Home For the Holidays- Part 1

Happy 2011 Everyone!

Unfortunately poor old Sunsets and Bluegrass has gone a bit dark and wilted over the last half a year, but the new year has brought some revival (hopefully!). Ideally I'd like to post someday about birthdays, family visits, holidays, etc. from 2010, but I also wanted to jump right in a capture some of the most recent holiday season since it is still fresh on my mind (and yes, my Christmas decorations were still up until this past weekend, but you'll have to give me credit that I stopped playing Christmas music.)

Greg finished out the semester with a bang...literally. I picked up this tradition from a friend and carried it through college. One balloon for each final. It is incredibly satisfying to have a nice loud POP once you are finished with a particularly torturous final. Greg popped his balloons and passed his classes with flying colors and I am so proud of all his hard work!

Shortly after finals (literally the last day of finals) we hopped on a plane to head out to beautiful sunny Cali! This year, after reviewing the horrendous cost of flying during the holidays we encountered last year we decided to beat the rush and bank breaking fees and leave early in December. It was a little different (everyone was in finals and so busy!) but I have to say, I think the perks of 1) saving money 2) getting Christmas shopping out of the way early 3) not having to travel over Christmas may have been worth it.

The weeks heading up to our trip I had been compiling a countdown to do list of things I wanted to do while in Cali. It included TONS of eating and hanging out with people and I have to say I am so thankful that we were able to do almost everything.

Our first stop on our Christmas adventure was to beautiful Sun Diego!

We arrived late Friday night and were able to crash after a pleasantly untorturous time at the airports (although we did get threatened to be delayed in a holding pattern and/or have to reroute, but thankfully that was not the case and we were less than an hour delayed.).

On Saturday we started off hitting the ground running, or should I say dancing? I got to visit my old dance studio, Dance Unlimited and take a zumba class with Mom. It was a fun, but perhaps not so relaxing start to an action packed trip. After cleaning up and catching our breath Lauren and Chase' girlfriend Priscilla came into town and we headed out to the cinema to see the long anticipated Harry Potter 7. Although I didn't end up making a scarf and wearing a robe (as I was threatening Greg with), I still thoroughly enjoyed the movie with my popcorn and candy in tow. Alas, the robe and Griffindor scarf can wait until part two! The rest of the day was spent relaxing and preparing for a nice family dinner. I made an attempt at molten lava cakes and we enjoyed good ole spaghetti, a Wong family specialty. After dinner the kids stayed up and Chase introduced us to Pandemic, a ridiculously fun co-op board game (yes, game geeks, I know).

On Sunday we got to go to my not so home, home church, Lighthouse. It was great being back, although so much has changed since I was there 4 years ago. The added bonus to the day was that Greg's sister Charissa Sunday now attends Lighthouse so we were able to worship together with her as well. After church we took Charissa out to REAL Asian food. Although we didn't do the all you can eat Korean BBQ, it was still so yummy, and I was perfectly happy with my Soon Dubu. nom nom nom.

A bowl of delicious goodness. Alas Louisville has failed us on the ethnic food front.

I also was treated to my favorite, boba from TapEx! Although we ate an inordinate amount of delicious foods, I think a regular boba milk tea from TapEx has got to be up there with favorite foods from Cali.



This is a shot of Charissa with her Christmas gifts, NYC coasters with some spending money for her trip to the Big Apple and a homemade penguin made out of a pair of gloves! 

 The rest of Sunday was dedicated to a Fuax Family Christmas as we celebrated a fake Christmas with my parents. Of course Johnny Mathis was in attendance also with some hot cocoa, a Winne-the-Pooh tree topper and presents galore. We were blessed with an abundance of gift love and came out with a whole extra suitcase full of stuff! It was the best fake Christmas I have ever had!

After another game or two of Pandemic we had to get our rest because the next day we were going to the Happiest Place on Earth with some amazing people. In my ingenuity prompted by super Asian thrift we met Tranwei and Abijah at Lee's Sandwiches to stock up on Vietnamese Banh Mi (which had the purpose of saving us from having to buy park food with the added bonus of allowing us to add yet another highly missed food item onto our "done it" list.). We carpooled over to the park, parked in my super secret free parking spot and were on our way. After getting our free (yes, FREE) Give-a-Day-Get-a-Day tickets we entered a world of magic.  

Happy People at the Happiest Place on Earth



Main Street during Christmas. It was hilarious to see how Abijah and I reacted concurently oohing and ahhing and making our hubands take pictures of every fine detail.

The castle festive for the holidays!

An awesome Splash Mountain Pic. I was determined not to get wet...needless to say I was the one who got soaked.



Greg and TW with the famous Main Street Corn Dogs. Yes, they are Yelp rated.



The castle at night. Truly magical.

After a ridiculously fun day at the park, we decided to spend our money on real food (although the dole whip and corn dogs were pretty tasty). We headed to the famous Boiling Crab which was a mix of a Korean restaurant gone Cajun (weird, but oh so delicious!). Here is a sampling of what we had. Pound bags of shrimp and crawdads with andoulle sausage and corn on the cob. It was a delicious and fun experience and allowed us to extend our double date (even though TW was in the middle of Seminary finals!)

We had a wonderful time with the Yus sharing the day and sharing our lives together. Greg and I kept remarking how we never thought anything could play background to D-land, but with the awesome fellowship sometimes it felt like Disneyland was interrupting our time together! We are so thankful for like minded and encouraging friends like the Yus!

Our last full day in SD was a nice low key day. We slept in, hung out and saved our stomaches for an epic lunch, one that Greg had been waiting quite some time for...meat...lots of meat. Yes, we headed to the Brazillian Rei do Gado Churrascaria for all you can eat meat covered in meat to top a pile of meat.



Picanha, the best cut ever. Tender top sirloin only rivaled by bacon wrapped filet mignon.



Here's what I got! Just kidding, kind of. I love meat, but I can't seem to pass up guac and cheese...

All done! Indeed I was stuffed.

We left beautiful San Diego on Wednesday morning to head to Sac. Even though we were there for about 4 days and accomplished much it felt so fast! We were so thankful for our time and the opportunities we had for fellowship, family and fun and look forward to family coming to visit us here in Louisville soon!

Stand by for part 2- Sactown to be forthcoming in the (hopefully near) future!