zoom, zoom, zoom

I put it off as long as I could but if I am going to be a school nerd in a few short weeks (more on that later), it had to happen. I am now the proud new owner of a 2009 Toyota Corolla S. It's been 4 and 1/2 years since I have been a car owner and I am having mixed feelings about it, but I'm sure I'll get over it though, because isn't she (Pete said she had to be a "she" because he didn't need any more competition) so pretty? Plus she gets uber great gas mileage which totally bumps her up to HOT status in my book.

In the Burtuester family tradition, she needs a name. Any suggestions? 

my bounty

my bounty

click on the link and you can check out my radical notes

Originally uploaded by jessica mae

A few days ago, one of my girls liz talked about how she often has people asking her about how to eat local and organic on the cheap. I thought about this today as I unpacked my haul from the farmers market and decided to document exactly what I bought and how much it cost me. If I had more motivation, I'd head to Whole Foods and do a little price comparison, but even without that I think we can all agree that, seriously? this would cost WAY more at whole foods. Plus, it's all organic, grown within 5-50 miles of where I live with no pesticides or any other grody stuff.

me + the getty = true love

This weekend was the first visit by one of the parental units since we’ve been here in La La land. Pete’s dad Wayne flew in for a conference, so he decided to kill two birds with one stone, and visit me! Oh yeah, and Pete too. Wayne once tried to trade me for Pete. True story.

this is Wayne talking on Pete's "blueberry"

This is the tree planted in the entrance to the Fairmont Hotel, which is my fave hotel in Santa Monica (ok, so I have only been to one hotel in Santa Monica). This tree is ginormous and was planted in 1869, which officially makes it the oldest thing I have seen since I have been here.

Friday night we went to Ma’Kai Lounge in Santa Monica. The food was great, and of course, we had the calamari. If you don’t know already, Pete is on a one man crusade to sample the calamari offerings at every restaurant in America. 10 down, roughly a gazillion to go.

Saturday afternoon brought us to the Getty Center, a place that I have been wanting to visit ever since I caught a glimpse of it off of the 405 our first week here. Really, this place is amazing. You park at the base of a hill and a tram takes you up to the top and the most amazing views of LA. The grounds themselves are just stunning. I could seriously live in here for a few weeks just taking pictures of all of the amazing flowers. I was in some major flora heaven; I might have even drooled a little bit.

Pete and I decided that this is the place we are taking every single person who visits us from now on, because it is just so impressive. And we like to impress people. We spent so much time walking around outside, that we hardly saw any of the actual art on display, but never fear, a follow-up visit has already been scheduled.

I am always thinking deep thoughts.

Pete loves it when I make him stop every few feet to take another picture.

We ate dinner at the restaurant in the Getty, which was equally impressive. Their seasonal menu changes weekly and includes a ton of local ingredients, plus their entire wine list is made up of wines from California! California wine = delish. Huzzah to the buy fresh, eat local! You know I love ya.

to see some more pics click here and/or here.

road trippin' part deux

The plan was to go camping. Then I found out that all the forests are on "fire watch", and to me camping just doesn’t feel right if it is lacking in a cold beer and a fire to roast some mallows. So, with those plans in le toilet, we decided to do something almost as fun, apple picking!

We went to Riley's Farms, and I read on their website that they are a "living history farm", which apparently means they dress up in colonial garb, and teach you all sorts of super important things like how to throw knives and tomahawks, skills I think everyone should have. But I already know how to wield a machete, so I passed. Besides, we were there to get us some delish apples.

 Do you know what Pete loves more than I love and old man and a banjo? apple picking. he isn't posing at all in this picture, it's completely natural.

apple-icious

Afterwards, we continued onto another farm and bought some totally amazing cidah and doughnuts. I also decided I need an alpaca and a peacock, which can chill out with the mini-pony I am going to house for Ali until she moves out here. As a side note, I had a conversation with a friend recently about how I don't like birds, except peacocks, emus, ostriches, and penguins and he pointed out that I only like birds that can't fly. Feel free to extrapolate what you want from that.

 

no animals were harmed in the making of this photo.

In a rare moment of spontaneity, we decided to drive up to Big Bear Lake and see what it was all about. While the drive up was amazing (seriously) the lake was a total letdown. I don't know about you but I like my lakes to be rustic and this was...not.

 

 

It's amazing what a little cropping can hide. What you can't see on the shore of this lake is the huge paved sidewalk that surrounds it.

Which brings us to Sunday night and me conquering one of my cooking fears. I have been weary of pie dough in the past (that pie disaster last christmas did nothing to assuage my fears), but on Sunday, feeling inspired by the huge bowl of apples sitting on the counter, I decided to go for it, and the cooking gods were smiling upon me because it came out pretty damn good. I used this recipe from Smitten Kitchen, following the dough recipe exactly (I like to do that sometimes, it makes it easier for me to blame the recipe later and not my own lack of skills) but like Emeril, kicked it up a notch with the spices. Next up on my cooking fears list: a soufflé. stay tuned...

in closing i leave you with this jewel. this is what happens when you hit traffic in LA.

if you want to see the rest of the pictures from our glorious adventure, click here.

road trippin'

If there is one thing about me that I feel could use some improvement, is that I am easily unmotivated. And I am messy, and I cry. A lot. But back to the lack of motivation. I had been looking forward to going to Joshua Tree for weeks and Pete and I had decided to go on Saturday. Then, Saturday morning rolled around and I was all, "Joshua Tree what? this pillow is so much nicer, and not hot and not the desert." Luckily, Pete was experiencing a moment of clarity and rallied the troops. I think he just wanted me to buy him breakfast (PS. Literati Cafe? tacos? For breakfast? I think I might love you. Brilliant.). It was totally worth the drive, plus I discovered the outlets, and who doesn't love things on sale? Unfortunately, the le Creuset outlet considers knocking 20 bucks off their ridiculously expensive enamel cast iron a "deal". Oh well, I drooled over the pretty colors and then we were back to the real world.

A wind farm we passed. For a few miles, this was all you could see. So rad.

Good old Truly. Once we got out of the car, the silence was unreal. It's funny, living in a city, you sometimes forget that there are places that don't have constant noise, all the time.

This is one of the campsites the park has set up. It has a picnic table, firepit and a grill. It's not my cup of tea since there are about 10 of these sites pretty close together and I like my camping without other peeps up in my grill, but if you like less rustic camping (i.e. you like to pee in a toilet, not on the ground), you can sleep out under the stars next to some big ass rocks.

I love being slapped in the face with how awesome Mother Nature is. I love that these little yellow flowers were just chilling, like they were growing on the banks of a lush river instead of in the desert.

and then there were the Joshua Trees. Oh how you have stolen my heart with your craggly, prickly arms and ugly shapes that are awesomely beeyootiful. I love you so much that I'll overlook that you are named after a Mormon leader.

this was when i told Pete we'd be stopping at the outlets on the way home.

smell you later. LA, maybe i don't hate you after all.

gardening 101

One of the nice things about Southern California is that you can grow things all year round. One of the downsides of living in LA, is that most people rent and in a renting situation, it isn’t a given that you will have space for a garden. Luckily, I have a patio. It isn’t huge but it’s big enough that I felt the need, the need to seed! I picked up a few herbs from Armstrong 's, but I was feeling like I needed something a little more adventurous. So, last Saturday I took a class on container gardening with Marta at HomeGrown Los Angeles. 7 or 8 of us urban gardener wannabes met at her (amazing) space downtown and she talked to us about the ins and outs of container gardening. What kind of container to use, how to prepare your soil, watering, when to harvest, etc. and then she showed us how to mix the soil (a mixture of potting soil, compost (with horse poop!), greensand and veggie fertilizer), and we each planted three lettuces, 2 herbs and an edible flower. I can’t harvest it for another two weeks or so (you should wait until the plant has doubled in size) but doesn’t it look so nice?

It joins my herbs (basil, rosemary, parsley, chives, lemon verbena, thai basil, and mint) who don’t seem to be growing that much. They aren’t dying but they aren’t getting any bigger either. Maybe they need some of the heady horse poop compost to help them along?