My Daughter's Home in Portland

       

         Last week I traveled to Portland, Oregon to visit my older daughter and her husband in their new home.  If you want to know what Portland is like without actually going there, just watch the show Portlandia.  Nothing in the show is an exaggeration.  I have never had a waitress be so genuinely supportive about my ordering a Greek salad.  As you can imagine people ride their bikes everywhere, and they recycle everything including gum wrappers and used aluminum foil.  Don’t even think of going into a grocery store without your re-usable bags.  Obviously there is also curbside compost pick-up.  And many of the public rest rooms are unisex.  I will probably wander into a men’s room when I get back to Pittsburgh.  

     

No trip to Portland would be complete without taking in some of the natural wonders of the surrounding area.  The Pacific Ocean is about an hour away by Prius, and there are also plenty of scenic rivers, waterfalls, and hiking trails.  Fortunately my daughter and her husband love the outdoors.

They met a few years ago when both lived in New York city and worked at the Botanical Garden- she in development and he in education.  Now she is with Outward Bound and he has a new job at Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI), but they both retain an interest in horticulture.  So I took the opportunity while I was visiting to pick up a few gardening tips from Mavia.  

Gardening Tip #1-  Move to Portland.  Everything grows like crazy there.  Known as the City of Roses, Portland is home to the International Rose Test Garden.  There are public rose gardens all over the city, roses along every street, and everyone grows roses in their yards.  I think it’s the law.  If you get tired of roses, there are also plenty of dahlias, fuschias, petunias and passion flowers.  And I’m sure in the spring you can’t walk anywhere without stepping all over tulips, daffodils and hyacinths.

 Gardening Tip #2- Plant hydrangeas.  Not only are they wonderful in the garden, they also make excellent, long lasting cut flowers.  My daughter has the variety of hydrangea that combines subtle shades of blue, pink and purple with green- all on the same plant.  The flowers manage to be both opulently beautiful and tastefully restrained, just like my daughter.     

Gardening Tip #3- Don’t plant bamboo.  This hardy, fast growing plant will soon take over your yard and your neighbor’s yard.  I didn’t think the bamboo next to their house looked that bad, but it was probably taking up space that would have been better served by something more decorative.  Like hydrangeas.    

        

As I write this post I am on an airplane flying from Portland to Denver, where I will visit my younger daughter.  The next post will be My Daughter’s Home in Denver.