This has been a busy week, such a good week. Last Friday I met up with friend Tim to chat and play a little music. Then that evening we drove to Newberg to have dinner with Alexis and Joe. They took us a to a place that we had never been. It had been a food truck which moved to a permanent location with an indoor kitchen and outdoor seating – The Lemon and Olive. I had a lamb gyros, way too much to eat, but so good. If you are out that way, check it out.

Alexis is a writer, and almost as enamored with journals and notebooks as I am. She said she wants to get into fountain pens – Oh my! Music to this father’s ears. So I came home and set up a gift pack of one of my pens and some ink, which will be delivered soon, along with a free lesson in the art of filling a pen.

On Saturday Tricia and I went to Forest Park. It is one of the largest urban forest reserves in the country, over 5,200 acres and 80 miles of hiking trails, many of which are quite rugged. We chose a more gentle path, hiking .8 miles into an abandoned stone structure known these days as the Witch’s Cabin.

Tanner Creek park is in its full water lily glory these days so a painting of the very Monet type of images was just the thing.

If you have followed this blog for any length of time you know that my travelsketching is closely connected with urban sketching. The Urban Sketchers were formed in Seattle by Gabe Campanario in 2007 – “for all sketchers out there who love to draw the cities where they live and visit, from the window of their homes, from a cafe, at a park, standing by a street corner… always on location, not from photos or memory.” It has grown to a huge international movement with well over 300 chapters.

Though I have followed the USK Manifesto and urban sketching is what I have done the most, and my “Yes! You can travelsketch” workshops would qualify as urban sketching, still I have never actually joined in with another group of sketchers at a sketch crawl. That is going to change this Saturday here in Portland. So with that in mind I went out to do a bit of practice.

First I headed back to the Deschutes Brewery, sat outside and sketched the old building across the street. It is now The Pearl Parking garage.

Before meeting up that afternoon with Tricia at The Fields I did a sketch of a lady on the other side of the terrace.

Tuesday I had to go back to Les Schwab since the right rear tire still had a slow leak, thankfully it just needed a new valve. One sketch while I waited for them to open, then another at the coffee shop while I waited for it to be repaired.

We did a WhatsApp video call on Wednesday with our friends from Mukilteo who are now living in France, it was good to see and hear of their adventures as they are settling in.

Last night we went to a food truck pod at 50th and Division (food trucks are famous here in Portland). On Thursdays they have a jam, so we went with some friends, ate too much good food and played some music. Tim found a guitar, me, “I pulled my harpoon out of my…” pocket and we had a lot of fun. Tricia was stuck in a corner but did capture a bit of the festivities in a video.

I had so much fun, we will be back next week – how can you not want to be with some good people and some good music. It is really nice to be making new friends and connections.