Monthly Archives: January 2013

FIRST FRIDAY ART (and food and shopping and refreshing adult beverage) WALK

31 Thursday Jan 2013

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It’s First Friday again!  After the annual January hiatus, the artists are back, the restaurants and lounges are open, and there is great coffee to be had. 

AND the forecast is for dry and pleasant temps.  Get out and celebrate the break in the rain and enjoy the sparkly things.

GALLERIES
Caswell_Idaho Record Mule Deer LSweb
Caswell Gallery
If you haven’t had the pleasure yet, it is.  Rip is a cornerstone of our local art community, and his wildlife and figurative bronzes are not to be missed.

Follow the link to his site – if you’re lucky, you’ll find some vid of the polar trip.

Ann Cavanaugh_Infusion

Infusion Gallery
Parris Foley is a complete delight, and she has a great eye.  It is worth the entire evening to see Ann Cavanaugh’s fused glass piece shown in the picture (which does it not a bit of justice).  It’s stunning, and every time I go into the gallery, I recount my pennies to see if I’ve acquired enough to make it mine-all-mine yet (I’m not close, but dreams are the stuffing of life, yes?).  The gallery supports the local program, Adult Learning Systems Oregon.

donna_2007-winning-piece

Columbia River Gallery
Donna Erwin has moved her gallery and award winning framing business downstairs (just below Infusion – just walk through the door and down the stairs). 

Restaurants and Lounges Open!
(West to East)
Olde Town Pub
Shaken Martini
Brass Rail
Siam Sushi
Ristorante de Pompello
Celebrate Me Home
Taste Of Village

See you there!

Well that’ll put a rose in those cheeks!

22 Tuesday Jan 2013

Posted by in And Around, Day Trips, Other Side Of The Inside Of The Box

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It has been one wicked windy few days.  Utterly beautiful blue skies, frosts in the mornings, and an all around visual delight.

But bundle on up before you go out there, it has been one wicked windy few days.

You would think that those of us who have lived here our entire lives would be used to it.  However, I have come to the personal conclusion that there are things you never get used to and will push against to your last breath.  For me, the wind is one of those.  I’m good with cold, I’m okay with hot (yes, we do get hot.  Think back.), but when you add those 52 mph gusts to a 32 degree temp, I’m out.  Could I please have the 14.1 degrees straight in calm air?  [Want to know where I got that number?  Here’s a cool toy for those of us who live in the wind.  Wind chill / temp conversion tool.  You can thank me later.]

However, I would like to point out a couple bright spots in the midst…
1)  You look very healthy when you come indoors (once you get the hair back off of the wrong side of your head and other humans can see your face) with a flattering rosy glow.
2)  If you’re having trouble waking up in the morning and getting into your day, save the five bucks for the coffee and just step outside.
3)  When you take your dogs up to that stretch between Corbett and Aims for the run down to the river,  that calm clear cold under a clear-star-sky moon will absolutely redeem any lingering annoyance with the environment.

Larch Mountain blocks the east wind completely where the dogs and I take our nightly hike to the Sandy River.  Completely.  We pile into the van in the chaos and drive up the hill, and we step out into pure peace.

"Hey, what do you want from a cell phone in the dark?"

“Hey, what do you want from a cell phone in the dark?”

It is such a gift.  The waxing moon has lit the trail almost to no-flashlight level, the river is sparkling under the occasional mist, the rocks are beautifully frosted, it’s the perfect temperature for the long hike back up the hill, and everyone else is huddled at home around the woodstove, leaving the trail, and the forest, and the river,
to just us.

It is a good thing.

Walkabout

16 Wednesday Jan 2013

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The past week I’ve had several occasions to be in town and am reminded how much I love this place.  All of it – the sweet little town, the wilder places just outside of town, and my beautiful river.  You can have the Columbia – I’ll come look at it, walk by it once in awhile, delight in that magnificent approach to PDX over the mountain, but the Sandy River has my heart.  I lived on it for four years, drive by it every day, walk to it 300+ days a year.  Love my river.

Anyway, Troutdale this past week.

The West Columbia Gorge Chamber Of Commerce is moving from the house by the arch just across and down the street to 107 on the historic highway.  I went in to see Marcia last Wednesday, and she was her usual gracious self, with only a slight underlay of Frantic (moving will do that to you).  I was able to get in a couple hours helping her haul stuff Thursday and Friday, and am seriously in love with the house as studio / gallery space.  If I win the lottery tonight, it’s all mine.

Nimitz_Caswell

Photo Rip Caswell

Stopped by the Caswell Gallery to take a look at Rip’s Nimitz sculpture on Wednesday. His son was working on the shoes, which are incredibly more detailed than in this earlier pic.  It’s an impressive piece, and worth the stop to watch work in progress.  Article on the Pearl Harbor installation is here.

Gulled, my cohort from the hotel across the highway, met me for lunch yesterday at Ye Olde Pub.  We talk about having lunch once a month, and it works out to about three times a year.  Philly sandwich,  fish and (onion-rings-substituted-for-) chips and good conversation.  Some of it about work.

Parris sold four more pairs of the Mirror Project earrings (yay!) at Infusion Gallery on Friday, so Gulled and I dropped in, since he hadn’t seen the gallery yet, and I needed to talk to her about more inventory.  It is looking SO great.  The (big!) workshop for Adult Learning Systems is ready to go, kitchen and art supplies and all, the ALS art is hung (you have to go in to see the new collage work – I’ll get the artist’s name, my brain is its usual sieve).  Grand Opening is February 7th, but don’t let that stop you from stopping by prior.

SOLD! : )

SOLD! : )

Bunches more, but I have to go pick up the pups from their night in the woods, so will post the rest shortly.
Rock your day!
Loree

6:45a P.S.  Pups are home and fed and passed out…  whooboyhowdy is it foggy up there today – hate it when it’s so dense the highbeams just kick back glare, but gotta use them or you can’t see the inevitable deer in time.  (They are beautiful but stupid and slightly suicidal – had to brake hard for only two this morning.  Look both ways before you cross the road, dear does!).

Terri Clark image

Terri Clark image taken (I’m guessing), sometime in the summer and when the sun was up.

The only good thing about getting up early to drive in the 5 a.m. dark to pick up dogs, is that shining light in the black as you come into Springdale.  Next drive up that way, make sure you stop at Liz’s Coffee Cabin.  I’ve been driving eight miles out of my way to work to get the Big Train Chai latte.  3.50 for the huge one and so so good.  Cool thing, too – the punch card isn’t for free coffee.  When it’s full, she donates 4.00 to the Corbett Cardinals to support the kids.  How hard does that rock?

The Dark and The Mud and the Sweet Spot

10 Thursday Jan 2013

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It rained yesterday for a goodly part of the day.  Hard.  I know that because Rian and I were tromping around town in it, gathering up site partners and talking to good people.  Everyone here understands when you walk in with their informational packet wrapped in plastic, your hair askew, and your makeup running.

It quit, or more accurately slowed, early afternoon.  Late afternoon, clear of tasks for the moment, I headed for my daily hike in the woods with a van full of dogs (358.8 pounds in four black-and-tan bodies officially qualifying as a van full).  We got there just before 5:00 (the days are getting longer again, have you noticed?), in time to walk the first mile through the forest without a lamp.  And when we came out of the woods at the river a mile later than that, there was still enough light at the bottom of the gorge to sit on a wet rock by the river for a few minutes and enjoy the rampage before the late dusk turned to full dark.

It is a function of human, that when you’re in the middle of flourescent and traffic and phones and people all day, you don’t think about what that inconvenient rain and a relatively warm day means in the wilder parts of your world.

The Sandy was running high and loud and beautiful with rain and snow melt.  The huge sitting rock at the edge of the beach was six feet out in the river, the boulders at the bottom were gently knocking into each other, the air was crisp and clean and six kinds of jazzed up with ions, the sky had cleared enough to show a swath of stars sparkling in the cold.  It takes all of thirty seconds in that environment to wash out a day and drop you into sweet peace.  Try it some day, when it’s been raining all day and still might be a little.  Hike a muddy trail, get a little wet, take a happy dog, brave the dark.  You’ll walk out new, I promise.

LLH

It Ain’t ALL Cold and Wind and Wet!

07 Monday Jan 2013

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First and foremost, I have been absolutely utterly terrifically negligent in getting around to the fun stuff… please accept my abject apologies for leaving a gaping hole here between pre-Christmas and post-New Years : ). I hope you and 2013 are off on the right foot.

Just found this on my camera from last week at the Delta behind the hotel, and was reminded that (Oregon being Oregon) even in the middle of a stretch of gray, a sweet spot will appear.

…which seems like as good a thought as any for the first post of a new year and so I’ll hush right there.