So it's the middle of the work day and I've been going non-stop since about 6 this morning. I actually got out of my pajamas before noon, which is a major accomplishment on home office days! So about 20 minutes ago, my brain was fried up like eggs and I decided the brain need a segway into something else for a few minutes before subjecting it to the "work" stuff. So....I grabbed my camera.
LOVE my camera. My husband got me the Nikon D90 last March and I've been loving it ever since. I actually got a gift certificate from him for Christmas so that I can go get another flash and a lens. I recently also purchased the book, "Nikon D90 for dummies." Let's just say I made the purchase, I've flipped through a couple of pages, but I really need to learn some of the other fun things that this camera has to offer me.
So getting back to the first paragraph....."I grabbed my camera." Of course I have 2 of the cutest most adorable dogs in the world. I have a few friends that own dogs that come in a close 2nd, but I gotta tell you, mine are the cutest. So I decided to take a couple of shots of Roxy and Dude aka deet da dee. Uploaded the pics, the cropped and played around with the picture itself. For me, this is good times. And I love to share them too. Especially since they are super cute pictures of my two adorable dogs.
Here are the two pictures before the crop and manipulation of the picture.
Roxy -
and Dude aka Deet da dee -
So this time, I opted to do them in Black and White.
Here is Roxy. It's kinda like BIG head, little bodyish.......both of these dogs crack me up on how I was able to capture them looking at me "sideways"
And here is Dude aka Deet da dee. I love Dude's eyes, you just wonder what the heck is he thinking? Most likely "Am I going to get food for this?"
We just got back home from the Riviera, our family home escape out in the Anza Borrego Desert next to the Salton Sea, "The Riviera". What a great week that we had out there. I am attaching some pictures with stories to share the highlights of the week with you.
This first picture is from our 1st FULL day out there. This is my son Kevin headed up to the Phone booth. Someone planted an actual phone booth on top of one of the highest ridges in the Truckhaven area and this is a favorite off-roader spot to visit. Not just for the phone booth, but for the views as well! This is the first time Kevin "drove" up to the phone booth. It's a sketchy climb as there is a shear drop off if you do not make the right turn towards the top.
This is the view from the backside of Phonebooth hill.
Day 2, One of Kevin's football coaches and his kids came out to visit us. We did a group ride to Gas Domes, Shell Reef and the "pumpkin Patch". Below is a picture at Gas Domes. They're essentially really stinky mud puddles. (sulphur smell, which smell like rotten eggs) We're not sure how deep they go Folks have stuck their legs down them and still haven't felt the bottom.
This is a view from the Gas Domes. Looking towards the Salton Sea. I love this picture for the colors. I took other view pictures as well, which look just as good. It was a tough choice picking my favorite to post here.
This is Shell Reef. Named for the millions of fossilized shells that are in the area. This desert used to be under water several thousand years ago. Shell Reef is a popular hang out to watch the better riders climb this and do jumps.
One of the riders jumping at Shell Reef.
The "pumpkin patch". These large boulders started off as a small shell, or pebble and rolled around the desert for hundredes of years in the sand and became what they are today. It is truly amazing to see this site. There are several other areas where there are smaller "pumpkins" This area provides the biggest. Sadly over the years people have stolen the pumpkins and the population has dwindled. The park service has fenced off the area in an effort to protect these big guys.
Another view of these "great pumpkins"
Day 3 took us around the ENTIRE Salton Sea. Starting off at Salvation Mountain, then off to Bombay Beach and back around to "the Riviera." This first picture is of Salvation Mountain, built by Leonard Knight. Here is the link to the offical site for Salvation Moutain if you want to learn more.
http://www.salvationmountain.us/
Here is a picture of Leonard Knight in front of his mountain. Leonard is a sweet old man that is very compassionate about his mountain and the message of God. He was gracious enough to give us a tour. He gets so excited everytime a group of cars pull up in order to provide a tour. At the end of the tour he gives his guests a "picture puzzle", postcards and a DVD about the Moutain.
Next stop is Bombay Beach. Bombay Beach is a small community on the East side of the Salton Sea. Anthony Bourdain, No Reservations of the Travel Channel visited Bombay beach. Here is the episode in which he visits Bombay Beach. To watch the following video, press the pause button on my pink playlist to the right of this blog.
We did visit the Ski Inn as mentioned in the video above to purchase some "fish assholes". "Fish Assholes" are cans of spaghetti-O's re-labeled as Fish Assholes. They are sold as a fund raiser for the Bombay Beach Fire Department. We only know they are spaghetti-o's cuz we opened up a can when we got back to the house.
A few years ago, Bombay Beach was flooded. Since the flood a Dike was built to protect the community. Unfortunately the flood had some casualties. This decayed trailer is one of the most photographed casualties of the area.
A view from the "beach". The Pelicans are BIG here.
December 30th is Paiges Birthday. The last 3 years in a row we have celebrated Paiges Birthday in the Desert. 1st year was on our property off of split mountain road in our motorhome. Last year was on "the Riviera". Last year was a year to remember as Paige celebrated a milestone birthday. We will never forget that year. The festivities were topped off with a refreshing dip in the Salton sea a little before midnight. Some lamebrained idea of one of our other friends. Even though it was lamebrained, we'll talk about it for years to come. This year was not as spectacular, however, memorable for Paige I am sure. We did a Taco night, then Wii Kareoke. Fun times! Happy Birthday Paige!
We spent New Years Eve at Mobiland in Ocotillo Wells at our friends place, playing bunko with up to 40 other folks. Good times. To Celebrate the New Year, they had purchased a couple of cases of silly string. This has become a tradition, and what a good time it was!
We went on a New Years Day ride. Unfortunately, so did everybody else. The desert was packed full of Off Roaders. We cut our ride a bit short as it was SO dusty and hard to see and just plain dangerous. The picture below show our two toys in the foreground and Debbies cute pink Razor in the back.
They say all good things must come to an end, but this is different. This is the start of a really GREAT new year and it started off with a really good time in the desert with some FANTASTIC friends. The picture below is of the sunset on New Years Day. Definately a sign of good things to come in 2010. Happy New Year!!!
This weekend I started baking cookies. Only two different kinds were completed. I will work on 2 other today or tomorrow after work. Every year this is a tradition for me...no matter how busy or how tired I am....or I'll tell myself, "I'm not doing it this year"...something happens and I end up doing them. Only because I LOVE my peanut blossoms. So does my family. Peanut Blossoms are peanut butter cookies with a Chocolate kiss stuck in the middle. My mom made these cookies as I grew up and they were my favorite then. It's definitely a Christmas tradition in our house to have these around during the holidays.
This year I documented preparing them. I couldn't help myself! Only because I love my camera and I wanted to share with all of you.
So....here we go.
First off I had to unwrap what felt like a Bi-jillion Chocolate kisses. This year I tripled the recipe and wanted to insure I had enough of these unwrapped. Turned out, I was only 4 unwrapped kisses short. Not bad for a guess.
Next putting all the ingredients together to mix up. This step included, white sugar, brown sugar, eggs, milk, shortening, vanilla and of course PEANUT BUTTER!!!
Then add the flour, baking soda and salt and mix all together!
Once mixed and all of the ingredients are blended together, roll them up into balls, roll in sugar, place on baking sheet.
Bake for 8 minutes, pull out of oven and strategically place a single chocolate candy kiss in the middle. This part is fun as it defines the cookie!
Bake for an additional 6 - 7 minutes and WHA-LA....yummy cookies! And the house smelled great too!
For some reason, I was having a heck of a time getting into the Christmas spirit this year. It may have something to do with starting a new job on December 1, which involves developing a new company image, company mission, new pipeline.......or maybe I was in denial that it was already Christmas. But late yesterday afternoon it finally hit me. I was going to get my tree up no matter what. And guess what? Once I got that dang tree up, the Christmas spirit finally came to me. There is something to be said about twinkling lights and putting up ornaments that come out once a year that bring back some great memories. Over the years I've saved the ornaments that the kids have made throughout preschool and school. Other ornaments have special meaning too. Actually every single one of them do. And every year I make an effort to buy a new ornament with special meaning to develop new memories.
Here are a few of my favorites....although, it's hard to pick favorites, because as I am sitting here typing this, I am thinking of others tucked away that didn't make the tree. Believe me I have boxes of this stuff!
Kevin made this in elementary school. Unfortunately this does not have a year on it, but I'm guessing it's early elementary school. ;-)
I remember buying this one at the Robinson's Christmas store in the mall. It's a little known fact that my husband likes carousel horses and I put this on a present as decoration for him. I had the words, "I love you" put on the back side of the horse.
This ornament was given to my oldest Son Michael in 1994 from his Daycare providor "Weezie". "Weezie" who's real name is Louise took care of Michael full-time while I was off overseas in Desert Storm.
I remember picking this ornament up 5 years ago at the Hallmark shop in the mall when Roxy was a puppy. I love this little guy!
John's mom made this ornament along with 3 others. 1 for each member of our family. She made these even before she moved out here to California. In fact the one pictured below was for Kevin when he was a baby.
It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.
Dude aka Deet da dee checking out the view from Phone Booth Hill
As is our annual tradition for close to the last 10 years, we are enjoying Thanksgiving out in the Desert. This year will be the biggest crowd yet. We are pot lucking with 28- 34 people from our Salton Sea Neighborhood. We've been emailing each other for the past 2 weeks on who is going to bring what. How many Turkey's we'll have here and I think we're going to have 28 pumpkin pies. ;) Everyone is bringing their favorite family dish or dishes. We'll be sharing Sweet potatoes, Stuffing, Scalloped Corn, Brussels sprouts and pearled onions with White Sauce. I will also be cooking a turkey. But mine will be for the sole purpose of Turkey sandwiches over the couple of days. That's the best part of Thanksgiving right? The leftovers!
The phone booth is on top of one of the highest "plateaus" in Truckhaven. The views from up here are AMAZING
We've been out here since last Sunday in the Desert. We went on a ride to the phone booth day before yesterday. We took Dude and Roxy with us. We let them off leash to run down the hill from the booth and Dude aka Deet da dee gave everyone a good laugh. He has NO experience with Sand and wasn't sure what to make of it. He was leaping, spinning, taking two paws at once to get the sand out of his eyes.....but then he would leap down a hill and just prance in pure joy. He absolutely LOVED it. Dogs are amazing how much they make you smile.
The gang all up on Phone Booth Hill.
Yesterday was a down day where we ran into Indio to the grocery store to get last minute items for the BIG dinner. Then baked pies, sat around and talked, watched a movie. I also went on a mini ride with the teenage boys. What a blast! The only part that bothered me was the dust. But I quickly got over that. Always a great feeling to be out!
HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO ALL MY FAMILY AND FRIENDS!!!! I will post some pictures from our big dinner.
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