A Full Five Days Exploring California

Last month my mommy and younger brother Drew came to visit us(our first and most likely our last visitors) and we decided to take a five day road trip from Portland to California. Well, Tim and I planned it out in advance and if you know anything about our planning as of late, it is thorough and doesn't waste a second of time. We like to milk everything we can out of our little trips. And although we weren't positive that my mom and brother could keep up with our sometimes exhausting way of vacationing, they held on with us for the whole long and bumpy ride.

It would be too much to recount every spectacular detail, so pictures will have to suffice. There were over a thousand so I pared it down to about 150. We spent the day before the road trip eating and romping around on Mt. Hood in the snow. The first day on the road we all piled in the car, the four of us, the two pups, and all of our clothes. We drove for about twelve hours stopping in Modesto, California for the night. The second day we played in Yosemite National Park and visited the redwoods in the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias. The third day we made it all the way to the Mojave Desert. I plucked three cacti from the desert sand and we almost got stuck off-roading. The fourth day we cut back up the coast to San Francisco. We explored the city by day and toured Alcatraz Island by night. On the fifth day we drove up the coast stopping to play in the Pacific Ocean and to see the redwoods once again in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. 

We drove over 2600 miles in just five days and saw so much of California. It is definitely the prettiest and most diverse states that we have visited. I highly recommend it. You should go. Now. Like right now.

The day before the road trip we had many grilled cheeses for lunch.

Yum. At The Grilled Cheese Grill in NE Portland.

Drew eating The Grilled Cheesus, a burger with two grilled cheeses for a bun.

We ate on the second floor of a rickety doubledecker bus.

We went to the Timberline lodge on top of Mt. Hood. You can see the lodge in the background of this photo. It's where they shot the establishing shots for The Shining. 

Newton loves the snow!

It was very snowy, very cold, and very windy. And those are the tip tops of trees in the background.
We were probably on top of at least 15 feet of snow at any given point here.

Tim was slightly under dressed. 

Drew went to walk Persie and disappeared in the blizzard for a while. Then Persie came running through the trees alone. When we found Drew he was face down in the snow. Laughing. Just laughing like a crazy man.

Crazy Drew always gets extra wet in the snow.

Newton in his stylish vest.

Admittedly I was also a bit under dressed.

Oh and it was my mommy's birthday. Happy Birthday Mommy!

Walking on the edge of a cliff of snow. We could barely distinguish the sky from the ground.
Probably not the safest thing to do.

Bathroom photos after we fixed our snow ravaged hairs.

We found some safe hills and sledded down them in a Rubbermaid container. 'Cause that's how we roll.

My mommy is so cute :)

Especially when she wipes out ;)

Tim and Newton

Newton did not like it.

But that didn't stop Tim.

Birthday pie in the evening.

Mommy is five years old.

Morning rain in Oregon on our first day.

Apricot tongue.

Northern California

Cliff roads.

Coming up on Mt. Shasta.

All the tops were hiding in the clouds.

Mt. Shasta's little friend.

Shasta!

Newton is a motorist!

Happy Persie loves road trips.

Starting to see some orchards.

We saw olive, citrus, and pistachio orchards.

One day these will be trees.

Ah, palm trees are so California.

In California, things don't look real. Everything looks like a model. And you can see forever.

After driving vertically for a while we reached a lovely secluded vista point.

Wildflowers

My cute husband missed the sunshine, and the weather here was perfect. Just like you'd imagine California weather.

Love him.

Love both of them!

Down at the bottom there was a river that we could just barely hear.
Mommy had binoculars and we used them to look for Sasquatch.

One of our better self portraits.

We made it!

Our first peek at half dome.

Newton catching some air.

Wow. Just wow.

El Capitan is the formation to the right.

Half Dome

Biggest medallion ever! I need it!

Bark teepee.

Valley forest river.

Lower Yosemite falls. So much water!

The falls through the forest.

Upper and lower Yosemite Falls.

Rock cuts.

Color patterns.

Lovely cliffs.

Leaving Yosemite Valley, headed to the redwoods.

Coyote on the side of the road.

Giant Sequoias. YES!

Dinosaur trees.

They make me jump for joy!

Tim approves.

Tim is a monkey!

I actually don't weight that much.

Giant redwood pine cone! Yeah, I took one home with me.

Snow ball fights in short sleeves are the best.

I'm a crazy lady for pine cones.

Bigger than my head they are!

Californian countryside.

Happy cows.

Vineyards.

Gorgeous sunset in California!

In the desert, they don't get very creative with their street names. Or they get very creative, however you look at it.

The Mojave Desert.

Long straight roads.

Cinder cones from volcanoes and lava.

Off-roading through the sand.

Hot dogs.

Lovely pink ball cacti everywhere. They were too hard for me to pull up and take home.

Pink ball cactus!

Joshua trees.

Dunes! These were very far away and very tall.

Mommy and Drew lost in the desert.

Persie and I were hot and a bit tired at this point. 

The dunes! Well, the big dunes were still a few miles away.

Desert flowers.

Lava fields.

Bought some California oranges at a fruit stand.

Dusky goodness.

San Francisco. Where they build houses on top of houses.

Weird creepy fog that rolled in and covered everything.

We thought it was some sort of toxic gas.

Awesome city.

Alcatraz!

Not too many sea lions out at Pier 39.

Chilly on the boat to Alcatraz.

Me and my bird buddy who followed the boat to the island.

Alcatraz greeting.

"Break the rules and you go to prison, break the prison rules and you go to Alcatraz."

The yard at Alcatraz Penitentiary.

Tim in solitary confinement.

Painting done by the prisoners.

A sample cell .

A painting box. The prisoners had more art supplies than I do.

San Francisco covered in the fog.

The dummy head that was used to facilitate the only "successful" escape from the island.
They dug the hole under the sink with a spoon and made the head out of human hair and dried paint.

Not a lot of wiggle room in the cells.

The creepy morgue. 

The Golden Gate Bridge as we left the city.

Last view of Alcatraz and the city.

Northern Californian hills by the sea and pretty happy cows.

Love me some Bigfoot.

Awesome wood carving shop with a dragon and black stallion.

Elk.

Giant clovers in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park.

Climbing a familiar tree.

Mommy amongst the redwoods.

Wandering through the forest.

Playing in a fallen tree.

Newton kept trying to slide down the cliffs.

Paul and his ox.

The Pacific Ocean and it's many monoliths.

Playing with the drift wood.

Oregon sunset and countryside.

Driving up I-5.

Voodoo Doughnuts!

Mommy taking care of business with a jelly filled voodoo doll.

Sprinkles.

Mmm... rice krispies.

Fritter!

Iggy Pop is two years old...

So I felt kind of bad when I realized that I had completely neglected to announce Iggy's birthday this past week. His second birthday was the day after Persie's, May 21st, and while we did celebrate at home with some tuna, I forgot to do a little blog post with some photos of him. And since we don't play favorites in our house(okay, admittedly, Persie likes to pretend she is the Princess Pup and all the other babies are her servants) I would like to share some pictures of the old guy now.

Although Iggy hasn't been around all that long, he still has lived a pretty exciting life for the two years he has been alive. He has traveled across the country by car(soon to be twice). He has lived in four different houses and stayed at at least six different hotels and counting. He loves to eat crackers and strawberries, along with all of the normal foods that cats eat. For Halloween he has been a banana and a pumpkin. Well, I think that's a pretty interesting life for a cat.

This used to be Iggy's spot in our old house. 

His obsession with strawberries goes way back to his kittenhood.

He is just a cat that likes fruit.

My little man is such a good little model.

One day Iggy jumped into a gallon of gray paint and it took us a few hours to realize due to his gray fur.

Let's just say he does not like baths.

For his first Halloween he wore a hand-me-down pumpkin costume.

He pretended not to like it.

Love his stripes so much.

This Halloween he was a bit too big for the old pumpkin costume, so he just hung out with the gourds and squashes.

Pupcakes for Persie's Fifth Birthday

Today Persephone the long haired chihuahua turns FIVE years old! She still seems like a little puppy to us, but at the same time, it seems like we have had her forever. We have done so many things with her and she has been so many places. She really is the most wonderful dog and the best companion anyone could ask for(besides Tim of course). She has many nicknames such as Baby Squirrel, MC Funky Pajamas(her rapper persona), Floo-pea, Persalert, and Pretty Pretty Princess, just to name a few. She is a world traveler, well, she has been to Canada and almost to Mexico. Since she was raised by Julian the black panther, she sometimes thinks she is a cat. Her favorite foods are pineapple and watermelon. Now that you know a little bit about her, enjoy some pictures of her from her eventful little life.

This first picture we ever saw of Persie before we adopted her. We fell in love.

Her first Halloween while we were still in college.

When she was still a tiny baby.

Persie has been to Luray Caverns and licked a stalactite.

She has played in both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, though not by choice.

She loves to hike.

And she loves to be carried while hiking.

She loves to lay around in the grass.

She was the flower girl at our wedding.

She can yawn even in the most amazing places.

She's a drift wood conqueror.

On the day she got a new little brother.

She likes to beat her little Newton up.

Tim and I just so happened to be invited to a BBQ today where there will be a ton of puppies, so I decided to make little puppy birthday cupcakes so they can all celebrate with Persie. Here are some photos of how they turned out, and the recipe is at the bottom of the post.

Carrot and banana cake with peanut butter and strawberry cream cheese frosting.

The birthday girl and her minion wait patiently on the couch.

I made a few regular sized pupcakes for the pups to share throughout the week.

Birthday Pupcakes for Persephone

Recipe for Carrot and Banana Pupcakes with Peanut Butter Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

Yield: 30 mini cupcakes or a dozen regular cupcakes

For the cakes:

1 C. unbleached or wheat flour

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. vanilla

1/2 C. peanut butter

1/8 C. applesauce

1/2 of a ripe banana, mashed

2 large carrots, grated

1/4 C. cooking oil

1 large egg

For the frosting:

8 oz. package of low fat cream cheese(neufchâtel cheese)

1/8 C. peanut butter

1-2 large strawberries, mashed

extra chopped strawberries for garnish

Combine flour and baking soda. Mix in remaining cake ingredients until well moistened and blended. Pour into nonstick or lightly greased cupcake tins, using a spoon to lightly pack down batter and smooth out the tops. Bake at 350° for 15-20 minutes until cakes are firm but not crisp. Let cool 5 minutes in tins and then remove from pan to cool completely. Blend together frosting ingredients. Frost pupcakes and top with garnish. Voila!