Oh, what a weekend!

This weekend's adventure started at the Good Will "Bins" store. We went to find me a new dresser, Tonia claimed this was the only thrift store to buy furniture at. There was lots of furniture, priced much lower than other thrift stores i've seen and, while I didn't find the perfect dresser, I did find a few awesome tops. Of course... It was a thrift store of a different breed, seriously, the stuff was in large bins that they wheeled out, unsorted, to waiting lines of people. I took these few pictures but I was scared, these people were hard core.

We found this fantastic yak statue

We went to dinner at Savoy, had a few cocktails and ended up being late to the TBA movie we had planned on seeing. This, of course, because they seated ten minutes early and locked the doors to late comers. Bummer. We regrouped, packed up, and headed to Oregon City for a sleep over at Tonia's. Fantastic time at our bar, then a bonfire at a friends, long evening to say the least ( and i will say the least, for now anyway!) 

Oh,. I forgot about the Laurelhurst park bit in there, this is where we went after missing the movie and before heading south. I drive by this park often, i'm glad to have gotten the chance to explore it a bit. It's big, like 4 city blocks, maybe more. We walked the path, played a bit in the park. I ran straight to the monkey bars and got right on them like I always did in grade school. I was not brave enough to actually do any turns on them but ended up with a very nice bruise on the under side of my knee anyway. Old. It's true. 

It's funny- the guy's ok but the lady is doing the potty dance!

We woke up the next morning late, late. We seriously needed cheering up so Tonia made good on her promise for a fantastic surprise trip. I thought we were in for a Salem trip but we ended up pretty close to home on Swan Island at the dahlia farm. * Warning* This is a lot of flower pictures! If, at anytime you get bored, feel free to scroll to the bottom. 

At the farm they had a private ish greenhouse where they grew these giant lemons... weird? 

The dahlia farm was amazing. A zillion different kinds, each with their own name. Kinda makes me want to be a flower farmer. Think about it, Shan......

Salt, Fire, and Time

Ok, so this post may be a bit preliminary but I am pretty excited after meeting with Tressa, the one woman show who is Salt, Fire, and Time, community supported kitchen. You can check it out here,

www.saltfireandtime.com


I have my first volunteer shift next Tuesday, we will be making pickles, berry jam, and starting sauerkraut! Picture to come.....

Sandy River Fairy

Ok, so this happened a few weeks ago but I still feel it adventure blog worthy. Completely a case of right place at the right time, this is a series of photos I took at the river. There was a young girl there with her family, she was 10 maybe? She walked down to the water and picked up two plastic cups that had been left there by other people and started using them to throw water into the air. I was sitting there in my beach chair and capture these images.

She was at the river with her mother and adult sister, I talked with them a bit about the photos and got her mother's email to send her the pictures. Turns out the mother is a dance instructor at Lewis and Clark college and invited me to come shoot the dance dress rehearsal of the productions this winter. Look forward to that in a few months.....

Silver Falls State Park

Also known as the hike of ten waterfalls, the Silver Falls loop is 8.7 miles around on a really nice trail past or under ten fabulous waterfalls. We arrived at the parking lot at noon and it was raining hard. It rained for the first few miles before letting up a bit and then rained all the way home. I'll let the picture speak for themselves....

Only photo of the trail trolls- people who pop out of the rocks

 if you do something you're not supposed to! She was kinda scary, like a witch!

The whole forest bed was covered in shamrocks!

Shot of the day, this was leaning over the wall looking down at the falls from behind it.

We saw a cougar!

This was a small theater showing the history of the park. Also where the stuffed cougar was.

It was a pretty amazing hike. Long, wet, but worth it. I definitely plan to come back in a month or so when all of the leaves are changing, it will be so beautiful!

The park is a bit east of Salem so we went there to get dinner afterward. I was pretty wrecked and not into much activity, but Tonia drove us around and showed me the sights- the house she used to live in, downtown, a cool park or two. Then we settled into a strange little Mexican place to eat. 

The view of downtown Salem from our table.

Sunset reflections on the drive home

Savoy

First night on line at Savoy tonight. Went pretty well, there was another trainee there so we totaled 4 in a 2 man kitchen, made it a bit crowded. This afternoon, right as I was leaving the knife shop where I had my knives sharpened, Ben, the chef, called to tell me that the man I was replacing, and being trained by, had gotten in a scooter accident and broken his ankle. Now, instead of the calm 2 week training period we had planned on, I had 2 days, Wednesday and Thursday, to prepare for running a station on my own Friday night. The busiest night. The place seats about 80 when the weather is good, less if not. Friday does an average of 350 covers. That's a few turns! I will get pictures as soon as I can, in the meantime, I scanned the menu in, i'm not sure what the quality will be....