My mother-in-law is already coming back. A week from today as a matter of fact. That’s right, she was just here last year. But that was almost 18 months ago and she has never spent a winter here in sunny Arizona and we thought it would be nice for her to get away from Germany’s long gloomy winter. I have been planning for weeks her travels and activities that we will share with her during her visit. Above is a sample of what my monitor looks like at any given moment while I work on her itinerary. Not much is left for improvizing as events sell out and good rooms can be hard to come by without some planning.

This visit will take us to Santa Barbara for Christmas, New Mexico on New Years’ for a massive flyout of migrating birds, a trip to San Francisco to see a performance of the Prairie Home Companion, and a visit to Alcatraz. We will stay at the El Tovar at the Grand Canyon, visit the remote western rim of the Canyon, drive parts of old Route 66 through ghost-towns, visit Death Valley, hang out in Los Angeles for a long weekend, go to the Renaissance Festival, take in the Kodo Drummers, and visit a fair share of museums and gardens prior to my mother-in-law’s departure in mid-May….err, I mean February.