a little bit country.

saturday afternoon after church and lunch irv and i decided to go up to the mountains to go to oak glen. once we got up there we found out that the apple butter festival was going on, so i guess we picked a good weekend to go.




if you're in the mood for a little bit of country, caramel apples, honey sticks and hay rides, then oak glen and riley's farm are the perfect places to go.

nothing but smiLes.

yesterday was chock full of my favorite things. thai food, frozen yogurt, the lakers and irvin.

for lunch irv and i stumbled upon bulan thai vegetarian kitchen. i was pleasantly surprised to find a vegetarian thai restaurant so close to irv's apartment.


i always love getting tofu in my pad thai or pad see ew. but since bulan is a fully vegetarian restaurant it was nice to have the option of ordering dishes with veggie chicken or veggie pepper steak.

irv and i tried the pad thai and some orange chicken.



i want to go to bulan again and try other things on the menu, hopefully everything else will be as good as the two dishes irv and i tried.

i'm sure you can guess what we got next...

my favorite frozen yogurt of course! we went to the yogurtland in little tokyo. since i can never decide what flavor i want, i love going to self-serve yogurt places. that way i'm able to get everything i want...yesterday i got strawberry, [my favorite] pistachio and taro.

and now, irv's addicted. i think we'll be making many more trips.

and for the big event of the night! the lakers vs. bulls game at staples center! irv and i watched the bulls vs. lakers at the united center a couple years ago, and since then i've been wanting to take him to the staples center and last night i was finally able to take him.

doesn't staples just make you smile? =]

sadly they told me i couldn't bring my camera in because my lens was too big =/

luckily i almost always have more than one camera with me, so i also had my point 'n shoot. here we are before the game...all smiles because the bulls haven't lost yet.


still all smiles, even after the lakers beat the bulls [like always]. not that it isn't obvious, but watch out for the lakers this year. i think the celtics short-lived time at the top is coming to an end.

shakeout.

the great southern california shakeout

so i just found out that today, throughout SoCal "the largest earthquake preparedness activity in u.s. history" is going to happen at 10 am, the ShakeOut drill.

so if you live in the SoCal area make sure that you drop! cover! hold on! its better to be prepared...

grub.

the other day irv took me out for lunch at grub. i don't know why i didn't know about this place until this week! it's a cute restaurant tucked away in between santa monica blvd and melrose ave.

i loved that they serve veggies, pretzels and ranch to snack on.

i ordered some home made ginger ale. andrew, you would love this stuff...there are little pieces of ginger floating around. a little intense for me, but still really good.

there were too many things that i wanted to try, so irv and i decided to get two things and split them. i ordered the "veggie-a-licious sammy" it had brie, fresh basil, tomatoes, alfalfa sprouts, cucumbers, creamy dijon and house made zesty pickled onions on chedder onion kaiser bread.

irv ordered their famous mac & cheese, it had a cayenne kick. some of the best mac & cheese i've ever ordered from a restaurant.


i wanted to try all of their desserts on the menu, but i was so full. but there was no way that irv and i could pass up libby's famous fosse cookies - chocolate chip cookies rolled in salty potato chips.

not my favorite cookie, but i've never tasted anything like it before. i know i'm going to be wanting to eat it again.

grub is definitely a restaurant worth visiting many times. the breakfast menu sounds delicious, but its only served on saturdays and sundays. one of these weekends soon, i'm going to have to make my way back again.

if you're ever in the LA area, be sure that you stop by grub.

birthday mom.

i know at least 4 people who have birthdays today. one of those people is my mom.

her work threw her a semi-surprise lunch get together this afternoon. it was only a semi-surprise because she knew she was going out to lunch, but she had no idea that her family and so many other people were going to be there.

we went to the comfort zone cafe in loma linda. i had never been there until today and i was a little surprised. its a nice little cafe with nice vegetarian options. it was the perfect place for lunch this afternoon.

irv and i got my mom a chocolate raspberry mousse cake from porto's. it was a huge hit. perfect amount of sweetness and tartness and not heavy at all. porto's is my new favorite bakery...everything there looks and tastes amazing.


i didn't really notice it until now, but it kinda looks like a 4th of july picnic.

lunch was great and it feels good to finally be home again for my mom's birthday. i'm super grateful for my family.

today, don't forget.

krispy kreme is offering a free doughnut to those who can prove they voted, ben & jerry's will be offering a free scoop of ice cream and starbucks is offering a free cup of coffee.

there you go, now you have 3 reasons to vote [as if you didn't have enough reasons before].