I flew out Saturday. I slept the whole flight except for the drinks and snack and when the pilot had an announcement. That is when I looked out my window to see Crater Lake.
Here is the Sacramento airport where I met up with R and Juls and Mom picked us up.
Spring in the gold country on the drive to my aunts.
We enjoyed our time at my aunts. Juls took Quincy for a run. It was gorgeous the whole time we were there. Aaaahhhh sun!
We did down town Grass Valley and visited all of our old haunts.
One of those being the pasty place for lunch. Mmmm. My favorite.
This is Mom down town.
Juls so cute!
Mom's cousin raises and sells miniature horses. She has 75 of them right now, and about 25 of them are pregnant mares.
She also had a mini donkey.
3 yearlings
My best friend from middle school came with us to see the minis. It was so great to catch up with her.
Here you can see how small the little buggers are.
The yearling pen.
We also spent two mornings down at the Yuba river. Here is the longest covered bridge in the US.
The mornings there were truly gorgeous!
Here is R panning for gold.
And Juls
And me
See! We found some! Unfortunately this is taken with a macro lens and I think I made more off of the penny I found.
The trail along the river was beautiful!
And the wild flowers were just coming out.
We also spent a day in Reno with my cousins. Here is R playing B ball with the two youngest.
We went down to the Trucky river for a walk and so the boys could fish.
D the little fisherman.
We also went to an awesome sporting goods store.
I thought I would just do a quick post. I am still in Grass Valley CA and enjoying every minute of it. We have had some wonderful time with family, and have been doing some sight seeing. This morning we even went panning for gold... and got some! I will post more when I get home and am not sitting out side an internet cafe.
Our favorite store when we were kids.
Since I am flying out tomorrow I thought I would wish everyone a happy St. Patrick's day. Also just one week until the first day of spring... think green and sunny thoughts!
Does anyone know why the US celebrates an Irish holiday?
He does not look bad, but he is mischievous. The other morning when I got up I heard an unusual noise. When I went to see what it was I found the freezer open. Now I know neither J or I left it open... so how did this happen? Well, some of the magnets and stuff were displaced also. I really think my cat tried to jump up on the fridge and opened the the door. Fortunately we did not have to throw away too much food, and I cooked up all the meat and what I could. I do have to say it has been nice to have pre-made meals this week, but this is not the way I would have chose to do this. We now tape the fridge and freezer doors shut at night. Argh.....
This one is the "Champion 4 American Standard *Virtually clog free *Can flush a bucket of golf balls." So J's and my questions were: Is this really the American Standard? And What size bucket of golf balls are we talking? Pint? 5 Gallon? And why are there so many out there flushing golf balls to make this a necessity?
Am I the only one that did not know that they made them "elongated for maximum comfort and sitting space?"
I didn't know you could even get different heights, did you? Is there a height you prefer?
This one is for my left handed readers. Is this not right hand bias?
These are embroidered lids.... oh my.
Are you gellin'?
Last week J and I went to the ranch and had a very nice time with my folks and celebrated Dad's birthday. There is still a lot of snow so we were not able to do too much, but we did go for a short ride on the roads that had been plowed. We rode three new horses. The top picture is Pat the new percheron. He is about 16.2 hands and is very much like Big Rowdy, except he is thicker build, and great to ride bareback. And black instead of white, of course. He has a very nice little jog. He does have a few faults. He had never had shoes on before and has some pretty gnarly splits in his hoof that Dad is going to have to continually work with. He also has some very strange teeth, but they don't appear to affect him. He is ride and drive (Yahoo! I don't have to teach this one to ride!!!) and will be working with Pete (yeah, Pat and Pete. Not sure how that will work for using them as a team.) pulling the wagon this next year.
In this picture J is riding Pat and I am on Sandy. She is a little chestnut mare. About 14.3 hands and looks to have a little quarter horse in her. She was donated by someone who used her as a pack horse. She works well off of just a side pull hackamore or bosal, she is very sweet and I enjoyed riding her. 
This guy is also very sweet. He does not have a name yet so we have been calling him Red. He is about 15 hands and has more energy and likes to lead, but will tuck in behind well also. He too does not use a bit. Dad rode him and seems to really like him.
