Wonderful Washington

Seattle was breathtakingly beautiful. The city is stunning and the trees are awesome. There's just so many trees and then the rivers and tributaries snaked all over the countryside. The plane ride in was fascinating! So different than anything I've ever seen before! I loved the shopping and the sight seeing. We got to visit the Space Needle on our first night, walk through Pike's Market on the water front the next day, and on Saturday our cousins took us to Port Townsend and the ocean. On one of our drives, I swear I saw a laughing face in the clouds. Doesn't that sound like a line of poetry? I kept thinking, "Today the clouds laughed at me, and I laughed with them." That really was the best part of our trip; oh!, we laughed and laughed and laughed!

Seattle was so pretty at night! At the Space Needle, we had several attempts before we got a photo that the flash didn't totally obliterate our facial features. We had a few jokes about how we should have viewed the Ark of the Covenant AFTER visiting the space needle :). We took a few NICE pictures of the Space Needle. Chris had to get low down on the ground to get it all in. We tried a not so successful pic with me standing over her in the corner of the pic. I was smiling so nicely while she was framing it up then asked if she had taken it and, of course, that was the picture she took. She looked at it and laughed and handed the camera to me. I looked at it and laughed and handed it back to her. She looked at it again and laughed. I'm pretty sure we laughed at that one for a loooonnnngggg time, but by then it was almost midnight our time and we were a little bit winky :).

Pike's Market. Super cool place with awesome Farmer's Market fare: jewelry, candy, fruit and veggies, fish, knick knacks, restaurants, etc. You name it; they've got it! It's huge! It feels at least three city blocks long and in some parts it has three stories. We found some chocolate covered cherries for my guys back at work, some smoked Salmon for my mom, and some fresh cherries for us :). After Pike's Market, we got on the ferry to go to Bremerton. People there really love their music and we ran across several street musicians. And on the ferry people carried there instruments with them there as well. There was a guy on a recorder/ flute kind of thing and a guy with a ukulele :). We had some fun experiences in Seattle!

On Saturday, our cousins took us up to Port Townsend and Fort Worden to do some sight seeing. It was so pretty up there with the flowers and foliage and trees and the gorgeous ocean. We stopped for lunch at a great place on the water and had a San Juan panini with bacon and avocado. Tasty! We also went over to Fort Worden where they had a huge bunker they used to watch over the ocean and protect the coast during World War II. We played on the beach for a while and watched the tide come in. Jacob found a seagull feather, which he was very excited for.

Later we went over to Uncle Bill's house for dinner and games. Tina and two of her girls came by as well as Tessa's family, and Uncle Bill taught us a new game. It's kind of like Bridge where you win tricks except we called it "Oh Crapola!" since that's what you tend to say (or something similar) when you win a trick you didn't want :).

Sunday and Monday were pretty laid back days. We went to church and visited Uncle Bill for father's day. We, of course, played lots games and visited, but mostly we laughed. :) It was so good to visit and so sad to leave. I'm hoping that we get to see everyone again next summer at Mackley reunion though!

Ditch the Parents Day

So this weekend Chris, Tricia, and I took our niece and nephew on a mini trip to an amusement park. Right before we went in, Tricia and Chris had us pose next to the Boondocks sign. It turned out to be a nice picture with me and the kids, but the thing that cracks me up is that while everyone is smiling so nicely, little 5-year old Ian pulls a bull horns sign. Where'd he learn that?! 

We had a little sticker shock when the internet deal we had planned on for eight people wasn't available on site. Grrr. Oh well, what do you but pull out the credit card. We did get unlimited access to all the attractions and tokens for the arcade, which the boys LOVED. They have lots of choices to do: 2 courses for Miniature Golf, Go-Karts, Bumper Boats, Laser Tag, Batting Cages, Large Arcade, Kiddie Cove, and a 4D Theater. The first thing we did was go-karts. I just kept giggling when I floored it and thinking, "I feel the need for speed!"

Next we did bumper boats. I went with Alex and he insisted on 'driving' which meant I had to lean over to drive when we would get cornered by the others and getting drenched! It was much more fun for him to spray people than to run away :). Needless to say, I was very wet and somehow him not so much! We figured we'd better go eat lunch to dry off and warm up. That's when everyone seemed to hit their cruising speed because we had an aunt watching some kids play arcade games, an aunt watching little kids at Kiddie Cove, and an aunt watching the purses :).

Later we did miniture golf and they got to spin a wheel at each hole and try to putt that way.  There was a hilarious putt by Loriel with her eyes closed.  I wish you could have seen it!  I wish we could have seen where it landed! Somewhere two holes down and "probably" a whole in one :).

We also tried the 4D movies, laser tag, and turned in tickets for prizes.  I think we were there a little over 5 hours! We weren't able to get everyone to everything, and some people did some things twice (I ♥ go-karts!), but, oh!, we laughed and had so much fun! Josh came with me as we dropped Daniel and Loriel off back at home and it was so nice that everyone got along so well. I hope it will be a day the kids remember for a long time.