An Endless Midsummer's Night

Look at me, blogging on the road. Now, had I been able to do this while I was on my grand European Tour I might not be posting about it fifteen months later. But then again, the "road" I'm on only involves a measly three cities and five days, rather than six weeks and eight countries; more importantly I have my laptop on hand, some spare time, and fifteen months ago I was too busy making the most extraordinary memories of a lifetime to be worrying about blogging. Better yet, as I've said before, getting to relive those fantastical moments is the best part of writing. So here, for your enjoyment and my reminiscent mind, is country number six: Sweden. 

We arrived at a dinky airport on the periphery of Stockholm on the 21st of June, the Summer Solstice, and date of the Swedish Midsummer celebration.

Anyone who knows my best friends and I well will not find it surprising that at my adamant demand we flew nearly a thousand miles to partake in a foreign holiday, mostly because you get to make flower crowns. Anyone who doesn't know us may call us a little crazy, which we are, so that's fair. 

October is Over?

I'm never going to be done blogging about my Europe trip, we can just all accept that. I do, however, want at least to document a few of my memories from this semester, which has been a blast, if busy as heck, hence the struggle to complete my blogs. Jewel suggested I throw in some of the here & now and just go back and forth, and you know, why not? Screw OCD and chronological order. 

So here's a goodbye to October, which is already ending, though how that has happened I don't know. It's still 85º in San Diego, since we don't actually have seasons, but when we headed to Julian for the day it finally felt a little bit less like summer. 

Welcome to 2014

Well here it is kids, 2014. Prepare to spend the next three months writing 2013 4. While this scribbly side effect may be a bit unfortunate, you get a whole new year just waiting to be filled with memories, which makes up for a few wasted pieces of paper.

This past year did its job well. I wrote 2012 on all my papers until at least May and tried to fit in as much fun and adventure into 365 days as possible. I would love to post every single photo I have taken this year and relive every single moment. It seems to be a pretty good sign of a great year when you get to the end of it and cannot even begin to narrow down your favorite moments. 

In any case, I've tried. Theoretically (according to the ever wise Miss Jewel), I should have picked twelve photos to sum up my year; but you all know me, never one to keep it short when it comes to pictures. So here's a few more than a few pictures, but still not nearly enough, to sum up some of my favorite memories of 2013:

December Nights

Now it seems a bit cruel to tell ya'll about an event that's already passed, but it was so Christmasy and grand how could I resist? I promise to pop up some other holiday suggestions at the end, just to ensure no one is deprived of any Christmas cheer. 

The first weekend of December, every year, Balboa Park (one of my favorite spots), hosts December Nights. It is the largest community event in San Diego and host around 350,000 people over two nights. Crazy, I know. You might think that with this extreme amount of people the event might feel overwhelming, but it really doesn't. There's a good dose of Christmas cheer in the air, and everyone is generally pretty happy to be there. I went with a whole gaggle of people, and we trekked our way to the park to join in the festivities. 

How (Not) to Build a Gingerbread Bus: A Guide to Failure

It's Christmas time, you're feeling festive, and you stop and think, *gasps* "I should build a gingerbread house!" What says Christmas better than a Gingerbread house? Nothing really. 

Step one, find a building partner. I chose the lovely Miss Jewel; she has the face of one serious Gingerbread-er. 

Step two, come up with a really elaborate design for said house, that really is no longer even going to be a house, but rather a double decker London bus. Because that sounds like a logical plan and not too hard at all. Feel free to draw out an excellent sketch of your dream creation.  

A day on Apple Hill

As much as I adore the nearly ever present sunshine and warmth in San Diego, it tends to really just put a dapper on the whole atmosphere of the holiday season. Is it really fall, nearly winter, if I can still wear sandals? Not really. With this ever present "#socalproblem", I really appreciate going home to enjoy some actual seasons.

After a properly crisp Thanksgiving, I rounded out the end of fall with a trip with the fam-bam to Apple Hill. Located in Northern California, near Placerville, Apple Hill attracts a wide variety of hungry guests looking for some wholesome fun. Being honest, we all know I was basically just in it for the food. However, I also got a pretty good kick of stomping on some crunchy leaves and enjoying the cool crisp air of fall. 

The whole Apple Hill "process" essentially consists of driving from farm to farm and eating various products, mostly apple flavored (they were really clever with the title). There are various farms (some small some large) each offering there own specialty. 

We started with one of the largest, known as Boa Vista Orchards, which, though they have a whole smorgasbord of items, is not my favorite. It tends to be a little over crowded (I really hate queuing) and more commercial then I enjoy. Nevertheless, here's a little peek at the marketplace. 

Giving Thanks

Well Halloween has come and gone, One Direction Day (let's just pretend it's an official holiday) was celebrated properly, and to round out the pre-Christmas holiday season a jolly-good Turkey Day was had by all! 

Now, as I do with all holidays, I take Thanksgiving pretty seriously. I mean what's not too love? You get to see the ol' fam-bam, miss school, and best of all, eat all day! And I did plenty of eating. However, in an attempt to burn calories and support a good cause, Thanksgiving was started with a brisk Turkey Trot 5k run walk. 

The Michael Bratton II Turkey Trot is is a charity run for depression and suicide awareness began by the Bratton family after the loss of their 25 year old son in 2006. This year was the 8th annual run and the cause has steadily grown each year, rounding out at around 2,000 participants this year. It's both a great cause and a good start to a day of being thankful for what you have, especially those people in our lives we love. 

The kids and I were up bright and early for the event. We ran a brief leg of the track and then proceeded to laugh/walk our way through the rest of the event. 

Halloween Haunts

HAPPY HOLIDAY SEASON! 

Oh my, oh my, once October rolls around I go into holiday-mode straight into the New Year. I pretty much spend each month with an agenda of holiday-related activities that must happen for the season to be complete. October is obviously Halloween month (I'd say it's my favorite holiday, but I'll say that about them all). 

While Halloween may not be the same as back in the day (oh golly do I miss trick-or-treating!), it's can still be quite the bash. For a really great October you need three things: pumpkins, a good scare, and an excessive & unreasonable amount of candy corn. Having a really awesome costume doesn't hurt the festivities either, but we'll get to that. 

The best part of this October was that it was chalk full of great people to share it with. Brooke even made the trek all the way from Nor Cal for some ever-traditional pumpkin carving.