Back to Work

This year I took a a couple of vacation days, the day before Thanksgiving and the following Monday, which is today. That made for a nice, long vacation. I had Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday off and I am so not looking forward to going back to work tomorrow.

Wednesday I got up early and my mom and I went into the city (Bakersfield) and had a nice breakfast and hit a couple of Goodwill Stores. My mom and I love thrift store shopping! I was searching for Christmas decor but didn't find anything. After Goodwill-ing, we went grocery store shopping for Thanksgiving items, all the pie, stuffing and mashed potato fixings.

Once we got home and put everything away it was time to make the pies. We used to make the crust from scratch, but since frozen pie crusts have gotten so much better we use those, but we do make the pie filling from scratch...well from a can but that's from scratch for us!

Thursday of course was Thanksgiving and we spent the morning straightening up the house, getting the extra chairs all ready and making the stuffing and turkey, then the family arrived and we had a wonderful meal and enjoyed seeing each other all together again.

We barely remembered to take pictures. Here's my mom and standing next to her my sister Lisa and then sitting is me and my brother Fred and his youngest, Melissa, the baby in our family and isn't she beautiful!

I had to get a picture with just me and Melissa of course!

Here's a picture of my godson and Melissa's big brother, little Fred.

After everyone left I spent about two hours getting everything cleaned and put away in my kitchen. Friday was a relaxing morning and then we all met in Bakersfield again to celebrate Thanksgiving with my dad. We took dad to Golden Corral because he loves buffets. I had a great time having all my family together again and I know dad really enjoyed it.

Here's the only picture I managed to get. This is my dad and on the right is my son James and on the left is my sister's son Isaac, who also is my Godson! Can you believe that my dad is 6 foot and both his grandsons are taller and bigger than he is???

Saturday I had to go and get new tires put on my car. My son James, (in the picture above) went with me. We had a great time considering we had to wait for two hours at Big O Tires! We spent the time playing Monopoly on his cell phone and I won!!! Of course he helped me to win and when I was almost losing he bankrupted and gave me all his money and property. Wasn't that nice of him?

Sunday I went on STRIKE and said I was not doing anything the whole day...and I didn't. I just watched movies on NetFlix and played on the computer and watched TV and read my book and chillaxed all day. My daughter's little puppy Chorizo was as exhausted and I was and laid on the little bed we've set up for her in my bedroom. Doesn't she look comfortable?

So today, the whole world went back to work...but not me :)

I decided to spend the day putting up the Christmas Tree and decorating the inside of the house. This year I decided not to put the Martha Stewart ribbon and garland that I love, love, love. I decided to try something different. I don't like it! Not sure if I am going to do it over or just live with it as-is for this year, but it's just too plain! I do love that where I put the tree this year it's reflected in the mirror, double the lights and sparkle....love that!

So tomorrow it's back to the real world and for once I'm not really looking forward to going back. I had a great Thanksgiving and a wonderful time being off. Can't wait for Christmas and tamale making and Biscocho baking!

How are your holidays shaping up? All your shopping done? To tell the truth I haven't even started, so don't feel bad if you haven't either.

 

The Purest Kind of Love

Today I saw a homeless man outside the window of my office. I was sitting at my desk and all I saw at first was his head. He was there for quite a while so I stood up to see what he was doing since where he was standing was a driveway and he didn’t seem to be concerned that a car could turn into the parking lot and hit him.

This man was about 34 to 40 years of age, disheveled with long curly hair wearing dirty jeans and a red thermal undershirt that had seen many washings and was more a rusty dark pinkish color. Sitting next to him in the driveway was a beautiful dog. The dog looked like a German shepherd but was more a blond color than black and white.

The man was standing in the sun and was playing with something in his hands and I saw that it was some clear green plastic twine and he had a whole tangled bunch of it in his hands and he was trying to roll it up and put it into order. The other end of this twine was tied to the dog collar of the dog. The dog, with his tongue hanging out, was sitting patiently next to the man. I watched the man as he rolled and unrolled the twine, trying to get it perfect. The dog sat patiently.

At times the dog would rise and walk a few feet towards the parked cars to get into the shade of the trees. He would sit there for just a few moments and then come right back to the homeless man. I realized that the dog was hot, sitting there in the sun with his owner and he would move over to the shade for some relief. But obviously he didn’t feel right being far away from his owner and he would trot back and sit in the sun again. The dog did this about four times and I contemplated going outside and telling the man that he was making that poor dog suffer, but I didn’t.

Eventually, the man got the twine wrapped to his satisfaction and he looked down and said something to the dog and the dog looked up at him and then the man dropped to his knees and gave the dogs neck a huge hug and the dog licked his face. The man stood and started walking and the dog walked with him. My eyes filled with tears.

Many would say someone who is homeless shouldn’t have a dog, why put a dog through the same kinds of trials, tribulations and suffering. I don’t know if that man was really homeless, or just dirty and disheveled as a norm but I do know that he loved that dog and was good to him and that the dog loved him. The dog was clean, much cleaner than his owner and his coat was brushed and he didn’t look hungry.

As they walked away I realized how three years ago I wouldn’t have noticed at all, I wouldn’t have felt the dogs pain at being in the sun and being thirsty, I wouldn’t have worried whether or not that man took good care of the dog…I simply wouldn’t have noticed.



But since my daughter brought little Chorizo into my life I’ve changed. I didn’t know I had changed, but I have. I am now a dog lover.

I do know that I’m not as good a dog lover as my daughter, or even as kind-hearted a person as she is because she would not have hesitated to go out there and take water to the dog and give the man a collar for the dog or some money for him to buy one. She would have given the man whatever toys, food and bedding she happened to have in her car for Chorizo. She would have offered the man food if she thought he needed it. I’m proud at having raised such a good-hearted person even though I don’t take credit for her being as such. Yet at the same time, I am fearful for her because she doesn’t have the fearfulness in her that I have. The fear of strangers and homeless people, which kept me from going and offering the dog and the man help. It’s a double edge sword, being proud of this daughter and fearing for her as well. Both edges are sharp and cut my heart for her. But I am so proud of her!

Oh! I had to come back because I forgot to give credit to the artist of the photo Homeless Man and Dog Linocut.  The artist is Shellie Lewis and she has a really cool blog which you can visit here.
 

Halloween for the Dogs

It was a busy weekend! Yesterday I spent the day with my mom. She loves to go thrift store shopping but yesterday was definitely a bad day to go as EVERYONE was there trying to find last minute Halloween costumes. So we just had a nice lunch and picked up some groceries and came home.

Then today I went back into Bakersfield with my sister and we hit the Goodwill Bookstore and I found five interesting books! We had our favorite salad at Cocos Restaurant, the Asian Chicken Salad. It was so good! Then we did some grocery shopping again...well she did, I had gone the day before so I just went along to keep her company.

When I got back home my daughter reminded me that I had told her I would go with her to the Self Serve Pet Spa Halloween Event. So there I went...back to Bakersfield. But we had a good time. I hope you all remember her little Shih Poo puppy, Chorizo. She was a banana for Halloween.

She loves being around other dogs, and there were so many! It was a nice event and I hope they raised a lot of money and that some of the dogs that were up for adoption found good homes!

We then went to Banducci's Family Pumpkin Patch. In the mosaic above, the photo of Chorizo in the wagon was taken there. She loved being there because there were so many smells. They had pumpkins, other dogs, sheep, pigs, chickens and pony's. Her nose was working overtime. Plus I don't know if she had ever been around hay before but she loved the smell and the taste of it.

 

 

Here I am with Chorizo. I love the photo in the top right corner where I'm trying to take some hay out of her mouth and she's not at all happy with me!

 

 

She was one tired little puppy on the drive home and I was pretty tired too. So April and I took Chorizo home and then we went to our local Mexican food place and had dinner. It was a busy but fun weekend. Hope you all had a good weekend as well!

 

 

Linking up to Little Red House for Mosaic Monday. 

CEO Chorizo

It's been a while since I did a post about my little grand-puppy Chorizo. My daughter sent me the most adorable picture of her so I thought I would share. Here Chorizo is at her new job, sitting in her desk chair hard at work being super adorable! CEO Chorizo!!

Happy Easter to everyone!

My Summer - Part One with Chorizo at the Coast

Now that fall is here and things have calmed down a little bit on the weekends I have time to post some pictures of a couple of fun trips I took this summer.

In August I took a weekend trip with my favorite daughter, April and my favorite grand-puppy, Chorizo. Yes...she named her puppy Chorizo which is the name of a much loved Mexican Sausage usually fried up with Huevos (Eggs) or Papas (Potatoes). I guess it's a fitting name as Chorizo is pretty spicy!

Chorizo loves car rides! What dog doesn't right? But don't worry, we don't let her drive! (Be sure to click on any of the following photos to enlarge.)

First we went to Elephant Seal Beach. We've gone there before and I posted about it on March 28, 2010 and you can view that post HERE which has more details of where and what Elephant Seal Beach is. I will tell you that it is located at Piedras Blancas in the southern range of Big Sur, near San Simeon and I love it there! Where else can you go to see nature in all it's glory for free? Here's some pictures you can enjoy for free as well!


A view of the coastline. The weather was beautiful and as is usual for that area, it would alternate between being overcast and being sunny.

Here's a picture of the Elephant Seals basking in the sun. Ahhhh, this is the life! Except for all that sand and having to haul your body around on those little flippers.

From there we headed to Avila Beach to a little fruit stand that April wanted to show me. She knows where all the best spots are! I loved this place. It was very busy, lots of people but you were free to roam around and see the animals and people watch. I'd love to go again!

This fruit stand is known as the Avila Valley Barn and you can go HERE to read more about the history of the fruit stand, get directions, and view tons more pictures. They're working on an online store where you can order custom mixed Cake and Pancakes mixes and their Jam, Jellies, Preserves and Honey! Here's a view of where we parked. Is this a beautiful parking lot or what? These are Zinnias. I've grown Zinnia's before but they never grew like these! Mine were short, scrawny little plants, these are gorgeous!

This is the view heading into the stand itself where they sell fresh flowers. Isn't this a beautiful display?

Here's a closeup of those beautiful red flowers. I want to say they're daisies, but I'm not sure. Doesn't it look like I photo-shopped this picture to get those beautiful colors? Nope, that's just Mother Nature's doing! I love the aluminum buckets they use to display them.

And a closeup of those tulips! I wish I had bought some now that I'm looking at them!

That night we had dinner at the Great American Fish Company in Morro Bay. I didn't take any pictures because the flash in my camera is "no bueno" at night and that's when you need the flash right? But here's a picture from their website and you can click HERE to read more about them and see their menu. April and I both had the Bacon wrapped Filet Mignon and it was so juicy and tender you could cut it with your fork! We also had an excellent bottle of Champagne from a local winery, Tobin James Cellars. I say we...but I mean me. April sipped at her glass and I drank the rest of it. Yum...it was wonderful!

The next day we headed to the Nipomo Swap Meet. It had been years since we had been there and it has changed so much! When we used to go it was filled with vendors selling Arts and Crafts and second hand and antique merchandise. Now it's just like a giant parking lot filled with 99cent stores. Now I love 99cent stores, but that wasn't what I wanted to see, so that was a bit of a let down.

We headed back to find someplace to have a nice lunch. Someplace that would allow us to have Chorizo with us. So that meant outdoor dining and April knew just the place. I tell you this girl of mine knows all the best places and a weekend with her is filled with fun and adventure! We went to Zorros Cafe and Cantina in Shell Beach where we enjoyed Mimosa's made with the same Champagne we had the night before. They had the best Chips and Salsa and if you ever get to that area you need to go try it! Doesn't Chorizo look like such a proper and well-behaved little puppy just sitting there. She's adorable!

After a wonderful lunch April figured she still hadn't tired me out enough (trust me, she had) and she insisted we drive out to Montana de Oro. Montana de Oro translates to Mountain of Gold and is named that due to the golden wildflowers that bloom in Spring. We love it there, it's so beautiful and peaceful and pretty secluded so you don't have a ton of people there.

Chorizo loves wading in the water. Here she is with my daughter April enjoying herself.

And just in case the waves carry her away and she doesn't know how to swim (I tell April all dogs know how to swim) April insists on her wearing a little doggie life jacket. Isn't she cute!

And as we ride off into the sunset back to our little casas (homes), we say "Adios Montana de Oro...until next time."

Summer Fun

So I notice everyone in Blogland is a little scarce this summer. Is it the heat keeping us away or all the fun we're having? Maybe a little of both? I know I've had air-conditioning woes at my house, but as of Friday the A/C man came and it's working great now...I was even a little bit chilly last night!

And I'm definitely having a wonderful summer. It seems like every weekend something has been happening. First there was Father's Day and a really nice BBQ at my brothers house where I got to spend time with some of my favorite people and pets!

Me, Melissa and Chorizo

Then came another BBQ at my brothers house for his son Fred Jr. We combined that BBQ with the 4th of July (actually it happened on the 3rd of July because in my small town we have our fireworks display On the 3rd). And again I got to see some special people...little people!

My niece Melissa and her cousin Maximiliano aka Max aka Maxie! And a little white kitten!

Then this weekend we had one of our favorite cousins from Arizona visit, Lydia, her daughter Daniella and her Daniella's husband and little boy and Lydia's son Mark and his cousin Alex (I think they were cousins, someone correct me if I'm wrong). We had two family get togethers, one on Saturday hosted by my cousin Steve and one on Sunday hosted by my sister and her husband at their home. We had lots of fun, lots of laughs, shared tons of memories and ate way too much! I've got photos to share but haven't downloaded them off of my camera yet, so stay tuned.

In the next few weeks we have birthdays for several members of the family....yours truly included. I'm having a fabulous get-a-way birthday to "Sin City" (Las Vegas) and I'm so excited about that. Then my niece is celebrating her 21st birthday.

So yes...I've been a little scarce in Blogland but it's only because I'm doing research and loving life so that I have even more to share with everyone. Oh...and I've lost 23 lbs now! Yay!

So what have you all been up to?

Bark for Life - American Cancer Society

Today my daughter April and I joined the American Cancer Society 1st Annual "Bark for Life" walk and I think it was a big success and if I get the chance I'll definitely do it again next year!

There were so many beautiful dogs there and dog people are just the nicest bunch of people ever! The walk was held at Yokuts Park which sits on the edge of the mighty Kern River. In this first mosaic I put a couple of pictures of the river. It's really full and flowing right now because of all the rain and run-off from the snow in the mountains. It was a beautiful, sunny, windy spring day. I even got a little bit of a sunburn!

Here's Chorizo and me in the top right and April and Chorizo in the bottom left.

Chorizo took third prize in the costume contest. She was dressed as a Sundae...a Chorizo Sundae! Here's some random pictures of all the people and their doggies!

It was a lot of fun and hopefully there was a lot of money raised!

Please visit all the other mosaics by clicking HERE and visiting Mary at Little Red House for Mosaic Monday!

Also linking up to Susan at A Southern Daydreamer for Outdoor Wednesday.

*****JUST AN UPDATE, I HEARD ON THE NEWS THAT OVER $10,000 WAS RAISED!!! ****

Caldo on a Rainy Day

Today turned out to be my favorite kind of day for staying at home. It's been raining steadily throughtout the day. Perfect day for staying home and keeping warm, blogging, reading, watching tv and eating something warm and delicious.

My mom had promised my daughter April that she would make her Caldo today...and she didn't even know it was going to be a rainy day.

Caldo de Res is Mexican Beef Soup. My mom hasn't made this in a long time because she said you can't just make a little bit of it...it makes a whole big pot. And she's not lying, just look at this big pot full of Caldo!

There's at least 4 gallons of Caldo here. What's in Caldo? Well my mom uses stew beef (this time she bought it already cut in cubes), Cabbage, Zucchini Squash, Carrots, Onion, Potatoes and Tomato Sauce. Lots of people also add corn on the cob cut into small pieces. We asked for Corn on the Cob...we didn't get it, cause that's not how mom makes it! But we did get the love...that's my moms favorite ingredient...the love.

We like to prepare our Caldo by squeezing in some lemon juice and Tabasco...Yum! It gives it that little kick! I love this picture above because the sun came out just long enough for me to take the picture!

Here's a closeup of all the goodness. . .

And poor little Chorizo was so sad because she didn't get her own big bowl of Caldo :-(
Don't tell April but while April was eating her Caldo in the living room watching TV...Chorizo and I snuck into the kitchen and I fixed her a little plate of beef and squash. That's healthy for a puppy right?

What's up with Chorizo?

Just what is up with Chorizo? It's been a while since I posted any stories or pictures of Chorizo right?

In case you don't know what Chorizo is...it's a spicy Mexican Sausage. Well at least the Mexican version that I'm used to is. I buy it in the store in the deli aisle and it looks something like this. . .

You can buy either the pork of the beef version. Both equally delicious if you ask me! You take this out of it's protective plastic packaging, throw it into a frying pan and treat it like it's ground beef, you just keep breaking it up and stirring it for a few minutes. Then you can use this crumbly, spicy meat to make wonderful dishes like. . .

Huevos Con Chorizo ......... Eggs and Chorizo. You just whip up some eggs with a fork in a bowl and then add them to the cooked chorizo in the frying pan and cook until the eggs are as set as you like them. You can then eat them with a spoon or even better, heat up a flour tortilla and wrap this spicy mixture up into a burrito. Yum! Nothing better for breakfast!

Another thing you can do with the crumbled up, fried up Chorizo is Papa's Con Chorizo, or Chorizo with Potatoes! To tell the truth, I love this little concoction better even than Huevos con Chorizo. With this dish you fry up the potatoes in strips or cubes, just like you're going to make country potatoes. Then in a seperate pan you fry the chorizo. When the potatoes are cooked to the consistency you like (I like mine slightly crunchy still) you mix the chorizo in. Serve this alongside eggs or french toast or anything else. It goes with anything! Oh...and again just wrap this stuff inside a flour tortilla...it makes an excellent burrito!

Another wonderful dish you can make with Chorizo is Nachos. Ohhhhhh I so love Nachos. My sister and I love to go to this wonderful Mexican restaurant in Bakersfield known as Mexicali. They serve the best Chorizo Nachos in the world! I know several people will say, "Oh no! The best nachos are Chile Verde Nacho's" But to them I say "Pshaw! You don't know Nacho's my friend."

You layer torillas chips, the cooked Chorizo, cheese, green onions, black olives, tomatoes and Jalapenos, then place them in the oven until the cheese is melted and gooey; then in the broiler for just a second to brown the top. Oh my Gosh...there is nothing better with a cold beer or an icy, lemony-limey margarita!!!

Great! Now I've made myself hungry! And probably you too right? But the Chorizo I'm talking about when I say what's up with Chorizo is my daughters little Shih-Poo puppy...Chorizo. Here's Chorizo now saying "Huh? What? You're talking about me and not the spicy sausage that smells soooooooo darn good when you cook it?"

Chorizo believe it or not is a girl puppy. I know, I know. With a name like Chorizo you would expect her to be a boy puppy. My daughter April just loved the name Chorizo and probably because she loves the spicy Mexican sausage Chorizo!

Chorizo is her own spicy Mexican Sausage...well maybe a spicy Shih-Poo Sausage. Oh now she's baring her teeth at me. I love when she does that!

Awwww! Isn't she precious. She honestly thinks my coffee table belongs to her. I think she likes it because when she's on the coffee table it's cool and she's in the center of everything that is going on and she loves being the center of attention!

And when it's been a long day, and a puppy just wants a warm soft place to go to there's nothing like a great-grandmamma's lap for a little snooze.

G'Nite little Chorizo. We promise not to cover you with cheese and jalapenos and eat you all up and wash you down with an icy margarita...even if you are cute enough to eat!

Designs by Gollum - Foodie Friday!