Happy birthday to me!  Margene sent me the sweetest (pun intended) bouquet at work on Friday...

Ralph and AJ got me a new TV to put up in the computer room for my birthday - sort of....

My plan was to get a smallish second TV and mount it in on the wall the computer room, which I've just added a couch to, so it can be more than a sewing room/computer room.  I should have known better.  Ralph got a 50" TV, with better optics, etc., than our TV in the living room, so......the new one is going in the living room and I get the hand-me-down TV in the computer room.  It will be nice to have - I don't always want to watch what Ralph is watching, and vice versa.  We now have the TV and mounting set - now to actually get it put up on the wall, hooked up to services, etc.  Maybe this week, since I'm on vacation, I can work on that....

Dave, Marletta, AJ and I are hiking Lassen today.  The original plan called for Ronna to join us too, but she called in sick yesterday - kidney stones.  Poor thing! She decided against even driving over for a visit.  

I had invited Jeff and Kirby to hike with us as well, but they were busy today, but came up yesterday for dinner instead.  I made pizza for them, and Jeff is a convert!  He ate two pizzas and practically rolled himself out to the car.  Kirby made a blackberry crisp for dessert, but Ralph was the only one with room for dessert!  (He said it was great  - I'll try some today....)  I have to remember to send my recipes to Kirby - Jeff was planning on buying a pizza oven ASAP.

Meredith and Chris invited me on a kayaking trip with them - we went up to Whiskeytown Monday morning and paddled around the Whiskey Creek area.  All those workouts with AJ are paying off - I loaded and carried my own kayak!  I did have help getting back up the hill after kayaking for three hours, but I think I could have even done that by myself.

It's still a beautiful lake, even with all the fire damage from the Carr Fire.  We saw a bald eagle, lots of ducks, some osprey, and one blue heron trying to be invisible.  I only had my cell phone camera for photos, so I couldn't get a good picture of him without disturbing him too much.  

I had my good camera with me, but I forgot to put the memory card in it - bummer!

I know - I haven't posted in a while - probably because not too much exciting has happened - no fun trips, no major accomplishments, etc.  Just normal stuff - go to work, go home, cook, clean, watch some TV (Go Giants!) and go to bed to start again the next day.  I'm not complaining - sometimes an 'exciting' day isn't a 'good' day.  

I've started the quilt for Emma and Ryan - their wedding is the last of October, so I hope I can get it done.  Here's what the pattern looks like:

And here are the colors AJ and I picked out.  The quilt top won't take too much time to put together (I'm actually halfway done with it now) but the quilting will take me a while.

Book club this month was our annual family BBQ - no book required.  I found a new yarn at Hobby Lobby that I just had to try (along with a yarn bowl that was just too cool to pass up....)

So I made wash clothes and scrubbies for book club for August.

I've started de-cluttering the computer/sewing room, now that the garage is sort-of under control.  I pulled the piano out and we got a large sofa in.  I plan on putting in a TV in there as well, so I can watch something different that what Ralph is watching.....I's like to make it an actual 'sewing room' one of these days.  I'll just keeping adding a few things at a time though.  My next big purchase will be a sewing table.....

Chewie thinks he's the king of the couch.

What a weekend!  It was my high school 40th reunion weekend!  I went up Friday night (okay - Friday afternoon - I skipped out of work early...) and took Dave out to dinner.  Then I went to a informal gathering at the local brewery and met up with people that did not have name tags on.  My name-memory isn't great in the first place, and then to try to place names on people that I knew 40 years ago????? Not happening!  Luckily, Mike Hilton took me under his wing, and pointed out everyone (and I mean EVERYONE - he knew who everybody was!!!)  I admit though, I spent most of the evening talking with Susan Tangeman.  I haven't seen her in forever, and it was nice to catch up.  

Saturday, Dave had to work a couple of hours, so after he left, I decided to pull some of the really tall weeds in his front yard.  Once I did that though, you could see the medium-tall weeds.  So...they had to go.  And, you guessed it, once the medium-tall weeds were pulled, you could see the rest of the weeds.  I was still pulling weeds when Dave got in - much more than the couple of hours he thought he was going to have to work.  He helped me in the yard until Cindy showed up and we went for a walk and a talk.  Whew!  The three mile walk we did was much easier than pulling weeds!

We went down on the river trail below Dave's house.   I can't decide which of these pictures I like best.....

And I found a bumble bee on a thistle flower.

Then it was off to the reunion.  Susan was taking pictures for the group, and grabbed one of me....

And of the group - with Thompson Peak in the background.

Then the fun ended, I came home and did the laundry, cleaned house, etc. on Sunday afternoon.  I also worked with AJ to finish up the garage.  Even the stuff in the center is out of there now (the washing machine is out on the street with a "free" sign on it.)  

So today, for my day off, I did dump runs of the stuff we pulled out of the garage.  I finally remembered to take a picture on the next to last load.  We hauled off at least four trailer loads from the garage since we started cleaning it, but I think it was more....

But it was all worth it.  This is the view into the garage from the kitchen now....

I got bangs!  (I have a lot of grey hair too.  I like to think it's just the light in the kitchen, but I know better.)  I like it, it's been a while since I've had bangs.  Now to see how they do for workouts and yard work!  My new 'do' is just in time, too.  I'm off to Susanville this weekend for my 40th (!?!?!?!?) high school reunion.  (Not the real reason I got a hair cut, but it's nice that the timing worked out.)

It's been a hot summer so far, with the added fun of our AC being out.  The first week it was out, we hit 106.  The swamp cooler just doesn't keep up at that temp, but it's better than nothing.  So far, the repairmen have been here 4 times, each time with 'the fix', and each time, it isn't 'the fix'.  First it was the thermostat, then a couple of other other items that it wasn't, and now it's the compressor.  The unit is fairly new - we put it in in January, 2013 (after the last one caught fire in the middle of the night.)  I'm looking forward to some cooler temps this next week - highs in the 90's instead of the 100's!

AJ is still trying for the elusive first job, and isn't getting anywhere (without going to food services, etc.)  So....he's embraced my plan for cleaning out the garage wholeheartedly.  Here's what greeted me when I got home last night - just waiting for me to go through and say what to toss and what to keep:

But here is what the inside of the garage looks like:

Progress!  Unfortunately, it seems like it's always two steps forward, one step back.  All the treasures that Ralph is finding as we clean out boxes are ending up on the clean shelves of the shop or in the house.  One step at a time, I guess.  Right now, AJ and I have at least three dump runs scheduled for Monday (I took Monday off - but it was supposed to be for kayaking...) to get rid of what we've pulled out so far.  We still have two more walls of boxes, and stuff in the center to go through, but....it's looking better!

New project finished (and I was cutting it close!)  I made a baby quilt and hat for baby Bambino, and the baby shower is Tuesday.  Not much time left on this one, but I did it!  

What I did on my summer vacation.....Alex and I cleaned out the shop!  We've been working on it, and the garage, all spring and summer, but we finally got Ralph out to go through all his 'treasures' that we couldn't throw away, and got the shop sorted and put together so you can walk through it (really, you couldn't walk through it before.....)  We made a dump run with the trailer overflowing, and have started a new pile to haul off of things that Ralph decided that we really could toss, but for now, we are done.  Whew!  It feels so nice to walk out into the garage and shop are now, and not feel like we are on the next edition of Hoarders.....

I also crocheted a large market bag while I was off, or at least finished it.  

My original plan for my vacation was to go camping at Hat Creek for a few days.  We finally got Alli into a day program, so Ralph only had to get her up, showered and dressed and off to daycare while I was gone.  We also had someone coming in in the afternoon/evening to help him, so it was looking pretty good.  Then Ralph had a serious low-blood sugar episode at night (requiring a rescue injection), and I figured it wasn't safe to leave him at night.  Oh well....maybe next time I can go camping.

Instead, Alex and I just went to Lassen Park, and went exploring.  Here's what Lassen looks like right now....

We found a place that sounded interesting to hike to, and that didn't have snow on the trail - actually it was quite difficult to find a trail not closed by snow!  Most of the park still has large piles/patches of snow.

The little creek we hiked by was pretty.

And we did have to cross some snow on the trail.  Not much, but it's the middle of July!

Another little creek we crossed over.

My hiking buddy,

Coming in to Paradise Meadows.

The flowers and butterflies were abundant on the trail.

And a caterpillar.....

And a woodpecker

Unfortunately, I left my phone in the bathroom (I'm paranoid about pit toilets, what can I say - it's the second time I've left it in the park because I've put it far, far away from me....).  When I remembered that I'd left it, we went back, but someone had already picked it up.  They left me a nice note saying they had taken it to the Visitor's Center.  So....off we went to the Visitor's Center - on the South side of the park, 45 minutes away.  When we stopped by, no one had turned a phone in to them, and they suggested that we check the 'other' center - the Loomis Museum - an hour back the way we came.  

So, we jumped back in the car and drove back to Loomis, but no one had turned in a phone there either.  Bummer.  I figured that the person that picked up the phone was still out enjoying the park, and I would catch up with it eventually, so I left my name and number and went on home.  That night, I got a call from the store at Manzanita Lake - someone had turned my phone in to them.  They were closing before I could get back up that night, so the next morning, I drove back up to Lassen to get my phone.  While I was there, I grabbed a couple of shots of Manzanita Lake....