Seattle, take one
This was written for the most part on Monday night. I’m sorry for so many details - I tried to highlight some of the, well, highlights at the beginning. Hope you enjoy!
As our first vacation together as a married couple (besides our honeymoon and Camp Nikos - both of which don’t really count), David and i decided to visit his brother Michael who is stationed in Whidbey Island, WA. Whidbey is about two hours outside of Seattle, and as it is the closest metropolitain area, we’ve spent a good amount of time there too. Because I have, as David says, a bad filing system for my memories, I wanted to share some of the highlights of our trip with you and as a by-product, document some reminders so that i’ll be able to remember our trip later on. For your reading pleasure, I’ve provided a couple of highlights at the beginning so you won’t have to read the whole thing - which will most likely turn into a book when I get started.
Highlights
Cool weather - even though I knew it would be cooler than Texas by far, I wasn’t quite prepared. I’ve been chilly ever since we stepped off the plane. I brought several jackets, but none that have alot of warmth to them. So, I’ve found that if I layer the jackets, I stay pretty warm. 
Maybe I’ll come across a sweatshirt that I’ll just have to buy (but so far the tourist prices of $40 a sweatshirt have made me happy with what I have).
Seeing Care - It was a lot of fun to hang out with Carrie and Mark, my longtime friend who’s wedding I was in last Labor Day. Even though it was a short time, it was great to catch up, to have David and Mark be able to meet each other, and just to see an old friend for an afternoon. Good luck with the house friend!
Hanging out with Michael - Even though David and I have been a couple for over 3 years and have known each other for a lot longer, this is the most time I’ve spent with Michael by far. Since he was stationed in Japan for 3 years, and was only over there for about 6 months before I met him, there hasn’t been many opportunities to spend quality time with him. It’s been super fun getting to know the brother of David’s who is a whole lot like David. I laughed out loud earlier today when I heard him asking the guy behind the counter at Cold Stone Creamery how they kept the counters so cold. It was such a David thing to ask! Because Brian and David are so different, this has been a whole new experience - and a great one!
The Crab Pot - A local Seattle restaurant on Pier 57 where we ate at last night - Michael found it in the tabletop book in the hotel room, and it was yummy! Not only the crab a delicious local delicasy but had a fun atmosphere. There’s just something that happens to you when your table is covered with paper, you’re given a plastic bib to wear and a mallet and plank to eat your dinner with. I’ll just say there was talk of a food fight, but we restrained ourselves. Good times. (Ps. I did learn that boiled oysters are pretty good, but only when they’re hot. When they’re cool/cold....they remind me of...nevermind.)
The beginning of the longer version...
We left our house at 7:30am on July 4th. Thanks to Southwest, we were able to cash in one of my free tickets from being a frequent flyer and thus knew we were in for a day of traveling. However, we were pretty surprised that the traveling was as light as it was (note to self and other interested parties: if you can handle traveling on the day of the holiday, MUCH easier). The lines at security were short and we had plenty of time to grab food, eat and get on our plane. The flight was somewhat uneventful, although we did have to change aircraft because of mechanical difficulties in Phenoix and I nearly left the wedding present I was bringing to Care...but thanks to my very astute husband, I was able to retrieve it. In the process, he lost me, but thankfully we met back up and all the flight attendants were glad to see us and the wedding present on the new plane.
After Michael picked us up from our 7 hour flight, we grabbed food downtown and headed to REI. David needed shoes and we needed a Joby for his big camera. That place was crazy. The biggest REI i’ve ever seen. They have an almost 70 foot tall climbing wall in the store, bike trails around it, and a whole eco system outside that makes you almost believe you’re not in downtown Seattle. It was so crazy huge that I took several pictures. All of our pictures will be on our alleys.smugmug.com under the travel section - check them out! We chilled out downtown for several more hours before we headed down to the waterfront to watch the fireworks. The sunset was God’s show before the fireworks - it was gorgeous. By the time we headed home, David and I were pooped. I slept the entire way back.
The next day we slept in, had a big breakfast and just hung out. We headed into into town to hang out with my friend Care and her hubby Mark. On the way, we stopped by the base and saw where Michael works. It was pretty cool, and i’m not even into planes. The base, being on an island, has a coast line and we went and hung out for an hour or so just walking around. It was low tide so we were able to go way far out into where the water normally is and see lots of cool rocks, empty oysters and COLD water. After meeting Care and Mark at the small town carnival that was in Oak Harbor for the holiday weekend, we headed to Starbucks to warm up. Side note - although it’s ‘summer’ up here, it’s been below 70 every day besides today and I have been chilly the whole time. The college kids working Cold Stone today laughed at me when i said something about being cold - one said that he went and swam in the river today because he had gotten so hot driving around. And today was probably the high 70’s. Yes, high 70’s in the sun. Crazy.
Anyway, back to my story. We had a good time with Care and Mark hanging out. We got to see his parent’s place (they live on Whidbey) and gave them their wedding invite that I framed for them. They loved it and that was great. We grabbed food from the store and made burgers and guacamole Sat night - super yummy.
David needs his computer...so i’ll continue my story (since it’s taken me this long - 1 1/2 days - to get this written) later today or tomorrow.