Food, Portland, Social Work

Neighborly Love: Bake America Great Again

December 18, 2016

Hey friends, after last year’s successful Bake Sale for Refugees, Portland bakers and bloggers and local businesses are coming together for a repeat to Bake America Great Again. All proceeds this year go to Portland’s Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization (IRCO), a 40 year old nonprofit known for welcoming and caring for new neighbors in our city.

If you’re in the area, come buy terrific homemade treats enter the fantastic raffle and show solidarity with our neighbors who have come to call this land their home: Sunday 12/18/16 from 6-9pm at Pip’s Original in NE Portland.

Bake America Great Again Bake Sale

P. S. I’m contributing homemade Creamy Eggnog Fudge.

Super rich: be warned. Continue Reading…

Musings

Autumn Breadcrumbs: Or, Fear and Love

November 20, 2016

Portland / OR / United States - 11/13/16

Back in my first days of blogging as a twenty year old living in New Zealand, I used to read She’s a Flight Risk. (“On March 2, 2003 at 4:12 pm, I disappeared. My name is isabella v., but it’s not. I’m twentysomething and I am an international fugitive.”)

Indulging in stories of intrigue and covert happenings seemed a harmless pastime.

Now, I’m a thirty something mother of two, with the real world right outside my front door…and as stories of fascists, despots, and despair flicker on my phone screen, I can’t look away. Continue Reading…

Musings, Tidbits About Us

Some Sports are Bigger than Sports

November 2, 2016

“Some sports are bigger than sports.” And that was true tonight. My Grandpa, a lifelong Cubs fan from Wisconsin, is on hospice at home. Since about game three of this World Series he has been too sick to watch, but my mom has been giving home the play by play at his bedside. I love you Grandpa. This was for you.

CUBS WIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

-Ted Continue Reading…

Food, Musings, Oregon

Apple Season

October 30, 2016

“Love is a fruit in season at all times and within the reach of every hand. Anyone may gather it and no limit is set. Everyone can reach this love through meditation, prayer, sacrifice and an intense inner life.”
– Mother Teresa

Apple season’s just fading to memory again as the deeper darker rhythms of Oregon autumn carry us toward November. Can it really be that time of year to swap fresh fruits for root veggies? To grab a jar of preserves instead of a fistful of berries?

Here in our home, we’ve been living on applesauce and apple butter. (That is, when we’re not chugging lemon ginger tea and garlic and honey, trying to fight off tenacious chest colds.)

Marion, eight months old, scarfs down bowl after bowl, banging her spoon joyously on the high chair tray, grinning wide with fruit smeared into her eyelashes. Continue Reading…

Uncategorized

Where to Go in Spain?

October 24, 2016

When Ted and I vacationed in Spain, we spent time with our dear friends visiting Barcelona, Valencia, Granada, Malaga, and Cadiz, exploring and eating and soaking in the scenes.

I’d love to return someday. Continue Reading…

BabyOregonian, Musings

Half a Year with our little Hazelnut

September 2, 2016

Little Marion’s been out here breathing air for half a year. I wrote a post when Lucie turned six months old, and so many of the same things could be said this time around…but it’s also an entirely different experience.

Mom of two.

Me.

A jump of a different sort into a new world. Not like the original: going from half of a footloose married duo to partnered first time parent. This time, the family rhythm thing was already ticking along in the background of our life story, but the change felt a bit like adding a second jump rope to the routine.

Quick.

On your toes.

Faster.

Watch out.

Here it comes again, sooner than you think. Continue Reading…