Winter Bouquet #2

Last night we had a freeze (24 degrees F). I think we've only had one or two so far. So I cut almost all my Iceberg Rose blooms and the sage blooms and brought them inside for a pretty bouquet that is more springy than wintry. But that's what you get in Texas :).

My husband was browsing the web yesterday and found this really cool flower farm in Australia. This is my dream. I maintain that it can be done with the 2ish acres surrounding our house. But first we'd have to own that acreage. :) My husband's fear is that one day he'll wake up and there'll be no room for his beloved vegetables. It could happen, I'm sneaky enough, haha!

In the meantime, perhaps I should try a flower-cart. My friend Jonathan rides around on a motorcycle sidecar selling coffee (check this out). It's amazing. I'd love to go all Vintage Paris style and have a mobile flower-selling business. I just have to convince my husband :p

 

Adventures in New Mexico

My besties and I on the Rio Grande

Our disposable, water proof camera had no view finder so it's a miracle nobody's head is cut off.

Moon River, wider than a mile, 
I'm crossing you in style someday. 

Oh, dream maker, you heart breaker, 

wherever you're going I'm going your way. 

Two drifters off to see the world. 

There's such a lot of world to see. 

We're after the same rainbow's end-- 

waiting 'round the bend, 

my huckleberry friend, 

Moon River and me.

~Johnny Mercer

Yosemite, Remix

Having been to Yosemite before, I was really excited to go back, this time with my friend Caroline. But the excitement was also tempered by two facts: 1) I was 16 weeks pregnant and 2) Caroline had never camped or backpacked before. I was worried that I would overdue it and that she might be miserable and/or hate me forever. :) So I planned and prayed. Most important to me was following through on a promise made roughly 6 years ago to take her hiking. I can say without hesitation that God answered my prayers! This was one of the most fun backpacking trips I've ever been on. Some of that, I think, was lower expectations on my part, some of it was Caroline being an awesome companion, and most of it was grace.

Start of the Panorama Trail (plus my tiny baby bump) Later that day we crossed over the waterfall down in the distance.

We entered Yosemite mid-week and spent the first two nights in the valley at a campsite while we worked out wilderness permits, visited Mariposa grove, and took some time to rest from travel and get acclimated. Yosemite is slammed with tourists in July, but since it was mid-week, it was less slammed. Barely. :)

Caroline making bacon. yum!

Mariposa grove (and me being obnoxious about my belly)

When the weekend came, we took a tour bus to glacier point (while listening to one of the most interesting tour guides ever), then hiked the panorama trail 7+ miles to the backcountry campground Little Yosemite Valley in the shadow of half dome. The panorama trail certainly lives up to its name! And except for a small portion where it takes you straight up and over some serious hills, most of it is going down. When we started the trail, there was a group of college students starting at the same time. I barely noticed them but half way through we caught up and started conversing. We felt pretty proud of ourselves for keeping pace with fit college students! It was also fun to see people's reactions when they discovered that Caroline had never done this before and I was pregnant. hehe. I have to admit, I like shocking/surprising people :p

Caroline on the edge of the world.

Morning coffee in the Backcountry campground.
Behind those trees is the backside of half dome.

We spent the night and then backpacked down the John Muir Trail for, I think, another 6 miles. That trail was brutal on our knees, it's literally switchback after steep switchback. I believe it gains 4000 feet of elevation in about 4 miles. The last time I was there, I was backpacking up the trail, which was psychological torture. It was helpful to have that experience in the back of my mind as I slogged down this time. I liked it much better. Haha!

On the John Muir Trail headed back down to the valley

Once we got down, we had to rush a bit to get our rental car back to San Francisco. Those were probably the most stressful moments. I didn't really want to jump in car and drive 4 hours without having a shower first but time constraints and other factors meant we settled for wet wipes. On the way out, we saw this amazing, apocalyptic swirling column of smoke. Let me reiterate: it was swirling! We drove right by an intense fire on the outskirts of the park. I heard later that they closed the road we used and the next day, smoke filled the valley and some of the outer campsites were shut down. We got out just in time.

What the picture doesn't show is that the pillar of smoke was swirling around like a tornado!!

Mundane Monday: Nostalgia

When I was young, I took on the fire...and won.

Somewhere out there is a picture of me fire-walking on a bed of hot coals. The first time I tried, egged on by a bunch of awesome guys teaching me awesomness, I burnt lovely little blisters and could barely walk for a week. The second time, fueled by girls who were showing me up, I learned the sweet spot of walking slow enough to have only light pressure but fast enough to minimize contact. The problem is, if you try to go too fast, you press off on your foot (to propell you) too hard and get the burn. Anyhow, I digress.

Remember to encourage your children to play responsibly with fire...because it's great fun. :p

Wonderful Wednesday

This past weekend, I had a quick but fun jet set to Los Angeles to watch my brother graduate with his MBA (his second masters degree!). I've never been to LA in the spring and it was beautiful! So many cool plants that I didn't recognize - purple blooming trees and some trees with red bristle like flowers. I recognized the birds of paradise flower, my brother had HUGE white ones in front of his house. The weather was so gorgeous. It was very windy and at times a bit chilly for me; ironically, LA had a heat advisory (all about perspective). After the ceremony, John was fabulous enough to race me up to the Griffith Observatory which I had wanted to see. It is awesome! I wish the telescopes hadn't been locked up and of course going at night would be even better but for the two hour window before my flight, it was a great side trip. We had a party the night before where I met his friends, talked them into eating carbs (in Texas I'm a healthy eater, in California I'm a junky eater - once again, all about perspective) and watched Pitch Perfect. haha! All in all, a great weekend.

Mundane Monday: Nostalgia

Once upon a time, my friend and I walked around the city of Bath in England. This castle guarded the entry to the woods and the stone path beckoned us deeper.

Mundane Monday: Nostalgia

I camped at Lake Tahoe for less than 24 hours, but I'll never forget it - peaceful, blue, cool without chill.

Thoughtful Thursday

Some of my favorite verses of poetry: EVER.

Wonderful Wednesday

A block from my house there is a large section of woods. Trails for mountain bikers weave between the trees and undergrowth. Neighborhood children claim this domain for their imaginary adventures. Sometimes, I take a walk on those trails, look at the birds, and enjoy glimpses of a woody flower. There's also a surprise in these woods, a remarkable, awe-inducing structure. The claims of ownership belong to no one and everyone. 'The Fort' is a lovely place to visit, to think, to breathe, to hear the squeals of happy children and to remember the joys of simple things. Sometimes, when all is quiet and still, I realize that adults need magical places too.

have friends, will travel

There's a group of girls I've been calling my friends for over half a decade. It started with a Bible Study but that isn't where it stopped. My favorite thing about this group is that we have real fun outside of our study times. We don't just describe our lives to each other, we experience it together.

[Please don't say that we "do life" because that phrase is disturbing - beyond the grammatical crime - because what if you don't 'do life' does that mean you're doing death? That phrase is a lazy man's way of saying nothing while trying to sound profound. End tirade.]

In March, for our [almost] annual trip, we went to Baltimore to visit bible study member and my former roomie Sara P. You may know that she went there for a brief educational hiatus. Here are some long overdue pictures from the trip - all compliments of Gaela Renee (pic hacking on fb is a forgivable offense, I'm told :p)

frame worthy



I love this girl!

nightime walking tour of Baltimore

Gaela is a great photographer :D

  I'm trying to convince them to sail around the bahamas in 2015, but we'll see how that goes.

Update

The fishing trip was great. These little guys are some of the best company a gal can have and we get together far too infrequently. The weather was beautiful, it was fun to see little boys learning to cast, and Matt actually caught a catfish (though he threw it back).  Since I missed summer (it passed me by while I was mired in family drama) it was healing to do something so summer-ish.

adventures with friends

I've known these ladies for almost 5 years (!). And somehow, we always end up on the water together :]

I had an amazing group of girlfriends in college. The depth of our friendships were aided by the constant contact that characterized dorm/class life. I was blessed to transition out of that environment via a neighborhood in Mississippi where my new friends lived down the block and a walk through the neighborhood meant a hello and hang-out time with those who knew me. Now, in Dallas, I see these ladies once a week. Twice if I'm lucky. But I've come recently to realize that this difference in contact doesn't matter now. Enough time has passed and conversations and experiences to build up the level of depth I had in college and then mississippi. The spatial barrier has been climbed. I am there. And I'm glad to have realized it because now I can stop yearning for the community I miss and enjoy what I have - the same function in different form. Of course, I'll always miss my other friends and constantly attend to those binding ties. But I'm glad to have friends here, now, of the same calibur as then. And I hope that remains true of everywhere I go.

When I was young (nostalgia series)

When I was young, I crawled in drainage pipes.

You could enter the system by the pond where the drainage opening was big enough to hold a car. Quickly, though, the pipes narrowed until a human could barely squeeze through. We would follow the labyrinth under the streets and parking lots of our university -- try to scare people by calling out through the drainage slots in the road. Eventually, we made our way under the city street popping up through a manhole in the parking lot of popular bbq joint. It was great fun :]

Our code word for this dank, stinky, filthy place was Australia, because it was 'down under'. Going to Australia was a rite of passage. It was actually best to go right after a torrential rain, because that cleared out the system. But my first trip didn't have that timing, so we ran a muck of foul smelling small animals decaying in piles of trash.

For all of its actual awfulness, Australia was pretty cool. 

belated adventure post

Our adventure to New Zealand included the most amazing scenes of my life... Epic traverses through a blizzard (its true), green rolling hills, and natural beaches. But most of all: amazing friendship.

 

 We backpacked to an artic lake and rode out a blizzard in a nearby hut.

grean hills meet massive mountains

hostels were homey

the beach was gray and thoughtful

 

(pictures by: me, eilidh, and Dave Wahl)

 

Run into the Woods

It will soon be October. In October, fires should be lit, pines should be smelled, chill bumps should be felt. The change of season reminds our minds and bodies that change is ever happening. It calls for a response: reflection at the very least.

Here I lay, trying to type in the prone position; temporarily disabled at mere 30 years of age. Some say the culprit is stress, some say heavy lifting. My body (my back) is telling me “no” with sharp signals and parts that malfunction in movement. It (my body and back) are supposed to carry me and 35 lbs. into the smells and greens of October next week – into the high altitude of emotion, the fires of reflection and the visceral ness of change. But it can’t even carry me to the bathroom.

Who am I? I feel this week stripped me and sent me wandering. My father was sent to jail and then released into my (partial) federal custody. I missed so much work it was embarrassing. I conferred with siblings and lawyers, signed more paperwork, drove far and wide, didn’t see my home for 3 straight days, spoke with my mom and prosecutors – and generally found myself in alternate realities right and left. I used to work, clean, cook, ride bikes, pet my dog, and smile. Suddenly, I’m texting pre-trial officers and signing leases in walmart parking lots? And now I can hardly walk?

What’s happening? When did the world turn upside down? When did I fall into the hole? I never liked Alice in Wonderland. It didn’t seem all that wonder-filled to me. I don’t want to fall into alternate realities. I want to run away into the chill of woods and the smell of burning fire. I want to run from broken humanity and my own human limits into some change. But the air outside is still and hot at 96 degrees. There is no relief.

fun with friends

I have a group of friends who do fun things with me. For this I am grateful.

Flashback

In July, Matt and I went camping. We drove an hour to a little park with a hike-in site on the edge of a lake. Where water met land was ambiguous and when illuminated by sunset became an eerie strange beauty. But it was also 103 degrees outside and very humid. Since I’m cold-natured, I crawled into the warm tent and was lulled into a deep sleep. Matt, on the other hand, sweated non-stop and felt completely unable to relax with constant moisture oozing from him. So, after one short night, we packed up and left. Oh, did I mention I forgot to bring the coffee? That might have been our real downfall! :}

Hey, at least the wildlife was friendly :)

Backpacking in Yosemite

I haven’t cropped and fixed the pictures yet, but here are my two favorites for some instant gratification. This is my friend Lori representing us, with heavy packs, traveling from that valley floor to the top nether regions of the mountains. It was a brutal climb but my new backpack held up great. At the top, another little valley nestled in between two walls of granite, and me stooped early morning next to a stream to filter water. I won’t insult it with cliche superlatives, it was simply: beautiful.

wend

I sometimes (okay, often) fall victim to nostalgia. Those times when we cut roofs off of cars, drove into the random unknown, slept under the stars, tromped through the woods, swam in waterfalls, and were like one big motley family. We didn't play it safe back then, and sometimes I wonder if that isn't the best way to live.