family visit, week 1

Steph and Mark came to visit starting on 4th of July, and we are already exhausted. It has been a good week so far, but a jam packed week and also has a little bit of bad luck mixed in.

Wednesday -
Steph and Mark got bumped from their flights out to San Diego on the 4th. They had to wait to get on 3 other planes, and finally made it into San Diego around 1:30 (originally scheduled for 10:30 ish). This meant we couldn't go to the Temecula Wine Valley on the 4th of July like we wanted.

Oh well! We ended up having a relaxing day instead, and when I picked them up from the airport we had lunch in Ocean Beach where Mark tried his first ever fish tacos (Wahoo - yum!) and washed it down with some Moose Drool beer. I had fish tacos too, but Steph decided to stick with carne asada. Then we headed up the coast for the long drive home and met up with Alberto to have cocktails and relax. That night, we watched fireworks in the sandy shores of Oceanside, as they were launched off of a barge near the Oceanside pier.

Thursday -
Stephanie and I hit a Jazzercise Step class the next morning where we saw none other than Miss Judi Sheppard-Missett in the back of the room, also taking the class. Stephanie is a Jazzercise instructor in New Orleans, so she was very nervous and excited about taking a class at the 'home base' of Jazzercise, and equally as nervous about seeing Judi! We had fun, and we decided we should go again, but to a regular Jazzercise class next time.

For the rest of the day we really didn't do anything! It was just a relaxing day at home with nothing on our plates.


Friday -

On Friday we took a walk around the wildlife refuge trails near my house. They enjoyed that, and Dudley came along as well so we got him nice and worn out so he slept the rest of the day.


Afterward, we headed down to Old Town so Mark could see some of the history of California, and we could have a good lunch too! There we ate at La Pinata, which is said to be the oldest restaurant in town, and then we saw a hawk hanging out on a golf course nearby.





We also bought corresponding cook books from Old Town that we are going to use, and then trade, to see what the best recipes are!






We also visited the first schoolhouse in California, and got to read about all these crazy rules they used to have for teachers

(one example was no teacher shall engage in any unpure act such as marriage) and a ledger of how many lashings children receive for a variety of bad behavior (boys playing in girls' areas and vice versa warranted 4 lashings - playing cards on school grounds called for 10!).

Saturday-

Since we had already done the work Steph and Mark were coming to town to help us with (hanging kitchen cabinets), we decided to all tackle the hill on the backyard and start getting it into shape.

2 1/2 hours and $300 later, we walked out of home depot with a pile of stinky manure, potting soil and peat moss, and a few lime trees, avocado trees, and bougainvilla to put in the ground. We didn't get even close to finishing it, but I feel that we accomplished a huge amount.


While Mark dug holes for trees and planted them, Alberto fixed the irreigation system once and for all and Stephanie and I pulled up weeds. In the midst of all of this, Mark dug up some tiny little lizard eggs, so Stephanie and I reburied them, hoping most were still viable.

Of course, Dudley supervised, alternating between sticking his nose in the middle of what we were doing, and finding a shady spot to nap in.

At 3:00 the proverbial end of work whistle blew, and we all got showered and prettied up to drive down to Puerto Nuevo for a lobster dinner.

It wasn't too bad driving into Mexico, in fact I'd probably be fine with doing it again except for the return trip wait - over an hour at the border to get back into the U.S., and trust me, it feels like closer to 2 hours! That was certainly a buzzkill, and I slept most of the way home after that.

Sunday -

Off to the Temecula wine valley,

to do what we couldn't do on Wednesday!

First stop was Wilson Creek, the same winery Stephanie and I decided was our favorite five years ago when I first moved out here. The winery has really grown, and there were 4 tasting stations instead of just the one we remembered.

One of them was 'in the back' of the building, and was among all of the huge floor to ceiling barrels of wine they maintained back there. It was great, and we spent a long time there.

By the time we were done there, we only had one more winery we could visit before things started shutting down, so Mark picked the one on the list that said it had a bistro (so we could have a light meal). This was Keyways Winery, off of Rancho California and down De Portola.

Well, we discovered there was no bistro (it hasn't opened yet), but we loved our wine pourer Jesse, who took care of us and didn't care one bit about how many tickets we had left. As long as our glasses were empty, he kept pouring us whatever we wanted. What a deal!

We liked the vibe of Keyways, and by the time we left (almost 3 hours later), Steph and I had both decided we might like it better than Wilson Creek.
It had a very homey feel, and the live music they provided was a nice touch.
Another plus is that it is the only woman-owned winery in the entire Temecula Wine Valley, so now I have another reason to support it! :)
After we left we decided (after much discussion) we needed an appetizer in the wine country, so we stopped at Plantation House Restaurant at the Maurice Car'rie winery.

This restaurant had a Hawaiian/Polynesian feel, and we sat out on the porch of an old plantation style house with deep wicker chairs and tall, stemmed water glasses.


We ordered two appetizers to share, macadamia nut brie (with fruit and toasted baguettes) and little polynesian ribs. YUMMY. Definitely try this place if you are in the area.

That night, we grilled the ribeye steaks we had gotten a few days ago, and washed it down with the Keyways Syrah that Stephanie decided was her favorite. Boy, what a luxurious life for us!

Monday -

More bad luck. I woke up really sick that day. Not sick like the flu, sick like a virus. This was not good for a number of reasons - it was Mark's last day before he flew home to go back to work, and also Stephanie had booked plane tickets to fly to San Francisco the next day to see Amanda for a night. After a variety of drugs and a small amount of food, I ended up sleeping through most of the day and getting up just long enough to have dinner with everyone.

While I slept, everyone teamed up to get more work done in the yard (thank you!) and now we have the bougainvilla and jasmine planted in front of the installed lattice.








We went to bed early that night, since we had such an early morning the next day.

Tuesday -

TODAY - Even more bad luck! We got up at 4 am because Mark needed to be at the airport at 6 am for his flight, and I discovered that Stephanie had gotten sick overnight with what I had the day before.

There went our flight. After driving Mark to the airport, we decided that we weren't going to be able to make it, cancelled our reservation, and headed back home to sleep.

After apologizing to Amanda for mucking up our whole excursion (sorry again Amanda!!), we decided we'd see how we felt tomorrow, and then decide on if we can still go up there a little later in the week.

That is where we are now, taking it easy and hoping all of this will pass soon. I am not as bad as I was yesterday, but I am certainly not in any condition to be out and about at the pace we were at over the weekend. Steph is sleeping and we hope that a nice homemade pot of chicken soup, courtesy of Alberto, will help us feel much better.


Mark got home ok, and was only bumped from one flight this time (woo hoo!). Steph will be here one more week, until Tuesday July 17.