Umbrella Saga

I bought a bunch of new umbrellas the weekend before last, including the two pictured and one (boring black) one for Chuck too. It had been really rainy, but ever since I made the umbrella purchase it's been mostly sunny and much more spring like. So I might as well blog about the umbrellas too, in the hopes of keeping up the trend.

Anyway a while ago, shortly before we moved out to Portland, I had decided I needed this umbrella for this city. It's been sold out on modcloth since I first saw it, but still I needed it. Then recently I decided I was going to get it if at all possible and even sent Chuck to scour the internet along with me to find out who made it, where else it was available, and if I could buy it. We didn't really have any luck with that.

Then over the weekend I decided we should check out Nordstrom Rack for some new sheets, and I figured I would settle for whatever the best second option - some kind of plain bubble-type umbrella - they had available. And they had the umbrella I'd been looking for. Not in the Gold, but still in a metallic silver (and also black) after a few weeks of using it (only a little bit for sprinkles here and there) I think I've decided I like the silver better. I wear a lot of gray stuff and it goes nicely. Plus it was Nordstrom Rack so it was cheaper! 

I also bought myself a purse umbrella, the colorful striped one above. I'm finally prepared for Portland...now I hope it doesn't rain too much.

Portland Walks: Around the Waterfront Again

This may become one of my favorite walking routes, I really enjoy walking over the lower part of the Steel Bridge and being right on the river on the east shore. It's also pleasant to stroll through the Saturday Market, which started up again last weekend, before crossing the river.

The first time we walked around the waterfront it was a sunnier day. This weekend was wet, and gray, with the water high enough to submerge some trees along the shore. The high water might be the reason we saw this creature, a nutria or coypu, but I will talk about him more in a post tomorrow. 

 

In spite of, or perhaps because of, all the gray skies and rain, it's pretty much already spring here. Cherry blossoms are starting come out, I think there were some blueberries, and the willow tree is looking lovely!

 

Downtown looked more crisp and clear than usual, with very little mist back in the hills. Well, that is until we got caught in a downpour about 5 blocks from home. Then everything got misty again and we ended up getting very wet. It was sudden and windy, a little unusual for the Northwest & of course it stopped shortly after we got inside our apartment.

New Etsy Business Cards and Snow!

It's always fun to get packages in the mail. Of course I had been anxiously checking my order status since I ordered these new cards from Vistaprint on the 12th. Back when I was making fun new graphics for the blog, shop, etc. I set up a card design too. I wasn't planning on ordering any right away, but after sending out a few orders I realized I was almost out of both the big and little moo cards I had been using. "Yay!" I thought "I get to see how my new design looks printed!"

I'm very happy with how these turned out. The cards stock on these is not as heavy (but still substantial enough to be satisfying) as what you get when you order from moo, but there's also a big price difference. And even though I used the free shipping they got here much faster than I was expecting. I've had fun pairing my moo cards with my packaging, but it will be nice not to have to worry about sending out cards with pictures of items I may not have in stock anymore.

We also got a decent amount of snow today. Well, sort of. It wasn't sticking to the ground much. For a while it was snowing really nicely. (see the image on the left below) Big fat snowing, pretty dense, a perfect winter wonderland. It made me happy and I wanted to go out and frolic in it, but by the time I could get myself wrapped up in coats, etc. the flakes were getting smaller and anything that had managed to stick to the ground was starting to melt. Which in a sense is the ideal snow, pretty when it falls, then it goes away before causing too many problems.

 

Of course it's a different story for those further out from the city, and some businesses did shut down today. Also, if you're ever curious as to whether it is snowing in Portland, this site will keep you updated!

Overheard in Portland

Guy: It's nice there, it doesn't rain as much as it rains in Portland.
Girl: It doesn't rain as much ANYWHERE as it rains in Portland.

It's actually very sunny in Portland today. Happily RSVPing "no" to this event on facebook. I have no complaints.

Stay safe Midwesterners!

Portland Walk: South Waterfront

We took a nice walk this week and discovered where the waterfront trail ends on the south end of downtown. It stops right under the Marquam Bridge, which is my least favorite bridge here, and there are no runners up because the rest of the bridges are great. But the Marquam Bridge is a big, double decker, ugly interstate bridge that blocks the view of the mountain. And I'll admit I did actually have to google map to find the name of the bridge which I believe means I'm still a Portland newbie. Ah, well.

Anyway, our plan had been to possibly take the aerial tram, however yesterday seemed to mark the return to normal fall weather. Recently it's been pretty hot and summer like, which I guess is nice, but the regular overcast, cool, pacific northwest weather is why we moved back here. So other than changing our plans to wait for a clear day to do the tram I was thrilled about the overcast sky. (It's clear today, so maybe this weekend.) We had coffee by the waterfront instead. (Uh, yes it was afternoon coffee, which I can't really do without being up really late, which I was. But it was worth it!) Coffee and overcast skies...I've missed them together so much. Maybe I'll even get to start wearing lots of knits soon!

 

So after coffee we walked along the waterfront, as I mentioned, to the end of the trail. Before we reached it there was a nicely landscaped area with all sorts of varieties of flowers still in bloom and I ran around snapping pictures of them. I didn't see any signs around so I'm not really sure what they all were (for example: what is this?) and I'm curious to find out if any of the plants were native species. The landscape design has a very naturalistic quality. I also really appreciated the sculpture Lost Birds, pictured above, featuring extinct bird species: The Passenger Pigeon, Carolina Parakeet, Great Auk, Heath Hen and Labrador Duck immortalized in bronze.

 

The area near the end of the trail seems to have been developed recently, within the last few years. Googling tells me it's The Strand at Riverplace by the architecture firm Ankrom Moison, completed around 2007. Overall it's fairly typical of the type of high-end condo projects that were so prevalent right before the economy tanked, but it did have a few pleasant details. Pictured on the left is the building for Lucier, a very fancy restaurant, which Yelp indicates is no more. As for the condos, I was kind of taken with the use of channel glass, as pictured on the right, but Chuck said he'd heard too much about it with his fellow students throwing it into projects left and right in grad school; it's actually pretty expensive. It looks good though, and I like that they used both matte and glossy style glass. 

Stormy Weather

I got completely drenched by an intense storm on my way home from work last night. I didn't really like that part, or the part where there were unpredictable gusts of wind, tornado sirens, lighting bolts, and promises to move back to the northwest soon, where the sky isn't trying to kill me. But once I got home and dried off it was pretty cool. Check out this sunset:

A few more pictures over on my flickr.

Month of Busy in photos

The last month or so has been busy and fun. We had a guest come to town who had never been to Chicago before, so we did all the classics.

Shopping:

Millennium Park:

I gave my tour of the Robie House:

Chuck's Campus, which has my favorite bathroom:

Water Taxi:

And the Ferris Wheel at Navy Pier:

Then we spent the entire last day of her visit in the Field Museum because it's such a great place. Worked out nicely too since that was the one stormy day! We learned a lot about strange birds like this one:

Yeah, being a tourist in the city you live in is pretty fun. I probably had just as much fun as our guest did!

After she left, we had a couple of free music events. She & Him! For Free! In the Pritzker Pavillion! Of course it was great, and packed!:

The Blackhawks won the Stanley cup, which normally I don't care at all about sports, but that was a big deal. Happened to be going to City Hall right at the beginning of the parade, which was crazy! And they dyed the fountian in Daley Plaza...red, which is a little creepy.:

Then the Blues festival:

I helped (and brought Chuck along too) get all of the planters at the Robie house planted, first time they've been able to get all of the planters filled! So now it looks as it was intended to look. There's not really much of a yard there, but you have planters on every level:

It's been rainy with rainbows:

and last night we got high speed winds, but for less than an hour. Long enough to do this at our apartment building:

And lastly, I finally finished my diminishing rib cardigan and took pics of it after the storm yesterday:

So that about covers the last month or so!

My Review of Today's Snow

Initially I saw a report that there would be 6-12 inches of snow by friday and I kind of freaked out. (You may have noticed on my twitter) We've lived here through one winter season and somehow survived. I was not sure I was ready for more of it.

But went out to the post office downtown anyway (my favorite spot, surrounded by Mies Buildings, punctuated with the bright red of the Alexander Calder sculpture...it always looks photogenic.) I was very pleased that it was a nice lovely fat snowfall, and extra thrilled about how it was sticking to the Calder. I disregarded the weather, slipped around a bunch on the slippery plaza, and took a bunch of pictures.

I'm not crazy about snow. When we lived in Seattle I explained to my parents that we would go snowshoeing, which was like visiting snow when you felt like it rather than having to deal with it in your daily city life. But, after all, I grew up in the Midwest so I suppose that means I'll always be able to manage. But take note snow, I prefer the type of snowfall we had today! (More pics of the Calder in the snow here)