California Weekending

 

We got home from Hawaii late last Friday night.  By the time we got in bed it was after 1:00 a.m. on Saturday - Les' 60th birthday!  I'm a horrible blogger since I didn't even mention it here, but I'm a good wife who showered him with love on his big day.

Four hours later, Les' alarm went off and he was out the door by 6:00.  He met up with friends in Ventura and they rode the Cool Breeze Century ride - 100 miles on his 60th!

Meanwhile, I went to the grocery store to get enough food to get us through the weekend.  I also bought supplies for another batch of homemade ice cream.  This time I made cookies and cream, cherry, German chocolate cake, and Heath bar.  I'm having SO much fun experimenting with different flavors!  I don't really measure the add-ins, I use about 1/2 to 3/4 of a cup for each quart of ice cream.

We hadn't been up for long on Sunday morning when we received a text that church was cancelled for the day.  This was due to tropical storm Hillary, with the threat of flooding and road closures.  The rain started mid-morning and didn't stop the rest of the day.

Sunday afternoon, Les was taking a nap and I was reading when I felt something a little different.  The wind had been blowing all morning, but I knew this was something else.  Within seconds, our phones started going off with emergency alerts.  It was an earthquake!  This was in Ojai which is about 50 miles from us.  Later that evening we had another emergency alert - this time for flash flooding.  Our total rainfall for Sunday was about 3.7 inches - more than a fourth of our annual average of 12 inches.

Les received two birthday gifts on Monday.  A bag of coffee from his sister, Lisa:

 

And a flugelhorn!  

 

 

This is something he's been wanting for a while.  His horn collection is growing:

Trumpet, flugelhorn, pocket trumpet

 

Things are definitely odd - a wildfire in Hawaii and a tropical storm in California, but one thing hasn't change, I was with my best friend!

This and That from Here and There

Happy Christmas Adam!  That's a phrase I read somewhere and think it's kinda cute.  Since Adam came before Eve it makes sense that the day before Christmas Eve should be called Christmas Adam ;)

It's only been three and a half weeks since Thanksgiving, but it feels much longer.  We were home for three days when Les had to go to Las Vegas for a work conference.  He got home on Thursday night, December 5th, and we flew to Hawaii on Friday morning, December 6th.  While Les was in Vegas I decorated our house for Christmas.  It was great coming home two weeks later to a decorated house!

It was during the week before we left that a mountain lion made an appearance in Simi Valley.  It was first spotted on our street.  The next day it attacked two dogs.  This mountain lion is believed to be a female with a tracking collar that is no longer working.  I learned about this from a neighbor while I was out walking in the early morning.  Yikes!  A few days later a young male mountain lion was spotted and later captured.

Not what you want to see sitting on your patio!

The captured cat, taking a little tranquilizer induced nap.

December 7th was the First Church Hawaii Christmas banquet.  Good food and great friends made for a wonderful evening. We played several fun games, my favorite being each table making a snowman out of toilet paper!

Sunday morning, December 8th was the Honolulu Marathon.  I planned ahead this year and brought a handy clapper.  I found a perfect spot to cheer on the runners.  Just past mile seven the route starts going around Diamond Head.  At the same place, the route returns with less than a mile to the finish line.  I found a kindred spirit who wanted to cheer and we clapped and cheered for about an hour. We saw fast runners coming back to place in the top 5 and slow runners still going out, but they all got cheered on.  We also saw the wheelchair racers, Les did his annual cycling escort and he got a special cheer from me.

Proof that I clapped much - I got a blister!

Les' company Christmas party was Tuesday night, December 17th.  Les took his trumpet and we played "Name that Christmas Tune."  There are definitely some Christmas music fans in the company.  I took one picture of Les with his trumpet but it's super blurry.  I ended up holding his music book for him because it was breezy since we were seated outside.  It was a beautiful evening at Cafe Julia and I enjoyed chatting with many of Les' co-workers.

As I've already blogged about, we flew home on Thursday, December 19th.  Friday was a blur of napping.

We had a great day at church yesterday.  Les and his trumpet student, Jeremiah, played a duet of "Oh Holy Night" on Sunday morning.  Jeremiah has been taking lessons for a little over a year and he is doing fantastic!  They also played during our afternoon service - a first for Jeremiah.  It was so great hearing the trumpets as I was praise singing.

We're home for Christmas this year.  Due to our travels I'm not doing my usual bake-fest, I just made a few cookies.  Les will be off work from Christmas to New Years and I think we'll be doing a lot of reading, sitting by the fire, and sipping hot chocolate!

I hope you enjoy time with family and friends, safe travels, good eats and a very merry Christmas!