Otis

I was shocked at how much I felt the news of his passing. He had an active day and died in his sleep. He was the best nephew dog a girl could ask for. He will be missed.

Aahhhhhh

Remember when you were young and poor and just out on your own and you drove a car that had no air conditioning but it didn't stop you from driving around in the mind-altering heat? And remember when you'd suddenly drive into the shadow of an orchard and the difference in temperature was always astounding and you could smell the sweet fruit as you sped passed and you hoped the orchard continued for a good long time? I just experienced something similar to that on my bike. Not as intense since it's not mind-alteringly hot outside but just as sweet.

Hot Fun in the City

This weekend I will be attending the Swedish Festival in my home town for the first time in 6 years. When I was growing up my family and I would get involved in some way or another. Before they had kids my parents made a float (for the parade) of Snoopy sleepy on top of his doghouse over their VW bug. After we showed up my mom put her energy into making us "authentic" Swedish costumes. I think I wore mine every chance I got. When I was in the 3rd grade my small rural country school was celebrating 100 years of existence and my parents made a float to resemble an old school house. My classmates and I got to dress up in "little house on the prairie" style costumes and recite our times tables during the parade.

The Swedish Festival is a wonderful mix of ridiculous cheesiness, greasy festival food and a celebration of everything awesome about childhood. We always start the day with Swedish pancakes in the park. Served with lingonberries, they are some of the best pancakes in the world although they are not as good as my dad's. As we eat the pancakes we watch the runners from the Dala Horse Trot (a 2 K run and yes the name just invites ridiculous jokes!) fly across the finish line. Then the May pole goes up just before the parade starts. Marching bands, trailers carrying Kingsburg High graduates from 40 and 50 years ago and the Basset Hound Waddle all make the parade a can't miss. Maybe I'll come home with a new family member.

Without fail the weekend of the Swedish Festival is always unseasonably warm and this year it'll be 103. Woo Hoo! It's not really a Valley visit without sweltering heat. With all sincerity, I can't wait! My sister's pool is waiting.

A Smooch Overcomes

He has overcome the waiting and worry about a full-time teaching position! He has been hired at Chemeketa Community College as a film/writing professor and they are lucky to have him. He works very hard for his students and is an excellent teacher and he deserves this job. Good job Justus! I am proud of you!

Let's not forget though that he does eat pizza and vegan chocolate cake sandwiches among other things.

Birthday Stench

Four square!

Ross brought his broken futon to burn in the fire

One of the birthday girls.........

So, even though we had an awesome fire-pit I have no photos of it. It worked pretty well though. After a bit we all realized there was stench coming for the fire. We all thought it had to be the futon wood burning. It wasn't. I had used some concrete slabs to line the fire-pit and had placed them tar side out. Woops!

A day in the life of Maurice

This is Maurice

This is his toy cubby

These are all his toys

This blue wig from the dollar store is his favorite toy............

............unless his toy cubby is empty then he likes to sit in it and look at his toys

Maurice is weird

A world of gardens and baby jungle animals

So far this spring break I've been sick so I haven't done much. I finally started to feel a little better yesterday and went to a nursery with Christie. We drove all the way out to Woodburn to go to Garden World (how can you resist a world of gardens?) only to find that they close the world on Mondays and Tuesdays. Bummer. That'll teach me to look at hours of operation. We considered going to RV World but figured they'd be closed too so we didn't bother. We did go to Portland Nursery once we got back into town. We both bought a lot of seeds and a little green house seed starter kits. Hopefully our gardens will be filled with lots of fruits and veggies this year! The world of Gardens is gettin' a visit from me though. I will enter that world, just not on a Monday or a Tuesday.

Today I decided to finish the baby blanket I've been working on. It came out pretty cute. The fabric is adorable. Thank you very much Bolt! I want some other ladies to find themselves in the family way so I have a reason to make more. In other words, please get pregnant just to please me and my desire to make baby blankest! Ha!

Whole blanket

Close-up

Look at du baby jungle animals

This blanket is for a baby girl but bolt has so many cute prints and so many that can be totally gender neutral.

I don't understand goodreads but I'm totally recommending these books

I just finished reading this book.

It was so completely fabulous there are no words. Completely fabulous ARE words of course but they just don't cut it as far as describing exactly how good I felt it was and I can't think of any words that would "cut it". Or "wood" cut it. Now I'm just playing around and really no longer making much sense, but you laughed. I heard you! Well, so off I go now to this book.

He really needs to write more. There are very few writers that I just adore and they never seem to write as much as I would like them too (no, see here I won't make a joke about "would vs. wood" because I didn't use the idiom "cut it", pay attention!). However, before I let myself enjoy this novella I am finally going to read this book.

I have become increasingly interested in cooking with and eating natural foods grown on sustainable organic farms. It's hard to eat only food created under these conditions. Time and money are the major barriers but, you do what you can and when you can do more you do. Right now my focus is on unrefined sugar. I have seen t in regular granulated sugar form but have not, until now, found it in brown sugar and powdered sugar. Now if I can only find chocolate made with unrefined sugar my cookies will be increasingly better.

A Valentine's Day at home

How Obama changed my refrigerator

This poster has been hanging on my refrigerator since September of 2004. At the time I thought it would only need to stay up for a little while longer.

Unfortunately I was wrong. This poster was made by a 7-year-old girl and is titled "Thumbs down". I kept it on my refridgerator until we were finally rid of "president stinkhead" a term I find to be far to civil to describe our 43rd president. The poster was a daily reminder that the president did not care about the middle class. He did not care about children learning in schools that were falling apart. He did not care about the victims of hurricane Katrina. He did not care for the environment. He did not care that people were having to file bankruptcy because they couldn't pay medical bills. He cared about making money for himself and his friends. He cared about maintaining a facade of social conservatism in order to keep his "base" satisfied. Those are not priorities I share. Every time the poster would slide, scrunch and need to be readjusted I was reminded that I had to stay vigilant of things happening around me and try to change them even if only at a local level. Now we are in a state of a near financial collapse (yes I totally blame him!) and it gets closer and closer to home everyday. I am confident in our 44th president and that things will eventually change for the better. We need to be patient though and be prepared to work hard. I am so glad that my refrigerator now is only covered with pictures of my loved ones. That makes me smile every time I walk into the kitchen.

Getting to know me, getting to know all about me

I've had a realization about myself and it only took 34 and-a-half years. Well, better half way through my life than never! I've been told that hanging out with me is like hanging out with someone you just met, no matter how many times you hang out with me. I can see how this would be very true. I am a closed off person. I didn't realize this, meaning that it's never been my intention to be closed off. This is how I get to know people. It has not been the ideal way to go about it in the least. Each time I hang out with someone new I learn a little more about them and the more I learn about them the more I can reveal about myself, the more I can be myself. I observe sense of humor, opinions, speaking styles, non-verbal communication and anything else that will tell me about my new acquaintance. I've been married to my husband for 6 and-a-half years and I am just now beginning to become comfortable around some of his family (even though I only see them on holidays and visits home). I see that they may appreciate or even enjoy my sense of humor. I take a risk and say things I wouldn't have 6 years ago. It feels good. 

This is why I am so close to my family. I can trust them. They know my idiosyncrasies and do not judge me or if they do they present it in a way that I can hear. 

It has occurred to me that my close friends, the ones who I can count on, the ones I trust and love the ones who feel more like my family, they have stuck with me. I am not an easy person to get to know but these people saw something in me that they thought was worth getting to know, no matter how long it took. My friends are some of the most important people to me in my life. This is one of the many reasons why. I appreciate you and you and you and you and you and you and you! Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Walk 19 Albina to hilltop loop

Today Amanda and I went on a chilly walk in her neighborhood. It was neat to see things as I walked past them instead of as I sped past them in my car. I had no idea there was a middle school across from Emanuel hospital. It overlooks the freeway and seems like such a strange place to put a school. I suppose the school was there before the free way was though.

At the bottom of the hill was this little info plaque about the history of Albina. It was once it's own town founded by scandinavians and russians. It was incorporated in the early part of the 20th century.

Amanda enjoys learning. The picture shows Union ave (now MLK)  in the 1930's. At that time it had a streetcar running down it that led all the way downtown.

This was also where the Widmer brothers set up shop way back in 1987. They've expanded a good deal since then. The entire block on both sides of Russel is theirs now.

We wandered under the Fremont bridge and up to Mississippi where we strolled and looked in shops. We had to go into Flutter. It's just so irresistible! Even though I've been to the Mississippi area many times this walk had us meandering down streets and alleys I would otherwise not walk down. We saw beautiful houses and more historic sights. The views were once again spectacular which, I guess, is the difference between the hill walks and the regular neighborhood walks. 

Sometimes you encounter legs on some steps. It is Mississippi. There's even a sign when leaving the area that says "Goodbye Hipsters". That made us laugh.

It was another enjoyable walk even though it began snowing and was very cold. It's nice to get outside every once in awhile as I wait for summer.

You're Stoooooooopid!

Why, as a society, do we care more about who sticks their dick into whom than we do about a man stealing millions of dollars in a pyramid scheme? There are actual white collar criminals out there swindling people out of their money, placing these people in difficult financial positions and basically ruining the remainder of their lives. These swindlers are people who actually seem to enjoy hurting others in order to get what they want. Not a big issue in our society though. If it were it wouldn't happen so often. Meanwhile we have politicians fulfilling natural urges in their private lives with consensual partners and they feel like they need to cover up that fact, they decide to lie about it and then ultimately they get caught for the lie and suddenly the act is "wrong" somehow. 

Bottom line: I don't care what people are doing in their private lives behind closed doors if it doesn't hurt anyone. I DON"T CARE! Are we really gonna spend tax payer money to see if Beau was 17 or 18 when he slept with Sam? Really? We already know that Beau consented so if he was 17 at the time the likelihood that he will press charges is very very low. So in a time of horrible recession, war and unemployment we're gonna focus our money and our energy on this? Is it really that important? It really isn't.  We have more pressing issues to deal with here people. If you're really concerned about this "issue" then you either need to get a job, actually do your job or volunteer somewhere because you are waaaaaaay too bored. 

You know you want to

Three fabulous things happened today. 

1. It is my wonderful sister's birthday. She deserves to be celebrated!

2. We have a new president who is not promising the land of milk and honey just competence and responsibility which is all we ever really wanted.

3. We finally settled the contract at work. We now need to vote on it in order to ratify it. We don't know any details about the settlement yet but we will be paid retroactively!  

Not a bad day for a chilly January.

Now go out there and celebrate. Celebrate our peaceful transfer of power! Celebrate the fact that our economy may be in the tank but we do not live in a war zone! Celebrate Ingrid's birthday! Celebrate our contract settlement! Celebrate something! Life is too good not to!

The inner workings of a lunatics mind

I love earmuffs. They keep the warm in and the cold out. They are a winter time necessity. I had misplaced my earmuffs and could not find them when getting out all the cold-weather accessories that one needs to survive in the cold. I asked for some earmuffs for Christmas and was surprised with 5 pair total (thanks again Steff!). I was very excited. Finally. I had my earmuffs back. 

My ear muffs are especially useful when walking up Burnside against the wind. On Monday Justus dropped me off on the corner of 11th and Holladay as he does most days. This is where I catch the Max. On Monday I hopped out of the car, ran across the street and jumped on the train. Now, I have to get situated once I get on the train otherwise when it's time to get off I have to juggle so many things I would more than likely miss my stop. Here's how I get situated. 

1. I hold my coffee between my legs.

2. I get out my ipod, put the buds in my ears, turn the power on, but I do not push play

3. I put my earmuffs on over my ear buds

4. I get out my book

5. I hold my coffee in my hand and read my book.

You see now I'm all ready to go when I get to my stop. Just pop the book back in my bag, press play on my iPod and I'm ready to go. Well, on Monday I sat down in order to begin my situation routine and I couldn't find my earmuffs. I looked and looked but they were not in the black hole that is my giant bag. I thought about where they could be and decided I must've left them at home by my hats and scarves. I made due.

When I returned home I still couldn't find them. I looked everywhere. In other bags, in pockets, in the car, under the couch. They weren't around. I was bummed. Lucky I got 5 of them for Christmas. I figured that they would turn up eventually so I grabbed my second black pair and stuck them in my bag. 

On Tuesday Justus dropped my off at the corner of 11th and Holladay. I smooched him goodbye, hopped out of the car and closed the door. As Justus drove away I happened to look down at my feet before crossing the street and noticed a big black pair of ear muffs on the ground. I picked them up (I know!) and felt how soppy and heavy they had become after spending an entire 24 hour period in the same exact spot. My train arrived so I dropped them and ran across the street, jumped on the train and got out my iPod and earmuffs.

One down. Four to go.

Walk 10

I purchased a book by local author Laura Foster, "Portland Hill Walks". Her books guide readers through different neighborhoods and parks while learning about different historical facts along the way. It's P.E. and local history class all rolled into one. It should totally be a high school class. The students could spend the first part of the week researching the historical facts and then at the end of the week go for a walk. Or, they could go for the walk first, noting all the historical facts along the way, and do a bit more research upon returning and then write a paper a bout it. Either way, that class would rock.

Today Amanda and I did "Walk 10: Multnomah Village to Vermont Hills Loop". We started at one end of Gabriel Park and walked through Multnomah Village stopping to look at the shops. On the corner of Troy and 36th is this fir tree. Planted in 1926 it has three equal sized trunks making it resemble a candelabrum or a harp. It has been featured on "Ripley's Believe It or Not" It must have been a year that they were hard up for some stories.

After that thrilling sight we were sent up steep hills into the neighborhood just above Multnomah Village. It was a beautiful day for walking. No rain and not too cold. We climbed to a peak known as the "Texas Hydropark". The city of Portland was smart and claimed the land at the top of all these hills to put the city's water tanks on. This way gravity can help them out. I learned that when there is more than one tank it's called a "water tank garden". The streets in this neighborhood are all named after states (hence the name Texas hydropark). We could not for the life of us figure out what sort of order they were in though. We had Nevada, followed by Texas and then California. Vermont was after that followed by Dakota.

We enjoyed more steep neighborhood hills that finally led us to the entrance of Gabriel Park. Once we entered the park we were greeted by dog after dog. We met a sweet-no-more-than 6 month old black lab named Dash. He was a Christmas present and was enjoying a walk with his "brother" and "dad".

At the end of our walk we came across what looked like a crazy rock with trees growing out of it but it was really a bulbous looking tree trunk.

 We were satisfied to have walked three miles up and down hills while enjoying something new and also historical. I'm looking forward to the next one.

Yeah, that's right

I'm doing it again! Aren't we all though. Come on, admit it! You too have made a resolution to either "get in shape", "lose weight", or "get healthier". My focus this year is on losing weight and toning up. Hawaii is coming and I'm ready for it mentally. I just need to prepare for it physically. I don't want to feel flabby and pasty on the beach. I want to feel confident in my modest bathing suit that covers the appropriate amount of body for my age. It's true that I have a slender frame which allows me to more easily hide the fat that I have gained but there is no hiding the giant amounts of cellulite that are on my thighs from pube to knee. I would insert a picture here so that you would truly understand the situation but it's lunch time and I want you to keep your food down. Unfortunately no matter how hard you try the cellulite is here to stay but at least I can feel better overall.

I know my friend who has organized this little trip to Hawaii reads my blog every now and then and for that reason I just have to mention this:

His wife has a smokin' bod (in a totally non-lesbian-I'm-really-jealous-of-it kind of way). Maybe she can be my trainer.

Anyway, my plan is simple. I don't have to make too many changes but the changes I feel I need to make are gonna be difficult. Here's my plan:

Power yoga every morning (already do this!)

Power walks or longer walks at least three times a week.

Some sort of exercise activity on the weekend (snow-shoeing, gardening etc..)

Hooping once a week (yes! Finally doing it!)

No more beer, nightly which has been my habit (small bits of wine)

No more constantly shoving sugar down my throat (honey and real brown sugar are fine in tiny bits)

Increase fruit and veggie intake and choose nuts or cheese or fruit as a snack

I am allowing myself small bits of treats I love every once in awhile (like once a week) so I don't lose my mind.

That's right. I'm doin' it!