Keep Portland Weird

Oregon greeted us last Saturday with crisp cool breezes, tall tall trees, lush greenness everywhere, shadowy mountains in the distance, and more. My parents, Josh, and I managed to get ourselves, two large suitcases, three smaller suitcases, a fishing rod in a PVC pipe, and six "personal" bags from here to Oregon. It was quite a feat I tell you, especially since we only checked the two large suitcases.


Sunday morning we got up early and went to Portland's Voodoo Doughnut of Food Network fame. Everyone, except mom, took a bite from Josh's Oreo Cookie Peanut Butter Doughnut and discovered that the magic was indeed "in the hole"



While wandering around, Josh was tickled by the Oregon Lottery signs, check it out:


After doughnut time we went to a beautiful Japanese Garden overlooking the city. We joined a tour but were quickly reminded of the fact that we are a non-tour family. We simply cannot stand still long enough to learn the wonderfully minute details of any location. We snuck away after ten minutes of listening to the guide wax on about the soulful cleansing that a Japanese Garden provides as well as his very strong recommendations that we each clean our hands and mouth (?) with cold water before continuing on the tour. When we were leaving the Gardens, after enjoying them fully mind you, we saw that the tour was still going strong, maybe about half way through.



We then walked across the street and followed the lovely scent of roses until we reached the Portland Rose Garden. The roses were gorgeous, but the real highlight was when we stumbled upon a gentleman who had his pet ferret on a leash. He was trying to get the squirmy little beast to pose amidst the roses...not very successfully:



Then we ended our Tour de Portland with a visit to a local Farmer's Market (thanks Josh!), enjoyed a yummy lunch, and picked up lots of fresh oregonian produce for the week. MMM!