Walking in San Francisco. Hot! Hot! Hot!

Jeanie and I planned to walk in the city before we knew that it would be 95 degrees today. But, we picked a perfect spot to walk. You start at Sutro Baths (that is the picture below) and you walk over to China Beach. It is all part to Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA). The trail along the coast is wonderful. The last picture (featuring Jeanie) was taken at China Beach. There were young mothers frolicing with their children in the water. Now when does that happen in San Francisco? When we arrived we noticed a hawk pearched in a tree. Since I only had my pocket camera, I didn't get a real close up, but I liked seeing a hawk at the seashore. Jeanie and I finished off our 2 hour walk with lunch at the Beach Chalet. What a nice day. We cruised in SF in the convertible and then I actually decided to do top down all the way home. I really don't love hot weather, but every once in a while, it is just fine. What a delightful day! We wish you could have joined us.

Easter 2009

We spent Easter at our cabin. This year was special because Rachel (our niece) just got engaged to Andy who joined us at Cascadel. They drove up to Yosemite to look at wedding venues. Laurel joined them and took great pictures. Debbie and I went for lots of walks and Steve and DB went to the lake to kill trout. And they did a fine job at it too.

Here we are for our traditional pose in the back yard. Aren't we a fine looking group?

Turkeys are taking over the world and it is no different at our cabin. Joe and Karen, across the street from us, have lots of turkeys in their back yard. Turkey's are really beautiful! This one had lots of girl turkeys following him around.

Here we are on one of our walks. This is the top of the falls.

I had to include a picture of Rachel and Andy in Yosemite. Aren't they an adorable couple?They are in front of the little chapel here. This is such a beautiful place for a wedding.

I love this location so I had to include this great pictures of cousins!

Don and I stayed at the cabin until Monday night and contributed to the air pollution , which we figure adds to Don job security. We burned a forest of pine needles. At least it seemed like a forest of pine needles. We both went home with sore muscles. Racking pine needles is tough work.
What a lovely Easter.

No Wildflowers but a found Green Jacket

Don and I joined Paula and Chet to view the spectacular wildflowers that should be in full bloom at this time of year out of San Jose, over the Mt Hamilton Road, past Junction and down into the Livermore Valley. Since the rains have been great this year, we figured the wildflowers would be great too. Well, that really didn’t happen. In fact, the wildflowers were better last year (a drought year) than this year. Four years ago, the flowers were really outstanding. So, the flowers from 4 years ago are the pictures that I am posting, because I want you to see what they should have been. Even without great flowers, we had a beautiful tour.

Now on to the most interesting part of our “wildflower” tour. Last year we stopped in the Junction Cafe for lunch during our wildflower tour. I left a favorite green jacket there and didn’t realize it until we were 15 miles away. I decide I could live without it and just decided to forget about the jacket. When we stopped at the Junction Café for a break today, Paula decided to ask if they had the green jacket in the lost and found. Now keep in mind that this Café, is a very small, biker bar, café and post office. The woman Paula asked tends bar, takes food orders and is probably the postmaster. She knew about the jacket as soon as Paula asked. She said that they had kept the green jacket for a long time. She knew exactly who had left it, stating that she knew we weren’t regulars. But, when we didn’t come back, she had taken it home. She was so apologetic. She loves the jacket and didn’t think we would ever come back. I told her she shouldn’t worry about it and should keep wearing it. I was so glad that this woman liked my favorite green jacket so much that she would take it home. What a happy ending to a lost jacket story. My green jacket is happy and alive and living in the country. I’m glad we went to find wildflowers. They weren’t there, but we found the lost jacket and it lived happily ever after.

I'm home, but a few more Portland pictures!

Grandma is now back from Portland. I had such a wonderful time visiting, playing, reading books, playing computer games with the girls and helping with moving. Maryn and Lucy are constantly busy and so adorable.

This picture is the first day in the house. The girls are using their new water play toy in the kitchen. These next two pictures are of Maryn. She just fell asleep. I sometimes felt like this. She just got so tired that she stopped and closed her eye.

I love this picture because Maryn feel asleep on the computer while playing a video. She was such a tired girl. The move was exhausting for everyone, even the kids.

Here are Jess and her mother painting. Now they should have been the ones that were sleeping. They worked really hard. By the way, I saw the finished room on Skype today. Jess even installed new closet kits. She is claiming this house as her home.

I love this picture taken in their kitchen. When Jess first arrived, she hung 3 of my mother dish towels on her oven. They were embroidered by my mother. That was a nice touch.

Grandma having fun with the girls

This has been a very busy week. Chris & Jess moved into a house today. Here are some of the things we have done with Maryn and Lucy this week. They don't seemed to be phased at all by the move. In fact, they love the new house. We all do.

Here they are in the play area at the mall. Nothing seems to slow them down. Here they are playing in their water play toy in their new back yard.

Maryn got new in-line skates and took to them right away.

Now this is the amazing picture. Lucy put on Maryn's skates by herself and just stood up and skated on her own. She is 19 months, weights just under 20 lbs., had open heart surgery 1 year ago and is such a go getter.

This video just cracks me up. Lucy is just starting to say words. She loves to sing. So listen to

her sing and dance "Deep and Wide" with sissy as she calls her.

During the move we haven't always had the perfectly balanced meals that we would have liked, but here is proof that we really did remember to feed Lucy. I would show pictures of Maryn eating, but she doesn't eat very much and she certainly isn't willing to pose very much.

Chocolate Brownie * Katie * Maryn * Lucy

Katie (on the right) gave me a wonderful box of make your own brownies at Christmas. They were full of chocolate chips and marshmellows. Yum! It turns out I forgot to bring the box home with me at Christmas, but when I was in Southen California last month, I brought them home. Then Don and I drove them to Oregon and that is how this story begins. Thanks for the brownies Katie. I am eating them as I type. Did I mention that Maryn, Lucy and Jess are all napping? That's where I should be, but I am so called to blog.

Here is Maryn mixing the brownies this morning. She is a very good cook and loves to do it herself. She even posed for a picture and that doesn't happen very often.

Here is Lucy licking the beater. At least that is what it is suppose to look like. Lucy wasn't so sure about licking gooey things.

When it came time to eat the brownie, Lucy jumped right in. It helped that she had taken a nap at this point. Lucy loves her naps and her brownies too.

Ok, I had to include this picture because Lucy is doing "Head and Shoulders Knee and Toes". She love this song on the computer. She is just too cute!We have had a fun day of dancing, playing school, water play, going for a walk, and baking. Grandma is tired and it's only two. I better rest because when Maryn gets up I know we will play many more games. Why can't 60 year olds have as much energy as 1 and 3 year olds? They are just so much fun. I better go, I need to think of a quiet activity for afternoon before I close my eyes for a rest.

Chuckeeeeeee Cheeeeeesssssse!!!!!!!

Grandma and Grandpa took the girls to their favorite place, Chucky Cheese. As we drove to Chucky, I warned DB that Krissy Evans did a blog on taking her kids to Chucky Cheese and the kids loved it and she came home with a headache. Oh my goodness, now I understand what she meant. Wow, was this place chaos. But, Lucy and Maryn did love it. We even left the place with more tokens than we came with, because a very nice young girl gave me her left over coins as she left. Grandma and Grandpa got a taste of this wonderful place, but we think we will leave the left over tokens for Chris and Jess. I know they will love taking their kids there for a treat. So here are some pictures of the fun things they did. Maryn was disappointed that Chucky was too busy with the thousand birthday parties going on, so she didn't get to talk to him. Well, maybe next time.

Both girls are napping right now. That place wore them out.

Walking Fallon

Don and I have our visiting dog right now and Fallon loves to take bay walks with us. Don takes Fallon on bay walks even when I'm too tired or out of town. Today is Sunday and we headed down to the Marina to take our normal walk. So, I decided that I had to take some pictures. It was a beautiful day. This is a good life for Fallon and for Don and I.

See how beautiful and glassy the bay is.

Then as we were walking and the most amazing thing happened. We ran into Helen and Ben. That has never happend before. So, we continue our walk together and of course I had to take a picture of Helen. She isn't really a dog person, but she sure looks like she could do it.

What a lovely Sunday!

Farewell to my childhood home

I just spent 5 days at my mother's house, which was built in 1946, sorting, cleaning and reminiscing. My mother died at the beginning of February at the age of 93.

Today I was sitting in her back yard while two nice gentlemen were loading a bunch of her belongings into a truck to be donated to charity. I started to reminisce about growing up in that tiny house with the big backyard. I noticed a hummingbird come buzzing by some of the geranium that were in bloom. This was the spot that my dad built the playhouse, which is no longer there. We had many great times in the playhouse,. Then a squirrel started checking out the apricot tree while birds were chirpping in the avocado tree that I planted from a seed when I was 10 years old. This house has so many memories. I was there to say my farewell to it.
This is a picture of Steven playing our childhood toy violin where the playhouse used to be. I think he is playing "tiptoe through the tulips". He is actually playing the violin like a guitar.

Here are Steve, Katie and Megan relaxing in the backyard after hours of work last Saturday. Notice the Tito's cup. I ate there 5 times in the 5 days . I guess I over did Tito's, but I don't know when I'll be back. Farewell and thanks for the memories.

Happy Birthday To The Daphodile Queen

Happy 26th Birthday Laurel!

Laurel came over for dinner tonight. She headed off to a pub to meet some friends after dinner. Here Laurel is wearing the tiara that her grandmother wore for her 70th birthday. She planned to wear it at the pub too. I think it looks great on her.

Laurel's birthday flower has always been the daphodile. It is such a February flower. So, we bought daphodiles for her 26th birthday, just like we had daphodiles on her first birthday. If you scroll down, you will see Laurel at her first birthday and there is a tub of daphodiles in the background. So appropriate. Laurel was a sweetheart back then and she still is. I love you Laurel.