Sad day

Well my laptop is broken at the moment so I'm attempting this post from my phone. (hopefully this works and doesn't look like a hot mess). I have lots to share but for now I thought I would show you my progress on my blanket I'm crocheting. I'm making a gagillon granny squares in the middle of summer. It's so hot just thinking about a blanket. I'm crazy I know. Hopefully I'm done by Christmas!

Chico or Bust (Part 3)

I'd like to start off by saying......

I don't like beer.

I know you probably think I'm crazy but I just don't.

I'm working on it though because I'd like to be able to sit down and drink a beer like everyone else.

I do however really like tours and museums and I was really excited for this one.

One big attraction in Chico is the Sierra Nevada Brewery.

The brewery is pretty awesome. 

They organically grow hops on the property along with an organic vegetable garden. Plus the vegetables from the garden are used in the restaurant.

Our tour guide was informative and out going.

But I can't tell you anything informative now.

 Hops! 

I know thats hops at least....

Here is my dad smelling the hops. What they have you do is take the hops in your hands and rub them together. This leaves the aromas on your hands and you can smell them. The hops smelled different depending on where they were grown and give the beer a different flavor (Oh look you just learned something!).By doing this oils are released onto your hands turning them a yellow color.

Well, this stuff is not water soluble meaning it will not come off of your hands when you wash them. The only thing to get it off is to use hand sanitizer. 

Of course the hand sanitizer outside the nicely chilled hops room was empty.....

So we had to leave it on our hands for a while. 

My stupidly sensitive hands of course broke out.

Yep, they hurt and turned red.....

Story of my life

Here is where they brew the beer.

Don't mind the window reflection.

It was a billion degrees in that room.

Literally.

Because we went during the week they were bottling!

It was pretty awesome to watch.

I could stand there all day.

After the tour they take you into the tasting room and gave us 7 beers to try! 

Oh did I mention this tour was FREE???

Pretty awesome right?

Then they gave us pens, posters, key chain bottle openers. 

This one in their Pale Ale. Each beer came is a specific type on glass.

I wanted to steal some... but I held back the urge.

After the tour I of course went to the gift shop.

It's ridiculously cheap. 

I got a shirt, a glass, and a mustard they make with their Porter. 

It's addicting and the glasses are so cheap only $3! And you can't break them.

We then went to restaurant and had big pretzels and a garlic beer cheese sauce.

I don't have a picture of that because I scarfed it down.

The other thing my dad really wanted to go to was the National YoYo museum.

Well, it ended up being in the back of a store in downtown Chico. 

Needless to say he was disappointed.

Basically it was just rows and rows of yoyos. 

(Sorry for this is an oddly cropped photo because I had to crop of the reflection 

of my boobs in the glass.)

They had one the size of me.......

It was pretty cool.

All in all I think this was a successful trip.

I got to learn even more about the city I call home for 9 months a year.

Chico or Bust! (Part 2)

The next place we went was Honey Run.

Honey Run road contains one of the few last covered bridges in California. 

It is also the only three tiered wooden covered bridge in the United States.

It's pretty special.

I've wanted to go see it since I moved to Chico and thought it might be a great place 

to visit with my parents.

Since I had never been there I googled directions.

We ended up taking the long way of course.

Along the single car windy road instead of on the fairly flat two lane road. 

The windy road was an adventure though and it was actually kinda cool because 

the road was covered in graffiti.

The outside
You can no longer drive on it but I'm glad. I enjoyed taking my time walking the length of the bridge. I got to stop and look at all of the nooks and crannies.

It is crazy to think that something built almost 120 years ago out of wood is still standing. 

I can only imagine how many people have crossed this bridge.

The inside....

The inside was so intricate. 

View from the inside. (look at my fancy composition)

Gorgeous creek running below.

Look out below!

View from the other side. You can see where the new bridge was built in order
to preserve the wooden one.

Half way through!

At the very end, looking back. 

The only scary thing is you can only have 120 people on the bridge....

View from the ground with my feet in the water. 

Man did it feel good.

The water was so nice.

The underneath view.

Water rushing over some stacked rocks.

 This place was so pretty and a great place to take the family and picnic.
I really enjoyed the history of it.

Curried Chickpeas

I made these curried chickpeas from a jar of spices I got in Canada. The recipe is on the jar and you can buy it here http://www.acecurriestogo.com/index.php . It was super fast and all I need was the spice mix, crushed tomatoes, 1 can of chickpeas, garlic, and oil.

Simmering away...

                     The finished product garnished with cilantro.

So delicious!  

Chico or Bust! (Part 1)

Summer is almost over so it's back to Chico! Since I don't have a car my parents drove me back up and decided to have a little vacation touring around Chico. 

Chico is known for a few things. The great outdoors activities. The Sierra Nevada Brewery. And of course the..well we will just call it the "night life". 

We came. We saw. We concurred Chico.

The beautifully boring 8 hour drive up. 

That is literally all you see on the 5.

Plus the car was packed tight with all my "crap". 

I had about 12 inches of seat.

We made it to Chico and this was our forecast for the week....

Yeah we don't get this hot on the coast..... ever,

In touristing it up we visited Upper and Lower Park.

First we went to Upper Bidwell Park. 

Here is a little background info (if it's wrong blame google). Bidwell Park was given to Chico by its founders General John and Annie Bidwell. It is a 3,618 acre municipal park and I love every bit of it. Upper Park is more of the wild lands with water holes, hiking trails, biking, and camping. You take a rocky dirt road back into no-mans land. 

I wanted to show them Bear hole where I normally go to relax and swim. 

Here is a very smokey Upper Park. There are tons of fires going on in northern California right now and boy could you smell it!

Bear hole with crystal clear water.

I think it speaks for itself, don't you?

It's just absolutely gorgeous. Those rock however are very deceiving. They are volcanic (I think). Well they get so hot they feel like a volcano. So hot you have to sit on a folded up towel or you will literally burn yourself. And they are slippery! I slipped trying to get out of the water once and ate it. 

This however is typical.

If I can hurt myself in some way I will.

I get it from my mom.

Blame her.

I do!

Awwwww!!!!

or is it

Ahhhhhhhh?

(or that someone screaming?)

I don't know just pretend you hear angles singing at all its glory.

We then went to Lower Park which is more the picnicking, leisure bike riding, playing catch in the park kinda place. Completely different from upper park and beautiful in its own right.

Here they dam up the river and create a pool in the summer time for everyone to go swimming in.

The water is a great way to cool off in the hot summer heat.

I didn't take too many pictures there because I was enjoying putting my feet in the water and just relaxing (i.e. cooling off) so I thought I would add a couple pictures I took from last winter.

I love that you can see the icy bitter coldness in these pictures. (It's helping me cool off a little)

 Even with all the leaves gone it's still stunning. 

If you visit Chico you must visit Bidwell Park. 

It is one of Chico's gems

Happy Hour!

Happy hour margarita. Nothing beats a $6 fish bowl. 

 Plus chips and guac!

 Mmmm so delicious! 

 And.... Done!

Now don't think you can drink a fish bowl and drive cause me and S.T. know that ain't happen'n. 

Trust us.

Things I've learned

1. My water bottle leaks. I found this out when I sat on the couch and my booty got all wet. I looked like I peed my pants but it was refreshing in this hot weather.

2. DO NOT. I repeat do NOT spray homemade natural pesticides on you plants. They burn like this....

Stay strong little! I'm sorry!

3. I am an artistic chalk prodigy.....Not!

4. Tape does not come off dishes in the dishwasher. They must be hand scrubbed unfortunately.

5. Fan are a by far one of the best inventions. Ever! Especially in 108〫weather.

6. Speaking of heat.... leather couches suck in the heat.... I keep sticking.

7. Brought way too much stuff home over the summer. It barely fit in the car on the way back.

8. I love Chico.

Well that's all so far. I might make things I've learned recurring. We shall see. I'll leave you with this picture of Ventura. I'm missing it already.

Goodbye Ventura. It's been real.

Schools around the corner and I'm headed back to Chico. I always miss Ventura when I'm away. The growing beach town that is intertwined in agriculture. It is just gorgeous.

Of course I'm going to miss my friends and family. The beautiful, constant, rarely below 60, rarely above 75 degree weather. All my favorite places to eat and shop. My garden.

But thing I miss the most are honestly my poopy Cheyanne, my Smokie bear, and Leonard. I don't have any pets in Chico and it gets lonely sometimes when I'm home alone.

As you'll be able to tell I love taking pictures of my pets. I have a ridiculous amount.

Here's Cheyanne. She has many names but most involve poopy.

This is her scientist look.

 Her action shot!

I took a photography class and had to show movement so I made her run up and down the backyard until I got the picture I wanted. I'm mean I know.

 Here she is looking like a princess. So loves to pose. I swear I want her life. All she does is sleep in the sun all day. Play with her toys and eat treats. 

Funny enough she loves to garden. We go in the backyard together and she sticks her head in my raised bed looking for things to steal. She loves cucumbers and always steals them. Everyday she goes and sniffs and licks the tomatoes. I think she's just as excited as I am for them to ripen. 

 Here's Leonard. He's named after the character on the Big Bang Story. This is probably the only picture I have of him because he is the biggest brat. Currently he has all the fish tank ornaments I put in there in a pile in the corner of the tank. It doesn't matter how many times I put it all back because in the morning it's all in a pile again. For Christmas one year I bought him some new plants. He ripped them out and killed them within a week. I try and talk to him and interact with him and he flares at me and hides. He loves Smokie though. Smokie stares at him and tries to attack him and Leonard flares his fins and thrashes around the tank. It's quite comical when Smokie tries to bite him because he repeatedly smashes his face on the glass. 

 Here's my Smokie baby.

 Isn't he adorable? 

He has the biggest attitude. When I pet him he cringes as if I going to beat him. He gives death stares from across the room when you talk to him. He enjoys clawing everything in my room along with knocking all my stuff off of my shelves. He love yelling at me at 5am to let him out and occasionally biting me so I get up. I love to fake him out though. I get up and say "you want to go out?" in an excited voice. When he runs for the back door I close my bedroom door. Mean I know, but he knows he's not allowed out until it's light out.

When he isn't a total butt he can really be a spaz. He will run from the top of our stairs into our laundry room where he slides into the dryer because he was going too fast. Cheyanne and him love to play the "I'm going to get you game". Cheyanne chases him and he attempts to out smart and out run her while he tries to get to the fence. He generally wins.

 Here's George aka Georgie. Sadly he is no longer with us but I miss him. He adopted us. Some horrid neighbors I had didn't take care of him and left him when they moved. After some coaxing we finally got him to let us pet him and put him in the garage during winter nights. Then one day he basically moved in and wasn't going anywhere. He was a grumpy old man but a big lover.
He loved my garden too.
 Except he liked to lay in it.......