Happy almost-New Year! I was lucky enough to have both last week and this week off from work, which has been so relaxing. I don't think I've had a 2-week-long break since college! We spent last week visiting my mom and Patrick's family in California, and now we're back in Portland (just in time to catch the surprise snowstorm on Tuesday!), and I have been hanging around the house, doing some cooking and being lazy. A great way to end the year :)

Anyway, this seems like a good time to catch up on a few of the posts I've been meaning to write. First up: our anniversary trip to Vancouver!

A few months ago, we decided to go on a quick vacation to celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary. The original plan was to rent a cabin in Montana in early October (it seemed like a good place to get away and enjoy nature), but I had a huge project going on at work, so we decided to put off our trip until mid-November. And since Montana in mid-November sounded like it might be a little chilly, we decided to take a trip to Canada instead. Based on this article in Sunset, we ended up spending three nights at Rockwater Secret Cove Resort (on the Sunshine Coast) and had some time to check out Vancouver as well. Patrick planned the whole trip, and it was great!

We drove up to Vancouver from Portland on a rainy Thursday, and apart from a long wait to cross the border, it was a nice drive. This was the first time either of us had been to Canada, so it was exciting crossing the border!

We had decided to spend a night in Vancouver before going to Rockwater Secret Cove, and Patrick found us a very nice hotel downtown--L'Hermitage. After checking in, we walked down Robson Street (Vancouver's big shopping street) and had dinner at Kintaro Ramen, one of three ramen places that we wanted to try while we were in town (we ended up making it to all three, and the ramen at Kintaro was my favorite--really nice noodles).

The next morning, we needed Canadian coins for our parking meter, so we headed to a Starbucks near the hotel. Although Vancouver felt a lot like Portland, there were some small differences that reminded us we were in Canada--like when Patrick asked for his change in singles (so he could pay the meter), the barista looked confused and then asked if he wanted loonies or toonies. Anyway, we got it all sorted out, paid the meter, and headed to breakfast.

My small contribution to our vacation was finding a good place for breakfast while in Vancouver, and I chose Medina--they serve tiny waffles with all sorts of awesome sauces! We were tempted to have an all-waffle breakfast, but instead we got one waffle apiece and supplemented with healthier fare (yogurt, fruit, and granola). It was a good breakfast, and the waffles didn't disappoint. I had the milk chocolate lavender sauce with my waffle, and Patrick had the fig orange marmalade. Yum!

Before I forget--at a couple cafes in Vancouver, I noticed a drink called the London Fog--earl grey tea, steamed milk, and vanilla syrup. I didn't have a chance to try one while we were there, but it sounds like just my kind of drink! I'll have to see if I can get a coffee shop in Portland to make one.

After breakfast, we explored Stanley Park for a few hours. It was a chilly day, but it was still a nice way to spend a few hours. Vancouver is a pretty city!

For lunch, we had ramen once again, this time at Benkei Noodle Shop (Portland is ramen-deficient; we had to eat our fill while we had the chance!). This turned out to be Patrick's favorite ramen of the trip.

Bellies full, we headed across the Lions Gate Bridge and drove to Horseshoe Bay (enjoying the beautiful scenery along the way), to catch the ferry to the Sunshine Coast. This was our first time taking our car on a ferry, and it was pretty cool! The ferry was well-outfitted with a full cafeteria, and the 40-minute ride was just long enough to enjoy the scenery without getting bored.

The ferry disembarked at Langdale, and we drove along the coast to Sechelt, the town nearest to Rockwater Secret Cove. We had a fine dinner at The Old Boot and then continued on to the resort.

Rockwater Secret Cove Resort turned out to be pretty awesome. We splurged and reserved a tenthouse suite, which reminded me of the yurts at Treebones, but even nicer (in-yurt bathrooms--excellent!).

The Rockwater tenthouses had all sorts of great amenities--heated floors, super comfy beds, cute little fireplaces, and huge tubs with jets and light shows and stuff. All that luxury plunked down in the middle of beautiful natural scenery (one of the days we even saw a deer hanging out right next to the boardwalk!). It turned out to be a great place to just get away from everything and relax.

The one problem we ran into was the weather. The first night we got there, it was pretty calm, but the second night it was stormy, and the tent walls flapped around noisily all night, making it really hard to sleep. I was kind of afraid the tent would blow away, it was so loud. Since it was supposed to be stormy the next night as well, Patrick asked if they could move us to a more sheltered tent, and luckily they were able to help us out. So we moved from Tent #60 (which I'm sure would be awesome in the summertime but is a little dicey during stormy weather) to Tent #53, which had a less awesome view but was way more peaceful. Phew!

We mostly just sat around our tent and knitted/read. One of the days, we drove into Sechelt and explored a little. We managed to catch a holiday craft fair, and we visited a cute little store specializing in items made by local artists (of course I can't remember its name now, but it was on Mermaid Street next to a small European market). It turned out to be a nice little town to explore.

The restaurant at the resort was nice. We had breakfast there every morning, and we went there for a fancy dinner the second night we were there. In retrospect, it would have been good to bring some food to keep in the little in-room fridge, since the resort restaurant wasn't cheap, and our only other option was driving into Sechelt for every meal.

I'd definitely recommend Rockwater Secret Cove Resort if you want to splurge on a relaxing vacation in a beautiful setting. They also offer spa services and activities like horseback riding, but we didn't do any of that. Three days was a good length of time for us to stay--by the last day, I was feeling ready to get back into the real world!

On our way back to Portland, we stopped in Vancouver for lunch at the third ramen restaurant of interest--Motomachi Shokudo. The first two ramen restaurants we went to seemed pretty traditional; Motomachi was much hipper and experimental. It was good ramen, just not our favorite of the three. Also, Patrick lost his hat there, which was unfortunate :(

So, that was our trip to Canada! I'd like to go back to Vancouver at some point (maybe on the train) and explore downtown more. It seemed like a fun place to visit.

I love Lee's new ice cream earmuffs/headband pattern and kits! The design is great, and it's even better that she hand-dyed recycled wool to make the different flavors. We got to see them in person when she and Pete came over for Thanksgiving. Super cute!

(Photo by Lee)

So, Ladies Rock Camp! This was a fundraiser for Portland's Rock and Roll Camp for Girls. It's a 2.5-day-long camp, where women who have little to no experience with an instrument learn to play that instrument (guitar, bass, drums, or vocals), form a band, write a song, and perform it at a venue in downtown Portland. It happens twice a year, in May and October. Patrick heard about it this summer and sent me a link to the LRC webpage. I thought it sounded totally awesome, especially since the enrollment fee went to a good cause! I spent a little while choosing between vocals and drums (the thought of learning to play guitar/bass in just a few days was too scary). I ended up signing up for vocals. I figured that would be easiest, since I'd been in choir in high school. It would be like playing Rock Band, but for real!

Friday, October 23

Camp started on a Friday, with a potluck lunch. After that, we spent some time doing really quick getting-to-know-you activities so we'd have some idea of what kind of music people wanted to make. There were about 30 women there, maybe half of them from Portland, with a good-sized Seattle contingent as well. There was a pretty wide age range, including one mother-daughter pair.

Eventually it was time to form our bands, which was kind of scary. We split ourselves up based on the type of music we wanted to play. The group I initially went to had two vocalists, so I ended up standing in the middle of the room, hoping that there would be other people who had ended up without a band. Luckily, the numbers worked out, and I got matched up with Angela (guitar, from Minneapolis) and Beth (drums, from Seattle). Most of the bands also had a bass player, but there weren't quite enough to go around, and we did fine without one.

After we formed bands, we split up to go to instrument instruction, so we didn't have much time to get to know each other at that point. I headed off to vocal class, with our instructor, Teri, who was great--very supportive. The first class was spent warming up, getting to know the other vocalists (there were nine of us total), and practicing our group song (the vocalists traditionally sing a song at the Sunday morning assembly; ours was Don't You Worry About a Thing).

Following instrument instruction, we had our choice of two workshops--songwriting or sound. I went with songwriting, since I had no idea where to start. The main message I got was that you can write a really simple song with minimal lyrics, and it can still be really catchy. The teacher had volunteers go on stage and form makeshift bands, and then we all worked together to make up lyrics and write a song on the fly.

Next we had band practice, which was split into quiet practice (not actually playing the instruments) and loud practice. We had loud practice first. Beth and Angela familiarized themselves with their instruments, and I worked on writing lyrics. I wasn't really sure what I wanted our song to be about, and neither of them had a strong opinion either. I mentioned that the things I like (cooking, knitting, etc.) don't typically make good songs, but then one of them pointed out that there are some knitting terms that have double meanings, and based on that, I came up with what became our chorus and first verse. We didn't get anywhere on the melody (mostly because we were all kind of lost regarding how to get started), but it was comforting that we at least had some lyrics.

During quiet practice, the three of us walked down the street to MLK Fashion Plaza, where we bought some cheap T-shirts for screen-printing the next day. That store is something else--they had a whole assortment of gold teeth, including a full set of gold vampire teeth! Not the kind of place I typically frequent.

At some point we agreed on our band name, Three-Day Afghans. Angela had mentioned that growing up, she and a friend had decided that if they had a band, they'd call it 7-Day Afghans, based on a book her mom had (possibly this one). Beth and I didn't have any other ideas, so we went with that suggestion, modifying it to Three-Day Afghans, since that's how long ladies rock camp is. It also worked with our song's knitting theme.

We all regrouped for dinner, and then it was time to head home. At this point, I was pretty stressed out, since we had to have a song written by Sunday, and I still didn't really know how to make that happen. It would have been more fun if I'd just relaxed and had faith that things would work out, but that's not really my style :) But of course, things did work out. I should have known!

Saturday, October 24

We started out the morning with breakfast and then headed to instrument instruction again. We spent a little time practicing our group song, and then we spent the rest of the class singing alone in front of the group and having Teri give us suggestions on how to improve. Even singing in front of a group of 9 very supportive women made me nervous, but it turned out fine. And I wasn't the only one who was nervous, which made me feel a lot better.

During lunch, an alumna of Rock and Roll Camp for Girls performed, and she was really good! It's a pretty amazing program, and I'm glad girls in Portland have the opportunity to have such a confidence-boosting experience.

After lunch, we did a fun screen-printing workshop, where we got to design our band logos and print them on T-shirts and paper. Our teacher had lots of good ideas for screen-printing on the cheap, and instead of using photo-emulsion, we blocked the screens by cutting our designs out of contact paper and sticking it to the screens (similar to the Tyvek mailing envelope technique that Josh and Sarah used at their Screenprinting for Change party). I ended up designing our band logo--just a simple knitting graphic. Cutting out all those zig-zags from the contact paper took some time, but luckily there were three of us working on it.

Things really started to turn around and become more fun and less stressful at about this point. We had loud band practice after screen-printing, and we came out of it with a pretty well developed song, which was such a relief! I think the key was that we had some outside guidance. There were a few coaches going around between rehearsal rooms during practices, and we managed to get two of them--Bob and Teri--in our room near the beginning of practice. They really helped us get going.

We came up with a few chords that seemed like they might work, Bob and Angela played them on the guitar over and over again, Beth played drums, and I opened my mouth and sang my lyrics, and it worked! Teri and Bob helped tweak a few notes and gave me some advice on a few things I could do to make it more nuanced (which I promptly forgot, I'm sure), and we were suddenly on our way to having a real song, which was such a relief! We figured out the chorus first, and then the verse came pretty easily after that. Here's some iPhone audio from the beginning of the rehearsal, when we had just started working on the chorus.

* Unraveled - Early Chorus

After a few hours of practice, half of the bands had a showcase run-through on the little stage, just to get some experience being on stage and performing in front of people. It was so fun to see what the other bands had come up with! We had all gone in pretty different directions.

After dinner, there was a great karaoke party, but I was lame and headed home pretty early, because I knew I would be exhausted if I didn't. Probably the right choice, but I bet it would have been fun to stay for the whole party!

Sunday, October 25

We started out the day with breakfast, and then the vocalists performed our group song for everybody else, and then we had a hair and makeup session! I painted my nails, which I haven't done in a long time. And I let Teri give me rockstar hair (teased and sprayed with red hairspray), which was a little crazier than I would normally go with, but I guess that's the point.

We had a couple more hours of loud practice, which we spent tightening up the song and going in to watch the other bands practice. We were feeling pretty confident about our song by the end of practice. Here's an iPhone recording of the full song, right before we stopped for lunch. Considering that we put the whole song together in under 24 hours, I think we did a pretty good job!

* Unraveled - Final Rehearsal

Here are the lyrics (not an autobiographical song, by the way):

Verse 1:
Stitched our lives together / So snug at the seams
Now you push me away / I'm no longer in your dreams
Gauge your feelings for me / The fiber of your love
Are the strands frayed and slipping / Or are they plied strong enough

Chorus:
Don't cast me off / I'm a pearl in the rough
Don't throw me for a loop / You've unraveled me enough

Verse 2:
Seem a little distant / Your indifference needles me
Your comments are abrasive / Can't seem to agree
Have you strayed in your affections / Has someone got her hooks in you
Have we just grown complacent / Are you dying for something new

Originally, we had agreed that it would be more fun to do an upbeat song than a slow, sad song (it is Ladies ROCK Camp, after all), but it just kind of turned out a little slow and sad. At that point, we were just relieved to have a song, so we went with it. I think the chorus breaks it up nicely, with the harder drums and tambourine (playing tambourine is fun!).

At lunch, they set up a microphone, and everybody had a chance to go up and give shout-outs to anybody who had helped them or who they thought was awesome (it was really such a positive, supportive environment. What great women!). Clearly I had not learned my lesson from camp, as I was too shy to go up and talk (as usual), but it was really great hearing what everybody else had to say. One of the awesome guitarists even gave me a shout-out for my creative lyrics. Awww :)

Then we headed to our venue (Satyricon, where Nirvana once played!) to put on a rock show! I was dumb and didn't tell any of our Portland friends about it, even though they would have been totally supportive even if I'd messed up big time. Patrick was there though, which was nice. Here's the stage:

Rock and Roll Camp for Girls knows how to put on a show! They had a raffle, an entertaining MC, and all of the tech stuff was well organized, so we just had to show up on stage and perform (no checking sound levels or tuning or anything). They printed a program with everybody's lyrics, and it just happened to have a picture of a knitting mermaid on it (drawn by Heather McLaughlin, our screen-printing teacher), which seemed like a good sign, giving the theme of our song.

We were up third (out of eight bands), which was good, since we didn't have too long to get nervous, and then we were able to enjoy the second half of the show. We got up there, got all set up (I even remembered to adjust the mic stand to the right height), waited while a little raffle business was attended to, and then it was time to play!

Here's a blurry video Patrick took with our digital camera. There will be a professional video forthcoming at some point, though I'm not sure if it'll be online. Our song will also be on iTunes, which is just insane! Two things I would improve after seeing this video: (1) stage presence, (2) sing the right words! I guess I only flubbed the lyrics twice, which isn't so bad considering how new the song was.

Three-Day Afghans - Unraveled on Vimeo.

You can see me leaning over to high-five Teri at the end. She was up there rocking out during the whole song, which was so great :) Considering that we put this together in about 24 hours, I think we did awesome! I am so impressed that Angela was able to pick up the chords so quickly (like I said above, learning to play guitar scares me!), and check out Beth rocking on the drums during the chorus! I'm proud of my band :)

I think it was during the third chorus that I really realized that I was up there, performing a song to a club full of people. It was just a really exhilarating feeling. The experience was totally worth the initial stress. Here are a few videos of the other bands, who were all great!

* Lyte Bright - The Perfect Girl
* Vega - What Do You Give (What Do You Get?)
* Saddle Soar - Hipster Cowboy
* Dollywould - My Friend the T-Rex
* O-various Artists - Sundog Solara

So yes, Ladies Rock Camp is awesome, and you should totally go if you're a lady :) It's a great, supportive environment where you can try something new, and you get to meet all sorts of wonderful women and support a great cause.

I recently started crocheting a ripple blanket, based on Alicia's blanket. I wanted to take a few pictures to post to Ravelry, but for some reason Patches could not resist the yarn! Normally she's not that crazy about yarn, but I guess having it on the floor at kitty eye level is just too tempting. I like this cat :)

P.S. If you wanted to make a bacon scarf, this would totally be the pattern to use. When I was crocheting the pink and red rows at the beginning, it looked very bacony. Luckily, that effect has gone away since I added more colors.

Hoo boy, I've been quiet for too long! Here are a bunch of things I meant to mention at the time but never got around to writing about. Still to come: Ladies Rock Camp and our recent trip to Canada!

Back in early October, we went to Kruger's Farm on Sauvie Island to check out their pumpkin patch and corn maze. We actually didn't end up going in the maze, but we walked through the pumpkin patch and ate some yummy cinnamon-sugar mini donuts (no apple cider donuts to be had, but these were nearly as good). Good times :)

Around the same time, Patrick harvested all of our remaining tomatoes from the garden, since it was getting cold. Next year, we need to thin our tomatoes so we have more ripe ones and fewer green ones!

I canned some green tomato jam (not bad, plus I got to use our food mill!) and green tomato relish (aka piccalilli, recipe from the Ball Blue Book), and I still had pounds of tomatoes left over. At that point, I was kind of overwhelmed by the number of tomatoes left, so I asked Patrick to dispose of them on the compost pile when I wasn't around (so I wouldn't have to suffer the guilt of wasting perfectly good food). That was a relief! A little later, we got green tomatoes in our CSA box, and Patrick used them in this enchilada recipe (recommended by Susan), which turned out really well. I definitely want to use this recipe again next fall.

Around the same time, I got it in my head that I needed some muffins, so I made two batches, both from Dorie Greenspan's Baking--great grains muffins and morning glory (carrot spice) muffins. Both turned out well, and they made nice mid-morning snacks spread with some cream cheese. They also both froze well, which is good, since we would have been hard pressed to eat 24 muffins before they went stale.

Back in August, I signed up for Lee's inaugural Quick Knits club shipment. It was so much fun getting my package and finding all the little surprises she had included! I knit up that month's project (a little strappy pouch) in less than a day--nearly instant gratification!

Recently I knit myself a pointy hat (from an old issue of Rebecca) using more of the bulky pink yarn that I used to make my scarflet. It was another quick knitting project--I finished it in under 24 hours. Very satisfying! (also on Ravelry)

Here's a picture of the hat in action, at one of Patrick's recent cyclocross races. Andrew was visiting us for the weekend, and we went and watched Patrick get all muddy and exhausted. I'm proud of him for trying new things! I need to make him a cool ensemble for next year's races...

I still exist! Work has been kind of all-consuming for the past month, and it will continue to be for a little bit longer. That doesn't leave much time for baking and knitting and enjoying Portland, which is why I've been so quiet around here.

I do have a few things to tell you about once I have more downtime (like how I formed a band with two women I didn't know, wrote a song, and performed it at a real live Portland venue, all in one weekend! Ladies Rock Camp is awesome!). But for now I'll just point you to Lee's post about our group Halloween costume, where you can at least see some pictures of Patrick and me high-fiving and doing fancy handshakes.

This was probably the easiest Halloween costume I've ever done. Lee and Pete did the bulk of the work, putting together a Waldo costume, and all Patrick and I had to do was be not-Waldos. I threw on some striped tights, and Patrick put on a stocking cap, and that was it. I felt kind of bad for not putting more effort into it, but there was the aforementioned work craziness. Maybe next year we'll try harder. For instance, Patrick reminded me that he was supposed to be Potato Champion for Halloween. If he does that, I should totally be the Whiffies fried pie, since they're neighbors in the same food cart pod. That would be hilarious, though very few people would know what we were. Plus I don't think I'd get much use out of a fried pie costume once Halloween was over.

Okay, more later. Bye!

I feel like it has been forever since I've updated, but I guess it hasn't been that long. I just haven't done much of note in the past few weeks. The weather turned cold suddenly last week, and I just want to bundle up in blankets, eat oatmeal for breakfast, and be lazy. And once I get tired of that I think I'll bake a pie. Somebody emailed me about the lemon meringue pie in this entry earlier today, and now I want a big slice of lemon meringue pie. It looks so billowy and delicious!

So, what to tell? Both our front and side porches are currently under construction. We're having the floor of our front porch replaced because the boards were rotting, and we're having our side porch completely rebuilt because it was pulling away from the house and generally rickety. I'll post some before and after pictures once the job's done. Patches seems happy with the progress being made on the front porch so far. Plus we know it will hold at least a cat, so that's encouraging!

This past weekend, Tree came to town to run the Portland Marathon because she's a total badass! Her sister Ashly came down from Seattle and stayed with us, and she brought us cupcakes as a thank-you gift. Yes!

Ashly and I cheered on Tree at the marathon start, and then we did the KP 5-mile run, which went along part of the marathon course. This was the fanciest organized run I've done--there were timing chips for our shoes and live bands (including the Last Regiment of Syncopated Drummers!) every mile or so, and so many great volunteers! I tried drinking water while running, but that didn't work so well, and I ended up spilling it all over myself instead. And then I felt bad throwing a half-full cup of water on the ground as I ran past the volunteers, but I guess that's how it's done.

About 1.5 miles into our run, we ran past the marathoners, and we got to see Tree again and cheer her on some more! And then after we finished our run and cleaned up, we headed back to the finish line to see Tree one more time. She did a great job! We got there early, so while we were waiting, we cheered on all of the other marathon finishers. Many of them had their names printed on their race numbers, so I got to personalize my cheering a little bit. Some people seemed to appreciate having strangers cheer for them, and some just looked confused or peeved. But they had just run 26 miles, so I was not offended by any dirty looks.

Even though the 5-mile run was a little shorter than what Patrick and I usually do on Sundays, I was extra tired and sore afterward, and I didn't even run that fast! I think it was a little more uphill than our usual route. Plus we clapped and cheered for a full hour after our run. That's grueling work! I don't think I'm cut out for marathon running :)

Incidentally, Patrick didn't do the 5-mile run with us because he was doing his first big cyclocross race! You may recall that we went to a cyclocross event last fall, and I enjoyed all of the food. He went to a few more races in addition to the one I wrote about, and he decided that he'd like to try it out. He bought a cross bike (and sold his track bike, to keep the balance of bikes in the house even), went to a few clinics before the season started, and practiced carrying his bike and falling down in the park near our house. And now he's racing! Unfortunately, I haven't been able to watch him race yet because of various timing/location conflicts, but hopefully I will soon! I'm proud of him for trying something new, even if it means a few extra bruises and scrapes. I want to make him some sort of wacky racing outfit, but he doesn't seem interested :)

The weekend before the marathon and cyclocross excitement, we spent a good amount of time out and about. Patrick dropped me off at Knittn' Kitten for a little while, and I found some great things, including some classy vintage sewing pins and a bias tape maker!

We also got this cute vintage corner bookcase at Portico for cheap. I'm not sure whether I want to paint it a lighter color or leave it as-is.

That night, we biked down to Sellwood via the Springwater Corridor and Oaks Bottom Wildlife Preserve, had dinner at A Cena, and then caught a show at The Woods. If you go to A Cena in the summer you should definitely get the agnolotti (stuffed pasta with sweet corn filling, mascarpone, and lobster). The rest of our dinner was nice but unremarkable, but the agnolotti was super good. We need to get back there next summer (or sooner).

We arrived at The Woods pretty early and grabbed a seat on one of the comfy couches. We bought a goblet of snack mix (which turned out to be a boring pretzel-heavy mix; not Chex mix--a minor disappointment) and watched MBilly, Billygoat, and Frontier Ruckus perform. We hadn't heard of any of them before; I just wanted to take Patrick to The Woods since I enjoyed it so much during MFNW. Billygoat was crazy--it was two guys who had created a very involved animation, which they projected above the stage, and then they played the score to it live on all sorts of wacky instruments. Totally not what I was expecting. They were my favorite act of the night, just because they were so unique.

Seating had really filled up by the time Musee Mecanique took the stage, and I was getting sleepy, so we headed home after one song. Hopefully we'll have another chance to see them perform, since I think I'd like their music. It was a beautiful (if chilly) ride home, under the stars. Oaks Amusement Park looked pretty all lit up.

Okay, enough writing. Back to my blankets and oatmeal!

So, MusicFest NW went well. I didn't even get sick this year! I think the secret was only staying up past midnight on one night instead of four nights in a row (I don't know how I did that last year!). This is probably the last year that I'll buy a wristband, since I had the most fun at the free daytime performances sponsored by KEXP.

• We started out easy on Thursday by going to see Hey Marseilles at Ash Street Saloon. There was an accordion, so I was happy. After the performance, we headed over to Dante's to see We Were Promised Jetpacks, but there was a long line full of noisy people, and we decided to just head home at a reasonable hour.

• On Friday afternoon, I headed over to Doug Fir to see The Builders and the Butchers perform live on KEXP. There weren't that many people there, and I was able to stand right next to the stage. It was great! I'd never seen an electric banjo before--pretty cool (you can kind of see it on the right in the picture below). I also liked that their songs are so awesome that they need two drummers!

  

  Gunny (aka Jon) arrived from Seattle a little later in the day, and we grabbed a quick dinner at SubRosa before catching the bus downtown. Gunny was really excited about seeing Sunny Day Real Estate reunited, so we went to the Crystal Ballroom to see them and The Jealous Sound (another 90's band that hadn't played together in over 10 years). Since I wasn't cool in high school (or college), I hadn't heard of either band. Pretty much everybody else there was super excited to see them and had clearly been awaiting this day for 11-14 years.

  Patrick and I left about halfway through Sunny Day Real Estate's performance so we'd be able to see Viva Voce at Berbati's Pan, but Gunny stayed behind to soak up as much emo reunion music as possible. He really seemed to enjoy it, which was good :) We weren't that familiar with Viva Voce, and their vocals were kind of hard to hear from where we were standing, but I was glad to see them. They played a few songs that I recognized, including Rose City, which I like by default because it's about Portland :)

  After Viva Voce were The Long Winters, who were enjoyable. I like their album cover art, and John Roderick is a funny guy. However, I was really sleepy at that point, since it was past midnight, so I found a chair and tried (unsuccessfully) to keep my eyes open until the show was over. Add to that the fact that I was wearing practical footwear (clogs!) and complaining about how loud it was (despite my earplugs), and I think I am officially too old for MFNW. Ah well.

• On Saturday, we had breakfast at Chaos Cafe (our default neighborhood destination for healthy and delicious vegetarian food) and then headed up to N. Mississippi. I stopped at that garage sale I mentioned earlier, where I bought my very own full-sized ironing board, but no skulls or male mannequins. The ironing board is lumpy and wobbly, but I think with some love I can make it better, plus it was cheap. I definitely want to make a pretty cover for it, and hopefully Patrick can fix the wobbliness.

  

  We stopped in at Mississippi Records, where Gunny spotted the bassist from The Thermals and we picked up AC/DC's Back in Black and a Simon and Garfunkel album, plus the original Star Wars soundtrack for Susan! I forgot to tell you that we bought a used record player at Crossroads a few weeks ago. I'm afraid that buying a record player at this point makes us hipsters. Except that we don't wear day-glo sunglasses or smoke, so that's something. We just thought it might be nice to listen to records, like our families did when we were kids.

  We had a quick lunch at Por Que No, and then I headed down to Sellwood to see a bunch of bands (Langhorne Slim, The Lonely Forest, John Vanderslice, Bobby Bare Jr., The Black Whales, and Port O'Brien) play unplugged sets at The Woods, as part of a free showcase hosted by KEXP and Caffe Vita. I'd never been to The Woods before, but I really liked it! It's an old funeral home that was recently turned into a small music venue. There were lots of nice old comfy couches and chairs and a little kitchenette where you could buy cupcakes, cheese plates, and goblets of Chex mix (those first two items ended up being my dinner, but I didn't have room for Chex mix. Next time!). I grabbed a chair, settled in, and hung out there happily for the next 6 hours. The only thing that would've made it better is if I'd had my knitting and my cat (and my husband!). I'll definitely bring the knitting next time. I don't think it would be out of place.

  There was one guy on a couch next to me who stayed for the whole 6 hours too, but he ended up falling asleep after about 4 hours, and he just slept peacefully in the back, curled up on a couch, while everybody else listened to music. I thought that was nice :)

  

  Langhorne Slim's set was short but good. My favorite performers of the evening were John Vanderslice and Bobby Bare Jr. I'd definitely like to see them perform live again in the future. John Vanderslice just seemed like a genuinely nice guy, plus he sang a song about cannibalism on the moon--how innovative! He said that he lives in San Francisco, but he wishes he'd moved to Portland 5 years ago when he had the chance.

  Bobby Bare Jr. got there late, but he was totally worth the wait. He was an awesome performer, and his steel guitar player looks just like Ken Burns. Bobby Bare Jr. is really into Shel Silverstein--in fact he's working on an album of covers of Shel Silverstein songs. Sounds cool!

  When the show was over (around 9pm), I headed home and went to bed at a totally reasonable hour! I had originally planned to see Langhorne Slim and The Builders and The Butchers at Crystal Ballroom, but that would have been another late night, and I'm not really a fan of the setup at Crystal Ballroom (the three times I've been there, I've ended up in the crowded over-21 corral, smushed against a stair railing, unable to see much of the stage). Since I had seen both bands already that weekend, I decided it wasn't a big deal to miss them.

• On Sunday, I went for a solo run along the Eastbank Esplanade (Patrick and Gunny did go to the Crystal Ballroom show, so they skipped the run in favor of more sleep). Then we had a lovely morning bike ride through Ladd's Addition (perfect weather!) to Juniors, where we had a very nice breakfast.

  Later that day, I headed over to the Hollywood Library with Lee and Star to see Susan, Diane, and Alicia talk about writing craft books--fun and informative!

  

  Patrick saw Gunny off at the train station, and then we finished out the evening with a little Buffy-watching. We actually just finished our second rewatching of the entire series, so I guess now it's time to find a new TV show to watch on DVD. We have a list of contenders. I'd be interested in True Blood, but I don't know if Patrick will go for it. Maybe Deadwood?

P.S. Yesterday, while biking to trivia, I saw a parade of ~10 naked bike riders at SE 26th and Clinton. They were hooting and hollering, and everybody on the sidewalk at SubRosa and Press Club was cheering for them. It was an unexpected and momentarily shocking sight, but it kind of made my day--such a cheery and innocent display of nudity! Portland is the best :)

P.P.S. I got my information packet for Ladies' Rock Camp in the mail today! I don't think I told you, but I signed up for a three-day-long rock immersion camp in late October. It's a fundraiser for the Rock Camp for Girls program, and I'm both nervous and excited about it! I signed up for vocals, but if it goes well, maybe I'll try drums next year. The camp bands will be performing our original songs on Sunday, October 25, from 3-5pm at Satyricon, if anybody wants to come check it out. It'll be like taking Rock Band to the next level!

Some recent tidbits:

• Shangri-La, the new Indian place at SE 26th and Clinton appears to have closed (already!). Bummer--we never got to try their full menu! They've scraped the paint off the windows, and they're totally remodeling the interior. I wonder what it will be next...

• We've once again bought wristbands for Musicfest NW, which means it's time to gather our earplugs and bus fare and stay up later than usual. I'm hoping not to catch a cold this year. The acts I'm most excited about seeing are the ones that impressed me last year--Langhorne Slim and The Builders and the Butchers. There are others that we'd like to check out as well, and our friend Gunny is coming into town from Seattle, so I'm sure he'll have some suggestions.

  If you don't want to spend money, you can still see my two favorites (and others) perform for free thanks to KEXP and Caffe Vita. The Builders and the Butchers will be doing a short set at Doug Fir at 2:30 tomorrow, and Langhorne Slim will be doing an unplugged performance at The Woods (a new venue in Sellwood) at 3pm on Saturday. KEXP is the best!

• Other potential activities this weekend: crafty writers at Hollywood Library on Sunday (I'll go if I'm not totally worn out from late night music) and a crazy sounding yard sale (skull collection, male mannequins, and a papasan chair?!). If you go, please leave the ironing board for me--I've been looking for a full-sized ironing board. My tiny travel-sized ironing board isn't cutting it anymore.

• I made a batch of shiro plum and vanilla bean jam last weekend. It was based on the plum-amaretto jam recipe from Small Batch Preserving, but with half a vanilla bean added during cooking. It smelled so good while it was cooking. It tastes nice too, but not as amazing as it smelled.

  
  
  

  Speaking of jam, for lunch last week, I had pseudo quesadillas made with cheddar cheese and peach jam, and they were good!

  

• Another recent made-up lunch that turned out well: a grated carrot salad with balsamic vinaigrette, raisins, feta, basil, and pine nuts.

  

• I've been thinking about getting a food mill for a while, so when I walked by Mirador and saw a slightly used one for 25% off, I bought it and made applesauce with it the very next day (our favorite apple lady is back at our farmers' market, so I had to buy something from her, even though it doesn't quite feel like apple time).

  I used the recipe for caramelized applesauce from Morning Food, and then I specifically ignored the recipe (which said to leave the apples un-mashed) and ran half of the sauce through our food mill. It's tasty, but very thick--more like apple butter. This could be because I milled it, but it could also be because of the types of apples I used. Still good mixed into cottage cheese! Anyway, I like our food mill and am looking forward to using it more in the future!

  
  
  

• I actually made progress on our Roman blinds this weekend, but then I got distracted by life during the week. I just need to sew a little bit more, and then they'll be ready for Patrick to take care of the hardware. Must finish them!

• After over a year, we've finally bought a few houseplants! We went to both Portland Nursery locations and ended up getting a parlor palm (some cats love parlor palms, but Patches is totally uninterested) and a spider plant. I crocheted a little Granny hexagon (using old acrylic yarn and the instructions in Linda's book) to put under the palm so the pot won't scratch our floors.

  
  
  
  
  

  I also bought some ranunculus, crocus, and tulip bulbs to plant around our garden, so we'll have even more exciting flowers next spring!

When I was at Black Sheep, I bought a very large skein of pink handspun wool. My plan is to make some cold-weather accessories with it (not sure if I'd wear them all at the same time though; it might be overkill). I finished my first pink yarn project a few weeks ago. It's a scarflet knit in herringbone stitch (using absurdly large needles!).

I cast on 16 stitches and knit until it was about 22 inches long. The herringbone stitch was a little fiddly, and it’s weird knitting with such big needles, but overall this was a fast and easy project. The stitch pattern kind of got lost because the yarn alternates thick and thin; I’d like to try this again with a uniformly thick yarn.

To secure the scarflet, I sewed on two vintage wood buttons from the Button Emporium. The fabric is open enough that I didn't need to make button holes--I can just tuck the buttons in between the stitches as needed. It's nice and cozy--perfect for when my office is chilly in the mornings.

Next, I think I'll knit a really simple bulky hat with it--like this, but probably without the cables, since there's enough going on with this yarn already.

(Also on Ravelry)

Phew! August was a frenzy of preserving and trying to keep up with our garden and CSA. Things seem to be slowing down now, which is kind of a relief.

We were lucky enough to be overrun with tomatoes this past month. I stuck some in jars--as tomato sauce, mild salsa, and barbecue sauce (all recipes from the Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving). The salsa and barbecue sauce are both pretty unexciting but still serviceable.

I underestimated how many jars I'd need, so I had extra portions of both salsa and barbecue sauce to use up this past week. I mixed the extra salsa with black beans and topped them with poached eggs and cotija cheese, which wasn't half bad. Most recently, we had vegetables and tofu simmered in the leftover barbecue sauce, served on top of brown rice. Meh.

The short jar in this picture is full of oven-dried cherry tomatoes, which are awesome! I've made a couple batches so far. We made some tasty sandwiches with pesto, fresh mozzarella, and some larger oven-dried tomatoes, but the real winner was this pesto pasta salad. It was based on this recipe, but with oven-dried cherry tomatoes, roasted eggplant and zucchini, and mozzarella as the add-ins.

Continuing the canning frenzy, I also made two batches of pickled roasted peppers, one batch of sweet garlic dill pickles, and a few jars of watermelon rind pickles, just for kicks (I don't even know if I like watermelon rind pickles). We've only tried the dill pickles so far. They taste like pickles should, which is exciting!

I had some fun with stone fruit as well--I made peach and blueberry pie, lavender-peach jam, plum-amaretto jam, and honey-peach ice cream (recipe from Baking). All were good but not amazing. I think my problem with the ice cream was that I used a strongly flavored honey (it almost tastes like eucalyptus or menthol) from the wonderful old Scandinavian man at our farmers' market, and the taste overpowered the peaches. It may be worth another try with more standard honey.

All that canning kind of wore me out (though it was a great learning experience!), so I'm taking a break from the jars for now. The tomatoes have slowed down because of some recent cloudy weather, and we're finally getting some zucchini from our backyard plant (it hasn't been very prolific, since I planted it kind of late, which is fine with me!). Tonight I made creamy basil zucchini soup, using the last of the scallions from our summer garden. I threw in a poblano pepper and a cup of lentils, to add some body, and it turned out just fine.

I've also made zucchini-walnut bread and chocolate-zucchini cake. Both are yummy and moist and don't taste like zucchini. It's like magic! To avoid overloading on zucchini baked goods, I froze most of the zucchini bread, pre-sliced.

We harvested two large zucchini last week, when I didn't have time to bake, so I tried freezing them. I coarsely shredded the zucchini and mixed it with a little sugar and then froze it. This week, when I had time to bake, I thawed the frozen zucchini and then drained it for 30 minutes before proceeding with the recipe (the recipe I was using, from Cook's Illustrated, called for mixing the zucchini with sugar and draining, so I just added the freezing step in the middle). The zucchini bread turned out just fine despite my extra step. That's a good trick to keep in mind for the future.

Although we've spent a lot of time close to home this past month, we've also gotten out and enjoyed Portland. We've been to a few more movies in the park, and we went to our first ever roller derby game, which was a good time. I think it was the last game of the season, but we'll have to make an effort to catch some more next year. On a related note, I'm looking forward to Whip It next month. I'm guessing real roller derby fans won't like it because it's co-opting their sport into something mainstream, but this kind of movie is right up my alley. Plus I'm a Drew Barrymore fan, even though she's generated some movies of questionable quality recently (He's Just Not That Into You, for instance).

This past weekend, we saw the final performance of Oregon! Oregon! at the zoo, followed by a set by Pink Martini. It was a fun show--I especially liked the sets by Scrappers and the giant dancing beaver. It made me smile :) I hope they release the updated soundtrack so I can listen to it at home!

I had the opportunity to rent a few movies this week, and after reading this post about The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, I decided to check it out.

I'm not sold on the entire dialogue being sung, but I loved the clothes and interiors! Genevieve had an excellent scalloped jacket (in two colors) that she wore in a number of scenes. I would love to have a jacket like that! It actually looks like Tulle makes something similar, but not quite as dainty. If I were a better sewer, I could try to make my own jacket, but I think that might end in disappointment.

Also, it seems like maternity clothes in 1960's France were way classier than they are nowadays. That second dress doesn't look too complicated--I wonder if I could sew myself something like that when it's baby time. Or maybe one of Portland's many awesome vintage stores carries maternity clothes. That hasn't really been on my radar, but I should keep an eye out.

Finally, check out that wallpaper!

I've got a whole backlog of summer activities to tell you about (most of them involving putting food in jars). Maybe I'll have time to write a longer post this weekend!

Running

And my last little bit of news--I ran an 8k! Patrick and I ran the Homer's Classic in Silverton the weekend before last. He finished in a little under 37 minutes (wow!), and I finished in a little under 54 minutes. I was aiming to finish in about an hour, so I was happy with my time. And I was extra happy that I ran the whole thing without stopping!

After we finished the Couch to 5k program, we switched to the One Hour Runner plan. Both programs worked great for us. Hard to believe that we're running an hour every Sunday without much difficulty when I couldn't run a block back in March. I plan on continuing to run three times a week for as long as possible (I'm worried winter might derail me). I don't have any plans to do a marathon or anything; for now I'm happy with the occasional 5k or 8k. Maybe a 10k eventually...

A couple things have been important in helping me stick with running: (1) having a plan to follow, (2) having somebody to run with (the silent peer pressure is a great motivator), and (3) Shot Bloks. For the first month or two that we ran, I insisted on running first thing in the morning without eating anything, and I'd run out of energy pretty quickly. Patrick finally convinced me to try Shot Bloks, and they totally helped me keep up my energy for the whole run. It's pretty obvious in retrospect, but it took me a while to figure it out.

So yeah, I ran the 8k, and it went really well! It was the most enjoyable organized run I've done so far, probably because the route was flat and I was able to listen to music on my iPod. The scenery was nice too. I think I ran harder than I usually do, because I was pretty tired by the end. Patrick ran at his own speed, and he high-fived me when our paths crossed at the turn-around point. That was fun :) Since he finished way before me, he was able to cheer me on at the finish line. After downing a cup of water, I had some yummy watermelon and Mexican pastries. Here I am after the run (those aren't the shoes I ran in). I think the stripey socks definitely made me run faster.

We stuck around after the run for the Davenport Days parade. It was a pretty standard parade; lots of candy was thrown. And then we stopped at the Silverton farmers' market for lunch (burritos!) and then checked out the arts and crafts vendors and food carts at the festival. What we were really looking forward to were the couch races, but after walking all over looking for them, we realized that they weren't until the following day. Bummer!

After that sad realization, we headed back to our car, stopping along the way to buy some pink mini cupcakes from a cute little girl. We almost bought a cool fisticuffs whirligig at a local antique store, but we didn't want to venture into lawn ornament territory. That's a slippery slope! (But I still kind of wish we'd gotten it)

So, that's it on the running front. Our next organized run is the Portland Marathon 5-miler. Tree will be in town to run the actual marathon, so it will be fun to be able to sort-of participate with her!

Baking

We went to a fun barbecue at Susan's on Friday, in honor of Linda and Paul, who were in town for Linda's book signing. It was great meeting them! My contribution to the barbecue was a shiro plum and berry frangipane tart, based on the recipe in Tartine. The fruit kind of got lost when the tart was baked, but it tasted good. My only complaint was that the texture of the sliced almonds distracted from my enjoyment of the tart; next time I'd opt for the more traditional ground almond filling.

I had some extra pastry cream and tart dough left over, so I made mini tartlets topped with blackberries. Yum!

Part of the reason that this past week has been so hectic is that I spent way too much time planning for the Pie-Off on Sunday. I decided early on that I'd enter the CPR category (the three main pie ingredients had to start with the letters C, P, and R), since I enjoy a challenge. I spent a long time making a spreadsheet of all sorts of delicious C, P, and R combinations (the flavor pairing chart in In the Sweet Kitchen came in very handy!) and then narrowing it down based on what's in season and what I could actually imagine baking.

I was originally going to make two pies, but in the end I decided to just make one, for my own mental wellbeing. I ended up going to the PSU farmers' market on Saturday morning, buying a bunch of ripe peaches, and making a double-crust peach pie with candied ginger and rum raisins. I used the peach pie recipe from Baking Illustrated as my base recipe, adding 2T of diced candied ginger and 1/3c of rum-flamed raisins (using the method described in Paris Sweets). I used Shuna's all-butter pie dough instead of the lattice dough that Cook's Illustrated called for. And I sprinkled some big sugar on top, because you know how I like big sugar on my baked goods.

Word has it that about 70 pies were entered in the Pie-Off, which is awesome! There were about a dozen in the CPR category. Judging that many pies took a while, so we occupied ourselves with our picnic lunch (salads #1, #7, and #23 from Mark Bittman's 101 Simple Salads, plus maple-cornmeal drop biscuits and bluebarb jam) and then took a walk around the park's beautiful rose garden.

I ended up taking second place in the CPR category--first place went to a good-looking coconut pineapple rum pie. Oh well, second place isn't bad, and we got to eat lots of pie afterwards. I managed to get a piece of my pie, and it was plenty tasty, which is a relief. I should bake another peach pie just for us, before the season ends.

I feel like the other pie I considered making might have had a better shot at winning, since it was more unusual than peach pie--it was a roasted banana cream pie with chocolate-lined pretzel crust (C = chocolate, P = pretzel, R = roasted banana). But it also would have required more work, and it wouldn't have used seasonal ingredients. I might try making it this winter though--I think it sounds tasty!

Crafts

In crafty news, Linda was in town to promote Crochet Adorned, as I mentioned above. I went to her Powell's event on Thursday, as well as her Yarn Garden event on Saturday. At the Yarn Garden event, she showed us all how to crochet a flower, and it really worked! Very exciting :) I ended up buying her book, because even though I'm not a big crocheter (the last time I crocheted was when I made a granny square afghan for my mom when I was about 12), the compendium of trims and motifs at the back of the book seems like a great reference. And some of her projects are really cute and easy--like the embellished shoes and pretty petals tank top. I might have to break out my crochet hooks sometime soon!

I forgot to mention it at the time, but I went to the Black Sheep Fiber Festival back in June and bought some pretty roving so I could try handspinning. Lee was kind enough to lend me her drop spindle, and I finally got around to trying it out a few weeks ago.

I used my less exciting (scratchy) roving for my practice run, and the yarn turned out lumpy and unpredictable, as I'd expected. It's still pretty cool that you can make yarn from fiber though!

The roving (combined with my very thick spinning technique) only yielded about 9 yards of yarn, and it wasn't soft enough to make something wearable out of it, so I used it to knit a cozy for our mail slot. When we bought the house, it came with a mail slot insert with two knobs, so I just knit a rectangle with two buttonholes for the knobs (looks kind of scary in that picture!), and I sewed it around the insert. Not too exciting, but at least the yarn didn't go to waste.

I have a larger amount of my nice roving, so hopefully when I get around to spinning it, I'll be able to make something a little more useful with it. We'll see...

Wow, August is going by so quickly! We're so busy enjoying that summer that I don't have time to write about it. That's probably a good thing. Let's see, what have I been up to? I'll divide this into a couple entries for easier reading.

Preserving

I've gone a little crazy trying to preserve summer produce before it's all gone. I'm getting lots of canning practice, and our cupboard is slowly filling with jars, which is exciting! (All recipes are from The Complete Book of Small Batch Preserving)

After the bluebarb jam, I made spiced honey blueberry jam and fresh fig and strawberry jam. The fig and strawberry is my favorite so far, though they're all tasty. It's kind of appalling how much sugar goes into a batch of jam, but it's also a little thrilling dumping cup after cup into the saucepot. And delicious!

Oh, and if anybody in Portland is wondering, like I was, where to buy liquid pectin--the Urban Farm Store has it (along with all sorts of other handy canning supplies). Yay!

When last we spoke, I had just started brining my nine-day icicle pickles, and they're now all finished and tucked away in jars. It was fun taking care of them for a few minutes every day. The recipe made exactly 4 pints, so I didn't have any leftovers to sample, but they smelled good and pickle-y! Here they are at day 5, and then post-canning. Next time I'm going to try packing the pickles in the jars a little tighter, since they ended up floating to the top.

Today is our one-year Portlandiversary (and house-iversary)! It has been such a great year--I'm so glad we decided to actually move here instead of just talking about it forever. Yay, Portland!

In honor of the occasion, I've started working on a house project that I've been putting off for almost a year now--sewing Roman blinds for our windows. I'm starting with the two highest priority windows--our stairwell (which faces south and heats up the house a lot in the afternoon) and our bedroom (which currently has a bed sheet for a curtain). Hopefully I'll be showing you some before and after pictures soon!

I tried to convince Patrick to order dinner from Belmont Pearl to continue our August 10th tradition, but he's not going for it. We're going to have our favorite lasagna (zucchini and eggplant from Cooks Illustrated) and leftover lemon-blueberry buckle instead. Not such a bad way to celebrate!

P.S. I think it's funny that I described Patches as ugly in that entry from a year ago--now I think she's the prettiest kitty in the neighborhood!

I went a little crazy at the farmers' market on Wednesday and bought 10 pounds of blueberries. I froze most of them (mixed with a little sugar, which is supposed to preserve their texture better than tray-freezing), and I'm planning on making a batch of jam this weekend.

Today I baked a lemon blueberry buckle (from Rustic Fruit Desserts) with some of the extra berries. I used two loaf pans because we don't have a 9-inch square baking pan (weird!). We've already eaten two thirds of a loaf, and we're in danger of polishing off the remaining third tonight. It's tasty :)

I also bought a couple pounds of pickling cucumbers at the market, and last night I embarked upon a nine-day-long odyssey of pickle-making. I'm making Icicle Pickles (recipe from The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving), which require nine days of soaking in various brines before canning. Fun!

Note to fellow picklers in Portland: At first, I was worried about the lack of pickling spice in the baking section at New Seasons, but it turns out they have it in the bulk spices aisle, which was even better, because I only need a tablespoon or so. Phew!

Man, I meant to write about last weekend sooner, but it got so hot this past week, and I couldn't bear to have my laptop on my lap. But now, with the sun down and the fan aimed at me, I think I can manage.

We've been doing all sorts of fun summer activities lately (I suppose this includes our four nights of porch camping last week, but that was more out of necessity because our bedroom was too hot to sleep in). Last Saturday, after a haircut and a quick visit to the PSU farmers' market for one last box of pie cherries before the season ended, I headed back to SE Portland to catch the Division/Clinton neighborhood parade, which was held as part of the annual street fair.

It was a pretty short parade, but it was fun to watch. The Last Regiment of Syncopated Drummers was at the front of the parade and totally made me want to take up drumming. They were followed by an assortment of people in cars, on bikes, and on foot. I especially liked the fish bike!

Next, we had an excellent lunch at Little T, chatted with Susan and Andrew for a bit, and then walked up Division to check out the rest of the street fair.

The highlight of the fair, for me, were the snow cones. I'd been looking forward to them all morning, and they did not disappoint.

Maybe it was just the hot, hot day, but we weren't that impressed by the street fair in general. There just didn't seem to be much going on compared to the Hawthorne Street Fair (Patrick pointed out that Division has a lower concentration of businesses, so that makes sense). We did have some good ice cream at Pix's ice cream social, but it was super crowded and frantic, and at that point, we just wanted to go home. Next year we'll probably stick to the parade and maybe get some snow cones, and that'll do it.

The Tour de Coops was the same day, and we decided that instead of running around town trying to see everything, we'd just visit a couple of the coops along Division after we checked out the street fair. I convinced Patrick that we should walk to the coops, which were around 70th and Division. In retrospect, it wasn't a great decision--walking 50 blocks in the heat was unpleasant. At least we were smart enough to take the bus back!

We did get to see a few good coops. This Old Dutch style coop was my favorite.

When we bought our Tour de Coops booklet, we also purchased a few raffle tickets, and we were lucky enough to win a fully assembled Garden Ark! Here's one just like it in the designer's backyard, which was part of the tour.

It's a really beautiful coop, but we're not totally sure we'll keep it. We kind of wanted to build our own coop. But it's pretty handy to have a coop ready to go in our garage! It makes it more likely that we'll actually get chickens in the spring, rather than saying we will and then putting it off because we don't have a coop built.

Later on Saturday, we biked over to Meat Cheese Bread, picked up some sandwiches, and headed over to Colonel Summers Park to watch Dirty Dancing (part of the Movies in the Park series). It was great--we had our little sandwich picnic beforehand, plus some free popcorn, and Patrick biked over to Whiffies when they opened and brought us back some fried pies, which were awesome. I had a double chocolate creme pie, and Patrick had the first lemon creme pie ever dispensed from the cart. Cool!

The movie started when the sun went down, and everybody had a good time, cheering on Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey. It was so nice to hang out on our picnic blanket in the cool evening air--just a great way to spend a few hours. Afterwards, we rode our bikes home in the dark, which, I've recently decided, is one of my favorite summertime activities in Portland.

On Sunday, we had a great run along the Eastbank Esplanade before it got too hot (we're up to 54 minutes of running without stopping, as part of the One Hour Runner program--and I'm actually enjoying it). And then I made jam!

During rhubarb season, I'd frozen a few cups of chopped rhubarb so that I could make bluebarb jam when it was blueberry time (how could I resist, with such a clever name?). It turned out pretty well, though I'm not sure that I like rhubarb in jam all that much. But the jam is still plenty nice on toast.

In the afternoon, we headed up to North Portland to see Trek in the Park, a live reenactment of an episode of Star Trek. We're not that into Star Trek, but we really enjoyed it. The actors were great, and the production paid good attention to detail (like having the appropriate sound effects when the imaginary doors opened and closed). I'd definitely go back again if they put on another production.

And then there was a heatwave, and we had no air conditioning, and it pretty much sucked. I spent some time working from the basement, since my office is on the second floor of our house, but our basement smelled funny (Patrick thinks this was because of a dry drain trap). Anyway, we made it, and things have cooled down a little now. Phew!

We spent a good chunk of time yesterday getting our new chicken coop home (we had to rent a pickup truck, since it was too big for our car), which was kind of stressful, since we had to deal with U-haul. But we redeemed the day by biking over to Laurelhurst Theatre to see the new Star Trek movie (this much Star Trek in the span of a few weeks is unheard of for us!), which was fun. We followed it up with a late dinner at Laurelhurst Market, a new restaurant and butcher shop started by Simpatica's founder. I wasn't in the mood for a big piece of meat, so I ordered a few appetizers/sides instead--gazpacho with crab; grilled green beans with pancetta; and peaches with prosciutto and pistachios.

Everything was so good, and I really liked the service and overall atmosphere. I'd definitely like to go there again, but I'm not sure how often we'll get back, since Screen Door is also in the neighborhood. I sure do love Screen Door!

We enjoyed another late night bike ride last night, and another early morning run along the waterfront today. I haven't been a fan of the super sunny, hot days lately, but I'm loving the nights and mornings right now--the air is the perfect temperature and such a welcome relief from our too-warm house. Speaking of which, it's time for bed! I think we'll try sleeping in the dining room tonight--a good compromise between our bedroom (too hot) and the porch (too many bug bites). The only other option is the basement, but it most certainly has a higher concentration of spiders than our porch does.

Last weekend, Star and I participated in the Stumptown Challenge, a Portland-centric scavenger hunt run. We were hoping to win the second-place prize: a year's worth of Dave's Killer Bread (which is the best bread ever!).

We were given clues describing 12 Portland locations, and we had to solve the clues and take pictures of ourselves at 11 of the 12 locations, traveling only by foot or public transportation. The three teams that returned to the starting point fastest won. We were allowed to use the Internet and/or phone a friend to help solve the clues. There was also a brief Portland-related quiz before the race, and correct quiz answers improved a team's total time.

We did pretty well on the quiz (thanks to a close reading of the Portland Wikipedia page the night before), and with Patrick's help we were able to solve all of our location clues correctly. We brought Patrick's iPhone along, and it came it very handy--we used it to see when the next bus/MAX/streetcar was coming, so we could decide whether to wait for it or run to the next destination. Our main weakness was that we tired quickly and weren't able to run the whole time, but I don't feel bad about that. It was a hot day, and a good portion of the running was uphill. I can run for long(ish) periods of time when it's a nice cool morning in Ladd's Addition, but in a race setting I run too fast and use up all my energy right away. I should work on that.

We were given half of the clues to start, and then we had to go to a check-in point to get the remaining clues. The first six clues were all in the Pearl district, so we ran between most of the locations, but then the second six clues took us to North Portland, so we had to take the MAX/bus to get there. Waiting for the MAX was tough, because we kept wondering if it would have been faster to take the bus (turns out it would have taken about the same amount of time).

When the race started, I was hopeful that we could win, but at the halfway point we found out that 20 teams had gotten there before us, and I think that discouraged us a little. But we persevered, and we ended up coming in 18th out of 71 teams, which I'm really happy about! And even though we didn't win the bread, we did get our very own Dave's Killer Bread magnets, which is almost as good!

Click here for the clues and unflattering pictures of us at each location. I definitely need to work on my self-portrait skills. The photo below (taken in Overlook Park) is my favorite bad picture of us.

I'm really glad we decided to do the Stumptown Challenge. It was lots of fun, and I hope to do it again next year!

P.S. In case you were wondering about the logistics of getting a year's supply of bread (we sure were!), here's the scoop: Each member of the 2nd place team received a punch card good for 52 loaves of bread. They have to go to the Dave's Killer Bread store (in Milwaukie, which is just south of Portland) to pick up the bread, and they can pick up four loaves at a time. It's a good thing their bread freezes well!

P.P.S. Later that day, Patrick and I went to see The Decemberists play (along with Blind Pilot and Andrew Bird) at McMenamins Edgefield, and it was possibly the best concert I've been to. It wasn't just the music (the Decemberists are always great), but the setting was perfect--a warm summer evening, sitting in a clearing watching the sunset while listening to music we love. Not only that--Patrick brought me an ice cream cone, and there was a cute baby wearing too-big hot pink protective ear muffs. After the concert, it took forever to get out of the parking lot, so the people in the car next to us cranked up their Decemberists CD, got out of the car, and danced, and a bunch more people came over and formed a big happy drunken dancing circle (we are not dancing circle enthusiasts, so we stayed in our car and watched from a safe distance). It was just an all-around good night.

Note to self: Bread and Ink has totally awesome ketchup!

We went there for pre-trivia dinner about a month ago, and I was totally impressed by their ketchup (I think I said, "Is this what ketchup used to taste like? I feel bad for all other ketchups!"), and then I promptly forgot about it. The memory of that ketchup came back to me a few days ago, but I couldn't remember where I'd had it. Luckily, Patrick helped me remember just now. I'm making an entry about it so I won't forget again.

The other praise-worthy feature of Bread and Ink (that I know of) is their Waffle Window, but I've already written about that. Hooray for excellent neighborhood restaurants!

While I'm writing, I wanted to make note of two upcoming Portland events that I'm super excited about:

• Tour de Coops: We narrowly missed this last year, and I've been waiting patiently for it to come around again. And now it's only a week away! I'm excited to see all sorts of cool local chicken coops (hopefully they'll give us some inspiration for our potential coop), plus they're raffling off one of those awesome Airstream-trailer-style coops by John Wright. I would so love to win that!

• Portland Pie-Off: Thanks to Sarah for the tip-off on this one! We were vaguely aware of this last year, but it was the week after we moved here, so it didn't seem like the best time to bake a pie. But this year I'm definitely considering entering. I'm particularly intrigued by the C.P.R. pie category. I love a good baking challenge!

Wow, I guess this means we've lived here for almost a year now. It has been so great so far--everything I'd hoped it would be. Thank you, Portland :)

We made a quick trip to Seattle the weekend before last so that Patrick could do the Seattle to Portland bike ride for the third time, along with Andrew and Jon. I came along to help get the car back to Portland, plus I wanted one of the best cupcakes around!

Patrick, Andrew, and I drove up from Portland on Friday. We stopped in Olympia for lunch at the Fifth Avenue Sandwich Shop and dessert at Boston Harbor Pies. In retrospect, perhaps we should have skipped the pie since we had cupcakes in our future, but there's no way I can walk by a pie shop and not stop in to try some!

Once in Seattle, we made a beeline for Cupcake Royale (luckily, Jon lives in Ballard, so we were only a short walk away). Yum, yum! After digesting a little, we went to the Hi-Life for dinner. We made a last-minute Safeway trip for safety pins, and then we turned in for the night.

Early the next morning (early enough to catch a beautiful sunrise!), I drove everybody's bags over the starting line, wished them well, and then headed over to a little park in Ballard to pass the time until the U-District farmers' market opened.

I hunkered down in the outdoor living room at the park and read A Homemade Life, which seemed appropriate since Molly lives in Seattle. I've been reading Orangette for a few years, and I was excited to check out her new book. It didn't disappoint--it was funny and interesting and honest--plus I want to try all of the recipes in it!

After a pleasant hour of reading, I drove over to the farmers' market in search of pie cherries (short season, have to make the most of it!). Happily, I found one stand selling them, so I bought 2 pounds, along with a few early apricots, sour cherry jam, and some locally grown rice pilaf mix.

The cherries went into a cobbler the next day. I used the recipe in Baking Illustrated (also available here for CI subscribers), and it turned out okay, but I didn't like it as much as my first cobbler. This one was too grown-up tasting for me, what with the red wine and spices. But I'm sure many people would like this version better than a more traditional cobbler.

I considered sticking around Seattle for a few more hours, since my to-visit list is pretty long, but I was more in the mood to hang out at home in Portland and relax. So I headed back, stopping for lunch in Olympia. I stopped at the Bread Peddler, where I had an awesome morning roll (croissant dough rolled around a butter/sugar filling), rhubarb lemonade, and a wheat berry salad. What a great place!

I took my lemonade down to the water and then took a walk around the farmers' market (it runs 4 days a week!). Mindful of the farmers' market produce already in the car, I only picked up one thing--a mason bee house. I've been wanting to make one of these, and although this would be super easy to make ourselves, this is the kind of thing that would take us years to get around to making (our project list is far too long already). So now I just need to hang it in our backyard and see if any bees move in! Mason bees don't make honey, so this is just meant to provide a home for some friendly neighborhood pollinators--minimal maintenance required, and no bee suit necessary.

And then I drove the rest of the way to Portland, where I was greeted by a very relieved kitty (I wish there was a way of telling her that we're not abandoning her and that I'll be back tomorrow so that she doesn't feel obliged to ration her dry food). The next day, I met up with Patrick, Andrew, and Jon at the StP finish line in Portland. From what I hear, the ride went well. I'm totally impressed and proud that they were able to ride 200 miles in 2 days. Patrick even mentioned trying to do the ride in one day next year. Crazy talk!

More knitting completed! A while ago, I bought a skein of laceweight yarn to make some crocheted edging for a dishtowel, but that project didn't work out, so I used the yarn to knit a Swallowtail Shawl instead.

This was my first lace knitting project. There are a few obvious mistakes if you look closely, but I'm still happy with the finished product. I used Eunny's blocking tutorial, and it worked great!

I'm not sure if I'm meant to be a lace knitter, since it requires more concentration than I can usually muster while watching TV shows. But I like the end result, and it's nice to be able to make something so nice out of just a skein of yarn. Patches likes it too!

Now I just need to incorporate this shawl into my wardrobe. I haven't been much of a shawl-wearer up to this point.

(Also on Ravelry)

Patrick's family was in town this past weekend, so on the fourth of July we hosted a barbecue and then went to see the fireworks on the SE waterfront (it was very crowded, so next year we'll probably try watching from our house instead). We went to the PSU farmers' market that morning and bought supplies for dinner. I was super excited to find Montmorency sour cherries at two stands, and I bought a few pounds to make a sour cherry cobbler for dessert.

My joy was somewhat dampened by the discovery that somebody had stolen my third anniversary bike seat while we were shopping at the market. That's disappointing. But at least I still have the rest of my bike. I took the bus home, Patrick drove back and picked up my bike, and he put my old bike seat on it tonight. Not the worst thing in the world. Plus I had those pie cherries to cheer me up!

I didn't have a cherry pitter, so I used a drinking straw, which worked really well (though it worked less well when I pitted sweet cherries the next day--I wonder if sour cherries are freestone and sweet cherries aren't). I made the sour cherry cobbler from Rustic Fruit Desserts (a winner of a cookbook so far!), and it was well received. I enjoyed it a lot--full of cherry flavor, and not too sweet. I'm hoping to find more pie cherries in weeks to come, but it sounds like they're pretty elusive. I'm just glad I found them at least once this summer!

For the pre-dessert portion of our meal, Patrick grilled some red snapper from the market and topped it with an avocado-strawberry salsa. We had veggie kabobs, pesto potato salad, and green salad with roasted beets, goat cheese, and Tracy's balsamic vinaigrette. The green salad was actually the best of the sides, probably because the lettuce and beets were straight from the garden. Yum! The potato salad was good, but it wasn't amazing (maybe I didn't add enough olive oil?). My quest for the perfect potato salad continues.

In my excitement at being surrounded by Pacific NW berries at the market, I overbought, plus I had leftover heavy cream from the cobbler, so I ended up making a second cobbler the next day. This one was based very loosely on the blueberry cobbler with cornmeal biscuits recipe from Rustic Fruit Desserts, but instead of blueberries I used raspberries, blackberries, and sweet cherries, and instead of lemon juice I used lime juice. Despite all of the reckless substitutions, it turned out well, but the sour cherry cobbler was definitely the winner this weekend.

And speaking of baked fruit desserts, I forgot to mention that after the First Thursday run, we stopped by the newly opened Stone Pie Joe's on NW 23rd to check out their mini pie selection. I was intrigued by the spicy clam pies (such an unorthodox pie offering!), but we went with the blueberry pie instead, since we'd already had dinner. It wasn't the best pie I've ever eaten, but it was good, and I'm sure I'll want to stop in again next time we're in that quadrant. Mini pies are a winning idea!

I'll leave you with a couple more pictures from around our garden. First up are two pictures of our cover crop, which ended up making pretty flowers, much to our surprise. Soon we'll be digging it under so we can plant our winter garden--parsnips and kale, among other things!

And here are our beets and lettuce patch, going strong! They didn't much like the heat wave this weekend, so I think we'd better eat them soon. Pulling big fat beets out of the ground is so much fun! It reminds me of pulling radishes in Super Mario Brothers.

Part of our small red currant harvest this year. Now that I know what the currant bush is, I'll treat it better next year, and hopefully we'll get enough currants to make jam!

We had another guest over the long weekend--Susan found this excellent bouncy horse on the curb a few blocks from us, with a Free sign on it. So lucky! She wasn't able to take it home because she was busy wrangling Pearl at the time, so we stashed it in our side yard for a few days. Now that it's at Susan's house, we kind of miss it! It was such a cute addition to the yard. But I know Pearl will get more use and enjoyment out of it than we would :) Besides, Patches was suspicious of the horse...

Hey look, I sewed something! It has been a while since that happened...

When I saw Betz White's shirred pillowcase top tutorial on the CRAFT blog, I knew I wanted to try making one for myself, so I started keeping an eye out for cool old pillowcases. A few weeks later I found a great one for $2 at House of Vintage on Hawthorne. There were 2 of them for sale, but I decided to buy only 1 and leave the other for somebody else to find and get excited about!

Patrick graciously picked up some elastic thread at Cool Cottons, and I sewed this top over the course of a few hours during the long weekend. This was my first time working with elastic thread, and I was really pleased with the results. It's not scary at all!

I wanted to preserve the cute lace eyelet trim along the bottom of the pillowcase, so I ended up following the S/M directions, even though I was closer to the M/L measurements. Luckily, it fit me just fine. My only complaint is that the straps ended up a bit loose and tend to fall down unless they're secured to something, so if I do it again, I'll need to pay more attention during the safety pinning step.

Adding in the cost of the thread, this top probably cost me around $3, and it was super easy to make. I'm so pleased with how it turned out!

Yesterday afternoon, Patrick, Star, and I did the First Thursday Run despite the 90-degree weather. This is a monthly event, where they unveil a map of participating local businesses 5 minutes before the run starts, and then you run to as many businesses as possible within an hour and get raffle tickets from each. When the hour is over, they draw tickets and give away prizes from the participating businesses.

We didn't bring water along with us because we figured there would be drinking fountains along the way, but of course the route we chose had no drinking fountains. Oh, it was unpleasant. If we do it again, we'll bring a pre-printed map of the area with the locations of all Benson Bubblers marked on it.

Despite the heat and lack of water, we put on a decent showing and each got 6 tickets (from Title Nine, the National Guard, Lulu Lemon, Blush Beauty Bar, Santa Fe Taqueria, and Cafe Reese). Patrick was unfazed by the lack of water and ran up to Food Front for a seventh ticket while Star and I walked back to the finishing point, where there was glorious cold water! Hooray!

After getting rehydrated, Patrick and I split a big, melty maple bar donut from Coco Donuts, which actually tasted pretty good despite seeming like the thing you would least want to eat after a run in such hot weather. Patrick also ate a big donut before the run without any ill effects. He's crazy!

Patrick and I didn't win anything during the raffle, but Star won a card for a dozen free donuts! It was very exciting :)

Star and I also signed up for the Stumptown Challenge, which I'm looking forward to! I hadn't heard about it before yesterday, but it looks like it's some sort of crazy Portland-centric scavenger hunt run. The second place prize is a year's worth of Dave's Killer Bread, which is the best bread ever! That's an excellent prize!

Sadly, we didn't take any pictures at the First Thursday run, but there will most certainly be pictures from the Stumptown Challenge!