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Thursday, March 22, 2018

a real-life candyland...sorta

okay, so i've taken you through the museum of ice cream.  and then i shared the happy place with you.  after that i was on board to bring you into candytopia, which was scheduled to open back in december somewhere near downtown l.a.

but then the organizers of it couldn't get it together to clear a pretty important hurdle before opening:  permits from the city.  oops.  and so after a few social media posts and emails about having to postpone followed by radio silence for a long time, they ended up refunding everyone who'd bought tickets with a promise to open elsewhere in the near future.

what they ended up doing was packing up and moving to santa monica, where they were finally able to pull it off and open to the public.  and while santa monica is hardly a convenient place for us to visit, we decided to re-buy our tickets and head out to check it out.  why?  because we're gluttons for punishment.  heh.

we actually kicked off the day with a trip to the dentist and ortho for the bean, where she got her teef cleaned and x-rayed and found no cavities, plus picked up compliments from the hygienist on how well she was maintaining her choppers.


and then because it was st. patrick's day, we stopped at krispy kreme to pick up some green donuts.



she even had time to squeeze in her yoga class that morning, and then when her sister got home from work we hopped into the car and made the trek out to the west side.  candytopia is located in santa monica place, which is across the street from 3rd street promenade.


after a bit of a wait, we finally stepped through these doors and our candyriffic journey began.


just inside, this cart offered candytopia branded "selfie lights," in case you needed some extra lighting for all the pictures you'd be taking.


always take advantage of alllllll the photo ops.




 and then it was time to enter the first room.


after listening to a short speech about the rules (which really only consisted of "don't eat the candy on the displays" - and why would you want to anyway?), this clock gear thingy swooped down to offer us our first piece of candy.


there was a giant guest book in one corner with lots of signatures, but no pens to use.  luckily i always have a sharpie in my purse, and so we all took a turn signing it.



the next room was set up like an art gallery, with lots of candy portraits and recreations of famous works of art.  and here, our snack came in the form of a candy bracelet.









i took a closer look at "starry night" and found these creepy candies:


and was amused at the use of licorice whips for prince's "hair."


the next room had an "under the sea" theme, with a treasure chest full of pixy stix.





the next room was full of photo ops that were super random, but we posed at each one anyway and grabbed a few pieces of airheads from the giant bucket.







there was a tropical-y, beach-y vibe in the next room.



 the bean and i got photobombed as we plopped our butts onto the rope swings.




salt water taffy is my favorite.  well, one of my favorites.


and so are hammocks.


methinks the old lady prefers airheads to taffy.


it was warm in there, so the wind machine in the surfboard room offered a little relief.


through the rainbow beads:



uhhhh...


and then we followed this sign that took us through an inflatable puffy entrance to squeeze through to get to the "marshmallow" pool.



our shoes and bags went into a cubby and then we were free to hop into the pool for 45 seconds.  




and that was the end of our trip through candytopia.  the gift shop, of course, was right at the exit from the marshmallow pool room.








that's all.  get out.



and there you have it.  i just saved you the cost of admission to yet another silly pop-up non-museum.

you're welcome.

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