It's Good to be with Family - Part 1
Since we've lived out in Long Beach, we've had all sorts of visitors, including friends and most of our immediate family. The one notable set of house guests we'd been missing, however, were my brother Jim and sister-in-law Leigh, and last week, they were finally able to make it to the west coast to hang out for a bit! Hooray!
They flew into LAX and got in late on Friday, 7/27, and since it was between the hours of 9pm and 4am, we were happy to pick them up (seriously, if you come visit us, feel free to fly into John Wayne or Long Beach anytime, and we'll come get you. Choose LAX, however, and you may find yourself in an Uber if the sun is out. We hate daytime traffic to LAX something fierce). We all made it home just fine, said hello to Kaylee, and then all headed straight to bed.
The next morning, I did a long run while Chris went on a bike ride, and Jim and Leigh hit up the local Sprouts to ensure they had the food they needed during their time with us (Leigh has some significant dietary concerns). Once everyone got back and cleaned up, we made lunch together and then headed out to show our visitors around our fine city. Like we've done with Mom and Hugh before, we started by going up to the top of Signal Hill, which was a bit cloudy on this particular afternoon. We didn't grab any shots due to the cloud cover, but Leigh got good use out of her handy binoculars. We next zoomed down to downtown proper and wandered through MADE, one of our favorite stores, as well as grabbed treats at the Creamery's newest location.
We spent some time driving around the Shoreline area, going through the streets used for the annual Grand Prix at Jim's request (he's played this course on one of his racing games several times, and he was having a right proper geek out moment to see it in person), and once we finished there, we hopped on the 710 and took it north to Torrance. We ran some errands and enjoyed a brief stop at Yorkshire Square Brewing, where we grabbed a few pints.
All four of us, gussied up at
Cousin Ashley's wedding
last October in Cleveland
They flew into LAX and got in late on Friday, 7/27, and since it was between the hours of 9pm and 4am, we were happy to pick them up (seriously, if you come visit us, feel free to fly into John Wayne or Long Beach anytime, and we'll come get you. Choose LAX, however, and you may find yourself in an Uber if the sun is out. We hate daytime traffic to LAX something fierce). We all made it home just fine, said hello to Kaylee, and then all headed straight to bed.
The next morning, I did a long run while Chris went on a bike ride, and Jim and Leigh hit up the local Sprouts to ensure they had the food they needed during their time with us (Leigh has some significant dietary concerns). Once everyone got back and cleaned up, we made lunch together and then headed out to show our visitors around our fine city. Like we've done with Mom and Hugh before, we started by going up to the top of Signal Hill, which was a bit cloudy on this particular afternoon. We didn't grab any shots due to the cloud cover, but Leigh got good use out of her handy binoculars. We next zoomed down to downtown proper and wandered through MADE, one of our favorite stores, as well as grabbed treats at the Creamery's newest location.
We spent some time driving around the Shoreline area, going through the streets used for the annual Grand Prix at Jim's request (he's played this course on one of his racing games several times, and he was having a right proper geek out moment to see it in person), and once we finished there, we hopped on the 710 and took it north to Torrance. We ran some errands and enjoyed a brief stop at Yorkshire Square Brewing, where we grabbed a few pints.
Slainte!
Leigh enjoying her artisanal filtered tap water.
Noms.
We didn't spend too long at Yorkshire Square (recently named one of the 50 best new breweries by Beer Advocate magazine - just saying), because we needed to get back home to rest up and change for our big night out in Bixby Knolls. Like most evenings when we take visitors around our home turf, we started out at Dutch's Brewhouse for pizza and beer.
And pretzel bites, as Chris is demonstrating
We next moved on to Rasselbock, our local German spot; Leigh had a dinner that met her specs (I think it was chicken, but I'm old and don't remember these things, truly) while Jim, Chris, and I split a rabbit sausage entree with sides of spaetzle and sauerkraut and a slice of lemon cake with homemade curd. All of it was great, and well fortified, we headed to Roxanne's and our 9pm reservation at the Exhibition Room, our local speakeasy.
"Rasselbock" means "jackalope,"
so they have quite the theme going,
as you might imagine.
Jim giving the password to the speakeasy
We had to wait just a bit to gain access, but once we did, the gentlemen each had a nightcap while the ladies hydrated with more H2O, and we all enjoyed the live band.
They have quite the cocktail selection
at the Exhibition Room
We headed back home and hung out just a bit more, but most of us were pretty beat from traveling and working out, so we hit the hay before too long. Coming up on future blogs, the rest of our time with Jim and Leigh, including stomping around the stars in Hollywood, getting our Disney on, keeping it weird in San Pedro, and cheering for Kenny Hoggins at the OC Fair!
Later!
Amy
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