Magical Oregon Weekend

After work on Friday I headed down south to Portland, Oregon. The traffic was fucking terrible and the 3 hour drive took 4.5 hours but it was totally worth it. I met Marissa at her apartment in Kenton (N. Portland) and we shared some Rosé, meat, cheese, hummus and crackers before putting on lipstick (and a heavy, winter coat for Marissa because August? lol) and heading out to sip Moscow Mules at a cute bar with a patio on Mississippi. After that there were raviolis, fries and vodka sodas at another bar patio down the street. We hopped in an Uber from there and headed to Dig A Pony to drop it low and take snapchat selfies while waiting in line for the bathroom (as one does, duh).

^^Rebeka and Marissa running wild on the streets of Portland^^

^^HEY GIRL^^

When we were done sharing a beer with a stranger on the dance floor we ran out of Dig A Pony and into a random bar where we saw one of Marissa's ex-flings who  many summers ago asked me "Where abouts you be lurkin to, girl?" #winner. We hid from him in a photo booth and then emerged long enough to shout "HI!" at him and literally run out of the bar, down the street and into my first ever strip club!!

^^Photo Booth Goodness^^

I've always been a bit weary of strip clubs (is it degrading to the women? are they there against their will? do they hate it? are there a ton of pervs there?) but Sassy's totally changed my mind. It was so magical. It was like a really fun, packed-full-of-hipsters bar with badass, beautiful, real, talented ladies dancing around naked/mostly naked. I wanted to literally throw all my money at them.

Side note: can we talk about how I was definitely the least cool person in all of Portland? THERE ARE SO MANY COOL PEOPLE WHO LIVE THERE! I don't know where they all came from, but my self esteem is glad they're not in Seattle. Lolz.

Then, as we were leaving the strip club, Marissa wanted to take a picture of a sign on the door and she accidentally left her flash on and the bartender came over and literally screamed at us "NO PICTURES" (no joke, screamed) and we RAN out of Sassy's and down the street and called an Uber that we made drop us off at a 24-hour donut shop where we bougth donuts from a literal child and walked the rest of the way home and I face swapped a pic of Marissa with Spock and it was so so good. And then Marissa made us frozen pizza which we ate before passing the F out at approximately 3:45am. In case you're keeping track, that's: meat, cheese, hummus, crackers, raviolis, fries, donuts and pizza. Fat kids so hard.

^^Best Face Swap^^

Saturday morning we grabbed coffee and went for a walk in Marissa's neighborhood before grabbing some things, some snacks and heading down to the Willamette River for a mini-beach/river day. I ate a Reuben on the beach (logical) and we played on our phones behind a stump and waded out in the water and I sunburned the back of my legs like the ginger soul I am. It was great.

^^A Reuben is a totes approps thing to eat at the beach, duh^^

^^River chilling/back of leg sun burning^^

 

 ^^Hey Gurl^^

^^Only Marissa wears flannel to the beach^^

^^River River River Riverrrr^^

^^LOOK AT MEEEE^^

^^Beach selfie^^

After the beach we headed to Salt and Straw on Alberta (my first time!!) for a long line and eventually ice cream. It was worth the wait. I got the carrot cake batter that had cream cheese frosting chunks, OMG you guys, so good. Eventually we made our way back to Marissa's apartment where I showered, squeezed her goodbye and then drove to Hood River.

^^Waiting in line at Salt and Straw for ice cream^^

When I got to Hood River I headed to Beth's house (because Beth moved back to Hood River, eeeeeeeeeee! yay!) to get ready for the pFriem 4th Birthday Party event at the waterfront park. We ended up meeting Beth's sister Emily at the party and ran into more friends there. We had beers, listened to music and took pictures in the really cute photo booth. It was a blast!

 ^^Sun setting and all the festivities and Beth's face at the pFriem bday party^^

 ^^Beth, me and Emily at the pFriem party^^

 

^^Photo Booth Magic^^

After the party I was a little drunk and got a SUPER delicious quesadilla from a street cart before meeting up with everyone again at the Pub. We eventually headed for Double Mountain and then I met Brian to chill and drink some pink wine.

My liver hates me.

The next morning there was breakfast at the Hood River Inn (coffee, water and mimosas included which is my favorite thing at breakfast) before I headed back over to Washington see my parents and Fluffy Face for a bit. Fluffy was begging for a biscuit for like 20 minutes so eventually we finally gave him one and he went to town. We are bad pet owners for giving him human food, but also, it was hilarious.

^^Fluffy and his biscuit^^

When I got back to Oregon a few hours later I grabbed coffee at Doppio with Gaby. We gossiped and discussed our V EXCITING upcoming trip before hugging goodbye so she could go on a boat with some friends. I then grabbed a pork belly banh mi and a beer for lunch on a patio with Josh and Sarah where I third-wheeled really hard and peer pressured Josh into coming to my birthday party in Mexicooo (successfully, I think?). It was a really eventful 1/2 of a day. I spent the 2nd 1/2 of the day driving back to Seattle (6 hours I'll never get back, UGH, thanks traffic) and then slept for a million hours that night.

Thanks again for filtering all that alcohol, liver, you're the best. And thanks again friends, strippers, alcohol and the state of Oregon for the great-ass time.

xo

^^I am impressed with the amount of photo booth pics I took this weekend, high five Oregon Rebeka, killing it^^

4th of July weekend 2015 AKA #5daysofBrit

This year for the 4th of July I took an extra day off work in order to have a very much needed 4 day weekend. The weekend kicked off on Wednesday which was Brittan’s birthday. A group of us went to dinner in Ballard and then headed to the Tractor Tavern for some live music and drinks. Day 1 of Brit was a success!

Day 2 of Brit didn’t really include Brittan, whoops LOLz. I loaded up my car that morning and headed down to the Gorge. I stopped in Portland along the way to have lunch with Marissa and Zara which was the best!

 ^^Marissa and Zara at lunch^^

 ^^exploding nucks w/ Zara on the hot as F*ck summer day^^

When I got to Hood River I met Josh and Sarah for dinner at Solstice, and a pre-dinner drink at Camp 1805, which is our favorite 3rd wheel date! After dinner Sarah had to go home to wait for her cousin and Josh and I went down to the British Pub to meet Gaby and my friends from high school, Rob and Matt for a drink outside. We sat outside and Rob offended some people and it was a successful summer night.

Day 3 of Brit was also hot as f*ck. Like 105 degrees hot. Ohhhh man. I woke up to find my mom had brought be a coffee from Starbucks (they live like 30 minutes from town so this was an extra exciting treat), I snuggled with Fluffy Cat and hung out with my parents for a few hours until I left to go meet Beth at Everybody’s brewing for lunch (bethfrand + nachossss!). I then got an American manicure, some coffee and headed to The Dalles to Brittan’s parents’ house. I arrived just after Natalie and Erin and SURPRISE! Des! Des emailed me a few weeks prior telling me she wanted to fly up to surprise Brittan for her birthday and after a few scares (Brittan thinking she was going to have to cancel the trip to work, ew) she made it and Brittan was successfully surprised! Birthday win!

When I got to the Schwartz’s we headed down to Mill Creek to sit in the water and drink a beer. Brittan’s dad took this great picture of us being “River Folk”:

^^Natalie, Erin, me, Des and Brittan sitting in Mill Creek, drinking beers^^

A little while later, Ambur, Adam and Rob arrived in The Dalles with awesome matching Salute Your Schwartz shirts for everyone (thanks Ambur!!). We spent the night partying at the spot where they have Milstock every year (which is the best place in all of the Dalles!). Brittan’s parents grilled us dinner, we ate birthday cake, we drank beers, we dance partied hard and eventually fell asleep under the stars in a big pile.

 
^^Me, Des, Rob, Natalie, Erin, Brittan, Adam, Ambur, Kathy and John^^

Day 4 of Brit was the 4th of July. The 4th of July is my favorite day. I love America! We woke up with the sunshine, headed up to Brittan’s parents’ house for breakfast and then headed over to Washington to the Klickitat River where we were supposed to be meeting Dustin and Pickle for a float. We didn’t have cell service and ended up not meeting up with them because we couldn’t find them (sad face emoji). We did find Gaby and Adam though! And a few other friends too. I ended up finding Dustin and Pickle at the very end of the day when I was driving my car back from the put-in spot. The float itself was longer than anticipated and I fell into the water going over some rapids at one point and f*cked up my finger (it was SOO swollen and bruised and still hurts, UGH). I also lost my shoes and a paddle during that. Luckily I was wearing a life vest. Yay for life vests! Rob also fell in going over this waterfall thing that had appeared because the water levels were so low and almost died. Sooooo I’m pretty over floating that river for the rest of the year. Let’s all cross our fingers this winter is a wet one.

After floating we headed to our hotel in Hood River. We got ready (read: put on our red, white and blue) and went to 6th St. Bistro with everyone + Josh and Sarah, for dinner and then we headed to the British Pub where we watched the fireworks and then I went home early because I felt soooo dizzy (dehydration? Maybe I hit my head AND my finger when I fell in the river? IDK but it was dumb).

Day 5 of Brit got off to a slow start but Dustin and I eventually met Brittan, Natalie, Erin and Des downtown Hood River where we ate ice cream to try and beat the terrible heat before we all went our separate ways. Dustin and I stopped in Oregon City on our way back to Seattle at my uncle Bert’s house. He was having a BBQ with my parents and my cousins, and so we had some delicious food to fuel the rest of our drive. 5 days of Brit was a success! Hooray for long weekend in my favorite place! So necessary!

Beth's Birthday Gurlcation

Last Friday, after the longest week in the history of weeks, I drove to Portland after work to meet Beth and Marissa for Beth's 25th Birthday celebration. After lots of planning we decided the celebration should take place at The Nines. So, we booked a beautiful room, with one king bed (yes, just one, please & thanks), ate the best meal of our lives complete with surprise champagne at the  hotel's rooftop restaurant, and took some time to enjoy the view of downtown slash take some a ton photos all over the place.

After that was all said and done it was only about 10:30pm so we decided to walk around to find another drink. And another drink we did find. We found one at this club. Like, people grinding, rap music playing kind of club. Then, after a few minutes when we decided maybe that wasn't the place for us, so we wandered until we found the most magical bar of our lives. PURE MAGIC! It was full of super nice hipster-types (and here I thought I didn't like the hipsters) singing and dancing to the top 40 songs we all jammed out to in high school and college. Score. It was the most non-threatening, fun, dance-on-the-tables (truth), drink a tallboy of PBR, kind of dance party. The three of us left sweaty at 2am. And then got Voodoo Doughnuts. And then walked back to our hotel holding hands.

Gurlcations with B+M are my favorite thing. I could not have asked for a better night (well, maybe minus rude, end of the, guy-friend texts, rawr #guysruineverything).

So, obviously, here are (just) a few (crappy quality, iPhone) pictures of the fun:

Selfie in the Hotel before Dinner #obvz

 

Waiting for the elevator:

Beth and Marissa with their champagne:

 Beth and I at dinner:

Our second favorite place in the hotel (our most amazing comfortable bed was our first):

 

 

Beth and Marissa on the roof (aren't they pretty?!)

The three of us on the roof, after dinner, before everything else, phot cred to some random man who wanted to be our friend:

Portland Wedding Fun

A few weekends ago Dustin and I went to our last wedding of the season (shed a tear, wedding season is over). The wedding was in Portland so we drove down on Saturday morning, giving me just enough time to walk over to Nordstrom, drool over some Proenza Shouler bags, buy a big shirt (aka dress – the one you see below, to be more specific) and wander happily for a few minutes before we had to start getting ready. Ahh staying downtown, so good…

The view from our hotel room 

The wedding was perfect. It was held in a sort of understated and rustic venue right across a bridge from downtown. There was awesome food, awesome people and lots of drinks (what better form of social lubrication, am I right?).

 Signature Cocktail, don’t mind if I do…

Dustin even gave a speech. And his speech was so good. What a guy!

I’ll miss you, wedding season! Until next time…

What I wore | big shirt & necklace from Nordstrom and bright pink NARS lipstick

arcade games + drinkz

On Saturday I drove from White Salmon to Portland (after my friend Andy’s wedding) to meet up with Dustin who was there to drop Battle Cat off at Pickle’s house for a few days. When I got there Pickle was out at a BBQ so Dustin and I decided to walk over to Big Al’s and play some arcade games and have some drinks. 

We played Big Buck Hunter (see above) and Air Hockey and Racing Games and it was good. After we had been playing a while Pickle showed up and we played this pirate shooting game. Dustin steered the pirate ship while Pickle and I shot at some bad guys. Ha.

It totally wasn’t something I would normally do, but I had a bunch of fun playing games with Dustin.

Also we ate nachos. I love Nachos.

Ok that’s all for now. Byeee!