Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Santa Barbara....

....was beyond fun! The only problem was that we didn't nearly stay long enough.

We woke up "early" on Saturday morning and took the coast all the way up to S.B.


Driving through Malibu was a trip! The houses are literally hotels! Driving through I kept saying to David "which one do you think is Jennifer Aniston's house?........do you think it's that one?........do you think it's that one?..........oh no I bet it's totally THAT one!"

So we've decided that as soon as we make our first 5 mill (as in million) we're moving to Montecito. It was absolutely breathtaking! It was a little hard to actually see the houses, but it didn't matter. The gardens were enough. And they were incredible!


And I'll be moving in to the San Ysidro Ranch - I don't mind having guests!



I wish I had the words to describe how unbelievable this place is. The gardens are the most perfectly tended gardens I've ever seen. Everywhere you looked there were flowers.


All of the buildings had climbing rose, and bougainvillea.


I loved how they use gravel pathways in lieu of the typical concrete pathways that most inns tend to have.

And the rosemary was amazing!


Alicia - I chickened out on taking a picture of the lobby so I took one of the outside instead! This place made me feel like I had to be on my absolute best behavior!


I have to mention the shop that we stopped at in Montecito. It's called William Laman. It's an adorable shop located in a 100 year old barn. It had the most stunning (can you tell I'm running out of adjectives for this post? : ) open-beamed ceilings.





Ok-Last thing and then I promise I'm done. **INTERRUPTION - Did any one watch Betty White on SNL? I'm not typically an SNL viewer but she was SO worth staying up for! She did one segment on Facebook and how she doesn't understand it. She goes on to say how in her day being forced to look at someones pictures of their vacation was considered torture! I'm SO feeling like that right now!!! But I'm almost done and then I'll move on to design-y things! : )

On to my last story - because it wouldn't be right if I left you without a story of me getting caught house stalking. We were heading out of SB when I saw this house out of the corner of my eye. I literally almost got us in an accident getting David to pull off the freeway. This was the most incredible house we saw all weekend. I wish I could have gotten better pictures but it was pretty hidden by bushes, and as I said - I got caught. And by caught I mean leaning from the passenger side, over David on the drivers side and practically hanging out the window. (Are you getting a good visual?)

{It doesn't look like much here - but it was a very neat house (this is a shot of the second story)}


{This is one of 2 gravel driveways - there was a back cottage too}


I'll leave you with a few extras from the weekend!





**Thank you David for an incredible weekend and for the last 10, incredible years! I love you!**

7 comments:

  1. My, that was a lovely weekend. The gardens are beautiful and so are the buildings.

    ReplyDelete
  2. hi melissa,

    what a great post. i LOVE betty and will have to watch that segment. i bet i'll be able to relate to a lot of it.

    my middle son works at rl in malibu. can you imagine the folks that come into his store on a daily basis? sean penn, ozzy & sharon, ray liotta just to name a few from last week alone.

    i suppose you must know that people stalk your house too! hmm, i wonder how i'd know that?

    thank you for sharing such a special weekend with us.

    ~janet

    ReplyDelete
  3. well if you're moving to malibu, then i'm moving into your house! haha. (btw, you better not ever move!) what a lovely vacation you had. i'm totally gonna send this post on to collin. i'm in vacation mode! happy anniversary! see you on saturday:)

    ReplyDelete
  4. I've been waiting for you to post on SB - love the photos (i could have handled more). I have a bazillion of SYR....we will have to pour over them sometime ; ) y'all could have asked to see a cottage - ya' know make up some sort of story about planning a girls trip or something. first you become a stalker and than you start lying your way into certain situations, it's a process - it may take you some time ; 0
    thanks for sharing! xoAlicia

    ReplyDelete
  5. Happy Anniversary!

    I came over from gardeners cottage blog. I live in Ventura County and recognized Neptune's Net immediately! The next time you drive along PCH, be sure to stop at Trancas Canyon! You won't be sorry. Malibu Gardens Nursery, and two other shops, one that sells old movie props and another beach style furnshings called "Room at the Beach".

    ReplyDelete
  6. Funny to see a blog post on my home town. Looks like you found a lot of my favorites around town, especially the corner Cape Cod house on Shoreline Drive. Just popped into Rooms and Gardens on my lunch hour on Friday. Hopefully, you found my other favorite store, Celadon.

    ReplyDelete
  7. So did you stay at the Ranch? Lucky you! I adore SB and especially montecito. If you ever find yourself up that way again soon, the people in Montecito have the MOST amazing Craigslist finds and estate sales. Just sayin'!

    ReplyDelete