OC Fair, Disneyland + West L.A.

We're a bit late to tell you about last weekend, and it's kinda long, but here we go...

Earlier

OC Fair

Thanks to one of Chris' aunts we found out that on Saturdays and Sundays at the OC Fair if you arrive between 10am and 11am, you can get in for only $2 (instead of $11). So Chris, Kelly, and I went bright and early on Saturday morning! 

Kelly + Chris waiting for the gates to open

We were there from about 9:30am until about 2pm and I think we did and saw everything except the rides! My favorite part of this years fair was the petting zoo, where I got to pet a couple of wallabies (wallaby? walabi??) and some llamas (my favs!!).

I don't know if it was this one or the other, but one of them had a baby in her pouch!

Chris' favorite part of the fair was looking through all of the photography exhibits. And I'm sure Kelly's favorite was the food...This is what we had: pulled pork sandwiches, deep fried Oreos, handcut potato chips with cheese/bacon sauce, and frozen yogurt.

Here are some more photos that Chris and I took from that day...

Top: Kelly and the two llamas, Victor and Perdito - we see them every year!
Bottom: Sleepy lil fox, "ghost sheep", and some cows

This is a piece of a steel beam from one of the World Trade Center towers

We had a lot of fun, we've even ran into Chris' uncle Randy, Aunt Debbie, and cousins Quinn (check out Quinn's blog link to the right - she's headed off to Tokyo on a church crusade!) and Tynan! 

Oh yeah, and I got sunburned.

Disneyland

On Sunday Chris and I went over to Disneyland for a few hours to meet up with my parents and Kelly. We were at their house all day Saturday with Bruce and we left his bark collar at their house (!!) so they decided to meet us about halfway in Anaheim to give it back. We had lunch at ESPN Zone and took the monorail into the park for a couple of hours. It had been months since we've been into Disneyland, lately we've just gone into California Adventure because of the opening of Buena Vista Street and Cars Land.

Dad, Kelly, Mom, and Chris at the Tomorrowland Monorail Station

Stuck in the elevator (not really...)

Us at the Downtown Disney Monorail Station

It was a nice day, but kind of warm - I had to wear a cardigan over my sun dress because my shoulders and arms were fried from the fair the day before, and I had to try to stay out of the sun. We didn't go on a single ride, but we walked through Toontown, Fantasyland, and Adventureland. Chris and Dad were able to take a bunch of pictures.

Pic overlooking the submarines (edited with a tilt shift app)

Big Thunder Railroad Mountain

Here comes the train!

A lot of people poke fun of us because we love Disney and we visit the parks often. But I've had an annual pass with my family since the mid 90s and we have a ton of fun - there is always something to do and see, most trips (as of recent) we don't even go on any rides! I like to learn about Disney trivia and tidbits, and I really do enjoy Disney movies! LOL

This Weekend

Family Dinner

My youngest cousin on my dad's side, Spenser, is staying at my aunt's house for the next two weeks until he heads off to Norwich University in Vermont. He has received a huge scholarship and it's a pretty big deal. On Friday my dad came up to the office to help with some computer related stuff and also to help Spenser complete what needs to be done before he leaves. Well on Friday night aunt Becky took a group of us out to dinner at Maggiano's to celebrate not only Spenser's achievement, but also Chris' upcoming birthday, and Katy's boyfriend Cameron's music video release. 

Top: Katy and Anthony (Becky's godchild); Chris and Cameron
Bottom: Spenser and Becky; Dad

Group shot!

Cameron's band is called One Last Look and they've just completed their first music video. It's kind of scary, but we all knew Cameron was a serial killer anyway...so check 'em out!

West L.A.

Mallin'

Yesterday Chris and I ventured up a few freeway exits to check out the Westside Pavilion mall. It's just a regular mall, except not as ghetto as the closer Westfield Culver City mall, and it has a Nordstrom (hooray!!). One thing I thought was cool about this mall was that instead of a pet store, they had a storefront for the animal shelter and they bring in a few dogs from the local shelter so you can adopt one. I really want to get another dog so that Bruce can have a buddy to play with while we're at work...it's just a hard decision for us because it was so hard when Brucey was sick and needed surgery. We never want to go through something like that ever again :(

This parking garage rocked - if you saw a green light it meant there was an open spot!

Necromance

After the mall we cruised down Santa Monica Blvd. over to Melrose to check out this cool store we've heard of called Necromance.

Necromance storefront

Business cards

They don't allow photos to be taken inside, but this store caters to the unique...the creepy, the weird, the undead...Necromance sells everything from taxidermy to "antique" medical supplies to bones of various creatures to earrings made out of squirrel feet. Our haul from this trip included: a real Pacific octopus in a jar filled with formaldehyde, a bat skeleton in a picture frame, a few porcupine quills, some badger bone fragments, a glass bottle with a poison label, a beetle brooch, and some animal x-rays. Yes, we're a tad...odd.

We found out later that Zak Bagins from The Travel Channel's "Ghost Adventures" (one of our favorite shows) has been visiting L.A. and went to Necromance on Saturday too! I'm totally bummed that we weren't there at the same time!!

The Grove

All of that shopping made us hungry (heh heh), so we went down to Fairfax to The Grove for lunch at Wood Ranch BBQ & Grill. We walked around The Grove for a little bit, checked out Anthropologie and Barnes & Noble before calling it a day and heading home.

Chris outside Barnes & Noble

The Farmers Market sign

Can you spot Chrissy?

Oh, but on our way back to the 10 freeway we drove past this one antique shop called Vintage Treasures and we popped in for a minute. Didn't buy anything but Chris spotted an old "The Price is Right" sign (not for sale). The woman who owned the store was talking to me and told me a lot of their inventory comes from the studios.

"Chris Gallis, come on down!"

Today we just ran some errands and my family came over for a little bit - nothing too exciting, although we did have dinner at the IHOP across the street :P

Next weekend is Chris' birthday...we're not sure what we're going to do yet. He is so indecisive it drives me nuts! But whatever we do I'm sure I'll keep you posted!

xx, Chrissy