A Week in Portland

We had a good week in the Portland area. Monday's medical appointment went well. The doctor is going to consult with other specialists in the field before making a recommendation on whether the procedure he does will help with Charlie's tremors or not. Meanwhile, we got in some great family time and a little knitting.

The second sock is at the heel. They should be ready to wear soon. As you can see, they are not identical. Sometimes, when I'm using a self-striping yarn, I pull out the yarn for the second sock until I get to the exact place in the patterning where I started the first sock, so the stripes will match. This time I decided to just start the second sock at the point where I had cut the yarn loose from the first sock. They go together, but are not the same. Sometimes that's fun.

In spite of the rain, we walked the dogs each day, but on Thanksgiving Day Peter, Charlie and I took the three dogs to one of the off-leash areas nearby. The big grassy off-leash area was closed for the winter, because it gets muddy, but this smaller one was available. It's carpeted with astroturf, so the dogs don't get muddy. It was good to let them run for a bit, because we would be leaving them for several hours while we went to have dinner at Peter's in-laws' home.

There was a lot of food, of course. Everyone brought something. We contributed to the salad with stuff we brought from home. We also brought a homemade peach pie, which I had ordered during Trinity's fundraiser for Condega, Nicaragua, which was held in September. The lady who volunteered to make the pies even dropped it off at our house the day before we left to go to Portland. It was delicious. (The desserts are not in this photo, and neither is the turkey.)

They had set up tables in the living room in front of the fire and in the kitchen eating area. We had a great time, and it was great to see members of Alexa's family. We only see them every few years.

I took copies of my new book to the grandkids and their cousins. I had signed each one. Elsie brought me her copy and asked me to write her name in it, because she said her name was in the other books I had given her, so I did.

Soren finished eating and lay down on the couch to fall asleep. His mother reminded him there was still dessert, so he perked up. He stayed awake until he had eaten some pumpkin pie (his favorite) and then plopped down again.

The kitties had to be shut up in the master bedroom while we were there, because our dogs aren't used to cats. I know they were glad to be let out again after we left.

It was a busy week for Peter's family, and we are grateful that they allowed us to come. There were parent-teacher conferences, appointments with speech therapy and dentist and wrestling after we had come home.

My cold has reached the final stage where there's nothing left but the cough. I didn't know whether I was still contageous or not, so I wore a mask all week when we were in the house except when I was in the bedroom. I had trouble sleeping because of the cough. I tried several types of cough medicine. Nothing helped as much as I hoped. 

We had good weather for the trip home. There was no snow at the pass.

When I let the dogs out on Sunday morning, I discovered that we had had our first snow of the season.

Our basil plants held up very well during our trip to Wisconsin, so before we left to go to Portland, I just watered them thoroughly, let them drain in the sink and then replaced them on the windowsill. I didn't bother with putting the pots into plastic bags this time. They were fine.

Sunday I pulled a container of Mexican Stew out of the freezer to thaw for supper. Then I made a cute little loaf of bread to have with it.

I cut open an avocado, removed the pit and filled the pit cavity with salad dressing for a quick, easy salad. We need to buy groceries today.

I have a lot of difficulty responding to comments to my blog posts because of technical issues beyond my control (my lack of understanding of how things work). Message me on Facebook, Ravelry, BlueSky or Spoutible if you need information.

If you have a few minutes and are willing, please go to Amazon or B&N and search for Billy: Stories from The Doll's Storybook by Peggy Stuart". Every click on the page for the book makes it more likely they will keep a good supply in their warehouse and stores. If you are outside the US, you may have a separate website for these retailers. If you have a copy of any of our books, including Emil, Mariah, Classic Tales Retold, Our Favorite Verses, More Classic Tales Retold or Billy: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, please leave an honest review on the websites, especially if you bought from them.

Where's my blog: If you want to follow my blog, go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Still the Front Range Socks. 

What's on my iPhone: Still listening to Nobody's Girl by Virginia Roberts Giuffre on the AudiobooksNow app. Not much progress, as we were visiting.

What's on my sewing machine: Put away.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: This week we look back on Pippa's arrival, beginning with the announcement that a new doll would be arriving. Here's Big News.

What's my tip of the week: Like milk in your coffee or tea? Don't want to bother with a carton of milk when you travel? Powdered milk works well as a substitute for liquid milk. A small container of powdered milk keeps safely in the car for when you need it.

Where are my books: The stories in each book first appeared in the blog, and they are reproduced in print with a few changes.

The stories in Billy: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Talking About Boys, Changes, Shhhhh!, Staying After and Money in a Jar.

The stories in More Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Welcoming a Stranger, The Rescue, Unmasked, Fuzzy Town––A Play and Sky Blue.

Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook. Poems included are Valentine's Day, Keeping Pets, Back to School, Victor the Vulture, The Week Before Christmas, Insomnia and Veronika's Vocabulary Verses.

The stories in Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Little Green Greatcoat, The Boy Doll Who Cried Wolf and Lost in the Woods.

The stories in Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Best Buds, Getting What You Want, and The Boys Cook Dinner.

The stories in Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

If you don't get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, buy from the BookBabyBookshop, because 50% of the price goes to St. Jude. Other booksellers pay much less, only 8%, because the vendor gets a cut. My author's page at Book Baby is here. Scroll down and click on any of the books that interest you. Find my books at Barbara's Bookstore as well, or ask your local library to order the books.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Dangerous Liaisons

Look! A quilt!

Thursday we took off to go to the Portland area to visit family and for the Rose City Yarn Crawl. DDIL2 and I spent the evening at a fund raiser for Fact Oregon (Families And Communities Together.) The organization provides support and guidance for families that experience disabilities. The quilt was part of the silent auction.
Executive Director Roberta Dunn spoke to the crowd before the live auction about what was going on with the organization.

We had some delicious food, and the live auction was entertaining. I bought a bottle of wine in a paper bag (unseen). It cost $20, but I figured that even a cheap bottle of wine and my nice dinner would be worth it. I haven't tasted the wine yet, but I'm sure it's going to be good.

Friday morning I packed up my knitting and Mandy, and we headed out to visit the yarn shops. (It was raining. Mandy didn't want to get silver eye, so she wore a plastic bag.) 

The first shop was Blizzard in Vancouver, just over the border, in Washington. It was early, and the shop wasn't too crowded, so Mandy came out to have her photo taken in the shop. She was wearing her Stavanger Cardigan, because her St. Patrick's Day Cardigan wasn't finished yet. (I worked on it while we drove from one shop to the next.)

I bought some stitch markers and some repositionable highlighter tape (already in use).

At Starlight Knitting Society I picked up the official Yarn Crawl tote bag. The bag I had my cardigan in was a little too small for it, so this was a good addition. (That's a bird's nest. The theme for the Crawl this year was "Birds of the Pacific Northwest.")

Later we stopped at Fiber Rhythm.

After that we stopped at Twisted Yarn Shop, where I bought a kit for Which Came First (a wrap), although there's a version of the pattern that makes a cowl. Here are the colors I selected:

I also picked up a skein of lace-weight yarn on the sale rack for 25% off. I picked this color because I thought it would go with my "So Not My Palette Cardigan," which probably should be named "My Palette After All."

We stopped in at Close Knit Portland.

Close Knit is aptly named. It was a tight fit for all the customers.

For Yarn's Sake had a lot of mini skeins. Too bad Mandy was in the car. She would have appreciated them.

I found a kit for a hat I absolutely had to have. It's called the Roadside Beanie. It has sheep on it, so I thought it was cute.

Also included on Thursday were Knitting Bee,  Northwest Wools and Pearl Fiber Arts. At each place, we opened the door with a sleeve, handed our passports in to be stamped, entered our names and email addresses, usually on a laptop or a tablet, after which we used hand sanitizer. Then, if we bought something, we sometimes had to hand over a credit card, then take it back, then sign on a tablet or using a pen. It was a relief when a place accepted ApplePay, because then I didn't have to touch anything other than my own phone. After making a purchase, I always used hand sanitizer. The rain continued off and on for the whole day, and the car was wet. I started to notice after several shops that the car door handle felt slimy. I figured out that the residue from the hand sanitizer was rehydrating when I got it wet. It was good to wash it off when we finished our tour for the day. Here we are at the last stop.

Saturday morning, we only had one shop left: the Knotty Lamb in Forest Grove. I brought Mandy in so I could shoot some more photos. She attracted a lot of attention. Several people commented on how beautiful she was and wondered about the cardigan. One lady wanted to look it up on Ravelry, and when she saw my name, she recognized it. She said that she had made my Everyday Play Dress, but as a top. She asked me to wait while she went to her car to get her doll, who was wearing the top, as well as some leggings based on EZ's Nethergarments, but with short rows across the bottom. The dolls seemed to enjoy getting acquainted.

I think her name is Tiffany. She is an American Girl doll.

Later on Saturday, we had lunch at DDIL's parents' home, which was very nice, followed by a trip to Laurel Ridge Winery. I brought Mandy along to the winery, because she had never been to one before. The woman who brought the wine for tasting looked just like a grownup version of Mandy. Mandy didn't even pretend to have wine, because she knows she's too young.

We had more rain, but not as much as Friday, and we got to see this rainbow from the winery.

We had a nice tasting and a nice visit.

Sunday we took the boys to the gym for Johan's gymnastics lesson and Soren's "Sensory Sunday" activity. 

I missed the lesson because my alarm went off after we were already on the way. That meant it was time for Rocky's medication which I had forgotten (an hour later by the clock than usual because of the #@$*! time change), and I had to go back to the house.

However, because I finished the Cables and Herringbones Cardigan for Mandy, I'm back at work on my Maine Memories Cardigan for me, adding the third color to the bottom of the sleeve.

I hope I get done with the cardigan before I get the new coronavirus.

What's on my needles: Maine Memories. Almost done with first sleeve.

What's on my sewing machine: Put away for now.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. Another week with no progress.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: "Water, Water...." The dolls figure out where water comes from.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still Amy Snow by Tracy Rees. Still enjoyable.

What's in my wine glass: Terra d'Oro Red Wine Blend 2014. Not bad.

What's my tip of the week: If you are roasting vegetables with a small amount of oil, you can save time and mess by lining your baking sheet with parchment paper, spreading the cut vegetables on it, add the seasonings and oil, then mix it by pulling up the edges of the paper so the vegetables pile up, then spread them around again with a spoon or spatula. Halfway through, they can be remixed by the same process. When you're done, the parchment paper can be thrown out, leaving the pans with a small greasy spot at most.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

Visits

The Silver Leaf Shawl is finished:

We traveled to Beaverton to attend Johan's preschool graduation on Saturday. I wore my new shawl while I watched the ceremony and participated in World Wide Knit In Public Day. Here I am, knitting, in the Tiger Woods Center on the Nike campus, where the ceremony was held. 

There were 127 children graduating this year, the most ever in the history of Nike's on-campus day care and preschool program. Johan has been in the program since he was a baby. The daycare center is divided up into classes of children close to the same age. Here is Johan's class, called "Air Pegasus." Johan is the smallest, the one in the plaid shirt. 

Here he is with his teachers, wearing his new Nike backpack, a present from Nike given to each of the graduates. It was full of goodies, including a coloring book and other fun things.

Here's the program. Air Pegasus is listed on the center left.

Dusty and Louis spent a lot of time playing before and after the ceremony (and probably during, too, but we weren't there to see it). They hadn't seen each other since February, so they played hard until they collapsed under the dining table.

We were all pretty tired, including the parents and grandparents, so when the boys (and dogs) were napping, the rest of the family napped, too. Rocky was the only one who looked up when I took this photo. Then he went back to sleep.

Sunday we took a picnic lunch and went for a hike at L. L. Stub Stewart State Park. The pups have to be on a leash on the hiking trails. They had a good time anyway, though. The boys enjoyed running downhill and complaining uphill.

We stopped at the beaver pond to eat our lunch.

A pond turtle watched us from his perch, balanced on a floating log. He seemed to be enjoying the sun. (We didn't see any beavers.)

The park has a fenced dog run near the parking area, so when we finished the hike, we spend a few minutes letting the pups run loose. We will definitely be back. They have a nice campground, so maybe we will bring the trailer up to spend a few days.

When we got back to the car, I was excited to see that the pups and I had finally averaged walking a mile a day over a 30-day period. Our speed dropped considerably, however. I hope we can keep it up.

That evening, the babysitter came to look after the boy and the three dogs. The adults went into Portland to go on the Shanghai Tunnels Tour. During the late 19th Century, these tunnels were built under the growing city. From 1850 until 1941, able-bodied men were drugged, dropped through trap doors, held in underground holding cells and later sold to unscrupulous sea captains to populate the crews of their ships, usually between Portland and Shanghai, thus the term, "Shanghaied." It was fascinating and educational.

After the tour, we had dinner at Bangkok Palace restaurant. The food was excellent. This was just the appetizers (my plate).

We are on our way back to Bend today. Before we left, the dolls and I put together a retelling of "The Three Bears." It's called "Welcoming a Stranger––a Fairy Tale." It came out on Friday, as we were driving northward.

This week's story is the visit to the dentist's office.
What's on my needles: A new version of the Cables and Herringbone Doll Cardigan.

What's on my sewing machine: Costumes for the cast of The Doll's Storybook.

What's in my hoop: Still the Whole Cloth Quilt. No progress this week.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: "Welcoming a Stranger––a Fairy Tale."

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Finished listening to The French Affair by M. C. Beaton. Now listening to Roseanna M. White's A Song Unheard, and The Rise and Fall of the Dinosaurs by Steve Brusatte, for traveling in the car with DH.

What's in my wine glass: Oak Knott, Marechel Foch 2016 from the Willamette Valley.

What's my tip of the week: A small, flat Tupperware container makes a good dog water dish while hiking. There are many contraptions designed for giving water to your best friend, but most require you throw out the water your dog doesn't drink. On a long hike, you may not want to waste your water. A lid with a good seal can be placed back on the water dish to be consumed at a later water break or thrown out when you get back to civilization where water is available.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.