I missed a lot of movies while I was traveling, so I’m trying to catch up.
Luckily “Bridesmaids” is still playing at the dollar theater.
As I’ve said before, I’m not crazy about weddings, so I don’t even enjoy watching movies about them. But this flick is different.
It’s hilarious. It’s messy. It’s downright awkward. Just like a real wedding.
Where’s the very best place to spend Labor Day Weekend? Plopped down on a beach chair at Manhattan Beach, surrounded by your best friends, with a can of champagne in hand.
The perfect summer day was capped off with a visit to Cupcakes Couture, a fancy, pretty-in-pink bakery that recently won “Cupcake Wars.”
Here’s the gorgeous Lime in the Coconut, one of the winning flavors from the show.
And it’s hard to tell from this photo, but this Sunday Mimosa cupcake was such a piece of art. It’s champagne cake filled with blood orange curd topped with a mascarpone citrus frosting, garnished with blood orange pearls. It was approximately the size of someone’s hand, with towers of sparkly icing.
BONUS FUN! My friend Maria recently moved from the desert to the beach, because she has more surf in her blood than sand. This was our first chance to really catch up since I returned from my trip, so we hugged, dished, ate pizza, took a nighttime walk on the pier. It was fantastic.
EXTRA BONUS FUN! Seeing Maria’s gorgeous children!
Tonight, when it’s so late it barely even qualifies as today, I’m going to a birthday party!
You guys, I am such a birthday person, probably because my earliest ones were so unremarkable. I only remember three of them: The year I received an umbrella instead of Pink & Pretty Barbie; the time my mom splurged on a Snow White cake with a plastic figurine, candy dwarves and jellybean rocks; and a celebration at Showbiz Pizza that ended with a grubby bucket of vomit, five sobbing children and a Care Bear stained with pepperoni grease.
Nowadays, I go out of my way to make every birthday memorable, whether that means attending trapeze school, riding roller coasters or skydiving in my underwear. And I compile these activities, parties and experiences into a full week of festivities that I call Maggie Gras.
It’s a lot like Mardi Gras but with fewer beads.
I figure the aging part doesn’t matter as much as celebrating the passage of time in an explosively fun way.
My birthday mantra goes something like this:
I believe in the power of wearing a tiara all day long. Even to work. (But why didn’t you call in sick to work?)
I believe in special brunch foods, prepared extra fancy — preferably served in a watermelon bowl.
I believe in enough cheap flowers to blanket the dining room table.
I believe in surprises, thoughtfulness and burning candles in a bowl of soy ice cream.
I believe in gin martinis and frou-frou cocktails.
I believe in all the tiny magic that walks hand in hand with birthdays.
Unfortunately, my birthday obsession spills over to the other important people in my life. My husband — who is decidedly not a birthday person — has reluctantly warmed up to getting a car filled with balloons, heart-shaped pancakes, public serenades, birthday card scavenger hunts, pinatas and the birthday sombrero.
Lucky for him, I balance all this birthday love by hating Christmas and weddings.
In between laundry, dishes, grocery shopping, cooking, washing the dog, scooping the litterbox and packing for a move, I took a quick but restorative break.
Bare feet.
Steamy coffee.
Hula-hooping in the dewy morning grass, blasting the new song from Mates of State.
Shake your maracas to this synthy bubblegum goodness. Ka-POW!
Happy weekending!