Tulips and Mom

So my mom was just out here for her first visit to Seattle! The first day I took her to Pike Street Market and in true mom form she let out a small shriek and jumped back when the men started throwing the fish at the counter where I was buying oysters. For any of you that have never been to Pikes Street it's basically the best outdoor all organic local everything farmers market you could possibly imagine.

We spent the next couple of days eating lots of seafood and searching for the best martini which I do believe we found. On Saturday we headed up to Mt. Vernon where my aunt and uncle live for a girls lunch and a tour of the tulip festival. The coolest part about this day was that my Aunt Joanelle had invited one of my moms best friends Peach, whom she has not seen for almost twenty years. It was so great, they just picked up right where they left off and it was like no time had passed at all. "nanny peach" as I grew up knowing her was in the room the day I was born and it was so cool because somehow her and I had this instant connection even though I barely know her. I miss my mom more than anyone and I feel like now I have a piece of her out here with me. They are just two VERY cool ladies and such great moms. It was a great day, although I don't know how driving around looking at literally hundreds of acres of tulips in every color you could imagine while stopping for wine and cheese tastings could ever be considered anything other than fantastic. I know my mom had a great visit and I think it made us living so far away o.k. now that she sees where we live and how much we love it out here. Don't get me wrong we both still sobbed a little at the airport but we are already planning our next get together, I'm thinking fourth of July on the boat......

A couple of pics below from the fabulous weekend.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter Everyone!!

This was our first official holiday away from home and I have to say I probably missed my family more today than I have the entire time we've been out here. Don't get me wrong I don't consider eating dungeness crab benedict with amazing bloody mary's on the water a bad day but I did miss the huge family get together at my uncles and all the craziness that ensues with a family our size. I did not however miss doing dishes for 27 people once the meal is all over!!!......Good luck ladies in my family, how do the men always get out of that one? On a side note I have to laugh a little at the fact that we are already turning into "Seattleites" we decided when we got back from brunch we wanted coffee and there's a place right across the street by the grocery store so we could just make a quick 5 minute walk over to grab everything. The funny part about this is that it's been a complete downpour all day and the thought of walking to the store in that did not bother us one bit, it's just become a part of what we do. Anyway hope everyone had a great Easter and we love and miss you all!! above is a pic from our roof and then a few from our area outside our building and the cherry blossom trees out front.

Alright friends and family I finally gave in!!

So I love looking at friends blogs and decided especially now that we live so far away to give in to the peer pressure and join the blogging world. For all of you that I've lost contact with since our Fairview days I'll give you the abbreviated update, here goes: About six years ago I met JJ during our " I can't believe our livers survived that" summer and told everyone I was going to marry him two months into the relationship. I think they all thought I was just hitting the jungle juice to hard but as it turns out we were meant to be. We got married in October 2007 and since then have been experiencing the ups and downs of this roller coaster called life......I have to say for us we've been very blessed and it's been mostly good times for us. We took our dream vacation for our first anniversary to France and Italy where we went to Paris, Nice and Tuscany for a little over two weeks and as cheesy as it sounds it really was a life changing experience. While we were there we decided that we shouldn't be so afraid to move out of our comfort zone of Colorado and of course at the time said "lets move to Europe and make wine and olive oil and sell it at local farmers markets" While that sounds fantastic we thought we should start smaller and maybe just live in a different state and see how that went, but you know how it goes you get home and get back in the daily grind and sort of forget about making that actually happen. Then in December of 08 life through us an unexpected curve ball. The day JJ went back to work after the holiday break he found that the company was laying off 15% of the employees and being the new guy he was one of the unlucky few. We had planned and already paid for a ski vacation for the following weekend and while trying to enjoy ourselves but feeling that new found stress I said to JJ half joking we should just pick up and move to Seattle. We always talked about doing that but it never seemed like the right time, anyway turns out the lay off was a blessing in disguise which we said the whole time and in March of this year JJ flew to Seattle on a whim to check out the job market and was offered a position at The University of Washington!!! We just moved here about three weeks ago and while we miss our friends and family back home we are LOVING the Great Northwest. So there you have it, this will probably be the longest post I ever have but that's what I've been up to for the last however many years!