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Aren't these animal balloons adorable??  You can get them at A+R store, along with other very clever and fun items.  Recently we were at a birthday party for a classmate of Buzz and the parent mentioned that there is an apparent helium shortage and they had a tough time getting balloons for the party!   They indicated that they searched all over town for balloons and none of the big party stores carry them any more!  Crazy!  After doing some research on the internet, the real story is that helium is a byproduct of a natural gas mining.  Due to a slow down in the supply process, the price of helium has gone up.

The 3 year old birthday party we attended was at a local park and the theme was pink pirates...apparently very popular amongst young girls these days!  This little girl is Susie*, Buzz's best friend at school.  Lately, to keep Buzz entertained on long car rides, I invented a game called the Animal Game to play with him.  I would ask him a question and he would guess what the animal is.  For example, I'd ask him, "What animal likes to eat bananas and say 'oo oo ah ah?'"  Then Buzz would answer, "Monkey!"  We would go through all of the animals he knows and so I try to come up with new "animals" for him to guess.  So I asked him one day what animal likes to eat hamburgers and watch football?  He thought about it for a few seconds and answered, "Da Da!"  Mr. BAW laughed and thought it was adorable.  Then I immediately asked him, "What animal loves 'Buzz'?"  I fully expected him to say "Ma Ma!"  But he thought about it for a few seconds and said, "Susie*!"

* The real name of Buzz's friend has been changed.  

Pink pirates party balloons.

There was even a treasure map of the park!  Too bad it was too advanced for all the toddlers!
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Posted September 30, 2012


For his 38th birthday, I got Mr. BAW the Lego Expedition Space Shuttle set.  It has, brace yourself, over 1200 parts!  It not only includes two astonauts and a satellite, it has a detachable launch vehicle with 2 rocket boosters!  The space shuttle also has retractable landing gears.  So far it's taken Mr. BAW weeks to just complete the space shuttle.  He plans on displaying the whole set up in his office.

As amazing as the lego set is, nothing compares to seeing the real thing.  On Friday, we got to be a part of something big, something huge!  We got to witness the last space shuttle flight when Endeavour made it's final journey to LA, landing at LAX before heading for the California Science Center.  Endeavour's last flight path in LA has been all over the local news for the past week.  So on Friday, Mr. BAW and I made plans to witness the historic event with our friends and co-workers at the rooftop of a 5-story parking lot at work.  As you can imagine, the entire Aerospace and Military industry in Los Angeles were beaming with pride as Endeavour flew over various landmarks in Los Angeles.  Being a science and engineering nerd, I was naturally excited!  But when I actually saw the space shuttle, I was blown away!  It was absolutely spectacular and it took my breath away.  All I can remember is hearing the crowd gasped in awe and my own voice saying, "Wow, this is so awesome!" over and over again, as I snapped away with my camera.  I am now eagerly awaiting for an upclose view of Endeavour at the Science Center.

The Lego Space Shuttle.

The Endeavour Fly-by with two escort jets. 

Endeavour's landing at LAX.
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Posted September 24, 2012




Happy Friday!  There's been a couple of sad passings of doggie friends lately.  It reminds me how lucky we are to have Toby.  Dispite our chaotic lives these days, Toby is still the same and we love him so much for it!  Have a wonderful weekend!  
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Posted September 21, 2012


The Grandparents are visiting us!!  That means quality time with the grand kids and date night for us. :-)  We celebrated a belated wedding anniversary by attending Iris, the LA Cirque show at the Dolby Theater (formerly known as the Kodak Theater.)   Though this show is not as spectacular as Ka in Las Vegas (my favorite Cirque show so far), we still enjoyed it quite a bit.  It is a very short show, only a little over an hour.  But it was a sweet show, paying homage to film, appropriately for being in the middle of Hollywood.  As usual, the show is packed with amazing acrobatics and crazy costumes.  We went to a matinee so we can still have time to go to a fancy dinner after the show.  Because of this, there were lots of children in the audience.

After the show, we went to dinner at Mozza, a restaurant by the famed Food Network chef Mario Batali.  The food was excellent and the service was great.  But overall, we liked Craft for the overall experience more.  We would still recommend Mozza it you're visiting the Hollywood area for pretty fantastic Italian food.  But with so many restaurants still to try, we may not make our way back to Mozza for a while.  Oh, and I gave myself a photo break to enjoy dinner, thus, no pics from the restaurant.  :-)  We came home to two sleeping kids and two tired granparents!  We can't thank them enough for allowing us to enjoy a wonderful evening.

The Dolby Theater lobby.

The Iris stage. 
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Posted September 18, 2012




Oh my goodness, I love this idea of turning a simple bookshelf into a dollhouse!  I will keep this in mind when Ahgoo gets her own room down the road.  Of course Buzz will protest if we use his train tracks for a path.  
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Posted September 11, 2012


Besides our wedding anniversary, last week we had two other notable events.  Mr. BAW's first birthday as a father of two and my best friend, TNK's 35th birthday!!  Both birthdays are special and I wish them both a wonderful new year as they start a new chapter in their lives.  I still can't believe TNK turns 35 because when I met her she was only a 20 year old college kid!  Crazy!!   

For Mr. BAW's birthday celebration, we had our Aunt come and babysat for us and I took Mr. BAW to Craft for a special dinner.  We had never been to this restaurant before but now, it's become one of our favorite places in LA!  The service is simply amazing, all the wait staff were super friendly.  The food is amazing!  We loved every dish we tried.  I highly recommend this restaurant for any special occasion.  

Then for our anniversary, TNK sent us lobster pies!!  I can't express how yummy the pies were.  There was no potato substitues, every bite was pure lobster.  I was in heaven, not even the kids could interrupt my meal!  :-)  

A palate cleanser of figs, pine nuts, and goat cheese at Craft.

Yummy lobster pies at home!  Yes, there's even a lobster on top of each pie.
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Posted September 10, 2012




Four years ago, we started to build a family.  Today, our family is complete.  Happy anniversary Mr. BAW!  We will be enjoying a yummy dinner of lobster pies tomorrow night!  Thank you TNK!!!
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Posted September 6, 2012


Having two young kids isn't easy.  There are days where I would lament that I can't wait for the kids to be 21!  But Mr. BAW always reminds me that we should cherish the kids at every age because the days may be long but the years are short!  He had heard that from someone and it is a great reminder to me that I should stop and enjoy precious moments with the kids!  Here are a few things I want to remember of them:

1. Buzz (2.5yo) always asks us,"What you doing Dada (Mama)?"  
2. Ahgoo is the happiest baby I've ever seen, she greets me with a big smile every morning when she wakes up.
3. Buzz love to play pretend.  He especially loves to play the three little pigs and the big bad wolf.  He pretends the big bad wolf is coming to get him.  
4. Ahgoo will sit in her bouncer and play by herself, until she gets eye contact with me.  Then she'll grunt and call me until I pick her up.
5. Buzz LOVES to eat Mac n' Cheese and calls it "Mac and Cheesy!"
6. Ahgoo loves to "walk" by having us support her under her arms.

With so many ways to create and preserve memories these days, I want to share a couple of tips on what to do with all of those art works kids make at school.  Even at just 2.5 years old, Buzz has produced a huge amount of "art."  I used to save them all but now it's kind of getting out of control.  So I want to creat a virtual gallery for the kids by scanning all of them and uploading them onto a photo site.  I have not had time to do so yet, so the art work are just stashed into a folder for now.  Another tip I found online is to laminate the good ones and turn them into table placemats.  


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Posted September 3, 2012


There was a time when people only had home phones.  A time when people can only make calls from a pay phone if they were not at home.  A time when you have to walk to a call box if your car broke down on the freeway!  Those times were a long, long time ago.  I lived in those times, back in the 80's and 90's.  I didn't even get a cell phone until I was in graduate school in the late 90's.  But the other day I forgot my iphone at my office and freaked out.  I didn't even want to drive because I knew if I drove that I would get into an accident the one time I didn't have my phone with me!  Mr. BAW  laughed and reminded me that people did live without cell phones for a long time!  Though I am not a smart phone snob, I do have a few favorite aps that I use regularly.  

1. Kindle is free for the iphone.  I use my phone to do a lot of reading.  I no longer read paper books.
2. The only app I paid for, a language translator.  This helps me keep my Chinese fresh.  I look up words I can't remember.  They do have a free version without speech.  It's also a great app if you travel, they have a phrase dictionary in every language you can think of.
3. Netflix is good for watching movies and shows while waiting at the airport or dr's office.
4. LA Times, great for keeping up with the latest breaking news while waiting at the dr's office.
5. Sigalert, a must-have for LA living, especially during rush hour commute.
6. Yelp is great for checking out a restaurant for lunch or dinner.
7. Converter tool is very handy for converting units for lenght, height, volume, even data!
8. Yes, I use the Starbucks app to search for the nearest store, sometimes to search for one with a drive thru.
9. Scramble, an addictive word game I play while waiting at the dr's office or a store.

With my recent pregnancy and two young kids, we were at the doctor's office quite a bit. :-)  Besides the apps shown here, I also use Google Maps and web browser often.
     

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Posted September 2, 2012





































































































































































































































































































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