Summer 101 Update - Date Night

Okay, it wasn't really "night" and it wasn't even really an official "date," but I had a great time with my buddy Drew at Redhawk Community Park, home of one of Temecula's off-leash dog parks.

I was even efficient enough to cross two items off Summer 101: #21 (Redhawk Community Park, one of Temecula's 38 official parks), and #96 (borrow our neighbor's golden retriever and take him to the dog park.)

Except....I keep calling him a golden retriever, and duh, he's clearly a yellow lab. Sorry, buddy.



I think our date redeemed me in his eyes. He seemed really happy.

The Redhawk dog park is really cool. I drive past Redhawk Community Park all the time and never even noticed it (it's on Redhawk Parkway about two blocks past where it changes from Margarita to Redhawk, just a bit south of Temecula Parkway/Hwy 79 South.)

The narrow entrance is deceptive. This place is big. It has lots of grass, a big play area for kids, plus two separate fenced-in off leash dog areas (one for little dogs and one for big.)



I was intimidated because we had to go to the Big Dog side. I worried about Drew holding his own. There were boxers in there, and a bunch of German shepherds, and something uber-aggressive that I learned was a German shorthaired pointer.

His family takes him to Ocean Beach (Dog Beach) sometimes, and that's a very "keepin' it real" place, but still....you never know. And I'd hate for something to happen while I'm the one watching him.

I needn't have worried, though, since I was there first thing in the morning and all the regulars are on it.

The unofficial Mayor of Dog Park, who was there with three huge, impeccably trained dogs (one of whom easily outweighed me by 20 pounds), took me under his wing.

What I learned from the dog park:

* sniffing is very big in the dog world. It's the glue that holds their social structure together

* follow the alpha, even if he's an asshole. You want to follow the alpha even if you don't know why. And even if you don't know why he's the alpha. He just is. I also learned this from Twilight 2 (whatever the second book of the series is called - the one about Jacob and the wolves - New Dawn of the Eclipse or something like that.)

* drink water. It's very important to stay hydrated.

* if someone throws a ball and everyone starts running to it, it must be good, so you'd better start running too. Maybe it was just a moldy stick, and only one of you can really ever get the ball (moldy stick), but why not run? Everyone else is.

* blondes have more fun. If you're not blonde, spend the day with one some time, maybe at a dog park near you.

Lists: The Self-Help Section

The self-help section of the bookstore does not have to be a scary or mysterious place. I've culled the best for you:

1. Home Comforts by lawyer-turned-nesting-expert Cheryl Mendelson. Okay, it's not "self-help" in the classic sense, but anyone trying to figure out the art, science, and metaphysical meaning behind mopping and vacuuming will adore this meticulously-researched and detailed book. It is a hefty reference volume but it also is interesting enough to read straight through.

2. Diva (of It All) Martha Stewart's Homekeeping Handbook. See above, but written by Martha. Martha's inimitable voice carries through from Abalone, cleaning to Zucchini, storing.

3. Take Time for Your Life by life coach Cheryl Richardson. Don't dismiss Richardson or her advice as lightweight or bubblegum/pop simply because you might have seen her on Oprah's "Your Best Life" series. This is a fantastic book. She asks very basic questions that cut straight through to deeper "What is the meaning of life?" stuff. She has written several books and this is her best. She also has a website (try the magical "Touch of Grace" button.)

4. Organizing and time management guru Julie Morgenstern's SHED Your Stuff, Change Your Life (originally published as When Organizing Isn't Enough.) Thanks, Andrea, for re-introducing me to Julie Morgenstern. She's another Oprah alum and again, do not be put off by her "Your Best Life" ties. Again, her questions are basic and simple, but how often do we over-complicate life and miss the essentials? You can take Morgenstern's SHED Inventory at her website.

5. Your Heart's Desire by psychic intuitive Sonia Choquette. She definitely is a little woo-woo but her humor and humility are infectious. Suspend disbelief and you might start seeing fortuitous coincidences in your own life.

6. Michelle Bernhardt's My Inner World website. I want to crawl into Richard Scarry's Busy Town and live in that adorable little village. I also think it would be fun to actually live inside Webkinz World. Maybe that's why I think this "tool for self-discovery" is so much fun.

7. The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. This 12-week "Recovery Plan" for artists works best for writers but anyone trying to accomplish creative projects could benefit. If you really do it, your life will change.

8. The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by John Gottman. Any self-respecting list of self-help books has to have at least one relationship book. I love John Gottman. He has figured out a way to scientifically quantify the intangibles of what makes a successful marriage. Here is a "relationship book" you probably have a half-decent chance of getting a man to actually read.

Check out all of the LISTS at ABDPBT

Simple Woman's Daybook for Monday, July 13, 2009

FOR TODAY, MONDAY, JULY 13, 2009...

I am thinking...about three unrelated (or are they???) groups I've recently joined. The first is a weekly writer's group, which I absolutely love. The second is a small, informal far-flung group of us checking in online as we work our way through Cheryl Richardson's Take Time for Your Life. The third is a small group meeting weekly as we journey together through Julie Morgenstern's SHED Your Stuff, Change Your Life. I am bounding toward the big 4-0 with many plans!

I am thankful for...Mom and Dad. Thank you! We had a fantastic Fourth of July celebration together, then our girls stayed with them for a whole week. They took the train home and I met them for the hand-off at Checkers Hotel in downtown LA. Mom and Dad had to turn around and take the train right back home again. What a slog! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

From the kitchen...I was able to swing by my sister's house in LA before heading over to Checkers, and her husband gave me a giant bag of tomatoes to bring home. His garden is terrific. His dad is a really expert pickler and Rudy is learning the craft now, too. They have promised me a jar soon. Rudy's dad is working in Tennessee now, but when he is back in California I want him to teach me to make sauerkraut. Scott would be over the moon with happiness.



Home-grown fruits & veggies, including Rudy's tomatoes

I am going...to our favorite vet, Dr Gil. The girls love him and while the cats aren't thrilled to go anywhere, not to mention the vet, even they reluctantly agree he's not bad. Sidekick is having a general checkup since he's lost a dramatic amount of weight in a short period of time and we're really concerned about him. We've already prematurely mourned his death once so I'm not going to fear the worst until we get official news from the vet.



file photo

I am reading...Hothouse Flower and the 9 Plants of Desire by Margot Berwin and Echo Park by Michael Connelly. One is very noir. One is not. They balance each other well. I'm also re-reading World War Z by Max Brooks. I was all set to attend San Diego's famed ComicCon 2009, then I wasn't, then I was again, and now I'm not. Anyone got a spare ticket to ComicCon? Max Brooks is signing!

I am hearing...Laurent Korcia's violin rendition of "Smile" from his CD Cinema. I heard it on NPR this weekend and wanted to download it for Eva since she is a beginning violin student. I never knew Charlie Chaplin wrote "Smile" or that he was a violinist.

Around the house...the girls are shoulder-deep in sibling rivalry. It is really something. Bits, all three years and 35 pounds of her, knows how to completely push Eva's buttons. She delights in it, really. And all Bits wants is to be able to do every last thing her older sister gets to do. It might be a very long summer vacation.



There's a whole lotta goat getting going on

One of my favorite things...is the luxury of a nice massage. A friend who knows my love of (alas, pricy) Thai massage steered me toward a little hole in the wall place called Allo Spa, which I featured as "Off the Beaten Path" on Daily Temecula. I am having SO much fun discovering new things and meeting new people. I don't accept freebies and didn't need to at this place since a generous half-hour (she went long) traditional Chinese acupressure foot massage was only $16.

From the outside, it is in a long block of buildings that looks like this:



What's the secret password? Just kidding! Totally legit!

If a trusted friend hadn't sent me there, I might have been a little suspicious that it was a "no-tell happy endings" kind of place, but once inside, I quickly saw that it was 100% legit. Now their acupressure foot massages are one of my favorite things!

A few plans for the rest of the week: with the kids back in town, we are hitting it with our list of 38 Temecula parks. We have to! We also will be going to the library, plus I'm squeezing in a yoga class. Note to self: getting there shouldn't take such elaborate preparations that I need an hour-long yoga class just to recover. Must. Rearrange. Life. I am working very sincerely on not cramming so many things onto my to-do list. Scott reminds me that I only have two arms and two legs. I'm still working on that DIY cloning project. How awesome would that be?

Here is picture thought I am sharing...I finally figured out what my backyard "volunteers" are. A few years ago I planted "Cinderella" pumpkins hoping we'd have them at Halloween time. They never sprouted so I figured they were a bust. Guess what popped completely over in a different side of the yard?





Have a wonderful week!
Juliet

This weekly journal feature is an idea from The Simple Woman's Daybook blog. The Simple Woman is on hiatus from the Daybook for the summer but I really enjoy journaling so I will keep at it. I hope you come back each week to see what I'm up to around here!

Brother Is Watching You

Not Big Brother. Just Brother, as in manufacturer of the P-Touch labelmaker.

I bought their labelmaker at Costco. The next day, Brother began "following" me on Twitter!

It took several steps for Brother to find me.

Step One: My Costco card is swiped when I pay for the labelmaker (I paid with cash but they still swipe the card to make sure my membership is current.)

Step Two: Costco tells Brother, "Guess what!? Someone just bought one of your labelmakers. Make some more. These babies are selling like hotcakes."

Step Three: Costco also tells Brother: "Hey, here's the email address of that lady who just bought your P-Touch."

Step Four: Brother finds - through my email address - that I have a Twitter account.

Step Five: Suddenly my Brother is also my Follower.

Is this weird in a slightly creepy way to anyone else other than me?

I guess it's Seth Godin style "permission marketing," sort of, obliquely. If Costco suddenly started following me on Twitter, I'd be....what? Happy, maybe, or flattered? Maybe a little bit confused.

But Brother?

It could also be a big coincidence, that Brother, maker of the P-Touch, started following me one day after I bought their labelmaker from a place who tracks my contact information.

So Brother follows my tweets. It's "permission marketing" taken to the next degree. I don't care.

Not this time.

Summer 101 Update - The Three Parker

Busy, busy, busy! We are having a fun summer visiting each and every one of the 38 official Temecula parks.

The other day was a "three parker."

Here we are at #12 on our Summer 101 list, Meadows Park:



I broke my foot jumping into this sand two years ago on Memorial Day weekend. I was holding Bits, who was a baby at the time, in my arms as I jumped. Scott was out of town. Eva said, "Mom, why don't you just bring a magazine and sit on a bench reading next time?"



Maybe I could sit on this bench:



Meadows Park overlooks what I believe is a slough:



What is with seeing squirrels in park parking lots? It's happening to us a lot lately:



I know people who love #20 on the Summer 101 list, Pauba Ridge Park, and I know people who hate it.



My friends with big dogs love it for the large grassy fields where they can let the dogs run.



Pauba Ridge Park is set in a residential area with increasingly larger horsey and winey properties. There are some big-ass houses out there. One of my favorite big ass houses is the French country style estate on the corner of Meadows Parkway and Pauba Road. They have tennis courts, rolling lawns, big impressive gates, and a small vineyard. I am very curious about who lives there.

My friends who dislike Pauba Ridge feel the play equipment is too close to the parking lot, which is too close to Pauba Road. It really is true. The design is strange.



My kids love the play structures and I like that there is plenty of shade.





Finally, we met friends at #32 on our Summer 101 list, Temeku Hills Park, which is a favorite with my kids because of the elaborate castle motif play structures.



Whew! The three-parker was pretty intense. We are keeping busy and having fun. I hope you are too.

Random Flow of the Stream of Consciousness

One.

I am not a "mommy blogger." I sometimes write about my kids. Today's Wordless Wednesday picture is of Bits gleefully taking out a sheet of oversized popping paper with her feet.

Anyone who writes in a personal way about her family - whether blogger, newspaper or magazine columnist, satirist, or even the teacher who shares anecdotes with the class - comes to that day: "Can I continue to write about them? Will they be happy in five or ten years, twenty or thirty years, that the whole world knows that inside joke about their potty training or that they eat pickles dipped in hot fudge sauce?"

My seven year old in particular does stuff that is just so damned blog-worthy. It just kills me to not write about it. I have been wrestling with myself all morning whether to scan and share her to-do list (remember, she is seven; one of the items is "coloring.")

It might not even take the girls five years to be mad that I write about them. My seven year old could be upset tomorrow or next month.

How do I write about my life without writing about my family? Graciousness dictates that I continue to write about them but only ever paint them in a flattering light. If the only person I can portray as insane is me, what impression do I give to the world at large?

Two.

I am pet sitting. Thank god the neighbors' ancient (23? 27?) cat Monkey died on their watch and not mine. They have a nine month old kitten, Muffin, who rockets around the house like a cannonball.

The main responsibility is their yellow lab, Drew. I love Drew. Maybe it's a "lab thing" but he is just the sweetest, biggest-hearted dog I know.

I get nervous watching other people's pets. Too many goldfish and mice have died under our family's watch for me not to be.

Retrivers sometimes eat inedible objects. Drew has gotten better about this. When he was younger I'd be walking him and every time I'd turn around he was eating a pine cone or a rock.

(Once I saw a lady at the vet with her golden retriever, who'd eaten an entire cob of raw corn, which he jumped up and snatched out of a colander in the sink. It's a "retriver thing.")

Hopefully nobody needs pricy intestinal surgery on my watch.

Three.

I lost my cell phone. I started looking for "that thing 'they' invented" that lets you call your cell phone from your home phone and turn on the ringer even if your phone is off when you lose it.

Then I realized "they" didn't invent anything. I saw that on an episode of American Dad. Francine invented it. I think I watch too much TV.

Wordless Wednesday

Popping paper.



Want more Wordless Wednesday?

Hausfrau Hootenanny

Even if, theoretically, you can put your kids to work doing housecleaning, when they are very young, they are a cleaning liability.

For instance, why is our cat walking around with a honey nut cheerio stuck to him?



Would you want to play in their playroom?



How about sitting down to do some homework at the desk?



Pens, pencils, and stickers wind up where they ought not to be. Here's our dining room table (this one wasn't done on purpose; it was pen "bleed-over" from drawing without putting something underneath the paper):



The kids' table (this one was (probably?) on purpose:



I thought our wall had a large crack in it. Not to worry! The kids just drew on the wall with ballpoint pen. And when I say "kids" I mean Bits.



Someone (probably Bits again) drew on the front door, too.



The kicker is my meditation bench (!!!!):



Gee, I wonder who could have drawn on the refrigerator?



Can Goo Gone & Mr Clean Magic Eraser fix this house? Tune in next time to see!

Simple Woman's Daybook for Monday, July 6, 2009

FOR TODAY, MONDAY, JULY 6, 2009...

Outside my window...We are waking up in Santa Cruz! (You can read about my ties to this area here.)

I am thankful for...great friends & family. We have a regular-ish tradition now of getting together in the summer with the entire Wightman family. Our families have remained close friends over many years. It's fun to see all the "kids" now with kids of our own.



From the learning rooms...it's dance, dance, and more dance as both girls take classes and help out around the studio at Dancenter all week.

Dancenter is moving! Dad begins work on the new studio soon. Nothing is more fun than a construction zone:



From the kitchen...I am hoping to have time to show Scott my old high school hangout, Caffe Pergolesi. It's a Santa Cruz institution. We might hit Mr Toots in Capitola instead. I logged many hours in both places.


Caffe Pergolesi, or "The Perg"

I am going...back to Temecula with NO kids. I know we'll miss the girls terribly but I'm excited to an almost embarrassing degree about being kid-free.



And yeah, I think they have fun with the grandparents, at least if that picture is any indication.

I am reading...How to Buy a Love of Reading by Tanya Egan Gibson; The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany Baker; Hot House Flower and the 9 Plants of Desire by Margot Berwin; World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks

Around the house...the cats have been HOME ALONE with a pet sitter. They have been known to pull shenanigans so hopefully they are giving her a break.

One of my favorite things...is a cup of tea and pretty cookie from Gayle's in Capitola. Joe Ortiz ("The Village Baker") and his wife Gayle were our neighbors long ago.



A few plans for the rest of the week: The gym; Thai massage; shopping; checking out a bunch of local businesses for Daily Temecula; "date night" with Scott.



This weekend I'm heading to LA, my parents' destination when they bring the girls home from Santa Cruz on the train. Lily, Rudy, and baby Zsi Zsi might join us. I love Union Station. In fact, all of downtown LA is pretty terrific.

Here is picture thought I am sharing...

My backyard volunteers are PUMPKINS!!! There are three of them.




Have a wonderful week!
Juliet

This weekly journal feature is an idea from The Simple Woman's Daybook blog. The Simple Woman is on hiatus from the Daybook for the summer but I really enjoy journaling so I will keep at it. I hope you come back each week to see what I'm up to around here!

Summer 101 - Santa Cruz Special Part Three

Probably the best part about Blue Ball Park is the slide:







HOPE YOUR 4TH OF JULY WAS FANTASTIC!!!

Summer 101 - Santa Cruz Special Part Two

Scott has read about "the hill" that the Soquel High tennis team was forced to run.

Cummings/Blue Ball Park is adjacent to Soquel High, and when we were there today my mom told Scott that this is "the hill":



Scott was not impressed with my athletic prowess until I told him that you actually need to climb the staircase to the top of a very tall slide, then climb up this staircase:



Then run about half a mile to that faraway hill. That is the hill:



Satisfied? I doubt I could run it today, but there was a time when I did. And lived to tell the tale.