A little postcard from me to you. Hope for my snowbound friends this adds a little light to your day. Today is wedding day for my brother’s youngest son. Fun times are afoot!
Category Archives: California
2016 January-June in Mosaics…
January: Dear started a consulting job from home. We celebrated January birthdays. A business trip to San Francisco with reunions with old friends from my college days.
February: Our Lenten Rose bloomed early. We had a Superbowl party with a Chinese New Year theme with souvenirs I bought at San Francisco’s Chinatown. We also enjoyed a Valentines day lunch with a view in Bellevue.
March: We had a sister’s weekend. We celebrated my Medicare birthday in Bellingham with the Mennonite Girls and our hubbies. Dear and I had an overnight in Vancouver, B.C. to continue celebrating my birthday. Katie and Andrew celebrated their 5th anniversary!
Easter landed at the end of March and deserved it’s own mosaic. Our family was all together. Kulich baking, Seerney Paska, Easter egg hunts and Raclette all happened during Easter weekend.
April: We took a quick trip to Eastern Washington to work on some projects at Dan and Jamie’s. Late in the month I went along with Dear on a business trip to San Antonio, Texas. While there I drove to Austin to meet up with my brother’s family for a few hours.
May: Mother’s day with the kids on this side of the mountains. Dear and I took a road trip to Whatcom Falls and on the way home enjoyed stopping at a restaurant on Chuckanut Drive for lunch.
May: Two trips across the line to Canada to meet our play writer and later to meet a favorite blogger who gives so much encouragement to us Mennonite Girls, Rosella.
June: I flew down to be with family and enjoy my sister’s open house in her new digs.
June: A trip to Leavenworth where our family and our new daughter in law’s family enjoyed a weekend together eating and river rafting.
June: Father’s day brunch downtown Seattle with a photo op on Queen Anne Hill overlooking downtown Seattle.
June: We finished off June with a road trip to Yellowstone National Park and Cody Wyoming with stays in Montana coming and going. June really was packed full!
Six full months of blessings with people we love and trips to places we had never seen before. I’ll share July to December later. Dear’s consulting job ended in June and we began our time of wondering if we were unemployed or if we were retired.
How are you spending the last days of 2016? We are planning a little get together on New Year’s Eve after the Peach Bowl between our Washington Huskies and Alabama. We are the underdogs and will be cheering our Dawgs on to victory. Time will tell. Win or lose we will ring in the New Year with gratefulness to God for all He has done this year in our lives and the lives of our friends and family.
Favorite Five on Friday
The Lord is good to me and my family. Last Friday I flew from Seattle to Southern California to visit family and friends while Dear traveled to Chicago for an Oncology Conference. When I exited the plane in Santa Ana, California, my sister Lana was at the gate ready for her flight to Seattle. She is a beloved passenger on Alaska Airlines from John Wayne Airport and her friends at the gate decided I was special because I’m her sister so they booked me in first class for my return flight to Seattle. Yes and amen to that!
Here’s my baby sister with her sassy new hairdo. I’m so thankful that she shares her flying privileges with me. She’s a million mile traveler with Alaska Airlines and she doesn’t lord it over the airline employees but treats them with kindness and love and that trickled down to me.
My brother Leonard, Lana’s twin, and my sister Vera met me outside of baggage claim to take me to lunch. Yes…my family is always there for me. We had lunch at South Coast Plaza before Leonard and I headed out to Neuvo, California to visit another brother and his dear wife.
Spending time with my dear old Pop (93 years old) and meeting my sweet little grand niece (5-1/2 months) was a treasured experience while I was in Southern California.
I also spent a few hours over lunch with my Russian Baptist best friend, Heidi. Upper left hand photo from 2016 and the rest from the 1970’s. We were marveling at God’s goodness to us in allowing us to survive some crazy choices we made.
My flight home in first class was very nice. Beautiful views of the California Coast with a nice meal and more great views of Mt. Rainier when we reached Washington State.
Home again, home again, jiggety jig! We are working on a new phase of our yard project putting a border along our front planter.
While I mowed and weed whacked Dear worked on digging out the trench to add the blocks for our new planter border. Woohoo! Hard work with us now sitting and wondering how we can manage getting up and down with our aching muscles!
Thank you to Amy at Love Made My Home for Five on Friday and dear Susanne at Friday’s Fave Five.
V is for Vera…
Vera is one of my older sisters. She was recently widowed and has moved into a 55 and over community not far from her old home. While I was visiting she had an open house to share her new home with friends and family.
Her manufactured home is open concept with 9 foot ceilings that give it a spacious feeling.
There are 3 bedrooms which include a large master suite with a walk in closet and large bathroom with a separate tub and shower. My younger sister Lana lives with Vera part-time when she is in Southern California working. Lana got to decorate her own room. Since Lana was in Washington while I was in California I got to crash in her room. My brother Leonard from Texas was also staying with Vera and he got the bedroom/office and the blow up mattress.
It was good to see some of our cousins and old friends during the open house. Vera used an old email list for her invites so if she missed you she apologizes.
It was a nice day and we set up tables and chairs in the carport. I did not get photos of everyone, oops.
On Sunday Leonard, Vera, and I met some of our family for brunch in Newport Beach at Sol Cocina.
Leonard and I got to meet our newest grand niece for the first time.
Ellie with her Baba, my SIL Kelly.
Later in the day some of my family gathered at Vera’s again for more food and fellowship.
I’ve posted this photo before but I love it enough to post it again, Pop (dzeda) and Ellie. My dear old pop made it out to Vera’s twice and he lasted for several hours which was good for him.
My pop with 5 of his 8 children.
Leonard and I managed to be with our pop for dinner at Kathy’s on Friday night, open house on Saturday, Dinner at Vera’s on Sunday and then we drove out on Monday morning to go out for breakfast with him and my sister Kathy and to say goodbye to him until we meet again. He got his 2 eggs sunny side up with hash browns, sausage, white toast and coffee and even though it was at Coco’s instead of Denny’s he said it was good. He also insisted on paying. He says he needs to get rid of his money. From breakfast we headed straight to the airport for Leonard’s flight back to Texas. I still had 24 hours left in California.
The fun just kept coming. After I dropped Leonard off I met up with my BFF from my Russian Baptist days and we had lunch and a few hours of catching up. Would you believe from this meet up I headed to the third restaurant of the day, Zov’s, to meet my sisters for dinner?
Kathy and I split our Kebob dinner and we all shared the dessert tray. Kathy, this could have been your late birthday celebration if my brain wasn’t completely fogged up by then! Oye!
When Vera and I returned home Dear’s brother and SIL stopped by for a brief visit since they couldn’t come to the Open House. It was good to see them face to face. BTW, Dear wasn’t with me in Southern California because he was working at a conference in Chicago.
I’m now home after flying first class and that’s a fun story all by itself. This post is way too long already. It’s good to be home and I thank God for watching over me and giving me valuable moments to treasure with my Pop, family and friends.
Since it’s Wednesday and ABC Wednesday is on the letter V this post will be linked up for V is for Vera! Thank you Mrs. Nesbitt and Roger with his team of ABCers.
An Interlude…
…a brief period of time that comes in the middle of something.
Spent some sweet time with the youngest in our family, my grandniece and with the oldest…
our pop with his youngest great granddaughter.
When I get home I’ll share a lot more of my time away from the regular routine of home.
She Flew the Coop…
…and is spending time with another flock.
Getting lots of hugs in and catching up with my brothers, sisters, pop and friends. Three states represented in the photo above, Washington, Texas, and California. Hope your weekend is going well.
The Golden Gate Bridge
I was so pleased to be able to get many views of this historical bridge that has been photographed by millions. This first photo and next photo collage images were taken on Thursday from the Presidio and from China Beach.
The name of the bridge has nothing to do with the color but with the fact that the waterway that the bridge spans has been considered a gateway. The Golden Gate Strait is the entrance to the San Francisco Bay from the Pacific Ocean. The strait is approximately three-miles long by one-mile wide with currents ranging from 4.5 to 7.5 knots. It is generally accepted that the strait was named “Chrysopylae”, or Golden Gate, by John C. Fremont, Captain, topographical Engineers of the U.S. Army circa 1846. It reminded him of a harbor in Istanbul named Chrysoceras or Golden Horn.
On Friday I took a hop on hop off bust tour of San Francisco and it was a very grey and rainy day. These are the shots I got from the tour bus.
This photo was taken from the Top of the Mark on our first day in San Francisco. We walked to the hotel to have a drink and small bites in their top floor restaurant with 360 degree views of the town.
Don’t forget to look up when you are on the tour bus. I’m glad I didn’t drown or soak my camera lens!
Now for a treasure of a photo from 1959! This is my sister Vera, our lifelong friend Milla with our friends from San Francisco, the Hamzieffs. We must have been strolling across the Golden Gate Bridge.
Hope you all have a great Friday and weekend. An update on me going grey, my hairdresser decided a gentle approach with foils would be the best way to go. A little silver at a time till my hair catches up. She’ll leave whatever grows out naturally uncovered and add streaking to the ends of the new growth. I don’t know if I explained that right but the grey/white will be subtle. Now today I’ve got to get my cleaning skills out of the closet and get moving!
Sunlit Sunday…
San Francisco afforded me so many photos to share I’m joining Sunlit Sunday at My Little Home and Garden today.
Looking up at Saints Peter and Paul church in San Francisco.
This was my second time to see this beautiful church. This time around I hopped off the bus for lunch in North Beach/Little Italy. My bus tour this day was rainy from beginning to end. So I didn’t take as many photos as my visit in 2008.
This Romanesque splendor is often called the Italian Cathedral. Completed in 1924, the church has stone-white towers that are local landmarks. Mass reflects the neighborhood; it’s given in English, Italian, and Chinese. (This is one of the few churches in town where you can hear Mass in Italian.) Following their 1954 City Hall wedding, Marilyn Monroe and Joe DiMaggio had their wedding photos snapped here. On the first Sunday of October, a Mass followed by a parade to Fisherman’s Wharf celebrates the Blessing of the (Fishing) Fleet. Also in October is the Italian Heritage Parade in North Beach. The country’s oldest Italian celebration, it began in 1869.
The first time I saw Saints Peter and Paul was in December of 2008. Click here to see my full post from my first thorough visit.
Signs from Huntington Beach…
While I was in Huntington Beach last week I saw some interesting signs at places we ate and walked.
My sister and I ate here one of the nights we were together.
This was my favorite sign that we saw as we walked down Main street. Very clever on the part of the Huntington Beach Police Department.
Dear and I lived in Huntington Beach from 1975 until 1984. Our two sons were born while we lived here. Our daughter was born in Ventura. So all of our children were born in beach cities in California. Here’s a Huntington Beach Pier photo, too, that I took just this past Monday.
I’m linking up with signs, signs hosted by Lesley.
Flying Home Today…
…but not on the Goodyear Blimp!
Lots to share when I’m home and rested up. Can you believe it’s the last week of October!?
Thank you for your prayers for my BIL. Things are still as serious as they were. It was so good to see so many loved ones while I was in town. I am not fond of driving the L.A. freeways but happy that I could get around even if it took way longer than it should have.
Hope to catch up with some of you soon!
