on the road again

heading to the cottage. e is in hawaii with a friend so this feels a little different than usual. (she'll meet up with us in a week.) hope you're having a lovely summer.

july X

brookings, OR

july IX

seaside, OR

day trippin'

we had been wanting to visit the quicksilver ranch for a while. coupled with an invitation to carpinteria, and wine tasting in the santa ynez valley, yesterday we packed up a picnic and headed up the 101 to make a day of it.
































santa ynez valley (sideways :) )
brander winery (perfect picnic spot)
quicksilver ranch (huell houser episode here!)
jedlicka's
sides hardware and shoes (bacon!)
carpinteria state beach

summer lovin' (part 2)

the second important ingredient for our summer is a good playlist. we spend 2 days driving up to the cottage, then 5 days down the coast on our return. the songs need to appeal to everyone. they need to sound good played loudly. and ideally, we all can sing along. (and if we are really lucky, someone can play the ukulele along to them, as well*)



here is what e put together this year...

jesus of suburbia :: green day
geronimo :: shepard
high young :: rising suns
shut up and dance :: walk the moon
budapest :: george ezra
kids in america :: kim wilde
cheerleader :: omi
riptide :: vance joy*
american idiot :: green day
want you back :: michael jackson
living on a prayer :: bon jovi
its time :: imagine dragon
don't you forget about me :: simple minds
time after time :: quiet drive
can't feel my face :: the weekend
good riddance :: green day
all star :: smashmouth
car radio :: 21 pilots
in too deep :: sum 41
for baltimore :: all time low
young and beautiful :: lana del rey

stop #3 (brookings, OR)

there is something about this yearly journey that is hard to put into words. it is me, stepping back, watching these two grow. at the cottage. and on this road trip. it is about sisters (a subject unfamiliar to me, save through this lens), and about individuals. about adventure, and routine. about confidence, and about companionship.

every year. growth. all of us. xo


tomorrow night, berkeley. then home.

stop #2 (newport, OR)

stop #1 (pdx)

so very, very good.



no words.


just history. and friendship. and smiles. (love you all.)

mapping memory

in the spring of 2005 we bought a minivan. a minivan that would take us back and forth and back and forth along the west (best) coast. every summer. and every winter. we bought it before i had this blog. before my first digital camera. before flickr. when i was still shooting film all the time and putting photos into albums. when the girls were almost 4 and just weeks away from 1.

two weeks ago, now, we sold that minivan. it was bit bittersweet. it was definitely time, with 10 years and over 150,000 miles. i was ready to say goodbye to the three hubcaps, shabby mats and unidentified goo i could never get out of the rear seat cup holder. but it was paid for! and held a lot of memories.

i love a good road trip - as anyone who has read this blog knows. we do road trips. and 10 years and a few months ago, just after purchasing this van, we set off on our first to our island. d made sure our aaa membership was up-to-date and i started to do some research on their website, looking for maps and other references to guide us on our way. i stumbled upon the TripTik option and immediately ordered one, typing in our starting point and our destination. i'm not sure these are still available or not - now there seems to be a print your own option, though you can still order one.  (though i think the format is different.)  ours arrived and d and i poured over it. dreaming about the road ahead. in these early days we were ambitious. we allowed four or five days to traverse up the Interstate 5 (which stretches from the Mexico to Canada borders) and camped and stayed with friends along the way. (K celebrated her first birthday at a campsite in the shadow of Mt. Shasta on that first trip!)



now we can make it up in less than 48 hours. we do one stop (usually the Hi-Lo in Weed going up, and the Best Western in Redding coming down). we still use the same TripTik.



when i cleaned out the old van it was there with our ferry card and the menu to my favorite lunch spot when the girls and i detour over to the 101 at the end of every summer.



many of the pages have come loose from the spiral binding. every page has scribbles and notes showing favorite lunch spots and rest stops. calculations to answer "how much farther until..." an expense list from the first trip (hotel in Buttonwillow for $45 and gas for $2.30 / gallon!) it has directions to get to melissa's and the phone number of the realtor who helped us purchase our cottage. (after a few summers renting, we knew we had to put down real roots there.) it has lots and lots of e's attempts at printing out her name and quiet notes we'd pass back and forth over the seats.







i'm looking forward to many more road trips and moving this well-worn book into the glovebox of the new car. a little piece of the van we are holding on to. a map that takes me many places.

the long way home...

it has become our tradition that d flies home early from the cottage and the girls and i linger a little longer then take the coast back home. hearing the waves crash as i fall asleep is one of my very favorite things. if we are lucky we work in a stop to PDX and/or Corvallis and/or Berkely. this year there wasn't such luck on the first two, with deadlines and holiday traffic working against us. but luck did allow my mom to join us for the drive and a last night with friends like family. girl road trip 2014 took us to seaside, or; crescent city, ca and on to the bay area. it is a time for us to chat and to be quiet. to rest and to sing. to just be together. and to gaze out the window at the amazing landscape of the western coast we love. it is such a nice way to end our trip and prepare ourselves for the adventures a new school year brings.



today the new school year began. 5th and 8th grades unrolled before us and we are all excited by the prospects. it will be the final year at our neighborhood elementary school and also the last before e moves from middle school on to high school. it will go quickly i am sure.

and i imagine another drive the long way home will be here before we know it.

a bigger picture

with the opportunity to take in david hockney's "a bigger exhibition" at san francisco's de young sunday, we made a quick decision and headed north. of course the opportunity to visit dear friends only made the weekend sweeter.

i love to tell e stories of her visits with hockney. lunch at his house, and an amazing afternoon at his studio. of course she was a wee baby, and remembers none of it. but it is fun to recall none-the-less. he was so friendly and welcoming and excited about what he was doing. that exuberance is so evident in his work. e was drawn to the giant iPad drawings and video, and k went around searching out details in the paintings. it was the charcoal drawings though that had me lingering the longest.

visiting friends like these is, well, always a highlight. it is easy - the way it should be. we are blessed to have them in our lives. no matter where they, or we, roam. these big picture friends mean the world to us.

and we had a day to explore a little piece of golden gate park with them. these family outings are only beginning to get grumbles from the big sister. i hold onto them tightly.

so, the show was fantastic. the company the best. so good to have a little get-away.

(and oh those sf bay sunsets.)

weekend to do

it is a long one... but we aren't being too ambitious as we are going to include a roadtrip to this. (so excited!)

i do hope to:

sign up for this!

around the house
finish moving books an wall unit out of office (e's new room!)
prune back shrubs

and that's about it!

thanks for the wallpaper feedback. more next week.

happy friday!