the glory days of fall

Friday evening I stayed home and was oh so happy about it. I got back from NY on late Tuesday and then was out late on both Wednesday (Decemberists show at the Crystal) and Thursday (Naked Lady Party, a clothing exchange thing). I spent Friday night watching Netflix (episodes of Deadwood) and reading my book (Under the Banner of Heaven).

Saturday morning I drove over to Molly and Andy’s house in Sellwood. I had a cup of coffee and some marionberry coffeecake (yummm). Once Molly’s brother, Matt, and his wife, Jess arrived we all drove up to the Japanese Gardens. Molly’s mom’s 60th birthday is coming up so Molly asked me if I would take photos of her family. She wanted to have some nice family photos blown up and framed as a gift for her mom. I was flattered that she asked me. I have much more experience in taking nature photos than portraits but I was welcome to the challenge. I was also looking forward to spending the afternoon with Molly, Andy and their 4 ½ month old son, Sam. The Japanese Gardens are really beautiful, especially on a sunny day in all their fall glory. The views of Mt Hood with the tall buildings of downtown Portland in the foreground are famous and hard to beat. We took lots of pictures all around the gardens. Afterwards Matt and Jess headed back to Seattle and Molly, Andy, Sam and I went out for lunch. We sat outside at St Honore Boulangerie in NW Portland where we shared a bottle of red wine, ate delicious food and talked in the warm fall sun. It was a beautiful day out. When I got home I headed straight for my backyard and a patch of warm sun. I talked on the phone with Nandita in San Francisco for awhile then I ate bunches of grapes from the arbor and read my book as the sun dropped below the neighbor’s roofline.

That evening I spent several hours going through the photos I’d taken that day. I deleted the obviously bad ones, edited the best ones and burned it all to a disc for Molly to decided which photos to use. Later that night I watched movies and read my book.

Sunday was another sunny and warm day. I went to the local coffeeshop for a breakfast sandwich (prosciutto croissant please) and a mocha. I read my book in the sunny window seat before heading over to Gina’s house. We drove out to Sauvie’s Island, just west of Portland in the Columbia River. The crowds were already pretty nutty at the pumpkin patch. We had to walk to the far, far end of the field to find intact pumpkins. We skipped the hayride and the crazy lines for elephant ears. After paying for our pumpkins and putting them in the car we walked back to the market where we loaded up on fresh veggies (sweet potatoes, brussel sprouts, beets, green beans) and fruit (a pomegranate and apples) along with some apple cider. We got outta there just as all of Portland was arriving it seems. This little island was jammed with traffic flowing to the pumpkin patches. We were happy we had gone early and got the hell outta there. We headed up to Council Crest for some lovely views of all the mountains and to soak up all the sun. On Saturday there had been a small earthquake on Mt St Helens which caused part of the growing lava dome to collapse and sent a plume of ash 4,000 feet up into the air. All was calm and clear on this day though. We stopped at the grocery store to pick up some stuff for dinner that night and I bought some mums to plant in my yard. Back home I planted mums, pansies and bunches and bunches of bulbs (dutch irises, tulips, daffodils, crocuses, grape hyacinths etc). I can’t wait for spring when they pop up and bloom. The garden looks much better cleaned up too. Later that night I headed over to Elaine & Gina’s for dinner. Steak on the grill, baked potatoes and beets and green beans from Sauvie’s Island. It was a fantastic meal and a great end to my weekend.

Please let me know how you are and what you’ve been up to. I promise to get up to date on this blog pronto.

xoxo,
carolyn