Cali 2010, Day 4

Man, the most important day of my trip and I've waited so long to blog about it! I apologize about that, but I am a school teacher, and the school year is coming to a close, which means LOTS to do! Quick side note about that. I'm staying with teaching first grade next year, and will be moving back into the school. So no more portable for me. I've enjoyed it, but I've missed feeling connected to everyone by being in the building.

OK, so day 4 of our travels led us to the Warner Brothers studios lot, bright and early for a tour of the studio before hitting up the Ellen show. The WB tour was awesome, I highly recommend it for anyone interested in TV and movies. There were certain parts of the tour where cameras weren't allowed, they literally locked up our cameras a few times throughout the tour. We were able to see a lot of sets from lots of TV and movies, my favorites being from Gilmore Girls and FRIENDS.

The left corner of these buildings was where Luke's Diner in Gilmore Girls was. I LOVE that show!!

The gazebo from Gilmore Girls. I want to live in a Stars Hollow. They do awesome things in that cute little town!

Only 2 stages have official names. This one, and the ER stage. They were the most famous shows filmed at WB and lasted a long time. Friends for 10 seasons, and I think ER was 15 seasons?

The actual Gran Torino from Clint Eastwood's movie. It belongs to him, but he wants WB to hold onto it.

To the batmobile, Robin!!

I also am a big fan of Harry Potter! In the museum, which is one part of the tour that no cameras were allowed, the whole upstairs is full of Harry Potter set pieces, costumes and props. So cool!

This was my favorite part of the whole tour. They have a room set up with all of the FRIENDS props, exactly how it was on the actual set. Yep, this is the actual couch! All of the furniture and props were used on the show. The tour guide said the Smithsonian really wants the couch, but WB isn't giving it up. I loved that I got to sit on it!

Taking over Gunther's job for the day..

Central Perk! This makes me want to watch all the seasons again...Brady, I might need to borrow them again from you!! Or you can just buy them all for me. Whichever you'd like!

After the tour, we headed to where we were supposed to go for the Ellen show. We were 3 hours early, and they told us there was no point waiting in line because you don't sit by the order you come. So we ate lunch at a steakhouse down the street. Not too bad! We were all so antsy for the show! When we headed back, the place was loaded with lots of people. The producers had us fill out a survey of any hidden talents we had and weird jobs we've done. They had people come up and share random talents they had (some weren't that great, but I'm not judging..). We then were given a number, and lined up in that order. When we got inside the studio, they sat us wherever they wanted to put us. We ended up on the right side, about 6 aisles up. I was hoping to sit close to the aisle to get a better camera shot and see Ellen better, but oh well. Cameras weren't allowed in the studio, so these pictures were taken from Ellen's face book page. It's kind of hard to see me, but again, I'm about 6 rows up from the bottom, and clear over to the right.

It was such a fun experience. Ellen is beautiful, skinny, and genuinely nice and funny! During the commercial breaks we would get up and dance, and she would wave at us and dance along with us. We were all hoping to get on to do the game, but I think they just picked random people from the audience. I was tired of clapping and cheering by the end, but it was such a great show. Elaine from Seinfeld, Finn from Glee and the band slash, with Adam Lavine singing, were who appeared on the show. I would love to do it again, so any takers?! After the show, you could shop in the Ellen store. We were the last ones in there, and it was so fun because we got to talk to the girl who designed all the clothes. We then went to an outdoor mall, did some shopping, took food back to the hotel and watched the Jazz get killed by the Lakers. We were pooped by the end of day, after getting up so early. LA was such a fun, much needed trip for me!

This is my row. You can see me at the end with my hands up...

Where's Tawna?

In this picture, you can basically just see my hands. The guy in front of me was huge and tall!!

Cali 2010, Day 3

Day 3 in Cali was spent getting a Mother's Day brunch, since Monica and Mandy are mom's. We followed the yummy brunch with getting manicures and pedicures. This was the second time getting a pedi..you see, I hate feet. I don't like people touching my feet, and I definitely do NOT like touching other's feet. My first pedi I got as a gift for myself on my birthday, as a challenge to complete a goal I had set to get one. So the second time around, it was easier for me. We followed that with spending the rest of day in Hollywood, walking around to look at the stars, spent some time at the Kodak Theatre, and the Grauman's Chinese Theatre. We ended the day with an awesome tour of movie stars' houses. Give it to 'em, pictures:

Eating brunch. The shadow makes my nose look weird!

Look at our cute manicures!

Franky at Chinese Theatre.

And good ol' Dean Martin. Janet Carter, my singing teacher in high school, really helped me grow to love that era of music!

Not sure what I'm doing here..this is outside of the Chinese Theatre.

Mandy, Monica and I at the Kodak Theatre. Mandy has her eyes closed a lot in pics!

Waiting for our amazing Movie Star tour to start..

Look at our awesome ride! Yep, those are leopard cover seats! We rode in style!!

The Hollywood sign in the distance.

View of downtown LA. Super smoggy, but I loved all the big buildings, especially lit up at night!

The Magic Castle!

We took a late night tour, and my camera started to freak out, so this is a really bad picture. But this is where Frank Sinatra lived, behind this gate.

Eddie Murphy's house. A little 80's huh?

Supposedly this is the back of Jennifer Aniston's house?

And Laurence Fishborne's house. There were some amazing houses on the tour but the tour guide drove so fast and it got dark so I didn't get good pictures.

The famous Beverly Hills sign. We also drove down Rodeo Drive, which I had never seen, so that was kind of fun!

Cali 2010, Day 2

Day two of my adventures in Cal-i-for-nye-a were spent in Santa Monica. We slept in, headed for the beach, and then spent the rest of the day on the Pier and doing lots of shopping at the outdoor mall there. I was introduced to a yummy frozen yogurt place called Pinkberry. Their fruit was to die for. I literally could have eaten that fruit all day and been totally satisfied (in fact, we all went to Pinkberry again the day before we left, we all loved it so much.) We ate at a yummy Italian restaurant that night, and then headed back late to our hotel! Again, I'll let the pictures do the talking:

Just before heading to the beach!

Pacific Ocean, baby! It was so nice to just lay out by the water. It was a bit windy, but sunny so it was perfect!

An attractive police man took the photo of the 4 of us with the ocean in the background.

And the attractive police man took it with Santa Monica in the background ;)

The Pier

There were rides and lots of shops and restaurants by the beach. So fun!

Monica and I were introduced to a few crazies while shopping at the outdoor mall...

This was my favorite crazy. She wore a ribbon around her, like she was in a pageant, that said "Jesus is God." She had her megaphone and stood by us for a good 20 minutes while we sat and waited for the other girls, preaching to us about how we must believe in Jesus Christ or we will go to hell. She was being a missionary in her own way, I respect that...but I love Jesus in my own way as well!

Cali 2010, Day 1

My friend Monica got tickets to the Ellen DeGeneres show and invited me along for the ride! We flew to California Thursday, May 6 after work, and landed late so we just found our hotel in Burbank and slept! Friday, Day 1 of the Cali 2010 trip, was spent at Universal Studios. After, we ate dinner at the Saddle Ranch. I've never eaten so much food in my life, but Monica and Shannon rode the mechanical bull. I would have done it myself, but since I just had surgery, I didn't think it would be too wise to do that just yet. I'll let the pictures do the talking for the day!

Mandy, Me, Monica..

Posing it with the Shrekers. Not sure what was so funny but I'm laughing pretty hard in this picture!

Hanging out, this is pre- Jurassic park ride, where I got TOTALLY soaked and my hair turned into the curly afro!

Going on the Universal Studios Tour. Loved it!

Just call me Fred, and meet my wife, Wilma.

Highlight of my day..a worker dressed as Eddie Murphy. He totally had the laugh down, he was killing me! And He didn't know the concept of having a personal bubble space, he popped all of ours! But I sure found him to be so hysterical!

Lisa, from the Simpson's. The Simpson's ride was my favorite at Universal. The Mummy Returns was quite funny as well. NOT a fan of the House of Horrors tour. I literally cried and closed my eyes through the whole dang thing. I hate anything scary. We all thought it was a ride, turns out it was a walk through thing with people and things from scary movies. I don't recommend it!!

Yeah..I don't know...

Libbers

One of my best friends and one of my most favorite people, Liberty Lois Perkins, turned 6 yesterday! My sister Tabbi already stole my idea to dedicate a blog post to Lib, but hey, I can do it too! I love this girl so much. She is one of the happiest kids I know, and she always makes me feel so much better when I'm around her. She makes me laugh, gives me big hugs and kisses, and tells me that she loves me. One of my most favorite things about my niece is that she can totally entertain herself for hours. She loves playing with her sisters, but she's totally content to play alone as well. A lot of times I'll watch her when she isn't noticing, and she'll be playing her barbies, speaking and singing out the parts she wants each to play. It warms my heart a little bit. If I need some cheering up, the first person I want to spend time with is Libby because I know I'll leave her feeling so much happier! Happy Birthday Liberty! Thanks for being the happy, beautiful girl that you are. I love you more and more!!!

Hanging out at Yellowstone.

My grandma's funeral. We know how to have fun, regardless of the situation!!

Isn't she so beautiful?! She did such a great job at her Christmas dance recital!

Laughs!!

Kisses!!

Hanging out at Fish Lake 2008