we're back!

We're back in Chicago.  Our trip to Portland was beyond amazing, and it was so hard to leave.  It's been a few days and we're finally back in the swing of things (just one day at work I and felt like I had never left for a vacation - wah wah).  We had a week in Portland but somehow it still wasn't enough.  They days were jam packed from the moment we got in town.

Wednesday my pop picked us up from the airport, we got settled in, stole my mom from work and headed to the Pearl District.  Our plans to have some lunch at OBA! were dashed when we found the doors locked.  Apparently 1pm isn't prime snacking time for the snazzier restaurants so walked over to Byways Cafe and I had myself a little French Dip.

We sauntered around the Pearl's collection of boutique shops then decided to run over to the east side to catch a few stores before they closed for the day.  First on the list Whole 9 Yards.  A fabric store that mainly sells upholstery fabric, my mom and I have long loved this store and she thought I could make a quick fabric choice for the chairs . . . silly mom, I can't even choose a flavor of ice cream that quick!  The best part of the day was going over to The Joinery.  My dad has been excited to show Andrew this shop and showroom for a while and it was beautiful.  The Joinery is a shop of gorgeous hardwood furniture hand-crafted by some truly talented woodworkers.  Their shop is one of the largest FSC certified furniture producers in the Pacific Northwest.

Andrew spent most of our time there crawling around on the floor admiring their craftsmanship.

They also have an "observation deck" if you will, where you can look out into the shop and see what's going on.  We all decided that it'd be annoying if we were working there, but as customers we definitely enjoyed ourselves.

See all that in just our first afternoon!

Our second day was devoted to Mt. Hood.  The drive out was amazing. We took the long way there along the Columbia Gorge.  Each slight glimpse of the mountain got us more and more excited.

We got up to Timberline Lodge and were surrounded by snowboarders, because there was still snow on the ground! It was nice and warm and snowy!

This is a shot of the man right before he pelted me in the back.  It felt like dozens of frozen bee stings and went down into my underwear!!

We had plans to hike around but as soon as we realized we could go up in the ski lift we changed our minds, and it was the best decision we made all day.

OREGON IS GORGEOUS!!!!!

More about the trip later!

Talk to ya soon!