m + d

i freeze lots of things, definitely there's been few mysterious contents in plastic bags were found in my freezer. so i started writing "what it is" on the top of the bag with sharpie but i ran into this cute freezer label on martha stewart (you can download the label here). i think this is a good idea, why did i not think of that before? but i might get too lazy printing them out later??

or maybe i should make my own version? well i guess if i'm gonna make one, i would make few color ways, so that i can color coordinate (like yellow label = chicken, red label = beef, green label = veggie and so on). if i make one, do you guys want it? or do you have better ideas and suggestions?

i actually did this art project few weeks ago, i've been kinda busy (kai's b-day) and i guess kinda lazy to take some pictures until today. anyhoo, i watched the finale of bravo top design and the winner, nathan made this awesome painting by just pouring the paint on canvas. well, i totally "borrowed" his idea and did mine with my color schemes.

i just bought dark grey and orange quart of regular house paint from home depot, and used my "oops, wrong color" paint of blue from painting kai's room (the blue was by behr and was very thick and totally made the chunky spots on canvas, can you see that?).

it was easy art project but took me like 3 days to finish it (believe it or not!). i did this in the cold garage, and had to wait until the paint was dry to put another coat, so that they don't mix together. overall, think came out ok. i know some of you have see it already and gave me a good feedback. but what do you think? do you think it's kinda cool? fun? interesting? odd? or weird?

so this is what i did to the sad mantle but now i think it's a festive mantle ;) i did take vanessa's idea for putting the ornaments in the cylinder vases. it definitely worked out very nicely and i put touch of nature (pine cones) in between. also i put holiday dunnies that daniel requested on the stocking hanger and i got my reindeer in there too! i think this will do for this year and probably add more stuff next year since kai won't be eating (hopefully) the ornaments by then.

i found this fun chalk mat at target. it's a place mat but on the other side, it's a black, chalk mat. i think it's a pretty cool idea so that you can bring it on-the-go and your kids can have some creative fun. i also love the sans serif typography design (also had yellow with cute pink and lime green owls for girls) and that's pretty much what got me :P i guess my only concern would be the chalk dust on the table...ugh, that might make me go nuts!

we got our xmas tree a day after kai's b-day (so that kai's b-day doesn't get mixed up with xmas). it was raining on sunday when we got the tree, so we decided to let it dry in the garage over night. finally when daniel got home, we put the tree inside and put some lights on (don't you think that xmas lights are making the walls look like some kind of textured faux finish? kinda crazy looking).

i'm debating if i should put ornaments on it, i mean i really want to but if kai's gonna get into them, maybe i shouldn't. i thought about putting ornaments kinda higher up so that kai can't get them but maybe that wouldn't look as good...so we might go pretty simple, minimalist style this year. anyhoo, our house smells good and i'm definitely getting the holiday sprits now.

btw, i need some kind of cute decorations on the mantle...it's looking pretty sad with stockings and nothing else...any suggestions? maybe a reindeer?

sorry for the lack of post in the past few days. i've been kinda busy making some stuff for kai's b-day party. i wrapped his presents in this cute red dotted paper (bought it at target, probably for xmas? but fit the theme perfectly) i made birthday banner (has subtle grey dotted pattern like the ones on cupcake toppers but can't really see them), a little sign for his high chair, and cupcake toppers for ones that don't get candles (i'm planning on making close to 40 cupcakes tomorrow).

i know it looks totally easy but you know, they always take more time than it looks and of course, i make mistakes too...so that doesn't help. decorating the "party area" was one of my main thing to do and this is what i got so far. stay tuned for tomorrow's actual party pics ;)

we put up xmas lights today, nothing gorgeous or fancy with moving santa & deer and all that, just decided to do pretty minimal and one color. i wanted to put some lights up to keep up with the festive holiday spirits ;) the icicle lights are still bunched up at the top, hope it comes down a bit over time...

just took this right out side of the front door. it's been really foggy in the morning and at night. it was still foggy until almost about noon today and star getting foggy around 5 pm. i think it's kinda creepy like halloween everyday lol.

went on a walk in the late afternoon with kai + deedee and saw this flower on the side of the road.

just a collection of random pics i took. i think this post wraps up all the pics from our japan trip.

soft bank (cell phone carrier and they are the ones that carry the iphone in japan) came out with cool pantone color cell phones. i just like the coloful doggies too but why don't we have those in the u.s.! i do like the pantone 325, 109, 1495, or 200? i can't pick one :P

i saw this chair for the first time when i was on a walk with michelle few months ago. the chair says "our family rocks!" kinda cheesy, cute, and fun, no?

walking back home, it was only 6:30 but it was getting pretty dark already. i know it's gonna get even darker faster when the summer time ends and i'm not gonna like it! but the color and the contrail looks pretty in the sky tonight.

i've been starting to pack for japan on and off but i really need to start doing it now since we are leaving on tuesday. i know, i really have this many suitcases to pack, or bring i should say, so that we can bring lots of cool stuff back home (actually i have a big black duffle bag that is not in this picture too). yes, mr. kai's been "over seeing" what i do and making sure all the suitcase wheels work as smoothes as they should ;P

we decided to go to ikea and bought this storage box from the odda seris for kai's toy box (yes, we kinda got lazy and didn't make one on our own). it comes with casters but we decided not to put them for now since kai moves stuff around and could be dangerous. it is practical with an economical price compare to ones i wanted on the previous post. this will do for now ;)

daniel brought home a pumpkin from work last night. having this orange pumpkin in the house makes it very "fall" feeling. it makes me think that halloween and holiday seasons are coming all over again (didn't we just have that not too long ago? geez, time flies!). this pumpkin is a bit funky tho, sits kinda slanted like the leaning tower of pissa!

i made kai play with it, he had a good time rolling the pumpkin on the floor :)

yes, cucumbers are still growing in the backyard. i picked 67 of them to be exact so far (my goal is to pick 100 but i don't think that will happen since the fall is coming now). i saw this wired circular looking one with what looks like a mouth (kinda looks like a spore creature?) at the bottom! isn't that a little creepy? i don't think we'll be eating this one for sure. ewwww...

i went to a little grocery trip to costco today and i fell in love with these cookies (yes, it was one of those sample things...totally got me!). i've never heard of this brand before but it's totally yummy and a lot better than oreos in many ways (taste, price, and ingredients). it's organic (no pesticides, chemical fertilizers, or genetic engineering), all natural ingredients, has whole grain, and what do you know, it's vegan (v. i'm sure you had this before??). i highly recommend these cookies, seriously, try it!

daniel requested me to make some square shaped treats so i decided to make this one. i love oatmeal in cookies and sweets but i can not eat regular oatmeal for breakfast (i guess i just can't do that texture, yes, i know i'm weird...). i somehow think that putting oatmeal in treats will be a lot healthier and more nutritious (i know it's not "that" true when i put tons of butter and sweets...) so that's one of the reason i make treats with oatmel and feel not so guilty eating them. ha ha ha. do you guys like my reasoning? ^ _ ^

p.s. if you want this recipie, go to cont. reading.

++ INGREDIENTS ++

vegetable-oil/cooking spray
48 soft caramel-candy cubes
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

++ HOW TO ++

1. preheat oven to 350 degrees. Coat a 9-by-9- inch baking pan with cooking spray.

2. put caramels and cream in a small saucepan; cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until caramels are melted, about 5 minutes. Let cool.

3. stir together oats, flour, brown sugar, baking soda, and the salt in a large bowl and blend in butter.

4. bake until just set and starting to color around edges, about 20 minutes. let cool in pan on a wire rack 5 minutes.

5. sprinkle crust with chocolate chips; drizzle with caramel mixture. top with remaining crumb mixture. bake until pale golden, 20 to 25 minutes. let cool completely in pan before cutting into squares. enjoy!

decided to make some soup for dinner. beef cubes with lots of vegetables that were found in my fridge in tomato base soup. i think it came out better than i thought it would so hopefully daniel will like it too.

what a fun calender to have around the house! i like popping the bubble wrap so this is definitely kind of stuff i like to have ;) looks like it comes in both vertical and horizontal orientation. i love the fact that this is type set in helvetica neue, yay! check out more info here on bubble calendar.

trish and i made the sprinkles red velvet cupcakes today. it was fun and turned out great! soooo yummy and cream cheese frosting we made from scratch was the best! the cake batter was really red (hard to see the red-ness, you can go to cont. reading for another picture) and kinda stained my fingers for a little bit but it did come off ;) i really wanna go to sprinkles store and try other flavors to taste the yummy-ness. so i know what kind to make for the next time. check out their website!

it is seriously blood red!

we got the delivery from ups today and look what the ups guy did! he left deedee a little dog biscuit. i thought that was so cute of that particular ups guy. obviously he's been here before and have seen deedee going crazy every time new person comes around the house. guess he knows how to work the dog from his experiences ;)

so what we got in the package is a new external hard drive! since the other one broke already (didn't even last a year, don't buy those!) and became kai's new toy, we needed to buy a new one so we can back up precious pictures of kai! (i guess and some important documents too but i really only care about kai's pictures... ) hopefully this one will last forever, we'll see about that.

since daniel requested me for a coffee cake for breakfast, i made it from scratch! this is my first time making a coffee cake and it actually turned out great and pretty tasty :) it took me about 1.5 hrs including the baking time. if you wanna know the recipe, click on cont. reading.

CLASSIC COFFEE CAKE
*makes about 8 servings

+ + TOPPING + +
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup light brown sugar (packed)
1/2 cup butter, softened
1 tsp cinnamon

+ + CAKE + +
1 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup light brown sugar (packed)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1-1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cup all purpose-flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup milk

+ + HOW TO + +
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Make topping by combining 1 cup flour with brown sugar, a stick of softened butter and 1 teaspoon cinnamon in a medium bowl. Mixture should have the consistency of moist sand.

3. In a large bowl, cream together 1 cup butter, 3/4 cup light brown sugar and 1/2 cup granulated sugar with an electric mixer until smooth and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla and mix well.

4. In a separate bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. Add this dry mixture to the moist ingredients a little bit at a time. Add milk and mix well.

5. Spoon the batter into a 9- by 13-inch baking pan that has been buttered and dusted with a light coating of flour. Sprinkle the crumb topping over the batter. Be sure the topping completely covers the batter.

6. Bake cake for 50 minutes, or until the edges just begin to turn light brown. Enjoy!

this if what i decided to make for the dinner, meat loaf with cheddar cheese cubes (you can't really see the cheese cubes in the pic...) with fresh garlic butter sugar peas on the side. i was gonna make creamy garlic mashed potatoes, but decided to eat with rice instead...i needed my rice fix for the day ;)

we finally got our counter stools that we ordered back in mid may (i'm not joking!)! i guess it has been backordered by manufacture, particularly this color (graphite on oak) for this long (geez, right?) we did look around everywhere for other alternatives but there were always something we didn't like about them so we ended up waiting for them (yes, we are very very picky people!). i must say it was worth the wait and love the simplicity of these stools :)

here is my weekly baking item. since i have the mixer, it's amazing how fast i can make cookies from scratch. from measuring, mixing, and baking the first batch of cookies, it was only about 30 min. i guess me not physically mixing the ingredients cuts time in about half. awesome isn't it?

here is the recipe for the oatmeal toffee cookies.
(this recipe makes about 4 dozens so if you don't have a big family like me, i would recommend freezing half of the dough for the next time.)

1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine, softened
2 eggs
1-1/2 cups packed light brown sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups quick-cooking oats
1 cup toffee bits

1. heat oven to 375F. lightly grease cookie sheet.

2. beat butter, eggs, brown sugar and vanilla in large bowl until well blended. add flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; beat until blended. stir in oats, toffee bitt.

3. drop dough by rounded teaspoons about 2" apart onto cookie sheet. bake 8 to 10 min. or until edges are lightly browned.

4. cool 1 min; remove to wire rack. enjoy!

i just got a new ikea catalog in the mail yesterday. what a perfect timing 'cuz we are thinking about making a trip to ikea this weekend with a friend (probably gonna be really crowded since it's the labor day weekend...oh well). now i get to research before hand so that i take less time to decided? well we'll see about that.

after some bbq and get together, we always have lots of flies in the house and i was in need of buying a flyswatter! look what i found, this is super cool, a delete key shaped flyswatter, i'm sold! i've seen fred and friends products around shops etc. but i didn't know they have so much more products! these are some more stuff that i love and would totally buy :)

from the top
• tooth pickup
• airfork one (would be so fun for kai)
• snack & stack (and this one too)
• shower mic
• delete flyswatter
• toasted notes (lol)
• talk bubble clips
• bird @ home (so cute!)
• here! (that's so smart and great idea)

i picked 4 yummy cucumbers today and including that, i picked 30 cucumbers so far from our garden. they just get big so fast and ready to pick in like a week lately. we eat them in salads or dip them in hummus but we really can't keep up with the supply and demand :) so, does anyone want some homegrown, organic, japanese cucumbers? let me know!

i baked a cake for daniel's birthday this weekend and of course i used my mixer! this is the cheesecake i LOVE and my mom always baked this cake for my birthdays since i was about 9 yrs old or so. maybe this is the cake that i would make for kai's b-days in a future too?!?!

i've been wanting to make an iphone icon for my blog for a while and i finally did it! now any iphone users who (probably only my parents and daniel...) would like to add an my website to the home screen, it's there and easy to do! and i think it's just so cute :) it was super easy to make, you can find the instructions on how to make your own icon here. (via The Small Object and a little hut).

with my neighbor michelle and jordynne, we went to the park to play in the fountain. kai had this "not very sure" face in the beginning but he got used to the water and actually had a blast by the end. kai met another kai who was 11 months old at the park. other kai was walking around on his own and had lots of teeth in his month but i think my kai was taller than him. crazy!

i finished painting our master bath room to pale grey the other day. i dunno why it looks kind of light lavender color when it's supposed to be light grey! i even picked paint that was diluted black (like 15% black color, the paint is called snowfield by glidden). does anyone know why that is? i even primed the wall before and i did 2 coats of paint. it's kind of frustrating but it's not a bad color...or more likely i don't have motivation to mask and paint again. well at least for now.

i'm sure many of you have the mixer already but i got mine today! yay!!! i was so excited so i made chocolate-peanut butter swirl chip cookies. they turned out yummy and not so sweet (because i cut the amount of sugar a little bit and used some brown sugar). i think i'll try to make something fun with the mixer once a week but we'll see how that goes. stay tuned!

we fixed the comment issue, so you can post comments on my blog now. yay!

haven't talked about the japanese cucumber lately but they are still growing like crazy! i'm still picking them and actually i picked 16 of them so far and look there's number 17 growing right now.

i love the color of this flower, like royal blue/purple? i've seen white ones and light blue ones around the neighborhood but not this color. this was at kai's grandma's house.

i always wanted a red door for my front door but obviously i can't have a nice red door if the color of the house is orangy-brown (terra cotta color?). so i put that on the garage door! i love the pop of color in the garage (i used behr paint called california poppy), i think the door makes it a little festive too :)

if you are a designer, you'll love this. it's hilarious!!

we recently upgraded the office desk. it's 8 feet long so that daniel and i can both sit side by side and don't have to play the elbow game ;) i'm still thinking as far as decoration goes...maybe i'll paint the wall? I'm thinking about getting the white lacquer docking station to organize some camera/phone junk on the desk. besides that probably i want some cute paper filling thing and calendar. but i'm planning on keeping it pretty simple here. i'll keep you posted.

i picked the first batch of cucumbers today. these were 2 cucumbers from the 9th (see the bottom pics), amazing how much they grew in 9 days!! it was super crunchy and yummy, can't wait to eat more!

i saw two baby cucumbers today, one on top and bottom. i'm really excited now!

wow.

i swear, i never get the right color paint for the first time. i always have to go back to diy store and buy more paint and hoping second one is the right color. the bottom big circle one is the first one i bought for kai's room. i love the color but i think it's too saturated + dark for the whole room. so the left one is what i got for the second time and i think that's good . top right is the dining room color and top left is the first color i bought for the dining room i thought i'll compare...

here it goes the painting frenzy starting again. i'm painting kai's play room/office right now (it will be kai's room soon in a future). hopefully it'll be done by this sunday.

since we moved into our new house, we haven't decorated or have done anything to kai's room yet. so i was looking for inspirations on ohdeedoh and found some cool ideas. i like the idea of decals and the different and colorful wood typography on the wall. i think we gonna do blues, chocolate brown, tan, and maybe pop of red? we'll see about that... we're painting his room this weekend so i'll keep you posted :)

we currently have the eco friendly agent 18 iphone cases (daniel is black one and mine is clear) and works very well for us (i dropped my phone few times and the case or phone didn't break!) but we like the design of this hard graft cases too 'cuz it's very sleek and made out of wool felt so definitely won't scratch your iphone! but it's kinda pain to put your phone in and out, maybe? you can check them out here, they also have laptop sleeves so you can match if you want to.

i've been thinking about buying a cute nursery poster for kai's room. after some research, these are my options and i'm gonna buy one of them. i'll keep you posted on which one i'll buy and decorate with :)

top 2 images: these are isak birds poster series.

middile 2 images: binth alphabet + numbers posters.

bottom left: decoy lab animal alphabet poster.

bottom right: ink+wit animal a-z poster.

this is a pretty cool ferrari stroller + car seat. i mean, who would not want a ferrari stroller for your son, right? i guess this is a limited edition of 1000 in the whole wide world. i don't know if anywhere in US sell them, but they are selling this stroller + car seat for 147,000 yen (about $1,300). The booster car seat is not a limited edition so it would be awesome to have one (too bad we already bought a booster seat...). it's 34,000 yen (about $300) so the price is not too bad. if you can read japanese, you can check more info here.

here is our bathroom and dining room wall after my frenzy painting project. the bathroom paint is called marble green (although, it looks more blue-ish) and dining room wall is called silvery moonlight (light grey with blue tint). overall i think painting is kinda fun even tho i somehow get paint on my hair, arms, and bottom of my feet. next one to paint is second bathroom or one of the smaller bedrooms. hmmm, i have to get ideas on what color...

i've been going crazy and start doing some painting projects. I painted the down stair bathroom, master bathroom, and this is the third and final (well, at least so far) dining room accent wall. I'll post finished pics soon :)

i think they are on steroid or something, growing so fast!!

i love this house! i want my house to be like this some day... if you can read Danish, there's a whole article and more photos here.

we planted 3 different kinds of japanese cucumber in our backyard for a little veggie garden on last thursday. finally one of them sprouted this morning and when i went back this afternoon, 2 more came out!

deedee doesn't really care about the cucumbers...but she sure likes to sniff around the veggie garden.

i've been wanting this puppy thing by eero aarnio for a while. now i guess CB2 carries it too. CB2 only have this orange one but there's actually green, white, and blue ones. they are super cute and i think this will be a cute toy for kai to ride on etc :)

walked around neighborhood and noticed some cute flowers. of course 5 min. in, it started sprinkling so we had to go home :P

ever since i moved here in east bay, i always have seen these hills in golden brown. it rained a bit few months ago and they have been amazingly green. i'm sure the golden colors are coming up as we are approaching to summer time. ugh, gross again!

i've been looking for a cute alarm clock since my alarm clock is like a decade old and starting to fall apart a bit. i came across this one called Furni. i like the modern retro feel but the only bad thing is the "no snooze button on top" thingie...i mean i don't know what i do to alarm clock when i'm half asleep. i get really pissed at alarm that i hit it really hard and i definitely don't wanna break this one in a day. i guess i gotta think about that factor...

P.S. Furni also have cute stuff like faux wood pillows and solid maple earrings! i want them ;)

kate + alexa came to visit me for a few days. it was so nice to see them since it's been like forever to actually hang out with them. they left today in the early afternoon so they'll be home tonight. it's about 10 hour drive, wish it was closer!! thanks for coming down guys and i miss you guys already...

happy easter to everyone! meet our easter bunny (or playboy bunny) kai! we definitely took his "manly-ness" away with these pictures (he'll love this when we show this to his girlfriend in the future!! ha ha ha). since kai is too young for his "egg hunt," i made a easter egg tree. i think it's cute but daniel thinks it's odd. i mean you put fun stuff on the tree for xmas why not for easter, right?

kai discovered his fingers recently. he loves them as much as his binky :)

i love these 10 grain kids products. they are made out of molded plywood and just so simple + cute! these are my three picks (Log Rocker, URoll, + Robo Stool) but they do have more. i think it'll be so awesome to furnish kai's room with these ;) i guess they are coming out with 10 Grain Essentials line for adults and i can't wait to see them!!

i think he is chubbier now...if you wanna see the last 2 pictures, click "continue reading" at the
bottom for a comparison.

you can see how difficult it is to take these "birthday" pics... ;P

2 months

1 month

i cooked an artichoke for the first time tonight. i love artichokes and i guess i was a little intimidated by cooking it rather than buying them frozen or in a jar. i cooked it with some garlic cloves so that i can mince them to put it in the garlic butter dip. i totally loved it, and i'm gonna make it more often, too bad daniel doesn't like artichokes...

i finally captured this monkey eater on camera that appears in our bedroom! this monkey eater is highly dangerous and might eat humans so please stay away!!

we open the case and this is what we got! and before and after look of the dunny case.
P.S. if you care to know the ratio of these dunnies, click on "continue reading" below.

here is the ratio factor. the bottom 4 the ones we didn't get. the 1:400 one sells for like $300 on ebay. that's crazy!! (sorry for the bad quality images...)

i dunno what my obsession is with domo-kun. he is just so cute and i like him! this is a fun website!

did i tell you that daniel got more munnys? well these are 4-inch ones and i guess they are totally different thing than 8 inch ones he already has :P he got a family of 3 munnys and they each come with a secret accessory (blind assortment) which they are wearing/holding. actually turn out to be pretty appropriate,
daniel with glasses, kai with a hat, and me with a wind mill.

oh yes, new french series dunnys came out recently and daniel decided to buy a case of them. hopefully
he'll get what he wants out of the case! i mean it cost $$$ for these damn collectable toys! i'll report
which rare/collectable ones he gets later when he receives the shipment...stay tuned on that one!

very talkative kai in the bouncer. he is almost crying sometimes but not quite...funny baby!

wow, this is crazy!! it's a 24 karat gold plated with diamonds, 2.4 ghz intel core 2 duo macbook pro. i really wonder who will actually buy this...probably paris hilton? the price tag for this bling mac is $9499.00!!

i go to this neighborhood park everyday for a walk and it's a such a nice day today so we did some photo shoot. deedee was looking around for other doggies + birds, kai was asleep the whole time, some flowers started blooming, and clouds looked like cotton candy!

i bought some books for kai the other day. i just love this illustration by leslie patricelli. of course her illustration is super cute but the story of these books are cute also. she has a lot more series than this and i'm planning on collecting them all someday ^-^

kai + i met up with the girls (trisha, raquel, mitchie, sue, and alex) from work for lunch today at mimi's. lunch was yummy as usual and it was definitely nice to see them since i haven't seen them since i left for maternity leave! thanks girls for coming and we really have to do that again!!

we've been in need for a new mattress for a while (like the last 2 years and i had this mattress for maybe about 10 years!!!) since we are pretty tall, our feet always hang off the bed and kai's been sleeping with us in a full size mattress. we saw this ikea sale and we pretty much jumped on it. we got a queen size "sultan enebakk" and got $100 gift card! it's pretty comfy and have a lot more room to accomodate kai and our feet ^_^ now we just need a new bed frame!

on v-day, we took kai's hand + foot print. it took few tries to get a good one. all of our hands were black after this project ^o^ we are planning on framing this with his picture and his measurement (height 23.5 inches, weight 12 lbs 15 oz.).

here is kai next to the snoopy on his 2 months b-day.

here is the last month pic for a comparison.

well that was fast, he already got his passport, that only took like 2 weeks! i was expecting to get it sometime next month 'cuz they told me it's a 6 to 8 week process. he got one of the new passport that has a chip in the front cover 'cuz it's hard like a cardboard box. i gotta say that i like his picture with faux tie ;) so funny.

i've been loving these boon products. they are super cute and very modern looking! These are so far what i bought for kai, mainly feeding accessories and bath time fun stuff. they also have storage, layette, and jewelry (which jewelry doesn't make much sense to me cuz i don't think sterling silver bracelet is very safe?!?! they are cute tho...). you can check this brand out here.

i wanted to take 2 of them together...too bad kai is crying :P

kai got a gift from andrea today, a cute and soft soybean fiber hat!! i even liked the tag that came with the hat. it's sooo cute!! thanks andrea + mike :)

daniel got lots of oranges and lemons from his friend up in auburn.

we finally finished our mini project that we've been wanting to do. we got this very cheesy boat painting on sale and cute fabric at Ikea the other day. I love the branch pattern on the fabric and wanted to do something to decorate with it. so, after some staple gun actions, we successfully recovered and made a cheesy boat to a sheek modern picture :)

deedee got a hair cut over the weekend, so to commemorate the event, i took some pics of her today.

kai applied for his passport today and we had to take his picture. it took a while to get a good one but we finally did it and this is the one! yes, he is wearing a shirt with tie on it 'cuz we thought it would be more "formal" and passport appropriate. i dunno, it's just funny, right? below are some of the out takes of this photo session.

we got rid of my beloved civic of 10 years and got a family friendly element sc. my base model civic did not have a/c, power locks & windows, 4-doors, you name it! now this car has so many options that i feel like i'm driving a Rolls-Royce ;) what you see in the picture is exactly the one we got!

i bought this play house at target today. i know it's a little too early for kai to play with but it was a great deal that i just could not resist! it was $130 regular price but it was only $30 and i thought it was worth the wait until he is like 2 years old. why not right?

found these awesome t-shirts the other day online. they are made by
Artefacture. i especially want the "I love Typography" one!

this is what i got from monica for my b-day...very beautiful and practical. thank you! kai got me lots of poopy diapers and colic. what did i get from daniel? well let's just say that we went to tiffany's :)

i'm planning on taking pictures of kai every month next to this snoopy to see how much he grows. that would be fun, right? :)

since we got a new imac, we wanted to take advantage of "time machine" to start backing up everything on this machine. we started using this computer as main computer to import all the precious kai pictures so we can't lose that! we took a little trip to fry's and picked up this maxtor 500gb hard drive for a very reasonable price since it was on sale! it is as big as kai's upper body and a bit odd shape but it matches the computer so it's all good ;)

kai's silly expressions...

when kai is in a good mood, he makes lots of silly faces and his hands goes crazy!!

here is more pics of me, this is when i was 11 days old. kai looks like me but daniel says that the nose is different. :)

kai in bouncer for the first time, he was making lots of funny faces but when i started taking a movie, he started crying...

this is yo! gabba gabba that we discovered on kidrobot's website. they sell these vinyl toy characters and the actual show is airing on Nick Jr. i just love this catchy song and i'm sure kai's gonna be watching this when he is a bit older. probably daniel's gonna buy kai all these character toys for him some day...

here is kai 2 days old.

kai hiccuping for the first time. it's pretty cute how his whole body shakes :)

kai making some pissed off, old man faces on the couch but then he falls asleep...

we got to the hospital before noon to check in and get started on the induction. pretty much before all the pain and long hour that i didn't know...

here is the last preggie picture, don't see much of change?!?! this was the morning of when i was getting induced. i was 5 days past due date and i got a phone call in the morning to come in for induction. yes, it was a bit of surprise!

kai got some baby gifts from megan today. she got him a pirate theme dishes, egg press onesie, and parenting book (we definitely need that one)! i love what she got him, they are super cute! thanks a lot megan, can't wait for you to come visit sometime soon :)

eric came to visit from the city today to far far away tracy. it was really nice to see him since i haven't seen him for like over a year. we felt such chunks after we went to applebee's for lunch ;) thanks eric for coming by and i hope to see him soon since he lives in the city!!

we went on a walk to the park near the house. nate and daniel skated their way to the park and did their little tricks ;)

i think this is my last preggie tummy update (well it better be!). i never thought my tummy will be this big but i have lots of stretch mark to prove it :( my whole body has been so itchy and bugging me more than these stretch marks! i hope this will be over soon!! by the way this is a horrible picture of me. i have no shape, think it's the t-shirt! and my hair is a mess cuz it's sunday...

people at work threw me a surprise baby shower for lunch today. it was very nice of them to do that! i got lots of stuff as you can see but i still need to go baby shopping for more of the practical, boring stuff. thank you everybody, i really appreicate it!

so i guess baby's name is going to be kai aedan waldron. i'm not sure about spelling of "aedan" but that's how daniel wants it to be...maybe i like it "aidan." hmmmm... well for the "kai" part, if we were to use kanji, we gonna use this one that means "ocean."

a month from today is my due date. it is pretty scary to think about that our "little monster" is coming out to this world! i found this picture online and this is totally what i imagine how it's going to be! a crazy baby or "do-mo kun" out of control when i want some peaceful time! damnit!!

i thought it would be kind of interesting to take a pic of my work desk corner and daniel's. daniel's desk is messier than mine ;)

this is what i see when i look down. i even put my right foot forward so i can see my toes.

this is the another stroller that we are thinking of. price range is actually in between bogaboo and maxi-cosi. it comes in very bright colors like you can see but we both like the regular black/grey color. this quinny stroller is actually made by maxi-cosi and the car seat is compatible with both maxi-cosi and quinny, so for both stroller we can use the same car seat! this stroller is getting very good reviews and is really attempted to purchase one!

i guess i just have to say "wow craziness!"

i hung out with vanessa today and she gave me some baby stuff. the baby black converse and of course the beanie that she knit herself! i always wanted a pair of converse for the baby and it's so tiny and cute. vanessa suggested that i should have a matching converse day and i think that day is coming in the future ;)

we've been looking around on the stroller and we did want this one called "bugaboo" but it's super expensive!! so we kinda gave up on the idea of having the bugaboo stroller. then we went to babies'r'us today and found this cute one that looks very much like bugaboo (they are both from Netherlands) for more than half of the price! it pretty much has the features of the bugaboo. it's hard to tell but the color scheme of this maxi-cosi is tan, grey, and a little bit of orange. i think we really want this one...

here is my tummy today. wow it is getting a lot bigger compare to 4 weeks ago... i gained a lot of weight and actually doctor told me i should watch what i eat so that i don't gain as much. ooops!

we went to morgan territory regional park, which was about 30 min drive from the house in livermore. we tried this one cuz' it's a "dog ok" trail. this park was as you can see really lame. it was just hot and gold color everywhere, the coolest thing was that we saw a lizard...and that is pretty pathetic... i guess you can bring your horse and ride around and we saw few people mountain biking around the trail. but definitely not a place for beautiful scenery walk :P

we had a surprise visitor today, kate and gloria!! they went on a road trip to bakersfield and on the way back they stopped by to see us. deedee and kate really missed each other as you can see from the picture ;) thanks guys for stopping by!

i knew this day was coming but not this fast! the new iPod Classic holds 160gb!?!?! that is twice as much as my laptop hard drive and it's like 1/20 of the size. that's just nuts!! the new iPod Touch is cool but it's practically same as iPhone without the phone. i just can't believe they dropped the iPhone price to $399 for the "up coming holiday season" and probably to compete with iPod Touch. they already removed the 4gb model iPhone and i guess some people are selling that for $299 now. i should've waited another month and i would've saved $200!!! damnit!! i do like the more rounded edge of the new iPod series. it's cute ;)

we took deedee to a groomer today and thought it's funny to do her "before" and "after" picture. looks like a hairy beast became a black lab puppy!

so who is gonna get us these for a baby shower??? ;) they are super expensive, as you can imagine! the messenger diaper bag is $935 and the baby carrier is $850. the grand total of $1785 plus 8.75% sales tax! that's just crazy but i'm sure i don't mind buying them if i were a multi millionare!! just to go with my gucci obsession (too bad they don't have stroller) ha ha :)

here is my preggie tummy update. yes it is getting big!!

our friend kei sent us cute baby shirt from japan. it came in a cute wrapping paper/plastic and the bear character is just so awesome. i found this artist's website and he has more cute characters! Click here to check out aranzi aranzo's website. thank you kei!!

deedee played with vanessa's puppy, carlton today. carlton is really small but he was chasing deedee around the house!

finally got iPhone this weekend. daniel went to Portland so he bought it there to avoid sales tax! compare to my 30gb iPod, it's a bit longer (about 1/2 inch) but about the same thickness. it doesn't feel awkward or big in my hand. feels just right. :)

so now we know that it's a boy, guess we have to think about the name...hmmm...

i don't know why but everytime we clean and vacuum the house, she goes out and does this...yes, rolls around and covers herslef in dry grass from the backyard!!!! i think she gets jelous because she thinks we give the carpet more attention. so we decided to show her that we love her just as much, so we vacuumed her as well. she didn't act like she liked it but she definitely got the attention she wanted. turns out that she really needed one cuz bunch of dust bunnies came out of her also. ha ha i can't believe we actually did this to her, it' so funny since i've never done this to a dog before.

i got my silver ds from japan today in the mail. japan has 7 different color schemes rather than only 3 in the us (silver one just came out last month). since we can download any ds games, finally daniel and i can play with or agaist each other ;) we put on our slime lanyards too! i also use ds to practice my kanji writing skills, personal yoga trainer, and food calorie counter for diet etc. it really sucks that all these everyday life/learning games are not in the us, just japan only...

i've been growing more affection towards these ugly creatures. they are just so ugly that they are cute. these are some of the ones i like espcially big toe (bottom blue one), moxy (middle green bunny), and uglydog (top right).

i found some cute modern cribs. i really like the top white one, just simple and clean. i like the fact that they can be converted to a bed later on but of course you have to buy the "bed conversion kit." : P the bottom orange one comes in different colors like white, blue, pink, cream and you can choose the little saying on the side also. the only thing is that they are both bit $$.

here is the update on my ever growing belley. i'm more surprised at my length of my hair than my growing belley. (ugh, i look so fat...i need to loose weight :P)

my weekend project was to make daniel's portfolio sleeve. it looks a lot like a pillowcase with a tag...but it took a long time for me to make this simple thing. first of all, i had to remember how to use the sewing machine (it always confuses me how to thread and the bottom thread wheel thingie)!! thanks to the internet, i figured it out in about 30 min or so. i didn't know that there's difference in needle sizes and types of thread on certain fabric (i had to ask people at the store and i definitely made a fool out of myself). it was a bit frustrating but at least it got done...

we ate a once pretty and tasty wedding cake on our 1st anniversay. it wasn't quite as good and as pretty as a year ago... we didn't do anything very special today. now i think about it, we shouldn've done something special to commemorate the day before new member of the family come around late this year.

just a reminder, it did look like this a year ago!

we got a few very early presents from vanessa for the baby. obviously she knitted the beenie (yarn is very soft and it gets fat and skinny, i don't know if you can tell...) and got us this cute shirt with woodland pals on it. you can see this artist stuff here.

over the weekend, we had our favorite nate over the weekend. he is so tall now! either same height as daniel, if not taller. his favorite thing to do is to eat rice with teriyaki + rooster sauce, and watch movies on demand. i think that's all we did (oh, we did go on a walk everyday).

we have two big holes in our yard and for the first time we saw about 5 baby squirrels coming out. they were so cute and small and fuzzy ;)

deedee always sit like this, i call it frog legs!

it's been hot here and there so she is being lazy...

we went to see giants game on sunday at at&t park in the city. it was nice day, actually a perfect day to watch a game but daniel came home with sun burn, and he is all red now. sadly, giants lost 9 to 4 against dodgers...

i found these cute biz card cases and i simply like them all. eames dot patterns, eames chairs, grass, + typography. oh the website i found these stuff is a very cool modern website. lots of action scripts and movie clips.

we went on a little trip to santa cruz this weekend. it was very nice weather and we saw lots of surfers riding the waves.

xmas eve, i think i was a bit tipsey from wine...

we went on the walk with monica, ritch, daniel, nate, deedee and i. the boys were skating on the path and here is some very exciting video ;) of them skating.

merry xmas! hope everyone is having a good holiday season with your family!

i thought i'll share with our unusual tacky xmas tree, we put lots of toys that we bought in Japan as ornaments with this crazy silver tree we got from urban outfitters. Loverly huh? ;)

here is very happy looking family. nate is so tall now like 6'2" and he is so skinny...

here is us + deedee opening xmas presents.