our mini getaway

We woke up bright and early the day after christmas to drive to San Francisco. I did pretty good during the whole journey... i only slept for 30 min or so out of the 5-6 hours drive. :)) We finally arrived at SF bay bridge after a crazy detour from our crazy GPS system. on the way in to the island, we saw q big fire going on... which slowed down the traffic

into the bay bridge! We 1st checked in to our hotel to get refreshed a little.... and then visited... the golden gate bridge. we went to the other side of SF, the Marin county side the gorgeous view of san fran
my very attentive husband didn't bother to let me know that i buttoned my coat wrong so i can have picture of this to remember for the rest of my life :\
Since we were at the Marin side, we decided to drove around Sausalito. The water stink so bad..... -_- you think they get used to the smell?? i definitely cannot imagine living in one of these houseboats. Next visit was Union Square. We met up with eng jo and her brothers who coincidentally was visiting SF the same weekend. Union Square was so pretty. Decorated with lots of christmas lights. Almost looked like ny... a mini ny. So christmassy feel.... :))) It has a mini outdoor skating rink... pretty cool. We walked around town and had crappy chinese food at chinatown.

Next morning, we went on the Alcatraz Cruise. We both had not done the tour before and heard it is worth visiting. We took the early bird cruise to beat the crowd.

A very nice Saturday morning, unlike what the weather forecast said. on the ferry.... going to the island

the self guided audio tour makes the tour a lot more interesting. The narator explains the history pretty good. behind the bars if you don't listen to your wife :| the jail kitchen. surprisingly, they were one of the prisons that served the best food (according to the audio narrator) John had to go half way during the tour ;) and my curiosity prompted me to smell the toilet... emmm... not nice -.- after the tour, we had lunch at the fisherman's wharf. We shared a plate of fish & chips. Pretty good. Here at the Lombard Street, the famous crookedest st in the world. We walked from Fisherman Wharfs all the way to Lombard Street. Thanks to "Smarty Pants", who kept saying that it's very close but dind;t realize that every street that we had to go is uphill!!! on the famous famous trolley.... we went to union square again at night.... it was just so pretty the view from macy's top patio Next morning before we hit the long journey home, we stopped by the Golden Gate Bridge again for a better picture. This time, we didn't cross the bridge. SF City Hall.

It was a fun trip. I brought home from San Francisco a sore leg and John a bad knee. :P

PHO

I was craving for pho for quite some time. So last Sat was the perfect opportunity to drive down to San Gabriel for my PHO. Plus, we needed to get some chinese groceries to stock up, especially rice. We are totally out. Another reason to drive down there!

On the way down, we stopped by IKEA to check out their winter sales.... neh... nothing worth buying.

We went to Golden Deli. I think they have the best PHO in town. :)
Well, it looks like they were voted for the best PHO in town. Didn't know that until I checked out their website.

my delicious PHO...

of course john, who doesn't know how to appreciate all thing soupy, ordered rice with charbroiled beef and egg roll. Their rice dishes are good too.... he had almost gobbled up the whole thing before i told him to take a picture. :-)


I was a happy camper that night... i got to eat my PHO, had my favorite dessert (mango tapioca) and bought lots of chinese groceries. Guess what? I got sidetracked at the grocery store. I got everything except my bag of RICE!!!! grrrr.....
I guess we'll have to go again.... :P

christmas dinner with the folks

On christmas morning, i ran to my tree to look for my gift from John. Haha.. i am still in my pajamas.

Later that day, we went to Debbie's house to celebrate christmas. They do christmas at her house every year. I didn't take that many pictures. We had a regular christmas together with the family but i must say the dinner was really good. Dan made some kick ass prime rib. No picture on that unfortunately. Here are some pictures of the kids opening their gifts.

Jasmine with the Princess travel kit- frm us.

Jacob with Thomas the train set- frm us
having good fun with his new toy
one of the gifts frm grandma and grandpa
i think this is the wii organizer set that jasmine is trying to open here....

We got the best gift of all.... cash! ehehhee...

my version of santa clause incident

So I was reading June's blog the other day about her santa claus gift. It was really a peculiar incident... and what are the chances that a company made a mistake in shipping right? Plus, it was something that she wanted. I am pretty sure it was one of her friends that wanted to give her a surprise.

I then realized that something similar happened to me too. On Christmas morning, I was all excited, ran to my christmas tree to look for my present from John. More details on the christmas on a later post. Aside frm John's gift, I found another gift addressed to us both. It had a card, so we know it's from Jocelyn. I then found another unusual gift! with no name, no card. We thought that it might be Jocelyn's and that she had accidentally left it there. We put it back under the tree, didn't think it is for us. But i was very tempted to open and take a peek. John forbid me from doing so. We took the christmas tree down last night and of course that gift was still under the tree. Jocelyn hadn't come home since, and we had no chance to ask her. We left it on the counter and finally, she came home today. Surprisingly, she had no idea about that gift. I quickly told john that i can open the gift now cause no one knows the origin of the gift. I unwrapped it and the note was inside it. It is from Janet!!! I guess she left it there to surprise me. Well, i am surprised! She might have left it there the night she dropped her plants off. We are housesitting their plants for them while they are in London.

See??? I too have a santa clause incident.... hehehe....except i know who my sender is. My gift is a cd that i wanted, Lisa Donahey. I went to a disney charity event "Applause for a Cause", and she had performed there. I love her voice. Thank you mucho net!!! :)))

I hope you find out who your santa clause is.. june! :))))

Dinner @ K Town

Last week we decided to try something new. We headed all the way to K town for real authentic Korean BBQ :) I picked out Soo Won Galbi on Vermont St based on their rave reviews on the internet. This place cooks with real charcoal so the meat tastes extra flavorful, i think. It was the best Korean BBQ I've had so far.... Everyone enjoyed it and had good fun. Wish we could find something similar in our valley :(

the side dishes were delicous..... unlimited refills.... :))))) the fish cake was the best! tim patiently waited for the meat to be cooked..... the dinner package we ordered came with a bottle of soju... me and tim think that the soju was fake because we had like 5-6 shots... and felt nothing. even dustin who usually doesn't drink, drank some that night. haha... i guess because the hostess of the restaurant was flirting with him

All of us brought home a full stomach and clothes that smelled like Korean BBQ the entire night.

It was fun to eat at new places and explore.... will definitely do this again. I think Jenn said to try an Argentinian Restaurant at North Hollywood. We'll see if we can arrange a time....