I love my job!

Walking up to the front door

 I came to the stunning conclusion today that I love my job! My title is SAHW.... translation you say.... "Stay At Home Wife". For all of you who wondered if I would get bored "not working"- I am working very hard and loving it. I actually have time to get projects done around the house, garden, cook, and take care of Dave :).  When I was working part time I never felt like I had time to get everything done and as Dave became busier in his job I tried to do even more. Well, now I have time to whip this house and yard in order. I also love Sunday nights because I know I don't have to get up at 3:50 AM the next morning. I have time and more patience and I happily tell Dave that yes I think he should go golfing. He is working very hard and deserves to have some play time.
  I thought I would take you on a tour of our yard. There are a lot of pictures and this isn't even everything in the yard! So here goes....

Our beautiful fountain that calls you to sit down and relax!

Approaching our courtyard 

A favorite place to sit for lunch to bask in the sun and listen to the fountain

Rose trellis gate at the far end of our front yard

"Bottlebrush" bushes along our sidewalk

Looking down at our house from the upper flower bed. FYI- I found out you need to be part mountain goat to walk on that slope to weed it! The dead looking tree to the right is 1 of 5 trees called "Liquid Amber"- they turn a brilliant red in the Fall and shed their leaves. So we will have Fall here!

Familiar faces that won't get planted next year- they need too much water

Love all these in our yard!

One of 13 palm trees of various types that we now own.

California pepper tree I believe

What I see from the kitchen window

I call this the "Daisy Tree"

The "daisies"

Grapefruit

Lemon waiting to ripen. We also have an orange, tangerine, and figtree

The baby fig tree

Even pine cones!

I recognize these flowers- geraniums grow like weeds- often on the road banks

Yucca

Smells like an evergreen but has little purple flowers

That was just a sampling of our yard. You gardeners are excited and the rest of you fell asleep about 3 pictures into the tour. I have been adding plants already: Mandeville, Jasmine, and 3 huge flats of ice plant. Dave asks me immediately, "How much water do they need?" And my frugal self is pleased to answer, " They are succulents and very drought tolerant. " So on we go with this CA life!

I have surfaced from the chaos!!!

I had to laugh when I was unpacking my spreaders... from snowmen to  tropical. Just like me!

   I am back... that 2 week hiatus form the blogging world was due to extreme fatigue from 18 hour days. I believe I am in CA and this house for life because I DO NOT WANT TO MOVE AGAIN!
  We closed on the house on March 7th and moved in on the 9th. The nice guys with the huge van brought all of our stuff from Wisconsin and carried it all in our new home. The nice guys also put together all the many items they had disassembled for the long journey including but not limited to: dining room table, all the end tables, bar stools, floor fan, bikes, Dave's fancy desk.... I have to say the only things that have small issues now are the 2 floor lamps that they weren't able to take apart and the journey was hard on them. My fix it guy, Dave, took care of the issues. The nice guys did not help me figure out where to put all the stuff in a new house without a basement! They spell words differently out here.... basement is spelled g-a-r-a-g-e. You may laugh but until you try to go from a house with a full basement to a house without you have no idea! Now I know why Dave was insistent on a 3 car garage. I also understand why there are so many storage businesses here. My friend Jane was the greatest help since she was Midwestern born and had to cram 5 people's stuff into their CA home when her hubby ( Linda D.'s older brother who she loves dearly most of the time!) was transferred here.  Jane kindly explained that I could not fill 2 shelves in my cupboards with cookbooks unless I wanted my dishes down the hall by the bedrooms! So I chose my most used and stashed the rest in the hallway space.  It is a bit amusing to see what is in the sitting room's built-in bookcase lower cabinet.... games, serving platters and tupperware!  Whatever works! I must brag about said garage... everything is put away in a cabinet or on shelves and all the boxes are gone. Not bad for being here 1 week. We have a corner on Rubbermaid bins.

The kitchen looked like this for about 5 days. Those dish pack boxes had reams of paper in them.   While unpacking them I was thinking longingly of our 1 bedroom apt in Carlsbad with the 4 plates, 4 bowls, 4 mugs, etc.  The simple life! Saturday brought with it lots of friends to welcome us. First came that lovely family ( Dave and Jeannie and  their adorable children that live nearby bearing homemade cinnamon rolls.  Next came our friends Duane and Verla bearing citrus and avocado offerings and their guests from ND. Then Ross and Marilyn and clan arrived bearing sweet breads. Finally, my lifesaver Jane came and brought us lunch and stayed to unpack boxes and give much needed advice.

I heard the mower start and in less than 15 minutes Dave was done mowing our grass.  Green grass is great but we are glad that most of our 0.6 acre is in stone. Water is precious here. Today it is really raining which is like watching $$$ fall from the sky. Our water bill will be less!

This is a common sight- iceplant grows in mounds and as groundcover. The slopes are ablaze in magenta

Myrtle Creek Nursery- heaven in earth! I only bought 6 plants- not bad. Very tempting and only 3 miles away.  The jasmine will be awesome on our fence!

Our neighborhood.

Driving down the road to our house

And we are home. More pics to follow in future posts

We did it! 2 hours at the DMV and $$- we are registered CA drivers. Well all for now- Dave is waiting- we have a date for pizza with IA State basketball game. 

Relatives, friends, sunsets and dolphins....

 

Although I am excited about having a permanent residence again ( house closing this week), I will miss living 2 miles from the ocean.  Some days I walk my 3-4 mile route along the beach in the morning and then go again at sunset with Dave. It is such a hardship to walk along the ocean in the brilliant sunshine!  Friday we tried a new beach- Oceanside. This pelican was strutting and posing like a pro!

Oceanside pier with Ruby's Diner at the far end. It is a 50's style diner . We had coffee and hot cocoa while gazing over the ocean.

    Saturday morning we took our 1 1/2 hour hike to the top of the world and then cancelled out all that calorie burning.....

 Our friend Dave P. told Dave about Peterson's Donut Corner in Escondido. It is a little take out joint with the most amazing donuts. Cake donuts, raised donuts, bear claws, vienna cream, cherry turnovers, muffins, cinnamon rolls, cream cheese pockets, maple glazed.... You get the idea!

Saturday evening we had dinner at Alan and Fe's home. Alan is Dave's first cousin who he has not seen since the 1970's! A wonderful couple who welcomed us warmly and fed us a delicious meal! 

And we met their son Alan Jr who is a California Highway Patrolman. Always good to be related to someone in law enforcement....

These are my new good buddies: Kenny, Kaitlyn, and Katrina ( girls are twins) . We were at their house for  meeting and stayed for lunch. They live 6 minutes from our Fallbrook house. They have an adorable little sister who wasn't sitting still long enough for photos!

My lap was in high demand as I read books to them and the girls read books to me.   Luckily that moving van has lots of books and toys for just such visitors to our new home.

We finished off the weekend with a beach walk at sunset while watching dolphins right off shore!