Studio711.com – Ben Martens

There have been a few posts that mentioned our trip to Indiana, but I haven’t talked about the overall trip yet. We went back over Memorial Day weekend so that Dad, Luke and I could attend the Indy 500. Tyla and I were unsure how Elijah would handle the flight, but he did really well. We got a direct flight into Midway and then Mom and Dad picked us up so that we’d only have one flight to get through. It wasn’t as easy as our trip at Christmas, but we couldn’t have asked for much more from a one year old who just wants to walk and crawl everywhere.

The weather was pretty nice so we spent quite a bit of time outside going on walks or just pushing Elijah around in a little car that belongs to his cousin David. That thing was a huge hit! Luke, Rachel and David were there for the weekend and Grandpa and Lynnette came for a day too. Since it’s rare to have everyone together, Mom organized a family photo.

It was a nice trip and a good vacation. We relaxed a lot, visited some fun places, and spent a lot of time with my family.

The longer I live away from Indiana, the more surprised I am when I step off the plane. On this last trip, I kept notes about things that caught my eye:

• Billboards are everywhere! Uncle Dean calls them “litter on a stick.” Washington does a great job keeping signage to a minimum height.
• It’s FLAT. Hills that I remember being huge are really just little bumps. I attribute some of this to my childhood memory and some to the scope of the hills that I see around me now.
• People drive fast. In Washington, all lanes of traffic flow within 5mph on both sides of the speed limit. In the Midwest you might be flowing in traffic right next to a cop and you’re all going 20 over.
• There are lots of potholes! Midwest weather really does a number on the roads. The Pacific Ocean keeps our temps mild out here in Seattle so potholes are pretty rare.
• All of the trees around our house are so much bigger than I remember. It sounds silly because of course they have grown since I lived there, but it catches my eye every single day.
• The clothing choices are different. In the Pacific Northwest, everyone dressed like they are ready for a hike.

Hopefully none of this sounds like I’m making fun of the area. Indiana will always have a special place in my memory!

I already wrote an article about our weekend trip to Portland, but our dinner deserves it’s own post. Tyla mentioned she was hungry for pizza so I headed to Yelp to find a place with good pizza that was also very family friendly. Hopworks Brewery showed up and I thought it could be the perfect dinner as long as Tyla didn’t mind celebrating our anniversary at a brewery. She was game so we went for it.

Absolutely incredible. This was one of the best restaurant experiences I’ve ever had. First of all, there were plenty of kids around and they even offered us a seat next to a play area (which we declined since Elijah isn’t really old enough to enjoy it yet.) Even though it was 6pm on a Saturday night, we were seated after only a 5-10 minute wait. Tyla enjoyed her pizza and I loved my habanero burger. The service was excellent and my 12 beer sampler platter was fantastic! Hopworks specializes in organic beer. That’s not normally something I filter my selection by, but whether it was organic or not, there were some delicious beers in the rotation. If I had to choose a winner, it would be the Velvet ESB. I’ll be on the hunt to find it locally.

Portland produces a lot of fantastic beer. I don’t know where Hopworks officially ranks on that scale, but they are tops in my book. More research is needed though.

Tyla, Elijah and I made a quick trip to Portland for a little getaway to celebrate our fourth anniversary. It was our first real family vacation and boy is it different with a baby! Between his naps on Saturday, we took him for his first swim in a pool which he loved, walked along the river and through the huge market which Tyla loved, and then had dinner at a brewery which I loved. Something for everyone! Actually, I think we all enjoyed all of the activities. The weather was beautiful so it was hard to complain.

The hotel left something to be desired as it had more road noise than any place I’ve ever stayed before. The room came with a white noise machine and we had that cranked up along with Elijah’s white noise machine and I could STILL hear the cars. Elijah thought it was great though. He spent a lot of time standing in the window watching the cars go by.

On Sunday morning we visited Pastor Johnson’s church. He was our vicar and youth group leader way back when I was in high school and I went to his church in Minneapolis a bit too when I was working there. It was great to catch up with him again and see all of his energy being poured into the Portland area. The trip back went pretty smoothly with Elijah sleeping about half the way. He woke up right next to an exit with a Dairy Queen. How could resist?

I hear lots of people say how much they love Portland. I don’t know that I’ll ever love any city. I’d much prefer a huge tract of land with nobody else in sight. But as far as cities go, Portland is nice. It’s like Seattle but even more eccentric. They have some beautiful parks, great food trucks, and awesome beer. The city layout was frustrating. Even with two GPS’s going I managed to make a wrong turn on just about every drive. I understand how that evolves on the east coast where cities are really old, but on the west coast there’s not much of an excuse for it.

Here are a few pictures from the trip:

Tyla and I aren’t going back to Indiana for Thanksgiving or Christmas this year so we picked a cheap weekend in October instead. Luke, Rachel and David came over from Toledo and we all had a great weekend! It was a nice lazy, relaxing weekend with some Catan, pumpkin carving, and visiting a petting zoo and corn maze! Being back home always brings back a lot of great memories and it was fun to add a few more to that list.

Photos are available in the photo gallery.