A Rainy Day

My family wishes it would snow, but ever since I’ve been home I’ve really been enjoying the days it has rained.  It doesn’t happen enough in Utah.  I am a sun addict, but there’s something so refreshing about the rain.  I especially love the sound of rain on my window while I’m trying to fall asleep…  It’s so soothing it just relaxes me like nothing else can.  Everything looks beautiful when it rains too, with all of the lights reflecting off of the water.  The moral of the story is that it is nice.

A few of my favorite friends from home decided to embrace the rain today and head downtown.  The original plan was for us to go shopping on 23rd, but when it was still raining so hard we decided to stay right off the max line and shop at Pioneer Place’s H&M and Forever and the Calendar store.  I’ve been struggling to decide which calendar to buy so I made them pick one for me.  The verdict?  Surfing dogs.  A new classic, I’m sure.

These pictures are a little blurry because I had my camera on the wrong setting… but they’re still cute.

 

Home for the Holidays!

It’s been wonderful being back home. I was only here for two weeks during the summer, and it really just wasn’t enough. And my bed here is so comfortable. Every day I’ve been sleeping in for ridiculous amounts of time. I keep thinking eventually I’ll be all caught up on sleep and start waking up at normal times, but there’s no sign of that happening yet.

This whole week the saturday market is doing the festival of the last minute, meaning it’s open every day until Christmas, so we went down to catch it today. Here are some pictures of the holiday downtown magic:

View Full Album

Amber said she wanted me to start a photo company so she could have the official job title, “Amber the Poser.”

Santa was selling chestnuts at the market.

Oregon love.

We bought some Portland ornaments. Not the bald eagle one.

And there were even some carolers to bring the Christmas spirit.

More market stuff I’m too lazy to write captions for.

I just really liked this for some reason.

There were lots of other peoples holiday shopping.

We went into (the new, three story) H&M when it was light outside…

and came out when it was dark. Took the traditional umbrella man photo, naturally.

When dad got off work he joined us for dinner at the Rock Bottom Brewery next to his office, where I continued my mac & cheese quest.

Night night night.

Amber completed the trip with some Christmas window wishing at Tiffany’s.

Being home is nice.

Free Spirit

First: I’m home in Portland! Sitting on my cushy couch, watching a large TV with a fluffy dog at my feet. It’s lovely.

Second: This blog entry. So, because I’m a ridiculous person, the first thing I did on my first morning off was clean my bike. That’s right. I love that thing. It’s a Sears & Roebuck Free Spirit, circa the 1970’s (best I can tell on the internet). When I was heading out to school freshman year I didn’t want to bring my nice bike, in case it would get stolen or damaged or whatnot, so I started looking for a “beater” bike to bring with me instead. When I found this one on Craigslist, it was love at first sight. My dad and I drove to a house in Portland, test drove it down the street (a massive hill. Not ideal), left the $40 under the door as instructed and took it home. It was really a steal, a similar bike was listed shortly thereafter for over a hundred dollars.

We’ve been on some great adventures since then. Like hiking the Y. Yes, you read that right. It is not something I would recommend. Back during my freshman year when I didn’t have a car at school, my friend Corinne Fletcher and I wanted to hike the Y and thought it would be a good idea to ride our bikes up to the starting point to get there faster. Not so. The hill was way too steep, so we ended up having to walk them and this bike is like solid steel. Long story somewhat short, pushing the bikes to the starting point was harder than hiking the actual mountain. When we got to the beginning there were no bike racks. I wonder why. Although, it was pretty nice to ride the bikes down the mountain when we were done.

But this is all off track. The timeliness of this story (I’m always asking my reporters and people giving me press releases why I should care about their story ideas now) is that I cleaned my bike yesterday, largely to put some stuff on it to protect it from rust. My fingers froze off, but it was worth it. If you had a bike this awesome you would want to take care of it too! I mean, just look at these stickers.

And that’s not all! It also has a rack on the back. I’ve used it for many things. When I didn’t have my car the first two years at school, I became an expert at loading all of my groceries on it. I’ve transported gallons of milk, juice, large pizzas, balloons, everything. One time someone legitimately pointed and laughed at me when I had a large thing of toilet paper bungy corded on the back. I didn’t know people really did that. I’m sure they were just jealous.

And I got a sweet bell for it in London at Octopus, one of my favorite stores in the world. I may ring it every time I walk past it.

Now go love your bikes!

Can’t Wait!

Next week I get to sleep in this bed:

And play with this fluffy dog:

And be with these people.

So excited!

Egg Press

I’ve never been a huge greeting card person. I’ll walk down aisles of them in the store, read them and laugh, but I’ve never had much of a desire to buy them and just keep them on hand.

That changed when I was at home for Christmas in Portland. I was downtown with my Dad checking out the pop-up stores (this December since so many stores closed downtown because of the economy the city let local designers use open space in prime locations to sell their cool stuff) and we happened across one for Egg Press. I wandered in and fell in love.

I had to pretty much physically restrain myself from buying the Christmas cards that were on sale. Now I’m on their email list and just waiting for them to have a sample sale because I’m too cheap to buy them at full price. But in the meantime you can join me in admiring their work here.

They’re a Portland company that brings the art and home feel back into cards by using an old fashioned press to make them. For your enjoyment a picture of the press is below. The cards up top are from their new Valentines collection.

Decades

I feel like with this past decade coming to an end a lot of people are reflecting on the past, which is good, but right now I'm mostly excited for what will happen in the next decade. There are infinite possibilities, and I for one can’t wait.

I can't help but feel that whatever happens this decade will have a huge influence on the tone and direction the rest of my life takes. Hopefully by the end of the decade I'll have found myself a boy to be with for the rest of eternity. Maybe I'll have gone on a mission, or to grad school, or both. I'll have graduated from school, had my first real job, and moved to some yet to be determined place. And just think of all the new movies I've yet to watch and books I'll get to read.

On another note, thanks to all of you for being such fantastic friends! This past decade wouldn't have been any fun without you. In fact, it would have been quite lonely and horrible. For a Glee moment to accompany this thought click here.

And on yet another note, here are all the pictures I can find (or rather my mom could find) of me and my sister with the umbrella man downtown. I mentioned before I’d try to do it, and in case anyone cared, here it is. We started out taking this picture every year at Christmas after we visited the Santa downtown, but now we take it just whenever we’re all downtown at the same time and near the statue.

1995

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2005

2006

2007

2009 Summer

2009 Winter

AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!