BlogHer Biz Event - LA

I finally made it off the waitlist (thank you Megan!) the day before this BlogHer event and so that changed mine and Tony's plans for the day and I ended up driving solo to L.A. One of my least favorite things to do but usually worth it.  The drive was not so bad until I got closer to Santa Monica.

What was worse? THE PARKING. The email from BlogHer gave 3 suggestions of parking garages but I struck out with a couple of them so I tried to find street parking. Had to send Tony some pictures because the signs are so confusing, at least to me. Luckily I had decided to message my friend Megan and she was arriving close to the same time I was and sent me the address for the parking garage she was parking in. PHEW! We were able to park and walk together to the event.

Museum of Illusions - L.A.

I'm a sucker I guess for pop up museums and there are a few I want to go to but they can get spendy. The Museum of Illusions was not too badly priced and my friend Wendy agreed to go with me so on a Wednesday we headed to L.A. to check this place out!

Two Beaches in 1 Day!

 I heart the beach and take advantage of every opportunity I have to go spend time in the sand and at least put my feet in the ocean. During our trip to Southern CA we had Monday to visit a couple beaches before heading back to Utah.

First we went to Venice Beach

Some people love this beach, others are so-so about it or else they just plain hate it. I love it because it is so interesting and there are lots of things to see that you don't see anywhere else.

Smooshing a penny to get a picture on it is a must-do!

More shots of Venice beaches...tons of little shops and 2 fire engines..dont know why they were there

  

Really cool art made with metal parts from cars and other stuff

Playing around in the ocean

Trying to take a jumping picture

So peaceful

Street performers. This is what delayed us to getting to Santa Monica!

A guy was going to jump over all these people bending over. And he did it! I should probably post the video...

So, we stayed quite a bit longer than planned on at Venice Beach and I still really wanted to go to Santa Monica so fortunately it wasn't too far from where we were at. 

Luckily we were able to find a parking spot without too much trouble

Pacific Park at Santa Monica Pier!

We had lunch at Harbor Grill.

If you can see the Ferris wheel above, it is run by a solar panel! So neat.

I got a hamburger and fries for lunch and Tony made us fry sauce. He got clam chowder in a bread bowl and when I asked him which one he liked better, the one here at the pier or at Disneyland he said Disneyland's clam chowder was def. better. Who knew!

Choosing between Dippin Dots or ice-cream and the ice cream was a much better deal so that's what we did

  

Saw a brave girl holding an enormous snake

One last view of the beach before heading out. We didn't leave until probably 3:30pm , almost 4! A lot later than planned and we didn't get to our house in Utah until probably 5:30am in the morning. I don't regret it though - it was worth every minute spent in CA!

I turned out so dark here but at least the ocean looks pretty awesome! And...one last look before heading back to the car. Tony had to drag me away.

Cool license plate we saw when leaving

Pretty fountain while driving the streets of Los Angeles to get back to the freeway

Pandy & Hoote were so well behaved on the trip ;-)

I loved the way these trees looked

  

Driving towards Vegas..interesting looking sunset and the moon.

I seriously cannot wait until I can get back to the beach again!

What is your favorite beach to go to in CA?

First Annual Youtube Conference aka ...

VIDCON

I dont know how or when I heard about this but when I did I asked my friend Chesney (Chez101) if she would want to go and she said YES so months ago we booked flights to Los Angeles and got a hotel room reserved and paid the registration fee for the 3 day conference. 

The wknd of July 10th (my bday wknd!) we flew to LA and took a taxi for the first time. 20 minutes from the airport to Hyatt Regency hotel cost us $55 (to split) ugh - never again! I watched the $$ on the meter go up and up and up and considered asking our driver to pull over and we'd walk the rest of the way. Oh well, now I can say I have ridden in a taxi! (even though it wasnt in NY)

Blogger is still being really dumb and I cant put captions under some of my pictures or else the pictures disappear. UGH i am really really hating blogger and their new system for blogging. :(

This guy - Shane Dawson - is like the Justin Bieber of Youtube. Girls were CRYING when he arrived. He had 2 bodyguards! So crazy

Me and sxephil

brittanilouisetaylor . Never heard of her before today but her vids are pretty cool

very strangely dressed girl at Vidcon. Idk why she was dressed this way

Auto Tune The News performing. They were really good!

iJustine getting interviewed

David Choi performing

iJustine interviewing some other youtubers

I love watching this family on Youtube!

OraBrush was here. My friend Devin was there with them too but he is not in this picture. Sadly I didnt get a picture with him.

Where I volunteered for 3 hours Sunday morning and got 1/2 my registration $$ back! Yeah!

Me with The Station

The Station getting interviewed

Ijustine talking to xTurnipTimex and another girl

Above are two pictures of the hotel we stayed in, the room, and how pretty the landscape was outside

Sunday we ordered pizza from a local pizza place. SOOO GOOD

Flying back to Arizona via Southwest

Me and Karem at 345am Monday morning before leaving the hotel. He was way cool and I'm glad I got to know him!