The Americana

Today Matt and I took the girls to the Americana in Glendale for a free kids music concert. It was really fun. They loved it. Ivy is turning into a great photographer. We love daddy for doing girl stuff with us!They had face painting there for the kids. I didn't let Lucy do it or her naptime would have been a disaster. She didn't even seem to notice.


Mom, Stop taking pictures while I'm trying to listen to the concert!
Melissa Green is great!
The Americana is beautiful, even on an overcast day.

The Smokin' Joint

As usual, my pictures stink! Haha but I wanted to tell you about this great place we went to eat at last weekend. I have had this Groupon to a place called, "The Smokin' Joint" across from the Beverly Center down in LA. It is a yummy BBQ place where they play blues music the whole time. I think they have live music at night but during the day they have concerts on big screens playing. They played alot of BB King and Eric Clapton. They have a lot of sign guitars from rockers. It is a SMALL restaraunt but the food was AMAZING!B.B. King

My beef brisket sandwhich.
This amazing number was an onion with bacon and BBQ sauce baked in it!
This is what we ordered the girls and they didn't love it. Ivy ended up eating half my sandwhich. This was Mac and Cheese with a hint of jalapeno in it. It was A.M.A.Z.I.N.G!
Did I say the word amazing too much? It was really good. Being that I am trying to watch my portions, we left the rest of the mac and cheese there and I went without dinner that night. Well worth the sacrifice!

Vivian's Cafe

I had bought a Groupon to this fun little breakfast place on Ventura Blvd. in Studio City. It was so yummy. We were out the door by 7:45am to go eat!
The place was sooo small! Here is their little wall of celebs who eat at Vivians. ( Janet Jackson, the cast of "King of Queens", Smokey Robinson,etc.....)
Here is my yummy scramble (so yummy, I ate it all, so no lunch for me!) and Ivy's Mickey Mouse pancakes. Ivy cracked me up as she also ordered a hard boiled egg.
Matt and Lulu were there too. :) Then we drove around and looked at houses in Encino. Ivy bought some sand toys for the beach at a garage sale. Then we headed over to a music store in Sylmar. Busy morning but fun times being together!

A day with my girls

I took the girls for a little girl's day as I am starting to go back to work next week. Here are some pictures of the day. Ivy LOVES the Grove! Thata girl! She had to bring her American Girl,Emily, who by the way had to be buckled into her own car seat every where we went. Oh boy. We ate at the Farmer's Market, which was soooo good.

Lucy could care less. She only cared about her pretzel.
Ivy is watching the fountain show. Then we headed to Malibu!


Shopped at the Country Mart
Ivy got a cookie at Crumbs bakery
and shared with her sister...
Heavy traffic on the way home, where I kept threatening to pop that dumb balloon if Ivy got it near me while I was driving ONE MORE TIME! P.S. Do you see doll Emily buckled in her car seat?
Trying on her new hat that she got at Nordstrom to look like aunt Hollie.
Then, if you haven't heard the news. As I was driving into Malibu, I got the call that our court date to finalize the adoption for Lucy is set for August 18! So we cheated on our diets (me and Matt, not the girls) and went to Menchie's for some yougurt.
My girls+ L.A.+good food+Daddy+ ANSWERED PRAYER= a great day!