seven sunday loves

really loud heavy rain that bounces off the pavement (and saves my potted plants from certain death at the hands of the worst gardener ever :)

still-warm flaky heavenly croissants for breakfast (it was one of those wonderful mornings again :)

'Magical Mystery Tour' by the Beatles - the first Beatles album i ever bought :) also, i love that Penny Lane is near my English house and Blue Jay Way is near my American house (this proves that it is all supposed to be this way:)

Small Paul pyjamas (i borrowed Sam's :)

very occasionally, Guns n Roses "you know where you are? you're in the jungle, baby! you're gunna D-I-E!!" may just be our most quoted song of all time ;)

Gordon Ramsay's best British restaurant series... i really really really want to try this spanish restaurant and this vegetarian indian place on my next trip home

U2

off to bed xoxox

the day that should have been from hell but was actually from heaven :)

today we went to Beverly Hills, to check out places where famous people have died, visit the restroom in the park where George Michael exposed himself, and other cool family friendly stuff like that ;) sadly the Manson murder house now has a big gate so you can't creep up the driveway, with your heart thumping in your ears and the hairs on the back of your neck standing on end. sigh.

anyway despite this... i unapologetically love Los Angeles. while it's just a smoggy urban sprawl to others, i think it's beautiful and completely fascinating. i love that there is every style of house you can dream up, from midcentury to quaint little french farmhouse and huge obnoxious tuscan villa all in the same block, with painstaking attention to detail. i love the rows of super tall palm trees that lean towards the equator and the beautifully tree-lined shady lanes that still feel so 1960s and Mamas and the Papas and just plain awesome.

anyway we were on our way from Dr Phil's house (which i very much doubted was Dr Phil's house - it's such a busy street) to see Paul McCartney's house which is also where George Harrison died (i know it's sad... but i just love the Beatles that much...) when our car started to putter and sputter. but we just HAD to get up Coldwater Canyon to check out Prince's place (which i imagined to be teeny tiny and a pastel shade of purple with a splash of raspberry:) when suddenly our car DIED!!!!

after 10 minutes or so, it miraculously rose from the dead, so we gingerly made our way back down Coldwater Canyon, through LA, driving slow enough towards home to actually notice stuff like the Nickelodeon Studios and the Viper Room. we stopped for a little while in a beautiful shady park in Downey (i know, huh - Downey! it was so pretty with a duck pond and pretty bokeh, and we even had duck bread and the geese were even super friendly and didn't chase us!!) then onto towards home, at which point our car finally died again close enough to home to get the very nice AAA man to tow us home safely (very exciting for the boys - they now want a big diesel pick-up truck:)

we flipped our hair at our minivan as we went out to dinner in our good car, got home and made buttery chocolate chip cookies, looked at new cars online to scare the old car into making wiser choices in the future, filed our taxes (because that refund is about to come in very handy i think;) and now it's movie/bedtime. it should have sucked.... but i kind of loved today ;)

driving on Coldwater Canyon

George 'favorite Beatle ever' Harrison RIP (sob)

Aaron Spelling's 123 room house

Dr Phil's place (which i highly doubt - you can see right into the bathroom!)









dinner tastes extra wonderful when you haven't eaten all day :)

last night's sleepy picture of my 10 year old baby :)

life on mars, sticky ipads and global positioning systems

listening to
a documentary about life on mars... which makes me really want to listen to 'life on mars'

last night
i dreamt i went to visit Michael Stipe (in the Castro in San Francisco) and he let me play with his ipad, which was very fingerprint-y and greasy and i felt very uncomfortable touching it, but also noticably uncomfortable NOT touching it, so i had to slyly wipe it clean while he wasn't looking. hmm.....

loving
that breakfast today lasted till around 3pm... Aaron bought me my favorite cream pan croissants filled with bananas and strawberries and apple and chocolate and cream (all in separate NOT TOUCHING EACH OTHER croissants!) soooo yuuuummmy!!!

also loving
the new voices on my GPS - Sam and Danny narrated all the little phrases so sweetly and precisely and they're so much nicer to listen to than the wretched GPS lady of yore :)

packing
my best telephoto lens and map of the stars' homes!! tomorrow we're going to Beverly!! Hills that is... swimming pools... movie stars :)

scratching
my super duper itchy right foot, which supposedly means "a wonderful and productive journey is ahead" :) note to self: take hiking shoes and set GPS coordinates for Fryman Canyon :)

off to bed xoxox

so sooooo good! (and i still have deux pains au chocolat left to share with mon cheri amour:)

the boys made this birthday cake for me. do NOT count the candles... it is anatomically correct...

we spent the afternoon in Balboa and it was wonderful



bedtime - he still looks like a baby when he sleeps :)

little known, but truly fascinating facts

i kind of dislike Sarah Palin (ok i under-exaggerated)

and flip flops

and Vons too - who shops there???!

and i don't like one arm hugs (unless the person only has one arm and can't help it)

nails that go past the end of the finger give me the heebie jeebies (especially on men!!)

and so does Arby's (though i've never actually eaten there...)

my bag must have bandaids, a lip balm and a nail file in good repair in it at all times, or the world could potentially fall off it's axis and i would have nothing to fix it with ;)

despite loving dogs, i am actually quite scared of them

i am deathly afraid of vomiting and can't vomit into a toilet for love nor money :(

pizza hut pizza makes me really really sick and i am never ever eating it again :|

i want a little white beach house - it doesn't need to be big, a small one would do :)

i have never made anything with quinoa but i really want to try it (although i know it will get filed into the same category as tofu and mochi :|

i want a hedgehog. and a ferret too! but they're ILLEGAL in California :(

i get constantly poked on facebook by the same sick individual several times a day (and yes, i most certainly do poke back :)

there's a magnolia bakery now in LA (we are soooo going on saturday for banana pudding and pastel colored cupcakes with swirly frosting :)

i have a very heavy heart watching Pitchmen these days :( i miss Billy Mays so much (Billie Jean, as Danny calls him)

off to bed, tomorrow's a furlough day and we are all off school/work etc :)

curtains, big bowls of love and white flowers

hung
the new curtains. blah they look like shotgun wedding dresses to me :( i need a Nate Berkus intervention in my den :|

made
brown sugar chocolate chip cookies this afternoon to appease the above mentioned nesting instinct, and ate a sickly amount of the cookie dough... 1 stick of butter mixed with 2 cups of brown sugar might just be the most heavenly thing ever, bar none (second only to condensed milk :)


watched
big bowl of love - that woman gives me hives, she is a nervous wreck and is always a half second away from dropping something, chopping off her finger or getting burnt. i only watched to see if Dr Drew could cook. well he wasn't very good AND he's allergic to garlic... so i can't possibly love him anymore :(

planted
little white flowers (to replace the last little white flowers i planted last month that already are little dried up dead stubs:)

ate
that big pizza hut pizza for dinner (and it was soooooo yummy!!!)

the brown sugar cookie dough (before i ate half of it and immediately felt reaaalllly sick;)

pasty boy (he does look pasty, right? i did NOT photoshop him pasty)

he spent the rest of his sick day sleeping or like this playing wii

sick baby too... it's going around :|

why????

just w-h-y is today already so hard? i swear if i don't get up at 6:43am exactly, the day is officially doomed to failure :| always!!

Danny is sick so i sent all the appropriate notes/emails so that he could stay home without a truancy officer breaking down the door at 11am. then he decided he wanted to go to school after all :| but just so he could have a playdate after school :| which just isn't a good idea for someone who is floppy and pale and hasn't eaten for 24 hours :| so he has to stay home and with no playdate - begrudgingly and in a floppy stinkeye mood :| (who makes a remarkable recovery when he has a wii remote in his hand just to confuse me even more....)

why do those cruel people at Virgin advertise that you can go to England for $199??? and boy, am i homesick for Boots, really blue skies with really fluffy white clouds, moss covered stone walls, sand dunes lining honey toned beaches and Pizza Express' fiorentina with no olives :( so i clicked on the link and followed all the rules. and it's actually $2086 before tax. but thanks for getting my hopes up Richard effing Branson :|

why do i never want to walk but i always regret it when i don't... beginning of walk: awful... end of walk: awesome (i get to shower with tingly minty products and wash a 'housewife' show as a reward:)

why has my DVR not recorded Teen Mom 2 this week? WHY????!!!

why are these valentines so much cuter than the ones i already did all the work for???? NOT FAIR!


off to go and right the wrongs of the day at Target. it always works (sometimes;)

pizza dogs and the state of the union

since i first saw this advert, this pizza has been on my mind night and day :) it's almost two feet long and comes with 4 - count em, FOUR - cups of dipping sauce!! i must have this pizza ASAP :)


i don't know who this man is (honestly) but his dog has got to be Blackjack's identical twin!!! i still think it would be the most awesome idea for a tv show to reunite pets with their long lost siblings and parents - i would love to meet my pets' families (surely it's not just a me thing???!)



we had hawaiian food for lunch. it was extremely mediocre (despite being highly rated on yelp.com - my faith in yelp is waning) and i flatly refuse to squander my calories so foolishly so i tossed it away (i am so over my former infatuation with loco moco and hawaiian barbecue)

and sadly we didn't make it out to dinner to celebrate Aaron's birthday :( Danny came home from kindy complaining of a horrible achy neck (i don't like achy neck illnesses... they are worrying and meningitis-y...) and fell asleep around 2pm... he just woke up at 7pm. poor sickly little boy :(

videotaping the state of the union on tv (by the way i love Barack Obama;) for later - hoping to hear him address my question ;)

i love cats (if you don't love cats, please drive thru ;)

i love Kelsi... she has the cutest arms, like stripy sleeves :)

and she's really good at balancing a mouse on her head :)


this is Lucca - he is dark and exotic looking and very handsome, like the Dr Luka from ER :)


Rylee who is very very very shy - i love her moustache and big black nose, she looks like Groucho Marx (ok, not really but a little bit :)


Squeaky is pretty much the most adorable model ever :)




Oreo got a home! Sully is my new Oreo - i love him :)


Trinity - Sully's sister (who had to have her tail amputated... shh, you don't want to know.... but it's soooo much better now. she is feisty and sassy and i absolutely love her :)


Sadie, who is not related to Trinity (who never hisses and loves everyone:)


finally, Rudy (who is not technically a cat ;) but she's very sweet and mellow and doesn't try to attack you as you walk by and i already love her dearly (and my boys for rescuing her :)

weekend in pics

we received his letter from camp :)

he played with his action figures a whole lot (and i wondered how my lens can focus through glass doors)

the boys bought me this very poorly little fish, who i was deathly worried about in the Walmart pet dept. we named her Rudy and she is now happily swimming in and out of her pineapple :)

we tried out this bike (and we tentatively think we NEED it!)

we played at our favorite park

loving wondering and wishing

loving
that Sam is home!! with lots of stories of snowy hikes, wonderful feasts, starry nights and falling asleep as the camp leader softly strummed his guitar (i kind of want to go to that camp too......... :)

loving
fish tacos for lunch at our favorite neighborhood unfancy mexican restaurant (where the guacamole was a little bit spicy today and i had to drink 4 huge glasses of water in a row :)

loving
morning trips to Target to look for buy curtains and baskets and bath mats and all the things that make the house feel more cozy and loved

wondering
how long that Marshalls has been right by the Subway right by my house.... i just went in for the first time about a month ago and it's full of nice things, like the philosophy perfume i love so much :)

wondering
where to go for datenight. i kind of want the wood fired pizza but my diet doesn't allow crazy things like eating twice in one day ;)

wondering
what new pictures to hang in the den - we're painting this week and clearly you can't put old pictures on new walls ;)

wishing
i could go to Las Vegas on friday (it's my birthday!!!!!!!! and school is out!! we should go to Vegas, right??!)

wishing
i knew how international postage works. for example, if i send a letter to England, does the USPS and the Royal Mail split the 88 cents evenly (or however much it is these days... i just put a few stamps on, make the sign of the cross and hope for the best) or does the USPS keep all the money and hope that the person in England sends a letter back, then the Royal Mail can keep that money and so it works out. hmm....

wishing
for a freshly baked, still warm, slightly undercooked chocolate chip cookie (made with brown sugar and melty dark chocolate chips :) oh yes siree bob!



leaving on tuesday (sob)

home on friday (yes friday, four entire whole days later...)