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On Sunday, July 22, there’ll be a “block party” on the North Park Blocks celebrating the re-opening of the Museum of Contemporary Craft and the completion of the DeSoto Project, a space housing five art galleries—MCC, Augen Gallery, Blue Sky Gallery, Charles Hartman Fine Art, and Froelick Gallery.

At the block party, all museums will have their doors open, and art workshops and musical performances will be going on, free to the public, from noon to 7:30 pm. For more information, visit Craft PDX Block Party.

Thanks to Susan at West Coast Crafty for the heads up!

There are so many bloggers writing great advice on frugal living every day. Here’s what I read this week:

How to Start a Family Without Breaking the Bank

Carrying Tide Pen or Shout Wipes Can Keep You From Ruining Expensive Sweater

Savvy Saver, Young and Broke and MapGirl list what they do to be frugal

Have a great weekend!

Portland Center Stage Gerding Theater is offering several free events in July and August.

First is the Just Add Water (JAW) Playwrights Festival. According to the website, JAW is “Portland Center Stage’s developmental festival of new work for the stage. Every summer, PCS gathers together a company of professional playwrights, directors, actors, dramaturgs and other collaborators, who dedicate ten days of intense workshop time to some of the nation’s most innovative works in progress. The Festival culminates in concert presentations of the plays, and includes a full slate of performance events, forums and other free activities.”

This weekend is the culmination of the festival, and free events are happening at the Gerding Theater today, July 19, through Sunday, July 22. Check the website for details on all the events: http://www.pcs.org/season_jaw.html.

PCS is also offering free tai chi classes in July and August. Classes are held every Wednesday and Friday from noon to 1 pm. For more information, visit http://www.pcs.org/communityEvents.html#taichi.

Those looking for inexpensive entertainment, especially during warmer months, should keep an eye on the happenings at Pioneer Courthouse Square (aka Portland’s Living Room).

One of my favorite events is Noon Tunes, a series of free concerts in July and August. Every Tuesday and Thursday, local bands play from noon to 1 pm. On July 31, one of my favorite bands The Dimes will perform. I can’t wait!

For information on events year-round, visit the Square’s online calendar.

I won’t lie to you, I get caught up in Hollywood hype and have a sweet tooth for big-screen eye candy. Every now and then, there’s something comforting about the lobotomizing effect of a movie that doesn’t make any sense but looks really good.

But like a good corporal diet, my celluloid diet needs to be more well-rounded to be satisfying.

That’s why I love what the Hotel deLuxe is doing with their Sunday Movie Nights. On every third Sunday of each month (with the exception of the next showing on July 22), the Hotel deLuxe shows movies by local and regional filmmakers.

And even better, admission is free.

The screening room opens at 6 pm, and the movie begins at 6:30 pm. Food and drinks can be purchased through Gracie’s Restaurant or the Driftwood Room.

Seating is limited, so be sure to call 503.219.8627 to RSVP.

For more information and a description of upcoming movies, visit the Hotel deLuxe website: http://www.hoteldeluxeportland.com/movie_night.aspx

There’s a free and very creative 5K run happening on August 4.

It sounds so wacky that I may have to do it. I wonder how well I can run and take pictures at the same time.

The 3rd Annual Swim Like Hell 5k is set for Saturday, August 4!

What and Why: A FREE 5k run up SE Salmon Street from the Willamette River to the Mt. Tabor Reservoir - source to source - in empathy of the struggle of Pacific Salmon. Along the way, there will be many obstacles preventing runners from reaching their destination. Some will be caught in fishing nets. Many will get dizzy by being forced to spin around in circles as if they are going through the turbines of a dam. Most will be appalled by being forced to drink uncomfortably warm water. All will have fun.

Who: Not a runner? No worries! We need your help to catch and slow down runners.

More details: www.swimlikehell.net

Register as a runner or volunteer: http://swimlikehell.eventbrite.com/

I’m a big gelato lover, so this announcement at extramsg.com caught my eye.

Mio Gelato Celebrates 4th Anniversary with $1 Gelato Scoops and Seasonal Oregon

“Mio Gelato will celebrate its 4th anniversary on Thursday, July 12th with $1 gelato scoops available at all three Portland locations.”

I believe one scoop is regularly $2.50. This sounds like sweet relief for the scorching temperatures that will be hitting Portland this week.

Portlander Jon Jacob recently introduced me to his website thriftmapper.com. The site is designed to help people find and map garage sales in and around Portland.

Jon, a self-proclaimed garage sale maniac, created thriftmapper to address his own frustrations about finding sales: “I used to read through 100 or more garage sale listings to find the ones that were not too far away and sounded at all interesting. It was time-consuming and frankly frustrating….I just wanted to know where the big groups of sales were. I found myself wanting an organizing tool.”

On thriftmapper, garage sale seekers can search for sales by area (SE Portland, Vancouver, Tigard, etc.), type of sale (estate sale, multi-family, neighborhood sale, etc.) and date. Thriftmapper then lists all of the sales that meet the criteria and maps their location using Google Maps. Anyone can advertise their sale for free.

Additional features are available for registered users. Registration is free and Jon assures that personal information will never be shared. While anyone can post an ad, only registered users can go back in and edit their ad. Registered users can sign up to receive listings of sales via email and can customize their email updates by location and frequency of delivery. With the “Favorites” feature, users can select sales that interest them. The site stores the listings and displays them on one map.

Thriftmapper also has a blog and forum, where bargain hunters can connect with each other, as well as comment on the site.

I’ve signed up and have taken a look around. Anyone hosting a sale should definitely add thriftmapper to their ad campaign. It’s free and does not require sign-up. While the more advanced search features are rough around the edges, I think thriftmapper is most useful for finding a critical mass of sales quickly. There’s definitely potential for a great resource here, and I’ll be keeping my eye on it.

Thriftmapper can be found here: http://www.thriftmapper.com/

This is somewhat unrelated to saving money, but it is about simplifying your life, getting a tax break and, most importantly, helping others. I hope you’ll bear with me.  

There’s a group that I’m involved with called Women in Portland Publishing (WiPP). We’re sponsoring a book drive in Portland benefiting 3 organizations:

• Regence Boys & Girls Club in North Portland
• Books to Oregon Prisoners
• Portland Books to Prisoners (sister organization of Books to Oregon Prisoners)

WiPP is collecting new and used books for these organizations. Scroll down a little further to find out more about the needs of each group.

The drive runs from June 27 to August 3, 2007.

You can drop off books at these local businesses. If you are interested in donating new books, please consider buying from these stores.

• Annie Bloom’s Books, 7834 SW Capitol Hwy
• Looking Glass Bookstore, 7983 SE 13th Avenue
• Twenty-Third Avenue Books, 1015 NW 23rd Avenue
• In Other Words, 8 NE Killingsworh Street
• A Children’s Place, 4807 NE Fremont Street
• Ink & Paper Group, 1825 SE 7th Avenue, (M–F, 10:00 a.m.–4:00 p.m.)

The benefits of participating are:

• Your donation is tax deductible.  
• This is an opportunity to clean out your bookshelves of books that are collecting dust and cluttering your life.
• This is, most importantly, a way to help fellow Oregonians. The more literate, educated, entertained people we have in Oregon, the better.

More information on the organizations and their needs:

Regence Boys & Girls Club of North Portland just opened its doors on June 18, 2007. Their library is currently empty, so there is a real need here. They are looking for both new and used books for youths ages 6–18.

Books to Oregon Prisoners and Portland Books to Prisoners strive to bring books into prison libraries and directly into the hands of inmates. They have a need for books covering topics such as history, science, indigenous studies, women’s/feminism studies, African-American studies, Latina/o studies, and books in Spanish. Science fiction and fantasy are also welcome, as are dictionaries and thesauruses. They cannot accept books that contain depictions of weapons, martial arts, or nudity. They have a need for both new and used books: used books will be added to prison libraries, and new books will be mailed directly to inmates.

Please feel free to tell others about the drive. Here’s a press release that gives a little more info: 2007_bookdrivepr.pdf