Parks and Recreation

We had a blast in California this weekend. Ev and I got to tour the set of Parks and Recreation, see two scenes being shot, and meet Amy Poehler and Adam Scott! (and see Chris Pratt in action) The whole experience was pretty surreal...we had no idea how the entire shooting worked, and how many minute details were involved in every aspect of shooting. Alan really hooked us up and guided us around for about 3 hours before heading back to work. Then we stayed on our own and watched a scene with Adam Scott and Chris Pratt :) They shot the first scene, Amy Poehler giving a press conference, about 10-11 times and I was amazed at how many lines she had to memorize and how many different takes they did with just a little bit of tweaking each time.

Anyway, we met and 'talked to' Amy Poehler and Adam Scott, who were so nice. Amy's son was even there for part of the shooting. And it's true that everyone is smaller in person (well except Chris Pratt who is just as large as he looks on-screen!). We would be enormous on screen, I am sure. We weren't really sure about asking to take photos so I just pulled a couple of pics from the internet and we'll call it good :)

(By the way, the set was so authentic looking. I really thought we were in city hall - I could barely tell what was real and what was set.)

Amy Poehler

Adam Scott

Chris Pratt

Dad and Joanne were game enough to babysit for about 9 hours on Friday, for which we were very appreciative! Four kids 5-years-old and under are no piece of cake.

Saturday, we visited Knott's Berry Farm. It was a scaled down version of Disneyland for sure, but less exorbitant ticket prices, no lines, and a great selection of small kids' rides were right up our alley. The kids walked for a grand total of about 6 hours, with no complaints and very few breakdowns. All in all...success!!!

Olin experienced Knott's Berry Farm in the comfort of the Beco Carrier

This Speedway ride whipped us around those turns surprisingly fast!

Leelee's favorite School Bus ride - rode it 3 times.

Snoopy

This next series of photos I will call the Many Faces of Olin (along with the one outfit of Olin's. He wore the same outfit the entire weekend until this morning, when he decided to blow through two):

Something about the combination of Olin's face, Didi's face, and the fire flaming over Ev's head on the TV I find very funny!