By Julia

So, as is clear from my absence on this blog, I've been really busy the last few weeks. The sun came out, and my energy level automatically kicked itself up from "snail" to "cheetah." Well, maybe not quite cheetah, but at least up to a respectably speedy animal pace. Anyway, now I have to catch up on everything I've been doing. I'll try to be brief!

Back on Friday, June 27 I was lucky enough to attend the premiere of The Broadway Rose Theatre Company's production of Les Miserables. Now while the Deb Fennell Auditorium at Tigard High is far from the madding crowd in Times Square, the performance was more than respectable, and even I, jaded art school graduate that I am, shed a tear when poor little Gavroche, played by utterly charming 5th-grader Alex Thede, met his end. The theatre's summer season runs through August, so be sure to catch one of their upcoming performances.

Rhiannon already covered our participation in the LIVESTRONG Challenge, which was a great event, so I can skip over that. In keeping with our active theme, we've taken up golf lessons. Meriwether National Golf Club offers a great "Ladies Learn to Golf" program, so after years of running my mouth about how much I wanted to learn to play, I'm finally doing it. AND...our pro, Tom Carey, just qualified for the U.S. Senior Open, being held next week in Colorado! That means I'm learning from an expert!!! My dad's going to so regret that he never took me to the driving range, because now that I've got such a great teacher, I'm going to kick butt when we play!

The weekend before last was The Main Course in Forest Grove, which was fantastic. They closed down Main Street and a whole bunch of local wineries set up tables and tents and did a two-hour tasting session which was accompanied by delicious appetizers from Andina, Portland's highly touted Peruvian restaurant. Believe you me, we sampled all of the tasty bites multiple times - quality assurance, right? It was so hot that we stuck with mostly white wines, and by the time 7pm rolled around we had tried most of the wines on our "must-sip" list. We had double-booked, so instead of sticking around for the al fresco dinner (which I hear was wonderful!) we bounced over to SakeOne to check out their summer concert series. Between the fabulous tunes by Jonah and the tasty tartness of the Lavender Lemonade Saketinis, I could have stayed there all weekend. Alas, the music ended, but we were still in fine form, so we proceeded to McMenamins Grand Lodge where we sat outside at the Yardhouse Pub and had a relaxing and much-needed dinner. What a truly perfect day - it was a great reminder of why I moved to Oregon in the first place!