Summer Birthdays- Oh the Beauty of Lazy Weekend Events

This will likely be part 1 of a series on summer birthdays (and the summer is coming to a close already).  I've got a big family, and therefore lots of birthdays to celebrate!  Summer is great because these birthdays always end up lingering, and being celebrated for weeks... with barbeques, dinners, brunches and cakes.

In late July, we celebrated with the niece + Vicky.  (It was part one of the niece's 6th birthday celebration)... We had quite the feast on a mellow Sunday afternoon.  The star of the show was Enjoy Cupcake's beautifully crafted gems.  I had been dreaming of them forEVER, when Amber of Enjoy Cupcakes had tweeted that week about starting to experiment with gluten-free cupcakes.  I was instantly consumed with the thought of finally being able to taste these scrumptious looking goodies.  Hours later, the opportunity presented itself when RayRay (that's what my niece used to call him) told us that he'd be in Santa Barbara for the weekend, visiting on his maturing wine.  I took advantage of this information, and suggested that while he checked on his wine, he go pick us up some cupcakes as well.

Lucques Ribfest #1! Sunday Supper in Los Angeles!

Ribfest #1 happened a month ago... but in honor of Ribfest #2 (8/15/2010), I thought I'd post my experience from the first showdown with meat this year at Lucques Restaurant in Los Angeles.

Photo credit: gusto.com

Lucques is a renowned restaurant, with a star chef, Suzanne Goin, who has been nominated for a James Beard Award ("the Oscar of our world" as described by the restaurant host).  Anyhow, this is how it all happened... My man and I had a Groupon to the restaurant Taste, which is located next door to Lucques (this was on a Saturday night).  I'd been dying to try Lucques, and our reservation at Taste wasn't for a few minutes... so we sauntered over to Lucques to have a look.