Non-Parent Activities

I went to great pains to keep this day open. It seems our weekends keep turning into a flurry of activities - visiting friends, baby showers, birthdays, holidays, grocery shopping etc... basically driving the four corners of Portland (Hillsboro, Vancouver, Greshem and Clackamas) and using up a tank of gas. So this Saturday I kept free of activities so we could drive to the beach.

Alas, you have eluded me again Mo's chowder!

It will be awhile before we can go to the beach again. At least as long as it takes for Charlotte to be able to go the drive without needing to be fed anyway, which means probably several months. I've been craving a good bowl of Moe's chowder anyway. As the week progressed and we got closer to today, I started to have my doubts about the "need" for this day trip. Gas is expensive, and we've been to the beach so many times that there really isn't much new to do. Really all we're going for is the food. That seems like a dumb reason to drive so far. Besides, I can't have beer at Rogue, I can't have any oyster shooters, and I can't walk much without being exhausted so a long walk on the sand is out and so it the outlet mall. We've done all these things several times anyway.

So the beach got vetoed.

Racking our brains for other ideas of things we could do today that would be special before the baby comes, we kept coming up short. One of the best things about being a young couple in Portland is that there are tons of fun things to do. There's farmers markets, the Saturday Market, festivals, all sorts of tastings of various delicious things, hiking trails, biking paths, museums, theaters, etc... You know, all the wonderfully "portland" things. But we couldn't come up with something we hadn't done already or that we could do since I'm so pregnant.

The city that keeps us busy. P-town for the win!

We've managed to explore basically what we've wanted to explore sans children. While I'm way annoyed that we don't have anything "special" to do today, I'm kind of relieved. We have explored our membership of this city and this region. We've driven up and down the Gorge, we've camped at the coast and in the woods, we've eaten and shopped and walked every inch of downtown, northwest, northeast and southeast Portland. We've gone to brewfest, rose festival, gay pride and cultural festivals, we've taken cooking classes. We've taken trips up to Seattle, we've gone swimming in rivers and lakes, we go to the sakery for fun events and tastings, we see movies at the McMenamins theaters. We've gone to the zoo and omsi, the japanese and chinese gardens, the art gallery and music concerts. We are ultimate Portlanders in all the ways we've wanted to be. Now that we have a baby on the way, I don't really feel as though there are things we'll have missed out on.

So, even though we're basically reverting to our usual weekend routine - grocery shopping, visiting friends, driving to the four corners of Portland again - I don't really feel that bad about it.  I guess the next chapter will be all about being parents in Portland. It will be about sharing our love of the things this city has to offer with our children and discovering new things that are more family oriented. We'll get to experience all of the things we love through a completely new lens and that's exciting!