More Catching Up!

Patrick gave an update on his work life; as for personal, it's also included a bit of outdoors.

For Easter season we chose to forgo crucifixion and instead opted for a burning at the stake. Followup included a casket forged of graham and chocolate and burial via mandible.

We spent a lot of time in the garden again this spring, prepping beds and planting veggies. A pleasant surprise was the poppy seeds I planted last year (with little success) apparently spread and mutliplied this year all along the perimeter of our apple tree and leafy edible greens. They added a lot of glam to the yard!

Our pal, Matt (in foreground), acquired a small retired wine barrel. Since we all lacked equipment to brew enough for the barrel, there was a conspiring and sharing of resources (with our friend Phil, in background, as well) to brew the full amount to fill it!

Even Liliann (Matt's 3-year old) joined in the festivities. A fun day of collaboration, and of course, refreshments alongside!

Speaking of Liliann, I spent most of the Saturday before Mother's Day helping distract her on a weekend field trip Patrick & Matt were assisting with. I was a little nervous since my interaction with youngsters is limited, but she's a real cool kid and very well behaved. Plus I got a colorful finger-painted 'Thank You' card delivered to me the next day- can't beat that!

The next day, Liliann wasn't around for me to distract, so I needed distraction. Thus playing with the macro feature on the camera while trying to keep this dude from crawling in my bag.

I got the chance to see Patrick in a teaching role, as he showed students from UC Davis how to take a flow measurement of some sort using a particular set of equipment.

I keep getting exposure to new types of plant life out here. These looked like flying saucers.

Patrick and I had carpooled with a coworker of his named Erin (and her dog Sage- lower right corner), so once the field trip was done, the three of us chose to explore a little before heading home. There was a short hike Erin had heard of with a nice vista. We aren't quite sure if we chose the intended trail, but it lead us to a great view regardless.

Our perspective from our perch.

I just thought this rock looked interesting. Probably would have been good for bouldering too!

Our personal travels also took us to LA recently, so we'll have something on that in the future as well. Notice I chose to omit the word "soon" since I've learned my lesson on throwing that around. I'd rather not risk being a liar anymore! :)

Catching Up

This is the first in a couple blogs from me (Patrick) updating/documenting everything I was up to this past winter and spring...  This is what I've been doing at work.

 Found this site destroyed by a tree (foreground) in Sierra NF. I had fiberglass all over me for 3 days after fixing it.

 Chillin in the sun wiring up a datalogger.

A couple of our many methods of travel in the winter time.

On a snow survey in the Stanislaus NF.

Got a few new toys... er... tools for work.

We rednecked our snowmobile trailer so that it could haul pipes this summer.

Dragged the new hires on a 2 mile hike with bags of cement.

As for what I'm doing now... I've been gone 3 or so days per week the past 3 weeks and don't really see an end in sight.  It's been fun but is starting to take it's toll since nothing ever goes as planned.  Our slogan on the project this summer is "it's always something."  On the plus side, the weather has been awesome and the mountains are as beautiful as ever!

Going Solo

Back in February, Patrick was gone a few weekends for various expeditions, so I decided to get brave and have a couple of my own. Plenty of my friends have been on solo hikes, but I had not yet done any outdoor trek alone so I decided it was time to give it a shot! As my family knows, I am completely navigational-challenged so I first chose a hike Patrick and I had been to twice. Remember last spring the photos of all the orange hillsides covered in poppies? It was a little early for the bloom, but I knew I'd be comfortable venturing there, at Hite Cove.

'Signage' (aka a giant metal pipe) pointing out some of the mining equipment ruins.

 

 I felt lucky spotting this pretty, lone succulent adorning a rock face lining one side of the trail. I was tempted to pluck it to accompany the ones I have at home, but decided it would be better to leave for other passer-bys with sharp eyes to enjoy.

The flowers weren't out, but some berries were. They provided a lovely contrast against the green/brown atmosphere.

 

Sometimes it's easy to get tunnel vision on the trail, but I tried to take a moment every now and then to look at the dynamic skyline around me.

I was struck by how vivid green this section of stream and bordering moss were.

Made it to the mining camp without a problem (Patrick and I had a tough time finding it the first time.) Time for a photo to commemorate my first solo hike. I realized later that I think I had this same outfit on in the picture with Patrick here. :)

Felt like I was the lady walking up the stairway to Heaven. Kinda hard to capture in the photo, but the sunlight was casting this awesome aura being filtered through the branches and dully reflecting from the stone trail.

 

Lichen is like...

....nature's graffiti!

After my hike, I hit up Prospector Brewery in Mariposa, where I had the amazing limited time Vanilla Bean Porter to toast my success. Poor Patrick- I talked up the beer for two days straight until we went back there together. The keg had blown that morning. We hope they make it again next year, so he can get a taste and I can get more!

A couple weeks later I felt empowered after my first experience to strike out solo again. There is a path that follows the road to Yosemite National Park, just on the other side of the Merced River that I thought would be a another fail-safe route to follow w/o danger of getting lost, and I had a pretty good idea of where the parking lot and access to the trailhead were. I had the right parking lot but it turns out I missed the trailhead and followed a road up and around the backside of the hill (instead of along the river/highway side). I passed a few different groups of dirt bikers and ATVs, but it was miles by the time I ran into other pedestrians. I thought I should have reached the turn-around point by then, so I asked the hikers if I was close. Luckily, the man and woman seemed to be regular visitors and told me that I was close to a junction, and depending on which way I went, the trail could keep on going all the way to Tahoe! But since I told him I didn't plan on going there that day, he recommended veering to the right, up a short steep hill and a little further, for a peek into YNP with a view of El Capitan. It was a nice late-lunch spot, but I felt so exposed that it left me with a vulnerable feeling and I was on my return hike shortly thereafter. (El Cap is where that hill in the foreground overlaps with the hill in the background- near the white spot.)

I had some beautiful intakes of sky on my way back, but I should've brought sunblock! This hike gave me my first layer of "sunkiss" for the season.

A lot of the hike wasn't like this area in the photos. It followed 10-20' rock walls that harbored deep terraces above them, and rock perches or dugouts where I could just imagine a mountain lion having a fabulous vantage point. I think it was mostly my imagination getting the better of me, rather than there being any real threat (although there are warning signs posted in the Park, which I wasn't far from), since I ended up on a trail I didn't quite mean to be on and signs of other people were scarce most of the time. It kept me from enjoying this hike quite as much as the first one, and because of the slight anxiety, I took almost no breaks so I was pretty beat by the end of the 10 miles! Even so, it was nice to get outdoors, and I was rather proud of myself for making the venture, which might not be so bold for others but was for me!

The "Since-Christmas Status-Quo"

Christmas was a little different this year, as our Scotland family flew over to the States (we haven't had all 5 together here for Christmas before!) and some job scheduling factors pushed my immediate family's "Christmas" a week later (no problem at all though!). My mom had a medical procedure that kept her from being able to travel to the larger family party, so we stayed in town with her, and our flight schedule unfortunately caused us to miss (by less than a day) the family gathering on my Dad's side for my Grandpa's memorial service. All this, combined with having to mooch rides and borrow vehicles, meant of course we didn't see as many people, nor for as long as we'd have liked, but we did value the time we were able to spend in Michigan, and will try again (but probably fail terribly all the same! lol- it's pretty much an impossible assignment) to make the most we can of our next visit. :)

Patrick with the two youngest nephews: Isaac (furthest left) and John.

I suppose the slightly unusual Christmas might have been an omen for a year that seems to have started off feeling differently than the last one ended. You'd think it'd pick up the everyday routine same as before, but for some reason it's like a dial was turned to a higher notch. For me,work just seemed to grow even more stressful and hard to stay caught up with; Patrick's job has put him in the path of some out-of-the-norm and frustrating situations ("Jimmy and the snow chains" is a good one for a campfire sometime if you think to ask); and like much of the nation we fell ill at one point too.

To my inconvenience, and later my amusement: I reached for a tissue at my bedside during the middle of the night and it was kind of wet which surprised me. In the morning I realized the last tissue I pulled had another outstretched from the box still attached to it. It landed in my water glass and proceeded to soak it all up until the rest of the tissues and the box itself were soaked.

Patrick has had to travel out of town and away from home in higher frequency the last month or so (including some weekends), which can be exhausting and expensive for him, a little lonely at times for me (and nobody to split the chores with!), we miss each other a little more, and it does mix up our dynamic a little bit. At least he's been in hotels more this winter field season, which means we get reception to talk at the end of the night.

Certainly we don't want to seem like we're whining- we know we have it WAY good compared to the majority of the world- we're just reporting how things have been lately, which honestly is a little less ideal than our personal, previous status-quo. But, we've managed to squeeze in some fun too. I've been exercising 4 days a week after work (2 days on campus in a HR-sponsored workout class; 2 days with some coworkers in a conference room doing circuit training) which has helped me burn off some stress before going home, and has helped me grow closer with a few of the women at work. Patrick has been able to put the skis he purchased from our AK pals to use during some of his trips, and joined some guys from church on a snowshoe trip (future blog post in the works). And here are a few other cheering items:

My Aunt was eager to see the outcome of some knitting materials she gave me at Christmas, so I set to work on the scarf. Many of my attempts to progress beyond knitting washcloths have not turned out too successfully, so this was a rather encouraging project!

Patrick's coworker Phil had a mini "pre-bachelor" party for friends that couldn't accompany him to Denver for the actual bash. The bride-to-be, Vanessa, invited me to go hang out with her while the guys went on an overnight trip to Santa Rosa. So we carpooled to Davis- where Phil & Vanessa live- the first weekend in February. I was very envious of their Farmers Market which had a drool-over collection of food trucks and bakery wares, in addition to the fresh produce.

The poor boys exchanged some of their plans for disc golf and a few breweries to wait in line for 7 hours at Russian River, where one of the currently best-rated beers in the world was having a limited release. Very daunting for sure, but it was a bonding experience! Meanwhile, I experienced some of Davis, via a rarely-enjoyed greasy giant burger, a walk though the UCD campus arboretum (where I just happened to meet someone from Kalamazoo), and an entertaining performance put on in part by Vanessa's sister's dance company.

From the arboretum walk: quite a group of cacti with "red skin potatoes, as I call them.

Patrick and I got President's Day off, and his coworker lent me her skis/boots, so we went to Badger Pass at Yosemite National Park for the afternoon. It was my first time in about 8 years by my estimate (and I can count on one hand the number of times I've gone in my life), so I was a little wobbly at first and acquired a sore hip from falling a few times, but I think I caught on ok and had fun overall, considering!

Spring yields Merced's most pleasant temperature and fauna of the year, by my vote, so we've been enjoying 70 degree days, honey-sweetened air, and gorgeous greenery and flowers while it lasts (soon enough we'll be cursing 105 degree days). Our first real indulgence in the season was a couple weekends ago. We worked in the garden and relaxed at the end of the day with grilled veggies & pineapple, and a warming campfire.

 

I bought this wood bookcase at Goodwill for $20 with the intent to refinish it..... 10 months ago! It needed some structural reinforcing first though, so Patrick said it's finally time and went to work. To my immense luck, he has even spared me hours of sanding work on a volunteer basis! Hopefully we'll have added this to our living room before the 1-year mark. :)

So there's an update on the last few months. We'll provide a more in-depth look at the more interesting parts soon. I know it's not a replacement for direct contact (sorry- we usually get home at 7pm or later and delve into cooking supper, which places Michiganders nearly in bed; and weekends are riddled with travel/errands or reserved for catching up with parents), but we hope you can still feel somewhat connected via the pictures and stories!

Preserving the image of The Albin Clan in 2012

Clearly we need to catch you all up on our on-goings, but this posting is actually more for the purpose of sharing some photos. For Christmas, Patrick and I did some hurried coordination a few days before our flight to Michigan to arrange for a professional family photo session as a gift to my parents. The last portrait we had together was during my freshman year of college for my parents' church directory, so it seemed high time to get an updated version that included our beloved family dog while she's still with us, Patrick since he's been an official member of the group for a while now, and the 10 years' worth of wrinkles and rounded hips we've acquired. So before the stroke of midnight on New Years' Eve, we were able to capture the Albin family exactly as it was at the end of 2012. Here are some favorites, taken just outside the Veterans' Home in Grand Rapids. (To explain the final photo, we took a few snapshots indoors while warming up later, but the hypothermia was worth it as we much preferred the outdoor ones.)