Category Archive: foodie

Girl Scout weekend

Posted by Lisa On May 19th, 2010

The time had finally come for my niece’s 5th grade Girl Scout Junior troop to come up and visit San Francisco! We have been looking forward to this trip for over a year when I was still their troop leader and we all had a fantastic time together!

Judith (my sis-in-law), Dorothy (my mama-in-law), Katelyn (my niece) and 8 other Girl Scouts and their moms arrived to San Francisco Airport on the morning of Friday 5/7. I met them at the airport and we then BARTed our way to their hostel (a super cute place if anyone’s interested in staying in a hostel in the city) to drop off luggage.

The girls in front of their hostel

We then rushed off to eat some lunch at Mel’s Diner (a well-known diner in SF that had so-so food) and then made our way to Golden Gate Park

Milkshakes at 10am? Sure!

The group really wanted to go to the California Academy of Sciences so that’s where we spent the afternoon.

Golden Gate Park
K. and the frog having a face-off
My favorite part of the CAS: the 4-story rain forest


These frogs cracked me up! They seemed to be such characters, kind of reminded me of little Buddhas 😉

V. and the beautiful jellyfish
This sea star seemed to be laying out on a beach sunbathing
The awesome albino alligator!
V., K. and Katelyn messing around (it’s what they do best!) This beast of a display was for their “Extreme Mammals” exhibit

I have to admit, I was a little worried about being their tour guide since Kevin’s usually the tour guide when visitors come out and we generally don’t take public transportation with visitors–so though I’m super confident when it comes to the route I take everyday for work (2 buses + BART) it was a little worrisome to make sure we got on the right bus (and made sure all 18 of us got on/off at the same time!) But the first day went super smoooooth and I was pretty proud of myself. 🙂 Some funny moments riding the bus with the group–the girls absolutely LOVED riding the bus and were sad when we told them to sit down because the bus was getting full (they loved hanging onto the poles and swinging around); some young guys decided to sit down amongst the 9 girls and after they figured out who they were sitting next to (a bunch of giggling girls) it was funny to watch their facial expressions change.

They even enjoyed waiting for the buses at the bus stops…



A bunch of little monkeys!
Good friends V. and A.
This photo shows their level of excitement really well…bunch of nerds! 😉

For dinner we went to a real local treat…Chevy’s Mexican restaurant (can you hear the sarcasm in my typing voice? 😉 ) We called it an early night because we had a loooong day ahead of us!

On Saturday morning I made my way to the hostel to meet the group so we could make our way to the Golden Gate Bridge for the Girl Scouts’ annual Bridging event! When girls in GS graduate from one level to the next they call it “bridging” so the Northern California GS organize a huge event so that girls from all over can “bridge” across the Golden Gate Bridge. Our girls graduated from GS Juniors to GS Cadettes (6th-8th grade). This event attracts over 4,000 girl members (that’s just girls we’re talking about!) and is put together really well. The GS hired shuttle buses to take troops across the bridge into Marin County and then we all hiked our way back across the bridge back into SF.

Excited for yet another bus ride (driving across the Golden Gate Bridge)
The gorgeous ladies of Troop 3933!
It sure makes you think when you’re crossing that bridge and only have the water below and the huge metal structures surrounding you and the wind is blowing like crazy!
It sure doesn’t look like 4,000 Girl Scouts were crossing the bridge but believe me they were!
My beautiful niece, happy to be bridging to Cadettes!

I made an announcement as we approached the end of the bridge, that once they crossed the line they would no longer be Girl Scout Juniors but instead become Girl Scout Cadettes, so I took a few photos of them as they crossed:

B., Katelyn and K. running across the “finish line”!
V. & A. crossing in style
J., S. and M. crossing as a unit
Say hello to the newest Girl Scout Cadette troop in Long Beach!

After our trek across the bridge we were greeted with a festival for the girls–tons of booths with activities for the girls to participate in.

B. & K. with a vintage GS uniform

Katelyn & Judith taking a break
A GS tradition is making “swaps” that represent your troop and “swapping” them with other troop’s to create a collection. This is Katelyn’s hat decorated with her swaps (that was probably on 1/3 of them!)

After the event it seemed my luck with being the tour guide started to run down–I didn’t know how the heck to get us back to the hostel! Our misadventure included–walking up a huge staircase and then finding out that we had to go back down the stairs (oops!), stalking a park ranger and waiting for him outside the restroom so that we could ask for directions (awkward!), then walking a mile and a half to get to the darn bus. My excuse was that I never come to this part of town! Oh well, at least we eventually made it back safe and sound.

That night we met up with Kevin and ate at the Cheesecake Factory on top of the Macy’s building in Union Square. The group was so huge we had to get split up but it ended up being really nice spending time with Kevin and his mom Dorothy for an evening.

Overlooking Union Square: Judith, J., M., S. and B.

Sunday morning Dorothy and I made our way to the hostel to meet up with the group for their last day in the city. We went downtown to wait in a 20 minute line to take the famous trolley (I hadn’t done that since living here so it was nice to do).

The girls and the trolley
The blue skies in downtown
A group of men from Dockers pants were walking through the area with roses for all the moms out there in celebration of Mother’s Day (how cute!) So here’s a photo of all the moms with their roses.
Dorothy and me on the trolley (proof that I was there that weekend! 😉 )
Some of the girls got to ride on the outside, this is M. en route to Ghirardelli Square

The trolley took us right to Ghirardelli Square where the group split up for a bit and our little group enjoyed some delicious Ghirardelli ice cream treats (yes even at 10 in the morning!)

Katelyn getting ready to enjoy their sundae
Dorothy and my sundae (amazing!!)
The happy tourists 😉

We then walked to Fisherman’s Wharf (have I told you how much I love that place? 😉 ) and I am happy to announce that I finally saw the bushman!

The troop spent their last afternoon on a bay cruise and since I didn’t see the point in forking over $25 for me to do something I could day any ol’ time, I said my goodbyes at Fisherman’s Wharf.

It was so so so so nice spending a weekend with my family and with those crazy 5th grade Girl Scouts…I really miss spending time with them every other week at our troop meetings. Those girls mean a lot to me after being their troop leader for two years and it was so great to feel connected to them with this trip.

Dog beach and Indian pizza=The best Saturday!

Posted by Lisa On May 2nd, 2010

This weekend was Kevin’s first weekend working (which is going to be a very regular thing from now on!) so Lola and I were on our own for the first part of Saturday. What better way to spend a warm, sunny Saturday than a day at the dog beach! We visited Crissy Fields a time or two before and I knew that this was the best place to wear Lola out. 🙂

On our way to Crissy Fields

Lola and the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance

She isn’t much of a fan of the waves but she sure loves water so was happy when we found this shallow, calm spot.

Wet dog!

Happy dog!

An exhausted pup

After Kevin’s long day at work we decided to try out a new place to eat: Zante’s Pizza! I had tried their Indian Special Pizza a few months ago at a get-together and have been raving about it ever since to Kevin, so we thought it was a great night to check it out.

Hands-down the BEST pizza ever!

Kevin’s fancy coke

The best pizza EVER! Indian special pizza included: spinach, cauliflower, eggplant, green onions, curry, tandoori chicken, lamb and prawns. Amazing!

Whoever the next lucky visitor to SF is can request to come here and we will GLADLY take you! 🙂

Maya’s farewell–Part II

Posted by Lisa On April 28th, 2010

Maya’s got one week left in the Bay Area 🙁 and I was so happy that she was going to be in the city tonight and wanted to spend some time with me! She’s been staying out in Sacramento with a friend so for the night she stayed in a hotel in Union Square because tomorrow’s the final walk-through with her former landlord. She checked in and I went up to see the room for a few minutes. The hotel is called Hotel Diva, awesome! It was a little out of control…they even had complementary “Diva” temporary tattoos! haha


Maya was very excited about her King-sized bed

And I was a little excited about the fire escape that we had access to!

I felt compelled to ask Maya to take a picture of me on it. Don’t ask.

We walked through downtown for a bit and then decided to eat at a very high-class restaurant…Del Taco! Being from Boston and this Del Taco being the only one in SF, she had never been before! We used to talk about going there after work, so what better way to send her off to the East Coast than a trip to Del Taco? haha

She’s only had Taco Bell in her life, so did I make a convert outta her?? You gotta ask her. 😉

We then decided to have a little bit of dessert and we enjoyed two choclate-covered and chocolate-filled eclairs from Beard Papa bakery in the Westfield Mall food court (that is the most posh food court I’ve ever been in!) The eclairs were nothing short of amazing.

I’m hoping to spend a day with Maya and her friend Katie out in Sacramento at Katie’s new apartment over the weekend, so check back for “Maya’s farewell–Part III” coming soon! 🙂

Lisa’s visit to Long Beach

Posted by Lisa On April 28th, 2010

I just came back from a fun-filled time away in Long Beach! Kevin unfortunately wasn’t able to go because of school (he has to clock in and out so he can’t just skip class!) so he and Lola were holding down the fort while I was away.

Wed. 4/21
After a full day of work I left home at 6pm for the drive down to Long Beach! I made it in record time (3 minutes shy of 6 hours) and it was the best drive down the 5 yet! I generally leave in the wee hours of the morning and though it’s beautiful seeing the sunrise, there’s nothing quite like the way the green, rolling hills look when they’re bathed in the golden light of the setting sun (wow, I guess I’m more of a poet than I thought! haha) I was pretty blown away with how beautiful it was and I just wish I stopped for a few minutes to take some photos! I got in right at midnight and went straight to bed after a quick reunion with my family dog Lukey!

Thurs. 4/22
I woke up bright and early and went to breakfast with my mama and my second mom Diane! Diane suggested we try Brulee, a fairly new breakfast/brunch/lunch spot off PCH/Loynes Drive in Long Beach and we were definitely not disappointed! The food was absolutely delicious with very reasonable prices and super friendly staff.

After breakfast my mom and I went shopping a bit (I needed to buy a dress for the wedding I was going to that weekend) and I worked from home for a few hours in the afternoon. Then that evening we went to dinner with Allen, a Chinese student who is renting a room from my mom while he attends CSULB. We went to Cho Dang Tofu House restaurant in Cerritos, one of my favorite restaurants ever! The soup comes out boiling and you get an egg that you crack and cook right in your bowl! It comes with a steaming bowl of rice and a ton of little dishes full of yummy treats (kim chee, seaweed, etc.) And to top it all off, they have soft-serve ice cream available at the end of the meal, included in the price! 🙂

Best. Dinner. Ever!

Cracking an egg right into my soup. Mmm mmm MMM!
Me and Allen after a delightful meal

Fri. 4/23
I took it easy Friday morning trying to catch up on some sleep and get rested up for the big Girl Scout camp out weekend! The main reason I went down to LB was because of the Junior Jam GS camp out that my niece’s troop was participating in. I was the co-leader with my sis-in-law Judith for the past two years and as 4th grade Juniors last year we participated in Junior Jam in ’09 so we had to participate as 5th grade Juniors this year as it’s their last year as Junior Girl Scouts! And of course I had to come down to be with them. The girls didn’t know I was coming so it was a big surprise for them. 🙂 Junior Jam is a camping skills competition weekend, so they competed in a ton of skills like putting up a tent, first aid, fire-building, knots, lashing, emergency preparedness, GS know-how, compass and trail signs, etc. I think it is such a great event where 500 Junior Girl Scouts come together to demonstrate their knowledge with these type of skills. And on top of that, a High School GS troop is the one that puts on the event every year! It’s quite amazing.

So Friday night we set up camp, had dinner, and the troop participated in a camp-wide night games which was kind of like “Amazing Race”.

The girls were in love with the doggie door in the tent (okay, I know it’s not really a doggie door but it looks like it!)

Sat. 4/24
We woke up bright and early to eat breakfast (mmm breakfast burritos), decorate our campsite (the weekend’s theme was “Jammin’ Holidays” so our troop’s theme was “birthday”), and get ready for the competition!

The girls were up bright-and-early and wanted to check out the pond
We woke up to a wonderful surprise…squirrels got into our birthday cake! haha
I had a few of the girls pose in front of the huge decorations they had for the camp out, I told them to pretend they were part of the scenes.


The troop named themselves the “Party Bashers” for this camp out (last year it was a music themed camp out so our troop’s theme was the 80’s and the girls named themselves “The Crazy 80’s Ladies”, they sure are creative!)

That’s one good lookin’ donkey! 😉
We created a little birthday scene with the girl’s stuffed animals, too cute!

And now for the skills…

Patiently awaiting their turn
They had to use their lashing skills to make a table
Performing a flag ceremony, good job ladies!
Putting up a tent
Tying knots

The girls did a fantastic job with the skills, I was so proud of them! After eating lunch with the troop I had to leave early so didn’t stick around for the campfire that night or the awards ceremony the next morning. But I found out that the girls placed 5th!! 🙂

Saturday afternoon I tagged along with my mom and her boyfriend Steve and their friends to the Renaissance Pleasure Faire in Irwindale! The Renaissance Faire is one of my absolute favorite things to do so I couldn’t pass up the offer to go with them while I was in LB! We had a fantastic time and it was great spending the afternoon there until they closed…definitely the way to go to beat the crowds and still enjoy yourself!

My mom trying on a ribbon/flower headband, so pretty!
Steve’s grandson Christian…watch out Cap’n Jack!
A young Renaissance man checking himself out in the mirror
Give him a few years and Christian will have the biggest smile on his face 😉
Pirate mama

They have the prettiest masks there!
Christian wanted to ride the swing so I got to tag along 🙂 He’s just to the right of me.
Little Robin Hood
My head was too big for that hole, haha
My favorite thing to get at the Ren Faire…fruit ice!!
Christian sizing up the Giant
Christian and Steve showing the mini Giant who’s boss
Christian on the dragon swing (he’s third from the front)
It was Pirate Day at the Ren Faire, can’t you tell?
Beautiful horse!
I absolutely love all of the costumes! And they all play their characters so well too.


Christian climbing a tree

Saturday night I got together with our good friend Brianne and her sister Laura & Laura’s friend Kylie. We had some snacks, had some laughs, and played some fun games (our favorite past-time!) I was so happy we were able to get together, Brianne and Brian are two friends we miss so much being up here!!

Sun. 4/25
I had another early morning because I wanted to squeeze in as my visits to people as possible! The morning I spent a few hours with my in-laws Dorothy and George (with a short-but-sweet visit with my bro-in-law Thomas too!). It was great catching up with them and I really do miss our talks!

Mid-morning I drove out to my friend Kim’s house to visit with her and her three monkeys (I mean sons!) Kim and I are training for the half-marathon together (check out our running blog here!) and we hadn’t seen each other in about SIX YEARS! It was SO GREAT catching up with her in person and seeing her boys (who are a blast!)

Jacob (3) and David (12)
Kim’s dad came by on his motorcycle so Jacob and David got a ride back home while Connor (2) watched them drive off!

After a few hours of hanging out with her clan 😉 I had to rush back home to get ready for Evon’s wedding! Evon and I were in a sistahood at Redlands together (Wadada Wa Rangi Wengi or WRW) and she married her wonderful fiancee Russell! I was so honored to be a part of their special day and it was so great reuniting with so many of my WRW sistas! I carpooled with my good friend Alison and her husband Seth and it was so nice spending some time with them!

They got married at the most beautiful Catholic church I’ve ever been in!
The lone lit candle
I love stained-glass windows. Beautiful!
The newlyweds, congrats Evon and Russell!!
Nialta and Linda

The reception was a few miles away at a reception hall and it was gorgeously decorated and we had the most amazing spread waiting for us! The crazy thing is that that was only the first course of over SEVEN courses!!


And each table came adorned with a bottle of whiskey and vodka…

Danica getting us started with the Grey Goose
The reception was so much fun! In the first 10 minutes of the bride and groom showing up, her guests had her up in the air!
The happy couple’s first dance
The cake. Being on a Sunday night we had to leave by 10pm, and they hadn’t even gotten to the cake yet! It sure was gorgeous though…
Me and the BEAUTIFUL bride!

Alison, Caroline (a bridesmaid) and me
Me and Sneha (who flew in from NYC)
Meenal (who flew in from Antigua!), me and Alison

Mon. 4/26
Monday wasn’t too eventful except for the 6 hour drive back up to SF! And yes, even with the LA traffic I hit going up I made it in exactly 6 hours…I guess it pays only having one person and making only one pit-stop during the drive! I had a wonderful reunion with my Lola and after a power nap that evening I stayed up until 11pm so that I could see Kevin when he got home from school! 🙂

I had such a wonderful trip, thank you all for taking the time to see me and spend time with me!

Run, Lisa, Run!

Posted by Lisa On April 19th, 2010

Alright, blog world, I’ve got an important announcement to make…are you ready? Okay, here it goes…I’m going to run my first half-marathon this year!!! 🙂

Kimberly, a friend who I used to work with at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, and I have decided to train together for the Long Beach Half-Marathon in October (on 10/17 to be exact)! She’s still living in Long Beach so we’re going to be training long-distance together. We’ve already been at it for a few weeks, so I thought it was about time I made the official announcement on here. 🙂

We’re both avid bloggers (one of her other blogs about her adorable sons can be found here) and so we decided to make a blog together about our journey! We’re working on updating it more, so right now it might look a little bare in terms of posts. But hopefully you’ll all become followers over there too!

I’ve been running with Lola three days a week and this past Friday I asked Kevin to go along with me and to my surprise he said yes! We went to Golden Gate Park to run along the trail.

I gotta get him in workout clothes more often! 🙂

Two sweaty, happy folks

We decided to reward ourselves with a DELICIOUS lunch at San Francisco Meats & Delicatessen. We’d been there once before and remembered how freaking good their sandwiches are so made the drive from GG Park to Ocean Avenue just to get our hands on a couple of their sammies…and boy were we happy we did!

I got the smoked turkey on Dutch Crunch bread with everything on it…mmm…

Kevin got the hot salami with pickles, lettuce and mayo on a sourdough roll

At least we worked out before eating there, I guess it’s better than us just driving over there without working out all day…right?? 🙂

On Saturday night we were invited to a housewarming party for some new friends of ours. Terri and Scott are friends of Mika and Matt who we met through our friend Cynthia from Long Beach (Phew! That was a mouthful) They recently bought a new home in Concord (just past Walnut Creek) and we had a great time at their shindig. I didn’t take any pictures at the party, but Mika, Kevin and I took a quick trip to Baskin Robbins (Mika’s pregnant, so she was our excuse, haha) and lo-and-behold what do I find….?

Lisa’s Hot Dogs & Burritos shop!

Now that’s an interesting combination…

Anyone interested in trying my house-dog?

Their reviews look pretty good on Yelp, so maybe next time we go visit Terri & Scott we can have lunch at my hot dog shop. 😉

Jessie’s 28th birthday

Posted by Lisa On April 19th, 2010

On Thursday 4/15 for Jessie’s 28th birthday we celebrated in style at Morac, a delicious Middle Eastern restaurant + hookah bar.


She was thoroughly enjoying herself, if you can’t already tell 😉

Jessie’s roommate, Jessie P.

Jessie and Susan (friends since high school)

The birthday girl even provided her own cupcakes! And boy were they delish!

After dinner a few of us decided to keep the fun evening going and went to The Mint karaoke bar.

Jessie and her roommate Jessie P. dancin’

Lisa R. singing Sean Paul’s “Shake that thing”

Ryan and Charlotte singing No Doubt’s “Spiderwebs”

Jessie and I decided to sing a duet–“Ain’t No Mountain High Enough”. When we got on stage and the lyrics popped up and the music started to play we noticed that the music was a lot slower than we imagined…then realized that instead of the Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell duet version, we chose Diana Ross & The Supremes much slower version (click the links to hear the difference between the two)! Luckily we were brought up on oldies so quickly figured out our mistake and I think we pulled it off. 🙂

Ain’t no mountain high enough, baby!

And we ended the evening with a Sister, Sister! photo shoot 😉



Feliz cumpleanos mi hermana tan linda!

Mom’s visit

Posted by Lisa On April 11th, 2010

My mom and her boyfriend Steve came up to visit Thursday 4/1 – Monday 4/5 and we had a really great time. It was the first time my mom had come up to see our new place in SF and it was a great chance to get to know Steve better as well. They drove up on Thursday and that afternoon after hanging out with Kevin and me for a little bit, Kevin had to go to school so the three of us went out exploring the city.

We drove through Bernal Heights (a really cute neighborhood near our apartment) then drove through Diamond Heights and stopped to get a gorgeous view of downtown.

Kevin’s usually the tour guide for our visitors, so it was interesting being put in the driver’s seat and when I asked them “So what do you want to see?” they replied “Whatever you want to show us!” I know one of my favorite places in the city is Golden Gate Park, so that’s where we went!

We took a stroll around Stow Lake (one of my favorite spots in GG Park)…

The local sun-bathin’ turtles
Me and mom near the waterfall on Strawberry Hill
Mom and Steve in the Golden Gate Pavillion, a Chinese pagoda on Stow Lake


After our romp through the park, we decided to indulge in some delicious Peruvian food in the Mission at Mi Lindo Peru. My mom and I had actually been to this same restaurant years before when we came up to visit Jessie (long before Kevin and I had even considered moving to SF!)

This is a fantastic restaurant with extremely good food. My good friend Claudia (who visited me last summer) inspired in me a great love for Peruvian food. Our visit to this restaurant reminded me that I need to ask her for some of her recipes to make some at home! 🙂

My mom got Inca Kola (kind of like cream soda)
I got Aji de Gallina (chili chicken in a cream sauce)…I really need to learn to make this at home so I can have it whenever I please! 🙂

Friday through Sunday Steve was out visiting his niece’s family in San Ramon, so my mom stayed with me and Kevin those nights. On Friday I was able to get out of work early to spend some time with mom and Jess that evening. We hung out and talked for a couple of hours then vegged out and watched about 5 episodes of “Modern Family” (have you seen that show?? It’s HILARIOUS!) It was just like old times, the three of us cracking up so hard we could barely breathe kind of moments. That night when Kevin got home from class we went out to dinner to one of our favorite restaurants, CaliPhoNia (Vietnamese)…sooooo good!!

On Saturday afternoon, the four of us ventured out of the city and drove down to Santa Cruz. Jessie’s the only one who had been there before, and it was such a cute little beach town (definitely reminded us of Long Beach and Seal Beach).

Jess and mom doing the tango in our backyard

We had a little photo shoot on one of the cliffs overlooking the beach…

America’s Next Top Model, Jessie





We then drove down to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk…





My mom treated us to a ride on the Giant Dipper (the 6th oldest roller coaster in the US, by the way!)…


We had an AWESOME time on the roller coaster (can’t you tell by the photo? haha).

After braving the roller coaster we treated ourselves to some typical carnival food–Jessie got garlic fries, Kevin got cotton candy, mom got funnel cake and I got a chocolate-dipped ice cream cone…YUM!!

Those are some satisfied carnies! haha
My childhood favorite: chocolate-dipped ice cream cone

Kevin ate so much cotton candy his tongue turned into sugar!
The cone says it all…

On Easter Sunday we drove out to San Ramon to meet Steve and his niece Michelle’s family (her husband Steve and their kids Morgan and Melissa).

Spring is here!
Morgan (6 yrs. old) showing off his magic tricks (he was good too!)
Melissa came out in her princess gown and quickly got tangled up in some balloons and her tiara, in true princess fashion 😉
And then she proceeded to tattoo herself up with Easter stickers

To celebrate in true Easter-style we ended our evening at The Mint, a karaoke bar in SF, and the sushi bar next door, Sushi Delight. The Delmar girls all love karaoke, so Kevin and Steve just cheered us on. 😉


A few of the songs that were sung that evening…

Apparently, I really get into it. Me singing John Cougar Mellencamp’s “Hurt So Good” (my signature karaoke song, haha)
Mom singing “Can’t Take my Eyes off of You”

Jess singing “Angel Baby”

Jess and Mom dancing along to Dean Martin’s “Luna Mezzo Mare”

My mom will be back in town for my sister’s graduation from SF State so we’re looking forward to some more adventures next month!

Updates

Posted by Lisa On February 16th, 2010

Me and Kevin have been keeping ourselves pretty busy these past few weeks which is really great. Slowly but surely we’ve been meeting new friends and I think it’s been helping a lot. Nothing’s worse than not having a social support network, so we’re pretty lucky in that we’re slowly building up some friendships!

My co-worker and our friend Maya (who I’ve spoken about a few times on here) has been hanging out with us a lot lately (and sometimes her room mate Katie joins in on the fun). We’ve had quite a few game nights at their place which have been a blast (anyone who knows us, knows that we love playing games! 🙂 )

A friend of mine from Long Beach, Cynthia, came up to visit her friends that live in Oakland a few weeks ago and invited us to tag along one day she was in town. Her friends Mika and Matt have been in the Bay Area for a while and they’re a lot of fun to hang around. We met up with the three of them at Dynamo Donuts, which is a gourmet donut shop in the Mission. Cynthia really wanted to try the Maple Bacon Donut which was advertised on the Food Network (she was raving about it so it must’ve been good!) The donuts really are good, but be ready to spend a pretty little penny on each one. Then they did some sightseeing during the day and we met up with them that night at their home for some dinner and games (what did I tell you, we love games! haha). Matt and Mika made homemade pizza (BBQ chicken pizza and a potato/onion pizza, yum!) and spent a good chunk of time playing Scattergories. Since that first weekend we met them we’ve gotten together with them another time for a Super Bowl get together at their house. Though there’s talk of them moving out of state it’s nice to have some married friends in the area!

This upcoming weekend we were actually invited by one of my college friends to join a cooking party that gets together once every 1-2 months to eat yummy food together! Last month’s theme was Italian food and this month’s theme is Fat Tuesday: Comfort Foods. We’ll be preparing some delectable dessert and an update will surely follow after the event. 🙂

Another little something that I’ve been getting more involved in is the Buddhist organization that I grew up with. Each member of the organization is part of a district (neighborhood groups that get together once a month for discussion meetings), so I’m part of the Glen Park district and it’s been really great getting involved up here in SF. A couple of weeks ago I was honored by some of the Young Women’s Division Leaders (members who volunteer to help care for other members) and asked to become the Diamond Chapter YWD leader (a Chapter is made up of 3 or more districts, so I’ll be in “charge” of the young women in the three districts that make up Diamond Chapter, one of which is Glen Park district). I was a little hesitant to take on the position at first but am happy to say that on 2/7 my appointment as the new leader was announced! My goal is to really help develop the faith and practice of the young women in my Chapter and it’s my hope that by the end of the year (I know, pretty ambitious timeline!) I’ll have YWD district leaders for each of the 3 districts (at this point we don’t have any YWD district leaders). I just feel really proud that in such a short amount of time people here have faith in me to take on such a responsibility and I’m looking forward to the challenge and rewards of taking on this position! 🙂

Foodie reviews

Posted by Lisa On February 16th, 2010

The past few months we’ve ventured out and tried some new restaurants that I’d like to share for those of you planning trips to the city!

  • The Hidden Vine: An amazing little wine bar near Union Square. Me, Kev and Jessie went here and had a fantastic time. The atmosphere is extremely cozy with big, plush armchairs grouped together for small groups to get together and relax over a bottle (or two) of wine. Decent prices. It’s kind of tricky to find so don’t be afraid to ask around!
  • Barney’s Gourmet Hamburgers: A really great hamburger place in Noe Valley. We went here with our friend Maya who lives in the neighborhood and highly recommended we eat there…we were definitely not disappointed! They’ve got a great variety of beef, turkey and veggie burgers and amazing sweet potato fries. We will definitely be back!
  • Roosevelt Tamale Parlor: A cute little hole-in-the-wall Mexican restaurant in the Mission (what restaurant isn’t a hole-in-the-wall in the Mission?) Me and Jessie went here last week for a mid-week sister’s dinner. They’ve got a great selection of tamales but they were a little dry which was unfortunate. The salsa is super spicy so just be ready for that. Fast, attentive service and a warm atmosphere.

Thomas and Joshua’s visit

Posted by Lisa On January 29th, 2010

Early in the morning on t he first day of the new year we jumped in our packed car and made the drive back up to SF. Kevin’s brother Thomas and our nephew Joshua followed us in Thomas’ car to spend the weekend in the city with us! The trip hadn’t been planned more than a few days so it was a great way to end our trip.

Kevin and Thomas playing with Lola during a pit stop off the 5

After hanging out at our apartment for a bit we decided to head out to Fisherman’s Wharf (my favorite spot in the city…yeah, not really! haha) for some exploring.

I have to admit, it was nice seeing Fisherman’s Wharf at night
We were entertained for about 3 minutes by “Captain Jack Spareribs Pirate Show” (as you can see, we had to practically tear Thomas away from the show, haha)
We made another visit to the Musee Mecanique (antique penny arcade) and Josh made a little discovery (this photo was aunt/uncle inspired! 😉 )

For dinner we wanted to go to Goood Frikin Chicken or Balompie but unfortunately both were closed because it was New Year’s Day. So we ended up going to a Mexican/Salvadorean restaurant called El Patio in the Mission which had great food but horrible service unfortunately. Guess we should’ve read the reviews first, about half of them had the same complaint as us (click link above)! At least it was good food!

On Sat. 1/2 we headed out for more sight-seeing. We made our first stop at Buena Vista Park in the Haight which Kevin and I had passed many times and always said we’d visit so that day was good as any!

The boys race to the top of the staircase

Thomas, the victor

And of course the most fun the three of them had was in the kiddie playground!






After driving through some neighborhoods and popular spots we decided to get out of the city for a change so across the Golden Gate Bridge we went! We spent the afternoon in Sausalito, a really cute town just across the Bay.



Josh contemplating the meaning of life (or something along those lines, I’m sure…)



After Sausalito, Kevin and Thomas wanted to drive to Point Reyes Lighthouse but met some resistance with me because it was such a long drive and we had already driven 8 hours the day before! So we settled for a visit to Fairfax, a cute little town in Marin County. We spent some time on the major strip on Broadway checking out the cute shops and sipping on some coffee/hot chocolate/tea/coke (whatever our choice drink was 😉 ).

Thomas and Josh left first thing Sunday morning to make the trip back to Long Beach. Their visit was such a great way to start the new year!

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