Figueira Family

3.09.2010

SHNA Bookmark

Sylvan Highlands Neighborhood Association won about $3k in grant money towards community development. Part of the funds were used to create a bookmark that advertised our events for the year. I volunteered to create the bookmark, with the help of another volunteer, that we would mail to about 500 households in our neighborhood. Here is the end result of that work. The Racoons name is Waverly and is our logo for the neighborhood. The events on the back range from Tree Planting, to Neighborhood Clean Up, to a Movie Night outside during the summertime. It is because of volunteers and donations that allow these awesome activities to emerge; just one of the many great aspects about living in Portland, and the United States...

And Rafa continues to lead the developments of our website : )

http://www.sylvanhighlands.org/

Never Ending Landscaping

One day, we will be all finished with our landscaping improvements. For now we will keep progressing forward, even if it we are as slow as dirt : ) Here are some of the latest pics in progress...

Here is the back before anything added from when we purchased...

So, 10 Arborviates, 4 Magnolias, 5 Bamboo, 6 leylands, 1 Laurel, 2 retaining walls later and this is where we are at:

Facing North West...

Facing North...

Facing South. At the very end is a monstrous tree/shrub mixed with thorny ivy that we are removing so that we can extend the two retaining walls around the corner to the left (east). The top wall will extend our flat space by probably 6 ft. The lower wall that will extend around to the left will eventually be for planting a vegetable garden on top off. This area gets loads of sun.

Day 1 of removal....

After day 2 and 3 a couple weekends later....

And now to the front before anything has been done. We plan to put in three walls here.

After day 1. This is the beginning of the first wall. We will end up decreasing the height of the wall here, it is too tall as it is now. The plan is to put in two more above it evenly spaced out. From there we can plant like crazy.

Sometimes it feels as if we are making little progress, but then when we review the before and after, we really can see how far we have come along : )

Blazer W+K Seats

One of the best perks about working for Wieden + Kennedy is that every now and again your name gets called for some kick ass seats to a Blazer game. When you can see backs of the players heads, you know you are close : )

Sporting our new and official Blazer Gear. It was just time : )

2.17.2010

Travel Brain.

Profile

Cities

is an explorer that:

occasionally strays off track

likes a bug-free bed and hot showers

flirts with danger

Travel cred: great

I rank in the top...

0.9% most cities visited - Jamaica

1% most cities visited - Monaco

4% most cities visited - Ireland

Get your own widget

GeckoGo

2.15.2010

Sonoma with Friends

Over the first weekend in February, Rafa and I met Becca and Shahin in Sonoma. We rented a cottage right in the heart of Sonoma, and spent the weekend wine tasting, cooking dinners, and hanging out. It was a wonderful and happy weekend : )

Our first stop was in Sonoma Village,a quaint and historic town, where we walked around and stumbled on one winery store that directed us to some of the best wineries on Sonoma. Took a few shots and then headed to our first winery of the trip, Sebastiani, both lovely decor and tasty wines.

End of Mission Trail in Sonoma Village

Historic building walking through Sonoma Village:

Sebastiani Winery

A familiar and beautiful sight, the endless vineyards with rolling green hills as a backdrop. And another familiar site, the countless vineyard signs.

The 5th and last winery of the day, complete with a fire and barrel tasting : )

Day 2, 2nd winery for the day, Roessler, which was more like a tasting room in a cute little house. Here they had Pinot Noir from Oregon...

Buena Vista Winery, in the heart of amazing creeks and a small forest. Here we took some great shots and goofed around : )

Wonderful couple days with friends, the Riff Raffs : )

But, for Rafa and I, we had one more day to tour around, so we decided to head out on a drive. We started with a small visit to Napa , we hit up one more winery, the one on the Bachelor, Castello De Amorosa, and then continued driving through the hills eastward to get scenic perspective...

House in the Napa Village neighborhood, I think this was for sell for about $2mil.

Vineyards of Castello de Amorosa winery

Driving on the oustskirts of Napa rounded out our wonderful weekend...

1.26.2010

Who I Am

What most knew around me growing up, took me years to figure out. When I now ask, "Who Am I", I can answer that while I am so many things, I am mostly the strength and hard working spirit of my grams, the one who in the face of adversity, picks herself up and presses on (so much like my Mom), and at the same time, I am the goofy one, the dreamer, and hopeless romantic of my Paps. I also love to write poetry just like him.

As an adult, I am more aware of who I am, the fabric of what makes me me, and how these lovely people contributed to the woman I am today.

1.24.2010

Swanky Farewell

So my good friend Stacey is heading out to San Diego in a couple weeks. Her husband Nick is there to become a Navy Seals and so they are off for a big new adventure. So for a little farewell, Liza and I took her out to the The Nines hotel, where it is the epitome of swankiness. The martini's and girl chat were flowing with ease and we had so much fun. We wish Stacey and Nick all the best in their new life down south. Don't forget us : )