Out in the city.

Today was an exploration day in Seattle!  I took so many photos today.  I’m going to split the day up into a few blog posts because I know you don’t want to sit through a million photos in one post!

We had brunch at Wayward to start our day of fun!  I had my Diana Mini with me today for some black and white film experiments.  The Diana has not been functioning properly for a long time.  Eric examined it last night because I thought a part on the inside was broken or stuck.  No it was was not broken or stuck, but he thinks that I haven’t been advancing the film properly.  Sigh Diana, sigh.  I’m giving it one more shot!  Treat me well, Diana!

Other stops today included Pier 57, the carousel!, Post Alley, Pike Market and Carkeek Park.

The new Ferris Wheel near Pier 57.

Cinnamon Works at Pike Market sells cookies as big as dinner plates and huge cinnamon buns. We of course couldn’t say no to a cinnamon bun!

This is the biggest shell I’ve ever found at Carkeek Park! No one was living in it so I brought it home with me. I think I might put a small plant in it. Good finds and a good day!

Foggy days and weekly reads.

It’s been super foggy here the past few days.  I went to a craft store last night in search of supplies and it was even hard to drive in the parking lot.  We made the best of the winter weather yesterday and went out to eat and then paid a visit to our favorite beach park.

I almost always get the Creamy Corn Chowder from Bamboo Garden.

He was trying to break into my car.  Don’t trust the birds at Carkeek Park!

If it were a clear day you would be able to see the Olympic Mountains. Now all you can see are birds and fog. I like the birds.

Eric spotted this piece of shell from a broken conch shell. I hoarded things from the beach lately so I brought home this shell, a smaller conch shell, some sea glass and a bright orange stone.

Eric was prepared for trains with Polaroid Land Camera in hand. Sadly no trains showed up. Sad little guy.

Before we ate lunch today we stopped by Silver Platters for some record and book browsing. They actually have a decent used book section. They also have new books so I picked up the new book from John Taylor of Duran Duran. He’s my favorite band member. I thought he deserved a place on my longhorn altar.

 

Fun reading from around the web this week:

1. Don’t these Chinese factory workers just look so happy to be making all of that plastic stuff America craves?
2. Super cute alert!!  Mama kitten adopts a baby squirrel.  Not cute enough for you?  Well baby squirrel now purrs too!
3. I found this tutorial on how to screen print on pottery.  While pottery isn’t my thing, I do appreciate different ways to screen print!
4. This is probably my favorite find of the week!  DIY scratch off tickets!  Eric and I are trying to think of a way to use this technique for the wedding.  I have a feeling this won’t be a wedding project, but one day it WILL be a project.

Food and a park.

We spent a few hours in Seattle after work today. Teahouse Kuan Yin in Wallingford has some great vegan options and tea. I had some tomato mushroom soup.

Eric has some Chana Masala.

We also had a few spicy samosas. These are some of the best samosas I’ve ever had!

A few storefronts down from Kuan Yin is Fainting Goat. They sell gelato, which is made with goat milk, and sorbet. The sorbet is deliciously vegan!

Since it was sunny we decided to go to one of the beach parks. Carkeek Park is our favorite park so Carkeek is was!

Even though it was sunny, it was a little chilly with the wind blowing by Puget Sound.

There were quite a few people out wind surfing (did I name the correct water-based activity?) too.

You can usually find some seashells along the beach. Nothing super exciting, but they’re always beautiful to look at.

It was low tide when we were at the beach so we spotted some hidden wonders we can’t normally see. Barnacles matey!

I spotted sea anemones! There were geoducks too. Geoducks are fun because if you watch them for a few minutes you can see them squirt water in the air.  I’m not exactly sure what they’re doing when they do that, but it’s fun to see.  I dare you to find a picture of a geoduck…you will regret it!!

More fun.

Eric went in search of a place to take decent photos of trains and I laid down on a rock. Jeans and jacket in May, but I was working on my tan!

I also found this guy! A sea slug! I never saw one of these fine fellows before.

Thanks for a fun night Seattle!  I miss you.

Sunny Seattle Saturday!

Turtle enjoyed the sunshine on the way to Seattle today.

We started the day with some vegan donuts from Mighty O! I love them so much! The donut on the left is a peanut butter chocolate and the one on the right is a raised chocolate cream. OMG!

Cuteness!

Cupcake Royale in Ballard FINALLY has a vegan cupcake.

Hey creepy french fry guy!

We stopped by Wayward Vegan Cafe for lunch. They have a new menu so I tried the Wayward Burger. I approve!

I'm making a padded insert for my camera bag. I need foam to do this. Luckily Seattle has a Friendly Foam Store! How could I not take advantage of this?! They are super friendly and they have foam. They couldn't have picked a better name for their company.

Since it was warm and sunny we went to Carkeek beach park. I miss living in Seattle. We live in such an awesome part of the country!

There were a ton of people on the beach today.

There's the Olympic Mountain range.

It was low tide when we were at the beach so we were able to spot a few shells.

Barnacles!

Even though it was a little windy the sun was warm on our lily white faces.

A train was coming around the bend. Many people ran to the train bridge to wave hello and to take pictures. Eric is up there in the crowd.

There he is!

There was a crazy Seattleite swimming. Brr!

Shell.

Cute!

Eric was rather sweet at the park. We were walking across a wet and swampy part of the park. He stopped and motioned for me to hop on his back. He carried me across the marshy land. He earned major gold stars for that one!

Quack quack!

On the way home we stopped at the Root Beer Store. Eric took a photo of our haul at home. Junie needed attention as you can see.

Eric also wrote about the Root Beer Store over on his blog Little Black Star!  Click and check it out!

merry christmas from seattle!

last night eric and i spent christmas eve driving around to some of our favorite spots in seattle to take some photos. we went to carkeek park first to watch the sunset and then headed down to gasworks park by lake union to see the city at night and to see the christmas tree on the top of the space needle!

we haven’t been to carkeek park since august i think so it was nice to get back there. it was so cold though! it was a chilly day and then you had the wind coming off of the sound so it was brr cold! we didn’t stay there too long, but just long enough to find some seashells and say hi to the seagulls.

it was pretty dark by the time we got to gasworks, but you could see the city pretty well with all of the lights. we went there mainly because i wanted to see the tree on the top of the needle. i seem to forget that we live in a major city until we actually see the downtown. it’s pretty amazing!

merry christmas and happy christmas number two for us in seattle!

oh hi little trip!

i leave tomorrow for pennsylvania. i’ll be spending roughly two months there to work at all sports. i don’t want to leave seattle, but right now it wouldn’t be wise to not make some decent money while i can.

the past two days have been really really fun! it’s been a great way to spend my time here before hitting the road tomorrow. i’ll probably be stopping in montana for the night. and i sure hope i have internet access to post some photos and some notes about the trip.

ryan from WV and jason from NY are in seattle now for jaime’s graduation. jaime actually graduated from bastyr last night! congratulations to dr. jaime!! yesterday morning, ryan, ryan, jason, eric and myself went to mighty o’s for donuts, then i stayed at ryan and jaime’s to watch the kids while the others went to jaime’s graduation ceremony. when dr. jaime was dubbed dr. we went to bamboo garden to celebrate! yes! i’m really happy i was able to go for donuts and chinese balls before heading back to PA.

we hung out at ryan and jaime’s house with everyone until about 10pm last night. ryan from WV made mexican snickerdoodle cookies. they were amazing! he used cayenne pepper in them which i thought was going to taste odd for cookies, but nono, they were amazing!! it was bedtime for the kids, so ryan and ryan came back to our place to watch a movie and to talk funny stuff. we were up until 3am and i cannot tell you the last time i was up that late. it had to have been my last semester at bloom, but i really can’t remember.

this morning hercie made breakfast and i packed my car for the long haul to the east coast. i’m hardly taking anything with me, which is a good thing. there was a low tide today at carkeek park at 11:30am, so eric and i went to see that. it’s really fun to see the extremes in the tides. after the park we went to the grocery store. i’m going to miss carkeek park and i’m going to miss grocery shopping with eric. it’s fun to buy food and we see so many weirdos at the store.

tonight we’ll be going to gas works park with the other friends to fly some kites. it should be a great little evening. i am a little excited for the trip back because i will be doing a little bit of touristy stuff in south dakota. but i really wish ASA wasn’t on the east coast. and i wish hercie could be with me!

summer summer summertime!

summer paid us a short visit this past week in seattle! it was wonderful! the kids were outside all day at the day care which was wonderful as well. the kids got to play outside and swim and i was able to sit in the sun. i have a nice little tan and freckles to prove it!

the high temperature this week was on average 85 i would say. ryan told me that THAT was our summer. we might have another week of high 80’s at the end of the summer, but that was basically it. that’s just weird since most of the summer in pennsylvania is humid with 80 degree temperature. eww.

eric, ryan, the kids and myself went to carkeek park last night. carkeek is right on the sound with a little playground and a great beach to hang out on we are usually at this park in the morning, but it was fun to see the park at night. it’s great that seattle has these little places that are kind of a get away from the city traffic and noise. the only bad thing about carkeek is that the park seems to have it out for ryan’s son taviri. every single time we’re at that park taviri falls, and that’s pretty much the only time he falls! last night was no exception of course…and he has the scraped elbow to prove it! there are also pesky crows who like to try to open your bags you take to the beach with you to steal your goods. move it biiiird! my parents will be flying to seattle next week and i’m sure we’ll be spending many mornings and/or nights at carkeek.

as it stands now, i’ll be in pennsylvania for roughly two months this summer. i’m pretty bummed about leaving seattle since the sunny weather is apparently here to stay. i’m also bummed to be leaving ryan, jaime and the kids. they’re a great little family and seeing them is usually one of my favorite parts of the day. it’s going to be a hard adjustment to not being seeing them almost everyday. it’s going to be extremely hard if eric can’t come back to pennsylvania with me too. sad smartz.

here are our photos from carkeek last night!!