last week i finally got to take james and alice on one of my most favorite cheap day trips: treats at diddy riese and the noahs ark exhibit at the skirball cultural center. this is a trip my family has done a few times in the past, and i was really excited to get to share it with james and alice (especially since my dad and stepmom took alice to noahs ark without us and i was totally jealous). my mom and i had been talking for a while about going at some point this summer, and last thursday we all got to go (along with some friends and my aunt and cousins) and have a really great time.
since our reservation for 3:30 pm, went to diddy riese first:
now if youre not familiar with diddy riese, its a little bakery in westwood (right next to ucla) that only sells cookies, brownies, ice cream, and shave ice (i think they used to have hot dogs too? or maybe i made that up?). and not only are their cookies fantastic, theyre also SUPER cheap. i mean, look at these prices:
since i cant have cookies ever again, i got an ice cream sundae:
which was not only a lot of ice cream for $1.75, but it also came topped with a huge pile of AWESOME real whipped cream (im a big whipped cream snob, so i can tell the difference). so even though i was sad that i couldnt have a cookie (or ten), i was still really happy with my treat.
just about everyone else got ice cream sandwiches though:
as you can clearly see, thats two cookies and a giant scoop of ice cream. for 1.75. seriously. if you live anywhere near the la area and havent been to diddy riese, you need to go check it out. right now. its the best. even alice knows whats up:
AND! treats for all three of us (plus two cookies for later) was only $4.75. for real. its probably the cheapest treat in town. (i would note though that parking in westwood can be kind of tricky and/or expensive but we happened to find a metered spot right in front that has 30 minutes already on it, so that wasnt an issue this particular day)
anyways, after we were all stuffed with sweets, we went to the skirball cultural center, which is just a few minutes away:
now the skirball center is normally $10 for adults, but its free on thursdays. however, to keep the noahs ark exhibit from getting too crowded, you need advance reservations for that exhibit only (you can read more about it here). anyways, noahs ark is a big interactive exhibit revolving around different aspects of the noahs ark story, centered around these AMAZING animal sculptures made from recycled materials:
the exhibit has tons and tons of different things to play with, so alice had SO much fun. here she is having a dinner party with her aunt and cousin:
theres a huge climbing area, but its definitely more for the older kids, alice wasnt very into it:
alices favorite thing though, was sweeping up the pretend poop:
yeah, moving on...
the best part of the day was that the skirball had some cats(!) visiting from a local animal shelter:
seriously, real live cats! and a craft station to make cat toys! it was so cute! since our reservation was towards the end of the day, we didnt have a lot of time left to to check out the rest of the museum, but we did poke around the gary basemen exhibition, which was fun. and then alice took a really great nap on the way home. the end.
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