Home Again, Home Again, Jiggedy Jig

We are home. Amidst the piles of bills, laundry, homework, and responsibilities that so quickly press in upon us, our trip lingers like the flavors of a good meal. The week was varied, full, adventurous, and overall quite grand. The Redwoods are, indeed, amazing...even in a typhoon that dropped 1/3 of Northern California's yearly rainfall on us in one day. Donning our rain gear and boots we marveled at how few people were out to explore the Lady Bird Johnson Grove of Redwoods, Gold Beach Preserve, and the famous "Fern Canyon"(where scenes from Jurassic Park were filmed). Only later did we find out that the weather was not normal and that we had made our children hike through downpours to see the great sites of Northern California's wild lands. Fortunately, they had a wonderful time despite their parents' insanity. As Rynn pulled up her pants, got her shoes wet, and hiked up a creek in a canyon with sixty foot walls of ferns on either side of her she kept exclaiming, "THis is SOO awesome. This is SOOO awesome." The bummer for the blog is that my camera had no batteries and so, alas, no pictures until we arrived down in Santa Cruz.
We met up with my family to take some boats out into Monterey Bay. We saw otters and some porpoises who swam right by our boat! It was sunny, warm, and beautiful.
We wrapped up the weekend celebrating my cousin Leigh and her husband Johnny tie the knot under the California sun.

Leigh and Johnny make some big promises...



....and Party Time

The sound of Virginia accents under the warm setting California sun....does it get any better than that???

Games abounded at the post wedding festivities. Here the girls and Jason play with the bubbles after finishing a mean game of horseshoes.

And after twelve hours in the car on Sunday we arrived back home to find Portland ABLAZE with color. Every year I find it more and more amazing. Unfortunately, my camera couldn't capture the vibrancy of the color that brings a gasp out of my throat when I round many corners in our neighborhood. It is amazingly beautiful, and I am reminded again of lines from a poem by TS Eliot,

"Never stop exploring, and the end of your exploring will be to arrive where you began and know it for the first time."

55th Ave...our street this afternoon

Our backyard maple...because she has been on the blog for the past two falls.

Remember those cherry trees from a spring post? The ones so white and fluffy? Who knew they'd turn yellow??