Category Archives: Oregon

The Road Trip Part 6: The Last Leg

11 Wednesday Oct 2017

Posted by in Architecture, City, Drawings, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Trees, Uncategorized

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Before we leave Temple Square and the elms let me show you this one…John Constable, English, “Study of the Trunk of an Elm Tree,” oil, 1821….the fun of a resident art historian is that while one is in a reverie about the elms of one’s childhood, R is immediately struck with the similarity of the big elms to a Constable painting and has located it on Google and sent me the image…before we even get back to the car…

So off to Boise, familiar territory for the first time in days.  Our plan is to stay in Boise for two nights in order to see the Museum and have dinner with R’s brother Chris and his wife Dianna.  We have also booked a motel that we’re looking forward to.  So we head due north, me reading the next chapter aloud…

So this part sounds like an ad for the Modern Hotel, but this place captivated our imagination, provided us with real comfort and respite, and two wonderful dinners.

It used to be a Travelodge Motel right downtown and was abandoned…

But Boise is in a boom phase, buildings going up everywhere, hip restaurants, etc etc.  So a couple bought the old motel and “did it up”…and we loved it…here was our unit in the 1960’s (bottom left), and now…

a great bathroom

the comfiest bed of the whole trip, and wifi…so we could catch up with friends and family…

a really wonderful restaurant…

lamb chops…(the owners are Basque)

breeze blocks,

homemade yogurt for breakfast…

great coffee in the morning and a place to sit and have it (with R’s brother Chris who joined us…)

We headed to the Boise Art Museum (they don’t allow photos…sorry…great Rick Bartow show there) and out to lunch (all meals become drawing opportunities…)

and after checking the back of the motel

we headed home…

back into Oregon…

land of no cell-phone connectivity, vast spaces and unusual accommodations…

the Oasis…we bought some peanuts and bottled water….ahem….

Coffee break in Sisters…

across the mountains…

and down into Salem…

just in time for a neighborhood meeting on the subject of urban renewal…

and then home by the fire…happy to be here, home at last.

 

 

 

 

 

Today is Thursday…

07 Thursday Sep 2017

Posted by in Drawings, Family photos, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Sky, Uncategorized

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But for the first time in a few years we will not be heading up for “Sidney day” because he starts full-time preschool today.  Last week we had our last of such days, and though Sidney will still be a delightful part of our lives, the weekly conversation about this and that is complete.

Since Sidney and his family moved to Milwaukie a couple of years ago R & I have driven up on highway 99e instead of the freeway, and have our own set of “landmarks” so we took a few pictures and the day looked like this…

the “step-gabled” green building just north of town I’ve vowed to photograph, knowing it would be torn down one day…

the Sam Brown century farm barn miraculously restored…

the very beautiful Sam Brown house, sadly NOT restored…

Cloudy day sky

the Barlow house…

the driving head…

Ivy Street in Canby where we used to turn right to go to my Mom and Dad’s…

Pearson’s since 1934…

the old Oregon City houses all housing new businesses…

the tunnel

the Still (view of the falls from the deck)…

the bridges…

But, as we got closer, things got a little creepier…(Halloween is in the air)

and then the whirling dervish…the “Go Go”

The perfect outfit was found and off we go playing monsters…

first stop park number one…

“we’re going to Palm Springs”

then a little bit of art-looking (Marie Watt at PDX)

lunch and park number two…

home for a nap…(which on this day needed to be taken in a pile of pillows and quilts on the floor)

then a bit of a swim with the bike helmet for style…

and after some hugs and kisses…

 

 

 

 

The Eclipse…

22 Tuesday Aug 2017

Posted by in Celebrations, Court Street, Family photos, Garden, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Salem, Uncategorized

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The media is filled this morning…eclipse photos of great telescopic/cellphone beauty…ecstatic exclamations…large groups all experiencing together this moment of science and imagination…great fun.  I didn’t think I’d write about it since my pictures are blurry and unremarkable in every way…but…why not.

Maybe many of us though decided to experience this phenomenon in our own backyards…to watch our familiar horizons dim, to sit with our loved ones and our neighbors and just watch it roll.

The day before I scanned the empty blue sky where we would watch the moment unfold…

and then the loved ones arrived and so did the moment….

  

Jason brought Sidney some eclipse pancakes…

the neighbors began to gather in their own yards with friends and families…

the shadows began to lengthen…

the temperature dropped and the air became still…

…we all looked like we were in a black and white movie, and whether from excitement or solar intervention…ALL of my photos are out of focus (??)…

totality…

and then, way too quickly it became light again, the birds began to chirp…and we were off to Jim and Carol’s for the end of the saga…

and today it is sunny and bright, traffic runs as usual by our house…only the memory of an extraordinary moment is left…oh and one small creature left behind…

 

 

 

Sidney Day

11 Friday Aug 2017

Posted by in Family photos, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Uncategorized

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For three years R and I have spent one day a week with our grandson Sidney.  In September Sidney will be in school everyday and our daycare days will end, so these last few “Sidney Days” are precious…this week we had coffee and bubbles on the deck

then headed downtown to Blackfish gallery to see the “We the People” show…I asked Sidney if this was Wonder Woman…?

and he said “oh no Nana, Wonder Woman is the one in the underpants with stars”

Sidney made friends with Henry (visiting Portland from LA) in the park…

and we had PBJ at Pearl Bakery…as these days draw to a close I looked at some of the HUNDREDS of photos I’ve taken over these years so here’s a quick review…

wherein you can see that reading, park visits, Lonely Planet lunches, certain favorite locations for photos (like outside the cupcake store), visiting friends, urban hikes have all been terrific…

and as a result we are in the “NO PHOTO” phase…

but I’m sneaky…and though Sidney will still be a big part of our lives, these days of roaming around the city, conkers, snoopy park, the bubble dad at piccolo, dinosaur lunches are drawing to close, and they have been FUN!  The boy is growing up…

 

 

 

August Pursuits

06 Sunday Aug 2017

Posted by in Beach, Celebrations, Drawings, Ephemera, Family photos, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Uncategorized, Wedding

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August and December are months when, for me anyway, not much art gets made because of family, gatherings, celebrations, weather…and so on.  And speaking of weather….we’re having a heat wave…last week three days in triple digits…so Tuesday when we left town it was already 99 but, blissfully, we arrived at the beach and it was a comfortable 66…52 miles away but over the mountains and down to the ocean.

The next day Sidney & Co arrived which livened things up considerably…

and we had a nice week of delicious meals (made by Z & A) and drawing and fun…

Spaceships….

Aliens…

the beach…

As the temperatures cooled the schedule of activities became a reality so off we went

taking the back road…

which we love, but only if we have time for the CARWASH INTERLUDE…

Which we did, so off to the wedding.  Meg, the daughter of R’s cousin Mary, was marrying Bryan and it was a lovely event with lots of time to catch up with family…however, the chairs were all in the blazing sun except for one little corner that George staked out for us so we sat in the back row…

which, as it turned out, gave me a good vantage point for catching a few pictures of the wedding party…however I wasn’t the only one who thought this was a good spot…

Never mind…Mary and son Al were all smiles…

…I got a few good shots (though I couldn’t hear what Jeff said to Meg as he walked her down the isle)…

and the Hulls took over table 5

the bride was beautiful, the groom was handsome and the room was filled with people who were happy and loving…though there was a bit of photo chaos…

but Rayanne got the shot…

Home we zoomed to repack the bags…next adventure ahead…

 

 

 

 

 

Roger Hull and Where He Works

25 Tuesday Jul 2017

Posted by in Art work, Art World, Artists, Court Street, Ephemera, Modern Life, Oregon, PNAA, Roger Hull, Salem

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A loyal reader recently wrote and said she would enjoy seeing where Roger Hull writes his many monographs about regional art and artists.   As he is currently using both offices (the winter office and the summer office) I thought I might visit.  (Also, I have noted that when I write about Roger or quilts, my “stats” soar…)

Roger Hull is currently writing about Portland painter Lucinda Parker to go along with an exhibition at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art in the winter of 2019 (January through March).  But here in the summer of 2017 the work is well underway.  Usually he writes upstairs…amid files and ephemera and work made by former students of yore….

like Kent Lew…

Dan Schmidt…

friends like DE May

 

Photos galore…

these days he uses two screens, one for images and one for text…

But…it’s summer and we don’t have AC…so when the fan and Lee Imonen’s “Basket” study fail to cool, down we go to the basement summer office…

past Matt Ferranto’s portrait of RPH (R thinks he looks like Woody Allen in this one)

to the basement, or…as we now call it…the summer office…

two screens…

So there you have it…work places abound in our world.  Oh, and here’s one for the quilters…I’m working on a “rescue quilt”…

 

Quilting With Friends

14 Friday Jul 2017

Posted by in Celebrations, Design, Oregon, Quilting, Uncategorized

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I headed east over the mountains after the fourth of July to meet up with LeeAnn (coming from Seattle) and Mary (coming from Chattanooga) in Sisters in our home away from home for four days (The Quail’s Nest on Airbnb)…

We toasted ourselves with memories of five years ago when we went to Alabama to quilt

This year we were meeting up to go to friend Sujata Shah’s class called “Lattice”…a quilt from her book “Cultural Fusion”…

We set up…

and set to work…

and Sujata gave us encouragement and tips…

It was fun catching up with Sujata at lunch, and in the afternoon the quilt tops started to materialize…

Here’s the beginning of mine…I somewhat dully chose neutrals except for the turquoise…

We heard Sujata speak, we heard the quilter Joe Cunningham speak (after playing some walking-around-quilter blues) and other famous people…then the quilt show…all photo failures…

then a celebratory dinner with friends at The Open Door (Yum)

and a final goodbye…

with plans afoot to meet up and sew before another five years goes by.  Goodbye friends…

The 4th of July

05 Wednesday Jul 2017

Posted by in Beach, car wash, Celebrations, Cutler City, Drawings, Family photos, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Uncategorized

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Well, America.  All that it means to us…the history, the narrative, the many wonderful people just trying to live a life.  Maybe the fourth of July is when I can put aside the politics and the incessant bad news of NPR and just revel in what I think summer in America is…for me anyway…

Pie for instance…(apple in this case)

sunny and cloudy days at the beach…

picnics

drawing

Flags

traffic (unfortunately)…

fireworks…

builders…

the judging of the largest fern contest…

and then a change of gears for me…

off to Sisters tomorrow for quilting, on to Camp Sherman for Art Camp…see you soon!

 

 

 

 

Salem Sketchers

10 Saturday Jun 2017

Posted by in Art work, Artists, City, Drawings, Just visual, Modern Life, Oregon, Salem, Uncategorized

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For a couple of years an intrepid group of local artists has been participating one Saturday a month in what is an international movement of urban sketchers…very casual, very fun.  Each month they draw at a different location…I’ve dropped in and out, but decided to join today, even though the weather was iffy…(58 degrees on June 10th…yikes…thunderstorms predicted for the afternoon and it almost NEVER thunders in Oregon).  The group was led up to the terrace over the restaurant Orupa at the Water Place building and at first there was some watery sun…

I chose this view…

and everybody settled down to work…

Katy and I were at a table under an umbrella…

Uh oh…

and then the rain started and this person captured the moment…boing!

Still, in spite of the rain, it was a jolly morning…(Happy Birthday Jessica!)

some people headed inside…

Mike Bergen showed us his new book …

and then “the reveal”…

duly photographed…

Way too much fun…better think of coming along…the second Saturday of every month.  In July the sketchers will be in the Gaiety Hollow Garden and in August at the Rogue brewery in Independence.  COME!  it’s free fun.

 

Creative Thinking When Zoning Fails

29 Monday May 2017

Posted by in Architecture, Beach, Cutler City, Modern Life, Oregon, Small Buildings, Uncategorized

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“Densification” “Infill”…modern words.  These words weren’t part of the vocabulary 25 years ago when we bought this little beach house…

Across the street was a heavily wooded lot with huckleberries, salal, shorepines, rhoadies…it looked like this…and birds lived here…”habitat.”

For 25 years we rolled up to our house knowing that one day we’d drive in and find something different there…and it finally happened.  The people to the north bought the lot and for a couple of years left it alone, but plans were afoot for a garage with an apartment above for their children and one day we drove up to see this…trees all cut down…

and Friday, after a two week absence…

The thing to keep in mind here is that all but one house on Ebb Street is one story, and this garage is taller than the one two story house.  And here is the old view from inside, and the new…

We, on the other hand, were not allowed to put on a small front porch so made do with a pergola…

But, hilariously, I put a photo on Instagram this weekend and have received suggestions to think of it as an Italian villa…Roger and my brother suggested a paintings by Sassetta and Giotto…

and Rachel thought maybe just an Italian villa…

…so now, we are amused.   Sort of.