Oregon is only a memory

What a lovely memory it is! We had a great time and would have loved to see more but time wouldn't allow.

The Portland Temple is right off the freeway so you really can't miss it.

The temple is covered in marble. Very beautiful!!
The ocean is always one of my favorite places to see. I am in awe of it's beauty and vastness!




Every Saturday in Portland they have a street market. We went early and left soon after it opened avoiding large crowds. There was a huge variety of items for sell as well as variety of type of people selling and buying.


Brent tried the African chicken wrap and I had an English pastie for an early lunch. Mine was much spicier than his was.

There is a river running right through the city... totally a foreign concept to me. I am not used to rivers that actually have water in them.
The city streets were just amazing, a combination of old and new. A Paradise for a photographer.
This guy was juggling knives as we were leaving.

There are waterfalls about 30 minutes outside of the city. Of course it took us about an hour to find them because we got very lost but we got to see things we wouldn't have if we would have stuck to the highway.
I told Brent after I get my new camera I want to come back to the falls and bring my tri-pod and hiking shoes and take more pictures. There were more falls about a mile up but I wasn't up to the climb in my flip flops and we were extremely short on time after our little detour.

I am completely fascinated by moss... you could say I have a moss obsession.

Looking from the bridge by the falls I could see the river across the way.

When we got to the bridge there was a guy taking pictures over the edge so I had to look down to see what was so cool to take pictures of below us. It was right over the small waterfall.

Out of 4,000 pictures of me I found one that I photoshoped the heck out of that I wasn't too embarrassed to post.

Fall was just beginning. In a week the whole area would be in full fall colors!

Brent was amazed that I found these furry creatures just hanging out watching the tourists.
And a tiger caterpillar for Joseph
And at last heading home. a blurry view out my window.

If you have made it this far and want to see any of them larger check out my flickr.

Day Trip in Oregon

(I didn't take any of these pictures, I forgot to bring the cord to download pictures off my camera. I found these on the Internet and will post my pictures when I get home.)

We got to Portland safe and sound and checked into our hotel room and then headed out to see this absolutely beautiful state. We got a late start and the weather was, well lets say it was like a woman, it changed it's mind every 10 minutes. It was mostly sunny then 10 minutes later it was completely overcast and start to rain, then viola it was spotty clouds 10 minutes later. Crazy!!

Our first stop was the temple. Just like in Arizona Portland is the main city with many large cities surrounding it. The temple is beautiful (aren't they all). This one has  marble walls. The parking is very different. There must be 7 or 8 different small parking lots all around the Temple. There is one really nice place to get pictures but most areas are too close to the Temple to get the temple and people in the picture. It is so green and beautiful!!! 

Then we went to the local Deseret Book Store. Brent likes to see how different stores display his books and ask what sells best etc.  So we go in and they only had 2 or 3 Organ Chain books and that's it. He talked to a couple of different clerks asking about books until one said there were a stack of primary piano books behind the counter. maybe 10 books. They said they had to keep them there because they sell out so quickly. So he told them he was Brent Jorgensen and they got all excited and said they couldn't keep his books in, they sell so quickly. I just laughed... Brent is just Brent. 

Then we went back to the Temple because now it was super sunny and all my other pictures had massive clouds behind the Temple. I took a picture similar to the one here of the Temple.

We headed to the coast. Brent wanted to go through a forest (I didn't get any pictures we couldn't see the forest for the trees, n open over looking places just down in the forest). It was a beautiful drive, their pine trees are gorgeous and I loved looking at them. By the time we got to the coast it was very overcast. It took us about 30 minutes to find public access to the beach. I got a couple of pictures. The ocean was raging and with the heavy overcast looking toward the sun it all looked golden. Not the yellow gold but a very light cream gold, and very shimmery. I am hoping that my camera captured the color, it was beautiful, but very ominous. 

We went north up the coast. There are a lot of small towns along the coast and most are farming towns. I would crack up over and over again as we would see just these beautiful farms with houses far apart then come around the corner to see huge factories, they seemed so out of place. Then it would go back to farms again for miles.

Tillamook was a larger town that had several factories. That is were they make Tillamook cheese. We went to their factory

and were sad because we got there at 5:30 and they closed at 6 pm so we had to really rush through it. I really enjoyed the self tour and wished we would have got there earlier because it was super interesting. But it is what it is. We bought some cheese, ice cream, fudge and my favorite soft cream caramel's that were to die for. Sorry I didn't know they were so good until I got back to our hotel room and ate one or I would have got some for everyone!!! 

Then we went back to our hotel and got in about 8:40 so I started to watch the season premiere of Survivor but fell asleep around 9:15 from pure exhaustion from such a long but wonderful day. 

Oregon

I am off to Oregon for work, and fun. Mostly work but am hoping to get some scenic pictures while I am there. Brent made me get up at 4 freaking am... argh.... just to wait at the airport an hour and a half. Oh well as Lindsay and I always say, "at least we are in good company". 

Note to self: check weather yourself before you get to the airport, I would have  brought something warmer to wear. Nights are in the upper 40's so I won't be out at night... LOL 

Joseph's 1st Parent Teacher Conference

So my baby that has started school is doing well. I used to dread parent teacher conferences with my other kids. With 5 in school there was always at least one really bad report and a couple of not so good ones. Today was different. His teacher called him a genius at least twice, he had the highest scores he could get on everything and she said he and Jocey are a joy to have in class. She said that she has to be careful of how she corrects baby J because he is a perfectionist and becomes on the verge of tears if he does anything even slightly wrong. She also said he is shy and she tries to call on him quickly if he raises his hand because he doesn't raise it very often. I am so proud of the little guy I could bust!! He is such a great son. I feel so blessed!

I Just Felll Head Over Heals In LOVE!!

I want this so bad!! I am so in love with it!!! Just think of what I could do if I had such a beauty in my life!!!

21.1 Megapixel Full-frame CMOS sensor, 14-bit A/D conversion (16,384 colors/each of 3 primary color), wide range ISO setting of 100-6400 (expandable L: 50, H1: 12800 and H2: 25600).
Full HD Video capture at 1920 x 1080 resolution for up to 4GB per clip with HDMI output for HD viewing of stills and video.
Next generation DIGIC 4 Image Processor for faster processing of fine detail and color reproduction as well as reduced image noise.
High performance with 3.9 fps continuous shooting, new shutter with a durability of 150,000 cycles and improved weather-resistant body.
Live View Function for stills (Quick, Live and Face Detection AF modes) and video.
3.0-inch Clear View LCD (920,000 dots/VGA) monitor with anti-reflective and scratch-resistant coatings for improved viewing and smudge protection.
Updated EOS Integrated Cleaning System specifically designed to work with a full-frame sensor.
Compatible with over 60 Canon EF Lenses and most EOS System accessories.
Highest ISO Range to Date.21.1 Megapixel Full-frame CMOS sensor, 14-bit A/D conversion (16,384 colors/each of 3 primary color), wide range ISO setting of 100-6400 (expandable L: 50, H1: 12800 and H2: 25600).
The EOS 5D Mark II features a huge, full-frame sensor. A 21.1-megapixel CMOS sensor delivers images of up to 5616 x 3744 pixels. And since it is full-frame, all lenses will deliver the angle of view they would on a 35mm camera without a conversion factor. This comes in handy especially when shooting with wide-angle lenses. For the flexibility to shoot in even the most dimly lit situations, the EOS 5D Mark II offers Canon's highest ISO sensitivity to date, ranging from 100-6400 (expandable to ISO L: 50, H1: 12800 and H2: 25600). Thanks to improved noise reduction technologies, images shot even at highest sensitivity will be remarkably smooth.

Now I Just have to figure out how to pay for it!!

Never Too Young

I guess you are never to young to find fault with yourself.

I think when ever most of us see a picture of ourselves we find something wrong with it.

My 5 year old took one look at his picture and said, "my teeth aren't loose they just look funny" He was referring to the gap between all of his teeth. I explained to him that there is just extra room so when his big teeth come in there will be room for them.

He is way too cute to start this so young.

I guess he comes by it naturally, the first thing I noticed when I saw his picture was the dirt on his face and thought I should have washed his face before I got the camera out... and then I thought I should photoshop it out... he is cute, a little dirt never hurt anyone.

Amazing

So I am probably just easily impressed but anyone that has been at my house in the last month will understand. My darling grand kids took it upon themselves to destroy my curtains. They pulled down half of the curtain that is attached to the ceiling and the rod was bent down at a 45 degree angle.

My wonderful father in law with the help of my sweet husband came over today and pulled the whole thing down fixed the rod took all the broken pieces off and replaced them. My mother in law sewed the tops where the kids unpleated it when they pulled it down. So I now have brand newly constructed curtains and no longer have to be embarrassed to have people come over. I also don't have to use the giant clip to hold the curtain closed any more. Yea!!

lone flower

lone flower
Originally uploaded by Debe

Just Trying out something else.

Just trying to figure this whole thing out

Blogging could be fun if I could figure out how to make it do what I want. So I am just making a post to see what I can figure out for myself. This is a picture I took last Sept. while I was in Alaska.

This is really bad that it is actually easier for me to figure all of this out in the HTML side of things. But now that I am thinking about Alaska I couldn't help but to remember how pretty the fall colors were there!

Brent's Surprise Party

For Brent's 50th birthday I decided to have a surprise party. I told him this elaborate lie, something about one of our good friends son (that is going on a mission) was having to get married. It just so happened that it was going to be on Brent's birthday and I couldn't do anything about it. I was the perfect ruse because Brent knew Janie would be all upset and need to do lots of phone calls talking about this horrid happening (anytime ANYONE called about the party I told him it was Janie and Brent would tell me to take all the time I needed talking to her and completely understood we needed to talk privately and he didn't mind me leaving the room to talk to her) The party was actually a concert of his music. He writes, arranges and composes church music. So we had 15 songs sung by wonderful singers or played by wonderful violinists. It was an incredible evening. The party was a complete surprise to Brent!
He got to the church and the parking lot was full of cars (which fit for the wedding) then he came into the building and saw Janie in the kitchen and said hi to her. He said as he was walking down the hall he thought it was odd she was in the kitchen but by then he was too busy trying to figure out why I was standing by the chapel and was wondering what was going on in there. By this time he began to wonder why the organ was playing at wedding reception. When he got to me I handed him a program and he got this super confused look on his face. I told him, "Happy Birthday". He was still standing there looking confused so I told him to follow me.

People on the stand said they could see the confusion on his face and see the wheels spinning. He said as he walked into the chapel (we had the concert in the chapel, it was very much like a fireside, prayers and all) he realized that all these people (125-130 people) were there for him. It wasn't until he sat down and looked at the program that he realized that it was a concert of his music. At that point emotions took over and I have never seen him so happy. He said now he knows what it would be like to attend his own funeral.


The cake was BEAUTIFUL!! Thank you Janie!! It was also delicious, yummy and probably the best tasting cake I have ever eaten!! I know who I am paying to make every cake from now on!

Hmmmm... I have to start somewhere

So this is my starting post. Not that I have time to blog but my friends make it look way too fun!