Category Archives: In Real Life

Are You Gladiator Tough?

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I definitely am!

Around February, Jackie sent me an instant message at work and asked me if I would do the following with this: http://www.gladiatorrocknrun.com/. My reply was, “You don’t know me at all! Why would you think I’d be interested in such a thing!” and she rebuttal with “Look at the obstacles though.” So I did and changed my thinking to, “Oh, this looks like fun.” Long story short, I signed up and got Mike and Tina to as well and there we were, a team of 4 we like to call, “Mikey’s Angels”.

After I paid my registration, I immediately had buyer’s remorse. I was so nervous that I felt the need to somehow take control of the situation. “I know, I’m going to start training.”

I haven’t ran since high school, so no better time than now than since I still have a couple months to get ready. I talked to Van, the family runner, then I looked up “How to Train for your First 5K Race” online and found a great program. I started jogging/walking and by a couple of weeks before the race, I went from walking 4 minutes then jogging 1 minute to jogging 2 miles straight. According to Van, I was ready. Then I got this cough and wasn’t able to run the 2 weeks before the race! DOH!

Teamwork - Gladiator Rock n Run
Teamwork

Mudslide
Down the mudslide

The day of the race came and we had so much fun! The first half was a lot of running and tires, tires and MORE tires. After the first real obstacle in my opinion, the mud slide, things really picked up. We had to climb walls, crawl through mud, jump into mud pits, jump over fire and so much more. It was so much fun doing it with Mike. He was definitely our anchor. He helped us guys over the big wheels and any hurdles we weren’t able to do ourselves. The teamwork was awesome. Jackie would wait for me (the weakest link on the team, btw) and take pictures of all of us. The photos are hilarious and so worth it!

We Did it!
Dirty, but we did it!

We rewarded ourselves (we finished the race in 54 minutes) with some Shik Do Rak, now deemed the “Meal of Gladiators”, celebrated and thanked our cheerleaders (Khoa & Bao) for coming out to support us and take pictures.

I have a feeling we will be doing this again. Can’t wait until next year!

Team
Good job, Team!

Parenting

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I think my views on parenting will change the longer I do it, but the kids are a little over 2 years old now and sometimes I find myself alone in my car panicking. I’m thinking to myself, “I have no idea what I’m doing.” Usually followed by, “I’m totally going to screw them up.” And here’s the thing, Mike and I don’t plan on having any more children, so this is it…if we screw them up, we won’t even get a chance to redeem ourselves!

I never wanted to be that neurotic parent. Before I had kids, I said to myself numerous times, “I’m going to relax and just let nature take it’s course.” I definitely am not as relaxed as I thought I’d be. Sometimes, we can be our worst enemy…we want something so bad and want it to be perfect so badly, that we end up messing it up. I guess if parenting was easy, there would be no psychiatrists. :)

I wish kids just came with a manual. Just my vent for today.

2010 CHOC Walk

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Choc Walk 2010 Lam FamilyI’ve always love children and had a soft spot for them, but after having children of my own, that spot just got softer if possible. We added CHOC to one of the organizations we will be donating annually to. Not sure if I ever blogged about this but Mike and I donate to 4 organizations annually around the holidays. We just pick 4 we’d like to contribute to and CHOC was never one of them before now. It’s hard to choose because everybody has a good cause, but this one touches home. Not because our kids were ever patients at CHOC, but heaven forbid of they are, we know they will be in good hands. Plus, walking this walk reminds me how lucky I am my kids are healthy and happy and we did not have to go through some of the tragedies these families we walk among did with their children.

143 091

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15 years ago to date, a boy asked a girl to be his girlfriend.

Gone are the days of talking on the phone until 4am (those days were replaced with 3AM feedings last year). Root beer floats and banana cream pies were replaced with protein shakes and Costco rotisserie chicken. Pager codes are replaced by IM and text messaging. Yogi’s and nickel arcades have been replaced by PS3 and the Wii. We’ve grown out of Street Fighter, Duke Nukem, Unreal Tournament and competing at Angry Birds now.

Even with all those changes, one thing remains the same (very apparent by our recent Cupcake Throwdown). We are still the goofiest couple I know.

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Cupcake Throwdown

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It all started with a sweet offer:

Wife craving cupcakes but didn’t feel like baking. Sweet husband offers to bake cupcakes. Wife laughed at this offer. Husband remarked that his cupcakes are better than wife. Wife says, Game on…

We decided to bake up four dozen cupcakes for close family and friends and let them be the judge of whose cupcakes are better. The judging was based off: taste, moistness, frosting and creativity. We baked two categories of cupcakes to go head to head: one classic flavor and one couture (or “It’s My Prerogative”).

Mike took a few weeks to finally decide on his flavors (with the support and encouragement of his all-male carpool buddies). Classic will be a play off the Hostess cupcake which he coined as the Fauxtess. His couture cupcake is a churro cupcake with dulce de leche and vanilla Swiss Meringue buttercream.

FauxtessChurro Cupcake
Fauxtess cupcake (left) & Churro cupcake (right)

I decided on doing a coconut cupcake for classic called the Haupia cupcake. Haupia is a Hawaiian dessert that I fell in love with when we went to Maui a few months ago. The Haupia cupcake is a coconut cupcake filled with haupia filling and whipped cream topping. I decided this challenge will be a good opportunity to try it. For my fancy-schmancy cupcake, I went with a spumoni cup which was half cherry batter and half chocolate batter with a pistachio Swiss meringue buttercream. I have to confess I came up with this idea to win Bao’s vote. Hahaha.

Spumoni Cupcake
Haupia cupcake (left) & Spumoni cupcake (right)

So last Sunday we threw it down. Before he had even ONE cupcake in the oven, Mike turns and says to me, “I’m already tired.” Oh, he’s a goner. LOL. It was a lot of fun and we will definitely be doing it again. I had so much fun tasting and working WITH Mike on our recipes. We stayed up all night baking and tasting each others cupcakes.

All the cupcakes were delicious. I have to admit when I ate that churro cupcake, I thought it was over for me. It was definitely something I want to eat again. But at the end, the baker beat out the family chef with the haupia cupcake…coconut cupcake won of all things!

DiSC Results: Peacemaker

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Work asked us all to take the DiSC assessment and here are my results (I’m boring). I took something like this back in my Smarthome days and I don’t remember what I was assessed to be, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t “Peacemaker” which just means I’ve changed. For the better or worse? Not sure, just changed. I’m a lot older now and my priorities are definitely different from what they were back then. Either way, it’s pretty accurate of how I feel these days..about work at least!

Peacemaker

Thi values close, personal relationships, and she will often put the needs and desires of those who are loyal friends ahead of her own needs. She is an even-paced individual who thrives in a peaceful, harmonious environment. Thi will work to avoid conflict and sudden changes in her lifestyle and finds joy in keeping tradition.

Systematic and detailed, Thi focuses on the process. Others see her as practical and logical. She tends to be sensitive to criticism, but prefers to internalize her emotions rather than expose them. Thi likes to clarify expectations before undertaking new projects, because she works hard to meet the standards that are set for her.

Thi prefers a rational and moderate approach when first entering new situations and tries to avoid extremes. She likes the company of others, but Thi is equally comfortable spending a quiet evening alone. She is a realist who will always weigh her options before she makes a decision to move ahead.

Because she cares about how others feel, Thi may feel uncomfortable making decisions that strongly affect others. She typically encourages others to be involved in the decision making process and prefers to work in a team role. Others tend to see Thi as agreeable and humble.

Exponential Work

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Everybody always told me having twins, or triplets, or any higher order multiple birth is exponential in work load compare to the n-1. I will never know if this is true since I had the twins and don’t plan on having anymore. However, a vendor called me at work today regarding some work and asked how I am. I told him I’ve been in and out of the office since my twins are taking out all the people around them with their cold and he says he has twins too! Actually, he has 4 kids. Wow.

He says his kids are 20, 15 and the twins are 12. Continued to tell me he knows why people who have twins first don’t ever have anymore. He told me firsthand, through experience, that the workload is indeed exponential. “Having twins is like having 6 kids!” He even told me it will get easier once they are 3 years old and says that his wife and him had a celebration when the last kid was potty-trained. How cute is that.

They are amazing people because the reason why he has 4 kids is because his wife is just baby crazy. After deciding that the twins will be their last, his wife signed them up to be kind of like foster parents but only for babies of teenage mothers who loses custody from the state due to whatever circumstances they are in. He says it’s very sad when babies addicted to crack comes into their care. Those babies take longer to place but he says they always end up placed somewhere. The list of people wanting babies is very long and there is always a home waiting for them. That’s just beautiful to me. I admire people like this.

Ba Noi’s 90th Birthday!

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I can’t believe she’s 90…it’s amazing. Ba Noi was very much a 3rd parent when it comes to our primary caretakers growing up. She’s my “mah mah” like Mike’s mom is to my kids. I remember watching cartoons and how even though she barely new English or understood technology…she knows at 2PM is when my cartoons will start and would turn the dial on Ong Noi’s old-school TV for us to watch our shows. She would walk me to the bus stop in the mornings when we lived in San Jose and be at my stop to walk home with me everyday. She would make com chien with sugar and we’d always get in trouble for putting more soy sauce in it before tasting it. (It’s always too bland.) Man, I love her and am so happy she is still around!

happy birthday, ba noi!

Weekend Recap

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No recent post because since Thursday…VAN WAS IN TOWN! We’ve been busy busy busy! Between her visit and the kids getting a nasty cold, here’s a quick preview of posts to come:

  • Kids turning back into newborns
  • Ba Noi’s 90th birthday
  • OC Fair 2010
  • Disneyland with the Abris

Busy but so much fun!

Yellowstone Log

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In 1998, the family when on a road trip to Yellowstone National Park. My mom decided to bring a notebook and pen to document and log the trip. We all thought it was such a lame idea…until now.

12 years later, Van found the log and emailed it to us. I was tearing up from laughter! Best part is, we still all have the same jerky personalities we did back then! I had to blog about it to keep it somewhere I can go back to read it anytime!

Please enjoy:
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