from there to here

i've had a few people ask me about my blog lately, even al told me the other day that i needed to update this baby. well a lot has happened since november. i quit my job, suffered through another semester of school, planned our wedding, got married, took a semester off from school, and went back to work. after feeling miserable for about 9 months, i feel happier now than i've felt in a long time!


we've gotten some amazing gifts over the last several months and have had a blast using all our gift certificates to buy all the stuff we never felt we should before. our first wedding present was the beautiful heath shallow salad bowl from jen.


next was the large serving bowl from tricia, in aqua/turquoise -- two of the best colors ever invented.


we received a lot of gift certificates for heath and i bought the yellow vase i'd been eying for years. i was attempting to replace my ben owen vase -- which i broke a few years ago -- a gift from aurin and drew that i treasured. one day i'll get another, but i do love this heath piece.


we received this mustard colored bedspread and used some of our macy's money for these sheets that remind me of cotton ticking (but they are black, not blue).


leigh sent me these enamel ladels from labour and wait.


cristal gave us a homemade wedding cake.


we received all of our heath place settings.


and we got our first le creuset in avocado green. today we're off to ikea so i can buy a desk for the cabin. working up there on the sofa is not so great. i've been cleaning our house and cabin like mad, getting rid of stuff we don't need, organizing, tossing, donating..... i have the bug. but it feel so good to bring all these new treasures into our world.

winter time river exploring

we headed up to the cabin this weekend to enjoy three days of chilly bliss. when we arrived on friday morning it was a frigid 35 degrees *inside* the cabin! al got the fire going while i unpacked food, then he took off for his last dive of the season. i alternated between homework and adding logs to the fire, and finally got it nice a toasty inside. that evening we finally tried to the underwood bar and bistro, and our cocktails and burgers at the bar were heaven.


during our saturday walk at steelhead beach, we found a hachiya persimmon tree and filled our pockets. i'll make persimmon pudding in a week or so when they are ripe. it felt really jungly with the bamboo and overgrowth. next we headed out to hop kiln to load up on their horseradish mustard, but when the skies became dark and another set of rained rolled in we found ourselves sipping wine.


sunday we packed some lunch and went off to find the where dry creek and the russian river meet. this was harder than we thought even with our fishing hole map, so we paid a visit to lambert bridge winery for a little warm up. they gave us a tip on how to get to dry creek, and we bought a bottle of their 2008 zin. we soon found the river and creek meeting place, saw a beautiful sky and a this very sad sight.


now we're back home to work and school. tomorrow is my last day working for the next year. i've decided to increase my school load so i can get this program done! i'm really working at making myself feel at peace with this choice, it feels like such a strange time to give up a job! but alas, the decision has been made and all will be fine.

yurit

well here it is again, months since i've posted last. that's sad. work is busy and school just has me heads down all the time. i'm on the computer so much that i don't even want to post on here because it's just another 6 minutes on the computer.

it's definitely spring at the cabin. the last few weekends up there are all about fruit tree blooms, porch sittin', grilling dinner, and trying to get in some relaxation. al went to ridge and got us a case of their 2007 carignane so sitting on the porch with a cheese plate and a glass is rounding me out a bit.

yetti moved away, and i've been missing him, but last weekend a new friend came around. he's another young kitty, full grown, but so obviously a kitty still. he just hung out with us, talked to us, and tripped us trying desperately to get close to us as we walked around outside. we finally started to play "you're it" with him to see who could pass by without being rubbed on, and decided on his new name.

freedom

now that school is done for the semester i sort of don't know what to do with myself. it's weird. i've been waiting for this for 15 long computer-driven weeks, and now i'm stumped. i need a project but i don't want a project. i keep trying to talk myself into making a design to gocco cards for this year, but then i don't want to write and send the cards. then i think i should just sit around and read all day, after all it's cold and rainy. but i am enjoying my current book so much that i don't want to finish it too quickly, and i talked al into reading it with me so he's trying to catch up. i decided i needed another book to read as well, so i got the the portable mlis from the library to see if i want to buy it, but that just feels like reading school stuff and i can't get into it. maybe it's time to start baking again, something from breakfast, lunch, tea looks good. i went to sandbox bakery this week with sarah, it's really good but we wanted to sit so had to walk back to her house. hopefully tricia and i will venture out to eat something yummy today. i should go check out the prelinger library. also probably time to go back to outerlands, and i want to go to farm:table. crap now i have all this stuff to do before i leave for nc next week for two weeks.

recent acqusitions

no harm in talking like a librarian already. i need a break from all the information retrieval speak.


we found some amazing stuff at estate sales, some a month ago, i just never posted. i love this painting found up in santa rosa at a great sale. i think the gentleman was an art professor, his home was filled with books, paintings, sculptures, ceramics and i wanted to move in. al doesn't like this painting and said it can't hang in the bedroom. i absolutely love it and the rough wooden frame that houses it.


bernardo gave us a painting for the cabin, but i don't know if we can bare to take it up there and leave it alone all week. we were so touched. yes, that's wood veneer and a bad set of photos trying to capture the colors.


and finally a needlepoint pillow, another estate sale find.


back to the books!

neglect

oh little blog i've ignored you for too long. it seems between work, volunteering, and my first class i just haven't been motivated to post anything. school starts full time next week and this month i've been working through the class which introduces me to all the tools and technology. so far it's going well, i've gotten an A on all the projects, and have just three (out of ten) left to do. i'll have to complete them by thursday as i head back up to the cabin friday mid-day to enjoy my last summer weekend. last weekend at the cabin, yetti really made us his step-parents. he just hung around for 2 days, mostly dozing on the porch or walking through the yard with us as we were working on projects. he's so sweet and really loves to be with people. i gave him a little rug to sleep on and some water, but being true to his owner's wishes i haven't fed him. well.... i did give him one anchovy soaked crouton from my salad, but he just licked it and went back to the rug.


the tile job is officially complete and all cleaned up. and we took the craigslist canoe up, but didn't try it out yet.

landing

we're here and we can't believe what the young's left behind for us. we knew they were leaving their furniture, but we found they also left their tv (and there is cable somehow), sheets, towels, blankets, dish towels, some kitchen essentials and their coffee pot. we unpacked most of the things we brought, i just need to get into my kitchen boxes today and figure out how i want to set up the cabinets. there is a fire going, al just left for a dive, i've got the shout out louds going and it's time to get prepped for some cookie baking. i'll head out to the yard later to weed a little bit and cut some wild strawberries. i brought the ice cream maker up here because there is actually room in the freezer here. i want some lemon verbena to make up a batch. too bad al took my car and it's a bit far to walk anywhere. we need a bike up here. maybe i can convince al to bring up one of the 5 in our garage at home. no rain, but it's a bit cloudy. we still feel like we're in a weekend rental. oh, and obviously we snaked onto someone's wireless. that means i can study up here!

dewey

i passed filing & my dewey decimal tests yesterday, then made it through the interview. after my finger printing later today i'm all set to begin my new job, volunteering at the south san francisco library. they are loaded with volunteers right now and i was lucky to squeak in as the last one for a bit. i'll be there just 2 hours a week for at least 3 months, mostly just filing and shelving books and materials, but it sounds good to me. it's bound to help me prepare for school.

school

after five years of dreaming, three months of deciding, and eleven weeks of agonizing, i received my acceptance letter monday. i'll be starting my masters of library science in august and now i feel totally overwhelmed. i've got an application out for a volunteer position at a local library, arranging some time to talk with an art librarian, and hopefully starting some freelance work next week. bye bye sleep!