Life – Jest Cafe

Life Lately, March 2016

March 28, 2016/2 Comments/in Life, Los Angeles, Others, Ramble the world /by Mila

We went skiing to Big Bear back in January. It was the first time for Víctor and Max, and they both loved it. How could they not? There was plenty of snow and 60 degrees weather… only in California.

Max just turned 2 in October, so I didn’t think he would be able to go skiing. It was my brother, a ski instructor, the one that recommended taking him, and he was right. George and I are good skiers, so it was easy to carry Max between our legs. He was not able to ski on his own, but he still enjoyed the whole things as much as Víctor did. The best part was that we didn’t need a babysitter! We were able to ski all day together as a family.

From all the ski centers we went to, we liked skiing at Snow Valley the best. It is a smaller mountain, easy to access and with no lift lines. It is perfect when you are skiing with small children that need to go to the bathroom (or take a break) at any moment in time. Look at this little one on his mini-skies! People were so surprised to see him going down the mountain with us. He is a tiny creature! He was, without a doubt, the youngest kid on the mountain that weekend. And here he is in the middle of Snow Summit mountain… totally exhausted. A well deserved meal. I have never seen my kids eat so much. Big Bear Village is a cute little town with nice restaurants and coffee shops. After spending the day skiing, it was fun to go there to have dinner and relax a little bit.
Max couldn’t make it through dinner. ha!
Back in LA, Max’s favorite hobby is eating ice cream. This is a picture of Salt & Straw, one the best creameries on the west side.
Hi there, Víctor! Did I mention Max can read? Not really, but he looks super smart here.
I found this picture of George when he was 25 years old, so very cute, and he still has that jacket!!George and my friend’s son, baby Andrew!
As some of you know, I have been obsessed with the Flower Market in DTLA. I have been there almost every weekend for the last 2 months. I know the vendors, the flowers, the smell. I love it so much, I am always finding new excuses to go.
Hey, Max!
Victor being very helpful – decorating for Easter. More ice cream!!! and filthy children. There are a lot of hugs and kisses going around in our house.
Here is me trying to take a picture for my profile. George thinks is too cold. I kind of agree so I am just posting it here. Also, as you can see, I am not a fan of makeup. Eating at Maple Block Meat, the best meat restaurant in Culver City. It is just excellent. Max and I spending our Tuesdays together.Having brunch at S + W Country Diner in Culver City. This place is so good it gets crowded 10 minutes after opening. You need to be there early! BONUS: Lots of toys for kids to play with. Perfect! My friend Sarah celebrated her birthday at the Commissary in the Line Hotel. We had brunch with friends in this gorgeous place. It was fun! and the only hip thing I have done in the last 3 months, so I am sharing it here. Another proof that I am not into makeup. My favorite part of the Commissary was the mismatch-vintage dinnerware they have. Look at this beautiful coffee cup I got!Hope you enjoyed the photos! Have a wonderful day!

Have a Great Week

February 5, 2016/2 Comments/in Life, Ramble the world /by Mila

We are in Costa Rica!!! So happy to be here, too. I am planning to do nothing but relaxing. That includes blogging. 🙂

I will be back here on February, 15th!

Thank you all for reading.

A Photography Workshop With Joel Sartore

January 13, 2016/6 Comments/in Let us be inspired by..., Life, Others, photography /by Mila

One of my 2016 goals is to learn more about photography and, hopefully, get better at it. Now that I am accountable to the millions of people that read this blog, I decided to attend a photography workshop in January and start the year on the right track.

On Saturday, I took a photography workshop with Joel Sartore at the LA Zoo. He is a national geographic photographer that is the author of, among other things, the Photo Ark, a photograph project is trying to help animals in extinction.

Goals: attend a photography workshop, done; join a book club, done (I will write more about this later); exercise at least one time this year, NOT DONE. I need encouragement, people! I can’t get it together. Can somebody create a day with 60 hours, please? 20 of which should be dedicated to reading a book or binge watching Netflix’s series like “Master of None,” which is HILARIOUS, in case you are wondering what to watch next.

Back to the real topic of this post: as you might imagine, photographing animals requires a lens with a good zoom. I don’t have a lens with a good zoom. The closest I have to a zoom is a lens that shoots 50mm, which is the same perspective that humans see through their eyeballs. Bad news, right?

The good news is that at the beginning of the workshop we got to photograph animals that were really close to us, so I had no problem doing that (see below), but the animals that came afterwards were a different story.

With this challenge in mind, I realized that I needed to be creative about how to take my pictures, and, as I am a people person anyway, I decided to take pictures of the people taking pictures. I am SOcreative (and SO humble), am I not? Cuek.

Here are some of the results:

The workshop was a delight. I enjoyed being surrounded by people that had my same interests. Conversations flowed easily and I learned a lot by looking at the work of others. Joel Sartore was very nice and approachable, and the whole experience was a great way of spending a Saturday afternoon. New 2016 goal: sign up for another photography workshop.

Welcome, 2016!

January 4, 2016/8 Comments/in Life, Others /by Mila

Here we go again. One more year behind us, another one to come.

December started as an excellent month. I love the Holidays, but then some hormones kicked in and they made me feel annoyed with the world. Is it me or everybody is super stressed around the Holidays? Finding parking (or a stranger’s smile) is nearly impossible.

I was feeling discouraged and irritated about life for no reason whatsoever. Does this ever happen to you? Luckily, my hormones stabilized by Christmas and I was able to enjoy my kids opening presents.

The first thing we did in December was picking up the Christmas tree:
This is not our Christmas tree. It would be more appropriate for a big mall and it wouldn’t fit in our house, but it looked so good against the sky that I took a shot.

Here is an attempt at taking overexposed pictures for a little change. It was really fun and hard to find the perfect Christmas tree. We went to Home Depot where all the trees are tied up and piled one on top of the other. We saved a lot of money by going there, but my kids were loosing patience quickly.

Max decided he wanted to take a look from the ground:We looked at more than 20 trees. I wanted it “this” tall or “that” wide. George opened and showcased tree after tree for me, until we found the one. We saw a lot of friends and went to a lot of places during December. This cutie was my super companion:
We tried dragon fruit:We ate perfectly balanced meals:Followed by nutritious desserts:My kids practiced how to play peekaboo while I disappeared into my bedroom:And then Santa came, which was so, so exciting. This is the first Christmas that my kids really enjoy. Christmas day started with candy and ended with a bunch of nameless presents.It was heaven. It took them 7 hours to open all the gifts, not because they had so many, but because every time they opened one, they needed 1 hour to play with it before moving on to the next one. Victor asked for a lot of magnets so we bought them a couple these and these. The towers he is building with these magnets are huge and amazing.This is a wonderful gift for children.

My sister-in-law got the kids this Koala Crate box filled with craft projects. Such a good idea.
And we took the kids to Chill, at the Queen Mary. This “suasage” sign made me laugh. The best part of Chill were the ice sculptures and those cute gnomes dressed in blue walking around:
The kids loved the sculptures and they were freezing by the end of it. It was cold in there! 9 degrees Fahrenheit. How cute are these little rascals with those huge jackets? Pretty cute, I must say. And then, for New Year, we had a fancy meal at home with friends. On the menu were: oysters, lobster, ceviche, fish, and plenty of sparkling wine. The best meal I have had in ages. At 10:30 our friends went to different parties, and we went to sleep. What is the point of waiting for midnight by ourselves? It is so difficult for us to find a babysitter on New Year’s eve. It kind of sucks.

I always like to write down my goals for the next year. I like having specific long and short-term goals, but this year I feel like being more general. Here is what I want to do in 2016:

Improve my photography – take classes, workshops and practice a lot.
Keep writing this blog.
Sign up for a book club.
Do some major improvements on my house (living room, children’s bedroom, etc)
Exercise. I used to exercise a lot but since Max was born, I haven’t. I don’t have time nor money to pay for the extra child care, and I am also lazy to wake up at 6am to do it. I hope to change that this year.
Eat less sugar. As I grow older, I realize how food affects my mood more and more. I decided I should eat less junk food if I want to be happy. Maybe I could eat sugar only once a month? Not sure I can pull this one off, but I will try.
Give Víctor and Max as many kisses as I can.
Tell George I love him everyday.

Welcome, 2016!

Outdoor Halloween Decorations – A Ghost Family

October 27, 2015/2 Comments/in DIY, Life, Others /by Mila

We put out our Outdoor Halloween decorations last weekend. I wanted to create a ghost family in the front yard, and this is how it came out. Cute, don’t you think?

Here is what we used,

Materials:

7 – sticks of different lengths. Approximately 1.5” x 1” wide. They need to be sturdy enough to support the weight of the fabric and not fall with the wind. No need to get fancy with the sticks, almost anything will do.
7 – Styrofoam spheres. 6 small 6” spheres for the smaller ghosts, and a big 10” sphere for the big ghost. I bought them at Michael’s.
Light sheer white fabric. I went to the fabric district in L.A. and got those rolls that you can buy as is. They are $1.99 a yard! So cheap. I used approximately 25 yards.
7 – 2” Nails to attach the fabric to the Styrofoam
2 – sheet of black felt ($0.39 at Michael’s)
Glue gun to attach the mouths and eyes to the Styrofoam.

Here is what we did:

We grabbed sticks of different sizes from our backyard and pounded them in the grass.
I made a small hole in the Styrofoam ball and pressed the stick into the sphere with enough strength to insert it 4-5 inches in. No need to glue.
We covered the Styrofoam balls with the fabric and cut it at the floor level with some scissors to make sure it had the right length; almost touching the floor. I used two strips of fabric on top of the spheres to cover the ghosts and give them more volume. I crossed them on top of each other like an X.

4. I nailed the fabric to the sphere.