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Dudamel and Lang Lang At the Bowl July 14, 2011

Filed under: Hollywood Events — Kelocity @ 7:33 am
Tags: Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood Events, Los Angeles, Music

We haven’t really have a ton of plans recently, but I’ve been keeping busy with scrapbooking, digitizing some home video tapes and of course, reading THE TWILIGHT BOOKS!! (I’m in the middle of Breaking Dawn and I am LOVING it!

We actually almost forgot that we had Hollywood Bowl tickets for Tuesday night. It was just the two of us this time, and we were happy to be outside, hear some good music and get out of the house for a few hours. It was a cool and breezy night, perfect for wearing a hoodie (my favorite!)

We kept it real simple for dinner. Instead of our usual picnic, we opted to just bring a small pizza in. Easy peasy.

Before the show started, we were just talking about how lucky we are to live in LA. We absolutely LOVE it out here. Sometimes I take it for granted that we have all these amazing places to see right at our fingertips. From our seats, we could see the Hollywood Sign, the Ford Theater and the Griffith Park Observatory! What you don’t see in this picture is the Greek Theater, Hollywood and Highland, The Walk of Fame and SO many others within a half mile from there.

I sometimes can’t believe this is my town.

Soon the show began. Dudamel is such a talented young conductor. He gets really into the music and you can tell he’s passionate about what he does.

I don’t know much about classical music, but I did recognize a few of the songs they played. It’s such an amazing orchestra.

And then Lang Lang came out and played his piano along with the band. He is incredibly gifted. He doesn’t even look at the keys when he plays. It’s amazing that only ten fingers are making such beautiful music. It sounds like there would be three people playing at once!

I really enjoyed the music, but I have to admit, I was so excited to read my book while I listened. I bought Breaking Dawn on the Nook software and was happy to read for an hour. Yea, it was probably rude, but we were in the cheap seats and we were the ONLY people in our section. Don’t judge.

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In other news, I am in love with the flowers Irving bought me for our anniversary this week! I love buttom mums. I had them in my wedding bouquet. So summery!

And I bought us two cupcakes to share. They were good, but not as good as our wedding ones. Le sigh.

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Happy 450th Anniversary!! July 12, 2011

Filed under: Russia — Kelocity @ 1:21 pm

Yesterday, Irving and I celebrated our 2nd Wedding Anniversary…. but we’ve got nothing on St. Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow. It is celebrating its 450th anniversary today!

Google was happy to celebrate with a fun google doodle!

We were there two years ago! It’s crazy how something so beautifully designed and colorful was created so long ago. Happy Birthday St. Basil’s!

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Happy Two! July 11, 2011

Filed under: California,Food,Love,Wedding Anniversary — Kelocity @ 7:00 am
Tags: California, Food, Love, Wedding Anniversary

Today is our SECOND wedding anniversary!!!!!

Happy Anniversary, Irving. These past two years have flown by, and I love and appreciate you more every day we spend together. Thank you for giving me a life filled with fun, travel, laughter, Menchies and Love. I need you in my life more than you know. I’m so lucky to call you my husband.
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We celebrated yesterday with a day filled with Southern California adventure. We started with breakfast at the corner bakery. We sat over cups of coffee and talked about current events, politics and some future travel plans. This is what being married is all about. It was perfect.

Oh, and we split a brownie after too… at um… 10am. Hey, it’s our anniversary!

Traditionally, the 2nd anniversary gift is supposed to be “cotton”. We were racking our brains all week thinking of something small we could get to celebrate two great years together. We decided on new beach towels! Our current ones are seven years old and were from the clearance rack at Target. Time for an upgrade!

Success at Macy’s! Two extremely plush and oversized beach towels!

His & Hers… they are so soft!

We didn’t really have any plans, so we kept driving up the One-Oh-One towards Oxnard and the Channel Islands. We found a beautiful marina and pulled in to walk around for a bit.

We pretty much decided that it would be awesome to live on one of the canals there. All the charm of a marina, without the touristy crowds.

We crossed the street, kicked off our shoes, and headed to the beach!

I was very surprised to see sand dunes there! That’s such an East Coast thing!

There weren’t too many people there, despite the hot weather. It was nice to enjoy the sea breeze hand-in-hand.

Hi Seagull!

There’s Mr. Seagull again!

After my calves had enough of a workout on the sand, we drove over to the Channel Islands Visitor Center to learn more about the islands. Someday we’ll get to go kayak and camp there. It’s a set of islands 11 miles off the coast that is supposed to be gorgeous. It’s on our list!

We headed over to the Pacific Coast Highway and drove for an hour towards Malibu.

Hey, are you following me?

We chose to eat dinner at the Beachcomber Café in Malibu. It’s a popular restaurant right on the pier. We bought a LivingSocial coupon a while back and figured it was time to cash it in.

Let me just say that we were not impressed. It’s one of those places that is way too popular for no good reason. The hostess and staff were slow, rude and confused. But we just laughed at the comedy of errors and had a great time anyways.

At first they seated us in an interior table (even though there were a few water front tables available).

But we sweet-talked the waiter into finally letting us jump over. Much better!

We had great views of the pier and the crashing waves.

We started with the artichoke and spinach dip that was baked and served with bread.

Irving got the Kobe burger. I was a little jealous.

And I ordered the filet mignon chopped salad. It was pretty good, but nothing special.

But I admit, I was saving up for dessert! Let me introduce you to this!

S’mores sundae! It had ice-cream, toasted marshmallows, chocolate sauce and whipped cream. And it had graham crackers along the edge. YUM!

What a perfect day. It’s nice to not have an agenda or specific plans. Sometimes it’s fun just to wing it and hit the open road.

Happy Anniversary Darling!

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Read about our 1st anniversary here!

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Royal High Tea July 9, 2011

Filed under: Dining Out,Food,Friends,Los Angeles — Kelocity @ 9:00 pm
Tags: Dining Out, Food, Friends, Los Angeles, Tea

In honor of Prince William and Princess Kate’s royal trip to Hollywood, my friend Janet and I decided that having afternoon tea would be the perfect way to celebrate.

Ok, so that’s not entirely true. We bought a groupon a few weeks back and scheduled our Tea Date long before we realized the Royals would be in town. But it seems appropriate, don’t you think?
Our destination was “Two A Tea”, a cute little tea house about an hour away. And we agreed it was definitely worth the drive.

The tea house is set up like an old Victorian home. Complete with crystal chandeliers, baroque art and antique linens. It was so fun to dress up, act proper (as proper as snapping photos of your meal can be) and enjoy some dainty foods.

They have various menus to choose from, each varying in the amount of courses you can enjoy with your tea. We chose the “Royal High Tea”. It was my first visit to a tea house, so might as well go all out, right?

The tea list is pretty big, and it’s hard to decide on a flavor. We each got our own pot, so in the end, decided on Vanilla Coconut and Peach Apricot. While the tea brewed, we started up a great conversation. It’s fun to catch up with friends without distractions. I really needed an afternoon of girl talk.

Before long, our tea pots were ready. Freshly brewed tea is so delicious. And even on a hot California day, it hit the spot. It was so fun to drink out of beautiful teacups too. It felt fancy schmancy.

Our first course was a freshly baked blueberry scone. It was the perfect mix of crumble and sweetness. Served with lemon curd, clotted cream and berry preserves. I admit I was scared to try the clotted cream, but it was really good.

Next up was the soup course. I got the pureed red pepper with feta cheese and croutons.

And Janet ordered the carrot ginger that also came with croutons.

Next up was a citrus salad. This was so perfect for a summer day. The dressing was sweet and refreshing!

Meanwhile, we were sip sipping our tea the whole time. Cup after cup.

Soon a scoop of sorbet came out to cleanse our palettes. I thought it was adorable that they served this on a tea bag rest.

Then we were ready for our tea sandwiches! We had a turkey, cream cheese & cranberry sauce, egg salad, roasted vegetable, curried chicken and cucumber. I had one of each (minus the egg salad). My favorite one was the cucumber, although I was too full to finish it.

And finally, we had dessert. We decided to each get one and split it half and half. One was a warm berry cobbler with vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce and the other was a black forest chocolate cake with a chocolate mouse with raspberry drizzle and fresh whipped cream.

Oh my, they were amazing. Sadly, all my camera wanted to focus on was the whipped cream, but you’ll have to trust me that it was beautiful and yummy.

I think we sat and chatted for almost three hours! The waitress refilled our teapots once, so I’m pretty sure I drank almost two pots of tea in all.

What a great afternoon, hope to do it again someday. Thanks for the great company, Janet!

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Sugar, Chocolate and Coffee Beans

Filed under: Food — Kelocity @ 5:05 pm
Tags: Banana Soft Serve, Chocolate, dessert, Food, Ice Cream

Trader Joes recently introduced a new product. It’s a Sugar, Chocolate & Coffee Bean Grinder. I’ll take a gamble on just about anything Trader Joes puts on the shelves, so we decided it was definitely worth a taste.

They say you can put it on anything: cake, coffee, ice cream. **Record Scratch** ICE CREAM?! Well then I bet it would be GREAT on banana soft serve ice cream!

I whirled up some plain banana soft serve and sprinkled my little heart away.

It added just the right amount of sweetness and flavor. Such a great idea! Such a great idea. I think the grinder only cost $1.99 which is pretty awesome for something so great that will probably last a long time.

I wonder what else I could put this stuff on?

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A runner with an appetite for adventure!