Hiking Devil's Slide

When my husband arrived home from work last Thursday evening, he asked if I'd like to go for a hike or something on Friday. He had a rare day of no meetings and thought it would be a great opportunity to take a day off and spend time together. What a sweetie! And, what a great thing for him to have a day off!

The weather finally started cooling down last week which made hiking a comfortable possibility. We quickly decided on a trail in the San Jacinto Mountains near Idyllwild, called, "Devil's Slide". We got up early Friday morning, had a good breakfast, loaded our day packs and drove up the mountain.  We made a stop at the Idyllwild ranger station for a permit for that trail and a wilderness parking pass.

It was a beautiful day!  The sky was blue with some desert clouds building in the distance.  I think the temperature was in the 70's to low 80's.  The humidity made it seem warmer, especially in the sun, but after the heat we've had the past few weeks, it was really nice!

There were interesting and beautiful things to see right from the start of the trail.

Check out this twisty tree.  I wonder what makes some trees do this?

Here's the whole tree.  It's dead but still standing strong and beautiful.

We saw another one later that day...

 Gorgeous blue sky!  And, more dead trees...but...the color and texture is beautiful!

So are the lines and shapes.  Strong and pretty!

This one looks like a dragon.  Click on it to make it larger and check out the scary looking head!

Little babies...trees of the future.

Hubby found a ring of bark on the trail, cleared out the center, and put it on my wrist.  A bracelet!
It was strong enough that it stayed on all day and didn't break when I took it off.  

The trail was two and a half miles long with 1700 feet of elevation gain.  It was a very good workout!

The terrain varied from smooth dirt, roots, rocks, steep drop-offs along the side,

and a couple of muddy sections.

There were a few sections that leveled out...slightly.  But, most of the trip up was just that, UP.

Lots of climbing!  There were some switchback sections that climbed pretty quickly.

At one point, we looked down and saw four sections below us.  I couldn't get a good

picture though because of all the trees.  But, here are two shots of some of them.

The steep climb made for a quickly changing view when we looked down the mountain and into the distance.  We started below the level of "Suicide Rock" (on the right side of the photo) but quickly climbed to a point that it was straight across from us.

And, in a very short time, we were above it and much farther away.  There was a marine layer over the valley that was slowly burning off and, even farther away, we could see clouds over the ocean.  What an incredible view it must be on a crystal clear day!

There aren't many flowers right now.  But, I did spot a few...like some Indian Paintbrush...

Some teeny, tiny flowers...

I think this might be Buck Brush...

Ranger's Buttons!  So cute!

We saw a few berries.  I think this is a Gooseberry.  Wicked!  Even the stems!  Hubby lifted a leaf out of the way so I could take a photo and it pierced his finger.  Ouch!

The above photo and the one below are from the same bush.  I love the colors in the one below.

More thorns!

We saw lots of lizards darting around and jumping from rock to rock.

Some were laying around, enjoying the sunshine.  They even posed for pictures!

So cute!

Now, I have more photos to use for sculpting lizards in my ceramics class.

Hubby is taking the class with me this semester.  :-)

We kept seeing tiny fur balls darting across the trail so fast that we couldn't get a good look at them.

We assumed they were chipmunks but weren't sure until this one actually sat still for a moment.

There were busy gray squirrels too.  Some of them had huge, fluffy tails.

I wasn't able to get any pictures of them.  But, I got a picture of this skinnier tailed squirrel
running around.  They all seemed quite busy getting ready for winter.

After a couple hours of hiking, we made it to the saddle junction.  I think the elevation is about 8,000 feet at this point.  There are lots of signs and trails that take off from this point.  Including, a trail that leads to Tahquitz Peak...the peak we went to last year but from a different side.

Even the famous Pacific Crest Trail runs through here.  A 2,663 mile trail that runs through the Cascade, Sierra, and other mountain ranges from the border of Canada to the border of Mexico.

At the saddle, we noticed strange things growing on the trunks of some trees.

Weird!  Creepy!

And, really big!

I also spotted this yellow growth.  The color is pretty but I wasn't about to touch it.  Eeeew!

From the saddle, we decided to follow one of the trails for a while and see where it lead.

The terrain started changing from mostly brown to partly green.

And, all of a sudden, we were surrounded by green fern.

The farther we walked, the greener it became and the fern got taller and taller.

It went from a few inches tall at the beginning to hip high further down the trail.

The clouds were getting bigger and gently drifting in front of the sun, giving us periods of shade.

It was gorgeous and magical up there.  I had no idea we'd find anything like this when we reached the saddle.  It was worth every steep step and all the heavy breathing and sweat!

We even came across a wet, boggy area.  I wonder if it's always there or if it was from the recent monsoon storms?  Either way, it's pretty cool and provides much needed water for the wildlife.

As we hiked back down, the clouds got thicker and darker but

we never heard any rumbling and they didn't seem to get any bigger or closer.

After our hike, we headed into the town of Idyllwild for a bite to eat.  We wanted to try a new place and decided on "Restaurant Gastronome".  They had outdoor seating under the pines with a terrific view of the mountain we had just climbed.  I had a delicious sandwich made with tender chicken on a soft, fluffy thin bread (I can't remember what they called it) with lettuce, tomato, purple onion and a yummy raspberry sauce.  Hubby had a delicious barbecue chicken wrap.  And, we had some ice cold beer.  The weather was wonderful, the food was delicious, and the company...there are no words to describe how wonderful he is!  I'm a very lucky girl!  Thanks, hubby, for a wonderful day!  

Colorful Fun

Just before our summer vacation, I popped into my local Michael's store in hopes of finding and buying a few new colors of Sugar N Cream yarn.  I found a soft, pretty blue, called "Robins Egg", and a happy, buttery yellow.  I packed them with some colors I already had and took them on vacation.  I thought it would be fun to make some chunky doilies for my daughter's new apartment.  I used some patterns I had in a little Leisure Arts booklet with a little improvising and came up with two beauties.  Here's the blue one.  I love how it turned out.  So pretty!  It reminds me of a snowflake...

Here's the buttery yellow one.  I used this pattern last Christmas to make a red one for a gift.  

I think I like it even more in yellow...

Before vacation, I had already started making things for my daughter and her apartment.  We had bought dishes and dishtowels for her one day and were so excited about it all that she decided to crochet some place mats to go with it.  She bought a great big skein of Handicrafter Cotton in a beautiful pinky/watermelon color.  She's made two, so far.  They're adorable!  I wanted to join in on the fun!  So, I made a dishcloth for her.

I used an H hook and made a simple, single crochet square.

I edged it with reverse single crochet.  It made a cute, twisted edge.

That was so much fun that I whipped up another one with a variegated blue skein that I had.

I'll either save this for a gift or use it myself.  

I made this orange one on vacation...

I made up a different edging for it.  I think it's pretty cute!  It's not this bright in person.

It's a softer, prettier, orange.

Sugar N Cream makes great dish cloths and it seemed like two put together would make a nice, thick hot pad.  So, I made one of those too!  I used two different colors, Mango and Tangerine,

to make it reversible and more fun.

I bound the two sides together with little white, triangle scallops.

Now, she has a few more useful and colorful things for her new apartment.   

They're all in softer, prettier colors than what they appear in pictures.  They go great with her white dish towels that have watermelon, pink and orange stripes in them.  And, it all looks great with the cute, watermelon place mats that she's making.  It also ties in with some of the colors in the quilt we're making...especially, the yellow, the blue, and the pinkish hues.  It's all so bright and cheery!  :-)

While I was having so much fun with Sugar N Cream, I decided to make a little case for my "peepers".  I call them that because I feel like I'm not old enough to need "readers" and "peepers" is more fun to say.  Although, I'm finding myself needing to use them more and more.  Sheesh!

I made a chain, single crocheted one row, and crocheted in the round so I wouldn't

have a seam to sew on the bottom or the sides.  I made a little button hole and stitched a

button on the inside so I could close it up and keep the "peepers" from falling out.

I topped it off with a row of reverse single crochet for a cute, twisty edge.

My "Peeper Pouch" is soft and thick enough to protect my glasses.  

The pouch makes it easier to find them too!  I love this turquoise color!

I still have a few skeins of Sugar N Cream, Handicrafter Cotton, and some other cotton worsted yarns in my stash.  But, these projects sure helped in de-stashing.  They also eliminated a lot of bright, cheery colors from my stash.  I'm kind of feeling some withdrawals.  I might "need" to buy some more!  Wink!

Morning Mocha

There's a local breakfast restaurant that serves up a delicious coffee drink that they call a "Rose-a-Rita Mocha".  It's delicious!  It's has a unique chocolate, coffee, cinnamon flavor with a bit of a grainy texture.  It sounded really good this morning but we decided not to go out.  So, I got creative and tried to make some at home.  It was a success!

All I had to go on was the flavor that I remembered and the name.  We had ingredients that I thought might work....Mexican chocolate, coffee, "milk" (I used rice drink while hubby and daughter used coconut milk...we've gone non-dairy), cinnamon, and I cooked up a new batch of vanilla simple syrup.  I posted a recipe for the simple syrup a couple of years ago...just click HERE.

Hubby had bought the Mexican chocolate a few months ago to try and make hot chocolate that didn't have corn syrup in it.  He didn't have much luck with it though.  It's a box with packets like this...

Inside each packet is a round chunk of chocolate with pie shape lines to break it evenly.  It's hard to break and even harder to melt.  Even when he broke it into small bits it would only partially melt in the hot milk.  It turned the milk into a speckled, chunky mess.

I had an idea this morning that worked!  I used a cheese grater and ground half of a disk into a fine, sandy texture.  I heated half a cup of unsweetened rice drink, added the chocolate, and swirled it around over the heat.  It melted in nicely and turned into a rich, dark brown liquid.

Meanwhile, I brewed a dark batch of coffee in my French Press as hubby brewed decaf in his.  And, we heated up some coconut milk and rice milk.  When the coffee, chocolate, syrup and "milk" was ready we started making our cups of mocha.  We stirred together:  eight ounces of coffee and eight ounces of hot "milk", about two tablespoons of the liquid chocolate, about one tablespoon of vanilla syrup and a dash of cinnamon.  Wow!  It was so good!  It was at least as good as what we've had at the restaurant...maybe even better.  And, it didn't have the sandy texture it does at the restaurant.  The dash of cinnamon made it perfect.  We'll definitely be making this again!

Good Food and Good Times

I've been taking pictures of things I want to blog about but haven't had time to create the posts.  Life has been super busy but I finally found some time today to load pictures onto my laptop.  So, now I can start catching up.

Our daughter officially moved to her apartment late this last week.  She was nervous about what is ahead and sad about leaving but, so far, it's all going really well.  We've been Skyping and that helps a lot.  She had several days of orientation events, meetings with professors, music theory testing, and other things to do.  She was very busy!  But, those few days were also a lot of fun for her.  She met some very nice people and starting making some great memories.  Yay!  Classes start next Monday.

The week before she left was filled with errands, gathering up things she'll need in her apartment, moving, setting up, working on her quilt and enjoying time together...as we always do...but it felt a little different.  One night, last weekend, we had an especially fun family evening.  We put together a healthy dinner of grilled Italian chicken sausage and mushrooms, roasted baby zucchini, steamed artichokes with Meyer lemons from our tree, and some tiny homegrown tomatoes.  It was simple but so delicious!

As a last minute addition to the meal, I pulled together some ingredients we had

on hand and made a pitcher of sangria.  It was soooo good!

I posted a recipe for it a few months ago.  You can find it HERE.  It's so simple and there really are

no rules.  It's fun to experiment with different ingredients.  While we enjoyed this pitcher full, 

we started dreaming up some new ideas...like a white wine with peaches.  Hmmmm?

We topped off our amazing meal and evening with a wonderful treat that we recently 

discovered at Trader Joe's.  It's a dark chocolate bar with caramel and black sea salt.  

It's out of this world delicious!  We ate the whole thing!

Somehow, special times with special people are even better with great food!

Yarn Therapy

I promised to post pictures of the yarn I bought last week on my "yarn therapy" session.  Here it is...

It's Cascade, Ultra Pima.  I love cotton!  It's soft and the sheen made it even harder to resist.  It adds a richness to it. It doesn't have a color name...just 3719.  It's a soft, silvery, beige.  I think it will go with a lot of things.  It will probably become some kind of lacy wrap or shawl.  I bought two skeins.

I always have a hard time resisting Sugar 'n Cream.  The yarn shop, Labors of Love, has some colors I don't see in the big box stores....like this yummy chocolate brown.  They also have copies of free patterns around the store, sitting next to examples.  I picked up a pattern for a cute, knitted dishcloth.  That's what this will become.

Back to the sewing machine!  We just finished sewing all the squares together for my daughter's quilt. Next, we'll need to decide on a border and sew it on.  Then, create a back panel.  After that, we'll be ready to tie it all together!  

The Scoop

I think it's time for a post with the latest scoop on things I've been blogging about over the past few weeks...

The Quilt
My daughter and I finally finished cutting all the fabric squares for her quilt last weekend and have been sewing and sewing.  It's coming along...just not as fast as we'd planned.  We've been busy this week with other stuff too.  But, I'm still hopeful that we'll finish it in time.  I'll be sure to post pictures.  I promise!

The Tufted Headboard
We've put this project on hold.  We priced out all the supplies this week.  It turns out that it'll cost a lot more than we'd expected...around $80!  Foam is expensive!  We're not sure how well it would turn out since we've never made anything like this.  We're thinking about it and trying to decide whether to chance it or see if we can come up with an alternative that's cheaper and just as cute.  We bought fabric for it last month but we got a deal...only $3 a yard.

Parking Ticket
Remember that parking ticket I whined about?  We had parked at the beach, in a parking lot and received a ticket that said we were in violation of parking in a red zone.  The curb was not red.  There were no signs that said we couldn't park there.  We were parked completely legally.  We even talked with other people there...even the lifeguards and they all agreed...we were innocent.  It was so wrong that they would give us a ticket, knowing that we hadn't done anything wrong.  Well, we fought it and WON!  Yay!  We're VERY happy about that.  They changed it to "officer error"!

Smog Test
All the error codes finally cleared on our car and it passed the smog test to renew the registration.  But, a couple days later the "check engine" light came on again.  Ugh!  I guess we'll have to take it to the dealer to have the computer "flashed" with the correct programming.  What a pain!  It runs just fine but this will have to be fixed before it needs another smog test in two years.

Post Op
I had my post op doctor appointment today.  I've been feeling great and the doctor was happy to hear that.  I was hoping to hear that the results of the biopsy showed absolutely nothing wrong.  But, that wasn't the case.  Luckily, it isn't the "C" word!  Whew!  It turns out that I have "Complex Hyperplasia without Atypia".  Say, what?!  I know...long words, huh?!  It means that my uterus is trying to be an over achiever...it has wayyyy too many cells.  It's what's causing the overly thick walls and wonky cycles.  It has a small chance of turning into cancer.  So, the doctor recommends progesterone therapy for 10 days per cycle, for six months.  It usually clears up the problem and it shouldn't come back.  She gave me three options for the hormones...the synthetic kind that insurance will cover (with a co-pay) but doesn't have a very good reputation for being safe; a bio-identical one that insurance might partially cover but it's suspended in peanut oil and absorbs so fast into the body that it causes unpleasant side affects; or a bio-identical one that is compounded, isn't covered by insurance but should only be $35-40 per month, and has the least amount of side affects.  Guess which one I picked!  The last one.  It makes the most sense and probably won't cost much more than my co-pay would have on the first choice.  Even though the cancer risk is minimal, it makes sense to eliminate the risk or, at least, reduce it.  I'm sure not looking forward to taking any hormones though and dealing with possible side affects.  Ugh!  I can only hope it'll be like my surgery was....dreaded but turn out to be painless and I'll feel great!  I'm keeping my fingers crossed.  I'll have to have a biopsy in six months to see if it worked.  But, it'll be a different procedure this time and can be done in the doctor's office.

Yarn Therapy
I know...I didn't talk about this before.  But, it was in my mind all along (and, some of you highly recommended it...wink wink) that I'd take myself to the yarn shop for a little yarn therapy and buy something pretty after my surgery stuff was over.  Well, it's not totally over but the surgery is and with the news of the biopsy and hormones, I needed it.  In fact, I just might need more therapy sessions over the next six months of added hormones!  ;-)  Right after my doctor appointment today, I stopped in at a wonderful yarn shop in Fallbrook, "Labors of Love".  I'll try to take some pictures of my new yarns (yes...I bought more than one skein...I bought three!) over the weekend and post them.

And, since I'm busy posting the latest...
I finally saw an orthopedic doctor a few months ago for severe pain that had developed in my left shoulder.  It had gotten so bad that it hurt terribly to put a shirt on over my head, put dishes away, even hold the steering wheel.  And, not just an ache kind of pain but really sharp....like close to a 10 on a 1-10 scale.  It was awful!  The doctor felt pretty strongly that physical therapy would help.  Luckily, it's been working pretty well...at least with my forward range of motion.  It has improved greatly.  But, I still can't raise my arm out to the side, above shoulder height.  Ugh!  I saw the doc again this week and had some x-rays to be sure there wasn't something wrong inside that was causing it to get stuck.  Luckily, it all looks pretty good.   The doc seemed pretty pleased with my progress and recommended more therapy...instead of shots or surgery.  Yay!  I've been working hard and pushing into the pain to get results.  I hope it'll take me all the way back to a normal and pain free range of motion.

That's the latest scoop on what's going on around here.  Maybe I should pour a glass of wine and celebrate all the good news....and, ease my mind about the upcoming hormones.  ;-)

Have a wonderful weekend!  And, stay cool!  We've been in triple digit temps all week...hoping for a cool down very soon!

Ready, Set, Sew! And....

My daughter graduated a couple of months ago from the local junior college with two AA degrees.  We're very proud!  In a couple of weeks, she'll be moving to her new apartment to attend a university/music conservatory.

She found room mates and they got an apartment over a month ago.  She took a few things over when she stayed there for rehearsals for the Disney Concert Hall performance.  And, last weekend, we took over and assembled an armoir/closet that we bought at IKEA for her birthday (she just turned 21!).  It's part of the Hemmes collection.  It's white on the outside with yellow stripes in the drawers and back of the closet (looks like wallpaper or shelf liner).  It's very cute and goes well with her Shabby Chic style.  It has lots of room for hanging clothes, shelves for folded clothes, a shelf for shoes, and two big drawers.  It even locks!

We also have some projects planned for things that will help decorate her apartment and make it a cozy, pretty place to live.   However, the summer has been going by very fast and we only have two weeks left before she moves.  Here's our list...

Re-paint the new-to-her/antique desk she bought
Paint and recover a chair to go with the desk
Finish making the lamp for her desk
Refinish/paint a floor lamp
Find and buy a few more needed items
Build an upholstered/tufted headboard
Make a dust ruffle/bedskirt
and...make a quilt

Whew!  Can we do all that?!  I certainly hope so.  It'll be fine if we don't get it all done by the time she moves and starts the school year.  But, we're going to try!  I think it will make her move nicer and ease the transition.  And, we'll have fun working on it together.

We have all the fabrics for the quilt and started cutting for it this afternoon.  That's going a lot slower than I anticipated.  We're already taking a break and we've only cut squares from two of the nine fabrics.  I wonder if the sewing will go slower too.  Hmmmm?  We're planning to tie the quilt rather than having it machine quilted.  I feel pretty confident that part should only take a day or two because I've done that in a short time before.

We're thinking of going over to the apartment one day next week to work on the desk.  The chair should go pretty quickly.  Same for the lamps.  I was thinking we could probably make the headboard in a day or so.  But...I'm not so sure now with how slowly the quilt cutting is going.  I guess we'll find out!  I'd better get back to work!  Wish us luck!  :-)

I plan to post pictures of our progress and projects.  Stay tuned.

Fresh Lavender

Mmmmm...Fresh Lavender.

My local Trader Joe's finally had fresh bunches of lavender in their flower section.

Yay!  I've heard of people finding it at their Trader Joe's and I've been waiting and

watching for it at mine.  They finally had it!  I hope it becomes a regular item!

We enjoyed it in a vase for about a week.  When it dried, 

I clipped of the top half of the bunch and removed the flowers.

The smell is heavenly!