Baby Madeline!

In the spirit of Christmas, to celebrate the birth of Jesus and all that is good in the world; I would like to welcome into the world, 3 months old Madeline! Brought into this world by my best friend Kayla and the lovable Fred! With both of their perfectly matched genes and their awesome personality, what came about was an adorable baby girl, all included with a cute button nose and all. The baby girl was weighed at about 7 lbs (right?) when she was first born, healthy and with a pink glow to her. Cute as a hello kitty collectable toy!

Welcome to planet Earth Madeline! May all of that which you wish for will come true, and all that you desire will be yours for the asking. Dream big and always aim high because if you fall, you’ll have a very supportive family to catch you, including your godmother (Me!). I've designated myself! Have a very wonderful first Christmas to you darling baby girl!

BMC

After watching Tenure, which was highly disappointing, Huy and I visited the beautiful campus of Bryn Mawr College! I waited for a year and a half for the film to come out in theaters so I can watch it with Sarah M. and then it never hit theaters but went straight to DVDs. I can now understand why no one wanted to take a lost of money to promote this film. It’s mediocre at best.

Here’s our photo op at BMC!

Micmacs!!

Sarah M. and Micmacs poster

Last week on Monday, Sarah M. and I decided to watch Micmacs at the Ritz East. Its rare for me to watch a movie without knowing much about it, e.g. I would watch the trailer first or read a review about it, but we decided to watch this movie on a whim. Sarah is a big indie fan, and all the indie films I’ve seen were with Sarah or ones that she recommends, so I was pretty sure Micmacs would be half way decent.

It turned out that Micmacs was a very pleasant film. There were times where I was laughing out loud and times where I was wondering, “who comes up with these things anyway?” It’s very different from American films, but I can’t really explain why. Maybe it’s the eccentric plot? The only bad part of the film is that you have to read subtitles because it’s a French film, which doesn’t bother me since I’m so used to reading subtitles for Korean dramas anyways.

The original title of the film is Micmacs à tire-larigot, which translates to 'Non-stop shenanigans'. This title absolutely explains the film to the core. Loads and loads of shenanigans!

I was discussing the film with my boyfriend after the showing, and he wondered if there was a hidden message or a satire to a situation, and he’s absolutely right. The director wanted it to be a satire on the world arms trade. I didn’t really care about the meaning of the film; it totally went over my head. But as someone who enjoys art, I love the artistic effects and the imagery of the film overall. I’m not sure why the film wasn’t promoted better, because if it wasn’t for Sarah, I would have never seen it. Please go see Micmacs, it’s a definitely worth the $10 dollars, if you’re a student, it cost only $6 dollars on weekdays!!

Hard Knocks Open Tough Locks

I went to King of Prussia today for fun, and decided to buy some gifts for my three brothers since I haven't seen them for almost 6 months! I guess you could call it late birthday gifts, besides, my family really don't even celebrate birthdays.

I headed to Urban Outfitters since they were having a summer sale, and ended up purchasing three graphic tees for my brothers.


My youngest brother loves the Stussy printed tees line, and probably has over 30 of them, so I Stussy graphic designed by Gilbert Hernandez was an obvious choice.

My favorite tee is the guy with the Afro hair-do! I always remember watching him teaching PBS viewers how to paint landscape scenery with acrylic paint. Do you guys remember this local celebrity? My best friend (Kayla) and I would watch him paint on Saturdays and it never ceased to amaze me, how easy he made it look! His voice was so monotonous that I would always switched the station, only to come back to it in 45 mins later and see the marvelous finish product. Once I did watch him paint an evergreen tree and the brush technique that he used was so easy that I thought I could do it to! I went to the dollar store and brought a cheap watercolor palette and imitated his brush technique, only to find that the finish product was a mesh of green and brown glob of paint on my paper. Was it that I was using watercolor rather than acrylic paint or the wrong paper? Could be and probably was. But I was highly disappointed at the results and it made me give up on painting all together.

Its amazing how a t-shirt can bring back so many childhood memories. I hope my little brother enjoys this t-shirt as much as I have enjoyed buying it.

My next post is about Bryn Mawr College, but I really wanted to post this picture, so I'll talk about it on this post too.

I wanted to visit Sarah B. and the professors in the chemistry department today, before my schedule gets hectic, and was lucky that they were still in lab today. It was a breath of fresh air to see familiar faces again; it was like the lab never changed since I've left the lovely niche a year ago.

I wish the best of luck to Ryan and Sarah on their PhD path in chemistry!! You're the smartest Chemistry Cookie of them all!! And all the best to Maggie on her pursuit for a bachelors degree.

Left to right: Sarah, Ryan, Tu, and Maggie

Linvilla Orchards- A lil Sweetness in Media, PA

After eating crepes, we headed out to Media, PA for blueberry picking. Blueberries are one of my favorite fruits of all time, when they are sweet and not tarty. I googled in blueberry picking the day before and had settled on Linvilla Orchards as our destination, because it was the closest one to Philly, only 30 mins away (they have a huge billboard on 95 South, near the Philly airport)!

The schedule online said that blueberry picking started this Tuesday, so I was ecstatic that they were starting it so early, since most farms usually let you pick in July and not June.

We arrived to Linvilla to find tons of family and kids there, they even had pony rides! They offered hayrides to get to the orchards for pickings. But if you don't feel like burning your skin in the sun to pick a pint of blueberries, raspberries, apricots, or peaches, they do have their own indoor market that sells fresh produce and fruits, straight from their farm! Prices here are cheaper than what you would find at Freshgrocer or WholeFoods.


I do recommend not wearing a skirt for those fashionable ladies when you're at the orchard, because it can be difficult to sit on a pile of hay without it being bothersome, if you know what I mean. The hay ride took you around the farm to the pickings of your choice, peaches and apricots, and another stop for raspberries.


Sadly, the blueberries were gone and I had to pick raspberries instead. If you really want to pick at this farm, you should definitely call ahead to confirm their picking schedule, even if it is up on their website, unless you're not picky on what fruits you pick.


Nevertheless, I had an excellent time at Linvilla picking raspberries and apricots. I thought the peaches were a little too hard for my taste, but it might be ripe in a day or two. I picked a whole pint of black and red raspberries and it only cost me a little less than $4, which is a huge discount from supermarkets!

The cool thing about this orchard, is that they have a small animal farm! With goats, chickens, deers and emus!


With the scorching Philly sun on your head, you can't go fruit picking without Italian ice! For a mere $2, you can buy delicious cold Italian ice after or before you go on your picking journey!


I highly recommend this place for young kids and adventurous kids at heart!

Crepes

Its tradition for Huy and I to head to our favorite crepes cafe, Cafe L'Aube, every weekend if we're in town. We usually drive there from West Philly, but its also accessible through public transportation by taking the orange line to Lombard, which is a block away from the cafe, located at 1512 South St, Philadelphia, PA 19146.

It has amazing savory and sweet crepes! Huy always gets the nutella with bananas and I always make a decision on a savory crepes, from bacon with leeks to ham with Swiss cheese, they are all delicious! The amazing thing about this cafe is that its local and its very reasonably priced.

Most crepes are around $6 to $10, and the coffee is to die for. Its very strong so if you like Wawa's coffee, this coffee isn't for you.

There's local artwork hanging on the colorful walls of the cafe, so its a good way to support your local artists, and view their work. The one that is behind me in the photo was a yellow orange watercolor painting that highlighted the orange wall paint.

The owner is very nice too. He's from France, and so if you speak French, don't hesitate to make conversation with him. That doesn't mean he doesn't speak English, but its a way for you to use your French language skills that you probably don't use every day.


I absolutely adore this place and if you're in Philly, you can check out this hidden gem too!

This blog will be for my musings on life and all there is to do in Philly... A hobby for the summer of 2010!!