Our Cherry plum tree, or Prunus cerasifera, is already blooming.

Isn’t that a beautiful sight? We’re enjoying some really wonderful weather here in Southern California. Our Cherry plum trees (also known as Prunus cerasifera according to Wikipedia) are, true to nature, starting to bloom their cute little pink flowers. These trees normally bloom in mid-February, so they’re right on schedule. Later on their gorgeous, deep purple leaves will grow in and stay with us until late autumn until they fall off.

I know I’m so lucky to be living in a place that doesn’t have to worry about a snow storm coming in and wiping these beautiful flowers out. And do you see that blue, blue sky behind the tree? No photoshop necessary — it really is that blue.

Hope winter is treating all of you nicely! If not, don’t worry! Spring is coming just as quickly as it can.

We went to The Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, CA. The Villa itself is incredible, it was built in the same style as the art it houses (mostly ancient Greek and Roman pieces).

lol, Are we old enough to be married? We still act like children!

Us in front of the fountain in the gardens.

That afternoon, we drove over to the Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey and checked in. The staff there was really friendly and excellent. They saw our note that we were celebrating our first anniversary, so gave us complimentary champagne:

and strawberries:

View from our room:

After we dropped our stuff off in our room, we rented bikes from the concierge and took a ride along Venice Beach:

The next day we went to The Grove and The Farmer’s Market:

tee hee

Afterwards, we tried to get in to see The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien but we didn’t get in. It’s really unfortunate that we didn’t, now that he’s off the show. Instead, we went to LA Live to look at the new Ritz-Carlton, Los Angeles (it wasn’t open yet, so we couldn’t go inside) and saw Avatar and went to a really nice dinner at Sur using a coupon from Groupon:

The next day we went to the Griffith Observatory:

You may remember it from movies and tv.

Awesome Periodic Table exhibit:

Went to the plane-arium and saw a show:

Oh hey, Hollywood sign!

The next day we drove to Marana, AZ and checked into our hotel:

They upgraded us to Club Level (!! a room with unlimited free drinks and food) and more champagne and strawberries were waiting in our hotel room:

View from our balcony:

The next day we went down to the pools. Mike went down the water slide:

It was kinda cool outside so I didn’t go in the pool.

Mike used to work with the guy that is now head chef of the restaurant CORE, he made us a really nice meal that night (that he didn’t comp it ended up being like $100, thanks for nothing, man! Oh well, it was still really nice of him, and tasty):

The next day we had to drive home :

It was an incredibly long drive:

The next day was our actual anniversary, we stayed in and celebrated All in all, a great way to end the first year!

I’ll post more about my vacation once I get caught up at home!

Here’s a map of the island. The main city is Avalon, and that’s were more tourists are. We’re going to Two Harbors (on the northern end of the island).

This is a view of Catalina in relation to the California coast. Can you believe it is only 22 miles away from LA? That’s like… from my house to school, hehe.

This is a map of all the islands off the coast of Southern California. Bet ya didn’t know So Cal had islands too, biatch! xD I figured out that the island that we can see from Mike’s house on clear days is NOT Catalina, but an island called… guess what… San Clemente Island! haha. I wonder if there’s a ferry that goes out there? That might be fun to explore.

I’m really excited, I’ve never been to Catalina. My mom went with my sister’s troop to White’s Landing (see map, it’s a little bit north of Avalon) because I guess the Angeles Girl Scout Council shares the shore there with the Balboa Yacht club. Boars invaded their camp ground and jumped in the trash cans, haha. xD

Also my mom told me that my grandparents used to take the ferry out to Catalina in the ’50s and dance in the Grand Ballroom they had out there. So I asked myself, what does this ballroom look like? I found some pictures at This site…:

The outside of the ballroom. Isn’t it magnificent?

Some dancers during the forties. I love it.

It looks so wonderful. Maybe once we come back from Catalina Mike and I will want to take a romantic weekend and go there. I guess after we get married or something. Chad said that he’s seen wild buffalo and boars on the island, and my mom said she has too. Ooh! So exciting!

I also found a picture of Two harbors:

Pretty.