~ Awesome Hong Kong Cuisine at XO Taste~

Good Cantonese cuisine is hard to find in the DC Metro area.  Maybe I am just very picky.  I don't think I have tasted good BBQ Pork around here.  Most of the time, it's dry and chewy.  So, to my surprise, I found some in Virginia!

 This soft, sweet, tender BBQ pork is from XO Taste in Falls Church in Virginia.  Their BBQ section is pretty good.  I love both the Soy Sauce Chicken and Roast Duck. 

The duck is tender too!  And the skin is not too fat.  Sometimes the fat is too much and you don't even taste the meat in the other restaurants.

We had the seafood fish stomach soup.  This has big chunks of seafood and fish stomach.  Sounds scary right?  But, fish stomach is very nutritious and tasty if cooked well.

This is the frog casserole with Chinese sausage and veggies.  I love the snow peapods and black mushrooms!

Frog sounds scary too but it tastes like chicken, but has a better texture.  

This is my favorite!  Known as kingdom pork chop, it is fried pork chop with a sweet and sour sauce.  This was so crispy and the sauce was awesome!  Not too sour and not too sweet.  It was so good that we ate all the leftovers when we got home!

Too bad it's kind of far from my house.  Otherwise I will be there every week!

~ Snowmageddon 2011 ~

Ok, this is really not as bad as the last Snowmageddon, but it was coming down pretty hard!!  Traffic was horrendous and I know so many people stuck on the roads.  It's not just 270 and 495.  It was a lot of other roads!  DC gets pretty crazy with snow!  At times like these, I am glad I can work at home and didn't have to go to the office today.

So, after a day of watching the traffic and news and snow, I went outside to shovel.  My husband was still out rescuing people with our AWD and I wanted to make sure he has a little path to the door when he gets back.  It was really beautiful outside!

I wish I can capture the magical snow in the street lamp.  It was hard though.  It was dark, the wind was blowing and my hands were frozen after shoveling.

 

The snow is very heavy and wet this time.  The trees are all drooping from the weight.  I hope my neighbor's tree doesn't crash into my house!

Haven't done this in a while! Snow angel!  I am really hoping for a snow day tomorrow.  A real one.  One that I don't have to work even though I can work at home.  I need a break from debugging this stupid ClassNotFound Exception.  The class is there damnit!!!  Oops... sorry for the rant :)

Wanna see what made Momo cry in the snow?  Check out his very own blog at Mimolo.com!

~ Prime Rib in DC ~

Last week was DC Restaurant week. I ended up at Prime Rib for a late dinner. This place is fancy! Ladies, please remind your men to wear a blazer because it's required.  We got oysters for appetizers. 

This was mine.  I really tried to eat it, but just couldn't do it!  It just looks so slimy!

Of course, we got the prime rib from the Restaurant Week menu.  See the stuff in the back?  It's fresh horseradish.  Interesting.  I must say that Morton's and Ruth Chris have better steaks.  It's tender, but a little bland.

This is medium rare.  I don't know, but this looks a little too bloody for me. 

We had a choice of key lime pie and creme brulee.  The pie was a little too sour.

The creme brulee was so much better!  Yum yum!  Overall, I think I rather go to Morton's for steak.  Same great service but better tasting steak.

The coolest thing at the restaurant?  This swan faucet in the bathroom!  Pretty fancy :)

~ Zuma Blitz Tips: Dizzy Corals ~

This past week was tough.  Sand and Surf was rough for me and I was #2 for long time.  It wasn't till Friday that I broke 1 million and climbed back to #1!  I ended up using Juicy Fruits instead of bombs because the bombs were not as useful as I thought.

Yes, it's gloating time!  #2 score was only 50K behind me!  I was so worried that he would beat me in the last hour but thankfully, he gave up.

This week's board is very simple.  It has 2 concentric oval track set in the deep blue ocean floor with pretty corals.  It's a very calming color.  Perhaps that will help you with the score.

The difficulty with this board is how short the tracks are!  The first time I played, I almost got chewed up!  The inner track is really short.  And it's easy to neglect the outer track when you are trying to take care of the inner one, like I did here.

The fruits are not too hard to get.  It is a little close to the entrance and you can end up with two tracks of balls between you and the fruit.  That's why I recommend the bombs for this board.  You may think that you don't need it because the tracks are not very close to each other.  But, it really helps because you need it to help you clear the balls.  Otherwise, you'll end up being chewed up.  And it's great to open a hole to the fruits.  So this week, I am sticking with my chrono balls, multiplier and bombs for powerups.  Also, this board is easy because the balls come pretty close to the frog.

This is going to be a high scoring board.  Look at my score now and it's only been 1.5 hours!  I think I am going to stay away from Zuma till someone beats my score.  Yay, maybe I'll finally be productive this week!

~ Zoya Nail Polish Haul and First Manicure with Edyta ~

A few weeks ago, Zoya was doing a free nail polish promotion. Yes, I said free. In fact, it's 3 bottles of free nail polish, except there's a $6.95 shipping charge. Well, that's still pretty good considering these retail for $7 each.  Here are my three:  Ginessa, Shimmer, and Rea. 

 Here's what my husband got for me:  Crystal, Ivanka, and Edyta.  He got the less girly colors :)

I have seen many, many bloggers rave about Edyta.  So, this is the first one I tried.  Edyta is a olive green color with a golden shimmer.  So, I paired it with my OPI Glow Up Already glitter polish.  It has gold, green and a little bit of red in it.  I have been pretty obsessed with glitter lately.

Last week, I did just Glow Up Already on the top half of my nails.  This week, I am putting in from my cuticles going up.  This is 2 coats of Edyta, a little bit of Glow Up Already on the base, and a Seche Verte Top Coat.  Edyta is a pretty opaque color.  One coat is probably sufficient.

I think this combo works pretty well :)  I am more into girly colors so Edyta is not my favorite.  I can't wait to try Crystal in about 2 weeks. Probably going to pair it with the Lipmann Happy Birthday polish or maybe just some pretty nail stickers.  I miss my snowman nail stickers!

~ Sweet Potato Tator Tots at Yumburgers ~

Last week, I went out for lunch at a neighborhood burger joint called Yumburgers at King Farm. On Yelp, it only has 3 stars, but most of the people just complain about the service. When I went there, the service was just fine though. Maybe they fired the "bad" waitress.

One of the best items on the menu?  The Chester's SweetTots.  It's basically sweet potato tator tots.  Love the buttermilk garlic dressing!

They were so nice and crispy and and a little bit sweet and a little bit salty.  Pretty awesome stuff.

I got the slider lunch combo with beef.  It comes with a soup and 2 sliders.  The beef was a little bit chewy, and I had to eat it with a knife.  It was very tasty with a little kick!  I think you can also get lamp or pork.

This is the clam chowder.  The waiter recommended it and it was delicious!  Very big chunks of clams but not fishy at all.  The combo is $12.99 which is a little bit on the expensive side I think.  But, I don't go out for lunch very often so I don't know what the normal price is.  All I know is Chipotle is under $7 :)

 

So, waiter was fine.  Food was good.  A little bit expensive.  Clear and modern atmosphere with a full bar and big TV.  Not too crowded on a Friday at 12:30pm.  Not bad at all for a casual, relaxing lunch!

~ Zuma Blitz Tips: Sand and Surf ~

I am sad to say that once again, I didn't break 1M this past week. Why is it so hard??? Well, many people didn't that board. Supposedly, it was too hard. But, I still got first place! It was a close one though. Second place score was 811k. Even my mom got like 580k.

This week's board looks pretty awesome!  I love the beach and with all this dreary cold weather, I am happy to look a this beautiful sand and surf board for a week. 

As much as I love how this board looks, I actually hate it.  This is why.... I am currently #2!!!  How is this possible?  This board is just so difficult for me!

So, with such a bad score, I don't feel qualify to give tips.  I am having issues with aiming.  The curves suck.  And the track seem to be shorter so better clear the balls quick! I am using bombs, chrono balls and multiplier for power.  Sometimes, I substitute multiplier with canon.  But, canon costs 2x as much and I feel that the results are about the same.  I also bought 24hr mojo so I can have enough mojo to power up. 

 

Wondering how you can get free idols?  Did you know you can earn Facebook credits by shopping?  You have to click on "Get More" on the upper right hand side in the Facebook sidebar.  Then, this window will popup and you have to click on "Show more payment options".  Then, you'll see "Earn for free by shopping".

 They have Groupons, VistaPrint, ShoeBuy.com, Lancome.com, Netflix.com and more!  Damnit, I should've gotten the $20 Amazon gift card Groupon through this today!  You need 125 Facebook credits to get 800 idols, so two of these smaller items will work.  Then, you can have 24hr XP for 100 idols and 24hr mojo for 15 idols.  Now, you can level up faster and get more power ups!

Wish me luck!  I need it to be #1 for this week's board!

~ Flowers, Candies and Kisses for Valentine's Day Projects ~

Less than a month till Valentine's Day!  If you are going to make something special for your significant other, you need to start gathering the supplies now!  Here are some flowers, candies and kisses charms and findings that are perfect for the Valentine's Day.  To see heart related items, please check out my blog posts about hearts.

Flowers

Of course you need flowers for Valentine's Day!  I have a big variety of colorful acrylic flowers and polymer clay flowers.  Acrylic flowers are great for earrings and necklaces.  They are light and colorful and looks great with bronze and copper findings.

Polymer clay flowers are awesome when strung with crystals.  Do you know how to weave a heart from crystal bicones?  You can add a flower to the heart and it'll be so cute!

These flower lobster clasps will be great for making purse charms and the big silver flower filigree charm would be awesome for necklaces.

My favorite charm is this little bicycle with flower basket!  It's so pretty and romantic!   I actually made a necklace with this charm.  Just love it.

Candies and Sweets

How about some lollipops and strawberry cakes for your valentine?  Yummy and sweet!

Kisses

And let's end the big day with a few kisses!  Smooch smooch!  I hope these charms inspire you for some great Valentine's Day projects!