Socks and Acorns

We got to sleep in today and enjoy the final day of our trip.

Ozzy the dog loves socks, even sweaty ones

Cora prying Ozzy's mouth open to retrieve Trung's dirty sock from his morning run

We met Wendy for lunch and afterwards, the kids gathered acorns

We go way back

The backbones of our families

The tradition continues

Every Black Friday that I am in town, my sister in law Cora and I wake up super early to go shopping at the Galleria, and sometimes other malls.  This year was no different, and my niece Jocelyn even came along and scored some good deals.  I was a bit disappointed with this year's shopping spree, but my disappointment was Trung's happiness in knowing I didn't spend too much.

Shopping trio

The kiddos feeding ducks after lunch

Another tradition...having dinner at the Taste of Texas.

Trung's half of the tomahawk steak; I got the other half, which quickly found a home in my stomach.

Nibbling

The kids were ecstatic about their five layer chocolate cake

Thanksgiving in Texas

We missed Thanksgiving with Texas friends and family last year because we decided to go to Texas in December for Christmas instead, so it was nice going back again.  Every Thanksgiving vacation with my family consists of eating, shopping, and more eating.  I was looking forward to all the good Asian eats and I was not disappointed. 

My mom outdid herself again

Family pictures at the annual family night with my Dad's church members

The Lee Family at its' largest

Family and friends

Chinese potlucks are the best!

An American Girl Birthday

We first met Emma and her mom Marie at Sophie's one and only callback a couple months back.  Just a week later, we worked with them on set of a commercial as extras.  The job was for a good 4-5 hours, so we got to know each other pretty well.  When we were wrapped, Marie invited us to Emma's birthday party at American Girl in a month and a half later.  I was pretty sure that we were available for Sophie to go and even though we exchanged cell phone numbers, I didn't think much of the invite because I have found that relationships in this industry don't run deep.

Fast forward one month later, we ran into Emma and Marie at another audition.  The minute Marie saw me, she asked if we were coming to the birthday party that Sunday!  I hadn't heard back from her in over a month because she was super busy, but she still wanted us to come.  So, we came and were glad we did because though Sophie didn't know anyone besides Emma, the food was good and the party was super fun.  Now she wants an American Girl doll and to have her birthday party there (not happening at $26/person).  :/

Emma and her posse

Sophie and Emma, acting buddies

Sophie got to have a temporary American Girl doll

A meal fit for little princesses

A very sweet cake

Happy Birthday, Trung!

 Happy birthday to the best husband and father I could have asked for!

The girls had fun with sleds while Trung looked for snow boots

They took turns pulling each other

We took Trung out to dinner to a delicious Japanese restaurant in Beverly Hills.  My sashimi combo was only $20 and stuffed me to the brim!

13 girls and a boy

It's movie night again!  This time we had 11 girls and one more boy come over to watch "Mr. Peabody and Sherman".  It got a little crazy at times, but overall, everyone got along just fine.

 Frank, as the only boy, didn't want to be in the picture

Funny faces!

Books for Cooks

The library hosted an event for kids to learn how to cook.  First, they did a cute craft, then read a Thanksgiving themed book, and then made tortilla roll-ups. It may have been too "young" for the kids, but they had no problem gobbling up the food.

Lydia and Sophie with their buddies Violeta and Lucy

The Morning After

Trung and I had such a wonderful evening and would have loved to have stayed at the hotel longer, but Sophie had an audition at 11 in Hollywood, so we had to cut our stay a bit short.  Trung still got to enjoy his morning espresso and paper before we went on our way.

This is the life

The pathway to our bungalow

 I was able to convince Trung and Lydia to come with us to the audition by suggesting we go to The Boiling Crab for lunch afterwards.  Win win for all!

Staycation

Last December, Trung and I won raffles for a dinner for two at the Fig Restaurant and a night's stay at the Fairmont Hotel.  We finally got to redeem our prizes tonight while the kids spent the night at a friend's house.  When I first contacted the person regarding the prizes, she said that the dinner for two was valued up to $150, but when we asked the waitress, she said to order whatever we want.  So we did...a dozen oysters and glasses of Riesling on top of the chef's prix fixe menu, which came out to a grand total of $250 before tax and tip!  Needless to say, we were happily stuffed and enjoyed one of our best meals ever!

Delicious oysters at $4 a pop

Sashimi and shishito

Charcuterie

Salads

Fish and pork main entrees with brussel sprouts and spinach

Dessert, plus the tea we ordered

 Yes, it was a mighty fine meal!

Booked as a family!

A couple weeks ago, I came across a job posting looking for Chinese actual families with children for a Bank of America print job.  The casting website usually doesn't have e-mail addresses and you have to pay to submit if the agent doesn't, but this job did, so I e-mailed the casting company directly with a family picture.  The next day, I received an e-mail asking if the family could come in later that day for an audition.  I had a discussion before with Trung about auditions and we agreed that he wouldn't come to the first audition since he would have to take some time off of work to go to Hollywood in the afternoon, only call backs (second auditions) and the actual bookings.  The casting company was fine with just the girls and I coming in, so off to Hollywood we went on Oct 21st.

The wait wasn't too bad, less than 15 minutes (we've had to wait up to two hours before), and we had been to this location before, so that was nice.  When we got called in, they took pictures of each one of us and taped us answering some questions to see how we interacted as a family.  I honestly didn't think the audition went that well because when asked what we like to do on the weekends, Sophie answered "go to Hawaii and go to work" (she had just had a booking the weekend before) and Lydia said "play electronics".  I had prepped them on the drive there not to answer "I don't know" to any of the questions and gave some ideas for answers, but you never know what they are going to say.  Somehow, out of over 400 people, they narrowed it down to 4-5 families, and then finally settled on us...and Trung didn't even have to go!

I had planned not to involve Sophie's agent since I self-submitted us and not them, but then Sophie got an audition with a possible callback on our shooting date.  So, I decided just to say that Sophie had a school play on the 17th and couldn't miss it, so she couldn't go on any auditions or possible callbacks that day.  It was our first declined audition ever and I didn't hear back from the agent, so I guess they were fine with it.  Below are the pictures the casting agency e-mailed me to confirm that we were the pictured individuals.  We certainly don't look our best, but we were exactly what they were looking for for this particular job.  Yay! 

The picture I brought to show Trung...they took a picture of the picture.

Farewell, Infiniti

After listing our Infiniti Coupe for two months on Craigslist since we decided that a second car was not longer necessary, we finally got a buyer.  Jorge, the potential buyer, had initially contacted me three weeks ago regarding the car, but never came out to see it.  Good thing I always responded to the e-mails, because he finally got the money together and drove down from Oxnard with his parents to get the car.  

I didn't feel comfortable with 10k cash, and counterfeits are really hard to tell these days, but fortunately a Wells Fargo in West LA was open until 2 PM and on a Sunday!  When I called, they said they could only do cashier's checks or wires for their account holders, which we weren't.  I figured that if Jorge didn't have an account, that we could always just open an account and close it later.  As it turned out, not only did Jorge have a Wells Fargo account, but he actually works at one!  Talk about a match made in heaven!  After the test drive, we all drove to the bank and made the exchange...a done deal!

We had some good memories with our little fun car

Head shots (take 2)

Apparently, the head shots I posted last time were, according to Sophie's agent, "bland and flat" and her smile looked "forced, stiff, and joyless".  I thought her comments were quite harsh at first, but she was just being straight forward.  So, rather than fork over a few hundred just yet for professional head shots, Trung decided to try his hand at it.  We were happy with the results, but I guess we'll see what the agent has to say.

When we skate

The girls are a bit afraid of letting go of the sides of the ice rink and trying to skate, but I don't mind when they practice during the grand opening of ICE, when everything is free!  It took a good hour before they let go of the sides, but once they did, they really enjoyed themselves.

Sophie kept posing with one leg up

From frowns...

to smiles!

A little help from Daddy

There's that leg going up again

Sophie got brave first

The bravery rubbed off on Lydia