Rowing

I completed the Concept 2 Holiday Rowing Challenge the day before yesterday (and Kim has been pestering me to post about it to the blog nearly every hour since). I also set a PR in the half marathon to do it. Since Thanksgiving I have been rowing four out of every five days for an hour. I planned on rowing this way so that I could complete the challenge before we get on a plane for the east coast with enough cushion in case I couldn’t row some days for unforeseen reasons.

Concept2’s rowing ergometers have been the industry standard for some time. They have sliding seats like rowing racing shells and use a flywheel to simulate the resistance of oars. Last fall Kim and I purchased a Concept 2 rower to help us stay in shape and to help keep my blood pressure under control. I had used their rowers at the gym before and liked them. One advantage that Concept2’s ergometers offered when introduced was that they measure work (this is what ergometer means) so the work that was done on one machine could be directly compared the the work done on another machine. You can imagine how this information might be useful.

Throughout the year Concept2 offers team and individual rowing challenges to keep people motivated. Some are only a couple days long, others run for whole months. To participate you upload your rowing results to their website. The Holiday rowing challenge runs from Thanksgiving to Christmas. If you complete 100 kilometers you get your name in an online honors board, a downloadable certificate, and a downloadable iron on transfer. If you complete 200 kilometers you get all of the above plus a holiday challenge pin.

They also have awards for rowing different distances. Once you have rowed one million meters cumulatively you win a prize. You also get prizes for 5, 10, 15, and 20 million meters. There are also incentives for single distances. If you row a marathon you receive a pin. Not only do you get a pin for rowing a marathon, but it seems that you can get one every year. I don’t know why pins are so motivating for me, but they are.

One of the special things about the Holiday Challenge is that Concept2 donates 2 cents for every kilometer you row until you reach 100k after which they will donate 4 cents. This year the money is going to Vermont Disaster Relief Fund, American Red Cross Disaster Relief (International) or Unicef Emergency Relief Programs. Last year all the charities were water related. As of this posting Concept2 will donate $14,428.52 and they hope to donate $30,000.

Pet Project

Our poor dog is not a fan of cold weather or rain.  As I have mentioned before he is happiest basking in the sun or in front of a hot fire.  When it rains or when it is really cold he will pause at the door and Cliff and I have to coax him to go out as we know that he probably really has to go to the bathroom.  If it is raining he rushes towards low lying shrubs and bushes and nestles himself under them (no matter how low lying) before he can go to the bathroom.  He must have shelter as he is that finicky about getting wet.  It is the funniest thing.  We have a rain coat for him which helps to keep him warm and dry.   He just hates being cold.  He is a warm weather dog.

Cliff and I have been really crafty lately.  We are both knitting projects and I got some nice wool sweaters from the thrift store for a felting project.  I have been feeling really confident in my crafting abilities recently so I decided that I should make Rudy a sweater from some felted blue and gray argyle.  We hoped that it would help to keep him warm and make him a little less cold and grumpy.

Cliff and I started the project last night.  After playing around with simply putting Rudy's arms through the actual sweater holes (hehe) I got down to business.  While I was busy "designing" Cliff made himself some felt inserts for his slippers.  He is really happy with them.  He thinks I should do the same so that I will stop pining for Wicked Good Slippers from L.L. Bean.  Rudy wasn't a big fan of the fitting portion (as he wanted to curl up and sleep on his bed) so it took me two different sessions to complete the project.  I finished this morning and he likes it!  I'm pretty excited.

He looks so handsome.  I reused the leather wrapped buttons from the original sweater as the fasteners for the neck piece and the part that wraps around his chest.  To help him look even cuter I added a collar.  He has worn it all day and it is still holding together and looking good.  I am considering this project a success.

Shines Like Silver

For the past few days we have been experiencing some pretty intense fog.  Like today some areas will be experiencing less than 1/4 mile visibility all day.  Since we are up in the hills you bet that we are seeing the fog and not seeing much else.  

The past day or so we have seen some pretty cold temperatures at night.  Last night got down into the high 20s.  When we woke up this morning not only did we see the normal frost on the ground but everything else frosted over as well (hoar frost Cliff tells me).  Everything looks like silver.  The spider webs.  The chicken coop fencing.  The trees.  It is so pretty!  Cliff got really excited this morning when he opened up the curtains and saw it.   We just wanted to share.  Oh the little things....

Go Ducks!

Get excited sports fans as the Ducks are headed to the Rose Bowl.  Non sports fans please hang in there with me as I promise I will try to make this interesting and not painful.

I wasn't really a football fan until we moved to Eugene in 2006.  I had watched countless Super Bowl games.  Some I watched for the actual game like when I was little and the Redskins were playing and we had family over to the house to watch.  Then in College I watched several more as that is what you do if you are a marketing major at Emerson.  Oh the papers.  The thought still makes me cringe.  Even after watching these games I didn't really understand what was going on and to tell you the truth I didn't really care.  With this said,  all of this changed when we came west.  Living in Eugene makes it kinda hard not to be a Ducks football fan and I wanted to share my top ten reasons why you should be one too.

1) The whole town is decked out in green and yellow....all the time.  Driving into Eugene in 2006 I was met with billboards with players on them.  How cool would that be to be a college athlete and have your face on a billboard?  You go to the bank or grocery store or really anywhere on a Saturday (or many other days for that matter) and every staff member has their Ducks gear on as well as the patrons.  It is really lovely to live some place with that much school spirit.

2) Chip Kelly.  I don't know a whole lot about other coaches but I am constantly impressed with him.  He is innovative, straight forward, humble, and you can see that he really cares about his players.  You never see him yell at a player.  Instead you see a hug, a pat on the back, or a smile.  He never seems to be shaken up by a player.  He also seems to be a really classy guy.  I read a story that an angry fan wrote him a letter after the Boise State fiasco game in 2009.  The fan was so upset by their performance and by their star athlete punching a Boise State player that he requested a refund of his travel expenses (a total over $400).  Chip Kelly wrote the guy a personal check and sent it to him in the mail.  The guy was apparently so shocked that he sent the check back but only after taking a photo for posterity.  He really does seem to be a solid guy.  Also, he seems to have an unlimited selection of fresh Oregon visors.  I love that he wears visors.

3) The players and pace keep things interesting.  Cliff even watches games!  That is huge.  He even knows names and can recount plays that occurred in past games.  It is just really fun to watch the Ducks play.  Chip Kelly is nuts and you never know if the is going to call a two point conversion (sometimes with no real need to do so) or go for it when they are 4th and 9.  LaMichael James always seems to find a hole and manages to spin and roll off defenders like it is no problem at all.  They catch interceptions all the time.  It is just so fun to watch!  The whole team is solid.  Also, how often do you see other teams have several touch down drives in under two minutes?

Photo from greenwichtime.com

4) The Oregon mascot Puddles the duck.  He is awesome.  Not only does he do pushups every time the Ducks score but he is also quite a character (well as much as one can be when they are in a huge mascot outfit).  A few years ago he got into a little skirmish with the Houston Cougar mascot.  Dad and I were at the game and I won't lie...the fight was enjoyable.  You can watch it here on YouTube.  My favorite part is at the end when he kicks over their cheerleading cone.  I know that it is not very sportsman like but...come one....they're mascots.  Also, he has "Andy" written on the bottom of his foot just like all of Andy's toys in Toy Story.  Come on....how could you not love him?

5) Team spirit makes my day.  Probably my favorite moment of the entire season occurred last week during the Civil War game with Oregon State.  The Ducks had a large lead so they swapped in their second string offensive line in the 4th quarter.  When the second string folks scored a touchdown on the Beavers the camera person showed the sidelines and Darron Thomas and LaMichael James were flipping out.  They were so excited.  Honestly it looked like they peed their pants.  The camaraderie is truly wonderful to watch.  Seeing people so happy and proud makes me tear up.  Those who have watched the movie Rudy with me know that I am a mess when it comes to team spirit and people being proud.  It makes me so happy.  Watching the Ducks is no different.

6) Autzen stadium is a crazy place.  First off it looks like this huge stadium in the middle of nowhere (it is on the other side of the river away from the main part of campus).  All around the stadium you see beautiful, beautiful hills and buttes.  It is loud.  Oh man is it loud.  When we first moved here Dad took Cliff and I to the Oklahoma game.  It was so loud that it gave Cliff a full on migraine almost immediately.  He spent a majority of the game in the concession area with his head between his legs.  We didn't want to see him sick so we left early and watched the rest from a nearby pizza place (Track Town Pizza...amazing).  It is seriously that loud.  Cliff will never go to another game with me because it is honestly that loud.  In fact, it was named the second loudest stadium in the country.  LSU is apparently worse but they have over 30,000 more fans in seats.  Crazy.  It is a loud place but it is a lot of fun.  Also, they sell kettle corn which makes it a winner in my book any day.

7) I always get a little emotional before spectator events (musicals, sporting events, parades, etc.).  I honestly will start to tear up a little when a marching band starts to play and fans go crazy.  Why?  Who knows.  Events just make me a little weepy...but in a good way.  The beginning of a Duck game is pretty epic.  First everyone is going crazy and then the Duck rides out on a freaking motorcycle.  Football players are running, cheerleaders and flipping all around, those big green Oregon flags are flying down the field, and the Duck is on a motorcycle.  I love it.  Dad loves it.  It is awesome.  I know this is really an odd thing to keep going on about but I don't care because it is that cheesy and amazing.  I have been to three games and every time I take a video of the opening.  I would love to post one but they are all too large to embed so please go here to see the event in all its glory. 

8) After every Ducks win there is always someone in the neighborhood that sets off green and yellow fireworks.  It happened in Springfield three years ago and it happens here in Eugene almost every Saturday.  Our gun shy dog is not really a big fan of the practice but he is slowly getting use to it.  Seriously, the game ended over an hour ago and there are still fireworks going off around town.  Insane.

9) The fall is already an amazing time but when you add in college football it becomes even better.  In Williamsburg, I would tailgate and hang out with family before the Old Dominion games.  Here Cliff and I get settled in and eat pizza, chili, and other amazingly bad for you foods.  Oregon also has some nice micro beers which makes a meal a little more enjoyable.  It is a bit chilly outside and it just feels right.  Food and football go together.

10)  College football is just fun.  It has surprised me how much I have enjoyed becoming a football fan.

Thanks for letting me geek out a bit tonight.  Hope I didn't bore you too much but I was overwhelmed with school spirit and wanted to share.

Go Ducks!

Haul Out The Holly

Yesterday Cliff and I decided that we wanted to kick off the holiday season by putting up a tree.  Decorating for Christmas always gets me all excited.  I proudly hauled two 18 gallon plastic containers filled with Christmas decorations across country when we moved.  Why does a person need to have this many decorations?  Well it is because I love Christmas ornaments almost as much as Fiestaware and I want our house to look like a Christmas explosion from December to January.

Growing up our Christmas tree was always so pretty.  We had red, green, and white button lights. Tons of glass ornaments.  Fun little decorations all over.  It is no wonder that I started collecting my own decorations in college.  Whenever we travel anywhere I almost always get some sort of ornament to hang on our tree.  I have a mini glass pumpkin from Salem, pewter skis from Burlington, decorated gourds from New Mexico,  a wooden ornament from The Hotel del Colonado in San Diego, and I could go on and on.  Additionally, mom was wonderful and let me raid the family ornaments and decorations so that I could have my favorites in my own apartment.  I obviously took some of the amazing glass ornaments but I also grabbed up the stuffed Hallmark reindeer that we got when I was a little kid.  I love Rhonda the reindeer.

So back to the tree. When we lived in Williamsburg we had an amazing six foot pre-lit tree with little white lights.  I got it at a thrift store in Portsmouth one day when I went down for an ODU game.  Sadly the tree couldn't make the trip with us (you have got to draw the line somewhere right???) so our good friends Rachel and Allen gave it a new home.  Since we are in the Northwest we decided to get a real tree this year (my first real tree in probably 18 years).  We went to the Northern Lights Christmas Tree Farm in Pleasant Hill which is about 20 minutes southeast of Eugene.   It was awesome!  They had seven different variety of trees to choose from and they ranged in price from $3/ft. to $7/ft.  Cliff and I decided on a scotch pine as they are small enough to fit in an apartment and they were only $3/ft.  All of the trees were so beautiful!  If we had a bigger place (or jobs) we would have totally gotten a big douglas fir or grand fir as they were gorgeous.

We took a hayride on a tractor to get out to the trees and we found a beauty.  We found a short little skinny tree that was full all around.  I got all excited to document the cutting down process but before I knew it Cliff was done.  We rode the tractor back to the main barn and when all was said and done we paid $12 for our fresh cut tree!  They put it on the shaker for us to get all of the dead needles and bugs out.  We opted not to get it baled in plastic as the little guy could fit right in the back of our car.  While we were at the barn we saw a family bring in their 11 foot noble fir.  I looked to be the most perfect tree ever.  It was so big that when they put it on the shaker the machine could hardly move and their baler was really in trouble.  We watched them try to bale it for probably about 5 minutes and when we left four guys still had not been able to push it through.   It was pretty crazy so I took a photo.

 

When we got home we trimmed the bottom of the tree and put it into our new $3 tree stand (thank goodness for thrift stores).  It fits perfectly by our desk and the bookcase.  This year we have multi-colored lights on the tree as I only have red button lights and I didn't think that would look all that Christmas like (I'm going to hit up Target after the holiday to see if I can get white and green button lights for next year!).  Holy smokes I had forgotten how prickly and scratchy needles are on real trees!  Most of our ornaments fit on the tree, the reindeer and nutcrackers are out, and the Santa pants have been moved into the pajama rotation.  It is officially the holiday season.

Since it is the holiday season that means I get to dress Rudy up as a reindeer again (don't judge....I was an only child).  I love our dog. 

So get out the Neil Diamond and Judds Christmas albums because Christmastime is here!

Thankful For Thanksgiving

I love Thanksgiving.  I really do.  It is a fall holiday which means there are pretty colored leaves on the ground, a chill in the air, and pumpkins everywhere. Amazing.  I always get so excited for Thanksgiving.  It's great if you stay home and host folks or if you go out and visit with family and friends.  Plus it is the beginning to the holiday season which makes everything feel just a little bit more special and like you are a kid again.

I always get nostalgic at Thanksgiving.  I made Cliff watch the parade with me yesterday and I sadly will admit that I always tear up when I watch it.  One year mom and dad took me to New York as a birthday present to see the parade.  It was raining and we were running late to get on the line so we stopped at a McDonalds and bought expensive New York breakfast biscuits.  It was raining so hard that the bottom of our paper bag fell out in the middle of the street (a busy NYC street) and our food went to the ground.  It didn't matter, we picked up the soggy wrapped biscuits and went on our way.  For anyone who knows my dad and me, you will understand the significance of us eating anything that fell in the street :) It was so much fun and it makes me smile just thinking about it.  I love the parade.

This year we were excited to host friends and family in our new apartment.  Brie (Cliff's cool cousin) lives in Portland so she came down for the event and Kathy and Jill (our super amazing friends from college) traveled down from Portland as well.   We wanted to do Thanksgiving with a bit of a southern flair so we tried to spice the traditional menu up a bit.  Our menu included:

• Bacon wrapped dates for an appetizer (thanks Katie and Read for introducing us to them last year!)
• My deviled eggs
• Brie's asparagus, beet, argulula, and chevre salad
• Brie's amazing collard greens (I want the recipe so bad)
• A lovely 12 lb. Walmart turkey
• Cornbread stuffing
• Cliff's homemade cranberry sauce
• Corn bread
• Cliff's sweet potato pie
• Kathy's pecan pie (always a must)
• Jill's delicious chocolate pie (we requested it as it is just that good)
• Apple dessert wine that we bought back in Virginia and saved for a special occasion

My one frustration was with my deviled eggs.  Our family always made deviled eggs for family holiday celebrations (sometimes they would be picked in beet juice!).  I remember being little and watched the parade (see...I love the parade) from our kitchen and helping mom make them.  I never remember them turning out anything but perfect yet somehow in my adulthood I have never managed to make a batch where every eggshell comes off cleanly.  It makes me so mad!  Deviled eggs are now my thing and I would like to make them not only tasty but pretty.  I have heard that older eggs peel easier but what does a person do when you have no choice but to use fresh eggs that you bought at the store just a few days earlier?  Any suggestions?  I would be extremely thankful.

Everything was so good and it was so nice to have everyone in our little house.  Great Thanksgiving.  We sat around chatting, laughing, and goring ourselves on pie and then we relaxed in our living room and played with Rudy.  We were going to go see the Muppets (the Muppets!) but there was not enough time and we were way too full to function.  Kathy and Jill sadly had to return back to Portland but Brie got to spend the night.  It was so nice hang out.  This morning we got up and went to breakfast at Off the Waffle and then Brie went back home.  I was so sad when everyone left as Thanksgiving went by way too fast!  Oh man.

Cliff and I have been shocked at how easy the clean up is this year.  We stayed on top of the dishes throughout the whole prepping and cooking process so the kitchen and house are not a disaster.  It is awesome.  One more round of dishes and we will be all set.

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  I know that we have a lot to be thankful for and were very lucky to share the holiday with great  people.

Now onward to Christmas!

A Week In Review

Last weekend Cliff and I found Steelhead on sale for about $2/lb.  at the grocery store.  This is an awesome price as it is normally around $10/lb.  Obviously we had to get it.  When we lived here before we really didn't eat any of the amazing seafood that the Northwest has to offer so we are changing that this time around.  We baked/steamed it in a foil pouch with lemon, sliced onion, and butter and ate with with rosemary mashed potatoes and peas.  Yum.  We had so much fish and mashed potatoes left over that we made fish cakes the next day for lunch.  This is the first reminder of the week that things fried in corn meal are always amazing. (Note to self: remove paper towel before taking a picture of fried food next time).  Thank you Albertson's grocery store for having a seafood sale that was within our budget and worth our while. Now if only your normal prices were as exciting.

Not a whole lot happened on Monday unless you consider watching Dancing with the Starts newsworthy.  In case you are wondering...I am rooting for Ricki Lake but I do hope that Rob Kardashian comes in second.  He just looks so happy when he dances.  Oh!  I also rowed 5,000 meters.

On Tuesday we went to Divine Cupcake for their trivia night.  As I am sure you can imagine Cliff loves trivia.  We played a few times with his classmates at the Green Leafe in Williamsburg but we stopped after a while as it took forever and people with smart phones ruined it.  We decided to give this one a try as I had a Groupon for $20 worth of cupcakes and beverages.  Apparently with Groupon you need to use the whole value at one time so Cliff and I both got a drink (he got an espresso and I got a hot chocolate with rice milk) and we got six cupcakes.  All of their cupcakes are vegan and organic.  I've had some amazing vegan cookies in the past so I was excited to see how vegan cupcakes compared.  To help you imagine our dining experience I will fill you in on the flavors.  From left to right and top to bottom: chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, lime cake with lime and coconut frosting, cherry vanilla cake with cherry frosting, lemon and vanilla cake with lemon frosting, chocolate cake with maple frosting, and chocolate cake with orange frosting.  In my opinion chocolate  vegan deserts are the best.  But anyway, back to trivia.  Their trivia is a bit different from bar trivia.  First off it starts at 7pm and only goes until 8pm which is our kind of event.  It is 25 questions broken down into five categories and the trivia hosts shoots them out one right after the other.  When all was said and done Cliff came in second place.  He was just one point behind the winner.  I'm sure you are asking "what does a trivia contestant get if you win or come in the top three?".  Well first place gets the choice of two mystery packages or a free cupcake and the remaining two get to choose between what is left.  Cliff won a super cute stuffed red dinosaur.   It was pretty exciting.  Also, more rowing all around.

On Wednesday Cliff and I ventured out to our old stomping ground of Springfield.  We ate amazing fish tacos at Hop Valley Brewing (along with a cesar salad, mozzarella sticks, and the worlds largest order of onion rings).  They have a pretty wonderful happy hour menu. Afterwards we ventured towards Walmart to do our grocery shopping.  On the way we saw something amazing.... a Sonic!  That's right....Oregon now has Sonic.  Amazing.  I know that we will go back soon as I love their chocolate malt milkshakes.  We stopped at the local home improvement store and bought daffodil and crocuses bulbs (they were 50% off) as we wanted to plant fun things on our little hill.  Afterwards we finally made it to Walmart.  We needed to find a small turkey as both our oven and freezer can't handle the size bird I typically buy around the holidays (I just can't help myself when they are $.27/lb!). We were up to our elbows in turkeys when we finally found a 12lb. turkey!  It was our lucky day.

On Thursday we spent the afternoon planting the 72 bulbs we purchased the night before on the little hill right outside our window.  It was chilly and rainy (it is Oregon after all).  Let me tell you that it is not easy to plant that many bulbs on a muddy hill with only a kid friendly trowel.  We will post photos in the spring when they come up.  It is going to be so beautiful!  We really loved all of the daffodils in Williamsbug and knew that we were going to miss them so we decided to get some for our new place. 

On Friday we saw our first snow of the season.  Downtown Eugene didn't see any but since we are in the hills we got to see the little white stuff.  It only lasted about 15 minutes and it didn't stick (which is good as we do live on some pretty steep slopes). Cliff and I were so excited that we sat there and watched it from start to finish.  We tried to take photos (see <-----) but it was heavy snow and fell to the ground pretty quickly.  I hope that we get to see snowflakes a few times this winter.  So pretty.

On Saturday I officially entered my late 20s. To celebrate Cliff and I went to Oakshire Brewing as they are open on Saturdays for tours and tastings.  It was really nice as a bunch of folks were there just hanging out before the Duck game (Go Ducks!).  They aren't a brew pub but they did have a food cart outside.  Food carts are pretty popular in the Northwest and Eugene has a few.  This was my first time eating out of a non-festival food cart and oh my goodness it was good. Delacata sells southern food with a flair.  Cliff and I split a basket of cornmeal fried catfish with cheddar and jalapeno hushpuppies. They also gave us a cilantro and lime coleslaw.  Living here I am finding that I might actually like coleslaw but it has to be a topping.  I now like it on fish tacos and falaffel and apparently with cat fish.   We will be going back as everything was sooo good.

After the brewery we went to an estate sale.  I love estate sales.  Last week we went to one and I purchased some super cute Christmas decorations and all of it came to under $5.  The estate sale we went to this weekend had lots of old bottles, canning jars, craft items, and clothes.  It was a jackpot!  I found a full sized Pendleton wool blanket (only $10!), old Ball canning jars (only $1), and antique handkerchiefs.  They are big which is great since we keep all of our baking supplies, beans, and pasta in jars. It was like Christmas.  Cliff was pretty excited as he found wool yard and knitting needles in sizes that we didn't already have.  The lady conducting the sale wanted to get rid of the craft supplies so bad that she told Cliff to go back in the craft room and pick out anything he wanted for free.  Sadly there wasn't any more wool yarn but there was the ugliest yarn on the face of the earth...and there was plenty of it!  We have no clue what to knit with it.  We will gladly take any suggestions.  Seriously.  It is red, yellow, brown, and white. If you are lucky you might get a Christmas gift made from it.  After the estate sale we went to PF Changs for dinner.  We ate dim sum dumplings (chicken with lemongrass and spicy pork and rice) and their stir-fried spicy eggplant.  So good.  On the way home we got cupcakes and ice cream.  I would say that it was a very good birthday. I'm a lucky gal.


Yesterday we finally washed our car.  We hadn't since moving and it really needed it.  We took it to one of those places where you can wash it yourself but the lady there gave us a free automatic wash in their new bay with felt brushes.  It did a really nice job as our car is back to its original color :)  It also put the rain repellant stuff on the windshield.  I love that stuff.


Ok I have laundry to fold.  Hope everyone has a good week as you prep for Thanksgiving.  I know I will post a few times more this week as we are hosting Thanksgiving at our new place and Brie, Kathy, and Jill are coming down. I can't wait!

Physical Challenge

Cliff and I have decided that we are going to make a prolonged, conscious effort to be healthier.  When we lived here before we were far more active.  For a few months in 2007 we swam over a mile four days a week, ran (varying distances) one or two days a week, and generally did more walking ad riding of bikes. Well now that we are back we are trying to create our new healthier lifestyle.  It has been pretty easy so far as we have had a blast doing one or two hikes each week.  This week I feel that we kicked it up a notch.

Cliff (who is the more active out of the two of us) has started rowing regularly again and is planning on doing the Concept2 holiday challenge which is rowing 100,000-200,000 meters from November 24th- December 24th.  He is trying to talk me into do the challenge as well.  I think I have put maybe 30,000 miles on the rower since it became apart of the family last October so 100,000 seems crazy.  But there are incentives.  Not only could I get an iron-on decal and Cliff could get a pin but for every kilometer rowed Concept2 donates money to the Vermont Disaster Relief Fund, American Red Cross Disaster Relief (International), and Unicef- Emergency Relief Program in the hopes of helping those who had the world rocked by Hurricane Irene.  Pretty cool, right?  Concept2's goal is to raise and donate $30,000 this year.   My plan....if I can manage to row 5,000 meters each day for 20 days then I will make it.  This is going to be pretty difficult as after 3,000 meters I am ready to give up and lay on the floor.  Oh well....we shall see.

In addition to rowing Cliff and I have been running. Cliff has had spurts of running over the past few years.  Each summer he would run along the William and Mary trails and meet me back at my office for a quick hello, a place to change clothes, and an occasional freeze pop (we always had them).  Some days he would run eight to ten miles in the swampy Williamsburg heat and humidity.  Nuts.  While at the elementary school he participated in the Boys and Girls running clubs.  He ran two days each week with the kids and did 5Ks with them.  He really enjoyed it and I can tell he misses it.  I have seen and heard stories about folks discovering that they enjoy running out of the blue and I have seen evidence with both Cliff and Brie.  I want to catch the running love bug so I am going to give it an honest try...plus I like running along the fuzzy trees.

So, as advertised, we have been running up to and on the Blanton Ridge Trailhead.  This week I have gone out twice. The first outing I ran (ok..jogged might be the more accurate word) with Cliff to the trailhead and then ran/walked along the 1.8 mile trail while Cliff ran ahead. Our plan was to meet up on the trail and then run back together.  I surprised the heck out of Cliff and myself by making it almost all the way to the end of the trail before Cliff caught me while he was coming back.  Cliff thinks that I might have had some sort of breakthrough as I did not complain at all (I'm normally pretty miserable to exercise with) and I was able to cover some serious distance....running!  I was pretty proud of myself.  Today I went out and ran to the trailhead and back.  Cliff continued on the trail with his new running shoes!  That is right.  Cliff bought his first pair of athletic shoes in 10 years.  Oddly enough we bought his last pair together on one of our first dates (exciting date...right?).  While he was out running last night a physical therapist critiqued his gait and was able to pick out Cliff's past injuries.  Since we want to run more it made sense to go out and get some shoes (don't judge Stephen). We went to the Eugene Running Company which was rated one of the top three running stores in the Northwest.  We figure since we live in Track Town USA that these folks should know what they are doing.  It only took about 15 minutes and Cliff had found his shoes.  In the car on the way home he looked shocked.  He has been trying to find a comfortable running shoe for years and they were able to put him in a pair in 15 minutes.  He put them to the test today and said that they felt great.  He has a month to run with them and if he is not happy then he can return them.  From what I can tell I think they might be sticking around as he looked pretty happy.

While Cliff has been out running or doing long rows, I have been hitting up the Wii Fit again. I love that thing.  You get to exercise in the privacy of your own home in your pajamas.  It is wonderful.  It is also pretty fun as Stephen and Nicole designed their own Miis on our system so their little animated faces appear along with animated Cliff and Rudy as I am hula hooping, doing kung-fu, and other fun games.  I think all of our Miis look pretty accurate.  Can you guess who is who? I bet you can. Anyway so far I have done it three days in a row and I am feeling good about it. 

I took a photo of us this morning to show you guys how serious we are about our pursuit of better health.  It was kinda cold so we are both decked out with nerdy ear warmers.  I think this photo pretty accurately describes how we feel about the endeavor.  Cliff looks overly excited to get done with the photo taking and get out on the trails and I look nervous.  Pretty accurate indeed.

Ok I've got to go now as we are making apple crisp for dinner.  Apple crisp is definitely apart of our healthier lifestyle.  I'm ok with that.


Also, I wanted to say thanks to Mom, Shane, and Aunt Pam for becoming followers of the blog.  You guys make me so happy!

We Passed Our Driving Tests

Yes, you did read that correctly.  In Oregon you are required to take the written driving exam to change out your out of state license.  As soon as we heard this I started to get myself worked up as I did not do so well 10 years  ago when I had to take the test to get my provisional license.  I won't lie.  I totally failed.  So needless to say I worked up some pretty serious test anxiety before going to the DMV today.  Prior to going Cliff and I took sample tests online and read through some sample questions.  We really needed to take care of car stuff today so there was no turning back.  We took our tests (32 questions) and we both passed!  I seriously couldn't stop smiling.  I had prepared myself to be devastated after failing.  I was that nervous.  Once the stress eased we chatted it up with three of the workers.  We heard about their dogs, date nights, living in South Carolina, and how lovely it is that we do not have to flight with bugs in Eugene.   Cliff got his photo taken super quick but when I sat down it took forever.  They had to take my photo three separate times as apparently I tilt my head when I smile into cameras and the computer doesn't allow this.  I was holding up the line and people apparently thought this was funny.  It was seriously a group effort between the two ladies, Cliff, and myself to get a clean photo.  With this said, I am pretty happy with the photo which is great since a license lasts for eight years here!

After the DMV we went out to Red Robin for a celebratory burger (we got a free one since it is my birthday month) and then See's candy.   I was already a big fan of Red Robin but the one here in Eugene is amazing.  The servers are always friendly and prompt, the burgers are actually cooked to order, the bottomless fries arrive almost immediately after ordering and they are always hot.  Their rewards card doesn't hurt either as Cliff and I have gotten two free burgers and quite a few other discounts.  If you like Red Robin, you should sign up!  Good day.

Home Improvement

The exciting thing about our new place is that there are pieces here and there that we can really make our own.  For example, we have a really nice porch that will eventually have some patio furniture and maybe a little fire pit thing, a little hillside outside our door where we are going to plant daffodils and wildflowers, and we have a pretty long window box. 

Over the past two days Cliff and I have been working on the window box.  We are late enough in the season that a lot of home and garden places are starting to discount their plants.  We lucked out as we got 11 four ounce plants for only $1 each!    For the window box we bought a little honeysuckle boxwood, an ornamental grass, and tons of Sedums.  We really love Hen and Chicks and those types of plants grow really well here.  I took a photo so that you guys could see our progress.  We still have a bit more space to fill so we are keeping our eyes peeled for goodies while we are out and about.  Also, the garden gnome is a lot happier now that he actually has plants to look over in our mini garden :)  Side note: we bought tarragon, rosemary, tri-color sage, and lemon thyme.  They are currently living inside but will get moved outside in the spring.

We are hopefully going to plant the daffodils within the next few weeks.  We really loved Williamsburg in the spring because daffodils were everywhere.  We are going to try to recreate a mini version of that in our own backyard.

Our other major project this weekend was to install a bike lock on the side of the house.  We have really nice overhangs so Cliff's bike won't get wet when left outside.  We wanted to be able to secure his bike since it is his "car".  Cliff researched and found a steel sleeve online that would allow for us to park our bikes together using a heavy metal chain.  In order to actually make this work we would need to secure the steel sleeve in concrete.  No problem!  We went to Home Depot, bought two bags, and were ready to go.  I am so impressed with this process as we mixed and poured a concrete slab using the limited resources available to us: a pickle bucket, a borrowed garden hoe, a stick, a milk jug, and some good old fashioned yellow dish gloves.  Cliff and I had never been around wet concrete so we did what any good 16 year old kids would do...we carved our initials.  Awesome. We know.  Now the bike is not sitting in the middle of our kitchen taking up precious space.  Yesterday was an exciting day.

Other than our home improvement activities we have been doing quite a few 0-5 mile hikes around town.  Most of the hikes that we have done pretty much require us to walk up big hills.  From being outside so much (and the help of Cliff's new tree book) we are able to identify more and more plants each time we go out.   I'm sure Cliff will post about it later but I did want to share a photo of a fallen leaf from a big leaf maple. Look how big it is! It's nuts.

Also, we now have some official followers to the blog.  Thanks Aunt Kay, Aunt Peggy, and Uncle David.  Hope all is well with you guys and thanks for reading!

Wildlife and Wood

 

 The other day Kim and I hiked up Mount Pisgah and walked through part of the arboretum. We’d always meant to walk through the arboretum but hadn’t. It was exciting to see some of the trees that I’ve been reading about in my new book The Sibley Guide to Trees. David Allen Sibley, well known for his bird guides, has written a guide to American trees. I really like how it breaks trees into families and subgenera and talks about the commonalities between these different groups. It makes it more readable than many field guides.

We didn’t take any photos in the arboretum, but here are some photos of tree branches from our back yard. To the right are some Western Hemlock stems. I included cones (about three quarters of an inch in length) still on the stem, cones that have recently fallen, and old cones. Notice how the length of the needles alternates between long and short as you go down the stem. The underleaf has two bright white lines (it's kind of hard to see the thin green line separating them in this photo. The Western Hemlock is the state tree of Washington.

To the right are some leaves from a Port Orford-cedar (the hyphen indicates that it is not a true cedar). Instead of needles it has scale like leaves. Our tree also has these beautiful blue round cones. Like with the hemlock I have included the top and bottom of the leaves and pictures of the cones at different stages. It is difficult to see on this photo but there are white x's on the underside of the leaves that are one of the characteristics that differentiate the Port Orford-cedar from Alaska-cedar.

 

 These are Douglas-fir stems and a cone. The Douglas fir is a very important tree to the forestry industry out here. It is the state tree of Oregon. Most of the forest regrowth is Douglas-fir. Older forests have less Douglas-fir and more of other species of trees as Douglas-fir does not grow well in shade. Notice how the three-pointed bracts project far past the ends of the scales.

Continuing the tree theme yesterday Kim and I spent a good part of the day moving wood. We moved a woodpile closer to the house and out of the way of a future fence, and we moved a pile of split oak closer to the cottage. I’m hoping that the increased surface area from splitting the oak will help it to dry out more before we burn it.

I went back outside to check the mail after we finished and saw turkeys scratching in the dirt on the hill near our car. I went back inside to get the camera. As I walked towards the turkeys three deer walked down the sidewalk and across one of the terraces. So I snapped pictures of the deer before I got close enough to get good photos of the turkeys. I'm not sure I did get close enough. I guess I need to work on my turkey stalking.

 Once I was back inside I checked about the turkeys. The turkeys in this part of Oregon are the Rio Grande subspecies, the same species that the pilgrims brought to the new world with them not knowing that there were already turkeys (and larger turkeys at that) in the eastern woodlands. Did you know that the turkeys we eat every thanksgiving have world-traveler ancestors?

 

Home Sweet Cottage

Greetings!

Cliff and I are happy as clams right now are we finally finished moving into our new place!  To get us here we needed an ABF pod to move us across country, a 17ft u-haul truck to get our stuff from the pod depot to the new place, a dodge mini van plus our car to get our new furniture home from Ikea, one week of literately doing nothing but emptying boxes and putting together furniture, and two trips with our car filled (and I mean filled) with collapsed cardboard boxes to the recycling plant.  To put it simply we are totally smitten with the cottage.  It is smaller than our old place but it has a lot of charm and it will keep Cliff and I from buying more stuff...as we can't fit it anywhere! We wanted to share a few highlights.

We have chicken friends!  They aren't actually ours as they belong to our landlords but we get to see them and interact with them.  There are a few more running around that are not seen in this photo.  They are so amazing.  Lots of goodies in our compost bowl now goes to these guys and they love us for it.  Awesome right?  Rudy is so mesmerized by them.  We will walk him up to the pen and he will stand super still as the brave chickens come up to check him out.  We are all big fans.

Getting storage options was really important for us in this apartment as we have so much stuff (i.e. books, school binders, VHS tapes, throw blankets, photos, kitchen stuff, and Fiestaware). Cliff has always wanted one of these desks and it is really going to help us keep all of our daily stuff contained in one place.  Also the shelves give me nice spots to place our nick-knacks and framed photos.  We have another nice square bookcase that helps to separate our living room area from our bedroom.  So useful!


Few things make me as giddy as getting to play with all of our Fiestaware.  Sad.  I know.  Don't judge me.  So I'm sure you can image my excitement when we found a big, bright red cabinet for all of the dishes to call home.  I seriously spent probably two hours standing in front of the doors figuring out different ways to place everything.  This isn't even all of it!  We are actually using many bowls and other dishes throughout the kitchen to hold things.  I stacked like items on top of one another so that I would have room to fit everything in there that we needed.  This cabinet gets bonus points as it is big enough to hold our cookbooks and our huge red pot.  Ahhh.  This cabinet makes my heart sing.


The new place comes with a wood stove.  Before we even came to look at the place Cliff was excited about the stove mentioned in the ad.  It is a bit finicky (Cliff is still working out the kinks) but it can really put out the heat.  It has been chilly here the past week so we have had a fire almost everyday.  It is really nice.  I feel so cozy watching TV with the fire and hot beverage in hand.  Also, Rudy is in love with the wood stove.  We always knew that he was not a cold weather dog.  At our old apartment his favorite thing to do was sit by the sliding door in the sun and bake.  I'm not sure if you guys know this or not but Oregon tends to be a bit rainy. We aren't going to see much sun soon so the wood stove was a must in order to keep the pup sane.  

I'm sure that many of you have heard me talk about my wishlist of things I am going to get once I strike it rich.  First thing on my list is an industrial shaved/crushed ice machine, followed by one of those endless pools, and then a sauna (this might be the only item that Cliff and I would agree on by the way).  Well our new place has a small bathrooms that is decked out in sauna wood paneling and it has a heat lamp!  When you combine these two factors (along with a little imagination) it makes you feel like you are kinda in a sauna.  The bathroom sadly has no storage and we have not figured out a solution yet but even with this going against it I still think the new bathroom rules!


Oh man...this brings us to the kitchen.  Cliff and I love to cook and bake and because of this we have a metric ton of kitchen stuff.  Seriously. Our last apartment was great because it had so much kitchen storage and counter space.  We knew that we were not going to be able to top it at a new place.  Welcome to the world smallest kitchen (probably not)!  We don't even have a full sized oven.  But you know what?  We don't care!  It took us three whole days to mentally prepare to organize the kitchen but it was well worth it.  We have enough room for everything.  The best part is now that we don't have a ton of counter space we are forced to do the dishes more often.  This means more manageable dish loads and a happier Kim and Cliff.


That is all for now.   Hope you enjoyed the virtual tour of our new place.  Come and visit!!!

A Portland Holiday

Cliff and I last week had the opportunity to pet sit for Kathy and Jill's animals for a few days.  Since we were still very much in transition we were able to help the out when they needed pet sitters last minute.  We decided that while we were in Portland that we were going to take a holiday.  When we lived in Oregon before we never really went up to Portland.  This was mostly because we were too broke to do anything exciting but we also just got wrapped up a whole lot in school and work.  Jill put together a really nice "to-do" list for us so that we could get the insiders perspective on where to go and what to do.  As always, Cliff and I pretty much just ate our way across the city.

Kathy and Jill have two cats (Lily and Cleveland) and an older dog (Toby).  Rudy was so excited to play with them...it was intense and it overwhelmed all of the animals.  We took several days to get them all use to one another and by the end of our trip they were all able to be in the same room without killing each other or driving Cliff and I crazy.  We considered it a victory.

While in Portland we went to Pine State Biscuits and ate yummy, fancy biscuits.  Mine had fried chicken, bacon, and apple butter and Cliff's had Carolina BBQ with red cabbage coleslaw on top.  He figured the BBQ would be good since the owners are from Carolina.  It was a very hip and happening place.  The music was loud and of the dance variety, the customers were all dressed in trendy fashion, and there was a line outside. The food was great.

We got a chance to explore SE Portland and relax.  While in SE we also ate at Fire on the Mountain (and yes there were lots of paintings of The Grateful Dead) and had some of their amazing buffalo wings.  Jill recommended them and I was a bit skeptical as I thought "how good could a buffalo wing place really be?"  Well let me tell you...their sauces were fantastic.  You could see the peppers and other spices in the sauce.  Really tasty.  Apparently they are going to start selling the sauces in stores so keep your eyes peeled folks.

SE Portland is also home to Distillery Row.  My dad stopped at a distillery in Kentucky as he was coming across country a few years ago and said it was really interesting.  We had never been to one so we figured why not?  After all....we were on holiday.  Portland is apparently fostering a craft distillery movement.  It was a Monday and there were not a whole lot of tasting rooms open but we did luck out as Stone Barn Brandyworks was open.  When we got there we actually surprised the guy as they apparently never have people come by on Mondays.  He was in the middle of making mash for their oat whiskey.   The whole operation was in a small warehouse unit so just by taking one step inside we could see the whole operation as they place was probably 25 square feet.   Cliff did the tasting and really liked their ouzo (it had spearmint in it!) and oat whiskey.  The guy who was working that day was really nice and told us a lot about the operations and gave us a few more suggestions on what to do in Portland.

 

As you all may know pumpkin is my favorite food.  Hands down.  So you can imagine how excited I was when we found out that a local bar (the Green Dragon) was having their killer pumpkin fest while we were in town.  They had 17 mostly regional pumpkin beers, a pumpkin food menu, pumpkin bowling, etc.  I love pumpkin beer but it is really hit or miss in my opinion with finding a good one.  I was excited because they were serving little tasters of everything on tap so Cliff and I got to taste quite a few of them.  Luckily there were more good pumpkin beers in their batch than bad.  We ate buffalo burgers (sadly a lot of their pumpkin main dishes had hazelnuts in them) and some amazing pumpkin pie.  We sat at the same table as a really nice couple and we ended up talking with them for almost four hours.  They had never been to the east coast so we told them about a few places they need to visit if they ever make it that way.  It was a lot of fun.

We got to see Brie while we were there.  We were originally going to go to a bouldering gym (yikes..i know!) but we changed plans when Brie had a meeting at work that was going to go really late.  Cliff and I were both pumped to go bouldering but we realized that we were probably going to be really bad at it as neither one of us are known for our upper body strength.  Oh well...maybe next time.  Instead we got to spend a morning leisurely eating breakfast and talking about running, apartments, family, and making future plans.  We might all run in a few races together.  Both Cliff and Brie have caught the running bug and I am hoping to as well.  It is really nice to have family relatively (ha) close.  I hope we get to hang out more.

Once we were back in Eugene we went to the REI scratch and dent sale.  Oh man did we play that wrong.  We got there right as the sale was starting only to see a line stretch along side of the whole building.  We stood in line for about an hour as we were hopeful that we would find the backpacking tent that we wanted and maybe a rain jacket for Cliff to wear as he bikes around town.  While in line we were reminded that we do live in Eugene.  Besides the guy on a bike who kept riding by yelling about local public transportation legislation and "go ducks!" we also got to witness someone doing yoga waiting in line.  That is right.  He is doing handstands while waiting in line.  See his feet?!?!  <-----  He kept doing it.  Every time it made me laugh a little bit.  Sadly we didn't find our exact tent or a jacket that fit Cliff but I did get a pair of Merrell's hiking shoes for $2.80.  Now I will be able to keep up with Cliff (at least I hope so) as he easily maneuvers over slippery ground when we go on trails.

I am happy to say that we finally got the keys to our new apartment!  We are totally smitten with our new place.  It currently looks like a bomb exploded as we have boxes everywhere but I will post photos once we are officially moved in.

Also, I want to give a late birthday shout out to my mom.  I love you!