Wes & Erica's vacation photo album // Tulsa & Sapulpa, OK // November 2024

Earlier this month, Wes & I took a quick weekender to Tulsa to watch their ballet perform Dracula. 🧛The original plan was to go to the ballet, then drive to Price Tower in Bartlesville. We'd stay the night in a Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired room, take the tour in the morning and then drive home. Just as I was about to book our room & tour, I saw on the news that the Price Tower is closed. 😒 There aren't any other tourist attractions in Bartlesville so I pivoted to Sapulpa. 

We got in to Tulsa around lunchtime and ate at Fixins Soul Kitchen. It is a local Black-owned restaurant in the Greenwood District that partners with Black-owned breweries and distilleries. I don't remember the name of the businesses, and I wish I did because our drinks were amazing (and mine was very pretty 🌺). Everything was good, but the roasted okra was the best part of my meal. I paid for the maximum time for parking (2 hours) since I wasn't sure how long lunch would take. [A quick note on parking - I had to download the ParkMobile app, which was dumb because I hate apps, but it ended up being great because it had a very efficient countdown timer and parking was only $2!!] We still had about 45 minutes left on the meter, so we browsed Magic City Books and Made boutique. Both were cute but way overpriced. 

After lunch, we headed to the Vintage Sewing Machine Center & Museum. I've been wanting to visit but they weren't open the last time we were in town. The museum is free but donations are appreciated. The owner teaches classes and holds afterschool programs for children. He showed us some samples of his students' projects and they all looked so professional, way better than what I can do! 

There was another visitor when we arrived; they were busy unboxing a brail sewing machine sent over from the Netherlands, so the owner told us to walk around as we please and not to forget to go downstairs. The "museum" is a house that's been gutted and jam-packed full of sewing machines. Like thousands of them! Some of the rooms are themed & organized but its mostly a mess. LOL I spotted my newly acquired treadle machine! I was going to tell the owner that I have one, too, but I forgot to mention it when we got to talking. Along with sewing machines, there is also a nice collection of old patterns, books, notions and some fabric. I told the owner (I wish I got his name; he was super nice and very informative) that I make my own clothes and he said I could take some fabric & patterns but I didn't want to disrupt his collection. 

The owner found us downstairs and started giving us a history lesson on sewing machines in the military. He has a handful of giant industrial machines that he uses for his classes. He gave me a quick lesson and I felt so silly because I couldn't sew on them. 😳 I didn't really understand the mechanics, but there are no feed dogs and the entire machine is driven by the needle. The machines use a walking foot (I have one but have never used it) and a walking needle (which I have never heard of but it seems to be better than the feed dogs). He said there was one of these machines on each of the aircraft carriers and they were used for upholstery and parachutes. He kept telling us about how the feet and needle work differently when sewing thick leather. Wes seemed to understand but I was lost. All I know is that I want a swiveling foot that can sew in all directions; instead of having to move the piece of fabric around.  

After our downstairs tour, he took us back up and showed me what he says is the best sewing machine ever made. It is a black Singer 201 with the light in the front. I didn't take a picture of it because I was really into his history tour and forgot - I don't think I took a picture of any of the machines he mentioned. Anyway, the assembly of the 201 machine is impossible to mess up because each piece is shaped differently. The light in the front is what sold me on it. He talked about some other machines but I don't remember any more fun facts. Before we left, he let me make a souvenir tile (and showed me all the neat ones his students have made, center right in picture above).  

Our hotel had a late check-in so we were going to go to the mall to find my Unicorno figurine and then stop into Glacier Chocolate & Coffee for a snack, but the sewing machine museum tour took longer than expected. I conceded to skipping my Uniorno, but I wasn't passing up on a sweet treat. I got a free truffle since it was my first time in Glacier. 🍬 I picked the peach raspberry one. Wes got a lemon cheesecake and an oatmeal raisin truffle (he said both were meh) and a cold brew (which he said was weak). My triple berry sorbet was good, but what I came in for was a caramel apple cup that Lacey showed me on Instagram. Sadly, it wasn't on the menu 😑

🩰Ballet time!! 💃 There was no photography allowed so this section will be quite boring. LOL The Tulsa Performing Arts Center is really nice and we had great seats in the mezzanine. There were several people in Dracula cosplay. We saw a guy dressed exactly like Gary Oldman in the 1992 Francis Ford Coppola movie (remember the grey suit & top hat? 🎩). This ballet version of Dracula was very different from the Bram Stoker novel. I don't even think Dracula was the main character; it was mostly about a towns girl and her fiancé. Act II was the longest and biggest part of the story. It look place in the village where the towns girl (another name I should have remembered) lives and it was all about her eighteenth birthday dance and her engagement. The dancers were immensely talented but I thought it was too long and repetitive. Renfield in Acts I & III was the best dancer, in my opinion. I think I prefer the OKC Ballet's performance of Dracula that we saw a few Halloweens ago much better. 

We were going to eat at Mr. Kim's (a trendy late-night Asian fusion restaurant) after the ballet, but we were both tired so we just got Taco Bell and went back to the hotel--welcome to your 40s 😭. I was so ready to fall asleep but there was an annoying tapping/hammering going on in either the room next to or above ours. I called the front desk and Guest Services told me there were hooligans in the stairwell. 😒 A ton of other rooms have called to complain and their security is trying to find the culprits but they keep moving from floor to floor. I think they finally found them on our floor, thank goodness!

The next morning we had breakfast at New York Bagel. Initially, we wondered why it was in a giant two-story building... we soon found out how busy it gets on a Saturday morning. 😮 Luckily, we got there before the rush. My salmon lox bagel was good except for the red onions weren't pickled. We had just run out of Everything Seasoning at home so it was nice to find a bottle for sale at the restaurant.

I've been wanting to go to The Gathering Place park for a while now but the weather never cooperated each time we've been in Tulsa. ⛅ We almost went after Chinh's wedding last year but I didn't bring a jacket, and it was actually cold in December. There was rain in the forecast this time, too, but it was mostly just overcast so we took a chance and went. We only got sprinkled on a bit --and luckily, we were near the boathouse so we went in to look at the Cabinet of Wonder.

The Cabinet of Wonder is a very clean and organized antique shop. [Two adjectives never used to describe an antique shop. LOL 😆] It had some cool stuff, like a drawer full of old scissors (top right picture) and some rocks & fossils. Like a majority of the park, it was mostly for children. I think I was more impressed at how everything was categorized & displayed than what was actually on display. A family came in as we were going out and the kids were astonished by the fossils, wide-eyed and declaring it a dinosaur (it was horse), so I guess it hit its target audience. 

We also came across a pressed penny machine. One of my pen pals collects them so I had to get her one. Lorie, I put it in the mail last week! I hope you get it soon! 😃 

The map of the park made it look MUCH larger than it actually is. We walked through all of it, except for the children's play area and some gardens on the outer perimeter, and it took us less than two hours. We walked all along Peggy's Pond and went up Mist Mountain (my favorite part of our walk). 🌄 The mountain has lots of manmade waterfalls and gutters that would direct water all around the stones, but the fountains were turned off. 😒 Either that or Oklahoma hasn't been getting enough rain. There weren't any birds but we kept hearing loud birdcalls so we suspect there were speakers hidden in the trees for ambiance. The landscaping is beautiful. It was nice seeing all the leaves in their autumnal colors. We'll have to come back in spring or summer to see everything in bloom.

The Gathering Place was really beautiful and deserving of all its awards. 🌲 We didn't see a single piece of litter, or any homeless people. The homelessness in Tulsa was rampant (waaaaaay worse than in OKC) so I was surprised at how clean and pure the park still is. After our peaceful morning walk, we headed to Sapulpa for part two of our trip.

We had lunch at Wimpy's. Wes is always quoting his tagline (I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today), so when it popped up on the list of unique restaurants along Route 66, I knew we had to go. The food was very mid (I got the Frito chili pie and Wes got a hamburger & fries, and I could have made both of those items better at home), but the prices were cheap so I guess it was worth going to. I think people go for the friendly staff and novelty of it being a Popeye's themed restaurant. 

Next on the agenda was the World's Tallest Gas Pump. We also went inside the Heart of Route 66 Auto Museum. 🚗 Car museums are a permanent fixture on our "travel to-do" list, along with art museums and fashion exhibits. I'm counting the Vintage Sewing Machine Center & Museum in the latter category so we got both on this trip! 😁 Anyway, there was a map and guest book at the lobby with people signing in from all over the world (we saw a party listing Cape Town, South Africa as their location!), but we were the only ones to sign in for November 2, 2024. 

There was lots of classic cars for us to admire. Several of them had current license plates so they must travel to car shows. I think one had a few ribbons hanging from its dash. The neatest vehicle there, in my opinion, was the 1967 Amphicar. It had propellers for driving in water. It only drove a few times and never caught on. Wes liked Maserati. I admit that is a cool car but no propellers or silly gimmick so my pick wins. LOL 😆

The owner of the sewing machine museum told us about how the Singer 201 was used to sew the interior dash of Rolls Royces, and he also mentioned how the industrial machines sewed on leather with a perfectly even stitch length. I never noticed before, but I found myself inspecting the stitches on the cars' seats and other details. 

Our original plan was to go to Little Taiyaki to get a quick snack (they serve Japanese-style ice cream desserts) on our way out of town. I didn't realize how close to Christmas it is (its not, by the way 😑) and downtown Sapulpa was already setting up for their famous Christmas Chute. The roads were closed so we had to park outside of downtown and walk. That was kind of annoying but we got a free viewing of the chute. Wes didn't feel like ice cream and I wasn't super hungry so we passed on our snack. I actually looked at the menu when we got into the restaurant and was going to try to get something to go if it looked amazing but I wasn't completely sold. 

Instead we went to Crossroads Coffee Lab. Wes got a cold brew and said it was really good. The dine-in restaurant part looked really nice, and they had a little soda fountain with gelato, so we'll have to go back to sit down for a meal & dessert if we're ever back in Sapulpa. I am usually terrible when it comes to timing (I try to cram too much into a vacation), but we were actually early leaving town this time around. We would get back into OKC before 6pm so we could pick up the dogs early from camp. 🐕💓 I was all excited to see Athena & Zephyr but Wes reminded me (when he tried calling the camp), that they close at 3pm on weekends. Oh well. We took Route 66 for the scenic route home. We drove through Drumright and Cushing, and I was ready to stop if I saw an interesting tourist attraction but there was none. 

Wes & Erica's vacation photo album - Catoosa, OK & Kansas City, MO - October 2021

Wes and I just went on a week-long road trip!! 🚙 We left Oklahoma for Iowa via Missouri/Kansas and came home via Wisconsin and Missouri (and sort of Illinois but we only stopped for gas and boba). It was the first actual vacation (not counting the mini-trip to Tulsa in September) we've taken since my birthday trip to Tampa & St. Petersburg, FL in 2019. Since this was a mega trip with tons of pictures, I'll post in sections.  

Last year on the British quiz show, QI, they had a short segment about the whale. I knew there was a gigantic cartoonish blue whale somewhere in Oklahoma along Route 66, but I didn't know much more about it or even what it looked like. I decided that we needed to pay it a visit after it was featured internationally. 

I expected the whale to be on a lake or on the outskirts of town...I was wrong. It is literally on the side of the highway in the middle of town. LOL It was made as an anniversary gift. It looks like it was originally a play area for children. You can slide down the whale's fins and climb up to its tail to use as a diving board. You can also climb up into the whale's head and look out some portholes. We didn't do any of that since it was chilly and the pond that the whale sits in was grungy & dirty. 

The Blue Whale of Catoosa is cute and worth the visit if you're driving thru. We stopped in Oklahoma Joe's barbeque for lunch. We went to the Joe's (another barbeque restaurant in Kansas City a few years ago) and I thought this was the same place, like a franchise, but it wasn't. The one in Catoosa wasn't  near as good as the one in Kansas City. I got their award winning "best baked beans on the planet." It was, I think black, kidney and pinto beans, with bits of pulled pork swimming in a soup of tangy barbeque sauce. It was too much for me; I'm used to simple baked beans out of a can.

After lunch, we headed on to Kansas City. We had some time to kill so we walked around The Plaza before dinner. We've visited before but it was at nighttime so we didn't really get to see much of the architecture. This time we went when the sun was still up so I got to admire the Spanish-style buildings. And, I got my Unicorno figurine -- my must-have travelling companion. LOL 

We had dinner at Gus's World Famous Fried Chicken. Normally, we try to go to restaurants we haven't been to before but Wes loved the chicken the last time so we decided to go a second time. It was just as good! The chicken is dredged in a slurry of buttermilk, cornstarch and spices instead of the traditional egg and flour breading. Then it's fried in peanut oil. So yummy!! Wes got greens & fries for his sides and he said they were good. I got coleslaw & fried okra and both were just so-so. It doesn't matter because no one cares about the sides. 😂 The chicken is the star of the meal!! Kansas City is so neat and I wanted to do more but I had a long drive ahead of me the next day so we turned in to the hotel after dinner for an early night. 

We had breakfast at the Opera House Food & Coffee Emporium on our way out. It was such a cool place. It is a large restaurant with a coffee bar, bakery, bar and restaurant. I had the best matcha tea latte! 🍵 I ordered the biscuits and gravy for breakfast. The biscuits were ... different. They were dense and made from either corn meal or some sort of grains. Luckily, they were smothered in delicious spicy sausage gravy.

The restaurant is in City Market... so naturally I needed to take a stroll around, since we were already there. City Market is a ginormous open air market. It was mostly produce vendors but there were a few artisans. There were also shops and a steamboat museum. We walked around for about an hour but I could have stayed and explored all morning! I wish we had access to a kitchen and another day in Kansas City because I wanted to buy so much of the fresh produce and local foods. I am adding it on the travel list for us to return to! But enough of Kansas City... we had to drive to our next stop - Iowa City!! More on that later!

Wes & Erica's vacation photo album - Tulsa, OK - September 2021

We're travelling again!! It was a short "practice run" trip this time around but we are hoping to take actual road trips soon. 😁 Since everyone loves (#sarkmark) looking at their friend's vacation photos, here's our Tulsa vacation album. 

NOTE: I know it's annoying to share vacation & food pictures, but these have really helped us out. There have been so many times when Wes or I will say, "where was that awesome brunch place we went to in Texas with the blah blah dish and the great coffee," and I've been able to find pictures/descriptions from previous blog posts. Great for my failing memory! 

We went to Tulsa mainly to go to the Philbrook art museum to see the Dalí's Alice in Wonderland exhibit.

We started with lunch at the museum café. Wes got the s'mores pancakes (with eggs and bacon) and I got the pimento cheese toast. It was a gigantic sandwich instead of toast. The pimento cheese was good... the rest of it was not. 😒 I've never had challah bread before... and I learned that I do not like it. There was also a red pepper jelly on the sandwich that I wasn't too fond of. The tomato soup was amazing, though. 

After lunch, we strolled the museum's garden (before it got too hot... which it was already hot but there was a breeze and, luckily, a majority of the gardens are under shade). We went in search of all the sculptures and cats. We saw one cat and all but two of the sculptures. My favorite part of the garden was the cabin. It is a beautiful modern log cabin with stained glass windows and a glass roof covered in colorful papier maché.

We also ventured through the Victory Garden. The café's menu offered a Victory Garden salad and I was curious about this garden. It mostly grew squash.

Garden stroll is over... time to go inside!

The Dalí's Alice in Wonderland exhibit was so good! At first, I was surprised at how small the exhibit was, but then I realized that he only illustrated one book... and one book can only have so many pictures. LOL The drawings and concepts are a perfect blending of Salvador Dalí's work and the telling of Alice's time in Wonderland. I liked that Dalí blended his signature elements into the drawings. 

Since we were already there, we took some time to browse the remaining exhibits at the museum. I'm sure I'm biased, but I think the Oklahoma City Museum of Art has a better permanent collection. But, then again, the Philbrook has a mummy so maybe it wins. LOL 

After we finished up with the museum, we drove about half an hour out of our way to get boba tea at Boss Tea. It was soooo worth it! I brought my mask from Babble (boba tea in OKC) on our trip and I thought, "oh no, I'm going to go in wearing a competitor's mask... oh, but we're in Tulsa, no one will know what Babble is." The first thing the barista did when she saw us walk  in was ask if I was wearing a Babble mask! 😮 Turns out, she is originally from Oklahoma City and loves Babble, too. LOL I got the brown sugar matcha milk tea with boba and it was probably the most delicious one I've ever had. Their cups are made from a thicker plastic than the regular boba cups and the lid has a cap, which is great for people like me who take forever to finish their drinks.

Next stop was resting at the hotel. I'm old and can't pack my days with activities like I used to. 😆 Oh, we went to Barnes & Noble when we first got into town so I could buy my Unicorno. I started a tradition of buying a tokidoki Unicorno figurine from every place we vacation... and the first place I bought one was at this Barnes & Noble when we saw Judas Priest in 2018. After resting up, we headed out to dinner. As we were walking to dinner, we passed this art space with a very interesting-looking exhibit.

But, no time to stop in... we had reservations at Sisserou's and it was time to eat! Sisserou's is a Caribbean restaurant. I've never had Caribbean food and was eager to try it. We started with bread and a very spicy habanero sauce. The waiter said it was "no joke" and he wasn't lying. I couldn't handle it but Wes loved it. We wanted a bottle to take home but they didn't sell any. Wes got the shrimp curry and I got the house burger. Both were fantastic! The cocktails were tasty, too! The elotè was the best part of the meal.

Our extremely friendly waiter suggested a tiki bar or a posh bar "where you can go if you want your bartender to talk down to you" for after dinner but instead, I rushed us back to the art space with the interesting dresses. The exhibit closed at 9pm and we were those horrible people who show up 15 minutes before closing expecting a tour. 😅

We had to run through the exhibit pretty quickly so I didn't really get to learn about the artist's vision or message. I believe it was one of those "stick it to The Man" protest pieces.  I thought the dresses were really cool and sort of haunting at the same time. 

DAY 2 - The Cave House!!!

The main reason why we stayed overnight in Tulsa instead of just taking a quick day trip was because I wanted to tour the Cave House. Our tour was at 12:30pm so we had some time to kill in the morning. We had breakfast at Savoy and did some shopping at The Farm Market (I think that was what it was called... I didn't take any pictures). We stopped in a yarn shop, Get Stitchin', and I almost bought a ton of wool merino yarn for a sweater Lacey & I have on our "things to crochet" list but I stopped myself. 

Wes got the traditional two egg breakfast, which he thought was good, and I got the eggs benedict. I'm glad I like hollandaise sauce because it was literally covered in it. Savoy is known for its cinnamon rolls but we were so full after breakfast that we didn't get one. Next time!

The Cave House was the highlight of the trip for me! Linda, the owner and tour guide, is a wonderful host and great storyteller. She bought the house on a whim and learned all about its history. It was formerly a speakeasy and warehouse for bootleggers. It's now decorated with finds from "curbby's boutique" which is things Linda has picked up from the curb on Big Trash day. LOL The house's renovations relies heavily on Elmer's glue (which she says is the only thing that works with the house's natural moisture). She's added crumpled up Wal-Mart plastic bags to the wall for a textured effect. It looks so good... maybe I should try that for our next decorating project! 

Linda collects keys and I wish I knew because we have a random set of keys that the previous owner left in our house that don't go to any lock. I would have totally brought them for her! She installed a slide that goes from the bed room to the sun room. She slid down and pointed at me to slide down next (she singled me out as the "cool kid" 😎). I would have slid down even if she didn't pick me! At the end of the tour, she had us all sign the guest book and say what our favorite thing about the house was. I said the mastodon tooth and Wes decided on the collection of bones. She also insisted on taking our pictures. 

We had originally planned to visit the Vintage Sewing Machine Museum but it was temporarily closed due to the pandemic so instead, we drove along Route 66. We stopped in Decopolis per Linda's suggestion. It is a local gift shop with fun statues around the perimeter. We also had lunch in the Mother Road Market -- a local food court. I know this is me being biased again, but The Collective Food Court in OKC is way better. LOL We got lunch at an Asian fusion restaurant. Wes got the kimchi burger and I got the satay Thai  fries. I don't even remember what it was called but neither of us were impressed with our meal. And, that's a wrap on Tulsa. It was a nice two days filled with art and food... two of my favorite things!