Wet Dog

Hey Portland. Lets give up the rain and the gray, what do you say? As much as I love running in the pouring rain...some SUN would be lovely considering it is nearly JUNE! Good grief.

Upon finishing our run last night we looked a little something like this:

It started pouring about 2 miles into our 6. And by pouring I mean I rang water out of my underwear when I got home. While this was fun and entertaining once, it would be greatly appreciated if we could not do that again. I think for the first time in 2 years I am cursing this city and its temperate weather.

Pioneer Woman and ME

Yesterday I was perusing Pioneer Woman looking for a nice wholesome treat to make for bookclub and I caught the cooking fever. Yes the fever. All of the food on her blog looked so amazing and I suddenly wanted nothing more than to spend my entire day cooking things I had never cooked before. So I left work at 3:00 and went to the grocery store. I had the best afternoon up to my elbows in food. Cooking really can be awesome. I was especially loving the colors of the vegetables going into my salad.

Many hours and a few too many dollars later I had created a very beautiful macaroni and cheese complete with one pound of freshly grated sharp cheddar cheese. Swoon. Some crispy mozzarella sticks. {And did I mention that these things are fried? And did I mention that when I tried to fry something a few days ago it melted into little pieces and was a complete and total disaster? I feel so accomplished.}And one of the most beautiful salads I think I have ever eaten. Behold: The Asian Noodle Salad. The dressing called for things like fresh ginger, garlic, lime, cilantro and jalepeno. Have you ever heard of anything better than that combo?While I was busy in the kitchen Tyler took the camera out and spent some time in the rain with the Azaleas. At least there is one good thing that can come of all the gray and rain. I think I am starting to wither and die from lack of sunshine.

After hours of cooking and lots of eating I headed to bookclub for lots of talking and lots more eating. Everyone contributed some home cooked goodness. It was a beautiful spread. It made me weepy. Here is just a smattering of what we feasted on:

Home baked "goldfish" by Malorie. Why would anyone ever buy goldfish again? Now that I know you can make them and have them in star shape!? Brilliant. And delicious.Hummus delight by Lindsay. Someday I hope to master the art of hummus like Lindsay.Tabbouleh by Katie. There was a bit of a Mediterranean flavor to many of the snacks. This is one little number I will definitely be making soon. And my lovely salad. While it looks a little messy, it was delightful. I loved it. And I made enough to eat it for the next 9 weeks. So come on over and get some.

A special thank you to Malorie for hosting a wonderful bookclub. I just don't know what I would do without the group of amazing women I am lucky enough to call my friends. And they even like to read! Yay.

And an extra special thanks to Pioneer Woman and her gift for cooking and explaining it in a way that even dummies like me can understand.

Just a picture

I have no comment about last nights season premiere of The Bachelorette. Other than to say I was amazed at how bad Ali looked. I found that odd. Anyway...if you want to read a recap go to A's blog here. But in the mean time I could not help but post this picture. Holy. Moly. Laugh out loud fun. For more laugh out loud fun watch this!

God Bless Television

I am going to be up way past bed time tonight watching this:

And this:

Happy to see Dancing With The Stars ending and Sad to be seeing The Bachelorette starting. But happy/sad in that I will most definitely be watching sort of way. Right? I know you are all there with me. Right?

New York!

We stayed in a lovely hotel in Times Square. It was large and beautiful and classy. We didn't really know what to do with ourselves. Thanks to my "work connections" (I am VERY important if you didn't know) we were able to secure an awesome room.

They even treated us to this delicious cheese plate. Thank you business connection. We did a lot of eating. Mostly of desserts. One day when moderately lost we stumbled upon Magnolia Bakery. We thanked our lucky stars then promptly purchased a box full of the worlds best cupcakes. See that top row? To DIE for.
So very happy.

Due to the a very much pregnant lady traveling with us we did the thing most tourists do and bought a city tour bus pass. It was one of those double decker hop on hop off things. And it turned out to be the best thing we did. Limited walking/ maximum ground coverage. It was awesome.

Times Square

We saw two fabulous Broadway shows: Mary Poppins and The Adams Family. Both were incredible.

New York stinks. Like it actually smells really really really bad. And it is packed with a million people. Times Square is for sure the worst. That place is quite horrible. Luckily it is also packed with Broadway shows and shopping which helped redeem its crappiness.

The Met was incredible. Our favorite part was finding the cafe.

Have you ever seen those people that refuse to smile in pictures? They are standing in front of something {Met, Eiffel Tower, Colosseum, etc...} incredible and this is what you get: We love to see those kind of people.

We however, like to smile in our photos.

A very glam shot of Andrea.

This is as close as we got to the Statue of Liberty. And I am A-Ok with that. Do you see those choppy waves? No thank you. My sea sickness and Andrea's pregnantness was a very convenient excuse for staying on the mainland...shopping however, was the real motive.

All of these lovely photos were taken by Sarser

(except for the ones she is in. I took those)

New York came and went far too quickly. But we had a fabulous time. There is nothing like a long weekend with your two favorite girls. Andrea -being 30 weeks pregnant- gets a gold star for trekking around this huge city. Thank you mom for the most amazing trip! We love you!

Dreay Friday

Today is already looking a bit precarious. It is pouring rain, I have a pounding headache, my contacts feel like they have dirt on them (but they don't), I left my cell phone at home, our computer cord snapped in half somehow, and my boss appears to be having mental breakdown number two in two days. And it is only 8:36 AM. Not good.

I am going to blame this wholly on the tsunami television program I watched last night. Far reach you think? I don't know. I watched the most horrific show on the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. Most of you probably know my fear of tsunamis is completely out of control...but I have been doing well lately. I go to the beach. I have camped on the beach. I ran on the beach a few weeks ago with only minimal nerves. But I have now seriously digressed. Tyler thought that by making me watch this episode I would learn the warning signs of a tsunami and that this would calm my nervous heart and I would be able to be a happy beach goer from then on. Wrong. I think my poor start to the weekend is fates way of telling me to stay out of the way of tsunamis in any form (television or physical) because it really messes with my mental state.

Plus after nearly having a heart attack from that show we switched over to watching a show about 9/11. I went to bed with thoughts of death and destruction. Probably not wise. I will now focus my afternoon on harnessing all the positive energy out in the world and releasing my tsunami stress hang over from last night. I think this may involve leaving work early and going and sitting in my hot tub in the rain. Hmmm. Yes, that should definitely help.

This is a lovely little flower in New York to help me harness the positive. Out with the bad...in with the good!

A new view (for me) on womanhood

Seeing as I am surrounded by a myriad of pregnant, recently pregnant or soon to be pregnant women I get to participate in a lot of baby, birth and pregnancy talk. Some of it I tune out, because I am just not there yet, some of it I laugh at, some of it I try to remember for my future life as a mother. I have a lot of wonderful women in my life to learn from and I am ever so grateful for that.

Today my sister, who is having a baby girl in July and is also planning on a natural childbirth, shared with me a birth story of an old friend of hers. It is an amazing and spiritual picture of her natural childbirth experience. It made me think about birth in a way I had not before.

I know that deciding how to deliver your children is very personal. I am so grateful we live in a time where we as women have the opportunity to choose, and that if we choose to go the natural route, that we have incredible medical professionals available if needed. While I have not had any children myself, I feel certain that childbirth is a unique and life changing expereince no matter the method of delivery.

With that in mind, if you would like to read Rebecca's experience please click here. The part that I loved are the last two paragraphs before the first photograph {whew! Did you get that?} If this story is not an empowering and moving passage about the beauty {and challenges} of womanhood, I am afraid I do not know what is.

**Becky has asked that none of her pictures or her story be copied, or posted on the internet. If you for any reason choose to share her story please only link to her page.**

Drama, Drama, Drama

After nearly 6 years without any major medical conditions, accidents, or trauma I suppose I should have known that we were due. I would like to think that I have a sixth sense when it comes to these sort of things. I was late to Tyler's softball game on Friday night and I kept thinking "Please do not let him get hurt while I am not there!" Impressive? You might think so, except this is the mantra I chant nearly every time I go anywhere without Tyler. I suppose I owe this to knowing him through the injury ridden years.

Well to make a long story short Tyler flew threw the air with the greatest of ease to catch a line drive to center field. And after catching the ball in what was serious style, he landed full force on his right shoulder. We called it a 'stinger', something that would surely wear off. I even made him drive the car home after I locked us out of said car {we are not even getting into that part of the story but thanks to Stevenson for rescuing us}. After several hours of pain, we finally got his jersey off to discover that his shoulder was actually not attached to the clavicle. Beautiful sight. So after a lovely trip to the ER {complete with cocktails of sprite and cranberry juice} we were given the verdict. Broken clavicle. Dislocated shoulder. Excellent.

Truth be told it could have been much worse and he should, SHOULD, heal up on his own. He should be back to using his arm in basic ways in a few weeks. So we are focusing on healing now.
After vast amounts of disappointment upon realizing the many things he would not be able to participate in, including but definitely not limited to, an awesome hike we were planning for Saturday - I decided we needed to do something very exciting. So...we went here:

If you have not been, you should. It will be in my heaven.
Tyler was deliriously happy despite the slinged arm. He is munching on The Babs. Bacon, apple, blue cheese, and swiss on Rye. It is incredible.
The Gabby. Four cheeses topped with avocado. I am dying just writing about it.

I love the hippie bus fully equipped with tables for the whole family.
We wiped this frown upside down. Grilled Cheese Grill. Go. Now.

Now I just have to figure out how we are going to get Tyler though the rest of the week. While he is busy struggling to get dressed on his own, I will be partying it up in NYC. And while I am terribly excited, I feel like an awful wife. Take care of him friends, will you?

If...

If I had not married the sweet faced man that I did, I think I would have chosen this one:

Who wouldn't want to wake up to this each morning?
Although I have to give Nash full credit for playing with a totally gnarly eye. Lets be honest and remember that no one on the Jazz would have done the same {except for maybe Paul, or Wesley who is the new Paul}.