Sands and Sunrises

 Sand, yes that is a color


Please bear with me while I explain what I have been up to.


On Christmas Day I flew with my family to Las Vegas and we drove to Death Valley

When we left Las Vegas we had to drive for 2 hours through a desert with no sign of civilization except for some correctional facility in the Middle of Nowhere, Nevada.

Have you ever been to

Photo courtesy of MB Post

If you have then you know that it's in the middle of nothing, nowhere, surrounded by even less, but it is the color of sand... everywhere...

My footprints.. Death Valley National Park, 12/26/14

even at night...

 Mosaic Canyon., at night, 12/25/14

This post is about sand because from the moment we left the city of Las Vegas to about three hours after we left Death Valley that is all there was to see.

But it's really not that bad.  It turns out sand can be fun.  We spent a lot of time walking  in it, up it, rolling down it, and enjoying the sun rise over it.

I know it sounds kind of desolate and lonely out there but it can be gorgeous, fun, and was a really cool place to visit.

I expected the entire place to be covered in sand, it is the desert after all, however I was surprised to learn that it had more rocks and plants than sand!

We wanted to see at least some sand dunes. We decided the best time to see the dunes would be at sunrise (I don't think I agreed to this).  We trudged out of bed at 6:00 AM, in the unseasonalably and unreasonably cold morning.  Despite the early wakeup, I would recommend this to anyone.  It was incredible!

Worth it right????

I wanted to know why there weren't a lot of sand dunes. I did some research and it turns out less than one percent of the desert in Death Valley is covered in sand dunes.  There has to be a certain environment for sand dunes to form.  The recipe is sand, wind, and a place for the sand to collect.  The Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes are the most popular dunes in the park and its easy to see why.  Some of the dunes rise to about 100 feet, and they run across a wide area and seem like they go on forever, with mountains on all sides.
It turns out that there are three types of dunes in the Mesquite Dunes area, (who knew more than one existed?) which is apparently and ancient lakebed.
Crescent dunes are wide and form under winds that blow from one direction.  They also move more quickly over the desert than any other dune.  We saw many crescents, but sadly, did not actually photograph one.  They were great for sledding and rolling down.

Linear dunes are the next variety. They are straight and long sand ridges that run forever in a line.  It forms as the result of wind coming from more than one direction and can extend for miles, and  were really hard to walk on without starting mini avalanches along the way.

Crossing linear dune in Death Valley

There are also star dunes. They are sand dunes with a steep side in three or more directions off of a center point.  They grow up instead of out to the sides, and tend to be tall and on the edges of the dunes.

Since I didn't know at the time that there were more than one kind of dune I didn't know what I was looking at until afterwards, so sadly I don't know what types I saw.



When we left Death Valley, I thought my sand-colored adventures were over.  I was wrong.  A few days later, my dad and I were at a music store in Fort Bragg, California.

                           He picked up a balalaika, which is a Russian instrument. We ended up buying it and a music book to go with it. Needless to say I am obsessed and it is more my instrument now than his. (I fully intend to have learned it by the time I get home.)

My new obsession
photo courtesy of Accent Music

Happy New Year and here's to sand-colored vacations!

All I Want for Christmas...

It is officially Christmas season!!!!

This is one of my favorite times of the year! I love the snow, except we don't really have any right now.

All of the snow in my yard

             
I also love how cozy sitting in my warm house feels, curling up on the couch to watch a movie with a cup of hot cocoa. This season just feels comfortable!

Unfortunately with the Christmas season also comes the stress of buying gifts for everyone.

Feeling very stressed and hermit-like

I am really having issues with this. As I am writing down a list of people I want to get gifts for, I am slowly realizing that I want to give something to more people, too many, than I thought.  Maybe I should just cut myself off from everyone and become an anti-social hermit in the woods to save a little cash and a lot of stress. I can tell you that being broke during the Christmas season is very, very stressful.
 
                         



Anyway you probably aren't reading this to listen to me complain about all of my problems, so on to the point.

This post is about...

Green, which reminds me of a scene from one of my favorite movies.

Every year, for as long as I can remember, our family goes out into the woods and cuts down a Christmas tree for my Christian mother. It might sound a little weird and boring, but it is actually really fun.
Its a long standing tradition with a schedule.  First, the parents have to stand in a line for a permit (luckily, because it's at 5:30 in the morning on a Saturday).  Then we choose a day and meet up in the mountains.  Every year for as long as I can remember, we have had friends come with us.

We all go out to breakfast (except not this year we went to lunch instead). We bring hot cocoa and tea and cookies and snacks for the hike to find a tree.  We have lots of gear, like sleds, snowshoes, and a saw or two.


While the adults go find a tree to cut down, all of the children go find a place to hang out. We bring sleds and find a hill and sled and play games all day.

Last year with our Christmas tree

One family of friends that come with us are known to always get the biggest tree that we are allowed to cut down. Because Bart is very picky about his trees and always gets lost in the woods trying to find a good one, we always know it will take forever to find him, and he always needs help getting his tree back to the car.

When we were little my brother made up a song about it to the tune of "The Bear Went Over the Mountain"
 It goes a little like this:

"Bart went over the mountain,
Bart went over the mountain,
Bart went over the mountainnnnn,                          
to get the biggest tree,
to get the biggest tree
Bart went over the mountain....

You get the point (I hope)

Despite the fact that we are Jewish it has always been a really fun tradition for us.


One thing that I have learned over the years is that finding something that is green and finding a good Christmas tree are not always the same thing.

Our skinny, little, no-branch tree

My Favorite Holiday

Hey everyone!

There are lots of things around this time of year that are orange.
Leaves,
      sunsets,

Yummy!!!!!
Photo Courtesy of Pillsbury

          sweet potatoes,
               and best of all pumpkin!
                     Pumpkin pie to be exact  :)









If you know me at all you will know that my one true love and passion is food. Given this information, I bet you then can easily guess what my favorite holiday is!

Yes reader, it's Thanksgiving.

Orange is my color of tradition.  Every year for Thanksgiving we have many traditions in my family.  I can tell you who will come to town, what we will do before, during and after dinner, and what we will eat.  I know who will tell bad jokes, who will get mad, and who will leave early because they are bored.  I LOVE this holiday!

My grandparents are a central part of my orange tradition.  For as long as I can remember, my grandparents have been at my house for Thanksgiving. They come in a week early from Pennsylvania and we go on a short trip somewhere to spend time together, and then...

Holiday Decorations
Photo Courtesy of Jan Coleman

It's time to prepare.
  We spend a whole day just setting up the table and getting ready to go! My grandma and I always decorate the house and table for dinner.
Well... I am making it sound too easy. However, this activity is far from it! When we pull down the big box of decorations from the attic everyone suddenly has an opinion. It's, "Oh, put this here" or "No! not there!" It's like the sheer number of decorations overwhelms us and we each feel the need to sell our opinion to everyone else. The goes on for quite some time, and but eventually someone gets their way (usually my grandmother) and we all agree it's a beautiful table.


A new tradition this year?  I helped my mom make pumpkin pie, not just turned the mixer on, but really did most of the work kind of help!  And to the amazement of all, those pies were fabulous (Just like me! Who knew!)!  Good for dessert, then breakfast, then snack, then dessert again!

Thanksgiving day is agonizing!  The adults, led by my grandmother, cook, and cook, and cook.  I can't stand the wait, and the fact that my mouth waters all day. Then our regulars start arriving, almost always in the same order, with hugs, smiles, and lots of laughter and conversation.  We have the coolest Thanksgiving crowd at our house. Some years there are lots of extra people and some years there aren't so many. We eat food and pie and talk until nine or ten.


Orange, my new substitute for Thanksgiving, is all about is remembering the people and things in life that are important. When I was little I would always get really excited because I got to eat lots of food, see my friends, and my grandparents would come. Now I realize that while all of those things are really fun and good, the holiday is about more than that. My grandma shows her love in her cooking, my grandpa tears up every time he says prayers at Thanksgiving dinner, and always makes me think about how much he loves us.  "The Murphy family meeting"  reminds everyone at our table of all the good things that happen, not just to us, but to everyone over the year.

What is the "The Murphy family meeting"?   Well, it isn't a meeting and we are not the Murphy family.  It did not start as our family tradition, but was brought to us by one of the people that comes to our house for Thanksgiving every year. We go around the table and everyone says what the coolest thing that they did in the year. It always has made me think of all the great things that I did and how grateful I am that those things happened. By the time it's my turn, I have relived my whole year of good things, and I am very thankful.