We were looking for something to do that was A) Free B) Outside and C) Nearby. Malia, the great, looked up and saw that just two blocks away was the Beverly Cleary School and there was even a section of a park with statues and everything.

This was serendipity!

We had not three weeks prior finished reading Ramona and Her Mother. And we had been reading since school started lots of the other Ramona books, all listed below:

     We were SO excited to see the actual park, neighborhood and yes SCHOOL Beverly Cleary had been writing about when she wrote the Ramona books. Yes, Ramona was based in Portland, in the neighborhood that Beveryly Cleary had lived in at the time.

 

So we excitedly walked over to check it out! On our walk we passed the school!

It was a beautiful day, and the flowers in the horse chestnut trees were blooming.  The leaves were ENORMOUS, and Lucas begged his dad to pick him one, which of course he did.

 

We quickly made it to the statues in the park, and they were actually water fountains too!

And there was Ramona in all of her glory!

The kids, especially Mirah, were stoked.

There were quotes near the statues too:

 

Not just Ramona was there, Henery Huggins too!

And Ribsy! Henry’s dog!

We went and played at the park for a while, and then cousins arrived, only interested in getting wet. Which was mostly the point of the installation anyway.

On our way out, we passed Ramona’s street Klickitat St.!

It was a pretty exciting afternoon.