Seaworld, Part 1

During our vacation in Carlsbad, we went on two day-trips to San Diego. SeaWorld was just a little over 30 miles away from the inn, so we spent a day out there. And believe me, it took us a full day to see everything... and we still missed one of the amusement park-type rides.

My other ride is Shamu! Heh.

Tickets at the gate are not cheap at $73 per person. However, you can get discounts by buying them online, searching for coupons, or buying them as a packaged deal with tickets to other San Diego attractions. I found a coupon for $20 off each ticket. It is a full day of entertainment, and they have to feed, house, and care for the animals somehow. We felt better knowing they also use their revenue to fund conservation efforts.

Seals galore!

Seaworld houses a variety of penguins. The ones below can survive outside in the San Diego weather, although they did enjoy swimming around a lot. They had an amazing penguin exhibit indoors under controlled lighting and heating conditions, featuring Emperor penguins. We learned that Emperor penguins only exist in three places in the world - one of those being in the wild. Seaworld has also aided conservation of the species by successfully hatching several Emperor penguins (no easy feat, apparently). I would definitely recommend stopping by that exhibit during one of the "show" times, when they feed and talk about the various penguin species.

Polar bears are epic. I mean, look at this dude.

And the only tank pictures that did not look atrocious were of the friendly turtle! Man, turtles are cool. Especially this one. Ever since Finding Nemo, turtles always remind me of Crush and Squirt.

Lots of awesome sea life... and great shows. I have some pictures and videos from the shows at Seaworld, so stay tuned!

Hair Through the Years... Ideas Requested!

I have a hair appointment with my amazing hairdresser, Antonio, this Friday, and as usual, cannot quite decide what to do with my hair. I typically decide on the day of the appointment - sometimes while sitting in the chair. Hehe. I always change the color, but this time I also need to change the cut. After bleaching it to oblivion, I think my hair needs a break. BUT, it is lighter than it ever has been, and that is hard for me to give up... because I know if I dye it back to black and grow it out again, it will take an immense amount of work to bring it back to the point where I can dye it almost any color I want again. I am have been thinking of doing rainbow hair for quite a while now, and after seeing Kaylah's new hair color, I am dying to do a pastel rainbow of sorts. My current hair color is very blonde, with bright pink and blue streaks and purple tips, as seen in my launch photoshoot.

I started out with the best hair ever. Strong, silky, and vibrant. After years of dyeing and extensive bleach damage, it now feels completely dead. Since I never had hair issues before, I always just used generic shampoo and conditioner. I know virtually nothing about hair products. So I am going to try out some of the suggestions in San's post about how to make damaged hair look healthy, and hope my hair can survive one last hurrah. Then it's back to my natural black? With a few rebellious streaks, probably... =)

I dug up some pictures of a few previous hair colors... this one was Manic Panic: first Amplified Flash Lightning 40 Volume Bleach, then Amplified Vampire Red. There was also some leftover red from a previous dye job.

The next hair color I only had for about 30 minutes... before I dyed the blonde part blue!

And... the resulting blue. It was darker at first but later washed out to the color you can see in the bangs. Dyed with Manic Panic Atomic Turquoise.

And this one with Manic Panic Hot Hot Pink. That side streak was not intentional... haha. That's what happens when you lay your foil highlight strip across your head and some of the bleach/dye leaks through. =)

And of course you can tell a pro did the next one. No way I would be able to get it looking that good. This was when Antonio suggested I try extensions, so I had him dye them Cotton Candy Pink and tried them out for a while. It would be nice for my hair color and texture if these had worked out! Only problem is that the extensions irritated me too much. They looked great, though!

Jewelry - Locketship

Again, done by Antonio at the salon. This recent dye job included some bright pink and blue (color from the salon), which faded to a nice gradient.

Jewelry from an unreleased Kelsea Echo collection

SO. Appointment Friday. Suggestions, anyone? Color and/or cut. I think I am going to cut it about shoulder length to get rid of some of the damage. That is really short for me. Eep!

Carlsbad Inn

Earlier this month, I posted about the Unique LA, the craft fair we attended with our friends Andrew and Nico. After spending that day in LA, we drove to Carlsbad. This week, I will be sharing our photos and experiences from the trip.

We stayed at the Carlsbad Inn for six nights - got a sweet deal for it last year on LivingSocial. Our room was decent sized and contained a cozy kitchenette.

The inn hosts several events each day, but the only one we ended up attending was the welcome snack on the lawn of the inn. I was attracted by the offer of free food, Jacob by the offer of free wine (boxed, but apparently still good enough). =)

Hairpiece from an upcoming Kelsea Echo collection

Across the street from the back of the inn, there was a staircase to the beach.

Jacob

If you recall, I have recently become enamored with cacti and succulents. Of course, they don't grow in the Pacific Northwest. But they do in Carlsbad!! We found these on the way down the staircase.

Okay, not only were there several succulents in little planters... there was a whole field of them! Blooming. Right along the path to the beach. I was ridiculously excited about it.

Hard to beat the beauty of rolling waves on the beach.

Later, walking around town, we came across a colorful surf shop where I bought a pair of sunglasses. Left mine at home thanks to always packing at the last minute... oops.

We also came across a few painted fire hydrants.

All in all it was a nice, cute little beach town. Lots of little shops and restaurants - to be posted soon!