Monday, June 29, 2009

Home

Over the last several weeks Greg and I have toyed with the idea of moving. Our location is great; however there our three of us (Greg, myself, and Pico) in 300 square feet. So we started looking, and looking, and looking some more. On Saturday we were headed for one more apartment tour when we started looking around our cozy nest and decided to... stay put! Let me tell you it is a nice feeling knowing where you are going to be living. Sure our apartment is small and there is no dishwasher or full size stove but, it is home.

(I will post some pictures of our cozy nest in a later post...after I have cleaned!)

Monday, June 22, 2009

Happy as a clam....

Picture this...it is 7:00am and the whole apartment building is quiet, except for Greg and I who are up and getting ready for the day. Greg is busily typing away on his computer and I am sipping coffee and watching the news. All of a sudden I hear the dreaded words "your grades are up..." Silence inevitably follows, I am sure that I have gotten a "C" in my Physiology class, sure I spent over 100 hours in the lab and countless hours in study sessions, but no matter how hard I tried I just could not get my grade up. So I say to Greg, "I know that I got a "C" in Physiology but what did I get in Psychology?" This time it is Greg who is silent as he slowly swivels the computer towards me so that I can look; little did he know what was to follow....I am pretty sure that I set of car alarms and woke everyone within a 2 mile radius with the shriek that followed...I GOT A "B"!!!!!!!! A "B" in Physiology how amazing is that!!!!!!! I was so thrilled with my "B" that I completely ignored my "A" in Psychology. So all in all I am extremely happy with how the semester turned out. Greg also did very well this semester although his happiness was much more subdued than my own, but I could tell that he was still thrilled. So here we are the two of us happy as clams living in Santa Monica and so so so glad that our first year in California and at new schools is over! Till next time...

Monday, June 15, 2009

The Rest of the Story...

Greg and I woke up the next morning and were super excited to go to Sequoia National Park. Our first stop of the day was Lodge Pole in order to buy tickets for a tour of Crystal Cave. Once we purchased these tickets we headed to Moro Rock, which is a ginormous marble rock which has stairs along the side up to the top where you have the most magnificent views. On the way to Moro Rock we had a great time driving through Tunnel Log, it was so early when we drove through I was able to jump out and take pictures. When we drove back by on our way to The Tree Museum there was quite a line of cars waiting to get through. The Tree Museum was fairly uneventful although it did a great job of comparing the Sequoia tree’s height and width to different objects so that kids could attempt to grasp how big they are. Once we finished up at the tree museum we were inspired and decided to go see General Sherman Tree which is the largest tree on earth. This tree is massive but Greg and I agree that we enjoyed General Grant’s Tree much more as it was a much more personal experience…not to mention Greg and I have become recluses and all those people running around with cameras made us nervous! After we finished ooing and ahing at General Sherman’s Tree we realized that we needed to head back to camp in order to get our flashlights for the cave tour. This was kind of a nice little break in the day and we ate lunch (Sloppy Joes) at camp and listened to the creek…then it was time to leave so that we would not miss our tour. I decided to drive the winding road to our cave tour so that I would not get car sick…I cannot say the same for Greg. The drive there was beautiful although the road is for the most part only wide enough for one car so it was a little scary at some points. Once we got to the bottom of the road we were early for our tour but the tour guide was nice enough to let us tag along with an earlier group. The trail down to the cave was pretty steep but I think that it was my favorite hike; there were waterfalls, and bridges, wild flowers and gorgeous canyon views! The tour of Crystal Cave was well done, unfortunately though the cave has been pretty beaten up by past visitors so a lot of its beauty has been tarnished. One of the really neat things about this cave is the fact that it has an underground stream and the cave is part of a marble rock…so anywhere the stream runs you see the most magnificent shining marble! After the cave tour Greg and I started the hike back to the top and let me just say that going down was much more fun then heading up! After catching our breath at the top we decided to go collect some firewood and head back to camp for S’mores and a campfire. Back at camp we eagerly set about making a fire and to our dismay could not get the wood to light, we dumped cooking fuel on it, lighter fluid, tried using a camp newspaper…nothing, and to top it off we ran out of matches! So for dinner we settled on a Hostess Cupcake and went to bed at 7:45pm…my kind of night! In the morning we groggily made our way to the camp store so that we could get some matches, which Greg used to light the camp stove and being the chef that he is make pancakes for breakfast…YUM!!!! After breakfast we loaded up our little car and said good bye to our campsite. We knew the ride home would be long; thankfully Greg decided not to take the 245 home and instead opted for a different route through the parks which was just B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L! Traffic was a nightmare but we made it back safe and sound. So now you know the rest of the story of Greg and Janet’s amazing Memorial Day Weekend!


Tunnel Log...so neat!


Trail going up Moro Rock.


View while hiking up Moro Rock.


The stunning view from Moro Rock...


The largest tree on earth!


Peaking out from behind a tree at camp...


Gate going into the cave!


Marble underneath the sand in an underground stream!


More marble...so amazing!


These were just outside the cave...what an amazing spot!


Greg just outside the cave.


Good bye campsite, we will miss you!


View from the road of Moro Rock. Beautiful!


My husband getting ready to make the long trip back...


Traffic on the way back...why does everyone always leave and come back to L.A. at the same time?

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Memorial Day Weekend Part II

As promised, although it is a day late here is the next installment of our lovely Memorial Day Weekend! Saturday morning Greg and I woke up early eager to start the day. We decided to do Kings Canyon National Park on Saturday and then finish our trip on Sunday by visiting Sequoia National Park. So after waking up early on Saturday Greg set out to make breakfast while I got everything ready for the day. Breakfast was fairly uneventful since Greg had learned and mastered the stove the night before, although we both had the pleasure of sitting in tree sap that has yet to come out of our clothes (any ideas on how to get that stuff out would be greatly appreciated!). Once we had everything safely packed away in the bear box we drove to Kings Canyon National Park and were shocked by how beautiful it was. Our first stop was General Grant’s Tree. This tree was incredible it is insanely tall; I don’t think that I can put into words how incredible this tree is, and the base of this tree is HUGE! Like I said it is impossible to put in to words but I definitely recommend seeing it! Our next stop was the Fallen Monarch which is also a gigantic tree except that it has fallen over, but the neatest part of this tree is that the trail actually goes through the middle! Throughout history it has been used as a shelter for various people who came through the area, and it was amazing to see Greg, who is quite tall standing upright inside of a tree! Next we made our way to Boyden Cave which was quite beautiful, although the hike up to it was strenuous to say the least! Boyden Cave was different from other caves we have visited because it was carved out by a river. Greg and I always enjoy cave tours but I think Boyden Cave is at the top of his list! Once we finished up with the cave tour we stopped by Knapp’s Cabin just to take a few pictures. The history of the cabin is fairly uneventful as it was used for storage during the 1920’s but I did enjoy looking inside it. Once we finished taking pictures we stopped to eat lunch and I must confess I had to apologize to Greg for being slightly cranky during the first part of the day, but thank goodness he was forgiving and we were able to enjoy the rest of the day. We set out on our hike which was beautiful and would have been a large 6 mile loop if the river was not overflowing and thus blocking the path. Oh well; we just turned around and headed back the way we came. We made a few more short stops on our way out of the park one to Roaring River Falls and the other to Grizzly Falls, both were beautiful, although there was quite a few people which made them less relaxing than we had hoped. On the way back to camp after our busy day we decided to stop by the camp store and take a shower…there is nothing in the world like a camp shower; mostly because you are so dirty from all the activities! After our showers we drove past Hume Lake which has very nice cabins and looked very nice, we were told our first night in camp that Hume Lake was where most of the people from Orange County went and after seeing it I agree, let’s just say I don’t know if I consider that camping! After our long day we went back to camp and enjoyed Mac and Cheese and hot dogs! We did have a short fire but were so exhausted we went to bed early again and slept amazingly well.

Here are some of the pictures from our day at Kings Canyon National Park. I will post our last installment of our Memorial Day Weekend on Monday, have a superb weekend!


Greg standing by a group of Sequoia's

General Grant's Tree

The Fallen Monarch.

View from the trail up to Boyden Cave.

Inside of the cave.

Knapp's Cabin

View from the trail...

A deer on the side of the trail.

Can't get there from here.

Great picture of the falls!


Friday, June 5, 2009

Notice

Attention Life With The Mace’s readers:

This notice is to inform you that the blog will begin to be updated regularly again after finals, 06/10/2009! Thank you for your patience during this difficult time.


Janet


"I think I can, I think I can..."


Yup...this could kill me!


My studying nest...


PS: Yes, I really do hold/pull my hair that much when I study!