West Coast Love // Pescadero Picnic

As you may have noticed by now, Dai is always planning special things for us to do. I'm trying to do the same for him, so for a while now, I have been wanting us to take an hour long drive down to a little coastal town called Pescadero to get the artichoke soup and artichoke bread they are known for. My photography teacher told me once that he and his wife (who actually met in photography class like Dai and I did!) enjoy driving down there, getting local food, and taking it to the beach nearby for a picnic. I had forgotten about this planned adventure in the back of my mind, but decided yesterday was the day it needed to happen.


The weather has been sunny, warm, and in the mid 60's. I can't believe it is even December. It seemed as though we couldn't have picked a more perfect day for this mini-trip.


The town of Pescadero is essentially one road of cute, rustic, touristy shops and restaurants. I had never really explored it before, but I already would like to return to browse through the shops a little more and visit a coffee shop again that I will be posting about later this week!


We headed to the beach and decided to have a little picnic on the cliffs above the water and sand. It was simple and wonderful, sitting on the dirt and the salty wind whipping my hair all around.

This is the most delicious, soft, and flavorful bread I have ever had! I didn't get a great picture of artichoke filled parts, but they are in there. And the bread was warm when we got it from the local market... YUM.











At one point, I felt like Dai and I were the only people enjoying the beach and the stunning views. It could have been the middle of June and I wouldn't have doubted it. It would be nice to experience a white Christmas one day, but I definitely can't complain about being able to relax on the seaside on the 29th of December! I felt content with life as it is, and the December breeze felt warm on my skin. Every Sunday should be like this.

(By the way, I'm thinking of starting a new section on the blog called 'West Coast Love' to organize different spots I visit on my side of the country as a resource for you and your travel plans, and as an extension of the series East vs. West from this fall. Sound good? Let me know your thoughts in the comments and any suggestions you may have!)

Chambray and Ruby Slippers

This is Laura, one of my very favorite little girls, one that I actually babysit a few mornings a week. She turned two in October and is really just as sweet as can be. I have loved getting to know her and her bright little personality, and have always thought about taking her photo, especially by this rustic white fence that we walk by on our way to the park nearly every time I am with her.









I am really thrilled with how these photos turned out and feel that they capture her spirit so well. She is so clever, curious, and funny, and it is truly a joy to spend time with her. I took these photos as a Christmas present for her parents and can't wait to frame a couple and give them to them the next time I am over. I am secretly hoping tears will be involved ;)

West Coast Love // It's Time for Tea

Tea time has become a sort of Christmas Eve Day tradition for Dai and me. He surprised me last year when he took me to Never Too Latte, and surprised me yet again this year when we arrived at Crown and Crumpet in Japan Town. Also, he decided that making me wear a Santa hat to these festivities is also a tradition, so that explains that.


Crown and Crumpet is a very cute, British-style tea cafe. We were greeted by a nice British man that showed us to our table and catered to our needs.



Our tower of goodies had things like tasty little sandwiches, scones, crumpets, peppermint brownies, and chocolate covered strawberries.


In the last few years, I have come to enjoy tea. I used to never drink it at all. I still only have a few tried and true flavors that I generally stick to, but I really enjoyed Crown and Crumpet's extensive tea menu and decided on an herbal tea called "Blue Eyes." Seems fitting, right? ;) I really loved it!




Before I met Dai, I had never had a "tea party," but now it is one of my most favorite things that we do together :)

Hope everyone has a lovely weekend! I'll be back later this weekend with bits of my Christmas and some more New York photos!

NYC Adventures Part 2: The Highline + Chelsea Market

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas filled with family, good food, and love! It always takes a few days to recover from Christmas, so I will get to that soon, but in the meantime, here's part two of my NYC adventures!


On our second day in New York, we started things off with brunch with one of Dai's friends and then explored Highline Park. This was by far the coldest day of our trip. I left the house that morning with slightly wet hair and it literally froze on our walk to the train. Luckily it thawed out and dried on our train ride :) It was also so windy that I thought was going to be blown over!

The Highline was quite a lovely place and I wish that I had taken more photos. Unfortunately, I was so cold that I wasn't very interested in photo taking and it prevented us from exploring as much as we would have liked. I will definitely be returning here though when I visit New York again, when it is a bit warmer ;)

We then took refuge from the cold in Chelsea Market, a place I had anticipating for quite some time.


There is just so much to see at Chelsea Market! A lot of it is food related, and we had just eaten, so we did return later on in our trip to try out some of it.




The fresh pasta was so interesting to me for some reason! I think it was the lovely colors and textures. Also, I got this cute little chocolate pudding jar from Sarabeth's and got to take the jar home with me, which obviously is the reason I bought it since you know I have an obsession with mason jar-like things. Duh.

I feel like a lot of these photos from our trip speak for themselves, so I'm just gonna let them do that and let your minds explore with them :)