Fits and Starts

In honor of "fits and starts"--including the near-six-month blog hiatus (where does the time go?!), I give you some pictures of our summer garden.
For a recovering black thumb on the first go, I think the results weren't too bad!  We got some zucchini, oodles of little tomatoes, some beans, broccoli and wild rocket out of our little patch.

 

Eventually, though, some sort of disease came through and hit our tomato plants and gophers wanted to share in our veggie feast. We ultimately wound up taking out the plants  and the ground is still "resting" (aka, we haven't bought seeds yet :) )--ready for the next crop.

We just found out recently that we will get to rent this home at least through the holidays, which is good news for us. In the meantime, we might plant a new crop of winter veggies, and prepare our home for the upcoming holiday festivities.  Our family will all be here and we are excited to share the time with them.

Life is currently a series of fits and starts--waiting to hear back about this or that, making important decisions for the future with just a little information, things needing to be fixed followed the odd windfall and generosity of friends and family, expectations or hopes fallen short, then others exceeded-- one step back followed by two or three small steps forward.  The challenge? Maintaining the perspective of living each moment fully and learning from and enjoying the journey.  
Hello friends, I hope you are well.  I hope you are enjoying your journey.

Big hugs,
Kat

A Long Relaxing Weekend

What did you do for this long weekend? We headed out to the beach (thanks Mom and Dad) and our sweet friends took care of our furbabies and our garden for us (thanks so much, guys!). We had a relaxing time, but it's also good to be home with the other members of our "family". 
Now, it's back to work, my friends!
Big Hugs,
Kat

Happy Memorial Day

Source

Thank you servicemen and servicewomen!

Garden Teaser

Christmas in...May?

Since I missed sharing our Christmas pictures, thought I'd post a few here for your shock and awe viewing pleasure.
Kind of makes me nostalgic for those chilly 60-degree days here in SoCal...  
Merry Christmas to all, a little late!!

The Moo Stocking

The Squidleydoo Stocking

The Mark Stocking

The Mark's-Little-Brother-Stocking

The Yours-Truly Stocking

Awkward Family Photos...

Couldn't have said it better myself!

Big Hugs,

Kat

Catching Up is hard to do...

Well, Hellooooooooo there!

Yes. That is picture of our Christmas tree. 

Our SECOND Christmas tree to be exact, with Squiddley (aka, Siddhartha, aka Sqiddo, aka Sqiddleydoo, aka Jabba the Cat, aka "NonoyoubadcatgetdownfromthecounterRIGHTTHISINSTANT!") lying beneath it looking deceptively cute and steriotypically nappish. 

Yes, this is from this past December, which seems like yesterday.  

No, thankfully, our Christmas tree is not still up. It is lying in a shallow grave in the backyard next to the first Christmas tree (which promptly died two weeks after we bought it from Lowes), awaiting a proper cremation at one of the various California beach bonfire pits...erm, possibly, like, this weekend.

So here we are May, and I've been avoiding posting due to a combination of lack of my computer recognizing, in any form, the camera via cable--via memory card, via me saying some not very nice things, beating my fists on the table and typing much more forcefully than necessary--and just not having enough creative energy enough to fight technology and do my amazingly great but crazy job.  For a while--I'll be honest--I was really struggling about my job. Last weekend, however, I came to the conclusion that I love what I do, but I'm getting a little burnt out--so I've cut back on the hours a little bit in the hopes of striking some sort of balance henceforth and keeping the creative juices percolating.

Anyhoo.

Here we are. May.

And although life has been moving along as usual, I did manage to document a bit of it to share.

There's been Christmas, wineries, Mark's birthday, friends having little ones, being honored by my work, and the garden.

My goal is to post at least five days (Yep. Count 'em, five!) this week.

I'm lookin' to anyone who may still be out there to keep me honest!

Big Hugs and Happy Monday y'all!

Missed you,

Kat

Happy Valentine's Day!

Wishing you a warm, snuggly day with your favorite buddy!

Guess What Santa Brought For Christmas?

Santa's made Kat a very happy girl! Glad to be back in the proverbial saddle...

(Thanks Mom, Dad and Jim for the amazing gift!)

Happy Halloween!

Image from here

Hope your night was SPOOKTACULAR!!!!

Big Hugs,

Kat

Sometimes we wonder...

Do the lights go off and on in an alternate universe when you press on the orange polka-dot on Mika-Moo's right flank?

We can only guess...

Big Hugs,

Kat

Mountain Anniversary Weekend

So, a little time's gone by, but I want to share a few pics from our weekend in the mountains at the beginning of October.

Big Bear Lake is a special place for my husband and I.  It's where he proposed to me and we got married at The Inn at Fawnskin, which is a Bed and Breakfast across the lake from Big Bear city.

The gorgeous Inn

 Our stay for the weekend was wonderful--October in the mountains (sigh). We walked around the city and looked at the fall colors.

We rented bicycles and rode through a park on the North side of the Lake...

We talked about our dreams for the future...

window shopped, and ate lunch outside at the Peppercorn Grille.

For our Anniversary Dinner, we bought a couple of nice bottles of wine and got carry-out from our favorite Big Bear restaurant, The Himalayan...

Us with our buddies, Buddha and Ganesh...

And dined on our pumpkin-spice wedding cake-top, wrapped so carefully by my mom after our wedding (thanks Mom and Dad for getting it safely to our freezer!)...and oh, it was STILL heavenly...

Made by THIS incredible bakery

Being in the crisp mountain air with the beautiful fall colors and nature, my yummy, fuzzy sweater and my bestest bud was such a treat.  And our homecoming wasn't so bad, either...

Big hugs,

Kat

Can Someone Tell me...

Okay, stupid question, but what is the DEAL with the spacing when inserting pictures and writing posts?

Plus, for your viewing pleasure: a random Smartass Squidley picture, complete with destroyed upholstery...

The sexy, "Come-hither & let me destroy your upholstery, Lounge Cat" look

Proof

Sid, aka, "Squidley the Destroyer", Lover of Shoes.

Meet the Family...

Just a quick little intro to our little household:

This is my husband, Mark. He likes teaching martial arts, camping and hiking, playing the drums, multiple adrenaline-charged activities, giving his wife heart-attacks, giving his younger brother a hard time and various and sundry forms of geekery (see photo)--especially if it involves bunsen-burners and test tubes.


 

 And this is me.  I love my husband and furkids, camping, hiking, working hard and getting "the cookie at the end", farms, learning in general, coffee (see photo), homesteading projects, reading, organizing, baking (and eating), random acts of goofiness and kindness, campfires with smores, traveling, wine and a plethora of other entertaining nonsense. 



   















This is us at our wedding at a bed and breakfast up in the mountains last October.
If you don't have a good feel for our general level of wackiness yet, you may now consider yourself forewarned... 




















This is Sid (left) and Mika (right); aka, the Brain Trust. 

Sid likes teasing Mika (Moo), drinking from Mark's or my water glasses (he really is rather determined about this), cuddles, chewing on, loving on and dozing on shoes, destroying the upholstery (see photo) and sleeping (he snores). 

Moo likes chewing on Sid, belly rubs, letting us know when her Kong is "broken", running along the fence with the neighbor dogs, trolling for crumbs, rough-housing with Mark, attacking the vacuum cleaner and cuddles. 


Aside from the (poor) houseplants and the spiders in the garage, this comprises
the membership of our strange and wonderful little family here in the House on the Hill.
I feel so very fortunate to have found my own flock of other goofballs willing to put up with my shenanigans.  Welcome to our mayhem, y'all!