California Garners

Baking with Julia, and about 300 other bloggers.

2012-02-07T13:06:00.000-08:00

I've joined an online group. It's a baking blog group. I read the blog http://doriegreenspan.com/ and there is a group called Tuesdays with Dorie (TWD) http://tuesdayswithdorie.wordpress.com/ that was just starting to go through the cookbook Baking with Julia.

Nathaniel had asked the week before if I could make homemade bread again. I haven't made it since we moved into this house, partly because there is a Great Harvest Bakery right next to the grocery store and I've been buying bread there. But, Nathaniel is having a hard time adjusting to his new braces-hardware (his lips and cheeks are tattered and swollen) and there aren't many things that he feels like eating. So, I found a recipe I wanted to try on America's Test Kitchen's website http://www.americastestkitchen.com/recipes/detail.php?docid=27410&incode=M**ASCA00
Check it out soon because they only have their current season available for free.
I love America's Test Kitchen (ATK) because they go about testing recipes in a scientific way, trying to figure out what is the most desirable trait in the dish, what are the major pitfalls, and what is the most efficient way to meet their objective. Martha Stewart always drove me crazy because she tried to make things more difficult than they needed to be just to prove she is fancier than anyone else. ("Don't use orange-flavored jello in a recipe when you could make your own by boiling down some horse hooves and adding sugar cane extract and blood oranges").
Honestly, when it comes down to it, I didn't like Julia Child for the same reason. When she was demonstrating french recipes, I'm sure her purpose was to show traditional french techniques. But it always reminded me of the old story where the daughter asks her mother why it was necessary to cut the ends off the potroast before placing it in the pan... "I don't know," says mother, "that's the way my mother always did it." When asked, grandmother replied that she never had a pan big enough for a whole roast and had to trim it down to make it fit. So, I prefer recipes made to use modern ingredients and techniques that get the desired results in the most efficient way. That being said, I like to make things from scratch and avoid cake mixes, jello, condensed soup, and the too liberal use of cream cheese. I have dropped blogs from my watch-list for depending too much on these ingredients. Too many ingredients that are unrecognizable as food go into the first three of those ingredients, and cream cheese is used so liberally in everything from desserts to pasta sauces that the purpose is just to mask a mediocre recipe.
Enough of my rant. I was ready to put ATK head to head with Julia (actually with Julia's guest baker). Right when I was about to start, Chris' neice Amanda posted my sister-in-law's (Andie's) bread recipe, so I decided to start with it. http://minasmith.blogspot.com/2012/01/andies-bread.html

Kneading in the mixer.

Rising in warm oven. They deflated when I moved them from the warm oven to the hot one to bake. A delicate rise.

Awww... The bake time in the recipe wasn't long enough. I should have tested the internal temperature.

Amanda/Andie's recipe came out doughy and undercooked. I really should have tested it before taking it out because the thump-on-the-loaf-to-see-if-it-sounds-hollow method let me down on this one. Onto Baking with Julia (BWJ) You can find the recipe here (unless you buy the book or check it out of the library) http://someonekitchen.blogspot.com/2012/02/twd-bwj-white-loaves.html

Photo from book. This is how it is supposed to turn out when sliced and toasted.

The directions are a little crazy. The dough is kneaded first, and then softened butter (a lot of butter) is added to the dough. The dough becomes a greasy mess, but after awhile the butter is worked in and the result is a springy, silky dough. Wow. I wonder if having the fat in the dough during kneading slows gluten formation. Why is the butter left out until after the kneading? Is this a cut-the-end-off-the-potroast kind of thing? The book provides no clues. (I love ATK because it explains why certain steps are taken.)

Lovely dough, I used 1 cup of flour less than the highest range in the recipe

Beautiful and eaten within a day with the creamed honey Chris bought.

BWJ white loaves turned out great, just as the recipe was written. But I had saved ATK for last. I was sure it would be the best one. You have to start the night before by making a "soaker" with the whole wheat flour (King Arthur's white wheat), wheat germ and milk. That is kneaded and left in the fridge over night to soften up the tough wheaty-bits. A biga (bread flour and yeast) is left on the counter overnight to bubble and develop deep yeasty flavors. Great. Then they are mixed together with the remaining ingredients.

It took a long time to get the cold-from-the-fridge dense "soaker" to mix in with the warm, soft "biga", even when the soaker was pinched off into 1 inch pieces.

"Soaker" after spending the night in the fridge.

The dough finally came together and was very soft. Recipe did not recommend adding more flour than went into the biga and soaker - so I decided to stick to the recipe.

Dough was so cold that I did the first and second rises in a warm oven in a warm bowl of water.

How did ATK stand up to BWJ? It really didn't. To be fair, I wasn't comparing white loaves with wheat loaves per se. I was comparing the success of following the recipe word for word. BWJ gives a range of flour needed. That means I could add just enough until the dough looked right. ATK did not provide any sort of instruction for variation. The dough was so soft that I wanted to add more flour, but I was sure their scientific method would have accounted for that and maybe soaking the wheat flour would make it a much softer dough. The loaves turned out more like batter-bread: the crumb was coarse, very little elasticity. It crumbles when sliced. But the flavor is good and it's not as heavy as you might expect with the amount of wheat:white flour in it.
Conclusion? BWJ recipes (at least this one) are written well for the home cook. The white loaves are a terrific texture - light and springy, but a little dry when toasted. I'm going to try ATK again, but allow the soaker to warm up before adding to the biga, and then I'll add bread flour to get a little stiffer dough. I'll try Andie's again too and bake it longer this time (or maybe I'll divide the flour and make a biga and soaker the night before, combining Andie's and ATK's recipes). What I really need though, is homemade jam (but that's another project for another blog.)

Result? Squashed loaves.

A Brand New Friend

2012-01-26T11:55:00.000-08:00

Nathaniel used to say that we had the worst luck with houses. We never seemed to find one that came with a dog. Well, now we finally have a dog and he is so excited. Even Davis who said he didn't want a dog really likes it and the dog loves to nap on their laps or eat their shoe laces while they do homework.

We brought this little guy home on Monday. He's eight weeks old. We don't have a name for him yet. He's a cross between a cocker spaniel and a jack russell terrier. He's pretty fun.

The Front Yard is Finally Done

2012-01-26T11:49:00.000-08:00

We have finally finished redoing the front yard. Its very exciting. Our house is very visible in the neighborhood and we have lots of people watching us as they drive by, making comments as they walk their dogs, and even stopping in their cars to tell us about how much work they have done on their yards. Luckily, we have nice neighbors (and patient too) and all of the comments have been positive (well, often full of advice, but still positive). There was one older lady who askedy why we didn't leave the yard like it was, she liked it that way. Can't please them all.

So, here is a pictoral history of the last year and a half in our front yard. I've included a picture of the final product at the beginning for those of you who don't want to slog through the whole process.

See, it turned out nice. The plants are still pretty tiny, but they'll grow quickly with our nearly-year-round sunshine.

OK, this is what it looked like when we first looked at the house. It looked great. But after we signed the contract the owner stopped watering and the tenting for termites (required for home sales in CA) killed back most of the plants near the house. And we discovered that the hedges and lawn were composed of at least 5 different kinds of plants/grass each. So, it only looked good from a distance.

This tree is an ornamental pear. It had never been trimmed properly and the branches hung low over the driveway. The roots were breaking up the sidewalk and heading toward the foundation of the house. But it was pretty.

So, we stopped watering (we had a $300 water bill because the cable install people had crushed a sprinkler pipe under the driveway when they installed a conduit and we decided we didn't want to spend any more money on plants we wanted to take out anyway.) The scouts spent two Saturday mornings at our house tearing out hedges. It was hard work. And, we poisoned the grass.

Then the digging started. Chris excavated the sprinkler system which was way more work than we expected. It was laid out crazy and the pipes were old and brittle and broke easily, and there are so many rocks in the soil that the digging had to be done by pickax. That meant either Chris had to do all the digging, or spend a lot of time patching pipe that broke when I did the digging.

So much work. Thanks Chris.

People would say to us, "You know you can hire people to do this?" Really?

I dug out the Agapanthus (Lily of the Nile) that completely obscured a lovely landscaping rock.

We did get some help from the boys, but only one at a time. Chris' grandpa used to say, "One boy is worth half a man. Two boys are worth no man at all." Or something like that.

Map of the yard for planning how much seed, mulch, and such was needed.

After the sprinklers were done it was time to get the ground ready to plant grass. We had gone back and forth on whether or not to take the eucalyptus tree out. It was huge. We had decided that we were going to keep it and just get it trimmed so it didn't blow over on the house. It shaded the house in the afternoon keeping it cooler.

Rototilling (he rototilled twice to get the slope right.)

This drove me crazy. The sod that was laid in the 70's used a plastic mesh that we had to keep pulling off the rototill blades. This bundle was only a small part of what we pulled out.

Of course, we had a storm come through the day after Chris rototilled that blew down hundreds of trees around town. So, we needed a new plan for the front corner of the yard.

I like the way the water looks in the rototilled furrows.

One advantage of having high priests help instead of elders is that you are more likely to have access to someone with some good tools.

We had the stump ground up by a tree removal company. All of the rest of the tree was collected by a neighbor for firewood, some that was left in the street was removed by the city, and we split the big slices of trunk for our own firewood.

Then we seeded the lawn.

Since I had the attention of the city (our eucalyptus tree blocked the street for a week) I had them take out the ornamental pear (because it was a city tree) and it was breaking up the sidewalk.

Biggest problem with the corner now was that it was full of giant roots left by the tree and it was a steep slope down to the sidewalk.

A lot of work went into moving dirt off the slope to make it more shallow and hacking out roots.

Nathaniel dug out a lot of dirt. Davis moved it to the backyard in the garden cart.

The city planted a new tree - another ornamental pear.

Nathaniel and Davis take turns mowing the lawn and trimming the edges now.

The next big project was to install exterior lighting. That meant digging more trenches and patching more sprinkler pipe.

We had quite a few large landscaping rocks scattered around the front and back yards that didn't look good where they were. We used them to stabilize the hill on the corner. The problem was moving them. We had to use a winch to pull them onto a dolly or onto boards and drag them across the yard.

Two of the four largest rocks in place and a giant root that we ended up burning out to get rid of.

Finally in December we were ready to put in landscaping plants. We laid down a weed barrier covered with bark chips because we have put so much work into this yard already, and there is still the back yard to do, that I just don't think I'd have the energy to start pulling weeds after the winter rains.

We planted different varieties of Agapantha, creeping lily, day lily, and iris under the ornamental pear tree.

The walk is bordered by Huechera (Coral Bells)

This is a sweet (or fragrant) olive. These tiny white blossoms smell so good. I put it by the front door so the fragrance will waft in on the afternoon ocean breeze.

White and pink tea trees. A grizzled old man came up to me at the nursery when I was buying these and told me that the barbary pirates used to boil these leaves for tea. Hmmm...

Against the wall to the back yard.

The reddish bark makes the rocks stand out better.

Some little succulents that look like rocks.

I wasn't feeling well, so I helped mostly by watching.

Our new little plants even survived some frost.

Rose Parade Line Up in Pasadena 2012

2012-01-22T13:15:00.000-08:00

The best way to see the floats in the Rose Parade is to go the evening before (usually on New Year's Eve unless New Year's Day falls on a Sunday, then the parade will be on the Monday because TOR has a "never on Sunday" policy - nice.) The floats are all lining up on Orange Grove and there are huge floodlights up and down the street and people walking around. You can get right up to the floats and look at the flowers and see all around on every side. We went for a short walk around Orange Grove this year (Nathaniel and I weren't quite recovered from illness and didn't have a lot of energy) and this is what we saw:

This was the only picture with Davis in it. Look how the flood lights light up the palm trees.

OK, this wasn't really a float in the parade line-up, but it was kind of funny.

December 2011

2012-01-21T14:56:00.000-08:00

Something happened in December - well, a number of things happened, but something happened to me. First couple of weeks were busy with college finals, Nathaniel's birthday, a visit from Chris' mom, and a meet for Davis. During my last final I started to feel shaky - oh no, I thought I was coming down with the flu. I graded the exams and submitted grades sitting in bed with my laptop. Well, 5 1/2 weeks later, I don't know what it was, but it wasn't the flu. The doctor rulled out mono, pneumonia, and a number of other things. I'd call it a non-mono mono-like viral infection with a respiratory emphasis. I'm still spending most of my time in bed, and the holiday trip was a total blow-out (the kids both took turns with a fevered stomach flu, and then a whopping head cold.) So, the many projects that I had planned for my two months between semesters have been forsaken. I'm starting to feel like I'm getting a little energy, but a trip to the grocery store will wipe me out for the rest of the day.

I don't have pictures of me laying around in bed, but I do have some from the other events in December:
Nathaniel's birthday party at the trampoline gym - bouncy fun with dodge ball and a foam pit.

Nathaniel always wants pie - so a boston cream pie was a good birthday cake compromise because pie is too hard to serve at a trampoline gym.

Davis and some of his sophomore running buddies competed in the Footlocker Western Regional Cross Country meet at Mt. SAC with athletes from all over the western states.

Compression socks are the new running fad (and it looks like Davis is wearing Uncle Mark era BYU shorts, if you know what I mean...)

Nathaniel's birthday celebration continued on Sunday with a family party and an actual pie.

Carol came down to help select plants for our front yard and was there for Nathaniel's birthday and Davis' meet too.

Chris discovered that our local spudnut shop makes giant doughnuts.

We made a trip to Utah for Christmas as planned even though I was not feelling well. I still thought it was the flu and that I'd be getting over it in a few days. I spent the whole time laying around or sleeping except for a few family gatherings: dinners at Chris' mom's and my parents with all the local family before Christmas, and a trip to temple square with my parents to see the lights after Christmas. I didn't get any pictures from my parents house because I was feeling pretty bad that night. But here are some of the others.

Nathaniel and I in the tabernacle.

Angels and shepherds re-enacting the Christmas story.

Angels

Wisemen with gifts.

Angel

Baby cousins sitting on Uncle Jeff's lap.

Mark and Annie introduced a game where a couple has to stand on a stack of phone books and one of them need to pick up a coin placed on the floor. I think Chris was disappointed that he didn't get to play because I didn't have the strength to stand very long on my own - let alone balance on phone books. Every couple had their own strategy; Matt and Karen used the belt loop method. I think they got up to 12 phone books.

Nathaniel spent most of Christmas eve night throwing up and most of Christmas day sleeping with fevered hallucinations.

After recovering from the family dinners and Christmas we decided to try a low key trip to see the lights at temple square.

Nathaniel and the life sized nutcracker.

Davis and Nathaniel with Grandma and Grandpa Johansen on Temple Square.

We had dinner in the Joseph Smith Memorial building. This was the first food Nathaniel had had since his the flu that wasn't plain rice or saltines. I think he was intimidated by the height of his dinner.

Well, after this evening Davis came down with the fevered-flu and I was in wiped out for about three days.

We cut our trip short and drove home before New Year's Eve. So, you wondered why you didn't get a Christmas card this year, its because I had planned to send them right after I was done with finals. Oh well...

Nathaniel Turned 12!

2012-01-04T13:06:00.000-08:00

Nathaniel turned 12 in early December. Now I'm the only one in the family left in Primary. Here's a slideshow of 2011 for Nathaniel. He loves exploring, adventures, and hanging out with cousins and friends. It was a good year.

Does Davis Look Like Mark?

2011-10-16T19:19:00.000-07:00

When I go to Davis' meets, the image I have in my mind when he runs is that he looks just like Mark used to in high school. The first meet I went to I even felt like yelling, "C'mon Marker!" So, I asked Nanette to scan some photos from high school. Now that I look at them I don't think he looks anything like him. What do you think?

Mark, 11th grade, Sugarhouse Park, Utah State meet (I think, based on the location and the colors of the other team uniforms), 1988.

Davis, 10th grade, Peppertree park, 2011.

Mark, 12th grade, Sugarhouse Park, state or region meet, 1989.

Davis, 10th grade, Oak Park, 2011.

Cross Country Pics

2011-09-18T14:48:00.000-07:00

I can't make it to Davis' weekday meets this fall because my teaching schedule makes it impossible to get home before 5:30pm. So, I was really glad one of Davis' teammates took a lot of pictures and tagged him on facebook. Then I can just download the ones with Davis. Here's a bunch of them from the meet this last Wednesday. Davis won the frosh/soph race - his first win! I would have loved to have seen it.

I wonder what he's looking at?

See Chris on the right with his arms folded? The race was close enough that he came out for Davis' race and then went back to work.

This must have been coming onto the straight away before the finish line.

I took this picture Saturday at a bigger meet. Davis improved his time by about half a minute and placed in the top 20. He thinks he was 2nd or 3rd sophomore in the race.

Davis has gotten much bigger and stronger (and as a result, faster) since last year when he first started running. Now he is starting to learn how to race. It's fun to watch.

August in the Chaparral

2011-09-03T12:48:00.000-07:00

In August the hillsides are dried out, the grass is brown, most shrubby plants have drying seeds on them, the baby quail are almost full grown, and the rattlesnakes don't seem to be out on the trails as much. There are still a few new plants blooming and a couple sights unique to this month.

Beware allergy sufferers - the ragweed is about to bloom.

In the early morning when the marine layer made everything all misty, I could see spiderweb "funnels" all over the open grassy areas.

Sweet Fennel is about 6 feet tall this time of year.

The marine layer cools everything off and makes for a nice run.

A field of sweet fennel.

Lake Tahoe and Gold Country

2011-08-22T16:36:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics (OK, a lot of pics) from our trip to explore another part of California. It is pretty awesome to live so close to great vacation spots. This summer we decided to do a little exploration of gold country and Lake Tahoe. The plan was to check out Sutter's Mill and the gold discovery state park, go whitewater rafting on the South Fork of the American River (on which Sutter's Fort was located), and then spend a few days in Lake Tahoe playing on the lake. We didn't like the place in Lake Tahoe very much and the boys were too young to drive any motorized watercraft - so we changed plans and spent a couple nights in Squaw Valley (we pricelined a great deal at a 4 star resort from our not-so-great place in S. Lake Tahoe.) So, we spent more time on bikes than on the water.

We did the Chili Bar section of the river.

OK, this isn't us, but this is what we would have looked like had we waited for the river photographer to load her photos, burn a disk, and charge us $60 for it. So, just pretend....

Auburn, CA - pretty darn cute town in gold country.

Boys in historic Auburn, CA where there was a Monday night festival.

Statue of a prospector panning for gold. Looks like Davis is digging for something else.

Most people see antique mining equipment. Davis sees a "light cycle" (Tron reference) circa 1850.

Sign says "Mormon Cabin". Sutter's Mill

Sutter's mill site on the American River.

Lake Tahoe

Nathaniel was the only one interested in getting in.

Biking in Van Sickle Bi-State Park (that means the park is in two states: CA and NV)

Taking the gondola up Heavenly Ski Resort.

This made me want pie even more.

Overlooking South Lake Tahoe

After eating high altitude chili dogs and chicken fingers, the boys weren't super excited about hiking (blech).

Why is there a ladder up here on top of the mountain?

It's sad to see them grow, but even more sad to see them shrink!

Nathaniel "downhill" mountain biking at Northstar Ski Resort, Truckee, CA.

Wild flowers border the very dusty trail.

Davis and Nathaniel play in the Squaw Creek Resort pool.

Davis tosses Nathaniel in the air.

A great place to relax.

Nathaniel runs...

jumps...

and splashes!

Nathaniel said it isn't weird for parents to go on the water slide with their kid. He didn't say that it is such a small slide that a parent is too heavy to slide down without pushing yourself along.

Through the chute.

splash down

Davis' favorite activity of the whole trip - driving the golf cart.

Squaw Valley - a very pretty place.

It's not really a vacation unless Chris is able to golf.

Dinner at the resort.

S'mores around the fire.

Cozy place when the sun goes down.

Mountain biking (cross country) in Paige Meadows (Lake Tahoe).

The cell phone camera only picked up the white flowers. This meadow was full of so many different colors of flowers.

Fun single-track biking through meadows and forests.

Root of All Evil

2011-08-20T17:36:00.000-07:00

Do you remember this tree?
http://cagarners.blogspot.com/2011/04/story-of-eucalyptus-tree.html

Well, it has taken a very long time to clean up after it. We moved rocks (really big rocks) from all over the front and back yards to stabilize the hill on the corner. We used a winch, cable, a dolly, and boards to ski the rocks across the grass. It was hard work and took a few weeks to actually get them all moved out front.

Davis helped us move rocks around the yard.

The rock "skis" across the grass while Chris cranks the winch.

Placing the biggest rocks first.

Building rock cairns with rocks that haven't been embedded in the hill yet.

While we were digging places to set the rocks we found huge roots left over from the eucalyptus tree. We chopped, sawed, dug, and also tried to pull the roots out with the winch. Crazy. One root was not going to budge. So, it was time to take drastic action.

We banked the fire with rocks all around and covered the top with the grill cover so you couldn't see any flames from the road as it got dark. We stayed outside watching it for a couple hours until the coals died down (it took a long time for the flames to settle down because the eucalyptus bark has a lot of oil in it). While we were outside we saw a police patrol car drive by 4 times - each time from a different direction through the intersection. Oh yeah, we didn't have a permit for this. It was like they had received a call that someone in the neigborhood was building fires in their front yard... So, either they never actually saw the fire, or they saw it was little and that we were watching it (from the front steps) so they didn't want to bother with it. We ended up leaving it burning overnight.
In the morning it was still smoking but the root had burned through enough that a couple of blows with the sledge hammer broke it off. We thought we were getting off easy having the tree blow over in the storm and the city cleaning up most of it. It took another day of digging to get all the auxilliary roots out so we could place the rocks. Now we have to finish putting in the sprinklers around that area and then we can plant.
Nothing to do with the root - here's a picture of the new quilt Chris' mom made that we are "storing" on our bed (It's not good to have quilts folded for too long so it's best to lay them out flat and Carol didn't have room to lay this one out on a bed at her house.) Isn't it great?

Tim Burton at LACMA

2011-08-08T22:53:00.000-07:00

I took some (not allowed) pictures at the Tim Burton exhibit at LACMA. Pretty interesting. Despite the many complaints, I think Davis really liked it. There were lots of illustrations that Tim Burton had done as a teenager.

Chaparral in July

2011-08-04T19:18:00.000-07:00

Ok, this isn't all from the chaparral and it is from early July mostly. Late July is very dry and most of the wildflowers have turned to berries or puff balls. I still see lots of rattlesnakes and just don't take pictures of them now. One reason is because they are plenty warm and move pretty fast, but really, how many rattlesnake pictures do you want to see? Today I saw a great big wavy track across the dirt road on which I was running where a rattlesnake had recently passed. The track was about as wide as my foot. I didn't want to run into that snake.

Lavender fields in Hidden Valley. Smells so nice in the heat of the morning sun.

Strange metal crates for no apparent reason.

Not a thistle - looks like an artichoke gone wild.

Chris at sunset.

Sycamore Canyon.

Coyote at Satwiwa.

Look back at Chaparral in June. This is pearly everlasting. The buds open into what feels like dried straw flowers.

Nathaniel and some friends did a service project at one of the park trailheads. They cleaned up trash from a stream.

Emma, Dylan, Christian, Nathaniel, and Riley.

You can't see it (and we didn't at first either) but there is a bees nest in the hole. We were about to climb up over this branch when Nathaniel spotted the bees.

A couple of pics from Utah. I didn't take photos of all the wildflowers, although we did see a lot of them. With the late spring all the wildflowers were out along the wasatch front and in Park City.

2 mile turn-around point from Ferndale trail head.

Chasing Courtney on the bike, and it was still hard to keep up with her.

Chris on the Bonneville Shoreline Trail.

Stream crossing

Cedar Breaks

2011-08-02T09:03:00.000-07:00

Chris had flown home a week earlier, Davis was staying another week in Utah to attend EFY, so Nathaniel and I drove home by ourselves. We left early in the morning so we were near Cedar City around lunch time. I had never seen Cedar Breaks National Monument and it was only about 15 miles off the highway, so we drove up there for lunch. It is a tiny little park but it was so pretty. At 10,000 feet above sea level it was also a lot cooler up there (63 degrees instead of 89 in Cedar City and 103 in St. George.) We spent a couple of hours having lunch, going for a little hike to an alpine pond, and stopping at the visitor's center where a wildflower festival was in progress. We didn't arrive home until about 8pm that night, but it was worth the stop.

Lunch on the edge.

Rockfall we saw on our short hike.

Everything was in bloom. I guess at 10k feet summer is short so all the flowers bloom at the same time.

Nathaniel helps a ranger with native plant restoration by planting a yarrow seedling.

Yikes. I've been in the car too long.

2011-08-02T08:49:00.000-07:00

Before we left Utah, it seemed appropriate for everyone to get together at the Iverson property in East Canyon. We went up and cooked hot dogs and s'mores and the kids played croquet and kick ball. The boys and I slept over with Matt & Karen and kids and Christopher. It is an easy campout (with a private bath house) and it was just beautiful.

Sydney and Nathaniel by the stream.

The pukey-wheel is a favorite activity.

Davis upside down on the swing.

The big boys used the swing set like a jungle gym as the wheel goes around and around and around...

Morning with Carson, Courtney, Nathaniel, and Christopher.

Cute barn on the next property.

All cleaned up and ready to go.

Antelope Island

2011-07-31T17:28:00.000-07:00

I haven't been out to Antelope Island in the middle of the Great Salt Lake for years. I remembered the shallow water with brine shrimp swimming around in it (actually crustaceans, not brine fly larvae as I erroneously believed up until this visit.) I remembered the round grains of sand, the clouds of brine flies, and of course, the smell of the Great Salt Lake. That's a hard thing to forget. After Chris flew back to S.Cal, I had time on my hands with the kids so I took them on the long drive out on the causeway to the island. We were actually pretty lucky in that it wasn't too hot (no shade out there), we saw plenty of wildlife (a burrowing owl, antelope, bison from a distance, and big orb spiders), and the kids were really entertained with just exploring.

One of the bison art installments. Not pictured are the big spiders living inside it.

Big spiders all over the visitors center.

Nathaniel, Sydney, Courtney, Davis, and Carson.

Atlases (or is it Atli for plural?)

Walking out to the water

It stays shallow for a long time and its so salty you can skip rocks even throwing them underhand.

These guys wandered way out. They spent a lot of time skipping rocks which would go forever on the salt water.

Look closely for the cloud of brine flies. I taught them how to herd them.

Davis found a cool old bike at the historic ranch.

Nathaniel weighs himself on the old scale.

Hope it's not hooked up to any dynamite...

Who knew blacksmithing could be so fun?

Great view from the island to the Wasatch Mountains.

It would be easier to if those dang cattle would hold still.

Hold on!

Davis got the hang of it, and then tried it on his cousins and brother.

But, we didn't float in the salt water. I wasn't that excited about it and we didn't bring swim gear. And I never really liked the feeling of my skin when the oily salt dried all over it. So, it was a successful outing without that experience.

Johansen Cousins in Utah

2011-07-30T15:08:00.000-07:00

We spent a couple weeks in Utah in July. Its a good time for kids to spend time with cousins. We were with our Johansen cousins in Park City and in Bountiful at Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Hummingbird at Scott's house.

After family dinners the old folk usually sit on the deck and the kids disappear downstairs to watch tv and play games.

Jamie, Cassie, Thanny, Lily, Holly hanging out at Grandma's.

Blake and Ione

We were lucky this time to be there for Holly's 8th birthday party. More cousins singing = more fun.

Holly's 8th birthday

My mom and I took some of the kids up to the This is the Place Monument in SLC. Boy it was a hot day. I think the statues below are of Brigham Young having a visitation from the martyred Joseph Smith. Brigham said, "This is the right place." Then Joseph said, "Yeah, but it sure is hot and there is no shade. Maybe since it's a dry heat it will be OK...."

A meditative moment for Nathaniel at the statues of Brigham Young and Joseph Smith?

Shuttle train at the "This is the Place Monument"

Touring the pioneer house with Grandma.

Pioneer donkey.

Grandma, Ione, Lily, and Nathaniel on a pioneer street.

Apparently pioneers played giant jenga games.

Ione scratching the pot bellied pig.

This is the Place monument, SLC.

Lemon, bluberry/raspberry, and watermelon flavored tongues (I mean, snowcones).

Lily and Nathaniel in Mueller Park Canyon.

Jamie, Lily, and Blake in Park City.

On the left: Chris, Jennifer, Kristen & Ione. One the right: Davis (red) and Nathaniel (yellow) ready to go down the alpine slide.

Lily, Blake, Jamie, Holly and Nanette survived the alpine slide.

Mountain Biking in Park City

2011-07-26T12:09:00.000-07:00

On our trip to Utah we spent a couple days at my brother's house in Park City. At one of the city parks there is a mountain bike "skills course". Chris and I haven't mountain biked for years and it was Nathaniel's first time (Davis has gone with the scouts a few times). So it was fun to go down the curvy bumpy practice trails and play on the wood structures. I must say, bikes with suspension make it a lot easier than it was with our old hard-tail bikes in Virginia.

Chris tests out the skills park structures.

Confidence, strength, and padded shorts - what else could you want?

Chris and Davis rode off the big teeter totter.

I rode off the small teeter totter.

It's a good thing you can't see my face. I'm pretty scared.

Nathaniel testing his balance skills with a drop off at the end.

Stopping to blow the parachute seeds away.

The flat road wasn't as fun as the downhill trails.

Boys and bikes.

It was so pretty. I wish I had pictures of us riding the next day when we took the gondola up the Canyons ski resort. We rode on trails that switched back down through the pine trees and then took a chair lift back up. I did get some pics of Nathaniel with my phone while Davis and Chris were going down a longer trail and Nathaniel and I explored a bit and took the gondola back down.

On the gondola.

Snow that has been hollowed out underneath by a stream like a turtle shell.

Lift chair with a snow shield. Pretty nice.

I need to get into better shape so we can do more mountain biking. Much more fun with the boys than going to the outlet mall.

Garner Visit

2011-07-24T15:50:00.000-07:00

Matt, Karen and family stayed with us a few days on their way from Hawaii as they move to Utah. It was fun to hang out with them. The three older kids ran with the high school cross country team on some trails and also with Matt on a trail that goes down a canyon and ends at the beach. We also went to Hurricane Harbor water park and learned that none of us are very excited about the big scary slides. The wave pool, lazy river, and racing slides were more our speed.

Shuttle bus to Hurricane Harbor water park

Matt rides the bike along with the kids on an 8 mile trail to the beach.

Running down Sycamore Canyon toward the beach.

Boys plug their ears as the girls sing along to the radio.

Sydney, Courtney and Nathaniel in the wave pool at Hurricane Harbor.

The water slide races were the most favorite activity.

Matt, Carson, Davis, Sydney and Nathaniel in order of speed (and weight).

The kids don't stand a chance against "fat" Matt.

Sydney and Nathaniel create a "wind tunnel" to sleep in.

Thanks for visiting guys - come back anytime.

Funerals = Family Reunions

2011-07-24T13:35:00.000-07:00

Mark with Jane, and Annie in the backyard.

Grandpa Charlie passed away on the 4th of July. We drove up the following Saturday to be there for the funeral. All of Chris' siblings and step-siblings were able to be there and so it turned into a family reunion, as funerals often do. We were glad to see everyone there (but wished Mark, Kaitlyn, and Maggie could have come too).

Davis wrestles Christopher with a stuffed gorilla.

Mark and Graham

Andie, Jeff, Matt, and Karen in a candid moment.

It's fun to see the cousins...

but the viewing feels pretty long for kids.

Carson and Davis enjoyed "hanging" around together.

Kristen Gurr played at the cemetery.

Carol and children.

All the Iversons/Garners

Davis got ahold of the camera and took this patriotic view.

Laura, Carol, Caryn, Andreana

The big boys made a meal of mostly olives and cupcakes.

Younger boys had a more varied meal, but with plenty of cupcakes.

Nathaniel demonstrates how a headless person eats a cupcake.

Cleaning up after ward functions is so ingrained in mormon culture that the family cleaned up after the funeral luncheon. (But Loren made it look cool)

It's all fun and games until someone blows out an achilles.

5K and a Pancake Breaky in the Car Park

2011-07-05T08:22:00.000-07:00

Running his first 5K

A few weeks ago Davis convinced Nathaniel to start jogging so he could be ready to run the community 5K on July 4th. Davis took him out on his first jog, then after that Nathaniel and I would jog a little bit on the trails after we dropped Davis off for xcountry workout. We would jog a little while, then stop to examine something (lizards, quail, rabbits, snakes, elderberries, bees nests...) The week before the 5K, Davis decided he'd rather cook sausage with the scouts at the pancake breakfast. Fine. But, the night before, Nathaniel told me he was still doing the race. So, we got up at 6:30am so Chris could drop us off early for registration. Then he drove Davis to the church and came back to watch the race.
Nathaniel did great. The first half of the race was all uphill. I couldn't keep up with him. He picked some guy ahead of him and said he used him as a "pacemaker" all the way up the hill. I caught up to him at the water station at the top. It was fun and Nathaniel was very proud of himself that he had said he would do it, so he did it.

After the finish line.

Davis, on the otherhand, did enjoy cooking all the sausages for three wards. But, as you can see, he does not enjoy having his picture taken.

Mmmm. Raw sausage.

Braces

2011-06-21T12:13:00.000-07:00

And it begins...

He chose teal brackets. Awesome.

Chaparral in June

2011-06-21T12:09:00.000-07:00

It's June in the Chaparral. There are still many blooms on the Elderberry bushes (and some berries starting to ripen too) and lots of monkey flower, black mustard, and white sage in bloom all over the hills. But, these are some pictures of new plants coming into flower in June.

Gum Plant (we used to call it tattoo flower because the buds have a sticky resin that will make a flower shaped spot on your hand after sprinkling it with trail dust. It resists soap and water too.)

Pearly Everlasting

Wild roses (probably not natives.)

Bush Mallow

Diamond Clarkia

Chamise

Red Stemmed Filaree?

Some sort of salvia - I don't think it's Crimson Monkeyflower.

Prickly Pear Cactus

This month the creatures I've met along the trail have been of a more friendly variety.

Road Runner

Long Nosed Snake (unfortunately his nose is already down the hole.)

Rabbits are all over.

Look in the mud nest to see the little swallow waiting for its dinner.

Johansens visit in June

2011-06-21T11:20:00.000-07:00

We are glad that two of my brothers have in-laws in California. That means we get to see them when they come into town for other family events. Mike and Mary Ann spent the afternoon with us on Friday. I was suggesting some things we could do and I mentioned the Reagan Presidential Library as a joke - because kids love presidential libraries. Well, that's the activity they chose.

Wes, Sammy, Davis, and Nathaniel cozy up to Ronnie and Nancy.

Chris took the afternoon off to come with us.

Air Force One is pretty neat.

It helps that the gift shop sells jelly beans.

See, edutainment can be fun (but I think Wes and Sammy had to write a report on it the next day.)

Dinner after the museum.

After breaking down in Nevada and then camping for 4 days at a family reunion, Mark and Nanette came to our place for dinner and some play time in the spool (and a shower for Nanette because she didn't think the trickle from the campground shower was adequate.)

The sun came out after a cloudy morning.

The fountain part of the spa makes a fun kiddy pool.

One of the rare occasions when they were holding still.

Even Davis got in with the kids.

Thanks for visiting everyone!

End of Elementary School

2011-06-12T19:48:00.000-07:00

Fifth grade is over and Nathaniel will go to middle school next year. The whole family is done with elementary school now. Hmmmm. Anyway, Nathaniel has really enjoyed the activities at the end of the school year. First was open house where he displayed the projects he completed over the year in school

Nathaniel in his classroom.

Playing with pals on the playground.

They loved playing tag on the structure.

I think Nathaniel will miss recess next year in middle school. But, I won't miss the 1/2 cup of sand that came home in his shoes every day. The weekend before school let out, Nathaniel's buddy Ethan came for a visit before his family moves out of state.

Nathaniel and Ethan with their gel-bead shooters.

Hey guys! Look at us (way up on the rocks).

During the last week of school the fifth graders had an activity day where they played games on the lawn and had a picnic.

Nathaniel and Riley compete in the tire race.

Getting ready for the water balloon fight.

Fun day.

A culmination ceremony was held on the last day of school to recognize the achievements of the fifth graders.

Fifth grade culmination under an arch of earth balloons.

Why did this picture show up in this orientation and why can't I rotate it?

Refreshments with Willey and Riley.

Add caption

Nathaniel with buddy Derek.

That night Nathaniel attended an 11 year old scout camp with his old patrol from S. Pas. It was pretty exciting for him to finish elementary school. He enjoyed being with so many friends, old and new. We are proud of the great kid he has grown into.

Memorial Day with the Silver Family

2011-05-31T21:48:00.000-07:00

We had a lovely Memorial Day with our friends. Cannon and Ariel Silver and family are friends from South Pasadena and then like so many from S. Pas., they moved away. We enjoyed having time to spend with them and having the chance for all the children to become reaquainted.

The boys gather materials for a construction project at the mouth of Malibu Creek.

We spent some (not nearly enough) time at Malibu Lagoon State Beach. We expected a cool breezy day and instead enjoyed a warm sunny one.

Enjoying the water

The 11 year olds discover that they are great pals (Nathaniel is holding a shark egg with a live shark embryo moving inside).

Chris and the Silvers

Then we visited the Getty Villa museum in Malibu. (Hey kids! Let's pack up and leave the beach so we can go to a museum and look at Greek and Roman antiquities. Yay!!!)

The walkway to the museum has a great view of the ocean.

My favorite thing about the Getty museums is that they are kid friendly. Running? Jumping? OK!

How often do you get a chance to read in the garden of a Greek villa in Malibu?

Thanny's drawing of Medusa in a pot in the family room.

Friends near and far by a beautiful pool

See the boys on the walkway at the top?

We love to have visitors. When are you coming back?

Chaparral in May

2011-05-29T21:58:00.000-07:00

Some photos from my runs and bike rides this month. I still love living here...

Rattlesnake sunning itself across the trail.

but sometimes the neighborhood seems a little rough.

Yucca in bloom

Paradise Falls

Purple Sage in bloom.

Sego Lily and Golden Yarrow.

Nathaniel in "Gardens of the World"

Nathaniel likes to explore new places after school on Fridays, so this was one of our outings.

Hidden Valley... Ranch

The hills are covered with Monkey Flower and Sage.

It's great having a national recreation area down the street.

Rye grass has gone to seed and shivers in the cool breeze that comes over the hill from the ocean.

15 Years Old

2011-05-29T21:47:00.000-07:00

Davis turned 15 this month. Soon driving, dating, what else?

The favored gift had to be the 5-finger running shoes.

They are even good for napping in.

No photos of the cake (don't know why?) but it was fun to go to the beach with friends the day after and sword fight with bamboo for a couple hours. I guess that's what 15 year olds do.

Grass Progress and a Few Other Yard Happenings

2011-05-29T21:29:00.000-07:00

The front yard is slowly shaping up, but oh, it has been so much more work than we had planned. After re-doing all the sprinklers and getting rid of downed trees, the ground finally dried out enough to seed the lawn.

Leveling the ground before seeding.

One week after seeding (around Easter) baby grass is starting to come up.

Nathaniel is moving extra dirt off the slope while Chris fixes yet another sprinkler-line break.

The first mowing - Mid May.

May 20th-ish. Grass filling in, stump near driveway needs to be ground up (by city) and landscaping needs to be done where eucalyptus tree used to be.

May 27- city removed stump and planted an Aristocrat Pear tree (ornamental). They will come back and plant another one after we get the landscaping done on the corner (gratis!)

A pair of ducks were swimming in the spa and checking out the yard to see if they liked it (they didn't).

Rabbit came in the yard to see if it liked it there.

I didn't want it to like the yard so I chased it out. We need a better gate before we plant the vegetable garden.

Exploring Hidden Beaches with the Suarez Family

2011-05-29T21:12:00.000-07:00

May has been cool and breezy, but sunny. Perfect weather for exploring a new beach (but not swimming.)

A small trail down a little canyon leads to a secluded beach in Malibu.

The dads find a sunny spot sheltered from the wind for napping.

Bamboo makes good light sabers for Davis and Adrian

Esteban, Nathaniel, and Davis spar until the bamboo breaks too close to their hands and then they search for a new piece.

Four growing boys.

The story of the eucalyptus tree.

2011-04-24T19:44:00.000-07:00

We had an old eucalyptus tree in the front yard. We talked about taking it out. We got a couple quotes from tree guys to trim it or take it out. One guy told us when the tree hasn't ever been trimmed like this one that the branches catch the wind during a storm and blow the tree over. "At least it is leaning toward the street," he said. We decided to leave the tree in and just get it trimmed. We didn't want to spend the money to take it out and it shaded the roof in the afternoon.

Eucalyptus tree on the corner of the yard

That very Sunday we had a drenching storm with gusts of wind up to 60mph. We were home in the afternoon. Chris heard a gust of wind and a crunch. He looked out and the tree was in the street.

Eucalyptus tree on the corner of the street

A neighbor wanted the firewood so he and a buddy showed up with chainsaws the next week and cut up most of the major branches and took two pickup truck loads away. Since it fell in the street, the city cleaned up the leafy branches and cut the trunk up to the property line.

Chris chipped away the dirt and bark so they could cut it with the chainsaw

Then some ward members came to help cut the stump up. Actually, a son-in-law of one of them who trains forest service guys in clearing trees came with his sharp chainsaw and pretty much did the whole thing himself. Chris cleaned up the trunk where he wanted to cut (it keeps the saw sharp).

This is as small as we could get the stump without paying someone to do the work.

Then we were left with a giant dirt/root ball. I got a couple of quotes from guys to get rid of it. They all suggested crazy, labor intensive and expensive ways to get rid of it. Then the first guy who told me it would probably fall in the street said he could just grind it away. (Why didn't any of the others say they could just grind it up?) So, when we got back from our spring break trip it looked like this...

Stump has been ground up into mulch.

If you look close you can see a faint green sheen on the ground behind the wood chips. Our 1 week old baby grass is growing. Now we need to grade the slope on the corner and clean it up so we can plant some flowering bushes on the corner and a new tree above them.

Spring Break with the Somervilles

2011-04-24T16:09:00.000-07:00

We had a fun spring trip to Tucson to stay with the Somervilles. We hiked and toured Kartchner Caverns, but the most fun was just playing with cousins in the pool and on the trampoline.

Loren and Alexandrea

Davis

Luke

Nathaniel, Caryn, and Davis

Nathaniel

Chris and Nathaniel

In the pool

Alexandrea and the Easter Bunny

Chris and Alexandrea drying off after swimming.

Luke -13, Davis - 14, Nathaniel - 11

Thanks guys. We had a great time.

Spring Break Hike to 7 Falls

2011-04-24T15:53:00.000-07:00

We took a hike in the Sabino Canyon recreation area to 7 Falls. The ocotillo, prickly pear cacti, and trees are blooming. It was sunny and clear in the 80s - such a beautiful day to hike in Tucson. There was even a breeze on the way back down the canyon to cool us off. It ended up being a more challenging hike than we expected - 5 mile round trip. Nathaniel did great.

Tram goes 2 miles up Bear Canyon to the trail head

Davis and Nathaniel head up the canyon.

Ocotillo

Palo verde

Mesquite

Prickly Pear Cactus

Broad billed hummingbird

Chris and Nathaniel in one of the pools at 7 Falls

Looking down from the trail

Chris by one of the waterfalls

Science Weekend at Paramount Ranch

2011-04-24T15:19:00.000-07:00

Thanny and I went to a Friday night science activity at Paramount Ranch which is in the Santa Monica Mountains not too far from us. We went on a night hike and learned about electronic tracking of wildlife, saw Saturn's rings through a telescope, saw owls, and had hot chocolate while we listened to a ranger rock band. It was fun, but I think we'll go on our own night hike the next time the moon is full, because there were just too many people on this one.

Thanny at Paramount Ranch

Wild west village used in tv and movies

NPS rangers sang a song called, "Purple Sage" to a Jimmy Hendrix tune.

What's Blooming in the Chaparral in April?

2011-04-24T15:06:00.000-07:00

So, this is what it looks like nowadays during my early-morning-seminary jog. The hills are beautiful this time of year. They really benefitted from the wet winter.

There are so many things blooming in the chaparral this month that I haven't gotten around to identifying them - sorry. I thought I'd post the pictures anyway. I'll label the ones I know, or guess at some I might know.

Hairy Vetch (?)

Purple Sage (I think I've heard it called black sage too)

A relative of the pea family

California Buckwheat

Golden Yarrow

Current blossoms

Current berries

California Poppy

Hummingbird Salvia

Holly Leaf Cherry

Thistle

Spring Storm

2011-03-20T15:57:00.000-07:00

Chris - Watch out where you rototill!

Big changes in the front yard this weekend.

Oh No!

Just kidding. Saturday was rototill day for the front yard, but that had nothing to do with the tree. We had been debating whether we should remove the big eucalyptus or trim it and keep it. I had a tree guy give me a quote on it Tuesday. He said, "When they aren't trimmed for a long time like this, then the wind catches the branches and knocks them down. At least it's leaning toward the street and not toward your house." Amen Manuel, Amen.

First thing Nathaniel asked - Can we play on it?

During the night it started to rain like crazy with lots of wind. On the way to and from church this morning we had to weave back and forth through the broken branches on the road and the water running across the intersections. This afternoon Chris says he heard a wind burst and then a noise. I heard a noise like someone dropping a cardboard box full of stuff downstairs and heard Chris say something. We look out the window and the eucalyptus is down almost completely blocking the side street. I guess that makes our decision for us.

Pretty big, huh?

So, glad it came down in the street and not the house. Plus, since it is in the street, the city will clean it up and we don't have to pay to have it trimmed or removed.

Then the boys played in the water.

It's a pretty big storm - and it's still going on. I think the city crews are pretty busy so I don't know how long before they get this tree taken care of.

Too bad we don't have irrigation ditches to play in. They would love that.

I'm glad we don't have a new lawn in yet to repair. I think we'll put a new tree in the same spot.

The tree didn't even touch our retaining wall. Yay!

Anyway, we couldn't do anything about it so we came inside for warm clothes, showers for the boys, and hot cocoa all around.

Doomed Blooms

2011-03-18T17:01:00.000-07:00

A week or so ago my little peach tree stick started to bloom... and then the nectarine, the meyer lemon, the oroblanco grapefruit and I bought a washington navel orange and hass avacado trees. I told my mother in law that they were starting to bloom. I was so excited. She asked, "Are you going to pick off the blossoms or wait and pick off the little fruit?" What???

Meyer Lemon with ant

Nectarine

Oroblanco

Washington Navel

Hass

Apparently you aren't supposed to let them fruit the first couple years so they can build stronger roots. :(
Watch out little ant.

March in the Chaparral

2011-03-13T20:18:00.000-07:00

I went on a long run/march in the hills this week. Some parts of the trail are so steep that I can't even pretend to jog up them. The day was so pretty and the plants are started to bloom. I decided I was going slow enough that it wouldn't make much difference if I stopped and took some pictures.

Wispy little clouds in a blue sky.

Single track trail through non-native grass.

I wanted to start keeping track of which plants in the chaparral bloom in each month. I'm also trying to identify the native plants before I have to take my biology class on a field trip to identify native plants.

California Lilac - sweet perfume floats around the hillside when these are in bloom.

Foothill penstemon

Sugar Bush

Maybe Lemonadeberry Bush?

I've been trying to figure out which bush is the lemonadeberry. It produces hard berries that taste like lemon when you suck on them. I just don't want to put something in my mouth if it's NOT lemonade berry.

Trail with sun streaming through the chaparral.

Canyon Sunflower

Common Monkey Flower

Can't find it. Maybe it's something that escaped from a garden and isn't in the native guides

The Coast Live Oaks are blooming too.

The white flowers and the green prickly thing hiding in the leaves are Wild Cucumber.

Elderberry

Even the poison oak is in bloom.

I love it here.

Long Beach with Babies

2011-03-07T22:26:00.000-08:00

Mark, Nathaniel, and Chris

Mark and Annie came through LA on a cruise trip so we drove down to Long Beach to see them before they flew home. We brought a picnic lunch and went down to the beach.

The seagulls would follow the boys up and down the beach because they fed them some of their sandwiches.

It was a mostly sunny day, but windy and a little chilly.

The sandwiches were on very chewy bread.

Mark watches as Ayla tries to step over the bits of bamboo in the surfline on the sand.

The babies weren't quite convinced that a cold windy beach was fun for them.

Jane plays with a placecard while Davis stacks and restacks pillows on her back.

It was fun to see them for a little while. Jane has changed since we saw them at Christmas. She is almost crawling so Davis helped her work on her skills by providing "resistance training", using pillows that Jane had to try to crawl out from under. Jane thought it was fun and Mark and Annie didn't object, so I guess it wasn't baby abuse.

The Grotto Trail

2011-02-19T18:57:00.000-08:00

It's been a rainy week with sick kids. Nathaniel was sick from Sunday to Thursday. Then after being in the house so long he felt well enough for a little walk. During a break in the clouds we went to a small canyon where they have a Chumash Indian cultural center.

The whole area was filled with California Live Oak whose branches reached down to the ground making large dome enclosures.

Seems like something is always blooming around here.

It was good to get some fresh air after almost a week indoors.

This is a Chumash reed hut.

Nathaniel imagined having this to play in with his buddies.

Saturday, during another break in the torrential rain, we drove way up into the Santa Monica Mountains to Circle X Ranch. Our hike took us down along a stream, past a couple waterfalls.

It was called the Grotto Trail. Very muddy after the rains.

The water went through giant boulders. We did a little rock climbing, but with our muddy boots and the wet rocks, we were pretty conservative.

It's very pretty after a rain - bright clear colors. A lovely place to hike if you can stomach the twisty narrow mountain road to get there.

Birthday presents

2011-02-03T12:14:00.000-08:00

All shiny and new

Early and late peaches, apples, a nectarine, and a 4-in-1 grafted plum.

Meyer Lemon and Oro Blanco grapefruit

Chris and I often get gifts from our parents that are a combo Christmas and Birthday gift. My cookware set was creeping ever-nearer to the end of it's 25 year warrantee (which seemed like a lifetime warrantee when I got married) and our silverware started disappearing about the time the boys started helping scrape the plates. I think a lot of forks went into the garbage and the spoons into the disposal (we were short on forks, the spoons were gouged up but I think we still had a full set.) Now we have a shiny new set of pots and pans and silverware. We feel so fancy now.
Our yard is getting more and more bare (it's a lot of work and the yard looks worse the more work we do.) But it was really fun to go choose birthday trees at the nursery. They have been planted close together in groups of the type of fruit they will bear. The idea is that our family doesn't need a whole mature-tree full of apples at one time. So, you get a few trees with a different harvest times, plant them close together and prune them so they don't grow very big. Then you get a more usable amount of fruit over a longer time. We'll see how it works.
Thanks!

Paradise Falls

2011-02-03T11:51:00.000-08:00

January is a great month for hikes in S.CA. Blue skies, not too hot, and lots of your neighbors around to share the experience. Hiking around the Conejo Valley seems like a community experience. I guess we aren't really looking for solitude and the people are very nice (and they clean up after their dogs) so its alright.

Chris and Nathaniel on Stagecoach Bluff

We hiked about 3 miles Saturday. This park has a lot of roads and trails and many of them are relatively flat so I think this will be a good place for running. It's only about 4 miles from our house.

Picking a prickly pear

We tasted a ripe prickly pear (and all got sliver-sized cactus spines stuck in our fingers for the rest of the day for the trouble.) It was actually really good. I'm tempted to go with some gloves and a bucket and get a bunch to make jelly with. I always loved my grandma's jellies made from wild currants, elderberries or chokecherries. Maybe it's time for some foraging.

Falling...

Lots of water in the falls.

View from the top

Time for friends and family to come visit and go for a hike.

A Lego Promise

2011-01-29T14:22:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time I promised Davis I would post photos of his lego creations on the blog. Well, many lego scenes and creations have come and gone and these pictures are a couple years old. But I did promise...

shopping cart

street tough with boombox

duck

aligator in swamp

naptime

studio apartment

computer desk

Oh please help me survive living in this studio apartment.

Hiking Boy

2011-01-28T15:00:00.000-08:00

Nathaniel found a throne in the rock wall.

I have found a hiking buddy. Davis has refused to go hiking with me since he was 3 1/2 (it was a huge tantrum at the Echo Canyon trail head where I had met a toddler hiking group with the hopes of making friends with outdoor interests, having just moved to California from Jersey City.) I have only occasionally convinced (coerced) him to go. But last Saturday, not even the bribe of bacon and eggs for breakfast would move him. Chris isn't a morning person so he isn't often interested in jumping out of bed and trudging up a trail.

Cool and comfy on a mossy seat.

But, last Saturday, Nathaniel said he'd go along. Since winter time in California means water, it was time to go find a waterfall. Not far from our house in the Santa Monica Mountains is an area called Satwiwa. There are so many trails to explore.

The waterfall curves up above and cascades run down channels carved in the rock. We thought it would be an awsome slide for a lego guy, but it would take him a long time to walk back up for another run.

True to form in Southern California, we shared our back-to-nature experience with about 40 other hikers. I have to say though, it is a little different crowd out here than when we lived closer to Los Angeles. Most were families or groups of friends - teens to young adult. They'd all sit down on big rocks for their snacks (just like anywhere) but instead of the cheetos and funyuns, they had baby carrots and passed around strawberries (we are just over the hill from the strawberry fields of Camarillo). We didn't see anyone swimming in the stream in their underwear. We commonly found underwear in the streams on hikes nearer LA.

California poppies are starting to bloom already.

Sycamore Canyon

Our hike ended up being about 5 miles when we planned on a little less than 3 and it was much warmer than we expected. The only complaint from Nathaniel though, was that he wished he hadn't worn his lined track pants because they were too hot. He says he is up for hiking to a different waterfall tomorrow. That makes me very happy.

Snow fun

2011-01-14T17:25:00.000-08:00

Chris wanted to take the boys up to his old swooshing-grounds while we were in Utah for Christmas. We went up to Powder Mountain (past Huntsville where my dad grew up) for a day of skiing.

Everyone but Chris took some lessons. I've been skiing since I was about 5 but never advanced much past a modified snow plow (did you know they don't call it snow plow anymore?). I need to improve to be able to ski with the boys as they get older. At least I can ski the runs while they weave in and out of the trees or go learn how to do moguls.

Davis is totally ready to start shredding the hills. He loves to head off on trails through the pines. Too bad we don't live closer to the snow. Nathaniel is doing great turns and chooses his own path down the slopes. He enjoyed showing me the different runs he went on with his ski instructor.

We love our friends and family for lending us nice warm snow gear. No one cries on our ski trips over frozen toes or fingers. I thought that was part of skiing when I was a kid. (Can you say "night-skiing at Brighton"?) Maybe someone will have some hand-me downs for me sometime. My snow clothes are older than my kids. (I'm not in the pic but just imagine some purple and royal blue early 90s gear - really. It was nice at the time...)

So pretty. I'm glad we can take our kids to see places like this.

Christmas in Utah 2010

2010-12-25T21:18:00.000-08:00

Our Christmas trip has been quite an adventure for the few days we've been here. It started with a 15 hour white-knuckle drive through a snow storm up I-15 that didn't even get us all the way to our destination. Then we've had an action packed time ice skating, snow shoeing (how do you spell that?) and cross country skiing with cousins. (We love cousins!)

We had Christmas Eve dinner with the Garner/Iversons. We loved meeting babies and dogs that have joined the family since our last reunion. And no gathering is complete without some of the cousins being schooled in wrestling by cousin Graham.

Christmas Day was spent with the Johansens. It was exciting with our boys and a cousin all testing out their new fire-arms (who know nerf guns and rubber band shooters could be semi-automatic?). Games were played - digitally and physically. I wish I had taken a picture of the desserts, but they were awesome (and chocolate!)

Merry Christmas!

Stained Glass Cookie Ornaments

2010-12-08T21:27:00.001-08:00

At Nathaniel's request, this year we made Stained-Glass Cookie Ornaments for the tree. You know - sugar cookies with a hole cut in the middle that you fill with crushed hard candies that then melt in the oven... Nathaniel was a great help in making them. He did all the sticky crushed candy work.

And then he helped me put the tree up, string the lights and hang the ornaments. I don't think I've ever had this much help decorating the tree.

I think it turned out pretty. I'm just worried that the ants will find the tree. I don't think my mom ever had to worry about ants in December in Utah.

Maybe I won't have to worry about ants though. The cookies are already being eaten. I tried to get a picture of the culprit, but he was so fast I couldn't even capture him on film.

Thanksgiving 2010

2010-12-05T14:07:00.001-08:00

Where were you on black Friday? Up at 4am? In line with a bunch of other early shoppers suffering from over-indulgence from the previous day's feast? I was here.
So, I didn't save 40% off linens, or toys, or electronics. I think most everyone else did because it was quiet, peaceful, and oh yeah, SUNNY! I love Santa Barbara in the winter, and did I tell you it's less than an hour from my house now? (Santa Barbara hasn't moved. We did.)

Nathaniel loves it too. We were overdressed for the weather, but he loves his snow-hat, even at the beach.

He did manage to hit himself in the eye with the rapier-like stick he is swinging. But, no one else was hurt.

After proving that he could jump over a water inlet on the beach, Davis set about building a bridge with driftwood found nearby.

It was a pretty good bridge. It was even used by other beach goers who found themselves trapped by the inlet as they walked from the parking lot to the ocean. I think they said 12 adults crossed (and one selkie - a girl just transformed from a seal and came out of the ocean, or maybe she was wearing a wetsuit and just got out of a sea kayak) before it broke when a man in cowboy boots crossed while carrying his daughter on his shoulders. Oh well. Just the boots got wet.

Afterwards we had lunch at Stearns' Wharf.

We were very pleased to have visitors for Thanksgiving. Chris' folks came down for the whole weekend and feasted, hiked, and beached with us. My brother Mark and his family came over Friday to see our new place. The kids had a great time in the spa and then playing horsey in the loft. I'm surprised no one was trampled by the big teenage boy horsies. The horsies were very good sports.

Hmmm. In this picture it looks like one of the big horsies is getting a ride from his little sister. She was a really good sport.

We discovered a lovely arboretum about a mile from our place. We went there to get ideas of plants we want to put in our own yard.

It was a pretty, sunny day; just a little on the cool side (60's... Brrrrrrr). Yeah, I've lived in S. Cal. too long.