- Having a nice diversity of restaurants nearby - including an AWESOME Hawaiian restaurant (Aloha Food Factory in Alhambra); a Cuban chain I loved (Versailles - the sit-down ones are better than the quickie version at Universal Citywalk); Yang Chow, really good Chinese food (one in Chinatown and one on Rosemead in Pasadena - or is it Arcadia?); and, believe it or not, Wienerschnitzel (the closest one is 52 miles away)
- Warm summer evenings with cool breezes
- Palm trees; streets lined with beautiful purple jacaranda trees; roses that didn't constantly get black spot or rust
- The Street Fair on Myrtle in Monrovia, including eating Rudy's Carne Asada Tacos from their booth - really tender, yummy meat
- My free annual pass for the Krikorian Movie Theater
- Weekly dinners and occasional DTS movie marathons with Buffy friends
- Seeing the waves roll onto the smooth sandy beach in Santa Monica
- Going to the Strawberry Festival in Oxnard each May, and staying at the really nice Embassy Suites Mandalay Beach Resort while there
- The remodeled Santa Anita Mall
- Having Disneyland Annual Passports and being close enough to drive there easily
- Being able to drive to San Diego for vacations
- The Festival of Lights at Griffith Park at Christmastime
- Wearing spring clothes for Easter, and not having to wear sweaters with them
I thought about doing another post with things I don't miss about California (e.g., horrendous traffic), but then I thought "Hey, why be all negative?" So instead I'll soon be posting about things I like about living in Washington.
you definitely have some great things here -
ReplyDeletei also love the jacaranda trees, so beautiful! what about crape myrtles, do you guys have them up there? the flowers in the spring and summer on these down here are so lovely!
did you know that they're expanding the santa anita mall? it's going to have an outdoor portion, as well - i think slated to open this year. my kids LOVE the mall, with the train, carosel, and play yard!
i've never done the strawberry festival - pretty nice?
We always really enjoyed the Strawberry Festival. There were three sections of artisan booths with all kinds of things for sale, a kids area with a petting zoo and some mild rides, musical acts (Sha Na Na was there one year that we went, and they've had bigger names than that, too), lots of food booths (including all sorts of strawberry things) and fresh strawberries for sale for good prices. The weather in Oxnard at that time of year is usually pretty nice, and it's just refreshing and fun. I bet all of you would have a good time. It's on May 16 and 17 this year, if you're interested (http://tinyurl.com/cvef66).
ReplyDeleteI didn't know about the expansion of Santa Anita. Sheesh! I wish Westfield would buy The Commons "mall" in Federal Way. There are about a dozen decent stores there, and it's just not that updated. Or well-shopped. But they did add a nice new movie theater that finally opened last year.
Crape myrtles seem to do well here. Our neighbor across the street has a lavender one that has really beautiful blooms. I may plant one of those as a jacaranda substitute. I'd always intended to plant jacarandas in Monrovia, but never got around to it.
hmmm... i think i'm going to have to check out that strawberry festival. it sounds fun! and not too far away. :)
ReplyDeletei'm about to plant a purple smoke tree in my front yard - i think it's going to be beautiful! i have some crape myrtle bushes waiting to be planted (i took ALL of my plants from my old place! i'm crazy!), but we don't have too much space for trees, which makes me sad.
santa anita is striving, i think, to rival in a tiny way the grove or the americana (which, drat! i still have not been able to go see yet). it was sad, though - jon and i went recently to have the boys play and we noticed the large amount of stores closed or closing...