Just the hubby and I enjoying dinner at Meritage last night while my sister watched Max. Thanks again Meetas. Feasted on the 7 course tasting menu which took about 3 hours. I don’t have a detailed description for each course, but we were served smoked gravlax, chestnut puree ravioli, sturgeon, wild acres duck, and new zealand venison. Service was great, but the food was so-so. My favorite dish was the sturgeon, and the cheese platter was a bit too stinky for me. We might go back & try their regular menu which looked good.

+ Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday and new year with their loved ones. All that mattered to me was Max’s experience. He was so excited & happy with all the presents he received. Thanks everyone! He also thought it was really nice of Santa to put together his red Lego train before leaving. :)

+ Max has a group of buddies in his class, and four of them have birthdays this month. We’ve got 2 parties to attend this weekend, and two next weekend. Just happy that he’s got friends. His social skills have improved tremendously, but he still has some hiccups here & there. Sometimes he’ll just blurt out things that seem out of subject & I don’t think he understands that some kids don’t follow his train of thought.

I’m still out on the bus stop with him every morning. If it’s really cold out, I’ll warm up the car, drive to the end of our street & make him wait in the car with me until the bus pulls up. He hates it, but seriously, the kid doesn’t know how good he’s got it. :) I keep asking the husband how long I can do this. First grade? Second grade? I wouldn’t want to embarrass him.

+ It’s January 4th, and I still have my tree up. Ssssh. Don’t tell.

+ We’re due for a vacation, I think. Want to take Max to Legoland in San Diego. Ang, you up for it?

What I’ve Been Up To:

Craft Hustlin’ - Needed a wreath over the fireplace for the holidays, and didn’t see anything I liked at the stores, so I decided to make my own. Very easy y’all. Cut out a wreath shape from an old piece of cardboard, find pretty & sturdy paper, punch out a leaf shape, hot glue the leaves to the wreath cardboard, make a bow, and hang up. This project cost me $17!



Put up a new light fixture in my dining nook. Got it from Crate & Barrel. Thanks to my honey for helping me. He held it up while I wired it. Yay teamwork. That thing was heavy. Really happy with it. Love the traditional, but more modern, sleek style. Pictures don’t do it justice.



Kids and gadgets these days! Found Max playing with an iPad & iPhone at the same time the other night. Doesn’t make sense to me.



I hosted my first Cookie Exchange Party this past weekend for my sisters & girlfriends. I’ve always wanted to do this since I love cookies. It was a lot of fun & just nice to hang out with the ladies minus kids/spouses. Everyone brought 5 dozen cookies & we nibbled on appetizers. All the cookies were so yummy. Thanks ladies for coming out despite the crazy weather.

+ I’m hosting Christmas dinner for Mike’s family this year, so that’s the next event I’m getting ready for. Planning to make prime rib. Never made it before, so wish me luck.

+ Max is really looking forward to Xmas. It’s really fun to enjoy it with him. We bought him a Lego train set (shhhh!), and are planning to have it all built & set up in front of our tree on Xmas morning, so it’ll be really fun to see his reaction. You know that scene on tv or in the movies where a little boy wakes up Xmas morning & there’s this awesome train set around the tree? Just love seeing the joy on their little faces.

+ Max is still in karate which we go twice a week. He’s got a couple more Lego & swim classes before he’s done for the year. Don’t know what we’re gonna do in January besides karate.

+ I’m almost done with my vanity/dressing area. I love it so far. I’ll post up pictures once I’m done. I’m slowly painting the interior of our house. Picking paint colors is a headache, but I gotta do it. Getting rid of all the tan in our house.

+ The hubby bought an elliptical machine so I have no excuse. I gotta get in shape. It’s now or never. Leave me a good song to exercise to.

These past few days felt like summer, but my front door looks like fall, doesn’t it? Just need a nice doormat and a big urn arrangement to complete it.

We’ve got Max signed up for tae kwon do, swimming, and Lego classes. We realized that team sports was something that he wasn’t very good at. During his t-ball games this summer, he would be in his own world & sometimes not even facing the right direction. It was comical to watch. So we thought we’d try different non-team activities this time around.

The other night, Max & I were at my brother-in-law Teng’s birthday dinner, but the hubby wasn’t able to make it. It was a small group of us, and it was funny how Max would try to entertain us with knock knock jokes. Learning to make people laugh & make small talk just like his Daddy.

Max and I went to the craft store today to buy stuff to make his Halloween costume. He wants to be Sponge Bob. Yeah, I could just buy a costume from Party City or online, but I usually like to make the costume myself. There’s nothing like a homemade costume, I think.

I’ve been neglecting this blog for too long. Sorry folks! Facebook is much easier to post things. This site is due for renewal in a couple months, and I’m not sure if I should renew or not. I’m not posting as often as I’d like to, and everyone’s on Facebook anyways. Gotta talk to my investor and see what he thinks.

Summer ended too soon. Max started kindergarten this fall. Time sure flies. I still remember bringing him home from the hospital. Max will be in school all day 4x/week since we were able to get him into the afternoon program, and half day once a week. What ever will I do with all that time to myself? :) I’ve been trying to finish staining the deck, and I’ve been sick so lots of sleeping in. Ha. Signed up to volunteer in Max’s classroom, so looking forward to that. Had lunch with Max last week just to make sure the food was decent. This week, he was Star of the Week so I had to make a poster for him. Will have to post up a picture of that when we get it back.

It was my little nephew Mason’s 1st birthday party in August, and my sister asked me to make little fondant dinosaurs for the cake. They turned out pretty cute. It’s a lot of work so I don’t know how those professionals do it. Maybe Pang will let me intern for her to improve my skills. :)

New Restaurants (out of 5 stars):

Haute Dish (Mpls) - 4 stars
Anchor Fish & Chips (NE Mpls) - 4 stars
Barrio (Mpls) - 3.5 stars
Vietnam House (Brooklyn Park) - 3 stars
Q Fanatic BBQ (Champlin) - 3.5 stars
Uptown Cafeteria (Mpls) - 2 stars
Fogo de Chao (Mpls) - 3 stars

Summer purchases: patio set from Room&Board, Weber Genesis gas grill

New Foods: We tried the Akaushi beef that Kowalski’s sells in the ribeye cut, and it’s very good. Great marbling and very buttery tasty. In fact, I can only eat two or three bites because it’s so rich. Be sure to call ahead to make sure they have some before heading out there. We did go back a couple weeks later and tried the ground round Akaushi, and made sliders which turned out ok. I think it helped that we added some sauteed shiitake mushrooms to it.

New Movies (out of five stars):

Wallstreet: Money Never Sleeps - 2 stars
The Social Network - 3 stars
Inception - 4 stars
Animal House - 3.5 stars

Upcoming Project: Vanity table/Dressing area

There’s a spot in our closet that’s perfect for a vanity table. Here’s a little sketch of how I would like it to look. I’ve got the mirror & lamps already. I’m planning to buy the vanity table from Ikea and paint it white. As for the chevron design on the wall, I hope good tape, a level, and pencil will be enough for me to pull it off. For now, the colors are butter yellow, cream and black. Will post results soon.

Congrats to May Kou & Xwm on their nuptials the other weekend. We’re so happy & excited for the lucky couple. Kou is my best friend Maysee’s older sister, so I couldn’t refuse when she asked for help with her wedding flowers. Kou is such a sweetheart and had complete trust in me even though I don’t have a lot of experience. Her colors were pink & brown, and her flowers were hydrangeas, roses, calla lilies, and asiatic lilies. Stunning combination. Can you believe 250 of the roses are Sam’s Club roses? Best deal ever.  Just let them open up two days before your event & they will look amazing.

Also a big thanks to my sister May who helped make the boutonnieres & prep the flowers. I couldn’t have pulled this off without your help, May. We stayed up all night working on 5 table arrangements, 6 bouquets, 2 corsages,  and 30 boutonnieres. We were only able to squeeze in 3 hours of sleep, but it was so worth it because the bride was happy with how everything turned out.

The gorgeous bride & bridemaids
L to R: Jade, Sam, May Kou, Chloe, May & Maysee

The arrangement in the white urn is my favorite and is much bigger in person. At least 4 feet tall if you count the curly willow branches sticking out on top. I love the green amaranthus drooping off the arrangement. So romantic. There were two of these & I was so relieved when they made it from the church to the reception intact.

I love weddings and all the details, so while I don’t know if I have it in me to do this as a living, I know that I absolutely love making weddings beautiful & memorable.

Hope you all had a good J4.

MayKou’s Bachelorette Party & Kindbeats @ Epic on Friday
Watched my sister play football @ the soccer tournament
Watched UFC @ our place with some friends
Food & fireworks at my sisters
Drinks with my little brother & his buddies

It was a fun filled weekend.

It has been a while since my last post. What have we been up to?

+ T-ball & swimming has started, and Max is slowly getting the gist of things. It’s funny to watch little kids learn how to play a sport.

+ I am slowing down on the home improvement stuff. Last on the list: gutters, deck & hardwood floors and that will be it for a while.

+ Watched The Cove last night. It was a good movie, but heartbreaking. I don’t think I can support zoos anymore.

+ The hubby, Max & I are all obsessed with the iPhone app Plants vs Zombies. Mike’s old iPhone died a month ago, so we had to take turns on my iPhone playing it.

+ Speaking of the iPhone, we were able to score the new iPhone 4 without waiting in line thanks to the hubby spending hours hitting the refresh button. Lol. Very nice compared to last time. Verdict: pretty amazing. The screen is really nice & it’s super fast. I want to get the white one when it comes out, and then we can utilize the face time feature.

+ Started teaching Max math last month. We’re working on addition right now. When he passes multiplication & division, I am handing it over to his Daddy since math is not my forte.

+ I am helping with my best friend’s sister’s wedding flowers next month. Want it to be perfect for her, so hope I can pull it off.

+ See my curtains I made for my mudroom? It’s the same fabric that I was talking about in this post. And I didn’t have to sew one stitch. Used hemming tape. Mike’s Grandma gave me her Husqvarna sewing machine, but I’m not ready to use it yet. I need some sewing lessons first. Anyway, this project was super easy & cost me less than $30 for everything. Love saving $$.

+ Signed Max up for tee-ball & swimming this summer. He needs work on his gross motor skills, so t-ball should help & also be something fun to do this summer. We might take him to a Twins game this weekend to get him familiar with the game.

+ Know what I’m super excited about? My new chair. The hubby bought me an Eames molded plywood lounge chair last week. Herman Miller’s having a 15% off sale right now. I have been coveting this chair for a while now. It’s like a piece of art, so if you come over to my house, you can’t sit in it. It’s only to be looked at. Alright, I’m just kidding… Kind of.

+ I am thinking about getting one of those GPS trackers for Max to wear when he’s out of the house. What do you guys think? I mean, he’s with me most of the time, but he does run outside a lot to play with the neighbor kids. It just scares me so much when I read about child abductions.

+ Max’s last day of preschool was last Thursday. We went to his graduation ceremony & he said his goodbyes to his classmates. It was sweet. I can’t believe my kid’s gonna be in kindergarten this fall. He’s gonna love waiting for the bus with his neighbor buddies.

+ Max & I spent the day with my girlfriend Mitsu & her nephew yesterday. Love hanging out with my girlfriends & just eat & gossip chat all day. It was a fun Monday.

[click on images to enlarge]

As promised, here are the results of the mini-makeover of my kitchen. This is what it looked like before. We had the perimeter cabinets enameled to match the trim/interior doors. I also replaced all the hardware. The pulls are the Asbury line from Restoration Hardware in satin nickel. To save money, I ended up buying the knobs from Home Depot instead of RH. Saved about $150. Replaced the island pendant light fixtures. And had new backsplash installed. Overall, I think our kitchen looks a lot bigger & brighter. I am contemplating if I should have the island stained darker, but it’ll do for now.

This weekend was pretty busy. On Saturday, we went to a birthday party, a graduation party, and a housewarming. Ate way too much. Then on Sunday was my best friend Maysee’s little girl Rylee’s birthday, so we stopped by & stuffed our faces more yummy food. All in all, a weekend filled with food. Love food, but not good if I want to fit in my dresses this summer.

This week, I hope to have more things done around the house. In the meantime, keep cool everyone.