Dad

Missing my dad.

12/29/1951 - 12/08/2010

College

Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. This is where I spent a glorious four years of my life living, working, and studying in Paradise. The last part was hard to do. I'm tellin' ya - it was hard to do anything but have fun in this town.

It was the life. I lived ten minutes from the beach.

My horse lived on campus, so I could ride during class breaks... or take an adventure to the ocean for a trail ride.

Once I turned 21, I had a new to-do on my procrastination list: wine tasting.

 It was hard to get anything productive done. I am proud to say that I did walk away with my Bachelors in four years. Do I regret not spending another year in SLO to gain more educational experiences? You betcha. But - I am more thankful for the life experiences I have gained by living in Colorado and Texas after college.

But, I will admit it - I miss college.

OK, I take that back, here's what I really meant - I miss SLO.

Ranch Chick

I was born in Washington state, but I claim Oakdale "Cowboy Capital of the World" as my hometown where I spent the better part of my childhood. Yes, my parents willingly up and moved from the beautiful Evergreen state where we lived in the middle of the national forest to... the Central Valley of California. I am eternally grateful for their decision to take me out of the woods, however, because I was given the opportunity to grow up on a ranch.



I feel as if I was destined to be a ranch chick. However, there were times when I didn't quite "embrace" the ranch chick look.



 

"Oops, did I do that?"


With that said, I loved growing up on a ranch. There was never a dull moment. Just when you think it's OK to relax - a cow jumps into one of the troughs and we're out of water; a chain broke on a gate and now a corral of 200 cows are in our front yard eating my mom's roses; the power's out and now we have a freezer full of meat going bad; you go outside to find your neighbor's horse farm engulfed in flames.





"Rosie"

You know what the best part of growing up on a ranch was? The ability to carry out every little girl's dream - owning a horse. Many of my peers growing up were "riding horses before they could walk" or were "horseback before they were born". I, however, had two parents who were Windsurfers. Kayakers. Hikers. Two people with a very minimal interest in horses. How I ended up with horse fever is still an unsolved mystery. With that being said, I was the proud owner of my 20 year old sway-backed mare "Rosie" at the age of 6.

Growing up in Oakdale and living the ranch life is something I will always remember and cherish. Thank you Mom and Dad. Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for giving our family the opportunity to live and work here.

The First

Howdy from Amarillo, Texas!

Wait - did she say "Texas"?

That's right. Little miss California Kate is now a registered citizen of the Lonestar state. Yeeeehaw! How'd I end up in Texas, you might ask? Well, that's a long story.

I decided to make a blog to share the tales of my previous and current adventures over the last couple years while living in California, Colorado, and now, Texas.

Before this blog dives in to reliving my past, I would like to focus on the present: Amarillo. Since my move to "the yellow rose of Texas" last month, I have tried relentlessly to prove my Texas residency:

• Eating massive proportions of Jalapeno poppers, brisket, and steak.
• Actually, just eating massive proportions of anything.  Is that why everything is bigger in Texas? 
• Shooting a deer. Sorry, Maggie.

• Going to a rival high school football game match.

• Wearing camoflague whenever I feel like it, and not being judged. This one's for you, Elake!
• Eating chicken fried steak.
• Ok, eating anything fried. And a lot of it.
• Hangin' out with cowboys. Correction: Hangin' out with a cowboy. :)

I'll post some interesting stories and photos up here as my adventures begin here in Texas as well as telling the story of how I ended up here.

Here's the jist of it:

Girl meets horses. Girl falls in love with horses. Girl goes to college to chase horses. Girl falls in love with mountains. Girl goes to Colorado to chase horses and mountains. Girl meets Texan in Colorado. Girl falls in love with Texan. Girl goes to Texas to chase Texan.

Until the next post...

Happy trails.