Edgefield

Ah yes, the vacation attitude, where my main computer interaction is to check email (but not write back). Certainly no blogging...but the holidays are over, and the new year has begun, and I'm starting to think about working again. A blog entry seems to be in order.

I'm still in Oregon for a few more days. It's been lovely here, with lots of down time and a friend visited for the holidays, and much hilarity with my brother and his family. We went to the coast for a few days, celebrated new years at the pub, and spent a weekend in Portland visiting with my sister and her family.

We stayed at a very cool place near Portland called Edgefield. It's a big brick building with a long and fascinating history as a poor farm and then an old folk's home, before the McMenamins bought it and converted it to a hotel. There's also a brewery, a pub, a winery, movie theatre, spa, etc etc there, sort of a self-contained northwest-style resort. But what I really like about Edgefield is the artwork. During the renovation, a team of artists converted the place into a crazy gallery of paintings. Every room has a theme (often about the elderly resident who used to live there), murals line the hallways, little faces peek out at you from pipe joints. Our room had a little unicorn owl hiding over the lightswitch. I love walking around absorbing the art. It makes me want to paint my house like this.

Here's a painting of one of the stairwells.