And mine certainly haven’t been idle! Two trips to Portland in the past three weekends, projects and all kinds of other things have kept me from having the time or energy to blog. I certainly have the fodder, just not the mental process.

The Pi Day trip to Portland was a great deal of fun. We were finally able to cash in the wedding gift from TheBoy’s bosses; a two night stay at the hotel of our choice. And what was our choice? McMennamin’s Kennedy School, one of our favorite places to stay in the city. Formerly a school, each classroom is now split into two bedrooms with a shared entry from the main hall (opening onto a tiny hall leading to the rooms). There is a cinema grill, a restaurant and two bars as well as a soaking pool and conference-type rooms. The best part? Chalkboards in the rooms and a distinct lack of TVs! Here’s what the main entrance looks like:

The weather was grey, damp and cold all weekend. Friday meant a trip to Ikea, where I picked up a new stool to use while spinning for a whopping $6. It’s wonderfully bright green as well. I’m hoping that it will get lots of use in the coming months.

On Saturday we stumbled out of bed relatively early and met up with Sara, for the first time since September. We went on a yarn crawl, and I added some lovely yarns to my stash (you can see more photos on flickr, starting with this one.) Eventually we made it to Pix Patisserie where we proceeded to eat these:

and this:

absolutely delicious! At this point, we were nearing time to meet up with some other friends of ours, the wonderful T and her husband who have recently purchased a house. They weren’t quite moved in yet, but they gave us the nickel tour and we talked for a bit before heading for dinner at the Russell Street Bar-B-Que. Apart from great food, they also have great service and a neon sign in the shape of a pig. What more could you ask for? Need proof of how awesome it is? Well, here you go:

The evening ended with several rousing rounds of Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Wii and TheBoy and I made our way back to the hotel where we promptly fell sound asleep.

Sunday was an errand running day, and we stopped on our way home to visit with my mother-in-law. All-in-all it was a busy weekend full of good people and great food. The only dampers to our spirits was a city so full of construction that there were several points where we had to play by ear to get where we needed to be. Guess it’s time to invest in a map of the city for future visits!