Los Angeles...City of Cupcakes, Milkshakes and Guns?!

So I'm sure there is a nicer sign somewhere welcoming you to Santa Monica, but I could only come up with this grubby bridge sign!

I had to snap California Street!

and By was especially impressed with this dinosaur in the downtown shopping area!

I loved this patriotic window display in Converse!

After browsing around Santa Monica, we headed to Brentwood Country Mart to track down this cute little ice cream shop, Sweet Rose Creamery

When you walk in and see them hand making the waffle cones you know it's going to be good!

Unfortunately they had no speciality s'mores ice cream pie which is really what I was hoping to try but you can't beat a good chocolate waffle cone, or some mint choc with real homemade choc chips which is what I had!

We also loved the cute little quaint shops and browsed around the country mart for a while!

but nothing can keep my beach boy away from the Ocean! so we were back to the waves again, and he hired a board to give surfing another go!

I wrote postcards and indulged in my crumbs cupcake I had bought the day before!

Huge brownie chunks on top of a chocolate fudge cupcake - it was totally delicious! 

Here's By riding in on a wave...

all the way to shore! He loved every minute of it! I definitely think the surf could be our ticket back here one day!

After that it was time to head to Hollywood! to meet up with some friends...

Heidi and Jaden! The first time I met Heidi was in San Diego airport at about 1am when I was 19! We didn't know each other! but a mutual friend of ours said she would be happy to meet me and my sister at the airport and let us stay with her for a few days in San Diego! She was an amazing host, even treating us to lucky charms and root beer and she showed us the sights of San Diego! A few months later she found out her happy baby news...and she kept us updated back in England of cute baby pics as Jaden got bigger! This was the first time I was meeting him! 

So we chowed down at Cheesecake Factory where else!

and then moved on to Sprinkles, whose cupcakes I have wanted to try for years and years since they are the original cupcake bakery after all! 

We were very excited! Heidi shares my sweet tooth!

Soooo many choices!

Of course I can never pass up coconut!

or the chance to have a little gender reveal fun for baby Braithwaite! so we picked up one of those too!

The malls in Southern California are seriously beautiful...no wonder everyone who lives here are shopaholics!

Heidi also introduced us to the delights of See's Candies! It is a seriously amazing chocolate shop, and they give you free chocolate just for walking in - you have to love that! If you ever stroll by a See's Candies you have got to go in! Try the milk bordeaux - it's a brown sugar soft centre chocolate, and get the key lime truffle and the milk cocoanut - you will not be disappointed!

 Afterwards we cooled down in Heidi's amazing pool! How beautiful is her back garden!

and we taught Jaden how to play pass the pigs by the pool - he was a fan!

For dinner, we headed to Thousand Oaks to check out Stacked

An amazing amazing burger place! Heidi's husband Kris joined us and Jaden showed us all how it was done by ordering on the ipad - each table had one!

You didn't just have to get a burger, they did pizza and mac and cheese too and you could build your own of anything - picking your base, toppings etc...

You could even build your own milkshake! So of course I went with a triple coconut concoction!

and then I picked out what roll I wanted on my burger, what meat, what toppings, what sauces...

and I came up with this beauty! Check out the shine on that pretzel roll, pretzel rolls are the best! I hate that they don't sell them over here!

By even went for some mac and cheese inside his burger!

It was a fun and super delicious night with our California friends!

In the car park, we came across this giant truck! I'm pretty sure the tyres were as big as me! So American! we just had to take a pic!

When we got home it was time to try those cupcakes!

According to sprinkles...and the cupcake Gods baby Braithwaite will be a girl! We'll just have to see if they're right!

The day before whilst eating lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, Byron had mentioned in passing to Heidi about how being in America made him feel like shooting a gun!

Fortunately for Byron, Heidi's Dad had taken up shooting as a recent hobby and so she was able to set Byron up with going along to the local shooting range!

I went to be photographer!

but somehow this happened!

and after the initial scariness of holding a gun and being worried about the kick back, it was actually pretty fun!

By had some serious skills and shot his bullseye much more than I did!

Thanks to Heidi's dad Peter for a great day! I couldn't believe we were just allowed to walk in there having never shot before and away we went!!

Here's By showing off his little souvenir of how well he did!

Everybody's going Surfing, Surfing Usa...in Malibu!

So the next portion of our trip consisted of driving into Santa Barbara.  I loved how cute this little city by the sea was, with it's Terracotta roof tiles all over the place! 

I was also mega excited to stop here because when Mel, Mara and Arne had gone on their California road trip last summer they had found an amazing cupcakery here with a frostinator - a machine that basically let you make your own cupcake! Sadly...we discovered it had since closed down! 

But what Santa Barbara lacked in cupcakes, it made up for with those palm trees, and blue skies and ocean views!

It doesn't get more Californian than that!

We also had a quick beach stop at Carpinteria, and Byron got right in the sea again because he just can't get enough of the water!

We made our way to our campsite, that was way up in the middle of nowhere pretty much! and so we passed these wild turkey's on the way!

We set up camp for the night, and sadly because of the area we were in the forest fire danger was high and so open flames were not allowed at the campsite so we had to give s'mores making a miss that night!

We headed out for an evening hike...

and came across this cute little swimming hole...

and we were surrounded by these amazing views!

We drove back to camp...

and By captured this awesome shot just before we plunged into darkness!

The next morning we arrived in Malibu, which By was more than a little excited about because he had arranged a surfing lesson! He surfed before in Cape Town but that was over 8 years ago so he wanted to have a little refresher!

The boys got right down to business! His instructor had been surfing for over 40 years and had a wealth of surfing know how to pass on to By!

I took touristy pics while they went over the basics!

Most of the beaches in Southern Cali are divided into surf zones or swim zones.

Here's By all suited up...ready to go in for his first try.

He got up first time!

and after an hour or so was looking like a pro!

It was tiring work but he loved every minute of it, and decided that Malibu was one of his fave parts of California we had seen so far!

The beach where he surfed was actually Zuma beach, which is Gwen Stefani's favourite beach too so we were in good company!

As far as I was concerned there was only one option for lunch...we had been in California for 8 days at this point and still not eaten at an In-N-Out so that of course had to be rectified immediately!

Loving my milkshake!

and drooling over the burgers...

and animal fries which have to be ordered from the secret menu!

Despite the fact that at least you can get milkshakes here, I still had to say that Five Guys burgers win over In-N-Out for me! but it was a fun little pit stop and brought back lots of memories! especially since we stopped at the one in Thousand Oaks!

We also ended up driving right by Pepperdine University so I had to snap a pic because my good friend Milah who I met whilst living in Turks and Caicos had just got accepted to study there! So jealous that every morning she'll be waking up to those California skies!

I can't exactly remember what we stopped for, but we stopped at this little parade of shops looking for something...and suddenly Byron was like 'isn't that Crumbs that you love?' I was like 'whaaaaaaat?' because Crumbs cupcakes are the best I have ever tasted! When my friend Jade came to visit us in Turks and Caicos, she flew via New York and as a joke I asked her to bring me NY cupcakes...but she totally did! a whole box full and they were the best and most delicious cupcakes I had ever tasted!

They used to only be on the East Coast so I was not expecting to see them in California at all! Thank goodness for Byron and being so observant...I would not have noticed it otherwise! and thank goodness for timing...they were due to close in less than 5 minutes!

 

So they were a bit thin on the ground with their flavours...but that didn't matter! 

 

Red velvets galore! We ordered our cupcakes, I gushed to them about how I think they make the best cupcakes ever and that we'd come all the way from Vancouver which they loved hearing! and we picked our cupcakes and off we went!

Yes Malibu, we're a little bit in love with your charming ways!