Los Angeles

A and I drove to LA to surprise his mom for her birthday! The road was pretty quiet the whole way and we managed to make it there in good time. 

She was completely surprised and was quite happy to find out that none of us had forgotten her birthday. She has decided now that she has reached a happy age and will now count backwards! 

After a few hours of getting ourselves together we dressed ourselves up and went out to dinner. 

After dinner we went to a great show at Cal Tech called Capitol Steps. 

We had amazing seats, which was wonderful because the show was an absolute riot! A and I couldn't stop laughing the whole time. Very smart political humor. 

Cal Techs theatre was incredible to look at. This is an image of the ceiling! It was an intense gold that my camera wasn't quite able to capture. 

The following day the whole family went to the shooting range. This was the first time I had ever been to a range and it was quite exciting. Even though we went early morning it was still pretty busy...which means loud. So many guns going off you didn't need a reminder to wear your ear plugs! 

The boys checking on our targets. They were inspecting to see if my bullets actually hit the thing!

The coolest part about the range is that it's nestled into California national park! So even though you're shooting at targets you still have this beautiful view beyond. 

Here's an action shot of me shooting my little birthday present!

And A's mom shooting an awesome rifle called a Keltec Sub 2000 a friend brought along. 

Then on Sunday A and I were able to catch up with my old roomies and bestie! We all met at Gladstones in Malibu and proceeded to order bottomless mimosas. 

Our waiter kept us all very happy by refilling our mimosas before we were finished with them! He definitely knew the way into our hearts! All throughout our brunch this group of pelicans kept flying overhead. I was finally able to get them in a shot but wasn't nearly as cool as in person. 

My two former roomies. 

All the girls in their Sunday best! We make brunch look good! 

It's always a fun time when we get out to LA but this weekend was especially nice. We were both super bummed to have to drive home so soon, but luckily I'll be back out soon for my bridal shower! Can't wait! 

Easter Brunch - Whole 30 Style

Andrew doesn't like mornings very much, but lucky for him I'm typically a very early riser! Since I had an extra few hours on my hands, I wanted to make something new for Easter brunch. Andrew doesn't like sweet things for breakfast (no pancakes, muffins, or anything delicious) and Whole 30 doesn't allow for any of those things, so instead I got creative (and went to Pinterest for inspiration). I found this delicious recipe for a Sweet Potato Quiche from Grok Grub and decided to give it a go.

First up was to peel 3lbs of sweet potatoes! This meant peeling the entire bag from Trader Joe's! I thought it seemed a little excessive to peel that many potatoes, but I'm a rule follower and that's what the recipe called for! 

All my sweet potatoes peeled and cubed. This shot isn't very good at showing depth, but trust me this pile of sweet potato goes on for a while!

Here they are all lined up on the world's largest baking sheet. But I didn't care, I love sweet potato so how could you go wrong with 3lbs!?

While the sweet potato is in the oven becoming delicious, cook up some bacon and try not to burn the house down (seriously does anyone else's kitchen get smoked out from cooking bacon!? Ridiculous).

Next add eggs from a hoard of chickens. It's always amazing to me how many eggs are called for in Paleo/Whole 30 recipes. Don't get me wrong, I like eating the unfertilized fetus of another animal, but 10 eggs is quite excessive. Wouldn't you agree?

Well here it all is in my square pyrex. It turns out I don't actually own a pie dish. It's quite remarkable, but true. So I used the next best thing I could find, and good thing too because all those sweet potatoes barely fit in the pyrex!

And three hours later I finally got to eat this delicious quiche. Even Andrew liked it, but did give a few notes:

• Why are there so many sweet potatoes?
• This would actually be amazing if there wasn't an entire farmers market worth of sweet potatoes in here.
• Next time add more bacon. And sausage. Just more meat in general.
• Really this is quite good.
• Less sweet potatoes though.

So there you have it: more meat, less sweet potatoes. Overall pretty good for Easter brunch. I don't think I would make this every weekend because it was quite time consuming, but definitely once a month or so!