Leaving California, Headed for Home

At Sister’s House in Citrus Heights, CA

We entered California four months and 15 days ago for our yearly visit.  This year, besides visiting with family in the Sacramento area, we visited the Santa Cruz, Yosemite, Kings Canyon, Alabama Hills, Carson City, and Truckee areas, along with a six week trip up in the Northwest portion of California, and Southwest portion of Oregon.  We celebrated Dad’s 90th birthday, Mom’s 88th birthday, both of their 70th anniversary, and the marriage of my oldest son Michael to his lovely bride Anna.  Tomorrow morning we head out…at this time tomorrow we will be somewhere in Nevada along I-80 headed to the Salt Lake City area to visit with my daughter Stephanie.  It has been a wonderful 4 1/2 months here…despite the hot hot hot weather, and the fires which are a yearly occurrence here in the west.  The Sacramento and San Joaquin Valleys have always filled with smoke…accounts of early settlers talk about smoke layers due to winter fires used to keep people warm to wildfires which broke out from what is believed to be lightning strikes.  As a kid, I remember the heavy smoke from the burning of the dry rice straw left over from harvest each year on the western side of the Sacramento River, a practice which is less common now days.  And I remember many large wildfires, some in the Sierra Nevada Mountains and lower foothills, which others were in Southern California or along the Coastal Ranges.  It is a part of living in the west.

    

Sacramento is a wonderful place for flowers.  It is the Camellia Capital of the World…just ask the Camellia Society of Sacramento.  They use to have a Camellia Festival in late February or early March--which ran from 1955 to 1993 which featured a debutante ball, princesses and a parade with flower-covered floats.  I think in 4th grade we had to make a Camellia Poster as part of a city-wide contest to help promote the event.  My posters were only good enough for the trash can…  I don’t know why they stopped the huge festivities…but they do still have a yearly Camellia Show, this year was the 94th year, still held by the Sacramento Camellia Society.  Not sure, but I think the parade probably stopped due to the Naked Ladies.  All I know is that the Naked Ladies appeared again yesterday, and we are headed out tomorrow!

Naked Ladies are also known as Belladonna Lilies…and they appear each year in Sandy and Arny’s backyard.  In the spring they appear as a green, leafy plant, which lasts for 4-8 weeks before they seem to die off.  Then in July or August a single stem starts to sprout upward…and lily opens up.  In the picture above, the short ones will be as tall as the lily that is open in just a few days.  The lilies will last for a few days, then die off.  It is an amazing show…  I am glad we were able to see a few of them bloom before we leave.

     

These two fur kids are not going to be happy campers tomorrow…especially the one of the left.  Bubba (upper left) absolutely LOVES being at Sandy and Arny’s house.  Arny is Bubba’s best friend…and outside of our trip to Oregon for six weeks, and the three weeks we were sightseeing California, he has been here at their house for the past year.  However, we were here for all but three months of that time…this time we will be gone for 7 or 8 months…so Bubba is coming along with us.  Boy, he is going to be one depressed dog for a number of days…perhaps a couple of weeks…but he always adjusts to it.  We just hope that at 15 years of age, he has a few more visits back to see his buddy Uncle Arny, and also Aunt Sandy.  Skruffy, on the other hand, is fine as long as she is with me or with Marcia.  But she too LOVES Sandy and Arny’s house…the daily small treats of fried pork that I cook up and give them to hand out twice a day, the squirrels, the lawn, being in Sandy’s lap every now and then…she too will miss them.

  

For us it is a two-sided sword.  We have had some meals with mom and dad, including finding a great breakfast/lunch place called Annie’s right near to their Assisted Living facility.  We LOVE visiting family out here, we LOVE staying in Sandy and Arny’s backyard when we are here, we LOVE the sights we can explore getting here, short trips we take while here, and on the trip home.  We also LOVE our friends and family who don’t live here…and we miss our friends and family back home.  Next year my youngest son Ryan is graduating from Chiropractic School in the Kansas City area in April…and our plans will be to return to California sometime after that.  When, How Long we will stay is all up in the air for now.  But the Lord willing, we will return, and seeing family out here is always a wonderful thing.

Back to the map…this is our proposed route.  It will take us through Salt Lake to see Stephanie, through Kansas City to see Ryan, Aunt Vera and other relatives in the area, then down to Arkansas, and finally back to Florida.  I am not going to see my doctor until next March or early April since we pretty much will be going through Arkansas again on our way to Ryan’s graduation.  We decided to NOT go through the Chicago area, probably saving that for next spring.  Marcia’s driver’s license needs to be renewed in September, and they will require her to take a vision exam…otherwise we could do it over the Internet.  We want to take a bit of time going through the northern portion of Colorado, so we are not ready to set time periods for our Kansas City or Arkansas Visits as of now.

Six Week Trip to Southern Oregon + a Wedding

At Sister’s House in Citrus Heights, CA

So we came to California this year, as we have each year since 2012, to visit family.  This year, there have been a few special events that went along with it…dad’s 90th birthday, mom’s 88th birthday, and mom and dad’s 70th wedding anniversary…all of which have taken place.  In July, there is another special event, my oldest son Michael is getting married to his longtime girlfriend Anna.  That takes place west of Santa Rosa near the end of July…so we have nearly six weeks from now until then.  This weekend Arny and Sandy, at the urging of my sister Patti and myself, and headed out for the weekend…destination “Who Cares, because we are GETTING AWAY for the first time in many, many months”.  Patti, Marcia and I will be taking care of Arny’s mother Euleda.  Monday will be laundry day, packing day, and on Tuesday we are headed northwest back to southwestern Oregon.

Our first stop Tuesday night will be at a National Forest campground along the Trinity River in what we think will be in a cool location…at least we “hope” that is where we can stay because it is a first come, first serve campground.  I hope to pull in there around 3 pm, no later than 4 pm…if it is full, there are some other alternatives westward, but I don’t think we will have any problems.  By-the-way…the little balloons on the map are different colors…blue for campgrounds, gold for gas stations, black for dump stations, red for laundromats, purple for campgrounds that we will use more than once, grey for possible stop at a commercial campground in Gold Beach, and a dark purple for wedding locations.  I put down the price of campgrounds, dates we will probably stay, etc, and furnish a link to Marcia so she has a map and agenda too.  It works for us.

However, our plans are made of “Jello”, they can easily change and conform to the situation at hand.  We MUST get into a park a week before the 4th of July so that we are sure to have a spot over this very busy weekend.  Nearly all of the places we are planning to stay at are ones we stayed at last year, except for this first stop, and the last stop where we have a commercial RV park near the wedding venue.  We really enjoyed our trip to southwest Oregon last year, and look forward to visiting the area again this year…only difference, we will have our car with us this time.

   

The average high in Sacramento for July and August is around 94 degrees.  Nine of the ten hottest days in Sacramento recorded history have been in July…but 100 degrees can be reached on any given day in Sacramento from May to October.  So when we come back in late July, it most likely will only be for around two weeks.  Then we head back east, with a lot of time spent in Colorado.  That trip will be on another map, and in another blog.  And we are lucky, local temps will be under 90 until Monday, and we will be out of the valley on Tuesday morning when temps are forecasted to by 100 degrees by 4 pm.  

Ninety Years Old

At Sister’s House in Citrus Heights

   

Both mom and dad have birthdays in April…dad’s was on Sunday, an April Fools baby.

To celebrate the occasion, we thought “wild turkey” would be in order…but alas, them critters are hard to catch….so….

Black Angus was our secondary choice.  Saturday late afternoon, before they are too busy, those children and spouses who were able to attend, took dad there for his favorite…Prime Rib.  Pictured left to right are Marcia, sister Patti, sister Sandy, Arny (behind Sandy), mom, dad, Rochelle (Roger’s wife) and just out of the picture to the right, brother Roger. 

    

On Sunday we gathered again for an Easter – April Fools – Birthday dinner.  Easter has fallen on Dad’s birthday only four times in his lifetime, 1934, 1945, 1956, and 2018…and will do so again in 2029, but dad says he does not want to be around ‘that’ long…which is understandable. 

We asked permission from the Fire Department to put 90 candles on the cake…but they said ‘no way’.  I think there are 90 sprinkles on it instead…

    

In the upper left picture are dad’s brother’s two children who were able to attend, Richard (far left) and Barbara (next to Richard), along with Richard’s wife Marci, and Roger’s wife Rochelle.  Barbara lives in Italy, and I had not seen her for many years, and it was the first time she had met my wife Marcia.  In the upper right picture is my son Michael (far right behind dad) and his wife to be Anna (July wedding) to the left of Michael (his right, picture left).  In the bottom picture is Arny’s mother Euleda (left) along with my mom and sister Patti.

Above, Sandy and Arny, whose home we all gathered at, enjoy talking to Marci and Richard, who live in the Santa Cruz area…and Marcia and I plan to go over to their place in early May for a few days as part of our May excursion. 

   

And now that I got these two in the blog, I think I got a picture of everyone, although Roger only got his arm in a picture.

When I took mom and dad home, mom asked me to get a picture of their front door…the Independent Living Facility had decorated it for Dad’s birthday…so sweet of them. 

Unfortunately, Sunday also brought with it some sad news.  Marcia’s cousin, through her first husband, Sophie, passed away.  The above picture is from October 2016.  Every year we have driven through Fort Smith to visit with Sophie, who was 95 years old.  She will be missed, but we know she is no longer in any pain, and with our Lord.  Prayers to her family and friends who are mourning her loss.  We still plan to stop in Fort Smith to see her son Jim and wife Pat later this summer/fall.

Kings Game Despite Protests

In Citrus Heights at Sister’s House

Because of a very unfortunate police shooting in South Sacramento (where I grew up), two times the Sacramento Kings played home games, and two times protestors shut down the entrance to the game only allowing around 2,000 people into the game instead of the normal 17,000+ they see at home games.  Now remember, the reason we quickly drove from Florida to California, 3,000 miles in 140 hours, which included six nights of sleep, was so that Sandy and Arny could attend the Kings Game on Thursday night (29th) that sister Patti had arranged for them, along with the neighbor who bought the house mom and dad use to live in next door to Sandy and Arny.  This “neighbor” is named Eric, is around 30 years old, and use to mow Arny’s yard when he was a lad…you see, his mom lives next door to where mom and dad had once lived…so now Eric and his wife live next door to his mom.

In order to be sure that they would ‘get into the game’, they decided to be there when the doors opened….which is normally 5:30.  Well, LOTS of people had the same idea…and Sacramento had full security to assure that the doors would not be blocked by any protestors.  The funeral was this same day, but the family asked protestors to not block streets of the staduim, so it worked out well.  And KCRA News had full news coverage, and the above picture was part of their ‘security’ news coverage.  And guess what?

There they were in the background of that first picture…you can see Eric’s #10 Kings Shirt, and all you can make out of Arny is the bald spot on the back of his head…and Patti always ducks out of pictures!

Anyway, they had a great time.  The Kings lost, but it came down to the wire.  They got home at 10, and Euleda (Arny’s mother) was awake…but she had two good sleep periods between 7 and 10, but coughing wakes her up a few times each night.  No, she does not have a cold…the doctor said that it is just a congestion in her throat that builds up, she coughs, it is gone for awhile.

As for us…we are recovered from the long trip, and everyone is back into the groove of things here in Citrus Heights.  WELL, almost into the groove of things.  You see, Sandy works just 2 blocks from the Kings Stadium…so on Thursday she just stayed downtown.  Patti came and picked up Arny and Eric, they left at 4:30.  By 5:15 they were all inside the stadium.  They only forgot ONE THING….no one game Bubba and Skruffy their afternoon treats that Sandy normally gives at 4 pm when she gets home from work.  Well…they survived….

Tonight (Saturday) we are having dinner at Black Angus for dad’s 90th birthday.  Tomorrow, we are having lots of people over at Arny and Sandy’s for a birthday party.  I’ll try to get lots of pictures….

Week One with Family – Citrus Heights, Ca

When I think of Citrus Heights, or the surrounding towns/communities of Fair Oaks, Orangevale, Carmichael, Roseville, West Sacramento, Elk Grove, even Folsom…I just consider it all part of Sacramento.  Having been raised and lived in the area for the first 30+ years of my life, and having had addresses or associations in most of these communities, it is just how I see it.  And when I think of Sacramento, there are many landmarks which come to mind…the Capital, the new arena, the Sacramento and/or American River, Sutter’s Fort, Old Sacramento Folsom Dam…even the iconic Folsom Prison…but most of all, I think of the Tower Bridge.  The Tower Bridge spans across the Sacramento River, and opened to traffic in 1935.  It has not always been gold…that feature coming in 1976 as part of a Bicentennial project aimed at matching the gold in the dome of the Capital Building nearby.  The word “Tower” has been very important in the 20th Century Sacramento…Tower Theater, Tower Cafe, Capital Towers Apartments, and the most famous...Tower Records (founded in Sacramento in 1960)…just to name a few.  We plan to be here through July 11th, but we will be back sometime in September and will be here (except for a few short trips) through Christmas. 

Arriving a week ago, we did attend Aunt Rosie’s Celebration of Life on Saturday down in Oakdale.  When the minister ask people to say on word about Rosie, the three most common words were kindness, sweetness, and loving.  Yep, that sure was Aunt Rosie.   It was nice to see a few cousins who were there, one of whom I had not seen since the early 1980’s.  Uncle Jim and Aunt Mary (whom we have visited and written about before) were there, along with my mom and dad…four the last five of the children and their spouses of my maternal Grandmother. 

We also took mom and dad out to dinner last Friday, took dad to a few doctor appointments yesterday, got a few things done on the motorhome, got a huge laundry mess taken care of, and we have sweated out about 25 pounds from the heat…although the last few days have not been “too bad”, which is kind of like saying to a young man on a blind date, “She is not as ugly as I thought she would be….”, or to the young girl on the same date, “He is not as much of a dork as I thought he was…”

Arny’s mom, who is in her early 90’s, is doing pretty well.  I watched her last night while Sandy and Arny went to dinner…an easy task since she was already in bed for the night.  I went in shortly after they left and said, “Hello my lady…do you remember who I am?”  (Of course, she has seen me a number times this past week, but at this age you want to reinforce everything all the time.)  “Yes.” she says.  “What is my name?” I ask.  “Umm…umm…”  Seeing her bit of confusion I said, “I will make it easy on you….am I Roger of David?”   “DAVID” she replies, with a big old smile….   We sure do love that lady…

Back Among Family, Citrus Heights, CA

Pulled out of Truckee at 7:30 and into my sister's backyard by 10 this morning...easy drive from 6,000 feet, up to 7,200 feet and then all the way down to near sea level.  To say the dogs, especially Bubba, were overjoyed is an under statement.  

Unloaded the car, and took it to get an oil change and a good wash...$39 combined plus tax!  Took mom and dad to Black Angus for dinner, and tomorrow we drive to Oakdale for Aunt Rosie's Celebration of Life.

Nice to be back "home", as this area was my home for 30 years...but this valley heat!!!  YUCK!

(Photo and post done by Kindle Fire...just because I was outside melting.....)