the Fairy & the Pumpkin

kindly mosey on over this way...

Finally!  I did it.  I have spent, literally, the last year trying to think of a new name for a blog that would help me refocus.  When I started this blog, I wanted it to be about reframing my daily life to help me see how special it really is.  And the blog definitely helped me shift my perspective on what it is that I do at home with all of the spare time that a young mother gets.  

Although, to be honest, as my children get older, I become less young and get more and more time to myself.  Being an older mother with independent children isn't half bad.  Or it is half bad actually.  Whatever.

As I grew into the ability to hone in on my gratitude and repackage it back out for my family, I realized that I now want my blog to reflect the things that I do and maybe less of the why I do them.  Because, let's face it.  I'm not that great of a writer.  And my sentimental writing is just the worst.  Only slightly worse than my humorous writing.  Which is as humorous as an ant with irritable bowel syndrome.

But what to name it?  I agonized and agonized as if I was getting paid by the hour to agonize.  I thought about "life out here" or "aqua submarine" or "agrari-land" and other horrible names.  I was stuck.  It was with the decision to make myself public (husband and children still won't be public though) that my husband suggested I go with my name.  Thank you, mom, for a great name.  Although, I have been told that my name is considered ugly in Russia because it does not end with a -ya or -ia.  So maybe if you're Russian, you don't think my name is great at all.  Opinions aside, when my husband suggested I go with "a struggling perfectionist with ADD" or my name, it just felt right to go with my name.

So, I present to you, my new blog, GetIngrid, at www.getingrid.com.  Because, you know, it's hard even for me to get myself with all of my scatter-brained tendencies.  I'm finally admitting to being impetuous, random, crazy, and wildly incoherent.  I hope somewhere there's a little carrot inserting the word "fabulous" in tiny script into that description.

The fun changes are the domain name and an RSS provider for my friends who kept struggling with my RSS feed for eReaders.  All of the old content should also be there so please let me know if you find any glitches.

I am unrolling the curtains at the new blog prematurely so I must impose on your kindness and ask for your patience.  There will be some design work in the near future and some of the pages are still missing; many an hour will be logged and possibly a few dozen donuts.  But since there's no really big change for anyone else but me, there's no need to pull an Apple here and keep it behind locked doors until it's perfect.  You can use it the same, the Nitty Gritty blog is still up (and so will this one even though I won't write here), good news: the world will keep on turning.

What I am hoping to include with this new blog are a few new focuses and the inclusion of my new soap shop.  That should be up by the end of July/August.  If anyone is interested in getting any samples in the mail, just let me know in the comments section of this post!

And so, we go where no every-other-blinkin blogger has gone before...

 

a few good dinners

Today we went to go look at a few houses.  With the children.  You should never look at houses with children.  I'm pretty sure it's generally accepted that you just don't bring children, but we ended up towing them along.  It wasn't long before the invasion of privacy performed by my daughter and her embarassing comments reached critical-humiliation-meltdown levels.  ("Wow, Mom!  Can you believe she has so much jewelry in her jewelry box?!",  "Awww, I wish Daddy made more money so we could buy a big house like this!", and "Why does that girl look so weird in that picture?")  We had to set a new rule prohibiting them from talking or touching while we were in the houses.  Watching a child with ADHD trying to supress an urge to talk is like holding bacon over a dog's nose and making him sit.  Next time, no children.

Needless to say, we're all pretty tired.  But seeing these old photos brought out an urge to cyber-share and a girl's gotta' do what a girl's gotta' do.  (These are from the good ol' Portland days.)

Nachos.  Everybody needs nachos.  Salty, filling, bar-style nachos.  I didn't make the corn chips for these but I should have.  Start with beans make from scratch (just drain the liquid), then brown some meat (preferrably steak cut into thin strips) in sauteed garlic and onions then sprinkle with a little cumin, coriander and paprika for the last minute of cooking.  Make your own corn chips by cutting corn tortillas into wedges, coat them with oil, and bake them until crispy.  Top it all off with tomatoes, cilantro and green or red onions.  The cheese sauce is a cheddar fondue made by rubbing the sides of a pot with a cut garlic clove, then simmering a little white wine or beer (1/4 cup), adding water or chicken stock (1-1 1/2 c) until barely simmering and then finally adding cheese that has been grated and tossed with corn starch (~2 cups with 1-2 Tbs cornstarch).  Quickly remove from heat or use very low heat for a smooth texture.  If you don't want to use alcohol, use something acidic like diluted lemon juice.  I can't find the recipe that I used but those are the broad strokes.

We enjoyed quite a few meals from the Cooking Light April issue that had 40 meals under 40 minutes.  That was definitely a fun issue!

This dinner was great, but the stand-out was the quinoa with toasted pine nuts.  So good.  I used my preferred method of cooking quinoa with a rice cooker (still used broth instead of water) and toasted the garlic and pine nuts separately and added them at the end.

chicken cutlets with tarragon-mushroom sauce

snap pea and radish saute

quinoa with toasted pine nuts

We absolutely loved this tikka pizza from that same issue.  I made homemade pizza crust though instead of using a pita bread.

chicken tikka pizzas

The 4 mushroom pizza was only so-so (maybe a homemade pesto would have rounded out the flavor better) but we loved the grapefruit salad.

four-mushroom pesto pizza

grapefruit, walnut, and feta salad

Last, but definitely not least, a friend recommend I try this falafel recipe (not from the Cooking Light April issue) to use up a quantity of chickpeas, also known as garbanzo beans.  They were, as the recipe indicated, a sure favorite.  Sooo delicious.  We loved them plain as I was just too lazy to make some pita bread, but I can only imagine what delicious falafel sandwiches they would make with some tzaziki in warm homemade pita.

my favorite falafel

At this point we were definitely just trying to use up food so we served them over broccoli slaw (which was a leftover), plain brown rice with cut bell peppers that were slightly steamed from being put on top of hot rice.  This meal, the nachos, and the tikka pizza are my clear favorites.

the city of roses

It was hard to say goodbye.  Our year in Portland was...how would I describe it?  Amazing.  Wonderful.  Nourishing.  Healing.  Beautiful.  Mesmerizing.  Leaving after only a year definitely felt like a harsh rip, like industrial grade velcro tearing itself as it gets pulled apart.

A friend made me a bouquet from her garden to help me remember Portland as the city of roses and it really stirred something in my heart.  Portland, from June until now, is just filled with roses.  Everywhere you go you run into roses bushes that can barely support the weight from all the flowers.  It was sad to think of leaving that behind.  When I last visited the Rose Garden, I could smell the blossoms as I stepped out of my car.  It's incredible to me that when you are in the presence of so many roses, you can smell their different fragrances.  Some smell more like honey, some like apples, some citrusy, others smell more musky.  It was just so sad to realize that I was leaving those experiences behind.  And of course, leaving behind all the people we've met or reconnected with.  And all those fun family trips we had!

Thank you, my friend A, for those beautiful blooms.  I get teared up remembering the gift.

Packing and the move itself went very well.  My husband's family came out to help, bless their stalwart hearts, and their help made all the difference.  Loading up all of our junk into a 26' uhaul several times has got to get old.  Am I right or am I right here?  Stress and craziness aside, the children managed to make a few sweet moments for me.  Like when they found my newly cleaned recipe chalkboard before it got packed up.  I left it so that I can find it again eventually.

And we made sure to have a fun swim party with their good friends for some memories.

Can I just stop for a second and elocute on just how proud I am of my husband and all of the hard work he has put into the past ten years?  Just about ten years ago, we started our married life on a trek out to Cincinnati, Ohio so he could start medical school.  Back then it felt like we would never get to this point.  But here we are!  Soft tummies and grey hairs galore!  But we're still happy and our family has grown and I know juggling this with his career was never easy for a day.  His career demanded that it be put first but he never made us feel like we were anything but first.  And then I made the poor man remodel a home during his residency, heaven help him.  But after all, it's the hard work that makes a thing worth having, isn't it?  I am very proud of his tireless efforts and his determination to never waiver in his committment to family.

After some wonderful family time in Utah, we are now in our final destination.  Hello, St. Louis, gateway to the west!  What a fascinating and beautiful city!  I love the old, French influence in the names and architecture.  So far so good.  The children are enjoying my parents' backyard.  (We are being the reprobate moochers and living in their basement for the time being.)

They get to be around a crowd of second cousins and they are loving that too!

My mother already sewed my daughter a beautiful, pink frilly nightgown from the most exquisite Swedish flannel (that I have heard, on good authority, costs more than $30/yard).  She will be selling them on her etsy shop (VintageBaby Clothier) so make sure to stop by if you think it's the most adorable thing you've ever seen.

Yes, they are jumping on my parents' bed.  Sacrifices must be made for a good photo shoot, right?  Hard sacrifices.

The good news for me is that the lighting here seems to be beautiful for photos and I'm looking forward to that change.  Also, we get to start looking around a little for houses.  We hope to not be moochers for forever!

And the good news for this blog is that I have some fun posts to catch up on: yogurt-making, some delicious recipes, and making soap too!  I'm even going to start selling soaps on my etsy store so I'll keep you posted when I'm giving away free samples.  Overall, I'm going to be giving the blog some tweaks and changes and hope to be putting more work into that now that summer has slowed us down.  I've got a knitting project, a sewing project, and a children's gardening project in the works.  Overall, I feel really excited for these changes in our life.  

But before I leave, I just wanted to share one more thing about Portland.  The unofficial motto is "Keep Portland Weird."  I loved that.  And Portland truly is a mecca for all that is weird and out-there.  You could randomly run into a man in a monkey-mask driving a van decorated with monkey statues while buying doughnuts downtown who charges you a dollar to dance with him to his groovy tunes.  Oh, Portland.  Thanks for the good times.

 

friends, fairies and cookies

I had never thought that cookies and fairies were a pair particularly but on this day, they were!

We have had the most unseasonably warm, sunny and divinely beautiful spring in Oregon.  Usually this weather isn't typical until July.  To have so many weeks in a row, repeatedly, of beautiful sunny weather by May meant that everywhere you went the weather would be a topic of conversation.  Sunny Oregon weather is truly that beautiful that it merits so much discussion and speculation, especially when you've traded it in for wet, cold dreariness.

To celebrate the onset of spring, a lovely, amazing woman in our church invited the children over to decorate some spring cookies.  What I did not realize is just how popular she is in her social groups for her half-to-three-quarters-inch thick butter cookies that she uses in place of sugar cookies.  I feel super lucky to have gotten an invite!  She walked me through her recipes step by step and even pulled out the "now that we've made the dough, I'm going to pull out some dough I made earlier from the fridge so we don't have to wait" trick.  It was like I was the special guest on a cooking show.

I will post the recipes for her cookies and icing later, but they are currently packed away.  When I get a-packin', my brain shuts off as I get into the rhytm of boxing, taping, and labeling.  I dont' think about how I wanted to still use what I'm packing up.  But I promise I will get that to you in a few weeks.

The decorating was serious business and I loved that she used colored sugar instead of regular sprinkles.

We burnt the cookies a little because we got caught up talking.  Oops.  I mean,...I can't believe that happened! 

Once we had finished and I stood chatting with her, thanking her profusely, she pulled out her standard ammo for the childhood-dream-fulfiling that she frequently does.  Would the children like to go out and visit the fairy that lives in her garden?  They looked at me, glaring, demanding why I had never before told them that fairies existed or introduced them to one before.  I have to admit, it stung a little bit.  My daughter has fairy books and we've looked over the pictures and read the poems, but I've never actually created that belief for them.

There is a beautiful horsechestnut tree in my friend's yard which naturally creates openings for squirrel nests and beehives.  This opening was the fairy's home.

So she sent them around the yard to look for fairy glass, which fairies love naturally.  My friend and her teenage son actually hide these glass stones and other fairy-things around the yard so that the children who come to visit her (and she is quite popular, as you can imagine) can look for magical baubles.  They put all of their fairy-findings into the fairy tree to decorate her home.

Of course, fairies love all things nature.  Every now and then they would hear a magical tinkling of a bell, which is a fairy's laugh, and run to the tree to see if she left any glitter behind.  Of course, there was always a plethora of colored glitter and the lingering smell of cinnamon (or cloves) to indicate her presence.  I really need to admit, that at this point I was totally caught up in the magic of it too.  Even though I saw her son putting glitter on the tree, secretly ringing a bell and spritzing cinnamon scent, I was almost in tears.

I had to keep myself the thought that the red glitter looked like the scene of a fairy massacre.

The children tried to find the fairy or any of her other friends.

My daughter built her a camp site so she could relax in spa-like indulgence.

They can't wait until we move and they have requested that we find a house with a big tree, preferrably with its own resident fairy.  I replied that we would do the best we can do, which is obviously not good enough, so they devised a plan to kidnap my friend's fairy and transport her with us.  I know...they look so sweet in the photos that they can shock me with their deviousness.  After I finished laughing, I came up with a few fairy-secrets myself, such as that they can only exist as long as they're never caught by naughty children which would be their certain demise.

Here are some of our favorite fairy books in case you're interested too: The Complete Book of the Flower Fairies, How to Find Flower Fairies, and The Girls Book of Flower Fairies.  They're all more of the Victorian/romantic-age fairies genre which is really so sweet and charming.  We haven't checked out any books on building fairy houses but I suspect we will very soon!

We have had the most amazing year here, I almost can't believe it.  It feels like a fairy dream, literally!  There are so many things I will miss about the city of roses when it's time to leave Portland.

tryon creek park

Yes, another post about a park in Oregon.  But if you're getting tired of them, no need to worry: this is the last one.  We went three weeks ago when my sister, husband and baby R were in town and have not been to any more parks since then.

Right in the middle of Portland is the Tryon Creek State Park.  Such an amazing treat for nearby city-dwellers.  On unseasonably warm days, when the temperatures are soaring near 80 (soaring, I know), the air in the park underneath the forest canopy is still crisp and cool with a little nip to it.  Like stepping into a separate world, the state park is truly a refuge.  It even has horse riding trails and while I did not see horses, I did see evidence of their passage.  (read: ahem, horse poop)

There were hollowed tree trunks large enough to shelter in...

And I even saw a face in a tree...

and large snails...

and more snails...

and I might have seen some fairies darting from tree to tree...

there were bridges for traipsing that might have been hiding a troll or two...

and every still surface was covered in moss...

we were a merry crew discovering paths just around the bend...

until we were finally led home.

We had an amazing, if not surprisingly long, hike.  There were a few agile trail runners that afternoon and Oberon wished he would have known to come running in the park sooner.  (I don't think I could maneuver all of the protruding roots in the trail; I can barely maneuver my own feet.)  Truly it's the softly filtered light and babbling creek that have left the impression on me.  What a boon to have when you live in the city.

cape lookout

Oh, Oregon!  We are going to miss so much about you!  Having lived here, I understand so much better why people would want to go all anti-establishment and build themselves some underground hidden bunker in the mountains, or wherever, in a remote corner of Oregon.  It kind of sounds awesome now that I know how dreamy camping is here.  I'm making no promises, but if I ever go anti-establishment camp-style in the wilds of Oregon, I'll post it all in a blog.  (Is it weird I'm a little excited about the idea?)

Cape Lookout State Park is right by Tillamook, Oregon.  Tillamook.  As in, where they make all of the fabulous Tillamook cheeses.  That Tillamook.  (Tillamook is like a B-list celebrity.)  Because of all of the hype, I expected a little more from the Tillamook factory but I am still glad to have gone.  Looking through the viewing window into the factory is cool but the highlight would be the super cheap block of cheese you can buy down in the cafeteria.  I've heard the ice cream is great but the line was so long we didn't end up getting any.

They were having a grilled cheese sandwich contest that day and we did get to taste some crazy-go-nuts amazing grilled cheese.  Oh, cheese.  I really love you.  You and Oregon.  Tillamook has cheese and Oregon going for it.  Tillamook's the best.

On the way out, we spent the afternoon doing a light hike in the Cape Lookout State Park; that was the real highlight of our coastal trip.  The forest is stunningly green with paths meandering up and down along switchbacks as you climb higher.  Apparently you need to watch out for black bears which had the children spooked.  If I so much as mentioned a spot that might make a great place for a bear to sleep in (my daughter has been studying habitats), they would go into full-blown panick, alert mode.

Not only is the forest gorgeous, it's right by the beach, overlooking those stormy blue waters.  They have cabins there and we were so jealous of the campers with their fires on the cliff over the sea.  Truly spectacular.  I will come back to Oregon just to camp by the sea.  No more words.  Here are my favorite photos.

Look at all of the fishers out in the ocean that day!

Those lounging Oregonians might make you think it was warm, but, oh no.  It wasn't.  Not at all.  Oregonians are crazy confused about what temperature is "comfortable" and what is "too hot".

Oh look, it's my three favorite people.  What a coincidence.

Do not tell my children that a bear might like to sleep there.  Just don't.  Or do because it's funny.

This petite creek above is about to become one of the many diaphanous waterfalls threading its way down to the ocean.

As seen above, this mesmerizing microhabitat just might be a fairy Disneyland.  If a tree falls in the middle of a forest, does it matter if it made a sound or not?  The tree fell, it became a mossy stump and was soon covered in ferms and plants.  Everything else: irrelevant.

I love these two.  They make my life and every experience in it more precious and worthwhile.

It was one of the happiest afternoons I can remember.

goodbye's and hello's

It's just about time for us to say our goodbyes to everyone here.  We've already said a few but there are lots more to say. 

Download 07 Hello Goodbye

The thing is that my children have a very hard time saying goodbye, even if it's for 30 minutes sometimes.  I don't leave on my own often, but when I do, the children ask if I'm going to come back.  If I'm going to come back?!! (And the Emmy goes to my children for their lead roles in "Les Enfants Triste et Negligees".)

My son has already cried his eyes out with one friend and my daughter only finished crying from leaving Oklahoma (last June) in March.  It's just really, really hard for them.  I guess I feel especially bad for them because I am a horrible mother when I get stressed out, e.g. when I move.

I want them to feel like this doesn't have to be a real goodbye.  I realized that they super-size-love getting letters in the mail (they thought Christmastime was the best ever because of all the cards we were getting; thank you if you sent us one) so I thought that turning these goodbyes into cards might ease the separation.  

There is something so much more friendly about the greeting in a card as opposed to an email or FB post.  Wouldn't it be a cheerful prospect to have letters waiting in the mail for you?  Maybe people are cranky because they don't have a penpal to write to them.  I love Facebook and Twitter as much as the next person.  But do they really take the place of getting a letter in the mail?

I didn't want this gift to be fancy but I did want to give their friends an addressed and stamped blank card so they could just send a quick hello.  I thought a pencil and some stickers would help flesh out the blank card into a pen-pal kit.  The cards are from that huge, colorful, bulk box at Target ($5 for 200?), the baggies and pencils are from the random discount section of Michael's, and the sharpeners are from Dollar Tree.  The only pricey parts are the stamp and the page of stickers.  I found little booklets of 6 pages of stickers at Michael's and it seemed to be reasonable enough.

The little tag is super cheesey, but I only had a moment to think of what to write.  So they say

you make the world al-"write"

I also picked up little notebooks from Dollar Tree to be their address books.  They've had their friends (preferably their parents) write their addresses just in case we don't hear from them first.  But you know children.  Most of them don't even know their own address (hallelujah they know their own name) so it's full of...random things.

What I am so excited about this little project is how busy my children will be writing letters and cards back to their friends.  I want to keep them away from the tv as much as I can this summer and this might be our ticket to occupying their little minds.

Right after they wrap up their study session (because my daughter decided my son needed some extra education).  Oh-my-word, these children need something to do.

1. What anbimal is the bigist?

2. how much lbs. is a ellefant?

3. When would elafants eat?

4. how much would a butterfly eat?

a brief history of chores

Or time.  Or how to teach your children to spend their time doing chores.  All very important.

(Today's topic is a deviation from the recent Portland theme.)

I did not do chores as a child.  I was expected to do my part and be a good person and a respectful young woman but not by any set of clearly defined chores.  The mentality behind it was that we shouldn't be required to do good things, we should want to do good things.  Should we limit our expectations for our children to a finite list of "chores"?  I suppose the way I was raised has created this assumption that defining familial responsibilities therefore negates other positive attributes.

However, my experiences at college quickly made me envious of my peers who had a killer work ethic because they had been expected to, no excuses allowed, work at home.  The discipline they learned help them rise to the top.  Mind you, I had some work to do at home growing up but not in a structured or consistent way.  And working consistently is so key for a successful future at work or at home, don't you think?  I've made my way around as an adult but part of me wishes I had learned the lesson sooner.  (disclaimer: my sister, who was raised with the same rules, happens to have a wonderful work ethic.  I guess I'm more of a Shaggy than a Velma in ScoobyDoo terminology.  Or wait...maybe I'm more like ScoobyDoo.)

It's the melding of the two philosophies that has made me decide my children should have a list of chores and should not be paid for them.  My husband (who did have chores) and I decided that it would be an integral part of their character to learn to be responsible for certain items at home and be equally responsible for dropping the ball.  But because I strongly feel that we work at home because that's what we do, not because there's a reward, we have decided to separate the concept of chores and allowance.  (Seriously, is it me that's wondering if entitlement issues are a given with younger generations?)

While perusing pinterest one day, I found this blog where she explains her family's reasoning for separating chores from allowance.  Basically, chores teach family responsibility while allowance teaches financial responsibility.  Teaching budgeting may be difficult if there is no set amount to expect every week (like how it might vary if it's tied to how many chores are done that week).  I liked her thoughts.  And I loved her child-friendly checkbook-style register for tracking expenses.

So, I made one for the children and they are soooo excited about it still, even a few months later.

children's allowance trackers

They are learning that they get x-amount ($1 for every year of their age) and pay 10% tithing that goes into their tithing jar and another 10% in savings that goes into their piggy bank.  The rest is theirs to spend according to their discretion.  Well, maybe not completely.  

I do my darndest to talk them out of spending $12 on cheaply-made, plastic Minnie Mouse toys straight off a boat from China.  But, if they have their hearts set on it, it is their money after all and I just cross my fingers and hope they learn the value of items.  At the very least, I'm not being harrassed at the check-out lane to buy them those over-priced plastic mini-Barbie and Angry Bird toys.  I, officially, no longer buy them toys except holidays or birthdays.

I made the book part out of file folders I found at Target.  With the leftover folders, I made some extras for the Gotz dolls because, goodness knows, their school studies are seriously behind.  I'm not even sure they can read.

Finally, now they can do their homework!  If there's one thing that irks me more than illiterate dolls...

Anyway, for instructions on making them and for Excel copies of the inside pages, click on this link or on the title above.

Now onto chores, which are a non-paid event now.  I found this fun blog and her easy idea for a chore chart.  The beautiful board I had before just had too many moveable pieces for the children to coordinate independently.  Click on the link below if you want the vintage-style cliparts I found for the chore pictures.

children's magnetic folder chore chart

When they do all of their daily chores and the flaps are all closed, they get a "dot" for the day.  You can use bingo markers or dot markers, which are a total favorite in our house, to put a dot in each day.  The templates for all of this are under the chore chart link.

Each dot is a point, but if they hav ea dot on every day, they get bonus points. (We give 5 bonus points for a perfect chore week which gives them 12 total points.  This would have them completing a page in their passport book each month if they did their chores every single day.)

They get to tally up their points at the end of the week and mark them in their "Family Adventure Passport" booklet.  Again, all templates are in the chore chart link.

When they've checked off 48 points, or one page, they get to pick out an adventure from the family treasure chest.  Our adventures range from simple to coordinated events that center around family time.  It could be a family movie night on the couch or it could be rock-climbing as a family.  The point is that they are things we can do that we know the children really look forward to.

We'll get around to painting the family treasure chest after the move...maybe.  Possibly.

And just to make sure the children know that chores are part of being part of a family unit, there is a consequence for not doing their chores.  If this was 1984, we'd call that "non-compliance."  Non-compliance means they have to pick one of mommy's chores and it might be picking up dog poop, cleaning out toilets, or folding laundry.  I also liked the idea on this blog for how to handle chore non-compliance and she has a free printable too.

The message is sublime.

You forgot to do your own chores and mom had to do more work.  Now you have to pick one of mom's chores to do for her.

Would you like to know my personal success story?  The children now put their dirty dishes in the sink.  I have been working on this forever and it just never sinks in with them (wah-wah) so I feel like I am winning here.  I am winning here.  When children do their chores, everyone wins. 

Of course, the children will out-grow their simple chore chart as they are given more and more responsibility.  We're not there yet but I have my idea on this great idea with printables for when we do.  Or we could have a chart for daily chores and offer a chore punch card for any extra, bigger chores they do on weekends.

tulip festival

In somewhat belated news (by about two months, ahem), there is a stunning Tulip Festival down in Woodburn every spring.  The weekend that we went on April 12th was the apex of the blooming season and we were utterly stunned.  Tulips.  Daffodils.  Wooden shoes.  So great.

The Wooden Shoe Tulip Farm in Woodburn, Oregon is the place to be in April.  They have delicious food carts and plenty of tents of activities for children, which are incidentals to the tulip event, but it helps to complete the trip.

And, oh yeah, let's not forget the matter of an earring giveaway!  Thanks to everyone for entering!  Come back for more giveaways because, honestly, your odds of winning are pretty darn good.  The winner of a pair of garnet and pearl earrings is my friend SJ!  Hooray, S!  You were right about the earring giveaway being a positive of my moving away.

Back to the tulip festival, here are lots and lots of photos.  My friend KH asked when these would be coming and I have to tell you, K, that I will email you more photos of cute S.

Can you see this adorable little train below?  Each car is decorated like a wooden shoe.

There's nothing like a little friendly competition...

...until it turns less friendly, more out-for-blood win-or-die.  I love the photo below that shows the drive my son has to never be bested by anyone, even if they are indeed better than him.

So my daughter decided to exclude her brother, synonymous with mean and horrible in her vocabulary, and just skip around with the girls.

Do you like the solid rows or the multicolor patches better?  I can't decide.

They're all...

...so...

...pretty! <sob>

Actually, who needs to decide?  We just need to dance in them.

If there's one thing that I will passionately remember about Portland, it's how vibrantly things grow here.  It's monikered the City of Roses for a very good reason and boy do those roses melt my heart.  Every time I see one, which is like every second here in Portland, I feel like I'm seeing a rose for the first time.  Oregon does tulips with the same flair and style (and lilacs and rhododendrons and dogwoods and camellias and magnolias and berry bushes and daffodils...).  And so, exhaling a languid sigh, I just have to say that I love you, Oregon.

For the flower lovers, you'll definitely watch to hit the International Rose Test Garden in June (I almost died with exhileration) and the Crystal Springs Rhododendron Gardens in May around Mother's Day or before.  Sadly, we went once the blossoms had mostly fallen off the week after and I didn't have the camera on me.  It demands a redo.  What surprised me is how exotic and tropical the garden looks.  The brightly colored rhododenron blooms and their twisted trunks placed in all of the emerald lushness felt like a more equatorial setting.  That other-worldliness was complete with old stone bridges, tinkling waterfalls, and marshy ponds.  Just amazing.

For anyone who does head down to the Tulip Festival next year, you'll want to stop at the small fruit/market stand called B & P Hitz that's just around the bend.  And even if you can only visit the tulip fields once a year, you can always order tulip and daffodil bulbs from the Wooden Shoe Tulip Farm throughout the year.

What will I miss even more than the gorgeous flowers?  The friends I've made throughout my life who are, oddly, congregated to this area.  I've been able to reconnect with friends from Oklahoma, Cincinnati and even high school.  It was with my dear old high school friend that I visited the tulip festival.  This will  probably never happen again.  And to top if off, I even got to make new friends here.   Such a sweet year we've had here.  And to anyone who was wondering, we'll be moving to St. Louis, Missouri in two weeks!  Life is always full of surprises and changes, isn't it?