Family Christmas - Kathy House

This year we celebrated Christmas at Kathy's house.  She recently bought an amazing home and wanted to take the opportunity to host the family event.  He home has cooloer lighting so the photos are less warm with yellow tint compared to Christmas parties traditionally at my parents house.  And Jimmy insisted that I take his street DSLR for a run.  I'm glad I did.  I was able to take some wonderful shots of my cousin's amazing setup.

My cousin Jessica rocked my taste buds with this brie + chili jam combo from Trader Joes.  Everyone was showing off their talents this year.

Crystal brought a cookie decorating contest.  These are the winners!

Cousin picture!

These rugrats used Uncle Wayne's belly as a slide.

Dinner feast!  Pretty epic.  I got the family nice and warm with Hot Toddies.

Present time!  I got my 3 lovely cousins work out tank tops with sayings that match their personalities.  I proclaimed, "I know your Keywords!"  They loved it.

Family picture!  I'm starting to see where I get my vanity from.  Check out my Dad and his sister posing!  Though my dad is actually making fun of my aunt with what Ernesto calls, "the triangle of insecurity" formed by the arm on the hip.

What's a diva home with out a shoe room?

#queen

Family Christmas at Home

Because my cousin offered to host the large family Christmas party at her house on Christmas Day, my mom got a break.  We were able to spend Christmas Eve having a wonderful dinner, opening presents and going to church.  Nothing made my mom happier.

The food was delicious!

I like this shot of my grandpa and brother.  My mom complains that she can't go on vacation because she's worried about her dad.  She essentially has 4 boys to take care of.

Every year my parents get my grandpa something warm - scarf, gloves, knit cap.  And he always loves it.  This year was a good year for gift giving.  I splurged a little for my family and my brother was excited to give us all gives now that he has a job.  I'm really proud of him.  I'm going to keep that messenger bag he got me for a while!  My mom got Macy's gift cards from both me and my brother.  She said she was going to buy something special with the gift cards so that she can think of us.  Dad was easy: a sweater and finally that souvenir from Indonesia that he wanted.  I got my brother a handful of graphic tees and a watch.  He's a December baby so he deserves more.

My parents after the gift exchange.

Every year we take this family photo.  This year we just couldn't get the angle right.  Above is the winner.

We even through angry, solemn Chinese facial expressions.

My mom had to help my Grandpa smile.  He eventually got it.


Other family pictures:

Me and my brother being goofy.

My dad working on an oil painting

Pho with family.  They opened up a pretty good spot near my house.  I was happy.

My mom lining me up.  

Who could ask for a better family?

Extravagant Affairs

I have the pleasure of attending some lavish events through my work.  First a Toy Drive in downtown LA which is one of my favorite events because it gathers old friends from the industry... plus I find myself pushing the limits with all of the free alcohol that I have access to.

One hour limo ride from Santa Monica to a toy drive in downtown LA

I snuck in a bottle of Fireball Whiskey into the event and convinced two guys to come with me into the handicap stall to take swigs.  And then walking out of the stall saying ironically, "it ain't gay if it's a threeway" in which someone at the urinal heard and laughed to himself.  Earlier in the evening, one of guys had his hand down the back of my pants while I was trying to talk to the VP of marketing.  I had to ask the VP for "a moment please" and slap my straight coworkers hand out of my pants and return to the conversation pretending nothing happened.  Very difficult.

Work Celebration at Beverly Hills Hotel

It's interesting to see the answer to the question:  What would you do if you a huge budget to throw a wonderful party?  The answer was seen in the second event I attended through work for our clients.

• Open bar, of course
• Huge raffle (each guest gets a key that may open 1 of 4 large trunks)
• Vodka tasting room
• Cotton Candy vendors
• Cigar booth
• Flipbook Photo booth
• .... and Synchronized swimmers because it's being held at a hotel pool patio in Beverly Hills

I was talking to someone and said, "this is out of control!  we should have just done a taco vendor huh?"  Knowing that it would be a hit for only $300.  But I couldn't get anyone to agree with me... synchronized swimmers is greater than tacos apparently.  

Here are GIFs our flipbooks we made from the photobooth - my coworker dancing while it's "raining" and my angry boss punching me.

Candyland - 321 Christmas Party

The thing about Christmas is that I can decorate the house with the tackiest decorations and no one can judge.  The house looks like the Christmas section of the dollar store exploded... which it sort of did since I keep adding to my Christmas collection.

This year's theme was Candyland!!  Which I thought was easy, except I couldn't find any decorations.  I was discouraged until I realized... I could just hang candycanes in the hallway and just scatter candy all over the tables.  Done.

We had the photobooth in Andrew's room and as of late, he's been taking the opportunity above and beyond and surprised me with a CandyCrush backdrop that he printed from FedEx Office.  $$$$$!

This made me so happy.  Sometimes I feel as though I put too much effort into these parties, spending too much, going over the top... but when when Andrew presents these creative creations I can't but be really thankful that there's someone else equally insane.

A lot of things going on in this picture which makes me laugh.

Ern/Erik got the house an inflatable Unicorn which matches perfectly with the theme of the house: random.

Gifts got creative this year which a couple of highlights:

• One of a kind KFC candle.. "too unique a gift to pass up" proclaimed Jon when he stole the gift
• A one month subscription to SeanCody - which was interesting to our honorable lesbian
• Very popular Fashion swag that was stolen many times

Last year we had a white elephant game with 56 people which I was sweating to manage.  We had to cut down the invite list since the house was going to fall a part which pained me greatly since I always want to introduce new friends.  We hit 30 which felt more intimate and manageable and everyone went home early to other other parties since it was a popular Saturday.  

Eating Out November

 Jon and Anthony celebrate their birthday's on holidays which makes things quite fun.  Jon did his on Halloween and Anthony on Thanksgiving.  You see that fried chicken?  BTW his friends can COOK.  So much amazingness happening.

P. P. POP - Beef Noodle Soup
Uncle Yu's Indian Themed Restaurant - Not sure, but it was good
Lobster Roll - Cousin's in Pasedena... now closed... it was meh
Jacks N Joe - LA Pancake (thinner)... such a long wait, so not worth it
P.P. POP - Fried Soup Dumplings.  Our favorite secret soup dumpling AKA Xiao Long Bao spot has been discovered by Eater LA.  UGH!  Go way!! This is our place!
Los Angeles Pizza Company - Bruce Lee pizza.  No parking... and they really skipped out on the sausage.

November was a poor eating month... I guess I was just preparing for Thanksgiving overeating... let's make up for it with Selfies:

Why not?  Most of these were meant for Jimmy only, but they're just sitting in my phone waiting to be shared with more people.  I shall fulfill my duties as a millennial.  Feel free to ridicule me.

In other news this month, our favorite gal pal had her birthday at Uncle Yu's Native American themed Taiwanese restaurant called Indian.  Yes... all sorts of wrong.  Uncle Yu is this creepy old man that wanders around the joint with his suspenders and Back to the Future crazy white hair. I'm not sure how they got away with this.  Cindy's Flickr.  

This photo needs to be appreciated

 David had a Thanksgiving event as well.  The Filipinos found the piano and began to karaoke.  They also broke David's bed.  Later that night, I learned that David came out of the room and yelled at everyone to go home.  Then curled in the fetal position on the carpet.  Every continued their conversations.

Happy November everyone!

Throwing Away High School

I finally threw away boxes of high school work when I was back home for Thanksgiving.

I took some quick pictures and realized again how much of a pack-rat I am.  But look at those notes... so color coded.  And organized binders and trappers?!  Are you kidding me?

I don't know why, but I thought this stuff would be useful one day.  Or maybe because I spent so much time that I couldn't just toss paperwork away.  I wish it was all digital, but the information in these boxes were out dated and pretty much useless to anyone.

My dad nagged me enough that I actually took the time to go through everything and toss things.

You wouldn't think so by all the grammar and spelling mistakes... along with elementary writing level of my blog, but I loved vocabulary.  I had a separate binder of words that I learned and wrote them down.  I eventually minored in linguistics... wait... education, but I was two classes away from getting a second minor.

In college, I would save money by photocopying readers... I did my best to try to save my parents money.  The readers were a part of the stack that I tossed.  I had the photocopy company bind my documents as well.

Anyway... everything is recycled and I only have about 7 more boxes to go so that my dad can fit his car in the garage again.  One day.