Life Through the Lens

Catch Up Post

Its been a long while (over a year) since I posted anything on this blog.  Life’s been busy and a bit of a whirlwind.  So here’s the post to catch up on all the major stuff that’s happened over the last year or so.

First, I met a wonderful woman by the name of Hoa.  It’s crazy how much we have in common, yet really don’t share any of the same hobbies.  We were both born in Vietnam and our pasts seemed to have intersected a few times.  In any case, I realized she was the one.

 

Then came our wedding in Laguna Beach with just the closest of family.  It was an awesome weekend and we had rented out an entire B&B so we could all hang out and chill together.

 

Here’s my awesome friends Moo and Lenny that documented our wedding with fantastic photos.

 

So what eventually follows marriage? …at least for some people it’s a baby. And we wasted no time   Our little peanut will be arriving by the fall.

 

Here’s her little face…

Easter in Seattle 2013

I planned a trip back to Seattle during Easter break to see my parents, but most importantly to get my dad a new car.  We had settled on a 2013 Kia Soul, as it was a good replacement for his old Mazda 5 mainly because of the high H-point and ease of entry and exit.  Contrary to all the advertisements, old people love the Soul for this very reason.  He wanted a backup camera and I wanted the 16” tires for better ride and cheapness for replacements.  All told, with the company discount, we were able to get it for a fairly good price and it was the first new car my parents paid fully in cash for.

My sister came up on her own from Portland because her husband had just started a new job and couldn’t take time off.  But she did bring up her new (certified pre-owned) 2012 Jetta GLI…in bright red to show off.  We did the usual of eating too much and taking care of all the issues for my parents had been putting off until we came to visit.

Aly’s Photoshoot

My friend Alexandra asked if I could be the photographer for a shoot she wanted to do for her friend Aly.  Aly is a mom and has recently gotten into crossfit.  Alex some ideas for a styled shoot and we ended up going around in circles trying to find a location, but ended up right next door to the hairstylist’s shop…which happened to be a studio.  We went for 2 different looks since we were limited on time.  We only had the studio for a few hours.  But I think the results turned out well for a first time model.

St. Patrick’s Day and Marc’s Birthday

You can tell I’m behind on my posts when its about St. Patrick’s day…

Every year around St. Patty’s day, Marc celebrates his birthday since he likes to get drunk. It fits perfectly with the holiday theme.  I headed out to San Diego on Saturday and we met up early to head to the St. Patrick’s day parade in Balboa park.  Lia was extremely excited as she loves parades.

 

Afterwards, we went back home and chilled out before preparing for Marc’s Bday celebration party.  Lia again was being extremely cute again and got a huge kick out of the vuvuzela I bought at the parade.  Ericka enjoyed some mother daughter bonding time as well.

 

Party Time.  I made some Vietnamese (although they were Irish for the day) grilled pork skewers for Marc.  It takes about 2 days of prep work, but they are worth it.  Ericka made some corned beef and cabbage along with some Irish soda bread.  Everyone else seemed to have brought alcohol laced desserts. Good times ensued, but we are old and everyone petered out around 11pm.

Brian’s Weekend Visit

Beefcake was in AZ for work in early March and flew in early to so he could drive out to the OC for the weekend.  Though it was short, it was a lot of fun.  We went out for some Sushi at Yabu in West Hollywood with Brian’s friends Matt, ZiZi, and Jenn.  Then the next day we met up with Hoa for some Dim Sum in Westminster.

San Antonio 2013

After snow test, we headed out to Uvalde, TX to the Continental Tire Proving grounds to test those tires in the wet. We normally fly into San Antonio and stay the night after we fly in and before we fly out.  Usually, it’s a nice place to relax after a pretty strenuous testing schedule.  It also beats staying in the tiny town of Uvalde.

Snow Testing in Minnesota

Every Winter we head up to Northern Minnesota for work.  We test a ton of tires for a week straight.  Its long days…and sometimes long nights depending on the weather. But we always find ways to make things interesting.  Usually there’s a lot of unhealthy food eaten, but this time there was bad food eaten.  I think the prime rib special (shown below) took out half the team with a serious case of Montezuma’s revenge.  We watched way too many movies and did too much shopping at hardware stores.  The temps also dipped as cold at –27, which was a record (in the outdoors) for me.

 

Here’s a crazy vertical rainbow that seemed to have been cause by ice crystals in the air.  It only lasted a few minutes, but was pretty cool to see.

Camera Pencil Sharpener

My sister sent me a present totally out of the blue.  But it definitely is one of the coolest things I’ve gotten in a while.  I suppose this just continues the streak of photography related gifts I’ve gotten recently.  It does look a bit over complicated to operate, and luckily I have to have ONE wooden pencil that has yet to be sharpened.

Chinese New Year in San Diego

I’ve got a lot of posting to catch up on.  May work and personal distractions have kept me busy as of late.  For Chinese New Year I headed down to visit my peeps in San Diego.  Didn’t have much else to do and had to get ready to go on my various work trips to Minnesota and Texas.  We went out for Dim Sum and then found a Taiwanese bakery afterwards for some desert. Lia was being extra cute that day too.

D-Dub Back in the OC

Doug was back in town for work and we got a chance to hang out this past week.  We had dinner and some beers at 3 Thirty 3 on Tuesday.  On Thursday I introduced him to authentic Japanese ramen and we saw Zero Dark Thirty.  Good times.  He also brought a kickass coffee mug for me too.