Why Julie should get to keep all her shoes!

From Shoes

It was difficult for Julie to come up with an interesting topic for her photography homework... so she decide to use photographs of her shoes as an explanation for why she should get to keep every last one ^_^

So lets start with the recent addition to Julie's black dress-shoe family:

From Shoes

noticed the details on this pair... very classic ^_^

Here is Julie's tennis shoe getting warmed up for a game:

From Shoes

Here is Julie's new polka-dot rain boot... super cute:

From Shoes

Here are Julie's sandals expressing part of her cultural heritage:

From Shoes

I just love the embroidery on this pair:

From Shoes

Happy spring shoes:

From Shoes

A cool shot of the shoe line-up:

From Shoes

Don't the boots look like they are peeking out from behind the door?

From Shoes

Fins in their natural environment (next to the pool):

From Shoes

Here are Julie's running shoes getting ready for Bay-to-Breakers:

From Shoes

Thus concludes Julie's thesis of shoes ^_^

Crazy SF weather

SPRING(n.): The season of the year, occurring between winter and summer, during which the weather becomes warmer and plants revive.


However, It has been a weather roller coaster in the city of San Francisco. We started off with a super windy week early April causing a boat to get stuck under the San Mateo Bridge ( Julie actually drove on the bridge by mistake 30 minutes prior to the accident).

From hot sf

Then the temperature shot up to the 80s reminding Eric and Julie of the lovely weather in LA. ( J: only if the weather can stay like this... SF would be a great city to live).

From Aiden

Unfortunately, the weather was so hot for little Aiden (Grace's boy) that he broke out into a heat rash in the car ...

From Aiden

so we tried to cool him down with some FroYo from Tapioca Express ...

From Aiden

little did we know that he was allergic to FroYo and broke out into hives on half his face.

From Aiden

Thank goodness he knew not to eat what's not good for him, and the allergy went away in 45 minutes. (J: Even good babies have bad days.)

All good things must come to an end... the nice weather only stayed around for 4 days and back to Brrrrrr..... San Francisco.

Scary bird experience

Ok... this is almost a Blair Witch Project moment... but here is Peter and Eric with their full face shield airsoft gear trying to get a bird out of a ventilation hole of our parents' house in LA.

Peter at first was very brave and was the first one the get on the ladder to try to get the bird out... but you will see the stick was very far from the nest.

Then Eric fashioned the full face shield.

Julie was trying to hold the light steady and film the whole event... sideways first then up-right.

Puppies from LA

Carol's parents' dogs had another litter of puppies this year. Since Cobby is getting old, this may be their last litter. We went out to visit these little fuzzy friends when we were in LA.

Here is a picture of them charging out of the garage when we arrived:

From puppies

From puppies

( sniff, sniff... what is this?)

We can barely keep our hands off of them:

From puppies

This one almost wanted to go home with Sung:

From puppies

From puppies

Here are the proud parents:

From puppies

From puppies

Spring flowers

It is really difficult to not have impulse buys at Costco. Similar to last year, Julie couldn't resist the temptation to take some flower bulbs home ( they look so lonely ^_^) and purchased some before her trip to Mexico. On the label it says that it will bloom in 2-3 weeks. Well... they all bloomed before Julie got home from Mexico.

From flowers for Julie

From flowers for Julie

Here are the pretty tulips with the red roses Eric got for Julie's homecoming.

From flowers for Julie

Here are the flower displays at Macy's Bohemian garden flower show ^_^

From flowers for Julie

From flowers for Julie

Eric was glad to have Julie back safely... went out to celebrate with some sake.

From flowers for Julie

Hola Amigos!!

With the assistance of Hermosa Beach Sister City, our team of VOSHers arrived at a small airport in Loreto, Baja California Sur, Mexico. Although the airport was very small and only had one runway and one terminal, our team could barely contain their excitement!

From VOSH-California: Loreto

We were greeted by the Loreto city councilwoman, who skillfully whisked us through costumes. We were transferred via a fleet of pickup trucks to DIF, where we would be seeing patients for the next four days.

The first morning of our clinic, we were invited by the el presidente to excercise in front of the police team at the city square:

From VOSH-California: Loreto

Here is Elaine and Dave trying to figure out how to say something in spanish.

From VOSH-California: Loreto

Our team were consisted of five optometrists from both northern and southern California, three UC Berkeley optometry school SVOSHers, two technicians, two assistants, and 30+ local helpers.

From VOSH-California: Loreto

We split up into two teams, one working at DIF for all four days and another taking a mobile clinic to more rural areas near Loreto. After a few long days, including one close call at sea, we were able to successfully screen 600+ patients, prescribe 250+ pairs of glasses, and dispensed 200+ pairs of over-the-counter readers.

The surprise discovery of a surgical microscope and a functional slit lamp at the Red Cross on the last day of our clinic made us all look forward to using the slit lamp to do better diabetic dilated fundus exams next time.

From VOSH-California: Loreto

From VOSH-California: Loreto

We concluded our clinic with the beer of choice on this trip:

From VOSH-California: Loreto

We were also treated to an almeja chocolate feast (chocolate clams) after clinic. When wrapped in fresh baked tortillas and creamy mustard sauce... the flavor is unforgettable.

From VOSH-California: Loreto

Doesn't it look like I am about to cut off Shirley's hand? ^_^

From VOSH-California: Loreto

Paulette and Roberto's B&B was our home away from home!

From VOSH-California: Loreto

(check them out at Loreto Playa).

From VOSH-California: Loreto

Here is Rebecca making margaritas for all of us!

When in Rome, do as the Romans do. We cruise the Malicon like the local teenagers in the back of Paulette's pick-up truck.

From VOSH-California: Loreto

We paid a visit to the first two California missions and a quick dip in the Sea of Cortez.

From VOSH-California: Loreto

From VOSH-California: Loreto

More pictures:


Of course if you want to join us on our next trip:
www.vosh-california.org