Balboa Park, San Diego, California

Balboa Park in San Diego, California is amazing. It has a park, a garden, a museum, a zoo, historical buildings, all located in one place. The area was dedicated in the Nineteenth Century as a park, and in 1915-1916 it was the location of the Panama-California Exposition (first World's Fair). The California Dome (which houses the Museum of Man) was erected for the exposition.

The architecture of the park's buildings reminded me of Stanford University. When I mentioned this to The Professor, he commented that both 'campuses' were built in the same era so it is not surprising that they would be similar in style.

We passed the Botanical Garden on our way to visit the Museum of Man. We misread the sign as 'fee entry' instead of 'free entry' so we did not go in until just before closing time at 4pm when we walked by again and correctly read the sign. We did a really quick tour of the building and promised ourselves we'd return when we had more time.

There are 35 of these little 'houses' in the International Houses Park, each one featuring a country of the world. They are open only on Sundays, so we were not able to do more than walk around and peek in the windows.

Thirteen museums, a replica of The Old Globe theatre, Casa del Prado theater (MamaMia said she saw the Nutcracker there last December), many parks, walking trails, and gardens!

There is just so very much to see at Balboa Park! You can click on the link and read more about this incredible park in the middle of San Diego.

I think the next time we go to visit MamaMia, we will need at least a week in San Diego to explore the 1,200 acres of Balboa Park. The Professor says we can buy a pass that allows us to visit all thirteen museums in a seven day period. And for a little more we can get passes to the San Diego Zoo, too. Two museums a day for seven days, he says...

Friday Fave Five, End of School Edition

It's Friday and it's Fave Five Time. Thanks to Susanne for hosting our Fave Fives every week!


And now for my Friday Fave Five, End of School Edition.


1. You guessed it! Today was my last day in the classroom for the school year. The classroom teachers and students have 11 more days but teachers in my classification finished today. I baked chocolate chip cookies for all three first grade classes and passed them out at recess and lunch, helped to complete all the assessments for language arts, attended an appreciation luncheon, unclipped my ID badge for the last time, and at 5:30 met some fellow freedom lovers for Happy Hour at a local restaurant.

2. Our Southern California weather has been wonderful this week. Early morning coastal fog and low cloudiness with sun breaking through in the late morning, giving us temperatures in the high60s/low70s. Perfect for doing afternoon gardening. Nothing tastes better than freshly picked spinach leaves straight from the garden container!

3. A wonderful weekend in San Diego with most of the family. We celebrated MamaMia's college graduation (scroll down to the post below if you're interested) and then played the rest of the weekend.

4. Where we played.

Balboa Park in San Diego.

Museum of Man

Balboa Park deserves a post all its own and I plan to share photos of the area later this weekend.

5. Coronado Beach.

I think I'm falling in love with San Diego!

Many other people share their weekly fave fives through Living To Tell The Story. Go on over and visit with them and Susanne.

Memorial Day Weekend

Three flags were flying at Balboa Park in San Diego. I thought of my men- three of them- husband, son and son-in-law, three of the millions in this generation who have served our country.

Thank you!

San Diego State University

San Diego, California

May 22, 2009

Graduation

Department of Anthropology



summa cum laude
Spencer Lee Rogers Award



Arts and Letters Graduation
How will we ever find her among the 1,200 plus graduates?

There she is!
Right side. Third row from the front, just to the left of the two flags.
150 feet away.
Love my new camera's zoom!


Congratulations to MamaMia!


Particulars: The Professor and Willow

Four children

Four Bachelor Degrees!

Two BAs and Two BSs

Friday Fave Five

Here we are at Friday again!

1. Of course, on the top of the list is my trip to Oregon. I spent three days with my brother and Flower.

2. I also went by the MarketPlace for The Knit and Crochet Show on Friday and found the booths of Red Fish Dye Works and Fiber Rhythm and bought some unspun fiber and bamboo yarn. I've already drafted one of the silk/merino blend fibers and started spinning. Photos? Oops. Still on the camera.

3. Short timers calender. I have three work days left in the school year. I'm looking forward to spending more time in the garden and puttering around my little cottage. Rather high on my to do list is decluttering.


4. Today is a very special day! Our youngest girl, MamaMia, is walking in commencement at San Diego State University. She will be wearing a gold cord with her gown. Word on the street is that she is getting an award... Are we proud parents? Oh Yes!


5. The Professor and I ate our first tomatoes out of our garden this week! Oooh, they were good! Sun Gold cherry tomatoes. So very sweet!


6. I have to add a sixth fave. The Professor pointed out that HIS fave this week was setting up part of his home theater, for which he has been saving his pennies a long time and has been researching AND researching for weeks. While I was in Oregon and NOT around to have to accompany him to electronics stores, he bought speakers, a Blu-ray player and an AV receiver (whatever those are). He says that when he is watching a Dodger game, it sounds like he really is sitting in Dodger Stadium.

I love sharing these weekly Fave Fives and reading about YOUR weeks. Go to Susanne's blog Living To Tell The Story to found out who else has posted Fave Fives this week.

Acres and Acres of Green

About twenty years ago, my brother made one of the best decisions of his life. In a stroke of good fortune, brilliant, blinding good luck, he married my best friend from high school. And so for the past two decades, I have also been the luckiest of sisters--to have two of my favorite people in love with each other! If you have been cruising around Willow's Cottage and Blogland very long you might have figured out that Flower is my sister-in-law.

My brother and Flower live on a Christmas tree farm. They grow several acres of trees.

But they have also chosen to leave a portion of their land as forest. Whenever I visit them, we always make time to 'take a walk in the forest'.

There are paths that beckon you to duck under the tree branches and follow where they lead you.

You walk past the hawthorn trees that are in bloom in the spring.

You can peer through the old moss-covered branches and see the forest floor covered with new ferns.

There are little white daisies and johnny jump-ups along the edges of the paths so you need to watch where you step so you won't trample them.

Dandelion globes decorate the damp ground under the forest canopy.

Even snail shells nestled in the moss are beautiful!

During the three days I was visiting the farm, Flower and I took two wonderful rambles through the forest and the Christmas trees.

It was wonderful!

Now, Where Was I?

If you board an airplane in Los Angeles and fly (almost) directly north for a little more than two hours, you will arrive in Portland, Oregon. My home town. I was born and raised there, left for twenty years, came back for a dozen more years, and left again. I now live in Los Angeles, but I love to check in with my roots regularly. Visiting is easy because almost my entire extended family lives in Oregon, including my one and only brother.

Last week I had one of those visits.

I spent one of my precious days in Downtown Portland. I grew up walking around the downtown areas, shopping on Broadway, crossing the Willamette River daily to attend high school. On this trip, when I was crossing the Willamette River on the public train, I was struck by the physical similarity between London with its Thames River bridges and Portland with its bridges across the Willamette.

Hop off the train and head west through China Town.

The Pearl District in Northwest Portland is a fun, funky, newly renovated urban area with lots of condos and lofts, shops, and restaurants.

The famous Powell's Books is on the south edge of the Pearl. You really need HOURS to explore Powell's. We had a tradition with our children that we went to Powell's on New Year's Day and spent ALL DAY there, wandering around the stacks and stacks of books in all the rooms in the massive building that houses only PART of Powell's book collection.

Friday was a lovely warm spring day and every where I looked there was blue sky and trees bursting out with green leaves. Portland really shines in the spring!

Of course, an outing to Portland wasn't my only activity during the weekend. There are so many green and fragrant places in Oregon! Stayed tuned for more!

Friday Fave Five

Even though I am out of town this week, I am able to post my

because blogger has this great feature called autopost.

1. Being able to post my Fave Five without being home. Go Blogger!

2. See above. I'm on a little visit to a happy place.

3. Mother's Day. Phone calls and sweet cards from children unable to make the trek home. And what mother doesn't smile happily when not one, but TWO, of her offspring come for the weekend? Son #2, soon to be Grad Student, came bearing a sweet card and a cheesecake. MamaMia decided at the last minute to hop the Amtrak Surf Liner and come for 25 hours of Mom Time. I love this photo. I named it Like Mother Like Daughter.

3. A God Thing. I had been meaning to go by G**dy**r Tire and get my tires' pressure checked because one of my tires was looking a little low. I had 10 minutes one day this week between tutoring and a dr. appt., so I popped in there. It's a good thing I did. A different tire had a loose air pressure valve and the tire could have gone flat at any time. The guys there fixed it quickly and I'm safe on the freeways once again. I'm glad I listened to that little prompting. I should listen more often, huh?

4. Evening time spent with my spinning wheel and The Professor. We have been watching old NCIS episodes before Laker games. That translates into more hours spent making Red Circus Clown Hair yarn (if you're confused, see haiku post below), yarn dyed Mountain Blue and undyed natural gray yarn. I'm in spinning heaven!

5. Local food. My garden has been sprouting! Carrots, squash, spinach, bush beans, bush peas. Some of the tomatoes are already ripening! Spring blossoms on trees means autumn and winter fruit!

As always, thanks to Susanne for hosting Friday Fave Five. Go here and see what other people all over the world are thankful for.

Shhhhh...

It's a secret! I'm on my way...somewhere.

My bag is packed; I always take only one carry-on.

Yes, I have my camera and back up batteries and memory.

Knitting? Check.

Books? Check.

It's been rather hectic here and I haven't been around to visit my fave people. So sorry. Teaching (California state testing again this week) and tutoring and packing has kept me off the computer and out of blogland.

I'll be back soon.

In the interim, here is a little eye candy from the hummingbird feeder

and a blossoming tree.

Haiku Festival

Elizabeth at About New York and Tracy at Pink Purl are hosting a haiku festival on Monday, May 11th. I decided to join and have been pondering my entry. You can click on either link and find many people writing much better haiku than mine! The haiku muse has not been around Willow's Cottage much lately, but here are my two attempts.

White against the blue-

sky, boats, sea blend together.

A perfect sail day.

I named it Neon.

But The Professor called it

red circus clown hair.

Friday Fave Five

Friday again! Friday is my next favorite day of the week because of Friday's Fave Five hosted by Susanne. I love doing this list of the week's blessings every Friday and then popping around to visit everyone else who participates!

1. and 2. and 3.
Last weekend I spent not one, not two, but THREE days with special people, enjoying my favorite places. On Friday I went to Ventura with a friend who had never been there before. She loved it and we had a wonderful wonderful time talking and walking and walking and talking. Then on Saturday, The Professor and I went back to Ventura and did the same thing!

On Sunday afternoon The Professor and I had tickets to visit five local homes and gardens. The tour benefits the local hospice. I loved the gardens and if you scroll down you can read a couple of my posts about the garden tour. Yes, I loved the gardens but I kept losing my focus on the plants and seeing other interesting things like this sign

and the pottery.

I was mesmerized by the swimming pools

mostly because swimming pool blue is one of my favorite colors.

4. I have been spinning and spinning this week. After I've taught, tutored, and walked with Ellen, I have sat down at the spinning wheel and spun to my heart's content. Fortunately we have had leftovers to eat as I haven't spent much time in the kitchen.

5. Monday nights I attend a Women's Bible Study and this week's lesson on Jesus' last prayer (John 17, if you want to read it) was one of the best in this series. This coming week is our last class and I'll miss meeting with the women in the group.

It was a good week!

People have asked about the Jesusita Fire in Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara is 30 miles north of us so we are not affected by the fire, although an elderly friend of ours lives quite close to the mandatory evacuation line and I've told her that she is welcome here any time day or night if she needs to evacuate.

Share the joys of this past week with others at Susanne's blog Living To Tell The Story.

Pottery

An added feature of the Garden Tour on Sunday was the 'marketplace' at one of the homes. I am always drawn to pottery at any craft show. I love pottery and hope someday to take a pottery class. I know very little about the process of making pottery but it seems to me that the taking of EARTH and the shaping and 'burning' of it to create a thing of beauty and function is nothing short of amazing.

Paul Zikmanis of Mystic Bottle Pottery was showing his creations and I asked him if I could photograph them.

I'm not sure what kind of pots these are but the colors and glazes are incredible!

What a wonderful way to serve your favorite olive oil.

I think my son in law The Marine would like these to hold his wine bottles during a dinner party. I might use one as a coaster for my morning coffee.

Salt shakers

The Professor really liked these mixing/serving bowls. So did I!

Can you imagine mixing chocolate chip cookie dough in one? And putting your best bread recipe to rise in another? And serving a fabulous green salad in the biggest bowl? Oh! you could use the smallest bowl for the dressing!

If blue isn't your color, they come in green and brown, too.

Beach Town

Ventura Beach and Pier

This little guy had just been caught by a fisherman and was looking for a way back to the water. I wonder if he ended up as a crab cake.

Seagull diversity

Why is the pigeon intently staring into the surf below?

I did not notice until I uploaded the photo that his leg is tangled in some fishing line.

My favorite shot of the day.

Taken from at least 15 feet away.

Thanks to Anne at nikkipolani for identifying the purple flower. "That little lavender flower is called "wallflower" or Erysimum Cheiri." I knew that if anyone would know the name it would be Anne!

Visual Highlights from the Weekend

Saturday

The Professor and I went as planned to Ventura on Saturday afternoon. I had fun practicing macro shots with my camera!

Lantana is a plant with rather small clumps of blossoms.

Small gratings on historic homes can look like large windows when I zoom in on them.

Ventura Pier

Window in an art deco parking garage

Flowers in plantings across the street from Mission San Buenaventura.

Sunday

So many fantastic photos from a Garden Tour The Professor and I did today, and I managed somehow to unknowingly make the ONE change that put the date indelibly on EVERY photo. Sigh.

Could these steps take you to a Secret Garden?

Swimming pools are ubiquitous in Southern California gardens.

As are iron railings.

The Professor commented that he liked these little purple flowers and asked me what they are. I didn't know so I strolled over to ask one of the docents strategically placed in the gazebo to answer questions. She sighed and said she didn't know either. She had asked another docent who had asked the garden's owner who had asked the garden's designer. No one knows the name of these little purple flowers. Here they are planted companionably with some Dusty Miller. Does anyone out in Blog Garden Land know?

They are sweet, aren't they?