Hike - the 4T trail in Portland

We hiked the 4T trail in Portland today (solid instructions provided on the first two pages of that PDF I just linked).  The hiking part was about 3.5 miles and Eleanor did just fine. The whole loop involves the train, the trail, the tram and the trolley; although for us it also involved the Toyota, so I guess that makes 5 T's.  We drove to a SE Portland Max stop and boarded the train bound for the Oregon Zoo, where signs guided us to the nearby hiking trailhead.  We stopped for lunch and a view 1.5 miles in at Council Crest, then hiked down to OHSU (taking the shorter, "urban route" option) and caught the Aerial Tram downhill to the water front.  Next up was a trip on the Portland Street Car "trolley" before closing off the loop on the Max "train" again.  (An all day Tri-met pass covers all of this; the total trip had us out the door at 10:30 and back home again at 3:30.)

Summer berries

Berry picking on Sauvie Island today, with a rare summer-storm on our heels.  Marion-, blue- and rasp-.  Our only evidence is this dessert we made when we got home!

Lavender festival

In 2011 we headed into the heart of wine country for the festival hosted by the Yamhill County lavender farms.  This year we picked a farm a little closer to home, with a view of Mt. Hood (this year's farm was Liberty Natural, if you are wondering, and it had food, lavender ice cream, multiple vendor booths, and a small but impressive water feature the kids could play in).

Pittock picnic

Summer appears to be passing largely undocumented.  But, Friday's outing had a picture. E and I parked at Upper Macleay Park (on NW Cornell Rd.) and hiked the Wildwood trail 2.7 miles up (400 ft. elevation gain) for a picnic chez Pittock.  With a view of the city backed by Hood (again, undocumented).  Then we toured the mansion, and hiked back again.

June in Wisconsin

Michael here, making a rare to date (but hopefully increasing now...) post.  Eleanor and I took advantage of the fact that I am effective remotely with my current job role to spend extra time in Wisconsin this year - a full two weeks, with the weekends on either side, right after Eleanor was out of school.  Visited the cottage right at the start with all of the cousins.

After the cottage, spent the rest of the next week in McFarland, including a midnight tornado drill (Eleanor had wanted thunderstorms, but got more than she wished for).  The next weekend my youngest cousin Phoebe had her graduation party.

Eleanor playing for her great-grandfather, just a week before he passed on

A trip to Vitense Golfland - they let you drive the Wienermobile!  Black-lit holes are also very cool

During the week we visited the Larsen House in McFarland where Grandma Judy has spent a lot of time helping with the restoration and fund raising

The last stop of the trip was in Whitefish Bay with the Lister cousins.  It was good to spend a couple of days there, helped by the stretched out trip.

Eleanor's ELECTRIFIED third-grade-bridge-project

Eleanor's bridge, inspired by Portland's St. Johns Bridge

The third graders around here spend their school year studying Portland history and as Portland has a lot of bridges, they also learn a thing-or-twelve about bridges.  Vertical lift, double-decker vertical-lift, double leaf bascule, truss-beam, cantilever truss-beam, cable suspension, and double-decker steel cantilever truss-beam are just a few of the new terms at our house (those are all bridge design styles, and we have all of them in Portland).  And at the end of the year, at the very end, right when things are getting so harried you simply can't take anything else, the third graders launch into their bridge building project. Which, by the way, is all done at home.  (?@#$!)

Eleanor's drawings of arches for her bridge.

The instructions to the parents went something like this: help your kids but don't help your kids.  Uhhh, ok.  I expected that to mean I should really just throw her in and let her sink or swim.  But the kids were told that their bridge had to be structurally sound enough to hold up a hot-wheels car.  Ok, soooo... that seemed to rule out leaving her to build it out of scrap paper.  Additionally, Eleanor had big dreams for what her finished bridge would include, so I knew I'd have to play some sort of role in this gig.

I love the whole thing (it is the centerpiece on my dinning room table now) but the COOLEST thing on this bridge is the real, working lights.  This was Eleanor's idea and she knew just how to wire-up little LEDs thanks to a series of fantastic after school electronics/robot-building classes from the super-nice folks at Interest-Ed LLC (seriously, try their classes, grades 3-5, best science-y experience we've found thus far).  Eleanor was so confident she could wire this bridge for power she even wrote the supplies list for me.

A famous view from the St. Johns Bridge recreated.

What the parents did:
I listened carefully to Eleanor's grand vision.  Then, I talked her through the discrete work packages involved (sketching and picking a scale = 1 hour; finding supplies = 2 hours; cutting parts, building up land, glueing together = 5 hours...yadda, yadda, yadda).  Then I showed her how this mapped out on our calendar, given her other commitments.  She adjusted her vision some, but still, her goal was ambitious.  And while she regretted the commitment to come home from school and work (instead of play) a few times, it was only a few times.

I worked the utility knife to cut her designs out of thick matt board. I cut the wood base, size strictly set by school. I helped brainstorm supplies, and then helped find them.  I tried to keep her spirits up... this is really the biggest job in any school project: help keep her buoyant when the doubts and difficulties start weighing her down.

Mike showed Eleanor a more complicated circuit, for flashing lights, but in the end Eleanor wanted to go with a circuit she could confidently construct herself (and thus more confidently troubleshoot, should something go wrong with the circuit once at school).

here is that famous view

Strawberry season

Strawberries mark the beginning of Portland's several-month-long berry feast.  One of the reasons I'll have a hard time every leaving the Pacific Northwest.

Our pickin's in about 30 minutes