Joseph

Fred and I just got back from our anniversary trip to Joseph, Oregon. The weather was rainy for most of the trip, but we still had a very good time. We stayed at a nice bed and breakfast with helpful hosts and great food.

Hiding behind the clouds in the picture above are the Wallowa Mountains, which sadly remained hidden most of the time we were there. But there was sun this morning, and we found out what a nice view our room had before we had to check out.

We were able to go on a few hikes, even though the rain and snow melt meant that creeks were full, the water was moving quickly, and several of the trails were closed. Our hikes were short and most of the views obscured by fog and rain, but the forest was still pretty with the first of the spring wildflowers blooming. Walking in the woods made me think of my grandpa, who would have enjoyed them-especially since the trails were also used by riders on horseback.

The town itself was small but nice and proved to be a great place for Fred and I to relax and enjoy our anniversary. We hope to be able to visit again sometime, although if we do, it will probably be later in the summer when there's a better chance for sun.

Cookies!

Fred and I are heading out to Joseph, Oregon (in the far Northeastern corner of the state) on Friday to celebrate our anniversary. It's going to be a long drive, so I decided to make some cookies to sustain us along the way.


I tried a new recipe for peanut butter and jam cookies out of my favorite cookbook, How to Be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson. It's basically a peanut butter cookie with an indentation that is filled with jam when the cookies come out of the oven. I used the jam that we made last summer from the blackberries we picked in the neighborhood behind ours. And yes, one of the eggs in the carton above is green. My co-worker Sharon has chickens, and I buy eggs from her whenever I can. The green eggs come from Araucana hens and are as pretty as Easter eggs without having to dye them.


Anyway, the cookies turned out well. I'm sure any peanut butter cookie recipe and jam would work. They might end up being a little messy for a car trip, but we'll bring extra napkins and hope for the best. And we won't have to worry about the peanut butter sticking to the roofs of our mouths.

Dead tree

For those of you who may have worried that Fred has moved to Oregon and become a tree hugger, I offer the following evidence to the contrary:


To be fair, Fred is merely euthanizing another poor plant that I managed to (almost) kill. For those of you who have been over to our house, this is the Norfolk pine tree that used to live on our landing. For a couple of months now it's been suffering dropped needles and dead branches. I'd been holding out hope that the spring sun would revive it, but that didn't happen, so we had to put it out of it's misery. Now we just have to think of of something to put in the landing that we won't kill.

A walk in the park

The weather here has been strangely warm. Fred and I decided to take advantage of the sun today and go for a short hike through Forest Park in Northwest Portland up to Pittock Mansion. The mansion was built in the early 1900s by the editor of the Oregonian and has one of the best views in the city of downtown Portland and Mt. Hood.

There were a lot of people out on the trail, but it wasn't too crowded to be nice. About half a mile into the hike we came across the old stone house, pictured below. I don't know anything more about it, but it would be interesting to find out where it came from.


We made our way up to the mansion and had a nice picnic lunch looking out over Portland. We didn't take any pictures of the view because it was a little hazy, but we did get one of the mansion.


Overall, it was a nice hike, and we look forward to more exploring throughout the summer.