foot

(pic from clipartguide)

John is having his toe/foot surgery tomorrow! Hopefully it won't hurt too much. He should be able to bend his toes to walk super fast and jump super high after the procedure.

I will (try to) play nurse... just a little bit anyhow, and I'll do my best.

We intentionally scheduled the surgery right before the long 4th of July weekend, so it wouldn't seem too long for us to close the shop (5 days including the weekend and the holiday.)

Next time you see John, remember to give him some love! :)

play

I love this fuzzy little picture. Everyone was running and playing in the backyard while I snapped the shot. It almost looks like a fuzzy painting... makes me smile when I look at it. :)

box of lychee

My friend Joyce came and said that her sister had sent her a present. She would like me to open it with her because she knew I'd appreciate the present as much as she would.


It was a box of lychee from Taiwan!

The packaging was super old-school. My grandfather was a citrus fruit farmer, and there was always these super solid "fruit boxes" in the storage at his house.

Anyhow, this box of lychee brought back so many memories!

But this was not a regular box of fruit of lychee:


It was a cute-tiny-little box!

It had all the "markings" of a traditional Taiwanese fruit box... stamps, trademarks, inspection forms, columns to fill in... you name it. It was awesome!

And what exactly was inside?


Lychee candies!

These delicious little lychee candies were soft and delicious, and they tasted EXACTLY like fresh lychee fruit. Oh my.

Ahhh. Lychee...

blood test before surgery

John had a blood test done today before his toe surgery next week.



One of his big toes has been bothering him for quite some time. It was from an old sports injury, and the doctor suggested that John takes care of it before it hurts him further.

From what I understand the doc is going to cut John's toe open, shaved off a bit of his bone, and place a little metal stick in the bone.

Poor thing. At least the surgery will help John wiggle his big toe and walk better and pain-free.

cake boss

I've been watching Cake Boss on Netflix these days, and it's seriously addicting!


(photo from TLC)

The series is a reality show on an awesome and celebrated cake artist Buddy Valastro and his family/crew in their 100-year-old bakery (Carlo's Bake Shop) in New Jersey. I love it!

The only problem with having a Cake-Boss-a-thon is that I want cakes more often and I believe I HAVE to learn to decorate cakes now.

cute kitties

Every time I go to Petsmart to pick up treats for our pets I'd go and check out the cats inside the adoption center. There are always cute and really lovable kitties there. Some are abandoned, others are strays, and still others are former feral cats. There cats are all now under the care of different shelters or rescue groups, and waiting to find a forever home.

Even though we cannot take more animals at this point, I enjoy going to see these little guys, play with them, and sending them happy energies.

They are so cute! This last time I was there I saw a bunch of cute little kittens, too!


Awww. Stop staring at me!


Mom and babies.


Cute little guy.

I say if your situation allows, go adopt a kitty (or two)!

care package from japan

The mail lady came, handed me the little pile of mail, and said, "You've got something really nice today!"



She was right! It was a lovely package from my dear friend Chikako in Japan!



Chikako sent me a cute Melody notebook, an awesome pouch she made herself, a couple lovely hair pins (also made by herself,) a cutest cell phone charm (again, made by Chikako!) a few photographs she took, and a beautiful letter she wrote me. I not only love everything she sent, but I also love the little things and details she added to the package.

To Chikako: I've missed you, Chi. Thank you for thinking of me, and thank you for the lovely gifts. I know you've been through a lot in the past few months... but I also know good things are going to happen! You are always in my thoughts. xxoo!

pride weekend

It was Pride weekend in downtown Salt Lake City, and the festival was at the Washington Square pretty much across from our building, so to show support for Pride, Bob (our landlord) put up colorful banners!



And what comes with the Pride weekend? Party with Les (and the gang) of course! It's always so fun for John and I to go to his parties!

Les prepared lots of delicious cold foods:




Mmmmm. So tasty. I made some spicy sesame cold noodles to bring to the party. I hope our friends were not scared of the spiciness of these noodles! (I added a spoonful of this cool chili sauce, and then decided to add another... :p)

Everything was so tasty, and on top of that, we had lots of yummy drinks: different wines, and mojitos and cocktails Victor made us!


Victor's mojito... made "from scratch" with fresh mint leaves!


A delicious cocktail by Victor.

We ate, drank, talked, and laughed. It was a very lovely evening.

As John and I were leaving the party, the sky turned dark and gray, and the clouds started gathering above the city. I had to take a picture of it because the sky looked awesome (and slightly scary!)


Look at the clouds!

It was a totally awesome weekend.

bamboo shoot stew

I was at the Asian market and saw tall cans of bamboo shoots. Normally I got the short and stubby bamboo shoot tips (the ones that look like little pyramids,) but these ones in the tall cans seemed to be whole bamboo shoots of a skinner variety. I bought a can out of curiosity.

Couple days ago I wanted to make my soy sauce stew with chicken and quail eggs, and decided to put in the whole can of these bamboo shoots.



I put in soy sauce (both regular and dark), rice wine, water, rock sugar, chives, five-spice, couple whole star anise, red peppers, and a spice/herb pouch, and cook everything in the slow cooker on high for about 5 hours.



I love how the bamboo shoots turned out! John did think the bottoms of the bamboo shoots got a bit rough, though. They were, however, exactly how I thought bamboo shoots ought to be. Maybe next time I will cut the whole bamboo shoots into sections.

Gonna go to the market and get a couple more cans of the bamboo shoots to add to my stew. I think I'll get the short kind this time, though.