Already in the Weeds

We’re baaack. And already in the weeds. Not surprising. The yard is full of weeds. The house needs things. The animals need things. I apparently need to do some work, both art and school. All good. Not doing school yet though. Sticking to art and the yard.

Can’t remember when I last posted…ah yes, we’d made it to Santa Ynez, but hadn’t done anything yet. Our rule was hike then relax. I mean, hiking is a form of relaxation in itself, but we wanted to make sure movement was a part of this trip, because the day job makes it hard to do anything but the day job. Hiking has fallen by the wayside. It’s easy to leave out the exercise, and we didn’t want to leave it out. SO. We hiked first, up in the mountains, where we found out that the Lake Fire last year had impacted part of the hiking trails.

It was beautiful out there and there were a bunch of people at the trailheads, but we managed to be quietly alone for a goodly portion of the trail. Which we prefer.

Burn was pretty obvious.

Apparently the boychild worked this fire last July.

We did a little over 4 miles. The weather was perfect…a little chilly, not too warm. The flowers were starting to bloom. Some of the oaks were coming back, some of the other stuff too. We didn’t see the pines coming back, but maybe it takes them longer.

After that, we headed out for a wine tasting. We wanted a pro-white-wine tasting and wandered around Los Olivos with a lot of really drunk people and dogs until we found a place that was more white friendly. Like white wine friendly. To be clear. We’d done a lot of reds at the last place and they’re not my favorite. The last place did give us an extra tasting though and then a great deal on two bottles of white. This place was interesting…different wines.

But he revised the tasting for us and we appreciated that. Afterwards, we were in the mood to feed some ostriches and emus (like you do)…

If you’ve been to Solvang, you’ve probably driven by Ostrichland and thought WTF. But you know, these guys are truly prehistoric-looking and fascinating up close.

Also a little terrifying to try to feed them.

It was totally worth it. We had dinner out at a place that wasn’t really known for its food, obviously. No amazing food this trip…oh wait, the sandwiches we had from the fancy grocery store…they were damn good. But otherwise? Eh. We did get apple strudel (well I did) from Solvang. It was good.

Then Sunday, we had to come home. It wasn’t a bad drive (knock on wood) for once…Los Angeles can be hellacious. Although this was interesting…

Let’s get that out there please.

I finished one Rooted tree (March block, Sue Spargo) on the way home…it’s the only one I worked on the entire trip.

I started the next one once I got home…

Once we unpacked everything and checked on all the animals and I ran to the store for essentials because the Man had to read a chapter and take a quiz and write an essay. The furry beasts seemed happy to have us home…

Poor pup. And I started quilting the piece I was working on before I left…

And emailing all the people I was supposed to deal with while I was gone. Fun times. I’ll be quilting today, getting vaccines, already took the dog to the vet and survived an earthquake in a building full of animals (5.2 just east of here…felt bigger). I even have pilates later. Although my stomach is not happy with me at the moment. Hopefully it’ll figure that shit out before I’m lying down and exercising. Just felt another aftershock. That one got a boof out of the dog. Hopefully I’m back on a normal blogging schedule now. It was nice to just check out for a week, but for some things, I really am a routines person, for good or bad.