Geronimo's Cave

On President's Day, I got together with two of my hiking friends (Cindy and Terry who didn't know each other) and two of Terry's granddaughters (Camille and Bunzer, Terry's nickname for her) and we headed out to the Peralta trail head for a hike to Geronimo's cave. When you hike with Terry we always have to have a pre hike photo, so here it is. You've got to love those lovely blue knee braces I've got around my ankles!
We have had so much rain this year that the desert was so green. Okay, I know that if you live anywhere but Arizona you are going to say that looks dead and brown, but to a true desert dweller with a discerning eye - this is green and we are going to have wonderful wild flowers this year.

Instead of going on the heavily used Peralta trail we turned right and followed a trail that most of the time wasn't a trail and we had to look for cairns to follow. In this photo you can see the 'cave' - the dark spot just below the rim and at the top of the yellow rock. We had to scale yellow rock which was anything but easy.

Terry had done all the research for this hike and was hoping to find Geronimo's bathtub. He was so pleased when he did, that he had to sit in it for a picture.

Here is Terry in the cave which was bigger than it looks in this picture. Most of the cave is behind me and several people could have slept in it if they wanted to endure a night on solid uneven rock. We were all pretty sure that Geronimo never actually was in this 'cave' but the name was intriguing and part of the draw to the hike.

Once at the cave, we had to find a way to the very tip top of the ridge, and here I am on the top. while Camille is making her way up as well.

On the way back down we took one last shot of the cave and where we had been. Can you believe that beautiful blue sky? No photo shopping done here. It had been a beautiful day all the way around - beautiful scenery, beautiful weather and beautiful friends to share it all with.

How do we spend our time?

Last week as our family was watching the Olympics, Raquel asked me why we didn't go to Salt Lake when the Olympics were there.

I remember at the time of the Salt Lake Olympics my mother calling me multiple times inviting us to come. She told me how exciting it was just to walk around downtown and how beautiful the city looked. We had a free place to stay (at my mom's) and even some free food (my mom's a great cook and I'm sure she would have fed us at least a couple of meals), yet we didn't go.

I tried to remember what my excuses had been and why we hadn't taken the time to spend a few days in Salt Lake at a time that would have been forever etched in my family's memories. It really was a once in a life time opportunity and we let it pass us by.

It started me thinking of all the "things" that take up our time, consume our thoughts, waste our energy and overwhelm us. And yet the very next week we can't even remember what they were. How many other opportunities are we letting slip away because of all the "things" we have going on?

I would like to think that I'm a little smarter and wiser now, but I'm afraid that I still let all those "things" consume me. But if the Olympics were held in Salt Lake again, Mom, I would be staying at your house.

The perfect plan

Last Monday, Preston and I decided we needed a break from school and decided to take advantage of all the snow Arizona has received. We headed up to St. Johns Monday night, spent the night with Garth's parents and then headed up to Sunrise Tuesday morning.

I don't think I have ever seen as much snow as they had and we were psyched for a great day of skiing and snowboarding. The plan we had was perfect - go up in the middle of the week, avoid all the crowds on the weekend and have great snow, roads and weather before the next storm came through on Wednesday. I was a little worried when we got to the slopes and the temperature was only 11 degrees, but our Arizona sun never lets you down, and it kept us warm all day.
As you can see by all of the snow and the bright blue sky, our plan was perfect and the mountain and snow were absolutely breath taking. The added bonus was the buy one, get one half price on the lift tickets on Tuesdays! Perfect plan!

You can see by the few tracks and lack of people on the slopes that we avoided the crowds. The best laugh of the day was when we were going down the snow park for the first time. I went first and I went off the side of a jump rather than going straight off it. Preston followed me and was headed straight down the jump and at the last minute went off the side like I did. He fell in such an awkward, funny way that everyone on the slope watching started to laugh. There was group of snowboards off to the side and they told him that was the funniest thing they had seen all day. We all had a good laugh including Preston.

To add to our perfect day, we had Indian tacos made with real Indian fried bread for lunch and since they had all their lodges open we didn't have to wait in one line the whole day - not for the chair lift, bathrooms, or food. What could be better?

Our only problem came on our way home. I completely forgot to fill up with gas when we left Show Low - not such a good plan. As we watched the digital gas display count down our miles until empty, Preston informed several times that he was not going to push the car when we ran out of gas. We drove almost 50 miles from the time the display said we had no gas, so we really coasted our way into Globe on fumes. Luckily running out of gas didn't ruin our perfect day in the snow, it just gave us something to concentrate on for an hour or so.

"You've been selected"

Those are dreaded words if you are part of my husband's family. "You've been selected" does not mean that you have won a prize or will be honored with some recognition.

"You've been selected" in my husband's family means prepare yourselves - you are about to be hosed, taken advantage of, inconvenienced or required to buy a steak dinner for 16.

Everyone is his family has their name blocked so when you answer the phone your caller ID can't tell you who it is; otherwise you would never answer the phone if you saw it was a member of the family. You just don't dare, you never know when you will be "selected." And it can be an expensive experience.

You can answer your door and have a family member standing there telling you that "you have been selected" to feed them lunch that day or let them spend the night or take them out for ice cream.

Don't get me wrong we have taken advantaged of this tradition, too. When Jason's car broke down in St. George last Thanksgiving, Garth called his cousin to let him know that he had "been selected." Garth wondered if his cousin had hung up, there was such a long pause on the other end. His cousin was very relieved when he found out Jason just needed to spend the night.

Every January I start to worry. I know we are going to be "selected," once again, to host the Super Bowl party.

So two weeks ago I wasn't surprised when Garth told me that yes, once again we had been "selected," the Super Bowl party would be at our house.

It used to be that we varied who had the party. We would head to Flagstaff, play in the snow, go ice skating, visit the Grand Canyon or go to Winslow and visit the "Standing on the Corner" monument (that's about all there is in Winslow) and have it at our house every other year. But that was long ago when we still had all our kids at home. Now no one wants to get cold (I think everyone but me is getting old) and so our house "gets selected."

The Super Bowl party is quite a tradition in my husband's family and we all look forward to seeing all the family, eating way too much, and watching the "big game."

So I shop for food and stock the fridge with cokes (our budget is so thankful that no one drinks beer) and Garth's one uncle brings his delicious salsa and his other one brings a half eaten box of chicken wings and you just hope no one invites too many friends they didn't tell you about.

I talked to Jason today and he was sad he would miss the Super Bowl party once again. I talked to my son-in-law and he wondered if we could set up Garth's laptop and Skype he and Lonica in. Then I remembered all the wonderful memories I have of Super Bowl's past and realized that while "being selected" can be expensive, it can also bring together a great family and create memories that will last a life time.

I guess I can handle "being selected" once again.

How not to start a conservation with your mother

I feel pretty proud of myself that I am not that obsessive, worrying type of mother. I thought I was pretty cool under most circumstance.

When my almost two year-old was standing at the sliding glass door with blood covering his face and needed 30 stitches, I calmly grabbed a towel covered his head, instructed my daughter to call her dad and then stood on the driveway holding him until Garth came and picked us up. I then laid on him for an hour to hold him still while the plastic surgeon stitched him back together. I was calm.

When the same child fell off a couch I let him walk around on a broken foot for two weeks before taking him to the doctor and finding out his foot was broken. (I know that sounds cruel but it was a couch a foot and a half off the ground for heavens sakes.)

When my daughter was head butted in soccer and had her lips smashed into her braces and her jaw dislocated, she pulled her lips out and a father on the team realigned her jaw, we rinsed out her mouth and she continued to play. No wasted trip to the hospital and I didn't freak out.

When the same daughter informed me that she had repelled off a train tressel hundreds of feet high, in the middle of the night, with trains going across, I didn't freak out. Just reminded her that that probably wasn't the smartest thing to do.

When my son was sent to live in Bogota, Colombia for two years, I didn't freak out. And when he told us how he had been bitten by a dog, held up at gun point, chased by gangs, and almost choked to death, I didn't freak out.

When my 16 year-old called to tell me he had wrecked my car and was in his fourth accident in less than a year - I did freak out. Well, wouldn't you have?

Overall, I feel as though I have a pretty good track record, so when my son who lives 600 miles away calls and starts a conservation with, "Okay mom, don't freak out." What are you supposed to think? Obviously, you think of accident, right? But how bad can it be because my child is talking to me on the phone, so he isn't dead yet. But of course, your mind races way at a thousand miles a second thinking of all the worst things that could have happened.

He then proceeds to tell me that he hit heads with another kid and has a gash on his forehead that needs stitches. Is that all? All those visions of mangled cars, broken limbs, or severed fingers for just a cut that needed stitches! Doesn't he know his own mother? Doesn't he know I'm not the "freak out" type of mom?

I guess not.

Maybe I ought become that "freak out" mom type and show him just how lucky he has been all his life.

"Oh, the weather outside is frightful"

I live in the desert. We don't get much rain. We average 7 inches a year; that is our average and we haven't gotten that in the last couple of years. We average 364 days a year of sunshine. That means that we never have to worry about getting rained out of anything. We only worry about heat and pray for a change in the weather.

So imagine our surprise when last Sunday the meteorologist announced that the Phoenix area would be getting 8 inches of rain this week. There would be change in our weather and next came the media blitz! Since the media gets excited anytime there is a prediction for change in our weather, and most of the time it doesn't happen, we were all doubtful that we would end up with even an inch of rain.

Well, this time they got it right. Monday it started to rain a bit, but Tuesday evening we got hit with the first big down pour (we've hardly had a reprieve since). At about 6:30 I was fixing dinner when I got a call from Garth on his way home from work. He had a flat tire on the freeway, almost at the exit to our house. You know every person that creeped by him that night was so glad it wasn't their vehicle with the flat.

His truck is a monster to change tires on and he wasn't in a safe place to do it, it was raining buckets of water and it was dark. We debated what to do, called a couple of friends to get advice and eventually I borrowed a heavy duty jack and set off to help Garth change the tire.

By the time I got there, one of the friends I'd called was already that and he and Garth were about done (yea, I didn't have to get soaked) They were soaked to the bone, but within 10 minutes Garth was home. Thank goodness for great friends!

Moral of the story is, when the tire pressure light goes on and you can get off the freeway and find shelter and light at a QT, don't think you can make it home. And sometimes the meteorologists are right in their predictions.

It's About Time

As you can see it is past the middle of January and I'm barely getting around to blogging about our holidays. (I hope that isn't a sign of what the year to come will be like!)


Once all our family got home we had plenty to do before Christmas even got here. We had to take Amelia to have her first picture with Santa.
Take a family photo for our Christmas cards that never got made or sent. (Sometimes something just has to give and that is what I gave up on this year. I've had terrible guilt but it will eventually go away.) We do look pretty good don't we. What is even better is that we didn't even plan on taking our picture that day and everyone just happened to coordinate. I just love it when things like that happen.

We had to make a quick trip to St. Johns so Amelia could meet all of her great-grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. My dad even came over from Albuquerque. Here is Garth with his mom and Amelia.

Amelia also needed her first hair cut which I wasn't too happy about being chosen to do. The top and sides turned out pretty okay but the back looked awful. Good thing Lonica has her wear headbands all the time.

And of course we had to play with Amelia every moment she was awake.

Finally, Christmas Eve arrived and we all sat down for dinner. Without Anita, Rob and their kids here this year our table seemed kind of empty. But for the first time in two years we had Jason home and that was wonderful!

After Christmas Day, we just sat around for the next week in a messy house, eating, playing games and going to movies. It was wonderful. Here we are having a fondue dinner with Preston's friend, Clark. He was really impressed with fondue and we taught him to play hearts. That is all he still wants to play.

Scott also made us a speculaas-cake. Anita had brought the recipe and spices for it last year, but we never had time to make it. None of us had eaten it before or knew what it was supposed to look like but right or wrong it was delicious!

Finally, on New Year's Day I decided to get outside and get some exercise by hiking with a friend, Terry, and his friend. This is a picture at the beginning of our hike (actually we'd probably gone a mile already) and you can see Flat Iron (our destination) way in the background, it's that point clear in the back.

Once we got to the top of Flat Iron we could see the top of the Superstitions about 1/2 mile further, so of course we had to go up there. Here I am at the top and you can see Flat Iron down to the right of me. It was a good way to start the new year - on top of the world (or the top of the Valley).

Since that day life has gotten back to normal. I'm taking four classes this semester, Lonica, Scott and Amelia went back to Ohio, Jason went back to Utah, Preston started his last semester of high school, Garth, Dave, Raquel and I all went back to work. So while life is back to our same routine, we will always look back to this past Christmas as one of our best - just a lot of family time, good food and relaxation.