Were you in the “path of totality” today?!

In case you missed it, there was a solar eclipse this morning. And if you’re not from around these PDX parts, you may also have missed that they’ve been hyping this sucker for months now. 40 minutes south of us is the “path of totality” aka complete darkness aka mylifewasCHANGED aka thecoolkidszone. For weeks, all I’ve heard is “what are you doing for the eclipse?”

The “cool kids” answer is “oh, I booked my campsite in this little unknown campground near Madras eleventeen months ago. How about you?”

Uh.

“Maybe taking a break from work to go out into the backyard?”

Alas, takes a little more than a cosmic event to motivate this clan into action. So much so that I blithely bypassed the “GETYERECLIPSEGLASSESHERE!!” kiosks at the grocery store for the past many weeks thinking, “oh yeah, I should prolly get some of those.”

“Should” = this past Saturday and “get some of those” = “not a chance you silly girl – all of Portland is sold out and you are a loser.”

A wee bit panicked (not so much for my own sake, but wondering whether my children would forgive me for forcing them to stay inside during the EVENTOFALIFETIME because SOMEONE left it too late to get glasses), I hit the ol’ Google and found that there’s more than one way to view an eclipse safely! We went old school!!

Yep, the ol’ “pinhole in a paper plate” method. You let the sun shine through the first plate and view the projection caught on the second.

It seemed to be working, so I ran in to tell the kids “hey kids, it’s starting! It won’t be at its peak for about an hour, but there’s an eighth of the sun covered already!”

[….]

So I tried 15 minutes later. “Hey kids! We’re coming up on a quarter of the sun covered! You should come!”

[….]

(Now it’s not like this is 7 am or something ridiculous. It was almost 10 am!)

Finally, I gave them last call.

And lo and behold, they eventually showed up.

My backyard is definitely not in the path of totality, so we didn’t get complete darkness, but we were at 99.2%, so it definitely got darker. Way eerie! The neighbors’ chickens were going kinda nutso, and it felt like everything was in an Instagram filter. There were some super cool shadows made by the sun through that tree behind us.

Aaaaaaand 30 seconds later it was done. My FB feed tells me I missed the experience of a lifetime, but I feel like we got into it about as much as this lazy family gets into anything.

And my paper plates? They totally worked.

(Saved myself six bucks on glasses, I did.)

What? Summer’s halfway done, you say? When did that happen?

Summer chez PM has been both full of good things and yet somehow free and easy all at the same time. We finished school mid-June (a week late thanks to all our snow days). Sigh. C’s get degrees, right? The Girl was bereft that the class rabbit was adopted out (well, happy for a good home, but sad for the goodbye), so we tried to mitigate by going to Bunnies in Baskets:

A “rabbit therapy non-profit organization”? Only in Portland, yes?

She loooooved it, but with only weekly sessions of “All You Can Pet for a Dollar,” she was wilting. So we took the plunge:

Meet Sitka the Guinea Pig!

Isn’t she ADORABLE????? OMG, we love her so much!!!

Ostensibly she belongs to The Girl, but we all take our turn. Even The Husband!

(We don’t talk about the “there’s poop in my bed” incident.)

She is truly the BEST pet ever. We were warned when we got her that solo piggies get very lonely because they’re herd animals, so we had to commit to spending at LEAST two hours a day with her. No worries there – she’s on someone’s shoulder/in someone’s lap/going on a lettuce hunt in an elaborate obstacle course pretty much our entire waking hours.

(SO CUTE!!)

We declared this summer to be the “Summer of Success” which means that each weekday, each child must do the following:

• Do a chore (ha, whichever ones I don’t feel like doing)
• Read for an hour
• Exercise for at least 30 minutes

(Side note: don’t you wish someone would force you to do those things every day? I think we’d all be much happier.)

The carrot = $$ and the stick = “no screen time until you’ve done your daily requirements” and it’s working quite well. The exercise is usually some kind of workout or else playing basketball at the community centre with a friend (The Boy) or being dragged through the forest with mom (The Girl). Sometimes it’s just a “family walk” (which sounds all Leave It to Beaver-y until I tell you that it’s really just making everyone accompany me to Fred Meyer to pick up a prescription).

The reading gets mixed reviews. The Girl likes it well enough, but The Boy looks at the clock, starts, and puts the book down EXACTLY one hour later.

(You guys – I can’t even. He has TEN pages left in this book. When I get to this point in a book, anyone coming in the room already knows not to talk to me because I’m eyeing the finish line and can’t be disturbed. The Boy? “Welp, hour’s up, I can put this sucker down.”)

The chores have been a welcome addition to our (well, my) routine. It’s been a bit eye-opening for some of us:

LOL.

(SHE’S SO CUTE!!!!)

All this “success” must be going to The Boy’s head because he’s been acting very strange lately, namely cooking and baking up a storm. The other day he decided to make fried chicken, so he looked up a Gordon Ramsay recipe, got the ingredients, marinated them in buttermilk overnight, and fried it up.

He’s also into baking, but he tends to get his inspiration after I go to bed (we’re on summer schedule here, so I let the kids stay up past midnight knowing that I’ll get 6-8 hours of uninterrupted work the next day before they even think about getting out of bed), so most of it happens without my knowledge. This morning I woke up to chocolate cinnamon roll dough rising.

The Girl’s baking forays are of the passive observer kind since we’ve been bingeing on The Great British Baking Show. Oh, it is SO good! Although we may have told The Boy that his cinnamon rolls were a bit “overproved” today. When she’s not being “successful” or getting her baking shows on or babysitting next door (she’s watching our SUPER CUTE 4-year-old neighbor girl for 10 hours a week this summer), she’s snuggling with the pig.

(ARGH!!! ADORABLE!!)

The Husband is keeping busy with gliding still. I went on my first ride and I didn’t die!! Woot!

We took an impromptu trip to Mt. St. Helen’s to meet a friend of mine from Minneapolis who was on a road trip, but unfortunately our plans to meet up didn’t quite work out. (Who would have thought “meet you on the mountain sometime tomorrow” wasn’t concrete enough? We ended up on opposite sides – relatively close per the old flying crow, but 4 hours of driving on the roads!)

(FYI – that part behind the clouds is actually missing.)

I’m keeping busy with work (we had a major software release go out end of June and I’m still recovering), hiking when it’s not a bazillion degrees, making chore lists, and my two book clubs. Between them and the usual summer reading, I’m required to be out in the backyard with a book for a fair number of hours each week, but I’m managing.

Next week is VBS and we’re all volunteering. Sunday is setup for all four of us. The Girl is on audio-visual/craft table duty. I’ve been roped in to something-something-registration-I-promise-you’ll-be-home-by-9-am. The Boy is a crew leader (LOL – he’s in charge of seven kids! We were a bit strategic and made sure his standard wrestling partners were NOT in his group). He’s been practicing a bit – he and I just started volunteering in the nursery once a month!

(Our youth pastor’s daughter. She’s hovering off-screen mouthing “don’t drop my baby!”)

And this is pretty much it until school starts in a month. We do better with a rhythm, so I think we’re all looking forward to school’s return. Additionally, it has been SO hot here (no rain for 30 days and only The Boy’s brownies get special dispensation to use the oven). We’ve got a camping trip in the hopper and a few other outings for August, but otherwise we’re just “successing” our way to September. And loving on our Sitka.

(OHHHHH, WORKING FROM HOME IS THE BEST!!!)

Well, hello there, blog’o’mine! Long time, no post! Bet you’re all wondering whether we said “eh, it’s fun here” in Australia and tore up our tickets for the flight home and were living the expired visa life on a beach somewhere.

(Spoiler: no.)

Been a heckuva few weeks (almost months, I guess) since we returned. Figure I’ll throw some highlights at you and we’ll call it even awesome, k?

We’ve seen a couple of concerts, our favourite of which was San Fermin. Oh man, if you ever get the chance….

The Husband’s been busy resuming his aviation-type activities.

And The Girl was officially The Husband’s first civilian passenger!

(I was at home, busy praying.)

We went to see a friend’s school play and I got to relive my Wizard of Oz obsession while reminiscing about how my cute boyfriend (no older than The Girl is here) fed it with gifts galore and tickets to Rainbow Stage.

Our besties came to town and we did the most awesome thing – a Portland food tour! We had beer tastings, local sausage (for the carnivores), food cart fare, New Mexican sopapillas, Indian street food, wine tasting at an urban winery, and fresh blackberry pie for dessert – so amazing!

For Memorial Day (the American “May Long”) we actually headed back to the Motherland and spent a couple of days on Vancouver Island. Not sure which was more exciting – seeing this guy in concert:

Or seeing the World’s Largest Hockey Stick:

(Still a toss-up for me.)

And while the kiddos stayed behind at the hotel and ate food from 7-11 while we were livin’ the dream with Tom Cochrane at the Cowichan Performing Arts Centre, they totes got in on the fun the next day.

Ooooo, look who I found!

Speaking of la famille Trudeau, yesterday we had an epic event at our house – a tea party complete with little sandwiches, scones, cakes, chocolate-covered strawberries, eight teenage hooligans of The Girl’s friends, and a special guest.

(Honestly, this picture makes me cry a bit. That’s my grandmother’s china and I make a point of using it whenever we have guests because she was one of my many inspirations for what it means to be hospitable, and to think that my daughter is using it to show her friends how much they mean to her is so amazing to me and now I am verklempft.)

And that’s pretty much it for us. Of course, there’s the regular stuff like work and school and lawn-mowing and the not-so-regular stuff like hearing aids and dental implants and [insert crisis here] that keeps us busy but isn’t terribly good blog fodder. Portland’s been in the news lately for some pretty awful reasons and sometimes it feels a bit hell-in-a-handbasket-y, but you don’t need me to pile on what you already know. By now you know this blog’s about as interesting as watching me read in my backyard and you come here for a bit of boring normalcy in a pretty crazy world.

Right?

Less than 48 hours in Sydney, but we still managed to see some of the sights. First stop, the library!

Ostensibly we went there first because it’s centrally located and has cheap lockers in which to store luggage while we waited to check in. But! It also happened to be a Tuesday between 10 am and 4 pm which is the only time the Shakespeare Room is open to the public (I get sneaky when there’s First Folios involved).

(Eleventeen points to first commenter who knows the speech depicted by the stained glass.)

After that we hit Circular Quay and The Rocks for lunch, and then headed to the Air BnB where a short nap turned into “eh, nobody feels like going anywhere isn’t there a Dominoes downstairs?”

(Y’all, we’re approaching the two-week mark on a pretty intensely scheduled trip. Not every day can be Amazing Race worthy.)

We did do lots today, though! Started off with a morning walk for the grown ups along the beaches (including the iconic Bondi).

Then we split up. I headed into the business district where the software company I work for has an office, and I got to meet some colleagues who’ve only ever been smiley emojis over email. They took me out for lunch and it was super fun to chat and put faces to names.

The Husband gave me the whole afternoon to myself, so I was able to introvert it up with a stroll the the Royal Botanical Gardens. So pretty!

Then I meandered through the nearby art gallery – it was small but mighty.

Recharged, I met up with the rest of the fam to hear about their adventures (basically they walked around being nerds).

Together again, my dear ones indulged me in yet another visit to an old church.

Then it was off for farewell drinks and Australia’s gift to the snacking world: potato wedges served with sour cream and sweet chili sauce (OMG, sooooo amazing).

Our last stop was a family vacation tradition – go see a movie. Maybe not the most touristy thing to do, but we’ve always found it to be a nice break from the constant novelty of traveling (we stil tease The Girl about falling asleep during Superman in London only to wake up during the credits to ask groggily, “did he save the world yet?”).

And now we’re all packed up and hitting the hay early. Tomorrow will be dreadful – a 7 am flight to Melbourne followed by three more flights to Auckland, San Francisco, and finally PDX. Fortunately we cross the date line so (lucky us) we essentially get two Thursdays to cram that all in.

Goodbye Aussies and Kiwis! We’ve loved hanging out, but it’s time to go home.

But first – how do you celebrate a sweet sixteen birthday halfway around the world?

With a hastily-assembled cake made out of Tim Tams and convenience store candles, of course!

And a carry-on approved gift of “wombat poo” chocolates and an Australia necklace.

And then you take your forensic criminologist/lawyer wannabe history buff daughter to the “coolest place ever”: the Olde Melbourne Gaol.

(Don’t let her mugshot expression fool you – she’s loving this.)

We all got charged, booked, and processed at the watch house (lol – my charge was “cultivation of an illegal substance” – oh, Portland, we miss you), toured the jail, and even tried on the notorious outlaw Ned Kelly’s armour.

(The Boy couldn’t quite figure out why you’d need a padded cell.)

Alas, no sooner was bail posted than it was time to hop another plane – this time, to Cairns.

We got in kinda late, but still had time for a stroll down the esplanade, a trip through the night market, and some happy birthday fettuccini alfredo.

Had to hit the hay early, though, since the next day was a watery adventure – snorkeling!

So proud of my kids. The Boy got a little seasick on the ride out to the reef, but as soon as he got there, he was raring to go. And The Girl is terrified of open water and the creatures that live in it, and yet she was the one who kept asking to stay out a bit longer.

We saw Dory (no Nemo), turtles, parrot fish, and even a (non-people-eating) shark!

We were knackered after a day in the sun and sea and all went to bed early which was a good thing since more wilderness awaited us today – the Daintree Rainforest!

Walked along yet another beautiful beach.

Added a few more creatures to our roster.

But the scariest of them all was the one we were warned repeatedly about all day.

This guy!!

Oh my, we heard the most horrific stories about how crocs attack in a split-second and how dangerous it is to go even within five meters of the most innocuous-looking shoreline.

Fortunately we all made it back, and have just spent the last couple of hours packing up for yet another early start tomorrow as we head off for the next and final leg of this epic journey – Sydney!

When we last left our heroes, they were headed to The Shire.

The movie sets from The Hobbit are now permanent and you can hang out by the hobbit holes on a gorgeous working farm.

Look! Bag End!

The end of our (soggy) tromp was the cozy Green Dragon where the grown ups had stout and the kiddos had ginger beer and we all pretended we were in Middle Earth with Aragorn sitting just around a dimly lit corner.

And with that, we dropped off our car, hopped on a plane for the second half of our epic journey, and headed to Melbourne.

Oh how I love this city! I’d forgotten how much. It’s vibrant and cultured and this perfect mix of old and new, technology and nature.

I did my usual “you have to visit the art gallery and you have to learn one thing” so while the grown ups wandered, The Boy found one exhibit and then enjoyed the free wifi.

We explored the city’s nooks and crannies using a free walking tour I downloaded.

(We also got a little lost, but I told my tour group they were getting what they paid for.)

Our evening was barbaric and hilarious (aka legit Australian) with an Aussie-rules football match. Think a mashup of US football, soccer, quidditch, and the invasion of the barbarian hordes. With no sissy pads or helmets to get in the way.

Yesterday we swapped city for country. First stop, a winery (plus bonus picnic by the vineyard).

Then it was off to a chocolate factory! We got to play games to win chocolate, see how it’s made, and even make our own bars.

You’d think that would be the highlight, but no – the best was yet to come. The wildlife reserve! Kookaburras, koalas, and cassowaries.

Wombats, dingoes, and Tasmanian Devils!

Echidnas, lizards, and emus!

But the best, best, best was feeding the kangaroos.

They were big! And a bit assertive, but so fun!

One last wildlife stop for the day – the Penguin Parade!

We waited on the beach ( in primo seats scored by our awesome Scottish tour guide and The Boy elbowing their way to the front of the line and racing ahead of the crowd) and as dusk fell, we watched the little waddlers emerge from the sea and head home to the nests in land. No pics allowed, but we did find this little guy outside of the park.

And with that, our wild day was done. Phew! We’re kinda exhausted, not gonna lie. The Husband definitely packs the itinerary full!

Today is a travel day off to Cairns where the highs lately have been 36 degrees Celsius. Tropical paradise! But first, someone turns Sweet Sixteen! Curious how I managed to put together a birthday breakfast halfway around the world? Stay tuned!

The next phase of our New Zealand trip has definitely been the “adventure” portion of the vacation. First up, The Husband getting used to driving on the wrong side of the road.

(Not a flipped image!)

He’s very good at it! Although fun fact, the wiper and blinker stick thingeys are also reversed, so sometimes when we’re about to turn, the windshield wipers go off. He says he does it on purpose, but it’s not always raining…

Our first adventure was deep underground – we went caving!

And not just into any caves. In our first cave, we got into a raft on a subterranean river, everyone turned their lights off and then ZOMG:

Glow worms!! It was like being under the stars, except replace “stars” with “maggots with glowing bums.”

The next cave was more traditional but also super cool.

After the Waitomo caves, it was off to Rotorua (with me navigating and reminding “stay to the left…). The countryside here is gorgeous.

The next adventure was the craziest – zorbing! Basically you get inside a giant hamster ball and roll down a hill.

Here’s the insider version:

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(The water is to keep you slipping around gently instead of clobbering one another. Since I consider being cold, going fast, AND getting wet to be the trifecta of evil, I stayed at the bottom and held the purses.)

I did participate in the next adventure – a gondola ride up the mountain and luging down it.

(The Girl is pouting because her head is too small to fit grownup sizes.)

It was basically MarioKart!

Then the MarioKarters hit the road again to Tauranga and found ourselves a very Oregon-like beach.

See that mountain? The Husband and I climbed it this morning!

The view was standard New Zealand aka amaze balls. Plus wandering herd of sheep, natch. I even took one of those fancy travel lifestyle pics of me doing yoga at the top of the mountain.

(Like I said, I’m getting SO good at corpse pose!)

Today’s last adventure was a tour of one of the oldest buildings in New Zealand where we got our history on.

(What do you mean “all your pictures have books in them?” I said it was an adventure….)

Tonight is packing up the clothes we washed today in preparation for our next leg. Off to Oz tomorrow! But not without first saying goodbye to NZ by hanging out with some natives (aka hobbits)….

Pretty much the only things I know about New Zealand are from Taika Waititi movies and these guys:

We’re rectifying that this week – Krakes are in New Zealand! Yep, time to pull out the ol’ ninja turtle backpacks again!

The flight over was quite fine for 3/4 of us. For some reason Mr. “Fall Asleep Five Seconds into the Car Ride” couldn’t sleep, so he was pretty wrecked.

NZ is 19 hours different, so while we skipped Thursday entirely, our body clocks aren’t too out of whack. Our first stop is Auckland, and after snuggling some tired children into the AirBnB, the grown ups went exploring.

It’s beautiful here! End of summer, so it’s warm and green. Auckland has amazing green spaces.

(We totally made out on the Lovers Walk. It’s required.)

Children napped, we grabbed them and continued exploring.

(You know the president’s made an impression when New Zealand craft brewers are making beer called “Im-PEACH-ment.)

Day 2 in Auckland was more of the same. We started with the Parnell Rose Garden.

Then it was culture time – Auckland Art Museum:

(The Boy hates museums with every fiber of his being, so I try to find free admission since this is how he spends his visit:)

Then it was park shenanigans, a cricket match (hint: just as exciting as baseball), and unexpected pianos and libraries.

Our last night in Auckland was divide-and-conquer. I took The Boy to the baths (aka the swimming pool).

While The Husband took The Girl to a Twenty-One Pilots concert.

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(We each feel we got the better end of the deal.)

And that’s it for Auckland! The adventure continues in Rotorua today. The question on everyone’s mind: how well can The Husband drive on the wrong side of the road??

Meet my new grandbaby!

This is “Will” (aka The Boy’s project in his “Family Life” Science unit). Will is a 10 lb bag of flour with a drawn-on face that The Boy gets to parent for the next week.

I found Will’s “home-from-the-hospital” beanie to be mildly terrifying, so I dug out one of The Boy’s old sleepers to see if he could be made somewhat more cuddly. It helped a bit.

The Boy is required to keep Will within his sight at all times, preferably being carried either on his chest or on his hip. And he has to come with us everywhere.

(I got so many “congratulations” at church. Our youth pastor just returned from her maternity leave, so she and The Boy swapped parenting advice while they bounced their babies.)

We’re allowed to babysit (provided The Boy “pays” us in chores), so sometimes this happens.

I’m supposed to grade The Boy’s parenting abilities each day on a scale of 1-3. Most days he’s been pretty good and I only have to text him once or twice that “you forgot your baby again.” But sometimes he abandons his child for too long and then something dire happens.

(I’m only giving him a “2” for this day.)

So it’s been a little cray-cray around here lately what with traveling and being sick and hockey and appointments and church stuff and book clubs and all the life that gets squeezed in between. And we’re heading into another similar season (hopefully less “being sick” because there’s definitely more “travel”).

Realizing I was blessed with a weekend in between with relatively little on my personal calendar, I quickly booked a bunch of appointments and had myself a nice little weekend o’ relaxation.

Treatment #1 was yoga. Look at my beautiful yoga studio!

I’ve practiced yoga off and on (mostly off) for years now. It’s tough to find the right fit of schedule, teacher, and yoga style. My favourite classes had always been the first ones I took at Great-West Life – mostly because they were for office workers (i.e. older working women) after work, so most of the poses were done lying down. I’ve always tried to find something similar, but ended up struggling my way through vinyasas and warrior threes and just looking forward to shavasana at the end.

(For the uninitiated, it’s known as “corpse pose” and you basically just lie there and think about breathing. It’s pretty awesome.)

So I was super excited to find a studio near us that has classes like “Restorative Yoga” and “Hip Hip Hooray” and (my favourite) “Easy Does It Yoga.” And I happily head off most Friday afternoons to hang out with the retired ladies and practice my corpse pose. (Oh man you guys, I’m getting so good at it!)

Treatment #2 was my typical weekend hike. It’s been a whole year and I’m still in the honeymoon phase of I can’t believe I live by the state park. It’s a sad weekend when I don’t get in there for at least an hour or so. Pictures never do it justice, so I tried a video this time. It’s so springy in there right now! (Also soggy, since it’s been raining since the snow melted, but you can totally hear all the spring run-off!)

Oh the love I have for this forest!

Treatment #3 was the tried-and-true massage. I haven’t been in ages, but I knew The Girl liked the massage therapist I found for her, so I decided it was mama’s turn. And I was definitely not disappointed!

She was perfect! Enough pressure/working out the kinks that I felt like I got my money’s worth, but not so hard that I was cursing the day she was born (it’s a fine balance).

Suitably turned into a noodle, I turned to the craziest treatment of my spa weekend: a float! AKA A SENSORY DEPRIVATION TANK!

(Essentially this. But less dress-y. And less gymnasium-y.)

I’ve always wanted to try one of these. I’m a massive introvert, and there are times when the hustle and bustle of life starts my head buzzing and my adrenaline rushing and I’m just super overstimulated. I retreat to my bedroom in the dark and put in my noise-canceling headphones and just have to take a break from it all.

So when The Husband bought me a gift certificate for a float for my birthday, I was super excited. (And also? How much do you love someone who knows you so well that they buy you a 90-minute escape from the entire world – including them – for your 40th birthday??)

You show up for your appointment and there’s a waiting room (with hippie herbal teas and fancy water, natch). Then they show you to your personal float room.

Look how excited I am for my float!

That door on the left side is basically like a refrigerator door (or, if you’re feeling morbid, like those doors in the morgue on CSI behind which the body is sealed).

You pop in some ear plugs, strip down, shower, and lie down in what is essentially a bathtub/coffin with water that has 1000 pounds of epsom salts. Then you close the door and hit the button to turn off the light and….you float.

It’s like this:

I had low expectations because it was my first one, but it was fab! They keep the water at body temperature so theoretically you lose track of where your body ends and the water begins. I couldn’t feel anything below the waist (so cool!) but I wish the water had been about one degree warmer because when I breathed, I could feel the water on my arms.

But truly, it’s the coolest thing. You know that feeling when you’re perfectly cozy at night and you’re just about sleeping and your mind is wandering and you’re wondering about why Charlie Brown’s shirt was a zig-zag and whether Peter and Lois realize that Brian is a dog and all those other meaning-of-life-style questions and you’re allllllmost asleep?

It was basically doing that for 90 minutes.

After 90 minutes (which felt like about 30), the music starts playing gently and you stretch, let yourself out of the morgue container, shower again, and stumble out with the muscle tone of overcooked pasta and a silly little grin.

(LOL, during my instructions, the attendant told me to make sure I rinsed off really well or all the salt would make me turn into a statue. I was totally going to make a “Lot’s wife” joke but then I thought, eh, he’s probably heard that one before. And then I realized it’s Portland and he *wouldn’t* have heard it and then I’d be forced to try to evangelize via Old Testament Sodom and Gomorrah and that would be awkward so I just left it.)

It was truly so great! I’m actually kind of craving one right now! I’m sure I’ll be back. In the meantime, I’ll just stock up on epsom salts and one of those eye thingeys you get on planes and maybe my own bathtub will do the trick….