My Family Visited Me for Thanksgiving - Tuesday

My family rented a house in West Seattle for Thanksgiving and everyone came to visit! My parents arrived during the day on Monday. After work I met them and Big B at their rented house, talked and then later picked up my sister and her husband from the airport.

Tuesday we visited Pioneer Square. We looked around a bit, spent a good chunk of time at Elliott Bay Book Company. After that we visited Pyramid Brewery, including a bunch of beer tasting...there were a bunch of good ones to chose a beer from.

After lunch we went to the Locks (this is a popular place to visit with visitors because the scenery is always changing). After some boat watching and flower viewing we headed back towards the city center. On the way out of the Ballard area we visited Hale's Ales. There beers tasted pretty good, but weren't quite our family's style (as you can tell from my sister's face).

We ended the day with a visit to the Husky stadium and dinner from Metropolitan Market.

Portland in November

The first weekend in November Big B and I drove down to Portland to visit with Big B's aunt and uncle. The drive down and home were not very fun because it was pouring, but Big B did a great job driving.

Both times we have visited Portland I have really enjoyed the city and and would encourage anyone to visit it!

While we were there we ate some Chipotle, watched the Portland Winterhawks play the Seattle Thunderbirds. Normally I would cheer for Seattle, but since Big B's uncle works on putting the game on television for Portland, and got us great seats, we cheered for them instead. The Oregon Humane Society was there and received numerous donations and recognition, what a creative idea (more information is available about this if you click on the humane society name). Also during one of the breaks there was a game called Dash for the Cash, individuals won money they collected off the ice. It was pretty funny watching people try to pry frozen coins off the ice and stuff as many as possible down their shirts. The Winterhawks ended up squeeking out a win after overtime and a shootout. After the game we had an opportunity to look behind the scenes for the taping of the game.

The next morning we had breakfast at The Industrial Cafe, which was delicious and had too many good options...it was a hard choice on what to order. We then visited Voodoo Doughnut, YUMM! The line was too long at the original so we actually bought our donuts at their new branch. Later the men watched some football while the women went on a walk with their basset hound before it was time to head home.

My Friend's Visit

Okay, in the last few minutes I decided to post some highlights in the last 3 months.

My friend  came to visit us at the end of October beginning of November. She had a conference in Portland, but flew out early to see me. Yay!

She flew in during the late afternoon on Halloween. We tossed around various ideas of things to do to celebrate the holiday, but ultimately decided to go low key. We ate dinner at the Whistle Stop Ale House and then ended up carving pumpkins. My friend had never actually carved one, so we decided that would be a fun first. Here our pumpkins and Big B's "scary" face.

On Sunday we visited the Hiriam M. Chittenden Locks, the Fremont Troll, toured Chateau Ste. Michelle and did a tour at Redhook Brewery, which was really us standing in the room listening to the "tour guide" talk and drinking beer.  My friend isn't a big fan of beer and Big B was driving so I ended up drinking a lot more than everybody else.

A peacock at Chateau Ste. Michelle

Our beer samples at Redhook.

On Monday we went to Snoqualmie Falls and then hiked around Cougar Mountain.

The view of the falls from the bottom.

Coal Creek Falls at Cougar Mountain

On Tuesday we visited the Woodland Park Zoo. This is probably one of the better zoos that I have visited. There is lot of natural exhibits and most of the animals didn't appear to be going cage crazy. Here are some photos of a view of my favorite animals.

After the zoo we went to Pike's Market to pick up some halibut for dinner. Here is a view of the sound from up above.

My friend had to go to Portland on Wednesday, but it is always great to have visitors!

Way Behind

I just realized how far behind I am on blogging. I might try to post some stuff that has happened since my run in the rain, or I might just start from today. We will see....

My Run Last Saturday

Last Saturday I went for a run after volunteering at the Seattle Humane Society. On the way I enjoyed some beautiful fall colors (they would have been even more spectacular in the sun, I am sure).

Off the Factoria exit from I405.

By the Renton Community Center and the Cedar River Trail.

It had been raining very hard all night and morning, but had dwindled down by the time I arrived at the "trail." Unfortunately as soon as I had turned around to head back it started pouring. I was able to ring my clothes out before getting into the car and was soaked through all of them. BUT I am proud of myself for going on the run in the first place (even with the threat of rain) and I am sure that this will help me out in the upcoming months (although hopefully it will be more of a drizzle that everyone keeps telling me about).

Why?

Here is a truck I saw last week in the Safeway parking lot (it was early before a work training). I think I could have driven the Subaru under it (notice the car driving by behind it)!

Last Week

Last weekend Big B worked a weird schedule, but this opened up most of Sunday. For the day I planned some kayaking and then shopping (which was more like looking) and dinner at Z Tejas in Bellevue. The Bellevue Collection is a pretty neat shopping/dining area. You can actually search interactively on a map and make reservations throughout the area.

We rented kayaks off Lake Washington and explored Mercer Slough.

One of the things I really like about Washington is the greenery. Because there are so many trees you can be in the middle of a city and not even realize it. You can barely see the Bellevue skyline above the foot bridge.

We also saw some wildlife. Ducks, Blue Herons, at least 3 breeds of turtles, a couple other birds I haven't seen before and Big B saw an otter (we sat quietly for a while hoping it would resurface nearby, but it was too smart for us).