Road Trip! Day 2

Breakfast in Flagstaff, Arizona.  Macy's Euro Cafe.  The. Best. Coffee.  The vegan waffle and the granola were also excellent.  And the company? Perfect--Son #1 The Chaplain and Wonderful Daughter-in-Law.

Back on the road.  Highway 40 East with forays along Route 66.

Standin' on the corner in Winslow, Arizona

Five hundred miles today.  We drove through basin and range country, mesa lands.

Rio Puerco Bridge, built in 1933.

Then, east of Albuquerque, we encountered strong winds and a dust storm.

The wind is still blowing, but we are tucked in safely at our night's lodging.

Road Trip! Day 1

We are traveling.  We're on a road trip.  After a rather unusual weekend in which we attended a graduation in downtown Los Angeles, we returned home and I promptly had the rest of my weekend sidetracked by an allergic reaction to 'something' (if we knew what, I'd be sure to avoid it in the future), slept most of Sunday, and muddled through Monday.

But Tuesday was a new day.  We headed east (well, we can't head west much or we'll fall off the continent into the Pacific Ocean).

Tonight we will sleep in that wonderful town of Flagstaff.  Having arrived at almost dark, I didn't have any opportunity to take photos.  Maybe in the morning...

We drove through Ventura County and Los Angeles County and then entered the US's largest county by area-San Bernardino County.  As I said, we are headed east.  This first day we detoured a bit to drive along the famous Route 66.

We have gone from 500 feet in elevation to 7,335 feet as we crossed the Arizona divide east of Williams.  We've passed avocado and citrus orchards, valleys of Joshua Tree cactus, ocotillo cactus, creosote bushes and drying tumbleweeds,  and beautiful mountains and mesas covered in pine tree forests.  Yes, all this in one day.  The change in vegetation is staggering.

Arizona!

Amboy Crater is located south of a section of Old Route 66 between Needles and Barstow.  It was created by a volcano which has been extinct for several thousand years.  The erupting volcano left flows of basalt and an incredible mound which can be reached by an easy hike.  We opted out of the hike since we had a destination to reach by evening and because the temperature was a sweltering 103F.

Tomorrow?  After breakfast with Son #1 and his lovely wife who drove up from Phoenix to meet us, on to points east!

A Hike, A Word, A Photo

My week has been lovely--just what I love in the summer--a little busyness, a little work, a little relaxation.  I'm linking to Susanne's Friday Fave Fives.

1.  I took a hike. Up a mountain.  To the top.  Among the burned up cinders of the recent wildfire.  Across a meadow.   Eight miles.  Then back down another trail to the Pacific Ocean.

Acres and acres of charred trees and grasses.

But there was evidence of new trail construction.

(We were hiking from the trail beyond the bridge and only saw the DANGER sign after we had crossed the bridge.  Fortunately, it was sufficiently stable for foot traffic.)

And new growth!

There was ONE yucca plant blooming already!

2.  The Professor read a NEW WORD this week.  Neither of us had ever heard or seen this word before:

IRREFRAGABLE

So, yeah, we are a bit nerdy about language.  It's not often The Professor finds a word with which he is completely unfamiliar.  In context, he understood its meaning, but it was a new word.

3.  I am making progress on the mammoth scanning of photos project.  I wrote a blog post about it and if you are interested, I'd appreciate your reading it and contributing any wisdom and experience you might have.

4.  A friend and a dinner.  We drove to Santa Barbara to have dinner with a lady and her grandson who is a close friend of Son #2.  It was a delightful dinner, and we thoroughly enjoyed their company and conversation.

5.  A clean closet.  I spent an hour or two one day this week decluttering my closet.  I love my clean and decluttered closet!

A new fave quote.

"In my experience, the people who survive are the ones who are willing to travel light."

A Little Advice Here

This summer I have a goal.  I want to organize my photos.  Somehow, probably because I truly do care, I have become the caretaker of many family pictures from both sides of my family.  Therefore, I have hundreds of photos of ancestors, none of which were ever organized in albums.  I think what happened was that people sent copies of pictures they had to share with other family members and so what has filtered down to me are the 'extras' nobody needed.  Also, it's possible that many of the pictures came from collections people found when a family member died.  I have already done much of the organizing of 'family group', 'individual', and 'decade'.  Attempts have been made to identify the people in the photos.  Unidentifiable photos have already been tossed.

I am also facing the task of archiving the photos from my own family.  Because we have a huge number of photos of our work in Indonesia besides the usual family adventures and school pictures, there is an additional level to dealing with them.  What is historically significant and should be saved for the Moskona people?

  Where is the cross over line between private and ministry photos?

I've begun the task of scanning the photos and have been trying to decide how to deal with the already scanned pictures.  As I see it, I have four options.  They are:

1.  Scan all photos except the obvious blurry and truly bad ones.  Put all scanned photos into albums.  I call this method the 'archiving the memories' method.  Until now, I have been storing photos in photo boxes and photo albums of varying archival quality.  Since there are many larger photos from 5"x7" to 8"x10", and even bigger, I had put these in sheet protectors in large three ring binders.  Now I am in the scanning stage and simply replacing the scanned photos into the albums and binders.

 Do I really need to keep photos of the USO swimming hole in San Marcos, TX or the snow on top of Snowqualmie Pass just because my dad was there?

2.  Scan all photos as above.  Keep picture copies of the best in an album and store the rest in photo boxes (organized).  This is the abbreviated archiving the memories option.

3.  Scan only the best photos and keep those in an album.  Discard the rest of the pictures.

4.  Scan only the best and save no hard copies and have only the CDs available to view on a digital photo frame device.  CDs could also be sent to appropriate recipients.

I would love to hear from people who have worked on photo archive projects.  What option did you choose and why?  Did you encounter any special problems?  What do you wish you had done differently, and what would you do differently now?  I want your opinions, please.

A New Week

A new week means new blessings, new Fave Fives for Friday.

1. A new bed

After way too many years, we finally decided enough was enough.  We bought a new mattress.

2. A new computer

The advantage to being married to a computer science professor is that you always get the best computer, exactly what you want and need, for the best price.  My poor old computer was well past due for an upgrade.

3. A new restaurant

Mary's Secret Garden

Vegan Restaurant

Ventura

We sat on the sidewalk patio and enjoyed the sunshine and lemon water while we waited for our meal.

Actually, we ate pad thai, but we were so hungry that I didn't take a photo in time.

4. New books

Well, not new-new.  But new to me.  After lunch, we stopped by two used bookstores and I found two more Newbery Award books.

Carry On, Mr. Bowditch by Jean Lee Latham (1956)

The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley (1986)

Half the fun of owning the Newbery Award winner books is the thrill of the hunt in the used bookstores.  The other half is, of course, actually reading the books, which I will do this summer.

5. A new (to me) flower

Farewell to Spring Clarkia

A California native blooming in my native garden

Anything new in your world this week?

Willow's Wild Weekend

Well, Willow's Week turned out to be rather more of a week than I expected.  A whirlwind visit by #2 Son the Grad Student. And a more whirly whirlwind trip to San Diego.  And in the midst of all the craziness, there were the many blessings.

1. Spending the few days with The Grad Student before he left to return to Indonesia was a wonderful gift. Also, the email telling us that he had arrived safely in Jakarta made this mama's heart happy.

2. The visit with Youngest Daughter and her sweet family was all the sweeter for being only twenty-four hours.  We didn't go any fun places except the park, but that was enough.  Hanging out at home talking and laughing is best.

3.  Little sweetnesses like this dandelion corsage which Little L picked for me and insisted that I wear tucked in my buttonhole.

4.  Beginning the 'organizing the photos' project.  Yes, I did start!  Hopefully, the small beginning will continue and a large dent will be made in this gigantic project.

5.  Possibly we have solved the deer problem.  A concoction from the big box home store which includes red pepper may be the solution.  Here's hoping.

A couple of bonus photos which I finally moved from my phone after way too long.  Both were snapped across the freeway from my neighborhood.

Sunset over the golf course

Avenue of Poinsettias

So that was Willow's Wild Weekend in Five Simple Statements.  How was yours?  You can link up to Susanne's blog and share your Friday Fave Fives.

FFF

Friday Fave Five

Focusing on the small and large blessings of my week.  Ignoring the sad destruction of my little garden by the hungry deer searching for any nourishment in a burned out habitat  (really, deer?  tomato vines??  ALL my snap pea plants???  rose buds??)

1.  It's jacaranda season!  For most of the year, jacaranda trees just stand there and provide shade.  They're nothing special.  But when they bloom?  Oh my!  Purple heaven.

2.  I've been rereading a book which has been on my bookshelf for many years.  Published in 1992, the thoughts in 'Tis a Gift to be Simple by Barbara DeGrote-Sorensen and David Allen Sorensen are completely contemporary with minimalism and voluntary simplicity principles.  Simplicity is not a new idea.  I've been loving this reread.  In fact, I keep writing down quotes and I've not read even a quarter of the book.

"Moving down--beginning the process of living less extravagantly than we once though possible--is called "voluntary simplicity". Voluntary simplicity is a way for us to live asking only our 'fair share' and allowing us to generous with the rest."

Two of ten reasons for choosing a simpler life-style--quoted from Jorgen Lissner.

As an act of faith performed for the sake of personal integrity and as an expression of a personal commitment to a more equitable distribution of the world's resources.

As an act of celebration of the riches found in creativity, spirituality, and community with others, rather than in mindless materialism.

As I read through this book, expect to see more quotes here!

3.  On Sunday I spent all day at Paramount Ranch with other spinners and weavers from our local handweavers and spinners guild.  We demonstrated our arts and enjoyed the festive atmosphere of The Banjo and Fiddle Festival while listening to some awesome music makers.  It's my favorite venue to attend with my spinning wheel.  People are fascinated with our wheels and looms.  (I wish I had photos but since I was sitting and spinning, I didn't take any pictures.  However, if I had a nickel for every picture people took of me, I'd be rich.)

4.  Another book I'm reading is The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge.  I was perusing the library shelves and catalog for more E. Goudge books because I was in the mood for a good dose of solid British culture for which she is famous.  The only book not checked out was The Little White Horse (evidently other people have been struck with the same bug.  Is it a spring thing?) which was listed as being in the children's section.  What a delightful story it is!  Sort of a fairy tale.  Absolutely wonderful as all EG's stories are.

5.  End of Year Luncheon.  Each spring when classes are finished, my boss invites us out for lunch.  It's a fun way to wrap up the school year.  This week we enjoyed lunch at Wood Ranch which is a local bbq restaurant.  Yes, even a vegan can enjoy barbeque--  bbq sauce on a vegan burger.

That basically sums up Willow's Week's Friday Fave Five.  I've linked up as usual to Susanne's blog Living to Tell the Story.

A Plea from Willow's Garden

Deer have been in my tiny garden.  They have destroyed my snap peas.  They have trampled on my lettuce.  They have eaten my roses.   They have even consumed top half of my tomato plants.

This is the first year I have had any difficulty keeping my garden secure from the deer which freely roam our neighborhood.  Until this spring, the deer have ignored my garden in favor of more easy pickings.  Really, my garden is no easy to navigate.  It is extremely steep, built in three stair step levels three feet deep and about forty feet long.  The top level is covered in native California flora which it turns out the deer are not eating.  Instead they are hopping down the bank and having at my mandarin orange tree on the middle tier and feasting on the kitchen garden plantings on the first three foot high level even though parts of it are covered with wire netting.

I am seriously sad.  Each spring we plan and plant our square foot beds and lovingly water and weed.  I knew the deer had spotted our garden because last month all the rose buds disappeared one night.  Understandably, things have gotten much worse, nutrition-wise, for the deer since the wild fire swept through the mountains which is their habitat.   I know I should share.  But it's gone too far.  They're taking everything.

What can I do to save the little bit of garden I still have?  Any ideas other than chasing the deer away with a shotgun?

Birds and Bees

I am not the only one who loves the gardens at The Getty Villa.

Lucky things.

More May Days

Welcome to this Third Friday in May for Friday Fave Five, Willow's Week edition.

1.  Mother's Day!  All my children called me.  It's a tradition since we live far apart.  The one who was home  decided that evening dinner should be eaten 'out'.  Pad Thai.  Yellow curry.  Green curry.  Wanna know why there are no photos?  We ate it all too fast!

2.  The end of the school year!  That's all I need to say.  Think sleeping in.  Leisurely hikes.  Road trips.  For Three months.

3.  It's also a bit bittersweet.  My students make me laugh every time they read their stories in class.  They let me know they appreciate me.  As the wisdom of this proverb inside the wrapper of a Dove dark chocolate candy says--All you really need is love and a little chocolate doesn't hurt.  My students must know this because as thank you gifts they gave me on the last day of class:
          Chocolate topped toffee.
          World's Finest caramel filled chocolate.
          Godiva chocolate morsels.
          Dark chocolate Tahitian vanilla caramels.

4.  They also know I love to garden.  They gave me:
          A five gallon pink hydrangea plant.
          Potted succulents.
          A vase of garden flowers.
          Home Depot gift card.

5.  Since I am a writing teacher, I often receive notes and poems:
          Dear Mrs. Willow,
             Thank you so much for being my writing class teacher.  I learned a lot.  My absolute favorite thing was writing the 'why story'.  I hope that I have become a much better writer.

          Mrs. Willow is super awesome,
          there is no part of her that's dumb.
          She has a great smile,
          that reaches a mile,
          and that is why this note has come:
          (has come, and that is why this note has come!)

          Our year is finally done,
          everybody has had some fun!
          We partied all year,
          and it is so clear,
          you get a thank you from everyone!

For me, it's officially summer.  More knitting soon.  What shall I cast on?  Any suggestions?

NICU hats?

More felted bowls?

Gardens of Villa Papyri at The Getty Villa