Yule Report

While you were spending Christmas in your comfy pants, eating peanut brittle and turkey legs while watching your favorite holiday movie with your family in your warm home, I was being tricked into doing a 12-mile hike. And it was fantastic!

I didn't go home this year, which marked my second ever Christmas away from my family in Minnesota. I've got a pretty big trip coming up in February (so epic that it involves anti-malaria precautions!) and have no vacation time to spare, as well as zero patience or money for peak holiday travel, aaaand my parents were just here two weeks ago, so quit judging me already, OK? Instead Beard and I had brunch with our friends Matt and Jenny, and then we all headed to Forest Park to take a stroll with their vizsla and visiting border collie mix.

As you can see from the photo, Portland suffered an identity crisis, and it was a gorgeous day. Sunglasses were worn. One thing led to another, and the next thing we knew we'd hiked up to Pittock Mansion, where the photo was snapped, then on to the rose gardens at Washington Park before looping back to the car, three adventure-hike hours later.

Then I promptly went home, put on my pajamas, and stuffed my face with pizza and Jubelale and watched Home Alone with some buddies. You really can have it both ways.

Hope you all had a lovely holiday, wherever or however you chose to celebrate it.

Like sands through the hourglass...

Trying my best to appreciate what will soon be replaced by pointy, sideways rain. Sigh.

Photo via my iphone. Not bad, considering I was on a bridge, on a bike, facing backwards, imagining all sorts of scenarios where my body and precious gadget would plummet into the river below. Notice none of those visions stopped me from taking the photo.

Etsy droolin'

Hi friends. I apologize for the lack of action here lately, summer has swept me away to a land of bike rides and happy hours and impromptu camping trips, and for the most part, I'm OK with this. Just falling a bit behind on general life-tasks; like dish-washing, and toenail-clipping and bike chain-lubricating. You get the idea. Please accept this list of things from Etsy that I'm currently lusting after as a real post, and I'll be back soon with the real thing.

Sparrow Necklace by MDsparks. You should get one, we'll be twinnies.

Logs. Print by GollyBard. I want this bad.

Terra cotta earrings by betsy3. I don't care if they're as heavy as marbles and they make my earlobes droopy.

Cute little day-brightening card by thebeautifulproject. When I'm not ogling this seller's cute paper products I'm trolling around her food blog, also worth a looksie.

Happy summer everyone! Soak it up.

Why June would beat January in a cage fight:

Top sirloin, horseradish mashed Yukon Golds, sauteed zucchini + asparagus. Almost all of it from the farmer's market.

Berries. Berries!

I luuuuurve Oregon's berry season. What we lack in sunshine, we definitely make up for in well-endowed fruit. Some of you might have heard that I have a teensy bit of a sweet tooth. Or a gigantic Paul Bunyan sized bicuspid of one. So when the berry bounty is in full swing, I feel good about satisfying my urges in a more natural fashion. Like more natural than a jumbo box of rainbow nerds, for example. Or a half pound of salt water taffy. You get the idea.

It starts with the rhubarb. Then come the strawberries. Then the raspberries, followed by my favorite: The jumbo Oregon Blackberry varities. I'm pretty sure no other berry will ever compare, and I've come to terms with this.

All summer long I come up with different ways to manipulate all this fruit into desserts, my favorite being the Crisp. They're easy, you can virtually mix any kind of berry together and it will meld OK, and I usually have all of the ingredients on hand. I'm a firm believer that if you take some berries, mix them with a little bit of sugar, then top it with some semblance of oats, sugar, and butter -- it will turn out amazing and stun everyone you feed it to. Of course, you can add little variations - a little cinnamon here, some walnuts here - but seriously, it's pretty hard to screw up a crisp.

Plus, it's the perfect dessert to show up with at a BBQ. Here's the recipe I based my most recent crisp adventure on, from Molly Katzen's Dessert book.

Strawberry-Rhubarb Crisp

2 lb fresh rhubarb, cut in 1-inch chunks
3 cups sliced strawberries
1/3 c sugar
1 1/4 c rolled oats
1 c flour
1/4 c brown sugar
3/4 tsp cinnamon
dash or two of allspice and nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup melted butter

Preheat oven to 375. Mix your fruit with the white sugar. Mix together remaining ingredients. Put this on top of the fruit. Bake for 40 minutes. I told you it was easy.

Thank you, Dog Mountain, and may I have another

On Sunday my bearded companion and I headed back to the Columbia River Gorge, only this time the weather had pulled an about-face. Instead of last week's 40's and sleet, it was sunny and 70. Sometimes, you win some.

This conquest: Dog Mountain. To be honest, we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. I have a Pacific Northwest hiking book with pages falling out that I study and scribble in every now and again, and this trek has been on the list for awhile. What I failed to comprehend, is what an elevation gain of 2800 feet over 3.5 miles really means.

It was brutal. There was a moderate amount of whining, abundant feelings of inadequacy, and oaths to whip our sorry aces into shape. Finally, we got to the top after taking more mini-breaks than I care to count, and it was amazing. Truly stunning. We were at the top of the gorge, and could see Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Hood (which is impressive when you realize that you've climbed high enough to see it above the walls of the gorge) and at one point, and I'm not joking, we saw an airplane flying down below us. This makes one feel pretty badass.

Unfortunately, I had tricked myself into thinking that once we reached the top, all of the hard work was over. The trip down would be my sweet reward! This was not accurate. I found out soon enough that the trail was so steep that the amount of agility and quadriceps strength needed to prevent one from somersaulting all the way down (which would have been ideal, actually) was far more difficult than trudging up.

I'm more sore today than I remember being in a long time. I am walking like someone took a crowbar to my kneecaps, and I could use some of those stability handrails for help getting off the toilet. Regardless of the pain now and the strings of expletives then, it was a fantastic way to spend what so far has been the nicest day of the year out in these parts. I'm glad I didn't do the math ahead of time.

It's patio season!

Sigh. False alarm.

Thank you, pretty Portland.

I managed to leave my nest of sickness and despair home for the first time in a couple of days to putter around my neighborhood. It's a lovely day to make your escape.