we enjoyed a lovely dinner at shaughnessy restaurant in vandusen gardens; good food with a backdrop of christmas lights from the garden.

hello nutcracker

family pic!

first christmas get-together was hosted by karen and colay. it was wonderful catching up with old friends and making new (little) ones.

i have a bit of a backlog of foodie posts, so i’ll have to catch up. nantucket grill. i stumbled upon this quaint cafe in a quiet corner of one of the strip malls. not much going on outside, but the inside was quite cute and the menu looked promising. tricky part is that it is only open mondays to fridays from 10:30 to 4:00 (!). we made it for lunch on one of joe’s non-teaching days a few weeks ago.

sandwiches were big and good. i especially liked the new england clam chowder.

rebecca eating her lobster quiche. i think she approves.

recipe for steamed lobster:

“Fill a very large pot with 1 inch of sea water and bring to a boil. If you are not near an ocean you can simulate sea water by adding 1Tbsp salt to each Qt of water. Put lobsters head first into the water, cover and steam for about 15 mins. If lobsters are very large, cook an extra 4 additional mins per lb.

When cooked, lobsters should be bright scarlet and the antennae should pull from sockets easily.

Drain and serve while hot with lemon and drawn butter.

Unless your pot is truly enormous, it is best to cook no more than 2 lobsters in one pot.”

it’s always kind of hard to predict how good a restaurant is, even with the reviews. we went to “squids” and were pleasantly surprised. it was nice casual seafood restaurant, joe had a really good clam chowder and my trout was grilled just right.

steamed oysters with all its trimmings.

i think we may be coming back!

finally, the first hot pot of the season! we tried to wait for it to get a bit colder, but couldn’t wait any longer. nothing a bit of AC can’t fix!!

with joe finished with his conference, we had one day to do some sightseeing as a family. first we stopped by alamo square for a view of the famous “pink ladies”, a row of victorian houses, with the city in the background.

architecture was generally very interesting, especially when virtually everything is built on a hill.

driving down a VERY steep hill. kind of came out of nowhere!

then we were off to see the golden gate bridge. poor baby, she slept through all the excitement!

next stop was fisherman’s wharf where we had lunch with a view. fried oysters.

then a short walk to pier 39 for a view of the lazy sea lions and alcatraz (if you squint, you can see it on the island in the background!). so much to do, but so little time. we’ll have to come back one day for a proper visit.

it was time to go… drove to sunnyvale and checked into our hotel. then a yakitori dinner with the family. delicious and beautiful!

day three. while joe was still busy at the conference, rebecca and i were able to spend the day with our family. first we went to the beautiful japanese tea garden in golden gate park.

jadon checking out the coy fish.

i loved the beautiful trees.

then we went to the embarcadero where we enjoyed the view…

a lovely peruvian lunch (pic of derek’s meal)…

a quick stroll through the market…

before heading home.

the day wasn’t over yet though. joe and i had a surprise mini reunion over coffee with our old friends from chicago, orlia and debra!

we’ve been looking forward to this trip for a long time now. joe is attending the Society of Biblical Literature conference and since his brother and family live in the area, we’ve made it a family trip to San Francisco! the flight from north carolina was painfully long, but we all survived, eventhough we arrived way past everyone’s bedtimes.

while joe was off conferencing today , rebecca and i went exploring! i decided to check out the mission district, a latino neighbourhood, also known for its many wall art murals. by the time we got there via bus (my first time busing with baby in the stroller – let’s just say not the easiest way to travel when you’re in a crowded bus) it was time for lunch. i stumbled upon a local authentic-looking mexican tortas restaurant and had a (very authentic-tasting) pulled pork torta.

after lunch i walked down 24th street, down to Balmy Alley. Its website describes the block long alley as:

the best place to see the most concentrated collection of murals in San Francisco. The murals began in the mid-80′s as artists’ outrage over human rights and political abuses in Central America. Today the alley contains murals on a myriad of styles and subjects from human rights to local gentrification and Hurricane Katrina

there where murals everywhere, not just in the alley. here are a few shots from around the mission neighbourhood:

in the week leading up to our trip, we kept getting forecasts for rain and thunderstorms. so we were really happy when we woke up and saw some blue sky peaking through. we decided to take full advantage of it and drive south along the cape hatteras national seashore.

first, we visited the bodie island lighthouse. we were the only ones there (if you don’t count the swarm of mosquitoes we encountered) to enjoy the beautiful view.

we drove a long stretch of road, flanked by sand dunes on one side and water on the other.

the houses were all constructed so that they were elevated off from the ground to avoid flooding (i guess). we drove through towns that were still struggling with rebuilding after hurricane irene. apparently some towns were completely under water for a long period of time.

finally, we reached the second lighthouse, the cape hatteras lighthouse. An interesting fact we learned is that in 1999, due to erosion of the shore, they had to literally move the lighthouse 870m inland. Big job!

lunchtime at a local seafood diner. fried shrimp, fried fish bits and crabcake sandwich.

on our way back, we stopped at a beach to stretch our legs. not a soul in sight!

another long bridge.

dinner was at “la cabana”, kind of a hole in the wall, but rated #1 in tripadvisor, so we decided to give it a shot. everything was good but the shrimp enchiladas were our favourite.

the outer banks is a long strip of narrow islands on the east coast of north carolina. our destination was the town of kill devil hills, a four hour drive from chapel hill. we set off on our roadtrip in the morning, just in time for morning nap.

after a lengthy nap, it was perfect timing for lunch. we found a local family restaurant in williamston featuring southern comfort food. we tried the fish burger (better version of a filet-o-fish), fried trout, and a country fried steak.

a bit more driving left to do, including over a long bridge to the outer banks.

after some rest and a brief walk to the beach (more tomorrow), it was time for dinner!! we were excited to try some seafood at colington cafe… we weren’t disappointed! all the seafood was fresh and perfectly cooked.

after a lot of food, we were really stuffed but couldn’t resist dessert… the coconut chocolate custard cream pie was delish.

haven’t seen too much yet, but our stomachs have certainly had a good tour of the area so far!