Halloween 2008

UPDATE 11/3/08: Picture of Dave at work!

Doesn't he look so wizardly/scholarly? He's just missing the long goatee. :)

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Last year, I tried to be a Transformer, transforming from a scarecrow to a pumpkin. Unfortunately, we couldn't get the pumpkin part to cooperate, so I just ended up being a scarecrow (using some leftover haybale that didn't get burnt by the fires). It was a pretty cool costume. I left hay EVERYWHERE at work!

This year, Dave and I were both pretty lazy. He decided to dress up at the 11th hour... so he wore a wizard's robe to work. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of him. I decided to just wear his old jester hat he had lying around. I was trying to put together a bright ensemble, but as I went through my wardrobe, let's just say, all the brightest, potential pieces I had got dumped in the "doesn't fit right now" pile. Ah, maybe next year, I'll be more creative.

Anyhoo, here's a group shot of my coworkers from work: (We're the best department. Everyone dresses up!)

Me in my "jester" outfit....

(a few days shy of 33 weeks!)

After I got home, a couple of my favorite neighbors couldn't resist starting their trick-or-treating bright and early.... before any sign of dusk!

Cute Pocahontas (Micaela) and a macho The Thing (Evan)

I told them that they couldn't have any candy until I finished taking pictures of them! hahahahahah

32 week Ultrasound

Yes, it has been confirmed. Baby Liu is still a girl!

Baby Shower

Today, Heather organized a Baby Shower for me at a nearby park. We originally planned on doing it at the Splash Park in 4S Ranch. However, when Heather went there at 7am to reserve 2 tables, 2 guys were already there. One showed up at 4am to reserve space for a birthday party expecting 100+ (!!!!!) guests. The other guy showed up at 5:15am to reserve some space for another party.... Uh, we decided to relocate at the last minute since we were expecting a small cozy group.

We held it at Heritage Park. It was a beautiful sunny day, albeit a bit on the warm side (80s?)... Dave came out to help Heather set up and take a nice picture of the two of us. He then ran off home to save himself from estrogen overload....

Heather, me, Caroline, and Jen (Michele graciously offered to be photog of the day) I have never been to a baby shower before, so this was all new to me. Heather spent so much time organizing many cute games! The first was to guess how many M&Ms fit in a baby bottle. I guessed 275. Dave's cousin, Angeline, guessed 270. The answer was 270!

There was another game where Heather posted a bunch of pictures of celebrities' kids. We were supposed to guess who's kid it was! That was a hard one. There was much cheating and chatting. :) We also had to match socks in 10 seconds. Heather tricked us with a few that looked the same, with slight variation on color.

The next game was a big hit and led to many pictures. She had a row of diapers with nice surprises in them. She melted chocolate bars and made us guess what they were. There were a lot of noses shoved in the diapers, and Jen even tasted one of them! The photog opportunities were irresistable!

Michele, Jen, Gwen, Angeline, Me, Caroline, half of Marta's head
A good whiff of that...

The next game was a bunch of bags which spelled BABY SHOWER. Each bag contained an item starting with the letter on the bag. Marta's little girl, Annica, helped me open the bags afterwards to show what the answers were....

One of them was Bibs:
Annie is modeling the other Bib, and trying to show us how Onesies are put on...

What a good time with friends and silly games!

Thanks so much to Heather for putting in the time and energy organizing this event! It was so much fun!

31 weeks

In our beautiful "front yard" (the park across the street).

A nice parking spot...

Hee hee... it was nice to finally take advantage of this at UTC mall!

Pickin' some apples in Julian

Today, Dave and I finally decided to check out Julian, CA. It's a short drive from San Diego, known for it's fall foliage and more importantly... apple pie! We drove out. It was a cute little village, albeit a bit crazy since our timing wasn't so great. It was the Apple Festival and the place was PACKED.

On the way back, we saw a little orchard selling organic apples and pears, with the option to pick your own apples. Neither of us had done that since we were young kids, so it was fun going around trying to pick the best apples we could find.

They were tasty!

29 weeks

Online Photo Journal

Dave found a way to publish the photo journal he made for our vow renewal. It's a walk down memory lane, through our childhood and our 12 years together!...

Check it out here.

"Wedding" Pics! - A teaser

CLICK HERE

Tri pics from Mike!

Mike had an awesome new camera that he brought with him to Dave's race. We finally got the pics!

From August 9th... the Camp Pendleton Sprint Triathlon

Dave hanging out in the transition area, anxiously waiting for it to start.

Working those tired muscles, running on super soft sand...
Where's my bike?

Nice start to the bike ride
Coming in strong

5K left to go!
Sprinting to the finish!
Yay!
Dave and his favorite cheerleader (and cheerleader in training - 5 months)

Lilly gets married!

On August 31, 2008, my old college friend Lilly Wang (aka volleyballer extraordinaire) wed a really great guy, Johnny Kim. He's been with Lilly through the toughest of times and we were absolutely thrilled to be there at their celeration!

Me (6 months) and Dave waiting for the ceremony to start With our good friend, Gary!
The Newlyweds
Us and the Beautiful Bride

Congratulations, Lilly and Johnny!

Triathlete in training...

Dave decided during the winter that he was going to do the Camp Pendleton Sprint Triathlon in August. Charlene's husband, Chris, had participated a couple years ago and the boys decided that they would compete together. (Unfortunately, several months later, Chris had hurt his knee and was unable to compete)

So, in February, Dave started training by biking, swimming at our local LA Fitness, and jogging. He rapidly built up his pace (and sloughed off some of the excess gained during med school and residency!).... He also found a few "trainers" at work, Mike Devereaux and Becky Gonzales. Becky was once a hard-core triathlete (now she's "retired" but still wins competitions, like the Camp Pendleton Mud Run - in fatigues, in her age division), mountain-biker (she was ranked 4th in California the one year she competed), and all around uber-athlete. Mike is an extremely athletic physician who regularly runs and bikes long distances. Mike and Becky would drag Dave to go mountain biking or biking at Mission Trails. Mike even invited Dave to ride a century one weekend with 2 days notice. Crazy Dave said yes...

They also swam La Jolla Cove (sometimes throwing in a run afterwards)

Becky, Mike, and Dave

On the 4th of July, they ran a 15K (I ran the 5K for 2 - 4 months in utero)
Dave finishing
Mike, Becky, me, Dave, John

They continued these activities throughout the summer, mixing up and combining different activities... It was a great way to make training fun for Dave!

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On the big day, August 9th, Dave was super nervous. We arrived at Camp Pendleton extremely early and was one of the first people there.

Waiting in line to check-in


Getting his swim cap

Check out Dave's awesome position in the transition area! The benefits of showing up early.
Later on, when it got full. Unfortunately, the spectator area was high up on the cliffs. We were not allowed access to the transition area or beach, which was annoying.
Dave's somewhere down there

Our other cheerleaders, Mike and Becky. Too bad I didn't get a good pic of them wearing their bright orange leis and pompoms. Mike was our official photographer of the day. He had an awesome new super-zoom camera that he was playing with. Whenever we get the pics, I'll be sure to post them up!

So overall, I think Dave did great! He was a bit disappointed in his time though (TYPICAL. First triathlon, and he had crazy expectations!). The swim ended up being much harder than anticipated. The waves were huge! Apparently, when Dave's wave went out, they spent a good many minutes waiting for a lull in the waves to get in the water. We noticed some people would try to swim out, and then a huge wave would crash into them and pull them back to shore. In Dave's case, some guy in front of him got knocked by a wave and Dave ended up getting smacked in the face with the guy's foot. So that put a bit of a damper on his swimming time which we had hoped to be very good. For the biking, Dave's little computer died in the middle! He is a very strong biker, and realized at the end of his bike ride that he had a lot of energy left. He was upset since he could've used that energy to easily cut a good amount of minutes from the biking portion. Dave's run was very strong. He even sprinted at the end! Usually, he's too exhausted to do that... but it was a nice impressive finish!

Good job, Dave! I'm so proud of you..

(Crazy boy thinks that the best way for me to lose the pregnancy weight next year is to do the Sprint Tri next year. Eek!)