Recharging

Mags and Nora Marie Carlson, beautiful daughter to Katie and Brian.

This year of travel has surprised us with the amount of time spent with family.  By the end of the year we will have spent about 6 months living with family.  We are blessed by their support, and will be so happy to start our own home.

Though all will miss Grandma Lois, it was nice to see extended family and work together to clean her home in Virgina.  Stu and I now have storage units bi-coastal, just waiting for us to select a place to move to.

Niece Anna and Cousin Becca

4 year old Anna rests for a brief moment between twirling, running, jumping, yelling and playing with her little brother.

Lucas eats a muffin

The last few months progressed slowly with my shoulder.  Healing comes in waves with me feeling so great that I over do it, and then soreness for a while.  I’m so happy to not have to wear a sling anymore and be able to move my arm.  I’m still not allowed to carry heavy things beyond a cup of tea and no weight bearing.  I can’t wait til I’m strong enough to get on a bike again, or just lean on my L arm!

I can hoop sans sling!  Can’t wait til my range of motion gets improves so I can do more tricks.

Even though we’ve been mostly in Irvine, we still have had a few get-aways.

We spent a week in Seattle attending the National Cooperative Business Association Annual Conference on Scholarship!  We were known as Crashers (as in young people crashing the conference of older business folks).   I’m front and center on the scholarship recipient page.    Not only did we have the opportunity to hear stimulating sessions regarding cooperative business development, governance, growth, planning and member engagement, we met cream of the crop cooperators from around the country.  The meals and networking events were phenomenal, especially the five course meal with wine pairings hosted by the Seattle Chefs Collaborative all locally sourced. We left feeling inspired and empowered to make progress on our businesses.

The Crashers

Seattle at dusk

Stu on the tracks in Del mar

We are enjoying the benefits of warm sunny  So Cal. We looked at some real estate to see what’s available and visited a farm in Carlsbad.  We also attended a worker cooperative incubator workshop at the LA Eco-Village.  We love to see how the OCCUPY movement has grown up and now provides educational programs that promote democracy and create vehicles for change.

Uncle Happy Farmer with Peanuts on his 1 acre organic farm in Carlsbad.  This 70 year old farmer plants mostly Taiwanese and valuable fruits and vegetables.

Cherimoya

Taiwanese Bell Fruit

Dragon Fruit. These 2+lb fruits sell for $12/lb at Whole Foods.  The bright fuchsia color looks so much brighter in person.

He has a sizable flock of chicken and geese to eat weeds, bugs, and fertilize the soil.  Life is so good a wild male mallard duck joined in.  Lots of ladies, fresh air, plentiful food and water–now that’s the life!

This sculpture garden in Kit Carlson State park is stunning. Millions of semi-precious stones, crystals, and glass pieces covering everything. I brought my niece, nephew, and their cousins here when they were young kids. Everyone had a blast running around a playing games in the art.

Stu at Queen Califia’s Magical Circle, Escondido

We check out Irvine Global Village Festival, which is a big food and cultural performance festival at Irvine City Hall.

Irish/Scottish folk band

Bolivian Dance troupe

The Indigenous Bolivian dancers work up a sweat with their intricate rhythms.

We spent a relaxing weekend in Del Mar, CA to celebrate Lisa Satin’s birthday.  We are so lucky to have such good friends and beautiful beaches close by.

Birthday girl rakes in the dough while Marrit loses.  Just kidding, we were playing Rummy, eveybody wins!

Sangria, pork belly sandwich, plantain chips, and spinach salad.

Ann, Jeremy, Lisa, Derrick, Mags, Stu, Hiroko, Tram, Charlie, and Maarit

Sunset as enjoyed from hot tub.

I had the fortune of hanging out with Renee, who gives the most amazing massages.  If you are in LA, don’t miss out on her therapeutic  healing touch.  She works as a massage therapist at the Crescent Heights and 3rd St. Healing Hands Wellness Center. If I could, I would get massages from her every week.

We stumble on to Ernest E. Debbs Regional Park, with Audobon Society Center on a local cafe worker recommendation.

We find a tree swing

and climb trees.

The last week or two, we have been scrambling to get business and trip planning before we leave again this Saturday.  We take the train cross-county to New York, visiting East Coast family, farms, and cities we might move to.  We can’t wait to check out Detroit and the Northeast!

Downtown LA