Ashley Visits Portland!

Back in September of last year, I was shocked to hear from my dear friend Ashley Whipple that she would want to visit me again in Portland. She has just visited in March, Twice in one year?? Really? I knew we were headed into a busy holiday season and I encouraged her to wait for better weather and to come see Portland in the summer. So, we let the idea drift away for a little bit until it was time to actually plan and purchase a plane ticket. Six months later and she arrived the day of my birthday. What a lucky girl am I to have a Best friend and husband to celebrate the day with?

A small introduction for any of you who have only heard the name but have no idea who she is. Ashley was my maid of honor at my wedding. We share a weakness for bagels and cream cheese, and a history of working together with some crazy jr. highers. She is a dog lover to the extreme and wants to be an elementary school teacher. And in case if you'd like to hear more about her you can always look into her brand spankin' new bloggy blog of her own.

After watching the weather for a week straight praying that the little rain clouds hanging over thursday and friday would go away June 30th arrived with the perfect forecast of a high of 70 degrees and no clouds. Unfortunately, thursday and friday weren't as good looking, but it all worked out and hey-- it could have been worse!!! That's for sure.

My birthday on the 30th started with a birthday bagel with Wes at Palios. I left Palios to pick Ashley up from the airport with all intentions of surprising her at the pick up gate. Instead, she surprised me by arriving with another familiar face: a man named Doug. Doug used to work with us in the jr. high youth group and just so happened to be on the same flight as Ashley for a business trip to Portland. After a small luggage scare, we found her bag and were ready for the visit to begin! Our first day we went to Laughing Planet for Lunch and ate yummy burritos. On our way out we turned the corner to see this:





"Only in Portland" was about all that we could think of as we took pictures to share with you.
The rest of my birthday consisted of a walk to the farmers market, and dinner at one of my favorite restaurants: The Avignon Bar, a wine bar across the street from our house.







After dinner I got a call from another best friend Marisa. Which was really fun for the three of us to talk together on Speaker phone. My birthday ended with yummy cake at Palios. However, to my surprise Rand (the owner) delivered the cake to the table with a candle in it. As cute as it was, what made it cuter was having Wes and Ashley actually sing to me. I felt so so special and you can see how genuinely excited I was in this picture. We all shared a slice of tiramisu cake and bittersweet chocolate cake. yuuuummy!!




Thanks to you both for a perfect birthday. And thanks to you all for sending your birthday wishes!!

The rest of the trip was jam packed full of fun things. We went to a breakfast place called Slappy Cakes where you can make your own pancakes on a griddle built into your table. Ashley couldn't pass up the eggs benedict (another common weakness we shared) but curiosity towards the whole pancake experience kept me settled on my decision to have pancakes for breakfast. The pancake menu comes with long lists of topping selections and you can even pick from a selection of batters. I went for normal buttermilk batter with blueberries and lemon curd.






We also: did a lot of shopping, watched a lot of friends episodes, cooked dinner together, purchased our first bottle of wine together, went to the saturday market (a flea market of sorts), hiked multnomah falls, rented a movie, attempted to see the rose garden, and was saved by Ashley's iphone many many times (we all know what a great sense of direction I have). I'm sure I'm forgetting things but bring on the pictures!






Lebanese food!

There were 3 weddings at the Rose Garden this day. We brought lunch with full intentions of having a picnic inside of the rose garden. There was no chance of finding parking so instead we circled the rose garden about ten times eating our lunch in the car and getting angry at all the other drivers trying to do the same thing.



Multnomah Falls adventure:
Us at the start of the hike:






Us at the top of the hike after discovering that we hiked the hard trail instead of the easy one. Oops!

The top of the falls!!!


The End! My dear Ash-Whip, thank you for spending the time and money to come and stay with us. We loved having you here! Thanks for the great talks and the great adventures!