30th Birthday Holiday, Fabric, Dresses and more!

It's been another huge year for me as I approach the scary adult age of thirty. It started off well since we had been saving all our pennies to put towards buying a house. It just turned out that we had this brilliant idea at the end of last year to book a three week holiday to the USA for my 30th birthday. Since my husband's birthday is only a day before mine we figured, why not? 

Then as we started looking for houses we stumbled across a great new estate selling house and land packages. Turns out or house settlement was only one week before this huge and incredibly expensive trip! So with much stress, packing, cleaning and then a battle to pay off accommodation vs feature walls, we not only moved into our new home but also got on our flight to the US!

Here's a little run down of our holiday.

Las Vegas

This was without a doubt the funnest part of our holiday. What better way to turn thirty (especially on Electric Daisy Carnival week) than to go to VEGAS, baby! So much fun and didn't even had to leave your hotel (mostly).

Here are a few photos....

The Strip

Lekala Dress I made for going to see Avicii at XS nightclub (since it's been a while since I went clubbing). 

Don't you love the cool ball thingy mcbob in the background!

This was my comfy touring outfit (Pin Peg Mini skirt by Annie)

Grand Canyon Helicopter Tour

Electric Daisy Carnival outfit number 1

Again another Lekala Dress - My US dress obsession. 

View from the stage at Electric Daisy Carnival

Few things I discovered in Vegas

1. The Grand Canyon tour was amazing and a must do!
2. They put a lot more alcohol in their drinks, which may or may not have contributed to an all day hangover (whoops!)
3. We booked a 3 day festival - made 3 outfits - was amped up to go to all 3 nights but in reality turning 30 is nothing like turning 20. So in the end we only made it to one extremely amazing and incredible night! It was well worth the $800 we spent on VIP tickets (lol). 
4. Even going overseas you can't avoid making friends with other Aussies. We left feeling we were a damn crazy, friendly and an extremely fun bunch of weirdos.

New York

We then flew across the country to New York! Here we stayed in a room that was the size of the bathroom in Vegas...damn (another reasons to miss being in Vegas). However, what an incredible place!

Here are some photos...

Central Park

Diner around the corner we ate at pretty much every day.

Being in New York you walk a lot! We spent about 3 days just walking discovering 5th Avenue, Soho, Upper West, Upper East, Central Park, the Garment District, Times Square, World Trade Center and more. There was so much to do and so many place to explore.

I am proud to say I got to visit Mood Fabrics and spent quite a lot of money. One of the best things we did in New York was the boat tour, which allowed us to get a 1.5 hour run down of the entire place spanning from Brooklyn to New York. 

Oh, and get this the New Yorkers had no idea what we were saying. I know being an Aussie we are slightly bogan at times and tend to shorten nearly every word but in the end we still speak English!

Example: 

Me: Do you have any brochures? 

Hotel Staff: Any what?

Me: Any brochures...like for tours?

Hotel Staff: For tours? uhhh....

Me: Yeah like a pamphlet?

Hotel Staff: OH A PAMPHLET! Here is a pamphlet of our hotel. Here is the business card for Jill, our manager. She can organise a tour of the hotel if you just give her a call.

Me: Stands there confused because we are in New York aren't we? Why do I want a tour of your hotel?

My actual reply: Umm...okay. That will do. 

San Francisco

I would have to say that San Francisco was more my kind of place. I had been building up a Pinterest board of all the places I wanted to see and I was quite happy with myself that I got to take photos of all these famous places.

Painted Ladies

Fisherman's Wharf

Fisherman's Wharf

Golden Gate Bridge

The Crookedest Street

Blogger Meetup!

The best parts was getting to meet my long time blogger friend Ping (Peneloping) and Emily (Dressing The Role)! It was so nice to meet these girls who I had admired from half way across the world. Plus, we caught up over something we all love - fabric. Yes, that's right. We couldn't help ourselves. You'll know what I mean when you see the photos below. 

Britex Fabrics located in Union Square had over 5 level filled with goodies! I spent way too much, especially since the dollar was at an all time low (another whoops!).

Thanks for travelling all the way to meet me for this day, girls! I had such a great time and it was so good to finally meet you. I'm also looking forward to the day I can return the favour if you ever want to visit us in Queensland. xx

Emily, Me & Ping.

Emily, Me & Ping.

Final leg of the trip

From there we got in a car and safely (since we had to drive on the opposite side of the road) managed to drive the beautiful California Coast from San Francisco back to Los Angeles. At first we were overwhelmed with how beautiful it was getting to see those cute little coastal towns along the way. Plus, there were never ending lollie shops, which my husband had to wait out the front off while I filled a 2kg bag for each leg of the trip. 

Then he's like, "Isn't all that chocolate going to make you sick?" (since I'm dairy intolerant). Me - "Yes, most likely but it's my birthday!" (He couldn't really say no to that could he?)

 Here are some photos...

Monterey (which we sounded like idiots saying since it's kinda spoken as Mon-eray).

Elephant Seals at a beach along the way

How cool is this!! My husband was required to stop so I could get photos!

  

Santa Monica Pier

Now we are back and come to terms with the fact that our holiday is over and we now have to start thinking about other things - like paying off the mortgage...eiikk! But that's okay because I have a bigger stash of fabric and what better way to save money than to spend each weekend sewing!

I will post more photos of the dresses, skirts and tops that I made for my USA trip soon!

Happy Sewing!

Erin xx