mountain girl returns to the city life

well, i am back from my little trip to the mountains. i just love it there in shaver lake. it is heaven on earth. we stayed in a great cabin home that was like a mansion compared to our family cabin that we usually stay in. we were spoiled by the hugeness of it as well as the cleanliness and lack of buginess. our family cabin is ancient and kind of icky and buggy. it has been in my family for a very long time and was built by my great grandfather so it has much sentimental value and lots of great memories but sometimes it is nice to stay in a big, clean, bug free place!! of course one of the highlights for me was having my grandkids there, i got to bring gabriel with me even though his parents could not come 'cos they had to attend a wedding and my kelsey girl came with her mom and dad and even my grandog penny was there with her mom and dad. our great family friend kathryn went with us too. so, we were minus my son and daughter in law and my husband, but we managed to have a great time without them!! the weather was great.....not too hot and not too cold. the lake was beautiful and we also spent some time at the great dinky creek where the water is cool and clear and the rocks are worn from the water rushing over them creating natural rock water slides, since the water level is low this year even gabriel and kelsey were able to play in the water and go down the slides.

we also took a trip to mckinley grove which is home to giant seqouia redwood trees. kelsey got stung by a bee there and gabriel dropped his nintendo ds at dinky creek and it went sliding down the rock into the water. that was our only mishaps of the trip. a dead ds and a bee sting. not bad for 5 days in the mountains. family is a wonderful thing and i am so blessed to have my family close to me and be able to vacation together. i wish i could take all the people i love to shaver lake with me and stay there forever!!

gabe and kelsey colored so nicely together while the adults cooked dinner!

kelsey playing in the sand at shaver lake, possibly in the same spot her mother and her nana played in when they were little girls. it really was so great to watch my grandkids do the same things i did as a child at shaver lake. amazing.

here is my gabriel floating in the lake on a lobster! too cute. i am gonna have to do a layout of this picture with a picture of me on a floatie in the same lake when i was little.

i could not leave out a picture of my sweet grandog penny. she is a chug (part pug part chihuahua) and she belongs to my youngest girl nicole and her boyfriend cory. she went swimming too with her life jacket on but i did not get any pics of that. darn it.

so anyway, now my mountain vacation is over and i am back to the land of reality. my husband lost his job, my car got towed from in front of my house yesterday due to an issue that is making it not pass smog so i had a sticker on the back window with the extension from the dmv but it apparently was expired the end of july so since i had it parked on the street instead of in the driveway they towed it away, the bastards! and it is going to cost me almost 400 dollars to get it back tomorrow. welcome home. i know life could be much worse and there are people so much worse off than me but i am just having a crappy time! i had a super bad day at work today and spent some time hiding in the bathroom, crying. it was not a good day at all, but i got invited by a friend tonight to share in a celebration of something special in her life and that made life so much better. i spent the evening among friends, laughing and talking and eating. just what i needed. so tomorrow i will spend a third of my paycheck rescuing my car from the pokey and then i will somehow figure out a way to pay the bills, the rent and buy groceries and pull myself up out of this pit i am in and trust in god to make things right again. and maybe even get a winter trip in to shaver lake and for sure visit it again next summer. somebody please slap me and tell me to get a grip and stop being so down and keep my chin up. come on, do it, slap me, a good one upside the head and tell me that there are people out there who have it way, way worse than me!!! i know it's true but it just isn't helping to think about that too much right now!! ok, throw me some cheese to go with my whine and i will shut up.

love to all of you out there that i love and hold so dear to my heart. you all know who you are don't you?