The Weekly Ramble 3/30/24

Hello and happy Easter weekend! It’s been rainy here most of the day with more coming tomorrow, but we had a beautiful week with great weather.

You’ll remember that last week I was planning a big focaccia feed at our Open Game Night. I am pleased to say that the grape and goat cheese focaccia was AMAZING. Seriously, so good.

I ended up making that combo on half my pizza for pizza night and found I liked it better than my regular goat cheese pizza. Just wow!

This past week the girls had the week off school so I asked them for their top three things they wanted to do. Their lists included hiking, farmer’s market, the beach, and a lunch out. The week went by so quickly!

One of the days Bryan took off from work and we drove out to the Anza-Borrego Desert. We’d heard that the wildflowers are amazing in the spring. For 15 years we’ve missed going to see it.

Bryan and I both wondered if it would be as “amazing” as folks said, but the girls were up for the long drive regardless. What was amazing were the metal sculptures at Galleta Meadows.

We checked the hiking box on the girls’ wishlist in the desert, ending the outing with lunch at Heroes. Remember when we bought a dozen chairs from them 15 years ago when it was under different ownership?

It was wild to see that they still have the same style of chairs, and we finally got ours all repainted!

Eating out is expensive these days, so we haven’t done it very often other than date nights. I had packed food for a picnic, just in case we didn’t have options. But, the drive to Julian is so far that we don’t make it to Heroes. So, in the end splitting a pizza and Caesar salad for the four of us was just right.

We ended up doing a lot of eating out over this spring break, but I consider it a bit of a staycation.

On Thursday, the girls and I walked the farmer’s market where we tried empanadas from a local stand (super yum!) and the girls got pastries from our local French bakery that also has a stand at the market.

The library had a book sale where I bought back one of the books I donated to them in the fall when we moved. #irony I also found other books that were once ours, but held off purchasing those, even though they were marked down to a dollar each.

After the market, we cruised down the coast to Baba Coffee. Bryan and I go there often as they have one of the best almond croissants in the North County. The girls had never been, so we got coffees (cheaper than Starbucks!) and split a croissant.

We ended the day with lunch at Chick-fil-A where they ran into all kinds of friends from church. We topped off Thursday with an early Pizza Night as a way to enter the long holiday weekend.

Bryan already has Monday off in honor of Cesar Chavez, and he took Friday off so we could have a vacation day. While the quickest way through San Diego county is the freeways, with the convertible, we take the side roads.

We stopped at different spots along the way to walk and take in the sites. It’s remarkable HOW MANY independent coffee shops there are around here. Dang!

After walking tours of both Solana Beach and Liberty Station, we grabbed lunch at La Perla. (I told you we met our dining out quota for the year!) I found La Perla randomly from google, and it turned out to be a winner. I asked Aaron who took our order what his favorite was and he said the King Kong Burrito, a carne asada/chile relleno burrito with pico and guacamole. It was amazing!

Bryan and I ended the day at Cabrillo National Monument. I was given an America the Beautiful pass last year and it expires in April, so it was great to use it again before it’s done for.

Today I’ve been racing around doing all the things (or trying to) that didn’t get done during the week while we were out having adventures. It’s been a rough time and I’m not at all caught up. I’m honestly a little bleary eyed from it all.

What I did accomplish, though, was building out the Life as Mom Pinterest account.

For years I had one Pinterest account for both blogs, but I’m learning more about how the modern Pinterest platform works and the word on the street is that each site, especially since they have different topics, should have its own. If you use Pinterest, I’d love a follow here and, of course, here.

The sun just popped out after a day of hiding away and it looks so nice and cheerful out there. We’re due for more rain tomorrow.

The boys have friends over tonight to play Magic in the garage and FishChick15 and I are finishing up The Detectorists. She never watched it with us the first time around, so it’s a rewatch for me — and I still love it! So good, and I still catch jokes I didn’t notice before.

Alrighty then, I promised my girl I’d be done at 5 and here I am, an hour late. I hope you have a great Easter. I’d love for you to leave a comment and let me know how you are and what you’ve been doing with your spring days.