Put my Feet Up.

Do you ever wish for alone time?

Sometimes just riding in the car by myself can be as relaxing as any spa around.

I don't have to answer any questions or work out disputes  -

I can just be.

 Me and the road, singing out load to any darn music I want

or, I can just sit there, soaking in the quiet.

Glorious.

A couple of months ago The Beloved had a business trip in Portland and thought it would be fun if I tagged along.

I hurriedly, without hesitation concurred with his genius plan.

My parents graciously agreed to watch our four little humans...

and we were off. (Thank you my sweet, sweet folks!)

The Beloved had meetings during the day -so it was just ME.

BY MYSELF.

What the?

Now, I'm a worrier and I really am the kind of mom who misses her kids an hour or so after being apart but, somehow :) I embraced it wholly. (With phone calls home and a constant pray in my heart for my peeps.)



Our rental car looked like the blueberry from Psych!
Made me feel joyous instantly.

On day one I was off to roam downtown Portland. I wanted to document this event with a photo of myself but it turns out I'm not very good at taking photos of myself. So, I'll share 72 of them with you so you can understand how much time I wasted but also, I wasn't interrupted once.Which is why there are a million so maybe interruptions by offspring should be counted as a blessing.

My yellow cardigan really stood out in Portland. I didn't realize dark neutral tones were the status quo. Which I usually really dig, but it made the streets appear a little depressing and overly serious.

But the trees were beautiful.
And so was this -
Powells City of Books!
Books as far as the eye can see -
Up, Down, Left, Right-
6 levels of deliciously bound, scribbled on paper.
Heaven.
(look I took a picture of my favorite fictional book series! bottom row - you should read it.)



One of the main attractions in Portland is the Gerding Theater at the Armory. The Beloved and I enjoy seeing plays and the two shows playing were A Midsummer Night's Dream (which is not going to happen because The Beloved is not a Shakespeare fan)  and another called, The Original Santaland Elf.... 

which sounded safe and cute.

The Beloved walking down the stairs at the The Gerding Theatre

NOT SAFE, NOT SAFE!

NOT CUTE!

Our smiles lasted but a moment. I am notorious for picking out bad movies and now... plays.

Some parts were funny but mostly I couldn't relate.

It turns out this play is about a homosexual elf or actually a man who really needs a job and grudgingly jumps at the opportunity to be one of Santa's elves in the mall.

.... weird.

The oddest/funniest part of the whole shindig was when the very large man sitting in the aisle in front of us raised his bum cheeks ever so obviously and let one rip.

The people he attended with didn't say a word.

 I look at The Beloved and he whispers, "Did that really just happen?"

We busted up.

We're just not mature enough for Portland I guess. :)

Afterwards to make up for my ticket purchasing mistake I took The Beloved to Powells where he fit in immediately; searching through the rows of art books. 

I pretended to fit in... by buying hot chocolate and flipping through Jimmy Fallon's Thank You Notes.

He's my bud.

On Day 2 I slept in, played the guitar, told the maintenance man yes, when he asked if I'd jam with him the next time I was in town (What? No.... not going to happen but I appreciated his kindness)  read, blogged, and planned out our day.

The Beloved  got off work early and we went to check out the Museum of Science and Industry.

The Beloved had never toured a submarine before so this was our first stop.

The section we inhabited the longest was all about

Grossology. 

We came across this game where you take a sniff and then have to determine what part of the body the smell is coming from but...

once we discovered the answer options we declined playing this fragrant game.

Learning about toots. 

The Museum had a model of the large intestine.

Maybe my favorite sign ever:

It was very nice to have alone time, one on one time with my spouse of love, and to get out and explore Portland. I loved driving on the freeways and looking out at the lush, green landscape.

The Beloved commented that he'd never seen me so relaxed.

Thinking about it makes me sleepy.

I loved being reunited with my chillens though. I missed their guts.

We brought each one of them home little surprises. Some fun books from Powells and the best gift ever, or so we thought... fake poo from the gift shop at the museum.

Lou cried.

He was offended beyond belief.

How dare we? :)

The other three rejoiced.

Lou decided to be our friend again after opening his real gift,

A Ninjago book.

The End.