Lazy Long Weekend

This Friday was a holiday, so we had a long weekend, but Jeff had to travel for work this past week, so he really just wanted to be at home.  That's fine for everyone except for miss social butterfly Vivian.  Luckily, plenty of her friends were in town, so we were able to schedule a play date a day in addition to her usual neighborhood wanderings.

Jeff's flight actually arrived on Friday morning around 4:00am, so he wasn't up for much that day.  I had been waiting on him to watch the new episode of Game of Thrones, and once we got Vivian off to her play date and Elena down for a nap, we were able to watch the new episode.  Game of Thrones is not a show I would have thought I would like, but I'm completely addicted, and this new season has been great so far.  I told Jeff that it was a sign of my love that I waited for him, but I also confessed that the one time I didn't wait for him, a major character got his eyes gouged out and his head crushed.  I was traumatized and alone, so I'm now a bit afraid to watch Game of Thrones without Jeff.  This new episode featured several traumatic deaths as well, but at least some of them were people we wanted to see die.  As I'm thinking about it, this show is so incredibly violent, I really don't know why I like it.  I just know I do.  Weird but true.

Saturday was a much more peaceful day.  I gave Jeff the morning off, and the girls and I went downtown with some friends to the Funarium.  Vivian has been a couple times for birthdays, but this was Elena's first trip.  No surprise, she loved it, especially the ball area, where there's a vacuum and the balls get sucked up the tube.

We got there pretty close to opening time, so it wasn't too crowded.  Elena contentedly put balls up the tube undisturbed for at least half an hour.  She eventually figured out that when the vacuuming sound stops, that means all the balls are going to fall from the big container on the ceiling.  She took this in stride, pushed the button to start the vacuum again, and kept cleaning up the balls.  Love my little OCD baby.

She tried the super big slide, but was a bit traumatized by it, so I transferred her over to the toddler section.  Everything was softer and smaller there.  She even found big blocks like the ones at Legoland.

There was a Funarium employee in charge of the area who was infatuated with Elena and wanted to play with her and squeeze her cheeks.  Elena tolerated the attention when she realized that this admirer would also bring her more blocks and help her stack them really high.  They had fun playing until the woman's shift was over.  It seemed like a good time to break for lunch.

Not unexpectedly, Elena wanted to have whatever Vivian was having for lunch, so they each got a juice box and chicken nuggets.  Elena rejected the french fries, which she usually likes.  I don't know if she just didn't like these ones or if she's realized that Vivian doesn't like french fries and has therefore decided they are an unacceptable food.

One of the best parts about the food area is that it had a direct sight line to the toddler play area, so we could do lunch and the kids could come and go as they pleased.  

Elena's favorite part of the play area was the little obstacle course.

I understood that, but I could not understand her fascination with the rolling pads.  She went back and forth through them over and over.

I kept waiting for her to face plant, but she's got skills and got out cleanly every time.  When she got worn out, she watched her friend be silly in the ball pit.

After a few hours, the grown ups were getting tired, even if the kids weren't.  The timing was good though, because there were a couple kids (not ours) who threw up right about then, and we were able to convince the big kids that this meant we should leave.  As far as we can tell we dodged the vomit bug bullet, which is a relief.

Both the girls had excellent appetites for our Sunday brunch excursion to Waft Me, the waffle place I went to earlier in the week.

We had to go about a mile out of our way, because we could only get to it by making a u-turn, but it still took less than ten minutes.  The girls liked the set up with a sofa right next to a window wall.

Vivian got a plain waffle with vanilla ice cream, honey, strawberries, and peaches.

We didn't order anything for Elena, but since this is Thailand and she's a cute kid, they brought her a free waffle.

It's good that they did, because it turned out that she loved it.  She also enjoyed sharing my bananas coated in raspberry sauce (that's what's on the corner of her mouth).  The only person who was less than thrilled with the meal was Jeff who insisted on ordering eggs.  We pointed out that he should have ordered a waffle.  He argued that waffles with ice cream was not breakfast or brunch.  Vivian decided we should call it bressert, and we all agreed, so Waft Me is now our official bressert spot.

It's been a great family weekend, and we're happy to have Jeff at home with us.

Brunchtastic

I'm on my two week break between quarters, and so, of course, I've been planning outings with friends.  The problem with busy friends is that I can't get everyone together on the same day, so I ended up with two brunch dates this week, instead of the one I had originally intended to have, not that I'm complaining ;-)

My first brunch was local.  A friend of mine wanted to try a place called Waft Me, which is on our main street out here, Chaengwattana.  It's mostly a waffle place, although they had a full menu of other food as well.  When you're presented with a menu full of delicious, design your own waffle decadence though, it seems wrong not to get a waffle.

For about $5, you get to pick from the following:

One waffle, one ice cream, one sauce, and two toppings.  I got plain waffle, strawberry cheesecake ice cream, raspberry sauce, and strawberries and bananas on top.  Oh. My. Goodness.  It was so good, I almost forgot to take a picture before eating the whole thing.

My chocolate addict friend got the chocolate waffle, which you can see in the picture.  Everyone's looked delicious.  The marshmallows on this one cracked me up.

Vivian loves waffles (and ice cream and candy), so I have promised to take her soon.  In the meantime, I took her to the middle school production of Into the Woods.

It was the junior version, which turned out to be an abridged first act.  The kids did a really good job, and Vivian loved it.  When we got home, we were thinking about watching the full Broadway version, but then Amazon recommended the movie version of Pirates of Penzance.  This show has a special place in my heart, because I was in it in college.  I put it on out of nostalgia, but, much to my delight, Vivian got really into it and watched the whole thing.  I am a very proud mommy.  Even Elena stayed still long enough to eat some popcorn and check out the operatics.  

If Vivian is interested in something, then Elena is interested too.  This can annoy Vivian at times, but she's a good sport about it, and I find it super cute.

Today, I went to my second brunch of the week.  This time it was at Roast, which is downtown.  There are two branches of this restaurant.  One is at Em Quartier, a shopping center on Sukhumvit near the Phrom Phong BTS stop.  That's the one we went to.  There's another one at a shopping center a bit farther down Sukhumvit called The Commons.  Em Quartier has an interesting layout, including a wall of plants and waterfalls accented by peacock statues adorned with flowering tails.

The menu at Roast is extensive, and pretty much everything sounded delicious.  I was torn between the regular eggs benedict, and the eggs benedict with a crab cake.  Luckily, I got one and my friend got the other, so I could taste both.

Turns out if you gain a crab cake, you lose an egg.  The crab cake tasted pretty good, but overall, I would say I prefer the eggs benedict at Chu's.  

There were three of us, and we were torn about several other menu items, so we ordered a bunch of stuff to share including corn and zucchini fritters (more batter than corn or zucchini, but they came with avocado and tzatziki, both of which were delicious),

and fried chicken which had been soaked in buttermilk and hot sauce.

Since Roast is known for its coffee, and since we weren't being decadent enough.  I also got a coffee shake.

That was the only meal I had for the day, but wow, it was quite a meal.  We have a three day weekend now, and the plan is family time and recovering from binge eating.

Downtown Time and Wrapping Up the Basketball Season

This past week has been a bit crazy.  Jeff's office was hosting a conference, and he was at work more than he was at home.  He stayed downtown a couple nights, and I was sending him pictures of the girls, since he was missing them.

Vivian at Tuesday night basketball practice,

and Elena, being Elena.

He asked me to come and join him for at least one of the evening outings, and so I picked the one that included some of my favorite things, Centara, Red Sky, and Din Tai Fung.  The plan was to take people for drinks at Red Sky bar first, and then have dinner at Din Tai Fung.  I figured if that's where everyone was hanging out, we should stay at the Centara Grand at Central World.

I drove down with a friend, and when I went to check in, they told me that they were going to upgrade us to a suite, sweet!  It was huge.  There was a big living area, complete with table and chairs.

The bedroom was also big, with lots of windows.

Even the tub in the bathroom was next to floor to ceiling windows, but I couldn't get a picture of that because there was too much glare.  The room was on the 43rd floor, and the view was great, but it was even better on the 55th floor where we met everyone for drinks at Red Sky.

We had fun chatting with everyone, but we were really bummed to discover that Red Sky isn't doing a buy one get one free happy hour anymore.  Luckily, when I checked into the hotel, I got vouchers for free tapas and sangria at Centara's new restaurant Uno Mas, which is on the 54th floor.  Jeff and I told the group we would meet them for dinner and went down to check it out.

The decor had a really nice blue theme.  The main dining room was open air though, and the fans weren't on because they were doing a photo shoot.

We decided that al fresco dining might work for December, but since it's May, we stuck to the air conditioned bar area.

The sangria was the same as the one at Red Sky, which is fine, since I like that one.  The tapas turned out to be yummy too, although very small.  They came around with a happy hour tray of free tapas to try.  We figured that the hotel must be pushing happy hour at Uno Mas now instead of Red Sky.  The view wasn't as good, but it was definitely nice.

We ended up being glad that the tapas were small, because there were lots of yummy dumplings at Din Tai Fung.  After dinner we invited some of our friends to come check out our cool suite.  We also know where the wine store is in Central (7th floor, past the movie theater), so we were able to stock up and host our friends properly.  It was a really fun evening downtown.  Of course, Jeff had to get up for work the next morning, and I had to get up with him and then drive back home.  That part wasn't as much fun, so I've made a mental note that weeknights downtown are not the best plan.

To keep the crazy going, we had everyone come out to Nichada that next evening and hosted a pizza pool party.  The kids thought it was great, and everyone had fun, but it was quite a fast paced week, so by the time we got to the weekend, we were all ready for some quiet family time.

This Saturday was Vivian's basketball final tournament.  It didn't start until noon though, so she came with me and Elena to music class.  I think Vivian enjoys music class as much as Elena does, so it's nice that it's on Saturdays now, and she can come sometimes.  

The basketball tournament went from 12-1:45, and it involved all the teams taking turns playing each other.  It was a fun idea, but I knew Elena wouldn't be able to last through the whole thing, so Jeff took Vivian at 12, and then he came back and got me and Elena over there around 1:00.  The Thai Craft Fair was also going on at the school, so there was lots to do, and all the food vendors were there, including Shoshanna's which has Vivian's favorite banana waffles.  I ordered one for her to have after the game, but then I saw Elena was eyeing it, so I ordered a second one.  Elena, Jeff, and I ended up sharing the first waffle while watching Vivian play.  It was a lot of fun.  At the end, she got a team photo, a medal, and a basketball.  She was very pleased.

The ball is a kids ball, so it's slightly smaller than a regulation size basketball.  We've already gotten Vivian a regular basketball, so she has generously decided that this smaller one will be for Elena.  Elena was very happy when the official games were done, and we let her run around the court bouncing and chasing the loose balls that were left out.  Vivian is paving the way for her little sister to be quite an athlete.

Today is a lazy Sunday.  Jeff and Elena are getting some Sparkle magazine reading time in.

I'm sure he'll eventually teach her all the superhero names, just like he taught Vivian, but for now, he's letting her make the reading decisions, and he knows all the My Little Ponies' names.  He's such a good dad.  His job keeps him busy, but he makes sure that his time at home counts.

Father Daughter Dance

The Girl Scouts organize a father daughter dance at one of the hotels downtown every year.  It's supposed to be a fancy evening for the girls.  Jeff was out of town last year, so he and Vivian didn't go.  He was in town this year, but still not super thrilled about going.  Obviously, he loves hanging out with Vivian, but dancing and formal parties are not really his thing.  He cleans up real good though, and he and Vivian ended up looking fantastic for their night out.

The dance started at six, and Vivian usually goes to bed at eight.  It seemed a little silly for them to spend as much time in the car as they did at the dance, so we got an Airbnb apartment downtown near the hotel and planned some other fun activities to make a full trip of it.

The apartment came with parking, so Viv and I waited in the building lobby while Jeff parked the car.

The apartment itself was perfectly serviceable.  It had two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, a balcony, and a living room that was big enough for having friends over, which was our evening plan.

We got there around lunch time, and decided to have a fun, fancy lunch out.  The Hotel Muse was right next to our apartment, and it has a couple nice restaurants.  Their steak restaurant, Babette's,  had a good lunch deal.  For about $30 Vivian and I got a 200g Australian tenderloin steak with a side, and either an appetizer or dessert to go with it.  Jeff branched out and got beef brisket, but we all agreed that the tenderloin was better.  The Hotel Muse has some pretty dramatic decor, and the restaurant was no different.  Vivian felt like it was all very fancy, and said she was going to try and be "proper."

We had a nice table with a great view, and we were the only people sitting in our section, so it was like a private lunch.  We really enjoyed it.

After lunch, we went back to the apartment to rest for a bit, and then some of our friends came over to enjoy wine with meats and cheeses and play some board games.  We had brought Disney's Beat the Parents from home, and Vivian was so excited to have a full crew of players.  We played a couple rounds with her, before it was time to get ready for the dance.  When I asked her what her favorite part of the weekend was, she said playing board games :-)

Jeff and Vivian got ready and posed for their picture on the balcony.  We all admired them and then sent them on their way.  

Part of the reason for our friends showing up was for me to have someone to eat dinner with while Jeff and Vivian were off at the dance.  I had also bumped into another mom who was staying with her family in the same building.  We invited her to join us, so we ended up with a group of five for dinner.  We didn't go far.  Crepes and Co. is a restaurant that serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and it was just a few steps from the apartment building.

I was so full from our steak lunch, that I ordered a salad for dinner, but it ended up being a huge salad.  Luckily, they gave it to me with serving utensils, so I was able to share it with everyone.  I also wanted to make sure that I saved room for dessert.  They had a whole menu of different, delicious sounding crepe concoctions.  Two people at the table split a flaming crepe, but I thought I'd go local, and ordered the crepe with mangoes and coconut ice cream.  It was HUGE!

I couldn't finish the whole thing, but I enjoyed the part I ate.

After dinner, we went back to the apartment.  Jeff and Vivian were back from the dance by then, and they were hanging out and watching a movie.  We let Vivian play one more round of board games, and then put her to bed.

We still had plenty of wine and more games to play, so the adults stayed up for quite a while longer.  I haven't done a game night in a while, and it was a lot of fun.

The next day was Mother's Day.  Our plan from the start had been to go to Crepes and Co. for breakfast, so we went ahead with that even though I had gone for dinner the night before.  For breakfast, I decided to try one of their breakfast crepes.  I started eating it before I remembered to take a picture, so it's a little messy.

It was only alright.  The dessert crepe was definitely better.  Jeff got an omelet and Vivian got pancakes.  They both really liked their food, so if we go back, I'll just get something different.  We all were missing Elena, so we headed home.  She was very pleased to see us all, and I got lots of hugs as my Mother's Day present.  We spent the rest of the day just relaxing and having family time.  It was a fun weekend.

  

So many fun things to do!

We love our vacations, but daily life in Bangkok is pretty awesome too.  The weekend after spring break, the Girl Scouts had a sleepover at the aquarium downtown.  There were the usual dealing with crazy elements of a field trip, but there were a lot of cool parts too.  Our favorite part was sleeping in the glass tunnel with all the sharks and fish swimming by.

We also loved the boat with a glass cut out,

getting to eat dinner and do a craft in front of the shark tank,

and having the aquarium all to ourselves after closing.

There was enough excitement to wear the girls out, and they were actually asleep by midnight, a new record for our troop!

The following weekend I was back downtown, but this time for some grown up girl fun.  My friends and I have been talking about the Sukhothai Hotel's legendary chocolate buffet high tea for months, and that was the weekend we all had open to go experience it.  We knew we were going to have a great time when we saw the chocolate trolley.

There was also a full dessert buffet, with chocolate in pretty much everything and trays of melted dark, milk, and white chocolate for dipping or drizzling over anything that wasn't chocolate enough already.

Oh yeah, there was also a table of savories.

Actually, those were pretty good.  We decided to be responsible and start with that table.

I got a kick out of the cucumber sandwich being wrapped in a slice of cucumber.  The black thing is egg salad in a "charcoal bun." I'm not sure who thought this was a good idea, but it tasted good.  

After a quick savory course, we started attacking the dessert table.  I was kind of disappointed because the only scones they had were green tea and mango flavored.  They were this funky green color with chunks of mango in them.  I'm not really a fan of green tea flavored anything that's not actually tea, but I couldn't have high tea without scones.  Luckily, they had clotted cream and strawberry jam, so I dolloped some on, and then it all tasted pretty good.  I tried to take a picture of my first dessert plate, but there was a lot of light and reflection stuff going on, so it's a bit of a weird picture.

We each took a couple runs at the desserts, but we saved the best for last, the chocolate trolley.  This was run by a man in full chef's gear with a big white hat.  He told us he was originally from Switzerland, and then he explained all of the different kinds of chocolate to us and let us try them.  It was a full on chocolate tasting!  Once we settled on our favorites, he melted them down into a cup of delicious hot chocolate.  Yum!

We had originally discussed inviting our husbands along on this decadent outing, but when they heard the words "high tea" they all turned us down.  Their loss ;-)  Jeff actually ended up showing up for a little bit though.  He was downtown with some friends of his on his own adventure that Saturday.  He went to experience the Bangkok version of Comic Con.

Some of the things were what you would expect to find at a Comic Con, like the Iron Throne,

and crazy Walking Dead fans.

Then Jeff got to the Star Wars section,

and the fact that we live in Asia began to be apparent. 

Then it got weirder.  Jeff said he thinks these ladies are famous, but he's not sure.

The weird award though, has to go to Bananas in Pajamas.  Yes, it's a real thing.

Jeff spent a few fun hours there, and then took the BTS over to where we were stuffing our faces with chocolate and caught a ride home with us.  

He kept the comic book theme going the next day, and took Vivian to see Captain America: Civil War in first class style. Yes, he has two Captain America shirts, and Vivian is wearing her Black Widow shirt which she put on at 6:00am, about the time she started asking, "Is it time to go to the movie yet?"

Don't worry, Elena gets out too.  Her new favorite thing is to come to ISB with me and have a strawberry banana smoothie while we wait for Vivi.

She has fun at home too.  She's very into lining things up.

She especially likes it when she gets everything to herself, like the TV and Vivian's basketball.

It's  good life here for all of us :-)