Believe it or not, but even we photographers take breaks! ;)
This past weekend I originally had a scheduled headshot session, but due to the terrible season of sickness, we had to reschedule it. :/ But thankfully, it ended up being a blessed weekend of just relaxing with my dear friend, Kristy, & exploring new things! :)
Ever since I realized that the Huntington Beach Public Library was completely different than the Huntington Library, I itched to see it in person. I’ve always been a huge lover of both nature & art, so when I heard what the Huntington Library was like, I thought it sounded like a dream come true–and it WAS!
Kristy and I had planned for Saturday to be just a relaxing day of eating desserts. We had no idea what to do until in conversation we had discussed talking about how we had always wanted to see it! And soooo we decided to do something about it! Already 2014 has become a year of actively doing! :)
After some lunch at Lemonade in Pasadena, we headed off to the Huntington Library in San Marino, where lo and behold we ran into John’s dad, Mr. Kwok! He was there with his friend and had just purchased a membership! It was such an amazing blessing because they gave us free guest pasts to go in! Already the trip started off beautifully!
When we walked in we were overwhelmed with all the greenery! Thankfully Mr. Kwok and Mr. Quon helped us figure out where we would go in our short time we had before the park closed! We started in the Chinese Garden, moved to the Japanese Garden, & went to the Main House of the Library to end our trip! Everything was SO completely peaceful & beautiful! After a busy end of the year filled with meeting & photoshoots, it was an amazing break!
You may recognize the lovely Kristy from her senior portrait shoot at Biola University here. She also was featured again in my blog post on how to ROCK your photoshoot (read it here!). :)
As we walked from the Chinese garden to the Japanese garden, we found pretty awesome structures and building details! Here’s an example of one of the things we found! :)
We also found this beautiful flower amongst several other beautiful flowers along the way! It’s called a “Camellia japonica sdlg.”
If only we could go in! So cool!
SO many beautiful bridges as well!! Unfortunately we couldn’t cross any of the crazily built ones! But we found a tiny one at the very least! :)
After the gardens we headed towards the Main House, where all the art was at, but we found a rose garden with these awesome dome shaped structures!
Kristy forced me in front of her camera for a few shots! Haha
& As we approached the Main House, we were completely in awe at the beauty of the mansion! It reminded us both of Pride & Prejudice, or maybe even just the grand-ness of the Great Gatsby House because it was in the midst of such a beautiful landscape! We couldn’t believe that this place used to be someone’s actual HOME.
Once we finally figured out how to enter, we were also so very captivated by all of their art collection! Kristy is also an amazing graphic designer who loves art as well! You can check out her work here. :)
One of our favorite rooms was the library! It looked like it came out of a movie–or Beauty and the Beast! It even had a vintage rolling library ladder, but we weren’t allowed on it! :( Their collection of literature was unreal!
Once we left the Main House, we realized we had a little more time before dinner and we ventured out to find the Botanical Science Observatory, which was beautiful! It was a bit humid inside, though, so we didn’t stay as long as we wanted to! Also, we had started to grow a bit hungry (for dessert)! :)
As our day ended, we got to try out this wonderful dessert shop called Cookies & Creme in South Pasadena! It was such a little hole in the wall with DELICIOUS homemade ice cream & cookies! :)
Here’s a little Instagram (taken on my iPhone) of the awesome food Kristy and I had during our little adventure! You can follow me at @Margarbee. :)
I hope all of your New Years’ have filled with love and joy so far! :)
Happy Tuesday!