Punkin' patch

It has been raining for about three weeks now, but every so often, we get a really nice window of gorgeous fall weather. We took advantage of one last week and went to the pumpkin patch/apple orchard down the road with Jody and Jonah. As usual, Bryan brought along the camera to catch some autumn action.

I'm sorry, who?

Allow me to introduce my friend Gayle. The Atoo-ele-opus-flamingo.
Meet your own new friends here: www.buildyourwildself.com
Isn't the internet sometimes the most divine waste of time?

Autumn Cheesecake

I found this recipe for cheesecake on the blog of a friend of a friend. Bryan made some dulce de leche sauce and we drizzled that on top. Seriously delicious.

Autumn Cheesecake

1 cup graham cracker crumbs
3 T. sugar
1/2 t. cinnamon
1/4 c. margarine, melted

Combine crumbs, sugar, cinnamon and margarine; press into bottom of 9-inch springform pan. Bake at 350 for 10 minutes.

2 (8 oz.) packages cream cheese, softened
1/2 c. sugar
2 eggs
1/2 t. vanilla

Toss cream cheese and sugar, mixing at medium speed until well blended. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Blend in vanilla; pour over crust.

4 c. thinly sliced, peeled apples
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 t. cinnamon
1/4 c. chopped pecans

Toss apples with combined sugar and cinnamon. Spoon over cream cheese layer; sprinkle with pecans. Bake at 350 for 70 minutes. Loosen cake from rim of pan; cool before removing rim. Chill.

Bryan on ice

A couple of weeks ago, Bryan spent a day ice climbing on Mt. Hood with our friends Rob and Geoff. They climbed on, or really I should say "in", the Eliot Glacier on the north side of the mountain. You anchor yourself from the top of the crevasse using ice screws and then rappel in and climb back out. B pretty much loved it.

Rob making his way out of the crevasseGeoff up top

An ode to Oregon

Yesterday, October 21st, marked my four year Oregon anniversary. In honor of my new home state, I present to you (drum roll please):

The Top Ten Reasons You Should Move Here
10. #1. Yep, that's the rank of Portland among U.S. cities for percentage of residents who commute by bicycle.
9. Portland is home to 46 micro-breweries and Oregon is home to over 300 wineries. Yay beer and wine!
8. When it snows, the city of Portland completely shuts down and you don't have to go to work!
7. It's possible to see the sunrise on the ski slopes and the sunset on the beach, all in the same day.
6. You aren't allowed to pump your own gas. No, no, this is a good thing.
5. Incredible urban boundary laws that keep the city in and allow eoungh room for the outside to still be out.
4. If you feel like protesting something, don't worry, no matter what it is, you'll find several others willing to protest with you.
3. We have the MAX, the streetcar, the bus system and even a tram.
2. Mt. Hood is always out there and offers you an open invitation to her summit.
And the #1 reason:
We live here. You should too.

Another stage of adulthood

I have been noticing a few rather distinct stages of my adult life. The first was the "everyone I know is getting married" stage that hit me during the summer of 2002. I attended seven weddings that year and was a bridesmaid/personal attendant in four of them. After that summer, the weddings started to taper off to only one or two a year. Then, last year, it was finally my turn to get married and it seemed to officially end that stage because now I have entered the "everyone I know is having babies" stage.

Over the past six months, four of my very close friends have had babies. Two of Bryan's close friends have had babies and I can think of three other new little ones in this world whose parents might have a connection to B and me. Right now, two other friends, Heather and Mike's wife Jen, are both expecting. There must be something in the water.

I wanted to take this blog opportunity to introduce you all to some of the new little faces in the lives of my friends:

Gavin Lucas Keller
Aubrie Jeanne Burke

Jonah Dee Lawson
We are so lucky Jonah's parents, Jody and Travis, live in Portland. We get to see this little guy all the time. He has become B's favorite photographic subject.
Cadence Rebekah Fritz

26.2 miles

The Portland Marathon was on Sunday so I met my aunt and uncle downtown to watch our friend Rich run. He had to break the 4 hour mark to qualify to enter the Boston marathon in April and he came in at a cool 3:59.26. Or some time very close to that.

I'm thinking about training for a marathon myself. Might start out with a half-marathon, just to get my feet wet and then we'll see how I feel about the whole situation. My friend Dena recently posted a blog entry about her experience with the Chicago marathon this past weekend. It's all just very inspiring don't you think?

Honorary Wildcat

When you get married, you not only marry the man, but you also marry everything about his life. His family, his history, his job, his car, his fantastic skills in the kitchen, etc., but most importantly, you marry his loyalty to his alma mater.

Fortunately for Bryan, he married into a Nebraska Cornhusker football family, full of national championships and long-standing tradition. Unfortunately for me, I entered into an Arizona Wildcat union. While this is great during March madness, this is not so great during this time of year. Arizona football is not.... how should I say this.... very good.

Putting that aside, and being the sweet and incredibly thoughtful wife that I am, I got tickets for us to see the Arizona/Oregon State football game last weekend in Corvallis. The Beavers CRUSHED the Wildcats, 31-16. Once, when B cheered for a Wildcat first down, the woman in front of us turned around, patted his knee and said, "Ahhh, that's sweet." I told her I wasn't used to being one of the only people in a football stadium dressed in red.

Choose your own adventure

Remember those "Choose Your Own Adventure" books? Where you would read a section and then at the end, you had to choose between two different paths? Let's try our own shall we?

Let's say that you saw a pretty beat-up, but pretty cheap dresser at a Goodwill. It had great character and you think that with a little work, it could be awesome. Time to choose. Do you buy it?

Well, if you don't buy it, you probably spent last weekend hiking/biking/rock climbing/backpacking/playing tennis etc.

But let's say, just for fun, that you did buy it.

Your husband, let's call him Bryan, works really hard and strips it, sands it and gets it all ready to be stained. Then, it sits in your dining room all summer because you're too busy to work on it and keep putting it off. Finally, you decide on a stain and your husband starts the staining process. But, the stain really isn't soaking in the way it should and he's not sure the color looks right. But you come home and say, "Wow, babe, it looks great!" So, he starts to apply the finishing oil..... and notices that the stain is coming up! Arrrghhh!

So, you spend last weekend, stripping, sanding, sanding and sanding some more, to get the dresser back to stainable shape so you can re-stain and re-oil. And, you finally get it done. Apparently, you choose the wrong adventure.

(Here is the lesson we have learned. Never, ever have some random guy mix a tinted stain for you at Lowe's. Chances are he'll mix an oil-based paint into a water-based stain and cause you to spend your weekend annoying your neighbors with the power sander.)

The dresser actually turned out better than we could have imagined. Since the paint sort-of set in, but the stain didn't, when we applied the second stain, the paint gave it this really distressed look which is awesome. Also, I did some research on our lovely little dresser and found out that it really was a vintage piece from the 50's. The company that made it went out of business in 1961.

Here are some shots from last weekend and the dresser in its final spot in the bedroom.

Early bird gets the sunrise

I'm not a "morning person." I think anyone who has ever lived with me can agree with that. I set my alarm half an hour early ON PURPOSE so I can hit snooze a couple of times. And by a couple of times, of-course I mean an hour. I need about 10 minutes and a hot shower and then I'm ready to go. But not before then. And definitely not before 6am. Or maybe 6:30.

This time of year doesn't help me out either. The clock and the sun are playing this evil game on me where the clock says 6:30 but the sun just isn't quite ready yet. It's still dark at 7am! You shouldn't get up before the sun, that is simply crazy talk.

However, getting up before the sun does have its perks. This was the sunrise from our deck on Tuesday morning.

All-American vacation

To celebrate our first year of wedded-bliss, B and I took a three-day weekend and headed for the coast.

Normally, we would pack up the camping gear (tent, sleeping bags, propane stove, camp chairs) and spend the night in a state campground, probably next to an RV running its generator so the kids can watch TV. This time though, we decided to go all out and made reservations for two nights in a hotel. That's right, a hotel. No sleeping on an inflatable mattress, peeing in the woods, or waking up with fuzzy teeth for us. This was a classy vacation!

We checked out every possible tourist turn-out along the 101, spent Saturday night in the adorable town of Florence, in our hotel right on the river. We watched tennis on cable and a movie on HBO. We swam in the hotel pool at the Best Western in Coos Bay and ate breakfast at a place called the Kozy Kitchen, where B had a breakfast burrito as big as his face. Seriously, we lived the American traveler's dream.

Here are some shots from the trip, more on the flickr site:

What's the price of gas in your state?

This is what B and I followed on the way back from the coast yesterday. Since we were in sand dune country, we were in ATV country.

We would pass dozens of RVs on the road, pulling trailers with four, five, sometimes six, ATVs. We could hear the sounds of their revved-up engines echo across the dunes. We could see the RVs parked close as could be up against each other in the RV parks. We couldn't help but wonder, in this time, where so much has been said about saving the planet and lowering carbon emissions and reducing our dependency on oil and gas, how the message missed so many people.

One year

A biathlon (of sorts)

biathlon. (according to dictionary.com) 1. an athletic contest comprising any two consecutive events.

Normally, these events are biking/running, swimming/biking or, strangely enough, cross-country skiing/rifle shooting like in the Winter Olympics.

Our weekend biathlon? Mountain biking at Timothy Lake near Mt. Hood on Saturday (thanks for the bikes Barry and Jordy!) and rafting on the Deschutes River out of Maupin on Sunday. Ah, the sun of central Oregon.

Here is a delightful little photo snack:Mountain biking around Timothy Lake.Central Oregon Native Americans are the only people allowed to fish along this stretch of the Deschutes River. They stand on these platforms and lean over with big nets. We watched a guy haul in several huge salmon in about 15 minutes.

The whole group after the day on the river-- me, Ashley, Julia, Geoff, Rob and Bryan.

More photos from the weekend on my flickr page: click here.

Sweden's gift to Portland

It seemed like a good idea at the time..... we were slowing killing one of our plants that needed a bigger pot and we had just gotten our IKEA catalog in the mail, so we thought, "Hey! Let's go look at pots at IKEA!" A giant IKEA just opened near the airport at the end of July.

If you've never been to an IKEA warehouse before, it's set up like this:
You walk in and you see an escalator up to the second floor. You go up the escalator and then weave your way through a showroom full of rooms laid out similar to the catalog. If you like something, you write down the location of the item in the storeroom/warehouse on the first floor.
Then, you take an escalator down to the first floor to do your shopping. IKEA is cheap. Really cheap. By putting items out in the boxes they came in and by making all the furniture "assemble-it-yourself," they keep their prices low. After you weave through the storeroom, you enter the warehouse where you pick up your furniture in flat boxes and you end up at a long line of registers.

The system is fairly genius. By making you walk through everything set up in a room, it makes you want to buy everything to complete the look. All of a sudden you find yourself saying, "we need that white vase with the bumps on it to match the white rug, which will play nicely off the dots on the ottoman slipcover." But the problem lies in the fact that there were THOUSANDS of people in there. THOUSANDS. Weaving your way through was more like being herded. While the system is genius, it's not very convenient for people who shop like Bryan and me: complusive mind-changers. You can't go back and look at something you've already seen. If you do try, you are going against the flow of THOUSANDS of people being herded your way.

FOUR hours later, we were out the front door with what we came for, a pot for our dying palm, but also a new bookshelf. Because we absolutely needed the bookshelf because it matched the glaze on the pot........ :)

Mini-moon #3

When B and I got married last September, we had a hard time deciding what to do for our honeymoon. There were so many trips we wanted to take that we had a hard time narrowing it down to just one. So, we decided to take a bunch of honeymoons-- "mini-moons", if you will. Our first one was three days in Cannon Beach on the Oregon coast at the end of September. Then, we were in Hawaii in January for a wedding so that was #2. Our most recent mini-moon was just this past week: kayaking for four days around the San Juan islands in Puget Sound.

Our good friends, Geoff and Julia, organized the whole trip through a guide company called Discovery Sea Kayaks out of Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. They offer a trip package called "guided rentals" which is perfect for people like us-- outdoorsy types who know how to camp, cook and survive in the outdoors, but don't know squat about tides, currents or the islands. They provided the boats, safety gear and a guide-- we provided the food, camping gear, and man power.

Here is little photographic taste of our adventure:

Bryan and me on the ferry to San Juan Island.

Boats in Friday Harbor the night we arrived. Being Portlanders, we were used to the fog. :)

Sunset shot near Jones Island of our guide Michelle.

Julia and me both in the driver's seat for a sunset cruise.

Sunset looking west toward Vancouver Island.

Lunch on Turn Island. Bryan, Geoff, Julia and Michelle, probably pointing out our afternoon route.

A shot of all of us at the end of the trip.

Bryan put some more photos from the trip up on our flickr page: www.flickr.com/photos/bdhoybook

Photos can't capture everything though. We were never fast enough on the shutter to catch the harbor seals that would poke their heads up out of the water just yards from the kayaks. They'd be gone just as fast as they showed up. And we couldn't capture the sound the bald eagles make when they talk to each other. Or how glassy the water is at 7am. One thing I wish we could get on film was the bioluminescense. We stayed out until after dark on our sunset cruise on Tuesday night so we could see it. Tiny little organisms in the water light up when they have been disturbed. It was as if we had sparklers attached to our paddles. So very cool.

We had such a great time and will definitely be back. You how I said a couple of weeks ago that I needed a boat? Make that a kayak.

Gotta get us a boat.

B and I headed to Seattle on Sunday to spend the day with some of my family. My aunt and uncle live in Pullman, WA and my grandparents come out to visit usually once a year. They were all headed to Seattle to see my cousin so we decided to meet them for the afternoon.

We spent a sunny afternoon at the locks in Ballard on one of the channels from Puget Sound into Lake Union. Forgive me for sounding like an eight year-old, but it was so cool. Gorgeous, manicured grounds with plenty of deck space to watch the locks up close in action. All I have to do now is get me a boat............

The first days of summer

People in Oregon say that summer here is from the 4th of July until Halloween. I always thought they were kidding, but believe it or not, the 4th rolled around and it was 96 degrees. And, it has been sunny ever since. And how do the Hoybooks like to mark the beginning of summer? With a trip to the beach of-course.

As I have blogged before, the Pacific coast is a great place to go when the weather in Portland is crummy. Even when it is windy and rainy, you can still stroll along, hunt for shells, and duck into a coffee to warm up. Since the ocean is so cold, its not like you get in the water anyway. The coast is also a great place to be when the weather in Portland is gorgeous. When the weather is hot in P-town, the beach is the place to be.

B and I headed west yesterday, stopping for awhile to shop in Lincoln City and then north up to Pacific City, mostly to get a bite to eat at the Pelican Brew Pub, but also to check-out the beach our friends call their "favorite." Pacific City hides behind this huge sand dune cape and it is one of the coolest spots on the coast. The dune is probably 500 feet high and climbing it is no easy feat. B and I made it about halfway up and then walked out on the cape, Cape Kiwanda, for some big wave action. This a popular spot along the coast for photographers to set up their cameras on tripods and wait all day for that one big wave that hits the cliffs just right. Its also a popular surf spot and while we were there, we saw probably 50 trucks and SUVs parked along the beach. Its one of the few spots where vehicles are allowed and people will tow their dory boats (fishing boats with high front bows for riding waves) down and launch them from the beach.
Pacific City is now my favorite beach. We haven't made it to the entire Oregon coast yet, but so far, this is the best.

A day of Independence

B and I are notorious for not making plans. Especially when it comes to holidays. New Year's Eve? Ask us two days before and we probably won't know what we're doing to celebrate. Valentine's Day? That most sacred of holidays to a couple? Since we haven't yet planned anything for my birthday (the day after V-day), we probably aren't doing anything. The three day Memorial Day weekend? You guessed it, we planned our camping trip the night before. So, it really did come as a shock to me when we made some plans for the 4th of July. We made plans 5 days early. That has to be a record.

Jody and Travis came over and after some really fantastic BBQ'd chicken (B should have his own cooking show), we headed downtown for the Portland Beavers baseball game. Not to be confused with the Oregon State Beavers, the Portland Beavers is the minor league team in town. It was hot, it was baseball, and there were fireworks afterward. God Bless America.In case you couldn't guess, Jody is super pregnant right now, she could pop at any moment.

I'm sorry, I meant Awesome-town, population: Us

After my last blog post, it was pointed out to me (by my dear husband who said, "hey, we're not boring!") that maybe Boring-town was a bit too harsh. I was merely trying to convey that we hadn't done anything "blog-worthy" lately. When I started the blog, I was afraid that we weren't interesting enough to write about everyday and this past week, I just felt like we hadn't done anything extraordinary.

However, the blog is really just a way to let everyone know what we've been up to. And, that's what we've been up to. I think that sometimes, I have this need for us to be always on the go, hiking, biking, climbing, whatever-- like we are wasting sunshine or days off if we're not. But the past couple of weeks have just been full of the normal rhythm of our lives. B went backpacking, I stayed home and went to Travis and Jody's baby shower. I got new glasses. B photographed a wedding. We both went to work. We saw Ocean's 13. We went to great party. We went mini-golfing with Geoff and Julia.

It may not be worthy of a screenplay or one of those documentaries they show at film festivals, but it's our life and it's our life together. And really, that alone makes it extraordinary.

For the record, Nick (the nameless co-worker in the last post) threw a great party for his 30th birthday. Especially because he hosted it as Earl, complete with the crazy mustache and the trashy-looking wife. We dined on pizza, cheetos and twinkies and drank Miller High Life in the backyard. If you get invited to one of his parties, you should go. You won't be disappointed.

Boring-town, population: 2

So, if you think the blog has been a bit boring lately, you're right. It's probably because we've been a bit boring lately. Well, not boring, just busy....with stuff..... and well, not very exciting stuff I guess.

It's not our fault though, we blame it all on Oregon. June is this weird month here where you can't plan on the weather at any given moment. The forecasters are always saying things like, "50% chance of rain tomorrow" or "partly cloudy to mostly sunny with a chance of showers or thunderstorms." Okaaay, but doesn't that cover about every type of weather possible?

Take Sunday for example. During the course of about three hours, it was sunny, drizzling, pouring down rain, sunny again, and then cloudy. It makes planning any sort of outside activity really difficult. So, what did we do? Stayed inside! We took the opportunity to get some projects done around the apartment-- one of those being this awesome frame I made to display a collection of my favorite jewelry. I think all of those Martha Stewart magazines might be rubbing off on me.

Other than that, it has been business as normal here in boring-town. Oh, Bryan's 33rd birthday was on the 17th! He celebrated by photographing a wedding that day, but the night before we went to a "My Name is Earl" themed party for one of his co-workers, who also has a birthday on the 17th. B pulled off a very convincing Randy.

And, to prove that we did have a little fun outside with Mother Nature in the past couple of weeks, here are two photos from B's backpacking trip with his buddies, Rob and Brian. They spent two very wet days (again, never trust the weatherman) in the woods near Detroit Lake.



So, then, what's coming up you ask? Well, the 4th of July is always good for an adventure and my super fun little brother comes to visit on the 6th. I'm sure he'll bring his usual antics along which means we're in for a good time.

One man's trash...

...is definitely our treasure. I found this dresser at Goodwill over the weekend, but B was gone backpacking, so we went back for it tonight. We're thinking of stripping it and refinishing it with a gray wash or maybe a dark chocolate to match the other piece B did for us. This is the "Before" photo-- I'll post the "After" once we get it done.

The greatest show on earth

Well, maybe not the absolute greatest, but really close. Bryan and I went to see Bob Schneider perform at the Doug Fir Lounge last night.

He's fantastic. It was one of the best shows I've seen. If you get the chance to catch him in a club/concert hall/theatre near you, do it. You won't be disappointed. A different points in the show, he plays the guitar, harmonica, keyboard, cymbal (just one) and even steel drums. Like I said, you won't be disappointed.

To help you out, I've selected a couple of upcoming shows of note (yes, I know where you crazy blog readers live):
6/11: Rhythm Room, Phoenix
6/15: Granada, Dallas
6/30: 26th American Music Fest, Chicago
7/12: The Knitting Factory, New York City

www.bobschneidermusic.com