Sunday, July 13, 2025

July 4th 2025

Ducky and I celebrated July 4th holiday at Kevin and Amber's house.  There were 8 of us; Kevin, Amber, Chad, Jennie, Kari (a friend from St. Simons Island), Alex (Kevin's cousin from Illinois), Ducky and me. We did boat ride and swam in the Lake Lanier. Kevin cooked pork ribs and hotdogs. Kari and Amber prepared the side dishes. Chad and Jennie brought dip and chips. Ducky and I brought Strawberry Pretzel Salad. Alex offered to be a dish cleaning boy.

The Strawberry Pretzel Salad was fun to make, and it looked pretty good and yummy!  I got the recipe from allrecipes.com.
Strawberry Pretzel Salad Recipe https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/20338/strawberry-pretzel-salad/

We all had a good time proved by the pictures below.  😊





















Sunrise EP 26 - Finally Exterior Paint completed!

Finally, after almost a year, our Sunrise home exterior paint was finally done!  The house looks pretty now with the garage of the same colors.  I360 Painting of North Georgia was our contractor. The owner, Drew was a nice guy.  His proposal contained 33 pages with the first couple pages filled with his auto biography and a family picture. The labor charge was half of what the other 2 contractors estimated.  Also, for project higher than $1,500, they sent a colors lady to our house to discuss and suggest colors for us. The Mexican crew of 3 people did a good job. George the operation manager showed up once on day 2 before the work started. On Day 3, the final day which fell on Saturday, he did not show up, but he did show up on Monday and did the walk through with me.  He spotted what he thought should be touched up and I also spotted some. He sent Alex, one of the painting crew to repaint those minor areas and finally Hola! Our Beautiful House!

On Day 2, one of our A/C units outside got cut off by itself due to the crew covered the units and the fan could not let go the air outside. Our A/C guy, Sean said that that unit was a newer one, so, it started to have this safety feature whereas the other old one did not.  I explained to the crew what happened in case they might experience this again in the future.  Oh, BTW, to activate the A/C unit again, Sean needed to go up on the attic, find the breaker and did something to it which I actually did not quite understand. LoL

Here are our final colors:
Siding: Benjamin Moore OC-24 Wind's Breath  
Trims: Sherwin-williams SW 7048 Urbane Bronze

The crew purchased both colors from Sherwin-williams.  The colors lady said SW could mix colors from other brands.  

    










Sunday, June 8, 2025

Niagara Falls May 24 – 27, 2025

 “Niagara Falls, located on the border between the United States and Canada, is a massive waterfall. It is the second-largest waterfall in the world. The name "Niagara" comes from the Iroquois word "Onguiaahra," which means "thundering waters". The Falls are known for their stunning natural beauty and immense water flow”

“The falls consist of three distinct sections: Horseshoe Falls, American Falls, and Bridal Veil Falls, which together form one of the most famous landmarks in North America. Niagara Falls is not only a significant geological feature but also serves as a crucial source of hydroelectric power and a popular tourist destination.”

Ducky came back from 1-month deployment in Kentucky on May 23.  We went to Niagara Falls right after that. We stayed at Sheraton Fallsview, Ontario, Canada. It was a perfect location!  Better than that, thanks to Ducky’s special kind of Marriott membership, our room got upgraded to Falls view!  We could see the American Falls right from our huge windows. 

This time, we did not get to prepare much. I did not have daily plan as what I did when planning for Japan trip. The only thing I did was to purchase the Maid of the Mist tickets which later, I found out, there was no need to purchase anything ahead of time at all, tickets could be purchased there for activities at Canada side or in the NY Niagara Falls State Park. 

On Saturday May 24, once getting there, we did a long walk over the scenic walk path where we could enjoy stunning American Falls, Bridal Veil Falls, and Horseshoe Falls.  Over the Horseshoe Falls, “Table Rock Welcome Centre” is located. We checked out the mall a little bit and walked back to pass the Nikola Tesla statue. At 10:00 p.m., we were happy watching the fireworks and colorful Falls from our hotel balcony.  

On Sunday May 25, we went back to “Table Rock Welcome Centre” and we purchased tickets for “Journey Behind the Falls” and “Niagara Parks Power Station + The Tunnel”.
Both activities were so awesome and memorable. We could experience how powerful the waterfalls are. We could imagine ourselves working at the power station and how complicated and dangerous it would be.  We got lucky as Nikola Tesla exhibit had been going on from Mar 8 – Oct 13 while we were there.  At night, we walked over to the scenic path to see the Fireworks up-close.

On Monday May 26, we walked over the Rainbow Bridge to the US Niagara Falls State Park. There we did “Maid of the Mist” and “Cave of the Winds”.  WOW!  I love them both.  The weather was very beautiful that day. For the Maid of the Mist, imagine when the boat passed the gigantic waterfalls and lots of mist spraying on you, and when the boat sat unmoved for a while close to the bottom of the Horseshoe Falls letting the powerful waves shake itself.  For the Cave of the Winds, we did not miss the “Hurricane deck”.  It is the ultimate MUST try for up-close experience.   All activities we did really completed the experiences of the Niagara Falls.  

Oh, I realized I did not mention about yummy food in Canada.  The food seemed very expensive there, we spent about 30 – 70 USD there for one meal.  But that is how vacation is for right? 

This trip gave me a new taste and knowledge of Poutine (Quebec French), “a dish of French fries and cheese curds topped with a hot brown gravy. It emerged in Quebec in the late 1950s in the Centre-du-Québec region”.  It was yummy and many restaurants created their own versions of Poutine with several kinds of toppings even with Korean BBQ.

We got to get our coffee and breakfast at Tim Hortons!  Before that, I knew nothing about Tim Hortons and now I had learned from Ducky that it was like Canada McDonald.  LoL  This made me happy knowing that, I could tell everyone I went to Canada.

Oh, and yep, and my first experience with “Inniskilling Ice Wine”, the wine made from -10 degree C ice cold grapes from Niagara Peninsula, Ontario, Canada.  Thanks, Ducky, for buying the whole biggest bottle. LoL  I guessed it was about 100 USD and even the biggest bottle, it was just a skinny bottle. It tasted very sweet and very easy to enjoy.  It did not make me drunk. I really enjoyed It.  It made me think about the warm German Gluhwein.  

Oh and one more thing not to forget, I really enjoyed the soft serve ice cream at our hotel there.  It was so thick, hard to melt and tasted super delicious. 

On Tuesday, May 27, we drove back to Buffalo, NY.  We just happened to find Canalside and the Navel & Military Park. I was so excited about the combat ships.  We got to look inside USS The Sullivans, USS Little Rock, and USS Croaker (submarine).  Wow, unbelievable!   They looked so complicated to build and controls with medium size bombs, and very huge bombs to load and all that. And they sure hold lots of memories of the past. I prayed for those lost their lives in the ships.  I am wondering how the combat ships look like in real life these days.  After that we stopped by Anchor Bar for Buffalo wings. Anchor Bar "is most famous for claiming to be the birthplace of spicy chicken wings known outside the Buffalo area as Buffalo wings"  Yum!






























Niagara Falls - (World Geography) - Vocab, Definition, Explanations | Fiveable | Fiveable

Niagara Falls Hotel Ontario | Sheraton Fallsview Hotel


Evening without Internet

I have not been able to find time to write for almost 9 months now.  I still have a lot to talk about from Japan trip to the move to Dawsonville and yes, with the move, I sold my house in Marietta.  The closing date is this upcoming Wednesday June 11, 2025.  Today is June 7, 2025.

Jasmine came back from Boston. She went to see Prem, her good old friend from Thailand. They hung out together for about a week.  She traveled there and came back by herself. I sponsored the plane tickets and the Airbnb room for her.  I am glad they got to see each other. 

I got to donate Thai Children’s books to a group of Thai families with young kids. They asked me if I would like to hang out with them.  They thought I had little kid(s) too.  LoL

This evening, a very severe storm passed right into our Sunrise neighborhood. OMG I had not seen anything like this for quite a while. There were big tree limbs and branches hitting the side of the house, I guessed.  I was not sure if they hit the side of the house or hit the roof and slid down to the side of the house. I was so scared, and I prayed hard.  It happened very fast within a couple minutes when the eye of the storm was passing by our house.  

Ignace and Dawn, our neighbors stopped by and checked on me. They said their next-door neighbor had 2 trees fall over to the lake.  Then, another neighbor walked over and said he also had 2 trees fall.  Ignace volunteered to be a ground keeper for the hood this year. After checking on me, they went on to also check other neighbors.  It is very nice of them, and it is very nice to be in a nice neighborhood.

No internet tonight meant no Netflix.  Good thing was, because of no Netflix, I had a new post to my blog. 

Saturday, November 9, 2024

Sunrise EP 25 - Aunt Linda visited

After the hurricane Helene hit Florida on September 26 and moved up to Georgia and South Carolina, Ducky was sent to Greenville, South Carolina. This time he drove there.  He headed off on September 30 and stayed there until October 27. 

While he was there, the lawn crew leveled the front yard and the ground around the house and seeded the grass. Oh, I had to mention that Ducky had 19 trees cut in September and the stumps were glided so, the front yard was ready for the grass!

He drove back to water the grass couple times. I could imagine how tired he could be. 

Aunt Linda visited for 5 days from October 29 to November 2. Ducky took her to Dahlonega downtown, to Horseshoe Bend where he used to live with Kevin and Amber and to the Blood Mountain. We also went to hang out at Kevin's house on Halloween night. There, Aunt Linda and I met several new people. 

I did easy home cook for 2 nights as well; turkey stuffed acorn and fried rice with salmon. As long as it was not so spicy, Ducky and Aunt Linda could eat pretty much anything including my simple cooked meals. 😀

Aunt Linda had difficulty going up and down the stairs. I helped her go up most nights. Other than that, she looked very much in good shape at the age of 75 (she was born in 1949). She said she would be back again, maybe after the house is done done.  (When would that be then? 😁)






Hurricane Helene - Wikipedia
Hurricane Helene (/hɛˈln/  heh-LEEN)[1] was a devastating tropical cyclone that caused widespread destruction and numerous fatalities across the Southeastern United States in late September 2024. It was the strongest hurricane on record to strike the Big Bend region of Florida, the deadliest Atlantic hurricane since Maria in 2017, and the deadliest to strike the mainland U.S. since Katrina in 2005.[2][3]


New friends
Mike and Dianne - Amber's next door
Bob and Dana - Pirate house
Rick and Natalie - Carribean
Kurt and Jennie - Schneider
Emma - Vietnamese Canadian American
Lisa - she brought chicken

Friday, October 18, 2024

Sunrise EP 24 - The Wood in the Bathroom

We spent hours after hours to pick bath towel hooks. Etsy has lots of cute stuff from around the world. It was funny that when I was ready to hit pay, then, the page started to show other similar items the customer like me might like. And indeed, I picked the other one instead and we really loved it! We now had a huge tree to hang our towels and also little bears to help clean up the toilet. 








Sunrise EP 23 - Master Closet

September 2 was the Labor Day of 2024. That long weekend, we talked about doing a short visit to Ashville in North Carolina or Greenville in South Carolina. But we ended up working on the house project instead. And here's the beautiful outcome!