We moved to Capistrano Beach in 1995 and in that same year a movie came out – Man of the House – with Chevy Chase, Farrah Fawcett and Jonathan Taylor Thomas.

Farrah Fawcett is a single mom dating Chevy Chase and her son, Jonathan Taylor Thomas isn’t too fond of this new man coming into his home.  A small part of the movie is where Mom and Son gather “Beach Treasures” and add them to a net on their wall.  I loved the idea and we hung up a net on an outside wall in our front patio.  When we found fun things at the beach we added them to the net.  After a storm we would go down and find some great things!  I just found a surfboard fin this month and have just added some nice pieces of drift wood to frame out net!

There are things in the net we have bought … shells, a fishing man, mermaid thing … but it’s all fun and looks cute!

My newest design is now available!  Some of my favorite things – The Beach, Finding Shells and Cross Stitching!

You can find the Kit and Pattern at my store – Camp Cross Stitch

We just remodeled our kitchen and I have been searching the web, for the past 6 months, for a new dining room table and chairs.  I really liked the idea of buying Amish made furniture.  Made in America!

Well, we actually bought our dining room table at Restoration Hardware while out looking for a couch… isn’t that the way it goes?  We love the table!!  It is made of 100 year old wood from Great Britain.  It is raw wood and that is the look we wanted.  It comes with two end leaves which makes the table big enough to seat 10 people!

When we saw the table in the store it had 3 planks of wood on top, our table came with 5.  The table in the store was lighter in color, ours came darker.  But .. we like it better than what we saw, so all is good.

This is the Trestle Salvaged Wood Extension Dining Table 72″  – HERE

So, now that I’ve gotten off the topic of Amish completely, I will tell you where we found our chairs!

We found our chairs here – Furnishings Direct and there website is www.comfortablehouse.com

They are located in Garden Grove California, just south of the 22 freeway on Harbor.

They are the most comfortable chairs!  We sat in a lot of chairs and wanted a really comfortable chair on our backs and bottoms!

We liked the light wood and the chairs are lighter in weight than others we looked at.  I don’t know if you’ve looked for dining chairs, but some are really, really heavy!

Each chair will be signed my the Amish worker who mde it.  It will have a marker on it (under the chair) that tells what wood it is made from and other important info.

Some pictures I took in the store -

Beautiful Furniture – Made in America!

I’ve been busy working on my new website!  I’ve added campsite maps to San Elijo, Doheny, Carlsbad with campsite pictures.  You can check on the campground map and see if I have a picture of a particular campsite.  I have a list of all available campsite pictures below each Camp Map.  I plan on adding the missing pictures over time … hopefully soon!  I drove down to Doheny to take pictures and forgot it was spring break!  The place was almost full .. so will head down next week.  I like to take photos of empty or near empty campsites to give you an idea of the depth, width, layout, etc..

I plan on adding a lot to this website and welcome ideas, suggestions, comments, and campsite pictures and recipes!!

If you own a KOA or Private camping resort, I would love to interview you and add your site to my site!

Check it out!!!

The Camp Site – Your Camping Resource

Earlier this month I stayed at the Holiday Inn Kensington Forum in London.  My daughter is in a study abroad program and her apartment is right next to the hotel, so it worked out perfect!

I had read reviews on Trip Advisor, some good, some bad.  I remember one of the reviews said the lobby looked like an airport lobby.  Well, it is big, but it’s a big hotel.  You have a lot of pilots and attendants staying here plus some large groups which took up a lot of room in that big lobby!

When I arrived at the hotel, a nice doorman took my luggage for me and it was delivered to my room   That was nice.  Check in went smoothly.  I booked a King Exectutive room because when I was looking at the different room options, it seemed a safer bet I would get a nice room with this option.

The room was nice.  My only comments -

The bath towels – Why can’t the bath towels be softer?  They felt rough.  If I went again, I would bring my own towel and just leave it ..

WiFi – Only available if you pay for it … even in the lobby!  I finally paid the 25 pounds for 48 hours of internet in my room.  Pricey but worth it for me at the time.

American Electrical Plugs – I also chose this hotel because they offer a line of plugs so you don’t have to use an adapter.  My “American” plug didn’t work so I had to call down and get someone to fix it.  They couldn’t fix it, but brought up a portable one for me to use.  This was a big plus because using adapters with your “American” curling irons, flat irons, etc ..  can heat them up wayyyy toooo fast and ruin them.

In-Room Refridgerator – NOT COLD – Barely room temperature.  I bought some Stella’s at the market and put them in the fridge … checked later and they were room temp.  On my way out for the day, I mentioned this to the front desk and was told the fridge isn’t meant to be cold, but to keep things more at room temp.  Give me a break.  And, you don’t find ice machines in hotels in London, or at least not where I’ve stayed.  I guess everyone drinks their beer in the pubs ….

Elevator security – You have to use your key to use the elevator.  This is nice … keeps people out who don’t belong there!

Concierge – Nice.  I bought my tickets to The Tower of London through the Concierge.  Didn’t save me money, but time in line … if there was one.  I also went down to see if they could go on-line to United and check me in for my flight.  They let me use the computer!  That was really nice.

I would stay here again unless the Radisson down the street offered free WiFi and was comparable in price.  We stayed at the Radisson Blu in Edinburgh and that was really nice.

Here is a picture of my room -

The view from my window facing Cromwell Road.

FYI – The hotel entrance is on Ashburn Place.  When I was looking at the map on Google and “walked around” the area, I thought the entrance would be on Cromwell Road.

Things close by -

The tube – Gloucester Road – very close and convenient!

Starbucks with free WiFi

Paul – Great Coffee and Bakery goodies!

Waitrose – the local market which is closer to the hotel than Sainsbury’s down the street.

Where we ate  -

Nando’s – Peri Peri Chicken – different levels of spice available.  Really good!  Flame Grilled Chicken.

Wildwood Restaurant – 154 Gloucester Road – Nice Italian choices but I had their special for the night which was Shepards Pie.  One of the best desserts we had – a waffle, bananas, nuts, ice cream and toffee sauce!

We ate at Da Mario up on Gloucester Road and it was Great!  We started with the Garlic Bread and Fantasia di Bufala Alla Caprese – SO GOOD!

We then shared a pizza and salad.  This is a small place with Great Food!  I would highly recommend it!!

One night we ate at The Monsoon on Brick Lane.  It was very very good.  It is traditional Bangladeshi cooking.  We had the chicken curry and a really good appetizer … can’t remember the name … it was just really good!

We also ate at the Newman Arms which was featured on Anthony Bourdain’s show.  It was very good.  We had to make reservations and we ate upstairs in the Pie Room.

Please let me know if you have any questions – just leave me a comment!