Sunflowers

Andie got me thinking of sunflowers the other day and I couldn't help remembering the sunflowers my mom grew for a few years. For some reason she stopped growing them when I was around 7 or 8. But they were so big and gorgeous. In the fall, she would dry out the seeds and bake them with salt.
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Desert Flowers

We left Sedona Friday morning. Saturday went to our niece's college graduation in Claremont, then drove home after dinner with the family, getting home at 2:15am. Sunday, as you may imagine, was a do-absolutely-nothing day aside from spoiling the kitty.
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May Flowers

“But friendship is the breathing rose, with sweets in every fold.” - Oliver Wendell Holmes

Happy Birthday to my dear friend, Monica.
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State Flower

The California Poppy

Wild poppies in the Sierra Nevada foothills, en route to the hideaway.
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backyard snapshots

Back in the Bay Area.
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Happy Easter

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It's good to be home

Traveling is awesome. You get to see and experience so many different things. And it really makes you appreciate home. Especially when spring is here but it isn't yet where you just left.






Photos taken at Stanford Shopping Center.
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5 of 7: spring in a grocery store

Don't be fooled, it's cold and windy here and the rain is coming back. We need the rain and cold is relative, so I'm not complaining.
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struggling to figure it all out

so, this has been how i've felt the last couple of weeks.

In July I got a new macbook and we (Jimmy) finally transfered all of my PC stuff onto it about 2 weeks ago so I've been fully Mac'd since then.
The transition hasn't been as easy as I had hoped.
Things aren't as intuitive as I had hoped.
Viewing and editing my photos hasn't been as easy as I had hoped.
Therefore, blogging hasn't been as easy as I had hoped.
Part of my frustration is that supposedly, mac is much easier to use and more intuitive. Like my MIL, she got a mac for Christmas last year and seriously? within minutes she was like, this is freakin' awesome and was all click-click-click ba-da-bing ba-da-boom. Me? I'm like bog-bog-bog what the??
Jimmy's been kind to my ego by saying that since I was such a skilled user on the PC, my adjustment period will be longer because of my old habits. And now I have to learn. What? Learn, are you kidding me?

What I have been having fun with is a program called Photobooth that uses the camera in the computer and that's how i took that silly self-portrait. Which is about a week old - yesterday I chopped of my hair and got it colored (for the first time in 11 years). The jury's still out on if it's a good thing or not.
On a brighter note, I leave you with a pretty hydrangea from my MIL's garden.
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How does your garden grow?

Just felt like sharing a handful of flower photos taken in the last year or so.

Sunflowers from the farmers market.

From our neighbors yard at the hideaway.

My SIL's bouquet from her wedding.

Hydrangea in my MIL's yard.

At the San Jose Rose Garden.

Also from the San Jose Rose Garden. A bit of a different pose from this post a few months ago.

Have a great weekend!
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Flowers for the Fourth

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Hello Monday

San Jose Rose Garden.
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It's gonna be a dry summer

The weekend before we went to San Diego, Jimmy and I went to the hideaway and explored the high country a bit. This is the Stanislaus River, up around 6000 feet elevation. Our hideaway is at 4500 feet.

This is a view of the Dardanelles from a remote road off of Highway 108.

A short hike in the Carson-Iceberg Wilderness.


Funny looking snow plants native to North American western mountain ranges, called Sarcodes sanguinea.

Wildflower Indian Paintbrush.

In the right place at the right time

At the San Jose Rose Garden
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updating

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Mine will be full of activities. Tomorrow morning, heading to the favorite scrapbook store for a chance at a 30 second shopping spree then going to Paper Source for their grand opening event. Sunday going to the parentals for dinner.

Wanted to give you an update on my attempt-to-better-health journey. I haven't blogged about it much but I'm almost down 2 sizes. My weight is evenly distributed - I'm not a pear, apple or cone shape. I fall more into the hourglass category. So even though I can't wear any of my 'big' pants anymore, I don't look like I've lost as much as the numbers indicate. This happened to me the last time, too. (7 years ago already). It wasn't noticeable for a long time till suddenly it was dramatic. Strangely enough, I'm really not telling anyone I know in the real world, except those few who read my blog. I think it's because the last time I was on this journey, it made some people uncomfortable. Like they couldn't eat in front of me or they had to change their way of eating or cooking when they were with me. It also made me uncomfortable whenever I would eat something that they deemed bad for me. I know how many points/calories I've eaten and how many I can afford for this meal or that snack. Trust me, I calculate everything to the 1/2 point. So if I'm eating a cookie, I know the caloric/point value of it and it's accounted for. I still eat ice cream (the low-cal kind) , chocolate and potato chips (always portioned out), Mexican and Hawaiian food. But I admit that I miss pizza.

On another note, since I admitted that I'm an aggressive driver, I've been driving a lot calmer lately. I really just like to get to wherever I'm going Now. So maybe I'm really more of a speed demon rather than aggressive. Because I always signal, I'll let people in if they signal and will move out of the way if someone wants to go even faster than I'm going. And I don't talk on my cell phone while I'm driving because I know that I can't possibly concentrate on driving fast, watching all the other cars around and hold a cell phone to my ear all at the same time. But what weighs on my conscience more is the gas issue. Since I drive an SUV, my gas mileage isn't ideal to start with. I try to get around 22mpg, but if I'm feeling a little lead footed, I'll only get around 19mpg. Yup, I need to slow down.

Those of you with blog readers have noticed that I've been updating my blog a bit. Just adding labels to past posts. That organizing thing I like to do. My apologies for any confusions. It'll probably happen a few more times till all of my old posts are properly labeled. Just as a little warning. :)

Happy Mother's Day

Who's that knockin' on my dogwood?

When we got to the cabin Friday night, it was a crisp 50 degrees so no chances of snow. When we got there, I did a little dusting and found just one spider in the sink. There’s almost always a spider in the sink when we get there, no matter if we’ve only been away for a week or 3 months. Much scarier than the spider were the items in the fridge. The fridge that hasn’t been opened in 3 months. The fridge that had food left in it because we didn’t think we’d be away as long as we were. You see, if all is good with the universe and all the planets are aligned, we like to go up to the hideaway every weekend. Or at least 3 times a month. So I usually don’t worry too much about leaving food in the fridge. Now, I don’t leave prepared food, I’m not that naive. But I will leave milk, eggs and cheese. Well, they don’t last 3 months. So you can imagine how…pleasurable that task was to my olfactory senses. But when all those little duties were done, we settled in for a nice, quiet weekend.

Saturday we had to go into town. I keep the pantry fairly well stocked, but I needed those valuable perishables and Jimmy had to look for some sort of rock to fill a ditch we had to have dug for water drainage. We stopped at a favorite Mexican restaurant for fish tacos and crab enchiladas to celebrate Cinco de Mayo.

Back at the hideaway, I snapped a few photos of our dogwood tree, catching the blossoms before they died.

I also snapped a few photos of my lilac bush before pruning the flowers to bring them in the house. My mom had a lilac bush in our yard in the desert so I always think of my mom whenever I smell lilac.

I donno what happened to Sunday. I went out a couple of times to take more pictures of the dogwood and this woodpecker. Then before I knew it, we were packing up and heading back home to the Bay Area. A great, but way too short weekend away.

Celebrating May Day

Didja know that May Day was the traditional summer pagan holiday? Or that May is celebrated by the Roman Catholics as Mary's month and they honor the Blessed Virgin on May 1st? I didn't. I love Wikipedia. :)

Dahlia

submitted to Lensday: Flower

A Good Friday that Happens to be the 13th

Knock on wood (LOL), this superstitious day as gone without a hitch, so far. I did have one frustrating phone conversation with the bank, but otherwise, it was a good day. I went to my weight watchers meeting and surprisingly yet happily was successful at the scales. I admit that I was concerned about my frivolous weekend in Seattle, but I also bumped up my activities and didn't give in to every single indulgence. (Note to self: don't wait to eat till your starving then go to Jack-in-the-Box). Continued the afternoon with my weekly walk at Stanford with my girlfriend Eve, the warm sun behind our backs. Now enjoying the evening, planning on quality tv time and crafting.
Tulips for sale at Pikes Market.

Reminiscing

It's hard to believe that it's already Thursday and I've been home for 3 days. My visit was waay too short and I wish I was able to spend more time with my cousin. I had a great time with her, every moment was cherished!The above view of Seattle was taken from Beacon Hill.

Moi, enjoying the tulips.

Me and Jimmy at Tulip Town. Windblown but happy. :)

This is Pacific Medical Center, which sits atop Beacon Hill. Amazon.com's global headquarters is here.

Cherry Blossoms on Beacon Hill.

Happy Easter!

Celebrated a great Easter day in Skagit County enjoying the tulips with my cousin and her family. A beautiful day surrounded by oh so many colorful flowers! Forecasts predicted rain, but as you can see in the pic, we avoided it, hurray! It's raining now, but we're safely tucked in our room, relaxing for the rest of our evening.

Hope you all had or are having a wonderful Easter day, too.

Wisteria

Thanks for all the comments on the wisteria tree! I decided to take the opportunity to post another photo of it and answer some of your questions, too. Hee! Unfortunately, I'm extremely allergic to it, but it's worth the watery, swollen eyes and sneezing and coughing. It's so purdy.

It's like a purple waterfall

photoshop fun

click to enlarge

original:

It's midnight and

the doors and windows are wide open because it's still hot in the house.
Temperatures were warm today. It wasn't too hot, but the house certainly warmed up to nearly 80 degrees.

I think this is a camilla, does anyone know? It's a large tree in the neighbors yard, over 12 feet tall.

Spring

It's impossible to have a bad weekend when this is what it gives you:

remember.

Flowers left by children at the Lorraine Motel. Memphis, Tennessee.

Purple Caterpillar

Does anybody know if he's normally purple or did he turn purple because he's eating purple flowers?

Merci, mes amis!

Everyone has been so encouraging and thoughtful and I just wanted to let you all know how grateful I am that I've met all of you through this medium. I love how much we share with each other and how positive this environment has been for me.

Thank you all from the bottom of my heart! Bouquets of flowers for all of you!

Leopard Lily

The leopard lily grows wild in the Sierra Nevada's. This bunch is growing in our neighbors front yard. And the big shiny black bee happily pollinates it.
I can't take credit for this photo, Jimmy took it.
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I don't even know where to start

We were up at the cabin for several days. I'm amazed at how far behind a person can get in daily blogging activities. I subscribe to most of my daily/weekly reads via Netvibes and I have over 110 posts I want to read. I have at least 5-6 posts I want to write, too. I have to ask myself, how, over the course of a year, did blogging become so much a part of my life? And how I have become so attached to people I've never met? A couple of blogging friends haven't been feeling well and I honestly feel concerned about their well being. Total strangers less than a year ago, people I've formed an attachment to now.

Our cabin is in a relatively remote area, ie: dial-up connection. I suppose most would appreciate getting away from the computer when they're at a hideaway but not me. I need hi-speed connection. I miss visiting my blogging friends blogs. I hate not being able to post till I get home. And then when I get home, I get overwhelmed with all that I have to say that I don't even know where to start. So normally I don't say anything and just post photos to various challenges. But I'm trying to 'spill open' a little more. I enjoy reading about my blogging friends activities so I'd like to share more, too. Plus I can be quite self-deprecating and think "who cares what I have to say?". I'm fairly confident in my photography skills. Not so much in my writing skills. And as I'm rambling on at this very moment, I'm certain none of my blogging friends are even reading this far. And what does this paragraph have to do with dial-up connection now? Shouldn't I have started another paragraph somewhere in there?

Photo of a day lily in our neighbors yard at our hideaway.

Aloe Vera

Didja know that aloe vera blooms a flower?

I was surprised when I saw this growing out of my MIL's aloe vera plant. Interesting. Looks like little bananas.
 
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Orange

submitted to See it Sunday theme: Orange  

Walking in Nature - Haiku

white petals of spring
appear when coldness retreats
barren tree anew

submitted to One Deep Breath: Walking in Nature
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