Happy Halloween! This year marks our first Halloween together as a family of three! Halloween is one of my favorite festivities of the year, and I love thinking of creative costumes every time. I especially like costumes that go together in some sort of a theme and last Halloween, I was just at the beginning of my second trimester so I was pregnant Quinn and Dan was Finn from the TV show Glee. This year, Dan was Mario from Super Mario Brothers, I was Princess Peach, and Mio was… ::drumroll please:: Toad (the toadstool mushroom)! Dan and I had actually thought of the idea of being Mario and Peach for Halloween and had prepared our costumes two years ago, but I got deathly sick that Halloween and so we hadn’t been able to use them! But I suppose it was for the better, because our costume idea was made exponentially better with the addition of Toad Mio!
We had a busy Halloween weekend — on Saturday, Dan and his coworker friend co-hosted a baby-friendly Halloween party in the neighborhood, and on Sunday we drove into the city for an evening of Halloween bowling in the Presidio with our friends from Nakayoshi! Check out all the photos of the Halloween fun from this past weekend…
Mio and I as Toad and Princess Peach.
Cedar was an alligator, and Cristina was the alligator tamer.
Mio looking up to Cedar.
Toad Mio with Mario Daddy.
Standing with some help from Daddy.
She was a little overwhelmed by all the people...
Jasmine and Emme, the older girls at the party.
Pocahontas Sofia pointing... adorable!
Going after Mario's fireball.
Kayo and Jinwoo.
S & S!
Gorgeous view of the skyline and San Francisco city lights, taken from the balcony.
A family picture at the end of the night.
Bowling at the Presidio Bowling Center with Nakayoshi. (I believe this is the first time we’ve taken Mio into the city!)
The Toad mushroom hat we had originally bought for Mio.
The hat was ginormous and way too big on her, so we opted for a different one that was a little more manageable...
...much better!
Jamie lives in San Francisco now! She's my dear friend from Virginia Tech. I'm so thrilled that she's in the area now!
Mio got lots of lovin' from her Nakayoshi aunties and uncles.
Mio's first time meeting Graig... and she loves him already!
Wow, look at that chin. Fat angle much? hahaha*
My happy mushroom, aglow under the black lights.
Graig was so good with her!
The masked men: army man, wolf, and storm trooper.
Basketball star Graig and Little Red Riding Hood Aileen (with mushroom hat)
My new friend Hisae-san! Loved her hat!
With lovely Sam... so glad we got to see her!
With Haruka and Aileen! Mio has known them since she was one month old! 😀
Standing around.
"There's a smile!"
She looks like she's about to break into a dance.
Mio's first encounter with a bowling ball.
Jason took this cool picture of Mio in front of the bowling lanes!
She's loving it! She is as round as a bowling ball.
There she goes, scrunching her face again in an all-out smile...
Mio loves Auntie Jamie!
Couldn't resist putting the giant mushroom hat on her one last time...
Hope everyone has a fun Halloween! Perhaps next year Mio can go trick-or-treating!!! I’m already thinking of more family costume ideas….
Mio had some very special visitors this past weekend — her Auntie Megumi, Auntie Sam, and Uncle Matt came to meet her for the very first time on Sunday! The last time we were all together was at the gorgeous baby shower that they threw for us before Mio was born. Megumi lives in Southern California now, but we’re so glad that she was in the area so that we could all come together again!
Mio loves Auntie Gumi already!
She loved Auntie Sam, too! Look at that big smile!!!
Matt was a little scared of holding her, but she loved him too!
I baked some lemon cupcakes for the occasion!
It was a nice balance of sweet and tart flavors, and my favorite part is the lemon cream cheese frosting.
Megumi, Sam, and Matt have been so loving, sweet, and generous to Mio even before her arrival! I’m looking forward to all the future memories we’ll have together, and feel so lucky that Mio has such wonderful aunties and uncle that will be there to watch her grow. Thank you so much for visiting us this weekend! Hope to see you again soon. 🙂
I’m a little late in posting this, but I’m catching up on uploading pictures. My friend Catherine from Virginia Tech is now getting her Masters degree in Washington, so she decided to come visit San Francisco over Thanksgiving weekend. She stayed with our friend Sue, who has been settling into San Francisco quite nicely after moving here at the end of the summer. We spent a Saturday morning watching the Virginia Tech vs UVA game at The Bus Stop bar in San Francisco, stuffed ourselves with delicious dimsum at City View in the Financial District, indulged in some shopping, and then ended the day with manicures and pedicures in SOMA (compliments of Sue). Thank you Catherine for visiting (we expect many more visits!), and thank you Sue for treating us!
With Catherine and Sue... Hokies in the Pacific Northwest!
Sue enjoying her Prosecco while getting pampered...
Fast forward to this past weekend, we had a really fun time at the Nakayoshi holiday party, and seeing everyone from Nakayoshi again! There was so much good food that everyone brought for the potluck, the White Elephant gift exchange is always fun, and there was such good company. 🙂 Megumi even came all the way up from SoCal to surprise everybody — I was so happy to see her; I missed her so! Thanks to Dan for hosting and Sam for organizing the party!
White Elephant gift exchange!
Hubby got a beer pong pitcher... haha*
With some of the lovely ladies from Nakayoshi!
Yesterday was actually Dan’s birthday, but I wasn’t really able to do very much except muster up enough energy to bake him a German chocolate cake for his party with his boys on Sunday evening. I was feeling pretty crappy about not being able to do more for his birthday, but Dan surprised me with tulips when I got home from work last night to cheer me up! 🙂 It seems a bit backwards to get flowers from your husband on his birthday, but it was very sweet of Dan….
Lovely tulips from Dan
We went out to an Indo-Nepalese restaurant so that Dan could get some of his favorite lamb curry, and I surprised him with the Leatherman tool he’s been wanting for a while. 🙂 Happy birthday, Dan!
This past weekend was our last weekend of the year on this side of the country, as we’ll be leaving to go back East in a couple days. We spent it celebrating Christmas early with friends and family here in California.
On Saturday, we went to Megumi’s in San Francisco for a holiday party for the Nakayoshi core members. Megumi was a great hostess, preparing so many treats and goodies for everyone, and her apartment was sparkling with holiday decor.
Megumi's homemade cookies - too cute to eat!
The party was potluck-style, so everyone brought a dish and everything tasted amazing. It seems like everyone in Nakayoshi (especially the ladies) has such awesome cooking and baking skills! They put me to shame… haha* After eating, we had a white elephant gift exchange (accompanied by the characteristic silly gifts and lots of laughs), gingerbread house building, and board games! 🙂
cozy dinner conversations in Megumi's living room
more people crammed into the kitchen.
With my (almost) birthday twin, Emily! Her birthday is Christmas Eve, mine is Christmas Day.
Megumi starting the white elephant gift exchange.
Me with the lovely Miss Aileen!
Dan won some Jack Daniels... but it quickly got stolen away.
Dan and Aaron were really serious and intense about the building of the gingerbread house. Very exact and diligent...
Cyril, Megumi and I. Thanks for the great party, Megumi!
For more fun photos from the party, see the Flickr set.
On Sunday, Dan and I went to San Lorenzo to his parents’ house to celebrate and early Christmas and gift exchange with the Allens. We’re really grateful that they were flexible and moved Christmas up a little so that we could celebrate with them before we fly over to my family’s to spend actual Christmas Day with them.
Miwa with Choco
Dan's parents opening gifts
Dan and I at his parents' house
We’re leaving for Virginia early morning of the 24th, so we’re currently in a packing frenzy. Hopefully the weather will be kind and we will be able to get there safely and on time, with no complications. To our friends and family on the West Coast, thank you for a wonderful time, and to those on the East Coast… here we come!
Dan and I went rock climbing last Friday at Berkeley Ironworks with our friends from Nakayoshi. It was a first time experience for the both of us, but with the equipment rentals and thorough beginner lessons from patient instructors, we were ready to go! Before we knew it, we were scaling walls and artificial cliffs studded with colorful, oddly-shaped knobs.
Okay, well… Dan was more successful in his climbing endeavors than I was. I was having trouble hoisting myself up past a third of the wall after not being to the gym in almost a year… I finally found a course that was significantly easier which I was able to climb at a pretty steady pace. Until I happened to look down. And then my fear of heights got the better of me. The course was so tame that I could have kept going without much trouble, but I knew that if I went any higher than I was (a little over halfway up the wall), I was going to be too scared to repel down. So I chickened out and came down, much to Dan’s exasperation. Dan was a natural, though, climbing to the top several times. Here he is, doing the LeBron James.
For those in the Bay Area, Berkeley Ironworks is definitely a fun place to check out — they’re supposed to be one of the largest indoor rock climbing gyms in the area, complete with the usual weight machines you’d expect from a fitness center as well. Apparently, they also offer group classes each week in yoga, performance cycling, core strengthening and cardio kick-boxing.
Check out more photos from our rock-climbing adventures.
