The Rose Garden in April

 If you have some time this or next week, and live in the Bay Area, visit the San Jose Municipal Rose Garden.  The place is an explosion of color this time of season with heady perfume of delicate roses that waft through the air, a treat for all your senses.

The entire garden is surrounded by climbing roses along the fence and inside a wide open field perfect for frisbee throwing or an impromptu picnic on blanket under a shade of a tree overlooking the whole garden.

This is Chris Lloyd with a sweet spicy scent of an old fashioned hybrid roses that I love.

Around the corner were some roses my kids thought was hilarious called Yabba Dabba Doo- but still pretty.

 There are volunteer gardeners keeping the place beautiful with arches of climbers, old and some starting.  Just a beautiful place a a photo-op... if I could get my kids to cooperate!

I am just so awed by the beauty of nature and all the blessings we receive every day, the clear blue sky and a gorgeous spring day, the company of friends, good health of family and yummy DQ sundae we stopped by eat afterwards!

Nola's Iris Garden

 I used to volunteer at my kids' preschool and the teacher would ask me to go outside - since she knew I was stuck inside most of my work days and loved gardening and I would divide the bulbs when it came to time.  Over time from there and other places I had amassed some beautiful irises.  But when we had our backyard landscaped, the landscaper told me "sure" when I asked that they save the iris bulbs, but alas when I got home that day, they were all gone, they were accidentally thrown away. Nola's Iris Garden is a 5 acre private garden free for wandering many months of the year at the top of the San Jose hills at the end of Sierra Road- beyond several curvy miles up the hill.

 They have acres and acres of all sorts of different colored irises, some for sale there and others for mail ordering.
My boys ran around like crazy as 9 year old boys are apt to do.  They loved this beautiful turkey that reminded me of the outfit that Audrey Hepburn wore for My Fair lady for the Ascot Races in this gorgeous black and white plumage.  We also saw heritage chickens, a goat, bunch of people riding horses, cats and dogs....

 From the top you could see the Bay area - you could see the San Francisco bay from here - unspoiled and serenely beautiful.  Hard to believe that this is nestled just above the busy silicon valley life.

Dylan is sitting quietly taking it all in.  You can't see it but beyond his feet is a hillside going straight down covered with irises!

This is one of the varieties I loved called Sharp Shooter- such intense colors and contrast.  I will have to order that one and Secret World on the next go around when they have it.  I was able to get Navy Blue, October (a Summer Sun colored iris)  Preteporter (a pale lavender color) to name a few.  We'll see how my garden develops in the next season.....


These are some of the shots I took with my new
iphone just to see-  It's amazing the quality of the pictures from smartphones and how they have changed over the years. Gotta love technology.

It's a venerable farm around here!

I live in the suburbs less than 1/2 mile from a highway-with a rather ugly backyard but with the parade of animals coming by, you'd never know it. We had a family of skunks living in our bushes leaving us with a lovely aroma every morning and night (I'm being sarcastic here!)

The other day Tyler yells out- "mom! come here! there is a turkey!" I thought he got his birds mixed up- it must a big crow or something but you know what? this is the guy strutting his stuff and leaving his business all over our backyard.


Kyle wanted to go out and catch him but gees.... Thanksgiving is so far away and what are we going to do with him until then?

He flapped his big wings and climbed up the fence and onto our neighbor's shed roof so my plans for a free dinner was gone. But he was magnificent! We've been all wondering where he/she is roosting. With urbanization of all their habitat I don't blame them for passing by.

I do not have rabbits either but this little guy came hopping by as well the other day and disappeared into our hedge. There must be a hole in there somewhere. We even had a family of black cats that gave birth in our bushes- we only saw them after one of the kitties fell out but they all disappeared few days later. I guess that's what you get for having a neglected back yard- the wild creatures are making it theirs.

Redwood National Park

Life is supposed to slow down somewhat as we get older, isn't it? But strangely I feel my life is speeding up - as if I am heading downhill in a car with no brakes - and it is exciting and scary at the same time. And sometimes I need a little help slowing things down and my DH helps me do just that.

He told me he made reservations for a campsite 2 weeks before we were scheduled to be there- it was a last minute thing- we were going to meet some friends and their 2 kids there - when he saw how stressed I was, he told me he COULD go alone with the kids and I had visions of Tyler, Kyle and Dylan running amuck and the mayhem they could create and felt too sorry for him to go it alone - but I had to find people to sub for me at work and trying to get basic things done before I left- the work just accumulates so when I come back, I have to spend more time at work to catch up so vacations are never vacation like other people- but I really did want to go.

We stayed at a campsite at the Redwood National Forest in Northern California and it was just soooo beautiful, serene, and magnificent. You'll have to see it for yourself. The trees are really that tall and some are hundreds of years old and would take many many grownups to go around them. There was this mist that hung on the trees that the trees use in dry seasons to get moisture. I am so happy to have at least some of these incredible trees preserved for future generations to see.

This is fern canyon where downed trees, the narrow canyon and the ferns growing on the sides of the canyons make the place seem ancient. One of the Jurrasic park and some other dinosaur movies have been filmed here. My kids LOVED this place and got soaking wet, wading through all the streams that flowed, playing with mud and checking out the fish and the frogs that inhabit the shallow waters.

We saw lots of wildlife, this is one of the elk just grazing by the side of the road nonchalentaly eating his lunch.

At the Gold Bluff Beach, the sand was gray black but so clean. There were seals bobbing in and out of water and the kids ran around chasing the waves, playing in the sand and all around getting soaked- do you see the theme here- lots of changes of clothing and towels will be required on our next visit here which I hope will be soon- even if I do have to spend 8 straight hours in a car with my kids- it was worth the trip.

This is elk prairie- now I know why it is called that- they do recommend that you not approach them by foot- they are big animals and could do you some serious damage if you provoked them.

We stopped at Grizzly Creek and at one of the stops in the middle of the redwoods was this beautiful canopy of a tree and the sun was shining through and the kids were trying to climb the tree- just gorgeous!

We meandered through the Avenue of the Giants on the way home and these trees are truly breath-taking.

Just a little too short of a time to get away but I have to thank my DH for putting the brakes on my ever hurried life and making me stop and smell the flowers.

Stampshop hopping in Seattle

Do you ever feel like you are living your life one deadline after another? Well that is how I have been living my life the last few weeks- Blogging somehow ended up being that thing I love to do but as there is no deadline per se, everything seem to be ahead of it in priorities- but I am back!

I was at the Regional Meetings in Seattle last weekend and what do I love to do more than taking in the sites of the city? Stampshop Hopping! And you CANNOT go to Seattle without stopping by Amuse store- It was closing at 5 and I booked there from the convention center to barely get there in time but it was worth the drive. Icould not get a shot of the storefront without the reflection but it is a super cute store with ALL the amuse stuff and other adorables to touch and feel. Literally a kid in the candy store!

















Look at all these yummies on the wall!
I had a picture taken with Linda the owner- she said that her husband calls her Linda Lu and was so super nice- she gave me impeccable directions to Impress store in University Village- my next stop-
My in-laws are from Seattle so Tyler had his first haircut at Kidz - a toy store cum hair salon for kiddies and right across the walkway is Impress- and they were having their annual sale to boot! So yes, I bought some paper and a few stamps I've been eyeing much to the dismay of my poor little suitcase-



Next day I went to the Impress in Tukwilla - closer to the airport- and you know what? It was a great store- if you only have a chance to go to one Impress, that one would be it! There is also a paper source down the street which is really cool for all sorts of paper too. and you know what ? I always say I never win anything but when I got home, I got a call from Impress saying that I won one of the raffle items for a tonic border punch- Of course they will charge shipping to send it to me but hey! This is my first win ever- I am not even sure that the thing I won is even worth the cost of shipping -but I may have to frame this one to prove I may not be totally bad luck after all!

Samples to follow in the next few days as I get my room back in order to take pics to post!

Hakone Gardens

There is a small but gorgeous Japanese Garden in Saratoga just past the village called Hakone Gardens. It is so authentic that when they were searching for the location to film Memoirs of a Geisha they thought this place ideal and had the whole film crew take over the place- but it really is a beautiful and serene place. In the summers there are red and blue dragonflies and in the winter as it is now there is a certain stillness. There are few flowering plants but there is so much texture.

The bamboo forest is really so lovely with all the linear lines heading toward the heavens. You could do some serious meditatation there.

There is a Koi pond with a little bridge over and in the summers you see a lot of turtles sunning themselves.

There is a modest entrance fee although for kids 4 and under it is free. My kids love running around the hills and exploring the trails that run up and down the hill. Several hours of peace for the grown ups and exhausted kids at the end- they take long naps after - a double treat for me! It certainly is better for all of us both physically and for the soul than a movie and less expensive to boot. Check it out if you're ever in Saratoga, CA.