Such Tourists in LA :)

January 18th

Saturday we spent the morning and early afternoon on Hollywood Boulevard doing some touristy things.  We walked along the Hollywood Walk of Fame and checked out the Chinese Theatre with the famous handprints, footprints, and signatures of many celebrities in the concrete.  Apparently there are almost 200 - it didn't seem like that many to me when we were there!  I only got pictures of a handful of them.

Gotta love Will Smith.

John Travolta.

Meryl Streep - had to get her since we'd just seen her on Ellen :)

Matt Damon.

Some of the Twilight cast.

Tom Hanks.

Jennifer Aniston - she was wearing heels :)

Adam Sandler.

There was a fun mall next door with a huge candy boutique that we checked out.  These steps were piano keys and would actually play as you walked up and down them :)

We got tickets to tour the Dolby Theatre, but had some time to use up, so we did a little shopping.

The Dolby Theatre is where the Academy Awards take place and Ellen actually hosted this year just the other week on March 2nd. We were not allowed to take any pictures inside during the tour.

Stairway up to the entrance of the Dolby Theatre.

It was interesting to see and hear how they get all set up for the Academy Awards because the theatre is literally inside a mall, so they were explaining how they cover all of the store fronts with curtains and roll out the red carpet.  We got to go up on the stage and they kept telling us that we were just kind of seeing the bones and framework and that it would look a lot nicer for the Awards..haha.

We got to see an Oscar and learned that celebrities are absolutely prohibited from giving away or selling an Oscar they've won.  If for some reason they don't want it, they can give it back to the Academy and they'll receive a dollar in return.  ONE dollar..haha.  Also, they're names aren't engraved on the Oscar until the after party.  So it really is a complete surprise for the announcers (and everyone else) as to who the winner is.

Picture after our tour.

It was fun to watch the Academy Awards the other week and see how they had dolled up the whole place since when we had seen it :)

Jimmy Kimmel airs across the street.

After that we headed to lunch at The Ivy.  Jordan got us reservations there.  It's kind of a celebrity hotspot so we were hoping to see someone, but no such luck.  Oh well, it was still fun to be there :)  We were a little surprised to find out that sharing is not allowed (it's a little pricey there), but we just kind of laughed and decided it was part of the experience ;)

Such a cute group, if I say so myself :) 

Just a shot of it from across the street.

There was lots of high end boutique shopping around there, so we did a little "window shopping."  I loved the ivy all over Stella McCartney's storefront.

The girls were excited to check out DASH, founded by the Kardashian sisters.  I actually didn't know anything about it because I don't watch Keeping Up with the Kardashians..ha.

Just a quick walk through :)

More ivy love - Diane von Furstenberg.

We headed back to the hotel for naps (haha) and later that evening we got a little more dressed up and headed to The Grove, an outdoor shopping mall.  It was a nice night and fun to just take it easy.

A nice backdrop for us sisters in Anthropologie..haha.

On this night baby girl was really active and the girls all got to feel her moving around :)  Amy was a little shocked that she "high kicked" her..haha.

We shopped and picked up some cheesecake from Cheesecake Factory, the best!

Not the best pictures, but we needed to document :)

We drove down Rodeo Drive and headed back to the hotel to get packed up.  The next day we flew home.  I was a little sad that all of the girls got to fly together.  And it stunk because their flight was like 5 hours before mine..ha.  I was so early they wouldn't even let me check in for like another hour!

Anyway, it was such a fun trip!  It freaked me out though, while giving hugs and saying goodbye, that the next time I'd be seeing them I'd have a new baby!!  Little did we know that I'd be seeing my sisters and Bryn just a few weeks later (with my Dad's accident and all).  I'm so glad to have my sisters and cousins as my very best friends :) Hopefully we can keep up the girl's trips!