!(:
loving our lunch date, where we have nothing on later and and chill and eat for super long.

It was restaurant week and we reserved Etna Italian Restaurant and Pizzeria!
A surprise 3 course meal, and we were pleasantly surprised.

first course had us going "oohhh". 

its pretty amazing- grilled calamari topped with crispy garlic and chilli with homemade aioli sauce. 

super love.

main course was: Linguine with crab meat in a lobster cream sauce. 

it a good dish but i like my linguine a little more bouncy. 

the crabmeat were plentiful!(: 

and the last was the best. oh man. 

though i just had this yesterday, i could eat another one now!!!

this confirms that i am going back for more.

it was a good experience and an awesome sunday lunch.
the casual and relaxed environment without the noisy chatter.

left to raffles city for some retail therapy. but we were both decked in our new wedges and had to make stops.
red mango to the rescue! 

Of the last of 2012

Wheeee~ last day of 2012 and I am going to attend belle's birthday party, have a countdown & a sleepover later.

Can't wait:D

Hehehe. Laziness got me and so I am writing this after all the events!

The last of 2012 was awesome and the first day of 2013 was equally good as well.

Pretty chillax and I spent w the cousins!

The six of us is fantastic combi & we never fail to have fun together!

 

pretty much spent the last of 2012 with them cux on 30th, it was our grandma's death anniversary, so we went for prayers and then to brunch at five & dime.

 

my egg benny which was pretty good.

but i think prive still serves my favourite. the fruit salad is awesome though!

thumbs up for that.

sis had my fav mentaiko pasta from there and i had a mouth. yums! still my favourite there!

belle had their big brekie and it had my fav mushrooms!

 

went shopping around town. and i got the pedro clutch!!!:D

mad love it. hehe. sis and i paid half each.

 

had a long and late lunch at coffee club after that.

tried their chicken and mushrooms baked rice.

quite alright though nothing to rave about.

 

and we shared a pear caramelised tart which actually tasted weird and not that nice.

looks over taste for this.

nice sis actually accompanied me till six plus before i met up with jiapei for her retail therapy.

she got her pedro heels at 40% off!

 

and we headed over to thai express for late dinner. reached at 9.45pm and managed to order before their 10pm last order!:D

had my tom yum soup. hot and spicyyyyy.

asked fy down and we had a nice chat at macdonalds!

So on 31st dec 2012, it was Belle's 21st birthday!

belle's dad came over to fetch us and then off we went to fetch belle and shirley.

 

taken before we set off!

 

went to oxford hotel cafe for decorations and preparations.

tons of shifting the tables around for the 4 girls. haha! should have gotten the two guys to help us.

 

all the work got us all hungry and we were so happy when the buffet started.

we were like in our own world, pigging out on the food.

non stop eating and we also played games among ourselves.

lost alot and red wine was the punishment!

 

steal a shot of shirley and sis.

jeffrey campbell, i tried on it and its surprisingly damn comfy.

both had about extra 6 inches.

 

 

cake!(: which was yummy!!!

campagne favoured.

had some fun with the props and balloons!

without the birthday girl cux she was busy entertainig her guests.

 

and finally full force of us girls.

the all cousins shot are in the official camera of belle's friend. 

and after that, we headed to shirley's place for our stayover.

initally wanted to count down at clarke quay but we were quite tired after everything so we decided to chillax instead of braving crowds.

&&&& the best last news of 2012 is that i finally got hold a pair of melissa shoes!

belle and i got soooo excited over that and it felt so unreal. hehehe.

mad happpyyyy. finally.

 

and then we mj-ed till 4am before resting.

sleep till quite late and then we watched running man tgt, have brunch and played mj.

time pass mad fast, and we went off to nex to have dinner at sushi tei:D

had sogurt for desserts before we head home.

 

i love how my 2012 ended and how 2013 started!

 

 

Xmas 2012: carlton hotel/ orchard grand court hotel & oriole!

I don't really celebrate x'mas besides the usual 2d1 gang gathering that we have.

But this year I spent quite some days having fun and soaking up the festive season feel:D

I must say its a good 2012 ending I am having(:

Firstly: Carlton hotel for the 2d1 gathering.

22nd- 23rd december.

Awesome location. Just less than 5 mins walk from city hall mrt.

definitely the most accessible location as compared to studio m hotel and the club hotel that we previously went!

Yes, it's the third year of staycation!

&& to make it just a little more fun and memorable for ourselves, we set up a games committee.

consist of xiano, junqi, joycelyn and me.

we met up twice to discuss the games and had so much laughters during the discussions.

 

the planning committee met up at JP to get all the party and food stuffs.

and its the usual bickering about what to buy and rejecting each other's choices.

the peanuts and beer team verus the butter cookies and redondo team. (OLD VERUS YOUNG!)

should be easy to guess who is the two in old and the other two in young huh.

 

wayyyy too much stuff and we got a cab there.

checked in and we got upgraded to a premier room cux there was full house. yipeeee!

started the preparations~

 

all the tidbits bought!

and no, we dont eat seaweed like that.

we love to dip it in soft drink and it matches perfectly with soaked marshmallows.

the drink will taste awesome too.

one of the mandatory game & we named it last christmas supper.

yums. never fail to make me want to vomit.

 

another one game was guess who drank the potion?

and so thats junqi preparing the mega salty solution and joy laughing evilishly at the back.

and thats the lemon for the sour drink.

 

there was spicy/ alcohol and bitter drink too.

i got 'lucky' and drank the alcohol one where we all had to drink it in a gulp.

totally burning throat and still had to act all calm!

downed some water after it ended. gross.

& thats creative xiano preparing the scoreboard!

 

there was a drawing game which was similar to the running man version.

and thats joy with her very creative drawing of..... iron man.

it would take a genius to guess that right!

 

& xiano is drawing a unicorn.

(hmmm, adm student? HAHA!)

 

group photos with the props(:

 

 

HAHA. the new pandas. guess who we kicked out!

junqi is forever joking on this.

the never ending bickering of xiano and jq.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

as usual, din sleep a wink and got jing hui to got down for hotel buffet breakfast.

did some catch up and had a good 2 hours chat and breakfast.

 

later, after everyone was awake and prepared, we headed to breakfast at mac- raffles city shopping centre and travelled home after that together.

knocked out straight after!

awesome xmas staycation (:

its 2012 coming to an end, and i am thankful for this bunch of friends.

you all are really all that i can ask for.

 

 

so the next day i went for xmas eve dinner with isabelle and her family!(:

at orchard grand court hotel.

enjoyable dinner, chilling, relaxing and it was a long dinner.

ended at about 10 plus. love ending meals with desserts and coffee.

somehow feels complete.

 

picture with my best shopping companion, gossiper.

love her tons!

 

 

 

sashimi(: nothing much can go wrong with it.yums!

we spam alot of this.

 

and the next day was CHRISTMAS.

met up with the cousins without joseph and ivan.

had a xmas dinner at Oriole.

the food was so-so and kinda on the expensive side but i did enjoy myself.

no crowds, we din have to queue and there was no pressure to leave after we are done with the food.

yeays. anyway, my red beef cheek pasta had good beef that was tender.the pasta was passable only though.

 

some random pictures.

 

 

 

 

and i received the running shoes i have been waiting for from shirley.

love the hot pink!

thanks so much(:

 

quite an eventful xmas i have & i really enjoyed myself.

 

Sisters' day out- wild honey and hoshino checked!

Went on a sisters' day out finally!(:
Had brunch at wild honey cux sis has never tried it before and she is so interested in it.
So off we go! Got to love wild honey because of the locations which are so convenient.

Tried their stacked pancakes this time round. It's nice and thick! And goes so well with the butter and honey.

But then it gets sick after awhile so it's really better for sharing!
Sister's English breakfast was better!

And after that, hopped over to far east for sister's hair make over.
Decided on Francis and jeans instead of shunji cux its so much more cheaper @ 180 bucks for Rebonding!
The stylist did a fantastic job on her hair! It finally sees its better days!

I had to wait for her four hours so I went to do my nails.
The usual place where I have been frequenting for years! Nail status but then the standard dropped and my nails weren't painted nicely at all.
The day before, I went with Xiano and shihua to nail status thinking of doing our nails. They two did it and the standard was horrible so I din want to do it that day. Shihua had bumps on her nails and i had to help her clean off those that were painted on her sides of nails.
Okay, time to find a new place!

And then we headed off for some shopping at plaza sing cux had to use the gap voucher!
Dinner at hoshino, a new dining place at the new extension of plaza sing.

see the pretty fake food on display.
Glad we chose this place cux the souffle pancakes is really the thing!!!
So freaking awesome, it totally triumphs the ones I had at wild honey previously.
Must add the soft serve and the whipped cream is salted lightly to match the pancakes.
Return visit is a must!

Packed home clam chowder soup from the soup spoon and we had it for our breakfast & lunch the next two days.

 

 

 

 

 

bishan canopy off bucket list.

Backloggsss too much.haha!!
To think I should be very free but really, almost every other day is filled w events!
So on 12/12/12 I am writing about 22/11 happenings!
Twilight last part with the cousins! We made it a point to watch almost all of the parts together!

And after that, we went to Bishan canopy!

We took an hour to reach when it would only take 10 mins?
Walked from one end of the park to another!
Anyway, the food was quite normal that day. Nothing really fantastic?
So it wasn't worth the effort.

My Caesar salad which wasnt nice! And there wasn't any eggs? How is that possible!
and worse, dont have my bread crumbs! so it was just mixed veg with a piece of bacon and garlic bread.

However, the desserts saved the show!
The apple crumble was awesome and the chocolate profiteroles was nice too!

And on one of the nov weekends, had a sing k session with joy and ruifen.

It's been so long that I forgotten k lunch has lunch for us!
The food improved so much and Japanese cuisine is served now!

 

after that Ruifen left, joy and I went to have desserts at Ji de chi!
Haha, being mad, we decided to head to Jcube for canton paradise dim sum!

one of the must try at canton is this. roasted pork bun. crispy on the outside and juicy inside.
and of couse, liu sa bao. but i realise it seems like most places seems to be able to do this dish well.
or i really love them so much that i dont mind imperfections!
but paradise version usually leaves me satisfied.

After that, headed to her place to nua. Yes, fav past time of ours.
Clearing up her closet and took home some pieces for mum and sis!
She sent me home after that.

Xmas hotel celebration party committee meeting at Jp coffee bean on of the weekday nights! Joy & I met up first after her work for dinner at coffee bean!
Risotto major fail! It's baked rice leh, coffee bean gave it a wrong name lah.

While waiting for the other two, she did her work while I read my James Patterson!
And after that, Joy, junqi, Xiano and i came up with some games!
Had a really fun time deciding the games!
Hopefully they turn out fun.