Hopes and Dreams

I've been so busy with work (my regular day job) and other assignments (not associated with my regular day job) and personal/family issues that it has been quite difficult to keep up with all this. I was watching the opening of X-Factor and thought to myself, Ugghh...I'm soooo over reality singing competitions, they're so boring because they're all the same now. But I didn't change the channel. I'm glad I didn't because after letting it run for awhile, and just watching the contestants, it was clear that WE all had the same dreams and hopes. Regardless if it is to win a $5 million dollar recording contract, or to finally land that job, there is one thing in common, it is our dream. Speaking from experience, it's easy to fall and give up. It's easy to let the evilness of negativity seep into your mind and convince you that you aren't ever going to get there. There may be days where it just seems silly to even dream or want what your heart is longing for, but...somehow, we have to muster up the courage to remind ourselves that it is not silly, that it is not "just" a dream, it is our destiny. When one accomplishes something, it feels good. For me, it is the final moment, the part where you realize, it's not a dream anymore, it is actually happening.

If you ever get to talk to a major recording artist or an entrepreneur or a self-made millionaire, ask them how many times they've been rejected, how many doors were slammed in their face, and if they ever felt like giving up. I'm positive that their answers will probably sound similar to yours. Whatever it is that you are aspiring, keep a reminder close to your heart and let that feeling take you over when you start to feel low and like you're giving up. I went to Los Angeles with my family back in August and on our way back, we had to take the 101 north and saw a very quick glance of the Hollywood sign from the freeway. I remember telling the people in the car I was riding with about how they were going to tear down that sign. I remember reading that article on the internet. I'm so glad that Hugh Hefner decided to donate the $900,000 to keep it up. His reason? "It would have been a real shame after having restored it if it wound up sold. It's become something iconic and represents not only the town but represents Hollywood dreams, and I think that's something worth preserving." Los Angeles is the entertainment capital of the world, millions of people from all over the world come to L.A. and most out of those millions are there to make their dreams come true. That sign serves as inspiration...as hope to the struggling artists trying to make their dreams a reality. Don't ever give up, no matter how long it takes, with preservation, anything can happen...

Stay inspired...

I LOVE LOS ANGELES!!!

I'm baacckkk!!!! After a long hiatus for personal reasons, I am finally back! Anyway, last weekend, I had the pleasure of going to Los Angeles for the first time since 2007! First, let me just say, I love LA. It's like being in a different country. The people there act differently and the weather certainly is different for me. It's a cross between the Monterey area and the Central Valley (where I used to live). It's hot, but it's got a slight breeze. Anyway, it was nice to get away with the girls for our trip. We did LOTS of shopping, lots of talking, lots of laughing and LOTS of eating. The pictures are a mix between my DSLR and the one on my phone. We only had a weekend in Los Angeles, so we only got to go downtown to the Fashion District and ChinaTown. Next time, we'll have to hit up the other tourist areas, but it was such a blast!

First, we all drove there in three different cars, I think there was a total of 11 of us. I was in my sister in law's car. Thank goodness I chose this one because she had a DVD player in there. LOL. So I got to watch movies for the 3.5 hour drive there. My little sister Malissa was the driver:

That's my sister-in-law, Dee, sleeping at the bottom of the picture, but here is another one anyway:

And next to me was Pang, my nephew's girlfriend (Don't kill me Pang for putting this up, but it was super funny):

And of course me:

By the way, Pang, Dee, and my other sister Jenny had made the drive from Sacramento down to the central valley to meet up with the rest of the family. We left the Sacramento at midnight and got intoVisalia around 4 am and then got up to get ready and leave around 8 am, so that is why we were all tired.

On the road, this was as we were passing the grapevine and the sign that you're getting closer to LA? Pyramid Lake! I remember waiting to see this landmark as a little kid on my way to LA with my mom or dad or aunt or uncle. It's so cool.

See? Part of the mountain is actually in the shape of a pyramid and I don't know if you can tell, but there are steps also just like the on the pyramids in Egypt.

We finally arrived in Los Angeles around noon and headed straight for the Fashion District. We decided to focus our attention on Santee Alley. If you have not heard about Santee Alley, you'll get mixed reviews, but its best to visit it for yourself and make your own opinions about it. I've been coming here with my family for years and years and my how everything's changed yet it's still all the same. I don't know how else to explain it but it's a must for me still. Before we get our shopping on, it's time for some commemorative photos. :D

My sister Mary not paying attention

The girls posing in the mirror

We've arrived to Santee Alley

I found a store that was ALL Hello Kitty, well mostly, they had some other stuff too (Like Kai-Lan)

After about four hours in Santee Alley (sorry no more photos, I was too busy shopping), we headed over to China Town which wasn't far from the Fashion District. I love this picture of the flag in China Town, yes, the sky was that blue. No photo processing here at all.

After dropping off our tons of bags and luggage off at our hotel, we decided to go explore. Check out the pics:

Jenny decided to do a hop, skip, and jump. :D

This time, Susan (on the left) wanted to do it too, but I didn't get it on time

Another commemorative photo while they waited for me

It was a hot day, so here's Nancy drinking water 

This was going to be just Jenny and Pang, but everyone else came in the picture too

Jenny utilizing her shirt and "Spreading" her wings. LOL

I was so busy taking pictures, I lost the group, Pang was the only one nice enough to wait for me.

So after 3 more hours of shopping (7 hours so far) in China Town, we decided to go back to the hotel and get ready for dinner and a night out.

Pang and Dee

Here's me for the night out...yes, my hair has grown...FINALLY! and some extensions :)

Mary and her mother in law watching. She's eating because I COOKED all the meat (Korean BBQ)

Mary and Dee before our night out

These were my dishes, a plate of meat and a plate of rice. I'm a simple gal :P

From our table, all the fixings and side dishes, etc

The girls karaoke-ing. So hilariously funny

Susan with her tambourine, but trying to escape my camera

Know what this is? It's an OLD SCHOOL TELEPHONE! In our hotel lobby!

One of my accomplished missions: LA street hot dogs with ALL the fixings!!! YUM!

 So, basically, that was my LA trip...in a nutshell. Sorry about the lack of pictures and lack of quality of the pictures, but I was more into shopping and didn't really carry my huge DSLR everywhere. Next time, the pictures will be more stunning! Until then, check out what I bought here on my Makeup/Fashion Blog!

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The BEST Soup EVER, rain or shine!

So this past weekend, I got to go down to Visalia with my husband and cousins from the bay area. With gas prices being so expensive ($4.25/gallon), we all decided to carpool together to go down there. Well, the trip was great! I got to see my nieces again AND a rare opportunity occurred. All three of my nephews were there! So I gathered them all together, nieces AND nephews and took pictures of them. Let me tell you, it was HARD. and what was harder was getting my three GROWN nephews to take a decent picture was harder than getting all SIX little girls to stay together and smile and take a picture.Anyway, that's not what this blog is about, it is about THE BEST SOUP EVER from my most favorite-ist place! We were on our way home from the Central Valley and I got super hungry, so after much debate in the car about what to eat, I suggested pho and my very smart cousin Nancy sided with me and eventually everyone in the car agreed. So where did we go? The ONLY place to go for pho in Fresno that is worth it!

Pho 99 in good ol' Fresno, CA! My old stomping grounds! I love this place. There's no other like it! Really, there isn't. I've had pho from all over California and I have to say, I've haven't tasted anything as close to this beautiful bowl of pho:

I always get mine with the wide noodles. I don't know why but in the bay area and on the peninsula, when you ask for the big/wide noodle, they call it the ho fun noodles and they are barely half the width of these noodles, but that's the best they get. Since moving from Fresno, it's been difficult to adjust and not just food wise. So everytime I'm able to go back home and visit with family and enjoy a good bowl of pho, I'm super happy. So after putting in my usual fixings, you know: soy sauce, oyster sauce, sriracha sauce, peanuts, basil, fish sauce, lime juice, etc from the condiment tray already on the table and the dish of basil, bean sprouts, and peanuts. I'm not a bean sprout fan, so I always leave them out.

 Pile all that on and this is what you get:

 Mix it around and feel free to slurp and enjoy all the goodness of this:

 I'm telling you, this pho is sooo good! Pho in general is pretty good. It's base off of a beef stock/broth. The broth itself takes all day to make and you always leave it on the stove with a slight boil. The idea is to keep the broth hot enough that you can spoon it over thin slices of beef and let the broth cook it through. I think that is the absolute best way to eat the meat, its more tender. All restaurants have different options, such as beef, chicken, seafood combination, beef meatballs, and Chinese BBQ pork. I usually just get the beef with a side of meatballs. I LOVE these beef meatballs. They are different from American or Italian or even Mexican meatballs. These are made differently and it's hard to make it at home, it's just worth it to purchase it from an Asian store instead.

Now, I've seen "inspired" versions of pho recipes from chefs and even the famous cooks such as Emeril Lagasse and Rachael Ray, and although their recipes remakes may excel in other areas, I have to strongly disagree with them and say that their recipes don't even meet the standards for pho. For example, in Ray's recipe, she uses chicken stock boiled with ginger and I think lemongrass, and she shreds pull pork and uses spaghetti noodles. I just think that is WAY too wrong. First, the flavor that the broth gives is KEY! A couple of standards if you want to make the pho from scratch is to have cut up onions, preferably beef bones to give some flavor, but if not then beef bouillon, and DEFINITELY star anise. The star anise gives the pho it's flavor and that oh so yummy broth that is not a pho broth without that taste. Oh, and don't fall for the "fancy" pho prices from other restaurants. Pho is a street food sold from vendors in the outside markets. Think of the people who sell hot dogs and pretzels and pizzas on the streets of NYC, this is like that but in soup form (yes, there are tables and chairs for them to sit at to enjoy their pho quickly) in Vietnam and other Asian countries.

Anyway, enough talk, here are some pictures of the people I was in company with slurping away

My husband slurping his pho away.

My cousin slurping his bowl away. He likes it a lot spicier than I do, but that's okay. Oh, and he doesn't know I took this picture. (hehehe)

And of course, my husband's visit to Pho 99 or any pho place for that matter would not be complete without an order of egg rolls.

 Yumm....it was a super fantabulous treat for all of us before leaving back home to the bay. I know this is all simple things, but I happen to find joy in the most simplest things. I love pho and it has been a soup that I've eaten all my life. I can't make it at home, and I actually find it cheaper to go out for it unless I was throwing a party and wanted to serve it. The funny thing is that pho is starting to gain popularity but it's still just a simple soup that my mom  made when company came over. Oh and it's pretty cheap too! About $5-$6 per bowl and if you're not a big eater, ALWAYS GO FOR THE MEDIUM SIZE BOWL! One thing I've learned is that the quantity in the small and medium is always the same it's just served in a different size bowl, and if you're just tagging along and are not that hungry but want to order something, go for the kid size. The kid size is about the size of a cereal bowl.

I love trips back home and being able to reminisce about food from the good ol' days. Next week when I go back home, my goal is to show THE BEST POTSTICKERS EVER! and PIZZA POCKETS! No, not HOT POCKETS, there is a MAJOR difference. Stay tuned! :D

My Girls

This week has been a hard one on me. Personally, there's been a couple of things that's happened that really, really stinks. But I realized this weekend how much I truly missed my little girls. My neices, all six of them, are my world. I don't have any kids right now and I treat them all as if they were my own. I love them all so dearly and miss them so much.

No matter how bad a day is or how sad I am, all I gotta do is look through my many pictures of my wonderful little girls and instantly, I can feel my spirits lifted. My hope for my loves is that they grow up with lots of love in their hearts and for them to grow up strong and willful.

My beautiful Celeste. Perfect example of a big sister. So full of love and and caring for her little sisters. Her little heart is always so full of love and she radiates positivity all the time. I love her so much for her pure and joyous heart.

My NeeNee as I like to call her, always the competitive spirit. Always aiming for higher and never stopping until she achieves it. She loves looking out for her sisters too and is always overprotective of each of them. Her little heart is full of love but sometimes she doesn't like to show it. LOL.

Angel AKA JoJo, MoMo and even MoJo. Always the princess, always the "angel". LOL. She loves being a princess and loves having things her way, but at the end of the day, she is just as golden as the others. Her little heart radiates with love as she kisses each of her sisters lightly and holds her "maw-maw" and "paw-paw" dear to her heart. She loves them so much and is so sad when they're away. She's also so silly, always making faces in pictures. My how she's grown up...

My greatest love. My sweetest sweetheart has to go to my little Lia-Lia. Lover of Ni-Hao Kai Lan and with just the sweetest, highest voice ever. She is always a ball of sunshine. From the moment she wakes up, she's constantly running around and playing and laughing and always being a big help. Always all smiles and always full of "bounce". :D Saleah will always protect you and always take care of you. Its so sweet watching her tuck my mom, her "maw-maw" in and pulling the blanket over her and kissing her good night before she tucks in right next to her.

Sweet Jayda. LOL. Well, sweet when she wants to be. She's growing and learning. Learning to love, yet you can already see it in her eyes when she's around her most favoritist person in the world, her paw-paw, my dad. He's built such a connection with all these girls, even donning his own nickname for each. Jayda is his little birdie and boy does she fly to him when he's home. Such a beautiful smile and such a beautiful little girl.

Finally, #6, Autumn. She's only a few weeks old but is already developing her own little personality. She loves smiling and loves waking up and is already knowing her many sisters. Like most all of her sisters before, she's grown attached to Celeste and shares a bond that only they could ever know and understand. Such a cutie already and already showing love to everyone around her.

My sweet little loves brightens my heart each day. I miss them so much everytime I'm away from them and my heart literally flutters when I call home and hear my sweet little ones' voices. Celeste and Gwennie know my phone number now and thanks to Comcast, it displays on their tv when I call. I love it when I call and I hear, Hi Auntie Mai. So joyful and so sweet. :D I miss them so much everyday and can't wait to see them blossom into their own little persons to show the world.

Words...and Their Impact.

Today has not been good. It's about 11:21 PM and I'm up watching an encore presentation of The Voice (which is very good btw) and reflecting on the events of this week. In the last few days, I've seen quite a few things just fall apart. Then today, I received a reminder from someone who I thought was close to me and supportive of me, well, I'm starting to see them in a different light. Maybe they were playing, maybe they weren't but it really hurt my feelings. This certain person, I thought had my back and was supportive of all my little side things, my hobbies, my passions, and my joys. Turns out that I may be wrong, and it just hurts I guess. Sometimes, we turn the other cheek, laugh it off like we don't care, yet as we turn and walk away we do our best to hide the sting and to control the vibrations it just set off. Sometimes, it's harder to shake off than others, sometimes it's harder to conceal than other times, so how do we deal?

Why do we automatically try to charge it off like it doesn't hurt? Why do we act as if we don't care? Is it "uncool" if we show our true feelings? Even when one of our deepest, most prized possession has been brutally sideswept? What is this bravado that we carry? Is it wrong to be vulnerable? I'm sitting here thinking, "if one of my friends came to me and told me this happened to them, what would I say to them" I know exactly what I'd say. It goes along something like this: "Screw him/her! They don't know what they're talking about; ignore the haters" or "Don't let it get to you; you can't always please everyone and not everyone will like what you have to offer, but as long as you enjoy it, keep doing what you're doing". Why is it always easier to give someone the advice but when it comes to ourselves, it's much harder to do?

Sometimes when friends come to us, we say what we are supposed to say and make sure it's not anything negative, but are we really being a friend by doing that? But if we state the truth and it's not what the person wants to hear, are we then being insensitive? I personally believe in right place, right time. If one of your best girlfriends is crying to you because she got into a fight with her boyfriend, and you think the guy is a douchebag, do you really think that situation is the best time to say something like, "Well, what do you expect? He's a douche!" Maybe instead, we should try something a little softer yet still be honest. How about something like "I'm sorry that you're going through this. He hasn't treated you in the way that you should be." This way, number one, you're not insulting their other half, and number two, you show concern for your friend.

There's so much hurt in this world these days; sometimes it's intentional and most of the time, it is not. However, in the work world, it never matters how one "meant" for it to come across; in the court of law, all that matters is how the comment made the other person(s) feel. Maybe this is something that we should apply in our own lives. I am not perfect, I am not a savior, I am not the best person, but I try my best. Sometimes, I am too honest; most of the time, I don't realize how honest I was until later and even then, much much later. I've never intended to hurt anyone as I'm sure that some of the comments directed towards me may have been unintentional as well.

So what's the point of this rant? Well, it made me realize how hurt I was over a comment that was made to me and how for so long, I've shrugged it off and acted like I don't care but it really hurt inside and finally expressing that hurt to the person today. Also, while writing this, I also realized how we treat each other and how much of an impact our words can have on each other.

Easter Brunch at the Monterey Plaza Hotel and Spa

Hi Everyone!

Happy Easter! I hope you all had a fun-filled day! So I don't really have an Easter tradition; usually if I was at home, we'd go to church and then go on an Easter Egg hunt. Memories come up of dying all kinds of eggs, and making just a big ol' mess and then going to Fairview park with my cousins and just running around and looking for eggs. It was fun, but since we're all grown up now, we've gone our own separate ways for Easter. 

Usually, I spend Easter with my husband but today, he had to work, so I spent it with one of my good friends, Kim at the Monterey Plaza Hotel and Spa. It was absolutely gorgeous inside. They had several tables set up with beautiful white linens and green napkins. Then to top it off with a simple, yet elegant look, they had vases of two or three tulips! I loved it! The tulips were so bright and gorgeous and really just stated Spring. I wasn't able to get a full picture of how the rooms were set up, but here's a picture of the tulips at our table.

Also, when you walked in, there was an actual Harpist in the room! I was shocked, it was so nice to hear that music and it was so sweet...I can't even explain it. 

Next, after they took our drink orders, we were like, Umm...where's the food? LOL, turns out that it was in another room. The servers were very nice to give us directions, but when we stepped outside the room, we were still lost. In fact, we almost went into the kitchen. Hahaha. That was super funny. We eventually found the food after a passerby told us it was in another room and not behind the tented area. It was absolutely gorgeous in there. They had a pasta station where they made a penne with tomato sauce dish and a spinach and cheese ravioli with chicken. They even had a ham and prime rib carving station.

Here's a look at the salad station (very yummy!)

And of course,  the peel and eat shrimp station. They even had oysters on the ice right there. I'm not a big oyster fan so I stayed clear of that.

Next, onto one of my most favorite breakfast items:

MUFFINS!!!! YUM! THEY'RE SO YUMMERS!

And also one of my new favorite things:

Caprese salad! I've seen Giada and Rachael on the Food Network do this, but was like, its so simple, whatever, but the combination is really good! Tomato, fresh mozzarella and basil with olive oil and balsamic vinaigrette drizzled on tip. Yum, simple, yet delish!

And my favorite part of all meals...

DESSERT! SO YUMMY! From left to right in a clockwise rotation, we have a canoli, (not sure what the dark chocolate thing with circles in the back is) and then chocolate covered strawberries, along with a blueberry cake in the front, then pineapple upside down cake and a delish lemon poppyseed cake. I had a bite of everything and can't decide which one was my favorite. Oh and check this out!

They had a little chick coming out of the egg as a decoration on the lemon cake! LOL. I thought that was so cute! Had to take a picture of it before I ate it. Hehehe

The only picture I got from the dessert station was the cannolis. I didn't take pictures of the buffet room until right before we were going to leave and it was super crowded in there. Plus I didn't want to blind anyone with my flash. 

Overall, it was a fabulous brunch! We had a few mishaps (I accidentally went into the men's room, Kim kept dropping the tongs into the food while getting fruit, and almost going into the kitchen instead of the buffet room, and of course, accidentally blinding the guy next to us using my flash), it was still fun and super delicious. Maybe I'll do it again next year. :D

Here's Kimmy with the Easter Bunny!