My Night With Richard Simmons

I finally plugged in my scanner so I could tell you about my Richard experience! I know everyone has been waiting with bated breath! Hopefully this won't get too long winded!

One of the reasons I wanted to go to the west coast for our vacation this year was because I have been wanting to take an exercise class with Richard Simmons. He teaches 3 nights a week at his Slimmons studio and it is just 12 bucks!But I didn't want to go just to have a fun story to tell, I'm actually a huge, non ironic, Richard Simmons fan. If you were to ask me my three biggest influences, this is who I would name. My own little holy trinity:

One thing they all have in common is they all preach some version of loving yourself and not being afraid to be a big weirdo. Like most other humans, self acceptance and love is something I've struggled with for most of my life. These three have been instrumental in the progress I've made in the last few years. (We have tickets to see John Waters in December and you have NO IDEA how bummed I am that the meet and greet tickets were 100 dollars. Maybe if I lurk outside for long enough....) But back to Richard. I've collected most of his work out tapes (and there are a LOT) in my years of thrift shopping. My favorites are Sweatin' to the Oldies 2 and Dance Your Pants Off. It is really the only kind of exercise I will do willingly. I have the Sweatin' To the Oldies DVD box set, which is great if you are interested!

I also REALLY love his autobiography, Still Hungry - After All These Years. I reread it at least once a year.
All the reviews I read online said to show up to Slimmons about an hour early to guarantee you get in the class, since it is first come first serve. I had the time wrong and as we were rushing to get there only 40 minutes before the class started I was FREAKING out. I couldn't miss my one chance to see Richard! It was all for nothing though, we were there in plenty of time. We changed into our workout clothes and waited around awkwardly. Richard made his entrance dressed as a mermaid! Red wig, sequin tail,  sea shell top and everything! He made the rounds, kissed everyone on the cheek, asked if we were from out of town, then he started the class.
It was a little over an hour and wonderful! He doesn't play oldies in his classes, mostly modern dance stuff, which was fine with me! Richard spends the whole class mugging and dancing and screaming and telling people to "Move up move up move up!" You aren't allowed to have your phone or camera in the building during class, probably because they don't want his antics all over the internet. It was great, we laughed through the entire hour.
After class Richard stays to take pictures and talk to whoever wants too. As you can see by the end he is out of the mermaid costume, and into a sparkly tank top and shiny scale leggings. I got in the end of the line so I would be able to talk to him a little. This isn't the cutest picture, since we worked out HARD for an hour (we were both sore for days!) but it's still pretty great! (I think I ended up with 110 "likes" on Instagram, including Richard himself!)

And with Travis, of course!

I started crying within moments of talking to Richard. He read my aura, I totally believe he can do it, he said things about me that no one but Travis knows. It was wild. He wasn't all unicorns and sparkles like I had expected, but he told me things that I needed to hear. It was pretty emotional. He talked to me for almost 10 minutes and it ended with a long hug that I will remember forever. Here is the photo he signed for me. I'm going to frame it and hang it in my kitchen.

It was such a great experience. If you are in the area I totally recommend it, even if you aren't a Richard Simmons fan, you will be when you leave! And you can pick up a great "I Sweat With Richard" t-shirt, and towel! Our California vacation was one of our best trips ever, and our night with Richard was a highlight for sure!

Desert Drive! Last day on the West Coast.

Now we've come to the last post from our trip to California! I wanted to wrap it up last week, but we went out of town AGAIN over the weekend so I didn't get a chance.

After we drove through Palm Springs we took a scenic drive through the San Bernadino National Forest on our way to San Diego. Check out that rainbow to the right! Amazing!

Neither of us had ever seen the desert so it was blowing our minds. I had to make myself put the camera down because I couldn't stop taking photos!

It was so unlike any other place we've ever been!

I was freaking out over everything. Especially big cacti like this!!!

Here is my "OMG look at that cactus!" face. Travis told me to cut it out because he kept thinking something was wrong.

We pulled over at lots of scenic overlooks.

Look at all the switch backs!

Me, being a dork. It was such a wonderful vacation. We were feeling so relaxed and being goofy.


It was a pretty long drive, but it was so beautiful we didn't mind.

We saw a bunch of these statues. I liked how they were positioned by the road.

We got to San Diego and check into the King's Inn. I had seen it when we were heading out of town on our first day in California and had to stay there on our way back! It was cute and mid-century looking on the outside. That is really all I need in a hotel.

The pool was gorgeous! Too bad we got into town too late to go swimming. We laid around then room for a bit to unwind, then went to see The World's End at the mall. We have a tradition of going to the movies while we are on vacation. It was great!

Next morning we got up bright and early since we had to be at the airport.

We stopped by the Whole Foods for breakfast. Their vegan muffins were SO MUCH better than the ones at my store! Travis got a juice too, and I got some fruit.

Here we are at the airport. So sad to be going home! The week we spend in California was one of our best trips ever! It was so sad that it was over. I can't wait for our next vacation!

West Coast Vintage Shopping

We didn't do much vintage shopping while we were in California. Which is kind of a surprise because that is one of my favorite things to do while on vacation! Especially so far from home. We saw all kinds of things we don't normally see in Tennessee at the one shop we stopped at right out side of Palm Springs. Oh well, next time! Here are some of the cool things I saw.

Look at all that Bakelite! I love looking at it, but I've never bought anything. Don't you love that snazzy water bottle display? Ha! I've never seen a case full of Bakelite so it was a treat too see all this displayed together!

I really thought about getting one of these guys. I was torn between the bucking bronco and the little native American dude with one googly eye. In the end they were just a little to expensive for my taste.

I REALLY wanted this bean art clown! Isn't he great? If I thought he would have made it home on the plane I might have pulled the trigger. I am now on the lookout for some bean art for my house! I have an owl mostly made out of sunflower seeds already, but I NEED beans!

I also loved these hand drawn portraits of the seven dwarves! They were very charming, every single one was just a little bit off.

Gorgeous Southwest table cloth, but they wanted over a hundred bucks for it! It was small to, probably not even big enough for a card table.

I hadn't ever seen anything like these jewel eyed animals. Pretty cute!

I was gushing over this cowboy light and checking out the price when I remembered that I totally HAVE this exact light in my front room, waiting for the day I turn it into my wild west guest room! It is terrible when you have so much cool stuff that you forget exactly what you have? I need to get working on that room!

There was SO much great mid century stuff. I LOVE those flamingos.

And figural lamps. I am on my way to having only weird figural lamps in my whole house.

Check out that silk screen! How awesome would it be to be able to screen Gerald Ford's presidential seal on whatever you wanted! So handy!

Here is what we ended up getting. A poodle dream pet for me, and a JFK cup for Travis. Not too bad!

A short trip to Palm Springs

Our little trip to Palm Springs wasn't planned at all, so I hadn't really researched anything for us to do while we were there other than drive around and point and cute signs and houses. There is an app available for 5 bucks that will guide you to points on interest, but Travis wasn't into it. So we just winged it.

We had to stop and see Marilyn of course.

We ate lunch at the Palm Greens Cafe and I got a sandwich called the vegan haystack. I'm trying to be brave and not get my food plain all the time so I didn't customize a thing. I got it bbg sauce, pickled jalapenos and all. And it was GREAT!

Travis loved his too. He might have been tired of getting his photo taken by this point. Haha.

If I had planned ahead we would have stayed in the Ace Hotel for the night. Someday! We did walk around the grounds. It was so beautiful!

I was a little obsessed with cacti the entire day.



One of the cutest signs I've ever seen!

We actually did a little vintage shopping right outside Palm Springs, the only shopping we did on our whole trip! I'll show you some of the sights I saw tomorrow!