365: Mini Mudslide

And I don't mean the yummy drink.

It rained like WHOA last night. It actually woke me up at one point. No thunder, no lightening, no hail...just loud ass rain. I laid there for a while hoping that the steep canyon behind our house wouldn't decide to move it, move it.

Today I counted 15 "waterfalls" on my 2 mile trip up to the highway. Some were in dry run off areas and some were just randomly popping out of the canyon walls. When I came home this evening most of them were still running...lighter flow but still running.

On the canyon wall on the way up our driveway there was a mini-mudslide. It's about 20 feet across by 20 feet high. Let's hope this is the worst slide we get around here! We have several more days ahead of rain!

365: LaRocca Winery

(click to enlarge the rad panorama)

We spent a couple of hours at LaRocca Winery today. Ange discovered it while surfing the 'net while I was in Denver & made a tasting appointment for today. It's only a couple of miles from our house and was the first organic winery in the state of California! For $10 we got an extensive & informative tour, 8 wine tastings (3 white, 5 red), and an all around great time. Our tour guide was the owner of the winery! It's a small, family run operation. It was a gorgeous winery and of course we loved all the green and organic parts even more! It's my new favorite wine & winery! If you come and visit us, this will definitely be on the list of things to do!

365: Cutie Little Post Office

Thought I'd snap a picture of the cute little post office that houses our mailbox! Just a little small town place where people are friendly and the mail woman knows us by sight. If you've ever sent us anything (or are thinking about it) this is where we get it! Ta da!

365: FREAKING MUSHROOMS!

There are tons of wild mushrooms growing in the canyon. There are at least three different species that grow in our gravel alone. I've seen two or three others growing out in our yard too. I'm totally a mushroom lover--as long as I know what they are (for 100% sure) and that they aren't either some poisonous killer mushroom or some trippy psychedelic mushroom. However all the ones growing around our house are suspect. So they piss me off continually every time they pop up. I don't want the dogs to eat them so I'm constantly digging them up and flinging them in the garbage. I just wish they'd stay away!

365: So in Love

We decided to do one of our favorite things on our anniversary: geocaching! We were 10 for 10! Score! We also saw some really awesome sights and had lots of giggles. Best. Day. Ever.

365: Mountains

This picture doesn't do any justice to the beautiful view that we are (sometimes) treated to on our way into Chico each day. The mountains look 10 times bigger and more beautiful with your naked eye. The only thing that ruins the view are smoggy or foggy days. As the fall settled in (and we've not yet hit the winter rains) we seem to have less of those days so it's all picturesque days for now!

365: FROST!

EEP! We woke up this morning and there was FROST on the grass on the hill behind the house! It wasn't anywhere else (this is the shadiest part of the house) but STILL! It was enough to make me die a little on the inside. Allegedly there's a cold front moving down from Canada and it's supposed to be even chillier tomorrow. The high in Forest Ranch is only 45! I guess this is good considering we'll be in Indiana in exactly two weeks. Help us grow some hair on our chests or something...

365: Miss Organization

A good friend wrote me an email today and called me "Ms. Organization" which I thought was funny and I was sitting here amongst my notes related to the bear incident I thought about how I best manage stress, particularly related to things I have little control over, and it really is about me being methodical and organizing the shit out of anything I CAN control that makes me feel better. My sliding glass door measurements might not stop a bear from coming in but dammit they make me feel a little braver!

365: Fog

We noticed last week that the fog is getting thicker and denser as we roll into winter here in Northern California. Chico sits in the valley between two giant mountain ranges. We're also upwind from San Francisco and Sacramento so anything that rolls in from the bay rolls into our valley and sits. Chico is very clean & green but unfortunately we suffer from the bigger city's pollution during the summer as it rolls on up. Looks like we get their fog too. The weirdest part is that it hovers over Chico and we live just far enough up the mountain to not get much of it at all. The past two days it has been blazingly sunny when we leave our house and as soon as we start our descent into Chico it's like we're flying through a ton of clouds. It usually clears up midday but returns for the drive home. I don't mind fog, and I surely love it more than snow, so if this is what winter is like around here, I'll take it!

(Thanks for snapping the picture while I drove babe!)

365: Beautiful View

We spent several hours in Chico today at the Harvest Feast sponsored by Stonewall Alliance Chico (Ange's work). We caught the sunset as we were coming home and some pretty valley fog to boot! How can you not love coming home to this?!?!

365: Heavy

The evening sky tonight was lovely. It felt like the clouds were heavy and sagging and ready to unleash a downfall at any moment. But they didn't. We love the way the clouds cling to the top of the canyon. It's a lovely view from down here. You should come and visit sometime and see for yourself.

365: Gee You're a Fun Guy

That's the punch line to one of my dad's favorite jokes. Every time I see mold or mushrooms in the wild I think of that. Speaking of mold or something...this nasty old thing is growing off a stump in our meadow. It's huge! We have no idea what it is. We're just going to let it grow and see if it grows legs or something.

365: This Rural

This is how far out we live from our far north town in very Northern California. So far that we have a mobile RV for a vet office. Luckily we "go to town" to see our vet. We don't have to go to the parking lot behind the trash bins at the country market.