Catch Up Time!

Oh here it is March! and I haven't written a word since last August.  It's not that I haven't had anything to write about, it's just I either haven't been 'in the mood' or haven't had the time.  I will fill myself in here.  Following the pictures I'll discuss some of the adventures!
Last year I had the great fortune of finding someone to go hiking with, my Path Pal, Terri. 
She and I hunted down and discovered a lot of fun places to put one foot down in front of the other; the Benham Falls trail; a good 7 or 8 mile round trip with a few water falls, "hiking" up to the  Dee Wright Observatory with it's paved lava trail to the "black castle" at the top of McKenzie pass in the snow storm and driving back down 3 miles to a beautiful place to hike in the sunshine.
That day we walked a good five miles round trip with a backpack snack of
hot chocolate and crackers/cookies.  On the return we stopped in Sisters and did some Christmas spending in the quaint touristy shops and topped that off with a nice hamburger. 


Shortly after that Kevin and I found a day that was fairly warm (for October) to go boulder hunting.  We invited Mike along as well, figured he'd be pretty good at rolling one or two down for us.  After climbing around our favorite rocky knob for a few hours, we sat down for lunch; navy beans and ham with buttered french bread.  It was the perfect gnosh food for the time.  Putzing around the area, Mike found an old manzanita branch that reminded him of "a Charlie Brown Christmas tree".  I picked it up and took that home along with our 500 pounds of new statue rocks.   Come Christmas time, Kevin cleaned it up and painted it white, I put it in a Christmas paper wrapped coffee can with pretty pebbles, bought two Christmas ornaments and we gave that to him for Christmas.

Christmas 2012 the whole family was invited to spend it together in Portland with mom and dad.  Mike had a new job so he couldn't go but was sending along his present for us to deliver.  Once again the snows came and mom wasn't feeling that well so we celebrated Christmas a week later with Sara and her family and Mike at our house. 


It would have been fun to be altogether in Portland, but you do what you can with what you are given.  I was happy to have them all at my house to share a beautiful meal, open presents and spend a day sledding and playing in the snow.
A wonderful end to a pretty good year.

December 21st was the last day I was able to hike since I've been dealing with plantar fasciitis ever since.

Tomorrow, March 2nd, Terri and I will do a hike; I have all my shoe inserts and gel pads so I'm good to go.  Gotta get out there!!