FABuLous Fall!!

I love things about each of the different seasons, but I think that I love fall the most. This last weekend we had a great time discovering why we love fall. Here are a few reasons why...

Inspirations for next year - although now that I've done some research I realize I might have bitten off more then I can chew!
Fabulous farmer's market produce - yum!

Farm fresh eggs

Beautiful fall flowers

Corn is finally here - sweet bi-color

Time to curl up with a good book - The Lost Symbol, An Echo in the Bone or Fierce Leadership

Time for soup - wrap your hands around a steaming mug of this fantastic Creamy Broccoli Soup (find recipes for following dishes at http://blog.beinhealthnow.com/)

Baked Oatmeal - great pre-made breakfast!

When you walk into the kitchen on Sunday morning and are greeted by this site, you know it's been a great weekend! Yes people, I do let my sink fill with dishes!

Have fun out there enjoying the bounties that fall has to offer; I'm looking forward to many more fall weekends in the Pacific Northwest!

Journeys

"Life's a journey, not a destination" - Steven Tyler

Life is filled with steps that take us along the journey; they may be forwards, backwards, up hills, into valleys, they may be hard or easy, the may take us along desolate byways or scenic vistas.

Right now I'm on the journey of weight loss - I've joined Weight Watchers and am loving the results! I'm on this journey with my good friend, Ramah, and am committed to reaching a healthy, happy place in my life. I have been using Weight Watchers recipes, but have also been borrowing from my friend, Emily's, webpage and her vast vegetarian/vegan collection (thanks so much!!). This year we've taken many journeys -backpacking trips, 1/2 marathons, vacations, journey to better health and more. I'm getting really excited about planning a journey for next year and that is to complete the Wonderland Trail around the base of Mt. Rainier. I'm hoping to put together a large group that would love to take 10-14 days and hike this trail next year around late spring/early summer or once the snow clears. I've made commitments before and kind of let them slip by the wayside, but this is something I really want to do and hopefully putting this out there for "everyone" to see will hold me responsible. As we approach fall I always become a bit more nostalgic, thinking of the past year and what's around the corner. Plus, fall always reminds me of hot cider, heavy quilts, walks through the leaves and poetry. It is so wonderful to curl up with a good book, a mug of hot cider and a book of poems (or any other favorite book). I thought it would be fun to see what journeys you all might be taking or have taken, so please post a comment sharing your favorite, most memorable, fun or whatever journey. Can't wait to see where you all have been or are going!

Happy journeying!

Sunshiney Days in California

It's been awhile since I blogged so I have a couple weekends worth of fun events to report off on. Fasten your seatbelts - it's going to be a fun ride!
I arrived in Sacramento on Friday, September 18, and immediately thought I was in the wrong airport. Having always flown Southwest Airlines I land in Terminal A and go about my merry way; however, I flew Alaska Airlines and landed at Terminal B and was completely lost - I didn't even know Sacramento had two terminals! Anywho I made my way to Terminal A, ate some snacks and read my book while killing time for Bear to pick me up. We spent Saturday evening visiting a fantastic little market called The Nugget (similar to Whole Foods or Central Market), making delicious taco salad and going for a 4-1/2 mile walk. Going to The Nugget made me realize why I love CA (besides visiting Bear!) - avocados for $0.99 a pound, huge tomatoes and other amazing produce! Saturday we drove up to Reno, NV, with a friend of Bear's to the Reno Air Races/Air Show. It was pretty spectacular and The Blue Angels were there to perform which is always fantastic! There were a lot of amazing airplanes and such, but it was wicked hot there and Reno is a very ugly little place in Nevada; however, I did get to add another shotglass to my collection as I was in the state long enough to "qualify" for being there.
On Sunday Bear and I went to brunch at the most delicious restaurant called Crepeville. I want them to expand to Seattle and I want them to be here by this weekend so I can go again! After stuffing our faces we headed to the mall and did some browsing before going to see a double feature of The Time Traveler's Wife (sorely disappointing compared to the book) and Julie & Julia (adorable, hilarious & poignant).
Monday was my last day in Cali and so we spent several hours at the mall, had our nails done, ate lunch and then headed to the airport. This is the first time I've ever had anyone paint a design on my nails - so much fun and so pretty!
It was a fantastic weekend of relaxation, visiting and enjoying each other's company. Looking forward to the next visit already!

More miles logged on the Pacific Crest Trail

We had another glorious weekend spending time in the out-of-doors! Friday evening my adorable sister was in town and we spent the evening together chatting, catching up and spending time together. Way too early on Saturday morning my alarm went off and I dragged myself out of bed to get ready to leave for our 2 day backpacking trip up to Josephine Lake in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness area. The weather was gorgeous and we hit the trail by about 12 noon. We started off at a pretty good clip, leaving the upper parking lot of Steven's Pass ski area. and then settled into a nice little pace. There were a lot of people out picking berries and the bushes were loaded with wild blueberries and huckleberries. We made great time after about 2 hours of hiking we reached Lake Susan-Jane (a smaller lake right below Josephine Lake) and stopped for lunch. After lunch it was a near vertical hike up to where the Pacific Crest Trail splits and we then headed down the Icicle Creek Trail and then a near vertical drop down to Josephine Lake where we picked a lovely little campsite (it wasn't crowded at the lake so we got a great spot), set up camp, rinsed off in the freezing cold lake, ate dinner (yummy rice dish compliments of Lindsay) and then crawled into our sleeping bags. We were visited at our campsite by this older gentleman, Mark, who told us about how he was retired and spent the summer hiking all over the Cascades. Nick and I did have a slight case of altitude sickness the first night in camp which made sleeping challenging; however, sleeping was made all the more complicated by Jack. We have a 2 person tent and there is no room in there for a 65 pound Goldendoodle who's all legs; so Jack was staked under our rainfly. I was just starting to fall asleep when the tent pulled really tight to one side and Nick sits up and says, "Did Jack just leave?!?". I unzipped the door promptly and sure enough, Jack had gotten tired of being under the rainfly and decided to do some wandering. We called him back over (thank God he came without me having to crawl out of the tent!), I pushed the tent stake through his leash, shoved it into the ground and we commanded him to stay under the fly or die. He complied, but all night long all I heard was Jack eating pine needles, dirt, sticks and so much more; oh yeah, and constantly figuring out how to get out from under the rainfly which kept pulling the tent tight and making me think he was leaving again. Needless to say, the other end of the leash was placed through the tent door and I held it all night long. Good times...

We did manage to sleep in a bit the next morning before getting up, tearing down our campsite and fixing a hearty breakfast of oatmeal, raisins, brown sugar, wild blueberries and huckleberries. After loading everything up, bidding farewell to Mark and another camper and using the delightful wooden outdoor toilet; we started the 0.25-0.5 vertical hike out from the lake. For some reason the hike seemed shorter going out, but felt like it took us longer. We did stop to pick a bunch of blueberries and huckleberries along the way and ate lunch near a lovely little stream. We reached the Steven's Pass parking lot at about 5 or 6 in the evening (I don't know the actual time because my Garmin died 1/2 way out on the way back) and it felt so good to ditch our packs! We never got to weight them so officially we don't know what they weighed but we're guessing between 45-75 pounds for each of us (Nick's & T/L's packs were the heaviest). After exhausted goodbyes we split ways and rushed home to hot water and showers! Nick and I went and picked up burgers, fries and onion rings at Blazing Onion - our favorite local burger joint - and then fell into bed by 9:30 p.m.

On our hike we got to see chipmunks, squirrels, a pika (kind of like a gerbil, but bigger), crazy colored mushrooms, a toad, flowers and lots of berries. We figure if we keep going on these short hikes we may eventually hike the whole of PCT without doing all 2,650 miles at once!

**Stats for this trip: 9.2 miles roundtrip + about 1,000 feet gained in elevation + 2 fairly good size lakes and a bunch of small pond/lakes + some very sore feet/muscles + one very tired doggy = a great weekend backpacking trip!!

Check out our picasa album for lots more pictures.

Rainy, rainy race weekend

This last weekend in summary...

• Nick spent 3 hard core days at PAX (major nerd convention in Seattle), but he'll have to tell you more about that...
• It rained...
• I spent Friday picking blackberries with Lindsay in the afternoon and then spent the evening with Tim & Lindsay, eating some wonderful Canadian food "hodge podge", watching the movie The Wrestler and chilling at home.
• It rained some more...
• Saturday I spent the morning and afternoon painting my toe/fingernails, reading my book and then enjoying Lindsay's company in the afternoon. We watched some TV, watched a movie and made a delicious dinner of veggie chicken Tikka Masala. My parents rolled into town late Saturday evening and we enjoyed Nick's fabulous kettle popcorn and watched one of my favorite classic movies, Arsenic & Old Lace. Very funny!
• It actually stopped raining for a little bit...
• Sunday my mom and I went grocery shopping; made some blackberry tarts which actually turned out pretty good, made a yummy rice casserole and played some games. I got the blackberry tart recipe off of http://www.foodnetwork.com/ under "blackberry handpies". The pies turned out pretty good, however, what I will do next time is double the dough recipe and roll the dough a bit thicker so that it isn't so fragile or tear so easily. The filling was very good and thick enough that the pies weren't too oozy.
• It started raining again...
• Monday was the big day of the weekend as it was time to participate in the Super Jock-n-Jill half marathon!! This was my third time participating in this event (2nd for the 1/2 marathon and the first time I did the 4 mile fun run) and it's one of my favorite events to participate in. It's local, gets a lot of good support and raises money for an awesome charity called "Charley's Fund". It was great to have my mom, Lindsay & Tim as participants in this event and we had a great time crossing the finish line as a group. Our time wasn't anything spectacular, but we crossed the finish line together and that's all that matters. We were drenched from rain and sweat; I think the only time it wasn't pouring, drizzling or sprinkling on us was for about the last 2-3 miles of the race. After our event we parted ways to clean up and warm up; then met back in Woodinville for lunch at Pallino's Pastaria. After lunch we all headed to our respective homes and Nick and I spent the afternoon sleeping and reading. (Check out our Picasa web album for all the pictures from the event)
• I had the privilege of taking Tuesday off from work and treating myself to a 2 hour massage with one of my favorite massage therapists, April, at Massage Envy.

I hope all of your Labor Day weekends were filled with great fun, activities and rest.

Turnovers, Refrigerators, Wine Labels, Composters and Roses...

A weekend filled with delights, frustrations and interesting smells... This last weekend was an interesting one for Nick and I. Friday started with Tim coming over to pull an all-nighter with Nick computer gaming and we ended up playing on Guitar Hero: World Tour on the Wii for some time before Nick & Tim started on their festivities. Lots of fun! Nick climbed into bed around 5:30 on Saturday morning... Saturday Nick slept until noon while I started trying to make turnovers so I could use our CSA berries before they went bad. Well, the dough turned out too thin and the berries too juicy. The dough being too thin should have been my first clue that something was up because the dough was supposed to be chilled for an hour and it wasn't very chilly when I took it out of the fridge. Anywho, the turnovers quickly became a cobbler, that due to the juiciness of the berries caused my topping to sink; however, it tasted lovely and has been dessert for the week. Once Nick got up I decided to make breakfast/brunch; went to the freezer to get out some veggie sausage links and they were thawed. I don't have any idea why our refrigerator decided to go on the fritz, but by Saturday evening we realized we needed to start trying to fix the problem. Can I just say that there are some things no one wants to ever see in their own house?!? Things under the fridge is one of them! Just to share the joy... EEEWWWW!!! At 8:30 p.m. we realized that we needed to do something more drastic. We did an online search, called Lowe's and the fridge we wanted was in-stock. We rushed down to the store and after explaining the situation Lowe's was kind enough to waive the delivery date and deliver our new, albeit somewhat unwanted, new fridge. After purchasing the fridge we drove down to the store and picked up a bunch of ice to create our own mini refrigerator's with all our coolers and to put some ice blocks in the old fridge. Sunday our new fridge arrived in the afternoon and we had a lovely time setting it all up and getting our food back to the 21st century! I don't know how they did it long time ago!! Nick wants me to tell you that the coolest thing about our fridge is that it has a pocket on the inside where he can store his Mountain Dew 12 packs. From now on we will pay better attention to the needs of our appliances - such as cleaning them... Another day this week I was picking up some things at Fred Meyer and spotted this hilarious bottle of wine! I do enjoy wine, but I love the labels even more and have become somewhat obsessed with collecting them. I doubt I will ever drink this bottle, but I had to have the label! On Monday I was thrilled to have my ECOmposter arrive! Nick was amazing and put it together for me and on Tuesday evening I put all the "goodies" that I'd been saving over the last few weeks inside and am starting the thrilling process of waiting for soil. However, Wednesday after work I went out to turn the thing like I'm supposed to and I cannot even express in words the aroma wafting off my green globe. It was like every worst smell you've ever imagined, all thrown into one giant container! To top it off, I had a fly problem; not just a few flies, we're talking Lord of the Flies problem. The flies were coating my glorious green globe, the side of the house and the ground under the globe. The globe was promptly moved to a new location closer to the garden plot, where it can happily drip onto the rocks and rot to its heart's content. The flies have left and after adding some grass clippings I think the smell is actually starting to decrease. More to come on the joys of making dirt... To end our "weekend" of adventure (I use weekend loosely as I am writing this on Thursday; right before another weekend!), I walked around the backyard today and discovered that my roses are displaying their usual fall fashion; one of the benefits of living in Seattle is that I have roses blooming in September and sometimes until October. I decided to pick a few and display them. The scent and color of fresh roses is unlike anything out there, hot house roses have nothing on fresh garden grown! I have no idea the names of the red's or yellow, but the pinkish one is called "Lavender Ice", smells divine and was Nick's and my wedding reception rose. My grandma took one of the roses, made a start and created two rose bushes. One year she gave me two starts and only one has survived, but ironically, this year it showed off exactly 9 blooms at one time while Nick and I celebrated our 9 year anniversary in August.

Going Green

I don't know if many/any of you know that I am passionate about recycling and composting, but I thought I would do a little blog about something I think is vital. The reason this topic came up is that I was sitting in the recovery room at work the other day talking to my co-worker, Ruth, and telling her how excited I was for my new ECOmposter from Costco to arrive in the mail. Anyways, Ruth started asking me if you just make dirt out of it and what you can put in it. We then had a wonderful conversation about what you can put in the composter, making dirt and the purchasing of earthworms. She thought that part was very gross! I love the feeling that recycling and composting gives me and how I feel that I'm giving back to the earth. Now that most areas are really focusing on reducing waste and increasing their recycling/composting programs there are numerous resources available. You can usually visit your local waste management website and find out the recycling/composting guidlines for your area. I know it's hard to recycle in rural areas as the programs and pick-up aren't always readily available, however you usually can compost fairly easily. You can buy composter's through many local hardware stores or you can build one yourself. Just do a quick search of the internet for compost containers. I was surprised at how much stuff I could compost and the items vary widely depending on what your goals are. If you want to make soil quickly you want to use items that are small and break down quickly. If you aren't in a rush you can broaden your compost item list. Here are just a few things you can compost:

*Yard trimmings (leaves, grass, plant trimmings, etc.) *Food scraps (fruit vegetables, bread, pasta, grains, meat, dairy, eggshells, coffee filters, tea bags and more). On this one be careful - if you don't want increased smell, rot, vermin and such leave out the meat and dairy products. *Food soiled paper (paper towels, napkins, greasy pizza boxes, shredded paper, etc.) Recycling is even broader, but some places do have restrictions depending on how much ability they have to sort their recycling.

For those of us living the Pacific NW, check out the waste management website for tons of information on what waste management is doing in your area. I must admit that I love it when the girls at work tell me that every time they go to throw something in the trash (at home or work) they hear my voice saying, "Remember to recycle!". It feels good to know that one person can make a difference in how we impact our earth and what we can do to make it healthier and better for generations to come. So think for just a second the next time you go to put those lovely food scraps, junk mail or milk carton in your trash bag and think of the impact it has on the earth and if you could do something to give back.

Genesis 2:15

"The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it."