Good Coffee, lots of laughs, and a car accident

It's so much fun having Julie visit this week. Here's a few things we did.

Lots of eating out : A beautifully cozy restaurant called Mothers, a swanky Thai place called Typhoon, breakfast at rustic Multnomah Falls Lodge and trendy Tin Shed Cafe.

Drank lots of coffee: Julie is a coffee connoisseur and I wanted her to try the local favorite, Stumptown Coffee, but she didn't like it. Her favorite is still Portland Roasting Company. Her favorite coffee shop, Palio Coffee Shop in Ladds Addition.

We laughed a lot: Julie is seriously one of my funniest friends. She had me in stitches all week. I even took her to the Pushing Daisies party where we laughed a ton at the fun episode about a dog breeding polygamist who was poised by one of his 4 wives. :)

We talked a lot: I sometimes joke that Julie is my counselor since she recently got her Christian counseling degree. It's so good to have a friend like Julie who knows me so well and can give me good feedback about things I'm thinking about or struggling with. She's seen it all in my life for the last almost 11 years.

We got in a car accident: I was taking her to the airport on Fri morning. We were really early so we took the scenic route and avoided the freeways. I was stopped at a light. Even though it was green, the little Honda Civic in front of me was stopped and so was I when a HUGE Ford Excursion with a sweet 19 year old gal behind the wheel ran into us at full speed, causing me to plow into the unsuspecting civic in front of me, crushing the car. We got the most impact, being in the middle, but interestingly, my trusty Honda CRV had the least amount of damage. The poor gal who was driving her mom's car was so traumatized, I even had Julie write down all our information for her because she didn't know what to do. I had alot of compassion for her because I actually crashed my parents car when I was 19 also. We were able to get that worked out and get her to the airport in time to fly back to Philly.

Since she's visited me in 3 different cities, it's definitely my turn to go see her in Philly next year. I'm already looking forward to it.

Julie is Visiting

I have another friend visiting this week. Julie is from Philly and we met when we joined Campus Crusade staff together at the same training. I LOVED our new staff training, it was so much fun and I met a wonderful friend, Julie, who I stayed friend with for over 10 years. We have kept our commitment to our friendship by talking on the phone every month for all these years. I loved our new staff training so much that I later went on to become the director of that training for many years.

I'm looking forward to showing Julie around Portland. Here are some of her favorite things that I'll try to incorporate in her visit.

Being outdoors: she loves to shop at LL BEAN
Cute restaurants and cafes: like Panera Bread
Good coffee: her favorite coffee at the coffee show in Seattle (which she went to with me when she visited me in WA) was Portland Roasting Company.
Reading : I'll have to take her to Powells.

We'll have lots of fun even though it's gonna rain everyday she's here. Ah, the great northwest :)