There are two things that remind me that we are back in California. The first one is the allergies I get from pollen that turn my eyes red and watery. I also sneeze a lot which causes my nose to run, and I get a headache afterwards. I can sneeze up to six times in one long sneeze. I'm glad there are allergy pills that work for me.
The other reminder is the number of hugs I recieve from our church family and friends. Their hugs are quite infectious and it shows how much the people here love. Each time Sarah and I return back to Redding, our home in the States, we always recieve a tremendous amount of warm hugs from almost everyone in our church, that's a lot of hugs. It sure blows my socks off how much the people here are able to show love in different ways including hugging. I've been infected and I don't think twice before I hug people back. I also initiate hugs sometimes! I remember when we first arrived in Manila and I ran into a Filipino friend. Out of excitement I reached out and gave him a warm bear hug but afterwards I realized that he wasn't too excited about it and I told myself that this guy would be hugging every one of his friends too if he spends only one year in Oak Grove (our church in Redding), that is unless he is my father in law who is probably the only one in our church who doesn't hug (but he doesn't love any less either).
Every hug I recieve here reminds me how warm and loving and accepting the people here are and I love them all a lot. I aslo love the way they hug.
I'm California born and raised, but there are still so many places I've never seen, and Napa Valley is one of them. We were really excited to spend a weekend there with some great friends of ours. The valley definitely didn't disappoint. It was gorgeous! The weather was cool and it even sprinkled the second day, but we had a lot of fun. A major highlight of the trip was that I had the best maple bar I've ever had- sorry, no pictures of that- I was too busy enjoying it! 
Right as I took this picture, Uche made this gesture. Doesn't he look like he's giving a tour? 
Our friends had brought food for a picnic- salami, lots of cheese and we bought a baguette and a bottle of sparkling juice to enjoy. None of us are wine drinkers, and obviously the main attraction of Napa is wine, but there's still a lot to enjoy without being a wine drinker.
We always like to throw in a self portrait. How do you like our fancy sunglasses we bought in Manila right before we left?
One of the must see places we heard about was this castle. I should start telling people we went to Europe- it's hard to believe this was taken in Northern California!
Here's my tour guide picture. The building in the back is part of the winery featured in the movie Bottle Shock. We had watched the movie the night before, so it was fun to see it in real life.
This was taken in the garden at the same winery. Most of the places we visited had gorgeous grounds like this. 
We did take a tour. This was taken in the caves of a winery. The caves were pretty cool- literally- they stay at a temperature of 60 degrees year round no matter the weather outside.
We pulled over at the side of the road for a picnic on the second day. Here's what we looked at while we ate. The whole area was unbelievably beautiful, and I'm so glad we were able to enjoy it.
