Mendocino Coast and the Little River Inn

Over a year ago, Les and I were given a gift certificate for a two night stay at The Little River Inn in Mendocino http://www.littleriverinn.com/. This is a really lovely spot, with a view from every room. We had never stayed there before, but will definately be going back! Les' cousin Merv and his wife Diane made the long drive down from Snohomish to meet us there. Our first morning we made plans to head up the road 10 miles or so to Ft. Bragg to have breakfast at a "hole in the wall" that Merv and Diane had eaten at before. This was a first time for Les and I, but once again....we will go back when we are next in the area. Breakfast was delish....! Diane ordered "wicked eggs benedict". The hollandaise sauce for this dish was made with cilantro giving it a BRIGHT green color. I couldn't help taking a picture!! I had my favorite of biscuits and gravy. The whole place is decorated in a Wizard of Oz theme and as you can see...is truely a "hole in the wall". Next we headed over to Glass Beach, where years of dumping garbage over the cliff into the ocean has resulted in a magnificent beach totally littered with ocean scrubbed bits of glass. All well rounded and smooth. Since some storms had recently passed thru, the glass was particularly plentiful. We were excited with each new color of glass we found...and I guess you could say I got distracted!! The tide was out, so I wandered closer to the shore than I should have and before you know it....out of the corner of my eye, I saw a wave coming!!! As you can see by the picture....I didn't move fast enough and went for a roll in the surf :) Amazing how sand can get into everything....I had on a turtle neck shirt, fleece vest, and ski jacket. Jeans and my Dansko's. Everything was completely soaked nearly to my neck. Needless to say, we headed back to our room and I was thankful that I hadn't been able to decide what to bring for clothes and so had opted to bring it all!! I showered and changed, and off we went again :) A meal at Capt'n Flint's that night of fish and chips, a game of Phase 10 and our trip was complete!!! Can't wait to go again :)

Dinner at Bill and Susy's

Not long ago, Bill and Susy De Kok invited us over for dinner along with a few other people. Susy had prepared veggies, beef, chicken, and sausages all cut in bite sized pieces. We were seated at the table and in front of us was a "Raclette". A sort of electric grill for the table top. Bill and Susy explained that this was a "Dutch style" dinner party and that when they visit relatives in Holland they always participate in this kind of meal. It was thoroughly enjoyed by all!! Thank you Bill and Susy!!

Raclette's can be purchased at Target online :)

Les' New Project

Ah, when you have grand kiddos, life changes. It's a good change, in fact, a fantastic, phenomenal, lovely change. There are now these new little people in your life that you would do just about anything for. They make you "remember when" their parents were your little people! And.....you think about what you used to do for them and with them and now you have a chance to do it over. In a small way, I guess. No pun intended. So, it came about that when Casey and Lisa had Katie, Les and I said, "what's something special we can give them?" Since we are sort of hands on kinda people, we immediately followed with "what can we MAKE for them"?

Les had made Casey and Jerry and Ri a toy box when they were little, and it got used constantly and we still have it today. It was bench style so they could close it and sit on it....which they did many times with one of them inside! It was great fun! Practical, useful, and special, cuz Dad made it. So, it was decided......a toy box it would be! One was made for Katie a little after she was born, and now it's also for Tys and Trenton and someone special due in July.

Then came James and Lucas and now Peter......they need a toy box too!!! So, Grandpa get to work!! And so he is.....now that he no longer "shares" his shop space and can lay out his wood and keep it clean, the project has begun! I wish I would have gotten a picture of him sitting in his recliner with graph paper on clipboard....furrowed brow.....in complete concentration....but you can imagine it can't you? For now...here is the beginning of the toy box project for James, Lucas and Peter.

Spring Cleaning

Yesterday my cell phone kept sending me a message stating I was out of room! It had content overload! Yikes.....what does that mean??? I cleared my inbox of rec'd msgs. Then I cleared my sent msgs. Then I moved on to My Pictures. Oy! Could THIS be the overloaded content? Uh....maybe so. It's funny how you can lose track of all those pics you store on your phone. Every picture that's been sent to me, like the cute purse Ri was buying, or the wrecked truck Casey helped put back on it's 18 wheels, or the "new ride" Jerry just purchased. It struck me that as I went thru these pics that "my picture" folder on my phone was a sort of diary for my life over the last year or so. And then there were the little projects that I took pictures of to blog about and well......never got to. So, here are some of the things I wanted to share with you and never did :). I made these "enameled" tags http://www.cantstopmakingthings.com/2010/07/french-enameled-numbers.html, and had so much fun with it, I ,like the blog title says, couln't stop!! Enjoy!

Snowshoeing in the Sierras

Ever since snowshoeing in Idaho with Ri last year.....I've wanted to snowshoe with Les right here in California :) I was convinced that Les would enjoy it as much as I had. We checked into renting snowshoes from our local sporting goods here in Modesto....and after finding out it was going to cost us over $75 for a weekend, we decided we would go ahead and put that $75 toward shoes of our own instead.

I promptly began a search online and found used shoes for Les on Ebay for just slightly more than the $75 we would have spent on the rental. After a couple of failed bids on a pair for me, I finally found a pair in my price range and won the bid! Yay!! We decided these would be our Valentine's gifts to each other :)

Finally the day arrived for us to head up in the mountains and try the shoes out! A huge storm had just passed thru and we were excited to see what kind of tracks we could make :) As we headed up, there were grey skies and snow flurries.....yikes. The temp. topped out around 20 degrees, but as we drove farther, we saw blue skies.

Pinecrest Lake was our destination. After a few adjustments on the snowshoes, we were on our way for a trek around the north end of the lake. Gorgeous......just gorgeous!! I think it's one of the best Valentine dates I've ever had.