Just before I left for Portland, a #GiftmasinJuly package arrived for me.

I was spoiled, because as you can see, this package contained three books off my TBR list, fancy chocolate, and stickers!

I was so taken with the books that I immediately replaced one of the novels that I was taking with me to Portland. I can report that Rosie’s Traveling Tea Shop by Rebecca Raisin is quite cute, having read it from my first supper to my penultimate breakfast in Portland.

Thank you so much to Monica! I love everything!

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. The airbnb that Rudi booked us turns out to be in the vicinity of one of Portland’s art districts and is a very walkable neck of the woods for our base of operations. It also includes a vegan bar that makes mocktails, so I got to spend my one dinner on my own in town in a particularly pleasant fashion.

2. On Monday, I got to see one of my favorite former coworkers at the concert and spend time catching up. It had been more than three months since I’d last seen her. Tonight, I got to see one of my dearest friends (whom I’ve known since college) and her family and spend time catching up. It has been more than a dozen years since I’d last seen her, and it was like no time had passed at all (except with her son, who is now in high school and absolutely delightful).

3. I’ve spent several weeks building a playlist for the volleyball team and finally got to unveil part of it on Tuesday. People were very enthusiastic.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Wanted to let you all know I’m still alive, but that it’s been a busy couple days and I probably won’t slow down until my layover in Chicago on Wednesday morning.

In the meantime, here’s some of what I’ve been up to:

Saturday night plans were rained out, but I got a rainbow and a conversation with Karen instead. More than a fair trade, I think.

Sunday, Rudi came home. We celebrated National Ice Cream Day with cones from Larry’s.

Tonight, the 2022 season of the Fort Reno concert series kicked off. Rain threatened, but the organizers are more than 50 years into this thing and they know enough to wait it out. We ended up with a nearly perfect night.

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. My dahlia has bloomed.

2. I had lunch with one friend and supper with another this week.

3. This was the first week of summer volleyball coaching. We had five kids show up, all of whom were very enthusiastic about playing and learning.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world this week?

Today was the midpoint of the Tour de France, which means I should be at the midpoint of my shawl.

…

Clearly we aren’t there. But I am happy with how pretty it looks, so when this shawl takes me a while longer, I will be happy to continue on with it. And I’ll definitely have brioche down.

First thing Friday morning, Rudi and I boarded a bus to New York City to catch a show. We rode Citi Bikes (those New York cyclists are a lawless bunch, but their traffic lights force them to be) to Chinatown, where we were staying, ate a delicious lupper of vegetarian dim sum in a covered streetery, checked out a bookstore, and took a nap in the afternoon. In the evening, we biked up to the theater to take in the penultimate performance of Macbeth, starring Daniel Craig and Ruth Negga (the girl in the flower dress from Agents of SHIELD). Before returning to the hotel, we stopped in Little Italy, in search of a cup of coffee for Rudi and found a patisserie with delicious cannoli, which we took back to our 11th-floor view of lower Manhattan.

The next morning, Rudi got up and caught a flight to Denver, and I bummed around the city for a while longer before catching the bus back to D.C. I returned to Little Italy to a shop where I’d seen Italian ice advertised for a taste of home. I knit for a while in the park across the street from the hotel after checking out. I biked over to one of the tea shops we like and stopped at a street fair en route.

It was a good trip, and I’m already looking forward to returning in August when we catch two Tony-winning musicals, The Strange Loop and Paradise Square.