Happy Friday...Top Ten things to LOVE about Oregon

A smidgen of viewer discretion is advised.  There is no nakey people on here, but there is one section about some onesies I saw in Seattle that I HAD to share.

Our trip to Portland was AWESOME.  And here are the many things I love about that place:

10. The amazing amount of Fern and Moss, Everywhere...This is why I love Green.  And no I am not a tree hugger, I drive a minivan not a Prius and I do shave my legs.

picture by Katie

Picture by Jeb

9. The trees, I love them and again, am not a "tree hugger" even though I think I did hug one or two of these beauties.






8.  The hikes.  Wow, do they really have places like this on earth?  I felt like I was going to see some elves or something mystical.

7.  The Dam, it was rad.  There was also a fish ladder for all the spawning and ocean-bound salmon.  Our tour guide was the funniest.  He made some great points about all the work they are doing to make sure the salmon make it in this world.  This is done at GREAT expense to the tax payers and it is plain asinine.  I appreciated his humor.

totally rad picture by Jeb

6.  The Food.  Get a load of this packaging.  They made us a snail, a mouse, a turtle (crush style from finding Nemo) and a scorpion.  All out of tin foil. 

For sure you cannot tell what these are, but you should go to Portland check this place out.  Le Bistro Montage.  And yes, I do know what that sign says above.  A lovely way of saying please wait to be seated.  don't you think?

5.  The shops downtown.  We found these lovely gems at a store while walking around downtown.  Get one for your friend who is expecting.  I dare you. (these were taken with my super high-tech, rapid fire, snail camera phone, I am glad I had it, but arrrgggg)

And my personal favorite...

4.  Being a Girlfriend in stead of Wife.  I loved being there with the just the husband.

picture by Katie

3.  Shopping at Ikea.  That's right, we hopped straight, straight off the plane, gathered our luggage mind you, and went straight to eating meatballs, lingonberry sauce and lingonberry drinks.  I also bought some crazy little night lights for the kids. 

2.  Celebrating my Birthday Early via MAC in the middle of a neighborhood.  Wow, to have a MAC store in neighborhood, I was drooling.  And I know, what is up with my hair?  The dye is washing out from when I went blond.  So I will be dying it again.

1.  Seeing Katie and Bart.  We love them.  Jeb and Bart actually resemble each other which makes smacking bums a little tricky and a little embarrassing from the back.  Bart, you have no idea how close you came...

 

Thank you dear Katie and Bart for the fun visit.  Thank you for treating us like royalty and showing us the sites and feeding us to extremely full.  We miss you guys, please come back soon.

A HUGE thank you to our family who watched our beloved brood.  Thank you so much.  Thank you Tiffany for making the trip even possible.  Thank you Celeste for watching twins (the four-year olds), Mom for watching Jack (the escape artist) and Pam and Bruce for taking care of Gavin and Max.  Love you guys, love you guys, love you guys.

Next adventure could be New York, Juliana, are we invited?

Have a fab weekend everyone!  Talk to you next week!

When plan B worked AWESOME....

Get ready to load your Karma, because ours has totally run out.

It all started a fine Friday morning.  Jeb and I had planned for a little weekend getaway to see some friends in Oregon sans kids.  We farmed them out to the far reaches of Colorado to dear and willing relatives (wink wink).  Jeb had just dropped the kids off at school, Jack at the grandparents.  My dad gave us some buddy passes to fly to Portland.  When Jeb showed up with Jack my dad so delicately mentioned, "There is no way you are getting out of Denver today.  All the flights are packed.  I wouldn't even get out today.  And I have seniority."  So a rats chance in He** huh dad?

Jeb called and gave me the news, "We aren't getting out."

Me:  "But we have to get out.  I mean we don't have to get out, but we HAVE to get out."  We have no kids this weekend.  We should go somewhere.

Jeb:  "Will you start checking flights?"

Me:  Ai ai captain. 

The TIME:  8:30AM
I look.  I find nothing even interesting.  Nothing that would fit our budget or our time frame.  I mean the only flight that would even remotely work in our budget left in a little over an hour from that time of checking.  The good flight left at 9:55.  I was thinking, wouldn't that be amazing, to actually make a flight in less than an hour?  Oh well.  We tried.

Ha ha...little did I know we were about to try a lot harder.

Jeb comes home at 8:45 and asks me what I found.  I show him all the options.  We think for about 10 seconds and then with a wily look in our eyes, we both agree to purchase the impossible tickets and hustle our rear-ends to the airport.

At 8:50 we purchased tickets for the 9:55 flight.

Tiffany, at our beckoning call, whisked us to the airport.  The toll 470 never felt so nice!  Seriously, no traffic!  (Insert sound of bell, DING)

Tiffany slowed the car long enough for us to jump out and race inside.  I don't think the car ever came to a full and complete stop. 

We raced inside the terminal to see the LONGEST line for check in with Southwest airlines. ...

A lightbulb goes off in Jeb's head, "We have business select.  We get to go to the front of the line!"  (DING)What luck, Hee hee.  We were giddy and the adrenaline was just beginning to kick in.  Nothing beats it.  Not a Pepsi, not even a Dr. Pepper.

We did all the kiosk stuff, then an ALARM went off.  Brrreep brrreeep.  Oh crap, what now.  I was waiting to be frisked.  EVERYONE was looking at us.

That is when we started to get some serious attention.  A sign came up on the kiosk.  "Late check-in, baggage cannot be guaranteed to arrive when you do."  The lady behind the counter was very reassuring, "We usually do a great job, usually."  what the?

We raced to the security line which was LONG.  Then (DING) "you can go in the business select line" which was short.  One problem, we didn't have Jeb's boarding pass.

So I did what any self respecting wife will do, "Good luck honey, I will see you in Portland."  ha ha, this is what I really said, "I guess I will go ahead, just hurry!!!!"

Jeb made it back in line with me.  We disrobed (practically), ran to the train for the concourses (ours was the furthers concourse away) with unmentionables in hand and then took a breather. 

TIME:  9:40

Phew...we still had 20 minutes.  But why waste good adrenaline I ask you?  We decided to race.  Once the train stopped.  I ran one direction, Jeb ran the other and we scaled the stairs going up, up up to the gates. 

I was home free.  I never win at anything.  I could see our gate and knew we even had minutes to spare.  I could also hear Jeb running up behind me.  RATS.  My lungs and legs were burning.  P90X would have been helpful right about now because I would have schooled Jeb.  But a 6 week hiatus doesn't do anything for your body. 

So, I declared myself the winner.  We walked onto the plane, before all the other people (business select DING) and sat down.  We exchanged tales of the various people in walkers we took out while racing eachother.

TIME:  9:50

And that is what I call a SUCCESSFUL plan B. (DING)

Katie and Bart, here we come. 

Tomorrow, pictures and fun times from our trip to Portland.  I have already picked out our next house there.  I worship the Pacific Northwest.

Introducing our newest family member...our wall

Jeb goes by many names.  Some I will share and some I simply cannot.

Jeb the Engineer is always thinking of new ways to use the Aluminum Composite Material (ACM) he works with on a daily basis.

He covered the shed at the old house with it.  Imagine this with white panels on it.  Oh so nice.

He made me some ACM cookie sheets.  He lined the garage at the old house with it.  It seems as though ACM has become the modern day Duct Tape. 

But wait, Jeb has taken it to an entirely new level.  Introducing our new wall, our new family member. 

It's non-organic, doesn't speak, poop, back talk, demand food...nothing.  I think we are going to keep him. 

ISN't it AWESOME?  I love it.  It's totally quarky, cool, rad, sweet, any other 6th grade adjectives would be appropriate here.

Who knew ACM had so many uses.  I love it.  And I love that engineer of mine. 

PS check out the cool decorater fabrcis I will be killing myself to forge into curtains, roman shades and new seat covers before Christmas. 

I am completely excited for it, or it could be the Prozac talking.  Who knows?

Happy Friday, Love Jack Jack

 

Dear Jack,

You seriously used to drive me batty. Now you only drive me nuts.  You see, I had a dream the other night that I lost you.  You drowned and we revived you, but you weren't the same.  I woke from that dream thinking how much I couldn't live without you and your very awesome self.

Jack I love your spunk.  Your sparkle.  You literally sparkle when you smile.  You are busy, but thank goodness you are.  We have no, I repeat, not one dull child in this family.   I am sorry for threatening to sell you to the gypsies.  They will have to fight me for you.

Thank you for being curious.  For being fun.  Thank you for having a unbreakable spirit.  I love you Jack and am so thankful for you in my life.

Hugs and Kisses

MOM

PS.  Don't forget the avenue b package give away at tip junkie today!  Click on the Tip Junkie Icon Button on the right. 

Superglue does not make good chap stick

Gavin is a little bit of an insomiac.  He has a hard time sleeping when he is in the middle of a good read.  Who doesn't?  I mean, Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NHIM is a riveting novel, never read it but I liked the movie.  So tonight, while I am madly editing photos and working on my website for avenue b photography, Gavin comes in the office.

Gavin  "Mom, my lips hurt."

Me:  "Really, go grab some chap stick in the drawer by the fridge."

He leaves and then comes back and says

"Mom, which one should I use?"

Whoa, hold it there, "Gavin do you know what this is?"  Is say pointing to the Super Glue...the super glue!

"Oh, I guess I didn't read the label."

Holy Bleepity, bleeping, bleep!  You mean to tell me son that you can read chapter books in one night, eat them alive.  But when it comes to a matter of life and sudden death of your lips, you didn't stop to read the freakin' label on the container. 

Instead, I said, "Hey, good thing you didn't glue your lips together, I think."  And I wink.

In summary, Gavin almost super glued his lips together tonight.  Albert Einstein couldn't tie his shoes.  Genius' are querky.

My Genius also stayed up until 1 am reading Inkheart, by Cornelia Funke.  It is 500 pages.  I have yet to read a 500 page book that isn't a text book.