Chuc Mom Sinh Nhat Vui Ve!

Happy 58th Birthday to my amazing, loving, and beautiful mother.



QQ Bakery Mango Fruit Cake.


Made with fresh yellow mangoes! The cake was very good, I like it.

Happy Birthday Thu!

Happy Birthday Swag.Haven! Hope you have an amazing day and year! Miss You Love and see you soon!

Happy Birthday [T]immy!

They grow up so fast. Happy 19th Birthday to the baby bro!


Excuse the writing. Chocolate and Vanilla cake from Shatila.

Happy Birthday to Me!

As a little girl, turning 25 seemed so far off. I never imagined the day would come so soon! My quarter-life crisis hit me last year-just thinking about the year ahead when 1 standard box of candles would not be enough for my cake. Thinking about how I acted last year makes me laugh. What a trip. Turning 25 ain't too bad...



Cake with the family, a tradition every year since I can remember. Red Velvet w/ Cream Cheese Frosting & Potato Chips - savory sweet, what a combo.


Reverse Happy Hour @ Kona. Free Creme Brule for the birthday girl. We couldn't even finish all the food ordered - but managed to finish off the dessert.


Me, a few of the sibs, and half of my hot date clan. LOVE.

Overall, I had a wonderful 25th. =)

Happy Xmas and Happy Birthdays 2010

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas!



Hotpot dinner (late lunch): Soup based or fried with butter.


Cutie!


Mom and Phuong made Taro and Tapioca Pearl sweet dessert. Mom suggested we add vanilla flavoring and I suggested ginger. The two flavors together, delish.

Happy Birthday to my two favorite Phuongs!


QQ Bakery Vanilla Fruit Cake
Sweet Dreams Venetian Delight Cake

More March Celebrations

So late. Last weekend we went to the Rochester Chop House and Oyster Bar in downtown Rochester to celebrate Miss Tammy Pham's 19th Birthday and Laura's 'baby dinner'. Instead of a baby shower before the birth of the little one, Lisa and Anthony decided to surprise Laura with a small dinner celebration. She's due any day now!



Bread basket starter: Seasoned toasted pita, fresh bread, and a mix of assorted beans and vegetables in a clam juice vinaigrette. So good!


Caribbean Breeze Cocktail




Flash Fried Calamari and Caribbean Spiced Mussels for appetizers


Opening presents as we wait for the entrees. Baby clothes - So cute!

Served:


Gulf Shrimp Scampi


Roasted Chicken


Alaskan King Crab Legs


Birthday Girl attacks her New York Sirloin - thing was huge!


Most of us went with the Steak with Zip sauce.


If I remember right - Hazelnut Ice Cream inside a cream puff topped with whip cream and chocolate syrup.



Nice nook in a beautiful area. Great ambiance. Delicious food (except the Zip sauce was a bit on the salty side). Awesome service.

LOL Random 4

Last Saturday, the family and I was invited to a wonderful dinner prepared by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.



Dining on the floor Vietnamese Style is the way to go!


Beef wrapped in grape/pepper(?)leaves | Bo Nuong La Nho/La Lot


Lemongrass Chicken Stirfry | Ga Xao Xa


Braised Catfish in a Caramel Sauce | Ca Kho To (this dish is showing up a lot in the last few posts huh?)


Wouldn't be complete without a Vegetable Platter | Rau Song

Sour Fish Soup | Canh Chua Ca also on the menu - not pictured.

On Sunday, the munchkins were over. They got a little bored after watching T.V., youtubing disney videos, and hearing my short answers to their questions. To give us something to do, I gathered up some paper, crayons, and colored pencils so we could draw. They decided we should make a book.



The first few pages of our book. The kid's imagination gave me a pretty good laugh. Kel's M&M flower and triangular shaped leafs. Lyn's blue gray sun and flowers made of star and heart shaped petals. Kids are so creative and imaginative - I love it! Can't wait to add more pages and see what else they've got to throw down paper. Being a kid again is nice.

Yesterday, little bro turned a whopping 18 years old! Happy Birthday young one!


Birthday Dinner: Hot Pot with the family and cousins


Hot Pot with Butter | Chien Bo


Hot Pot with Soup | Nhung Nuoc


MiGnon Cake from Produce Palace. One of our family's favorite.


Watching:

Amazing race: Not so great season so far - but rooting for my cowboys!
Undercover Boss: Great show. Very touching.
Stars Falling From the Sky: The "it" Kdrama right now. The first 5 episode had me in tears. Not draggy. Great cast. Good storyline. And super cute! Started it a week ago, now I'm all caught up for the last two episodes to air next week.

LOL Random 3

Birthday shoutout to OliveAve!

Celebrated the beautiful Liz's birthday on Friday. Dinner at Woo Chon/Mi-Loc Korean and Japanese Restaurant in Southfield. No pictures available, but if you saw it, you'd drool! Candice and I shared bibimbap and japchae. The japchae was very delicious. The sweet tea served after the meal reminded me of Maangchi's recipe for a dessert punch that I wanted to make. I never got a chance to because it called for dried persimmons and I couldn't find any when I went to the Korean market. It was super sweet so we diluted it with some water =/ I think it would've been really good with some ice.

After dinner, we headed next door for some Karaoke!


Happy birthday girl!


Duet-Liz and Sophia. Cute!
Dinner with the niece and nephew last night at Tokyo's, a restaurant I mentioned in a previous post.

Along with the most delicious salad ever, we ordered:


Gyozas


Shrimp Tempura


Variety of sushi rolls


Spicy Squid Stirfry


Kalbi


and Japchae, because the one I had from Mi-Loc was so good. This one was too sweet.

Side dishes. The sides from Mi-Loc was yummier too!




Ending the weekend with a lazy Sunday.

Celebrating My 24th

I turned 24 a few days ago. That's equivalent to the number of candles in a standard box of birthday candles! It also means that next year, I will need two boxes! I've been a little bummed because of this whole age thing, feeling like I'm not where I want be at this point in life. I'm at a standstill as time quickly passes me by and I've done nothing about it. Anyway, I'm hoping this year will be a good one. I'm going to start looking into some master programs. Sitting around doing the same'ol same'ol is not going to get me places. Hopefully, I'll be hitting the books in the fall. Be prepared to read my rants!

On Friday night, Lisa and the girls planned a dinner and a movie. We went to Kyoto Steakhouse in Royal Oak.



Artistic plate of sushi


A beating heart of fried rice for the birthday girl, is this a sign?? ^_^


Hibachi.


A cake from Shatila's much thanks to Lisa and Hangs. Can you guess what I wished for? Eternal youth =) haha Not, why would I waste a wish on something that won't come true and why would I tell you what I wished for? hehe If I did, it wouldn't come true
It was our first time at this restaurant and I don't think anyone enjoyed their food much =/ The soup was bland. Instead of the usually ginger salad dressing, our salad came with a white sauce that we couldn't make out what it was exactly. When we asked the waiter, he said he didn't know either. Hmm? hehe The hibachi was okay. I ate too much. I was so stuffed,the sight of the cake coming out made me exhale. Can I even squeeze in another bite? After dinner, we ended the night with Dear John.

Our Lunar New Year party was held on Sunday. Woke up at 8 in the morning to help mom and the sister cook.


The spread: Nem chua, banh u, banh cuon, banh bot loc, roasted quails, crab & quail egg soup, goi ngo sen, ga bop, rau cau, rau song, mussels baked in sambal & scallion butter, tuna sashimi, shrimp crackers, and thit heo & mam dua.

Not pictured - Pitas, sliders, chip & dip, and fresh cut fruit to eat while watching the game.



Nieces and Nephew


Tired... but must eat chips...Aaron's such a cutie!!


Vy's so pretty!


Happy Birthday to me! A small celebration with family. DQ's Strawberry Cheesequake. Also, Happy 8th Birthday Steven!!


"Chuc Mung Nam Moi" fruit cake from QQ Bakery for the older folks.


A homemade birthday card from Brandi =) If only all nieces were this great. One munchkin threatened to ruin my birthday after I told her to stop rolling in a chair. She's lucky I'm nice and I don't like making lil girls cry or else - game over!
Big Thanks to Phuongie for everything and thank you all for the birthday wishes.
Movie: Dear John was okay. Channing Tatum can't act and it was a little slow paced. I teared up for a good 30 seconds though.

Music: There's a few songs I'm listening to right now. Just recently discovered Khalil Fong from a niece and listening to some vietnamese based musicians.

- Nguyen Duc Cuong: Em Trong Mat Toi
- Pham Thanh Thao: Giac Mo Ve Mot Ngoi Nha
- Truong The Vinh: Hanh Phuc
- Lil Knight Ft. JayTee: Khong Tin Som Mai Binh Yen Remix (I usually do not listen to any kind of rap, most especially viet rap, but I like the vocals and beat)
- Khalil Fong: Is This Enough
- Khalil Fong: Nothing's Gonna Change My Love For You (what a voice! Love Love Love!)

Books: Yet to touch The Eclipse since who knows when...

I'm gonna make the best of being 24!