Birthday Bash

In honor of "Chef" Gema's birthday, it was decided that the gang would get together at our house, prepare a huge Mexican feast, and celebrate with lots of food & presents!  But... if you ask me, I think the birthday get-together was just a cover-up for why they really wanted to come over... 

To see the Key-Dens of course!!!

It was an absolute gorgeous day with perfect weather... wonderfully delicious food that Margarita slaved away in the kitchen making that morning... yummy pastries that Gema baked for all of us... and even birthday presents waiting to be opened by the birthday girl... but none of that really seemed to matter, for Ming & Bing completely stole the show!!!

On a side note... after dealing with crummy contact lenses for as long as I've known her... and almost having her eyeball scratched out from a friend's kitty... Jeilene finally pulled the trigger on a brand new (expensive!) pair of glasses!  She sure does look smart in them... I just hope she actually is and thinks twice now when going around sticking her face into strange cats!  

The party moves inside where pastries & presents await!

We all sing Happy Birthday to Gema... 

and then Jei hands out the presents!

What a great day we all had!  Great weather, wonderful food, and lots of presents!  Happy Birthday Gema!  

...now gimme back my Key-Dens!!!

Let there be CAKE!

One of Joanne's friends was celebrating her birthday this month and had planned a little party at her house in L.A.  Naturally, she needed a big pretty cake... so Joanne dropped Jei's name and just like that, Jei was hired!

One solid day of baking... another day decorating... and voila: another incredible masterpiece!

Jeilene & I delivered the cake... and needless to say, everyone - including the birthday girl went completely ga-ga over it!   

It was hard work... and seemed like it took forever to put together, but it certainly paid off!  Definitely one of Jei's best cakes yet!  Which is probably why it was so hard watching it get torn apart and cut up... but hey, we were hungry for some cake! 

The usual L.A. gang (Joanne, Gema, & Helen) was there to help celebrate and eat cake too... and it just so happened that Margarita had just flew into town from Mexico earlier that day for a week long shopping spree... so Sochi picked up Margarita from the airport and made it to the party just in time!

We stuffed our faces with delicious cake... drank yummy adult beverages... and somewhere in between had a great time partying with friends & family!

Random Cuteness (part 3)

Ming & Bing are growing like little weeds... but they're still so cute!

 

Holiday "Stay-Cation"

Jei, Momma Soch and I didn't have much planned for Memorial Day... so we decided to head up to L.A. and visit with the girls!  For future services rendered (hang curtains & hook up TV), Helen was kind enough to treat the three of us to an absolute fabulous lunch!  She took us down to Beverly Hills where we had a little taste of Brazil at Fogo de Chao.  It's pretty much an all-you-can-eat Brazilian steakhouse Gaucho style... where everyone is given a circular card, and if you want the servers to keep slicing off little pieces of heaven onto your plate throughout your meal, you flip your card to the green side... and if you're about to throw-up Filet Mignon all over yourself because you ate too much and want the servers to stop, you flip it over to the red side!  It was quite the experience and highly recommend stopping by if you ever get the chance!   

After a magnificent lunch (thanks Helen!), we had some time to kill before our afternoon matinee at the California Science Center in downtown L.A.... so we decided to push our way through the line of five-year-old's and explored all the wonder the Science Center had to offer!         

Definitely one of the highlights was the really cool kelp bed aquarium! 

After visiting the ocean... 

we hitched a ride on a camel and suddenly found ourselves in Egypt!!!

Queen 'Cleo-Sochi' riding her favorite camel heading back to her palace of gold!

Our camel ended up buckin' Jei clean off... 

so I had to take control and rode that thing for 8 seconds straight!

Sochi got lost... but then to everyone's amazement, 

she found herself at the footsteps of the Great Pyramid of Giza!

(Yes, I know... we're huge dorks, but at least we're fun dorks!)

We finally got back from "Egypt" when we thought, "You know... we had a little taste of Brazil, the Ocean, and Egypt today... why not end the day with a little Outer-Space too?!?!"  So we walked over to the IMAX theater and saw HUBBLE 3D... which was freaking amazing!!!   

(Click HERE to see the official trailer!)

Definitely not a super exciting weekend... but certainly nothing wrong with the occasional "stay-cation" every now and then.  Besides, I think we made the best of it and had a really good time with family!