happy new year!

whew! we got back at about 2am from a week-plus vacation in portland. what a great time. my first meal when we touched down was a stack of huckleberry pancakes from genie's - you can't get that in the midwest. here, you also don't get the hordes of hipsters lining up for the bloody marys, but i never had a problem with those.

brian's sister megan bakes at crema, a delicious (and popular) coffee shop and bakery, and we found ourselves popping in for a bite and a coffee in the morning. i only get a cappuccino when we come home for visits due to extreme foam snootiness borne in my barista experience.

manchego and mushroom biscuit. SO GOOD.

i love vacation schedule - wake up whenever, get coffee, sit and read the paper, then go about your business. it seems so civilized. we also made a short trip down to eugene, where we tried some micro brews from the new ninkasi brewery. i can heartily recommend their ipa. the next morning, we took a little walk down memory lane by heading for cafe siena, by the university of oregon campus. mexican and american breakfast food. ah, the memories. brian and i both got the "scramble #2," with eggs, rice, mushrooms, spinach, cheese...yum. but that's a LOT of food.

before leaving town, we trekked down to marche provisions, a new endeavour from the marche empire. i have a little history with said empire, having worked at the marche cafe when i first moved to eugene. we nabbed a macaroon at the cafe (oooh, the macaroons. why didn't i buy ten? i don't even like macaroons except for these), then went downstairs to check out "provisions." wow. i'm impressed. prepared soups and ice cream made in-house, imported tasty treats, a salad bar, all kinds of salt by the ounce, a cheese and charcuterie counter - i could have cried. everything looked so fantastic. (sigh.)

we loved seeing our friends and family so much, and wished we could have seen everyone just a little more. next time! hey, why don't you come visit, anyways?

happy new year to everyone out there! i resolve to try a lot of new things this year, so stay tuned.