SE Portland Creeks and Bridges

(We did this walk with a few other homeschooling families yesterday.) The walk started at Westmoreland Park and went south along there until we hit the Springwater Corridor. We walked on a small part of that and then turned around to continue the walk through the very different neighborhoods in this area. Eva was relieved that we weren't going to walk all the way to Gresham and we remembered that we have actually been for a walk on at least part of the other end of the Springwater Corridor with friends of ours who live in Gresham.









One of the neighborhoods had pink flamingos in all of the yards along one section.








Eva wrote her name on the community board.



The walk ended shortly after we hit these food carts for ice cream. I loved the flowers planted in this grill.

2011 upick chronicles (x2)

There has been a definite shift in the angle of the light in the last week and a half and the quality of the wind, which corresponds nicely with Lammas (half way between the summer solstice and the autumn equinox). This seasonal shift has been noticeable in the berry fields as well. We picked raspberries a few days ago and then picked a pint or two each of boysenberries, marionberries, black raspberries (black caps) and sylvan blackberries today. There are still a few berries on the vines but rather than sharing space with flowers and honey bees, they are surrounded by unpicked drying berries and yellow jackets enjoying the sweetness of the season. The rows, once easy to walk through, are now overgrown.

The weather was overcast and cool when we first arrived at the upick late this morning. There were also so. many. blackbirds flocking. By the time we left, a little over an hour later, there was sunshine with fluffy cumulus clouds filling the sky.







Our upick on Wednesday was cut short by the hot dry weather. I had us there much later in the day than I normally would have, had I known how hot it was supposed to get.

Before going to the upick on Wednesday, we went to the farmers market in downtown Portland. It was a quick trip to pick up my first tomatoes of the season. It was also a reminder that peach season has begun! (After the market, we walked up to the food carts for tacos and frozen yogurt. And this it was off to the upick. A summer-food-filled day.)

picture summer- day 27 {getting the giggles}

picture summer- day 14 {summer breezes} again

picture summer- day 10 {summer memories}

2011 upick chronicles

More strawberry picking yesterday, this time with friends. I picked 6.8 pounds of hood strawberries and noticed that the picking had definitely slowed down from a few days before. My feeling is that a few more days of sunshine and a little more heat will help ripen them up to make for easier picking {again} next week.

picture color- day 23 {meaning of color}

Don't be blue. There's more parking on the upper levels.

2011 upick chronicles

First upick for us today. We picked (mostly rainier and some puget reliance) strawberries (13.46 pounds) at Baggenstos Farm. I love picking berries and was so pleased to be there today. Strawberry picking is nice for a few reasons, even if they aren't my favorite berries. It is early in the season and my kids aren't burned out yet from picking. It's usually not hot enough yet to be uncomfortable. It can even be overcast, like it was today. And Eva usually enjoys picking as well, so the picking goes doubly fast.

I made sure to take a few moments to enjoy being outside with the berries. I miss being in the country frequently and when I'm out at the upick, I try to remember to take a look around at the big sky and vast spaces that can feel so peaceful to me.





Now what? Eva said she doesn't want me to make very much strawberry jam this year because she doesn't really like strawberry jam, which was amusing to me because she used to be the main person who did like strawberry jam. And why I made it. (Well- let's be clear. I made it because I like making jam. But I don't like eating very much jam, so it's nice to have someone who likes it...) I guess we'll eat a ton of strawberries for now, freeze some and make a little jam. I'm hoping to pick strawberries a few more times before the raspberries kick in. Once there are raspberries (and then other berries) to pick, I find it hard to pick strawberries any more. Right now is a special time with just the strawberries out there for picking.

picture color- day 8 {punctuation mark}

Eva's dancing boots.

portland walking tour

We went on a walking tour of downtown Portland today with a local homeschool group. I think one of my favorite parts was getting to try out two different echo chambers in the downtown area, one in Pioneer Courthouse Square and one further south, near the Keller Auditorium.



Both kids in the funky chair at the Center for the Performing Arts. Samuel was being timed by one of the moms and you can see by his face that something is up.



Anansi topper outside Center for the Performing Arts and the world's smallest park, measuring just 24 inches across.



Portlandia (second only to the Statue of Liberty as a large copper statue) and 19th century building with iron and grotesques (gargoyles without the water...) Apparently they used to use the different decorations on the buildings to give directions, as in- I'm in the white iron building with the grotesques sticking their tongues out...

The tour guide brought magnets so the kids could find out which of the older buildings had iron in them for decorative purposes. Portland has 20 iron buildings (down from 200), second only to New York City for cities with iron buildings.



Salmon Street Fountain and Eva looking at the Willamette and the Hawthorne Bridge.



There was a fantastic flower display in Pioneer Courthouse Square.




The kids doing crayon rubbings. (There is one block with several bricks with words and quotations etched into them. The tour guide brought crayons and paper for rubbings.)

impromptu

We ran into Indecision this morning after our plans were dashed. I had back-up plans, but for some reason they were not appealing first to one child, then to the next (after the first child finally agreed to them, and so on...), which vexed and confused me, leaving me at a loss. The kids and I went round and round with other ideas, back and forth, until I was sure I would spin right out into the atmosphere from the sheer chaos of it all. (Either quickly, because of that spinning feeling in my head, or slowly, because of that mud-like squish I felt I was walking through.) Not that not-knowing-what-to-do is a bad thing, per se. It's simply that particular type of not-knowing-what-to-do that I was feeling this morning, the kind that breeds lashing out and head spinning and desperate attempts to fill time that most probably won't work anyway. The type that require a quiet mind and {often} commitment to overcome.

So I committed to OMSI. And the kids came round with me and off we went. We haven't been in ages and we went to see- specifically- the Egypt exhibit and the shell exhibit I had heard about. I was pleased with both, I'm happy to say. I was also pleased with how everything began to fall into place once I had made my decision- lunch, the hologram exhibit (which is so rarely open when we go to OMSI I often forget about it entirely) and our trip to the serve-yourself-yogurt place near out house afterward. And tonight- lots of cooking, a chance to blog, photos to upload. Not all flowers and butterflies, to be sure, but still quite a bit less chaos than this morning.



And see- at least one child clearly enjoying herself at OMSI. And Samuel? Even he said he was glad we went, after we bought gummi space ships, of course. (Even before we bought gummi space ships, come to think of it.) Because who can resist those? And we all saw a mummy today. (Don't think it didn't get me thinking about how the Egyptians probably didn't imagine they would end up in our museums one day in the distant future...)