Spring Visit to the Pac NW Part 1

As I looked ahead to a busy-ish summer schedule, including my high school reunion which overlaps Mark's family reunion, I figured it was better to plan a return trip to Seattle sooner rather than later in the season (and just hope for good weather). Fiddled around on VRBO for the first time, trying to find just the right place to stay. Once again my expectations were met! Perfect weather surprised us all in early May, and the house we rented was beautiful and suited our purposes to a T.

As usual, we made it to Seattle in perfect time for rush hour gridlock. This time we didn't need to head back out of the city, though, so it was pretty sweet to just cross I-90 and exit, go a few uphill blocks, and pull into the lovely private drive.

While we unloaded the car/unwound from the long drive, my mom & step-dad headed our way with some take-out dinner.

We woke to sunshine the next morning so we made our way to Gene Coulon Memorial Park near my mom's new place to enjoy the weather for a while. Not having been there in years, I didn't know it had such an awesome playground area.

It's located right next to the Boeing plant where I used to work. We saw lots of fowl with babies, also frogs, and a dead fish being eaten by a seagull, all before heading to Grandma's.

After checking our their new digs, we sat down to check out their new toy: a 3D TV, and watched The Hobbit.

Eventually it was time to head back north to Seattle. My brother's girlfriend, Lainie, graciously, bravely agreed to watch the kids for us while Mark & I went to dinner with some old friends (of mine). We literally dropped them off downtown and Lainie walked them to the movie theater to see The Croods followed by milkshakes at Johnny Rockets. Mark & I then met up with high school pals Brad & Amy and also Tina (along with some more of their friends) at Tangletown near Greenlake for some good food and great catching-up.

Brad (who was a year ahead in school) and Amy are married with a couple of rascally (i.e. adorable) boys of their own. Tina just happened to be up to see her parents for the weekend - she lives in SF these days.  I've really missed these people (it's been 10-20 years since we've had a face-to-face). I was so grateful the timing worked out to meet up.

With another full day ahead, I still managed to sneak in a Vinyasa yoga class just down the street from us in a studio at Seattle Bouldering Project. Since I began practicing yoga in December, I've found it to be something that really resonates with my soul, as well as being good for my body, so I was sure to bring my mat on vacation with us. This class was perfect for me - I kept up but learned a couple new things. The main place looked amazingly fun and I wished there had been more free time to come back for rock climbing with the whole family.

Shortly after I cleaned up, it was time to split up. Mark & Isaac caught the Metro bus to take them to Century Link Field for the Sounders vs. Earthquakes soccer match. I loaded up the rest of the boys (the younger two desired to wear capes) and drove over to West Seattle, Alki Beach. Met up at Whale Tail park with my super cool, super smart, coincidentally both now medical professional friends Meg and Catherine. Catherine has had a second son herself since we last got together!

We went back and forth to the beach, bathroom break and chocolate milkshakes in between. By late afternoon Meg had to do rounds, my big guys were done watching their game (an exciting 4-0 win), and Dan & Lainie were ready to meet up with us all at the waterfront.

We decided to have dinner at Red Robin (where David pouted for not being aloud to climb on a table against the pier railing, and Sam rested his head on the table so forcefully it left a mark for two days).

Then we headed back to our house to chill. Of course "chill" to the kids means either play like crazy, watch a movie, or play on the ipad. We brought some games and toys from home, such as giant boxing gloves, and borrowed a Kermit the Frog puppet from mom for some of the crazy play.