Ma's Blog
• Jul. 29, 2007 - We're back from Seattle
We are finally back from our trip to Seattle! We arrived home at nearly midnight last night, unloaded the car and crashed into our own beds. We had a very full week, so I'll just recap how it went.
The week really started to get busy on Monday. I was still packing the suitcases and was hoping to have the car packed by the time Kevin came home. I got a little behind. My sister also gave birth to her first child that day too. I really wanted to see her and my brother-in-law & new nephew before I left. So as soon as Kevin came home from work, I hightailed it to the hospital so see them. I won't be posting any pictures of the little guy here, that's for his folks to do. But I will say this, he's really cute!
The original plan for leaving on Tuesday was to leave at about 8 or 9 AM, but we wound up leaving at about 10:30. Kevin did make a latte run at 8, because we really needed some caffiene! The plan was to go to McDonald's for breakfast, but we hit the drive thru 3 minutes after they stopped serving breakfast. So we went to Carl's Jr. Next time we go on a trip, I think we'll try to leave earlier so Micky D's can provide the morning meal. So we actually wound up leaving town at 11:30AM. We drove to Corvallis to see if there was anything added to the Extreme Makeover house. It looks like a fence is going being put in.
After viewing the house, we hit the freeway going North, and we had no traffic issues until we reached Portland. Kevin missed the turn he wanted to take and we wound up in downtown Portland and getting detoured by construction. I kid you not, there was literally road construction at every turn. It took us nearly an hour to get back on the freeway heading to Seattle. Soon we crossed the bridge into Washington and I soon noticed that Kylin looked like he was going to take a nap. It wasn't long before I found out that he was sick. After another incident, we finally stopped at a WalMart for some "cleaning" supplies and I prayed the rest of the way that he'd be okay. So the stops due to that and the one where we picked up some lunch, added to our travel time, making our 5 hour trip an 7 hour trip.
We stayed at the Silver Cloud Inn in Bellevue. It's a great hotel, our only issue with it is that their parking spaces are small and almost all of them are for compact cars. But the room was wonderful. Soft beds, flat screen tv, high ceiling etc. We settled in and then drove around and assessed our surrounding streets (checking to see where the coffee places were!). We stopped at a Safeway and bought some lunch-making supplies for the mini-fridge. Then we went back to our room, and settled down for the night.
For the 3 days we were there, Kevin had training during the day, so while he was there, the kids and I would check out the town a little, go swimming (a must for the kids). We had a shopping mall nearby and we went to Build a Bear and the kids each have a new friend. The mall had a Lego store, and two different Macy's stores (one for clothes, and one for home). I bought some beach towels there and was told that because I was from Oregon, I was exempt from the sales tax. Only one salesperson told me that, so I guess I need to ask to be exempt the next time I'm in Washington.
In the evenings, we would pick Kevin up from the training site and then drive into Seattle. Kevin took us to the Space Needle, the Sci-Fi Museum, a ride on the monorail, and to a Mariners baseball game. The game was on our last night there and I think that Kylin had been out and about and up late too many nights, because he had a meltdown while walking to the stadium. It took him awhile to warm up to being at the game. Heather loved it though. After the game, we found a Krispy Kreme and ordered some doughnuts through the drive thru. We don't have one of those stores here where we live, so it was a treat for us. We also went to Pike Street Market. Unfortunately, though, it was closed when we arrived, but the first Starbucks was open.
Speaking of Starbucks (and coffee places in general), the caffiene dependent person will never be without it in Seattle. There were Starbucks stores and other coffee places on every block, and across the street from each other. The thing that there was not plenty of in Seattle is parking. And then there are right hand lanes that become parking lanes after 6PM which can be hazardous if you're not from there or expecting the car in front of you to just be sitting in the lane you're in.
Between Bellevue and Seattle and all of the towns in that area like them, the traffic is so busy. We kept saying to each other, "We are not city people". It's fun to visit big cities and shop and see the sights, but the every day stress of driving in that traffic isn't appealing to us. It could also be that the only traffic we really saw was the rush hour traffic because that is when we were on the road.
On Saturday, we checked out of our hotel and drove down to Federal Way, where we went to the Wild Waves water/amusement park. We decided to ride the non-water rides first, and then put on our swim suits and check out the wave pool and whatever else they had. A couple of the rides were a little steep like the rollercoaster. Didn't like that freefall feeling and Kylin's only comment was "It went too fast". I did tell them at the beginning that they couldn't ride on anything that went upside down. They didn't seem to have a problem with that. Heather rode a zipline into one of the swimming pools and did very well. She had alot of fun. She has no fear of the water, or the water getting into her eyes. She just had a blast. We left the park just after 6:30 and drove home.
Restaurant recommendations: Papa Pete's Pizza in Castle Rock, WA, and Mama's Mexican Kitchen in Seattle.
So today, we have sunburns, but we had a good time. I am washing all of the laundry, but we had a good time. We're really tired even though we slept in, but we had a good time.
Lisa |
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