Long Beach
We make our home in Long Beach, Calif. It is the state’s fifth-largest city and maybe the last almost-affordable coastal community within a three-hour drive of Los Angeles. We are raising our kids here, eating at local restaurants, and enjoying the mix of beach vibe, cultures, decades of history and busy calendar of things to do all year long.
Neither one of us is from here, though we met here and, as much as we love to travel, we are happy to call it our home.
A Light in the Attic
Late one night I got an urgent text from Charla. “Someone’s iPad was missing!” “Was it stolen?” “We are checking her Find my iPhone app to find it!” Sigh. She was going to be late that night, then. One of the guests of the wedding…read more
Frida Kahlo | Her Photos at MOLAA
Feeling artsy this weekend? Grab the kids and check out “Frida Kahlo, Her Photos”, at the Long Beach Museum of Latin American Art, or MOLAA. Luckily, Los Angeles County is full of opportunities to get your art on, and you can even find something kid-friendly…read more
What’s For Dinner? Find out at your farmers market
We are grateful for the warm and friendly response that we have received from our readers at So There’s That. Just last week my niece texted me and said, “You should open a food truck.” While that’s a venture best reserved for another blog entirely,…read more
Restauration brings good food and vibe to Retro Row in Long Beach
It would be too easy a cliché to refer to Long Beach’s Fourth Street, “Retro Row”, as the city’s best kept secret. It is equally easy to fall for similar clichés of the area’s hipster culture, artsy vibe, and smart, sassy people. While Retro Row…read more
Yard Wine | Welcome to the Neighborhood
Several months ago, before I moved from the action-packed streets of Long Beach’s Belmont Shore to this quiet neighborhood in Belmont Heights, I got out of my car outside Charla’s apartment and saw a skinny dog running loose in the empty nighttime street. But it…read more
Urban Living | Downtown Long Beach
One the greatest pleasures I discovered as a foreign exchange student living in Europe was living in an urban space: multiple floors of housing above retail stores, markets, restaurants, cafes, all connected by a transportation network of roads, rails, sidewalks, and bike paths. It happened…read more
Simmzy’s Pub | Belmont Shore
Just a few days away from the longest day of the year and the start of summer, we celebrated the end of school by walking to Long Beach’s epic Second Street, the relentlessly beating heart of Long Beach’s Belmont Shore. A few years ago I…read more