Simpsons in Seattle

Evie wrote some notes to Nora while at school. I hope they are best friends forever! 

We went to the Floating Boat show on Sunday and the girls were beyond excited checking out the fancy schmancy yachts. Truth be told, I thought it was pretty neat too. It was like going to an open house but better because you can just walk a few feet to the next one. We got to check out some multi-million dollar yachts that were as nice as multi-million dollar homes. Seriously - these boats had full size kitchens with viking stoves and sub-zero fridges, 4 bedrooms, bathtubs, etc. Super fancy. If only I had a few cool million just hanging around, needing to be used up! Captains chairs This one was around $2M, and was not the fanciest one we saw. I'm the queen of the world! Here's more photos of Mary's Promise . $2.3m, and it's a USED boat that's about 15 years old! Showing off the boats they made Afterwards, we went to dinner to celebrate Grandpa's birthday and capped the night with ice cream and video games at Full Tilt! This place is a

Let's find out! Here's Evie's homemade job board and daily assignments Job folders. Today, Evie is line leader! Plus, the weekly schedule.

Last Sunday was Scott and my 11th wedding anniversary! We celebrated as a family by going on a hike and then going go get fondue! We've never been before and thought the girls would get a kick out of it. Who doesn't like melty cheesy food and chocolate dipped anything, right? Turns out they weren't so into the cheese or the main course (hot pot is WAAAAAAY better) but of course, they could not get enough of the chocolate. Nora would have licked her plate and the chocolate pot if we had let her!  Say CHEESE while you eat cheese! Chocolate is life! Scott and I celebrated on our own yesterday by going out to dinner at Opus Co, a small, hip restaurant down the street from our old house in Phinney while the girls hung out with Grammy and Grandpa. This restaurant has been on my list to try for a while now and in fact, I've made (and had to cancel) reservations with them probably three times already for various reasons. Anyway, we finally made it and it was fun an

This is a bit of a late post about our Labor Day weekend trip to Mt Rainier, but I wanted to share because we had such a fun time!  It's about a 2-3 hour drive to Paradise, the main visitor spot for Mt Rainier.  When we've gone in the past, we usually spend only an afternoon there because it's such a trek but this year, Scott had the foresight to book a room at the Inn inside the park! That let us take our time with our hikes knowing we had a place to prop up our weary feet when we were done. We did two big hikes while we were there. Considering it was a holiday weekend and the parking lot was overflowing, I was really surprised at how few people we encountered on the trail. On our first day, we did a 6 miles hike maybe passed a total of 10 groups after we left the main visitors area. On the second day, our hike was much shorter but much much steeper and still only passed a handful of people. It was really nice, and I was also pretty impressed with how well the gir

All aboard the piggie ride! 

It's time to get back to our regularly scheduled programming! Evie went back to school and Nora moved up to Pre-K yesterday. It was a big day for both of them, and it was super cute how excited they were. Evie wanted me to walk her into her classroom but they apparently don't allow that so I only walked her to the front door of the school, while Nora gave me a big hug and kiss and then merrily waved as I walked out of her new classroom. No tear from the girls OR me!  Afterwards, Evie declared the day was "AWESOME!" and Nora was mostly happy too. She said it was great and she didn't cry, but her voice was so bored that I couldn't really tell if she was serious or not. I'm happy to report though that today, the second day of school, she greeted me with "I had SO MUCH FUN, Mama!"  Hope both of them keep their enthusiasm up for the rest of the year!

I'll post shortly about our fun Labor Day plans but for now, here's some pics from our quick pit stop at Golden Gardens beach. We were in the area because Scott needed to do some work at the boat, and I had forgotten that there's a semi-decent sandy beach in Ballard! It's too bad the water was too seaweedy for the girls to have any interest in going in, and that we forgot all of our beach toys at home. Oh well, they still found stuff to do to stay occupied - like doing cartwheels in the sand and trying to make a mermaid tail out of sand! Ready! Set! ... Handstand! Don't be too impressed - she held this for about less than a second. Nora playing in the sand while Evie does gymnastics!