Here We Go Again...

Well, it is snowing yet again! Almost March and we're getting more snow...? This is getting a little ridiculous. It's been snowing off and on for the past 24 hours or so, we'll just have to wait and see what happens from here.





I spent last night at Great Wolf Lodge in Grand Mound. Ummm, has anyone ever heard of Grand Mound? No? Me either. Why in the world the GWL people chose to put their Washington State location of the lodge in Grand Mound I really have no idea. It was my first time staying there and it's a pretty cool place but I think probably best if you have smallish children.





I went with Christina and a family that she works for. The family has 3 boys and one of them brought a friend along so there was lots of work to be done. I spent most of my time following the four year old around. He's so fast! And never runs out of energy either. And he's quite stubborn. And loud. But very, very cute. This morning he came out of his bedroom and sat on the couch with Christina and I and said "So how did you guys sleep last night? Pretty good?" And it was just adorable. We spent some time in their indoor waterpark both yesterday and today.






Sorry I didn't get a better picture of it. I guess you can't really tell anything from this photos but basically everyone walks around the lodge in their swimsuit and flip flops and just goes in and out of this indoor waterpark. They have waterslides and a wave pool and a swimming pool and a hot tub and a kiddie area. I only did one of the big slides with the tubes. It was really crazy to be in there this morning because it was 80 degrees and we were all playing in the warm water but just outside the window the snow was coming down!





Christina and I hadn't had a sleepover in quite a few years so that part was really fun. We went down to the gift shop and bought a pound of chocolate and some diet coke and talked until pretty late last night -- quite reminiscent of many many sleepovers over the course of many many years. I'm a bit tired though. A night away from my husband spent on a hide-a-bed in a cold hotel room left me somewhat sleep deprived. I think I'll cozy into my bed with a mug of tea and watch a Harry Potter movie.

My mom bought me those flowers for Valentine's Day. I hope they don't mind the snow too much... maybe I should bring them inside with me where it's warm. It's so nice to have a little patch of spring in the midst of this seemingly endless winter :)

"My Husband is in the Caterpillar."

Steven and I work in the nursery at church on Sunday mornings and yesterday we were in a different room from normal because they didn't have enough volunteers. I figured Steven was really going to like the new room because we were with two year olds. Steven much prefers the ones that can run and talk and giggle and play. Understandably so. It makes sense why this would be more fun for him. Anyway the two year old room has this big plastic caterpillar tunnel type thing for the kids to crawl through -- oh, wait, you mean, you know where this is going? let me tell the story anyway -- and I had a feeling it wouldn't take long for Steven to check it out. Sure enough he was chasing kids through there and they were crawling in after him and laughing and shrieking and just having the best time ever. Then during snack time he had crawled through but everyone else was at the snack table so he just sort of layed there waiting for someone to come back and play. At that time someone came by to take attendance and she said "oh my goodness! Is it just the two of you in here?" and I said "Oh, no, my husband is in the caterpillar." It just rolled off my tongue as if that were a completely normal thing. I found it rather amusing :)



Things have been busy around here as usual. We've seen two shows in the past couple of weeks. The first was Vanities a new musical that was showing at the ACT as part of our 5th Avenue subscription. It was a musical performed by just 3 women and showed snapshots from different stages of their lives and friendships. I really enjoyed it. Of course, a show filled with singing and all about relationships - perfect. It's not my new favorite or anything but it was unique and so fun to hear the whole thing done in three-part harmonies. It was also my first time at the ACT. I really like the intimate setting of the theatre. It's nice that it's so small.



Then last week we saw The Odyssey at the Taproot Theatre. It was pretty good. Steven and I definitely prefer musicals to straight theatre but it was still entertaining. Josh Smyth is in the show and it's always fun to see a familiar face on stage. That whole evening was rather stressful actually. I had worked that day up in Bothell so I had to race home so that Steven and I could eat dinner and then drive into Seattle... where we discovered we had a flat tire. We decided we would just change it after the show since we didn't have enough time before but... sadly, everything had been screwed on too tightly so we couldn't get it off with our wimpy wrench. We were so annoyed that we had to call for roadside assistance for something we are both capable of doing ourselves. So we sat in our freezing car with it's sad little flat tire in the Bartells parking lot until someone from Seattle Auto Rescue, or whatever, came and fixed it for us sometime around midnight. And then the long drive home, during which Steven fell asleep, good thing I was driving... it was all very exciting. Fortunately, when I took my car to Costco on Saturday morning they fixed the tire for me at no charge! Another reason I'm glad I purchased my tires at Costco. You can shop while they fix your flat tire for free. Simply marvelous.




Valentine's Day was really fun. Steven had to work but I bought pink champagne and baked some spritz cookies and made cream cheese frosting to dip strawberries into and Steven and I played a board game and enjoyed our treats when he got home from work. Then the next morning I made us some mini-doughnuts with the mini-doughnut maker my mom bought for me for Valentine's Day and we put the cream cheese frosting on those. Yum! Cream cheese frosting makes everything taste better. Well, I'm sure there are exceptions to this, but it was really good anyhow. We had a little day-after-Valentine's-Day date that evening starting with a shopping trip to Borders books to spend up our giftcards before they go out of business, dinner at Olive Garden and then to the SuperMall Cinema to see The Kings Speech, which was truly wonderful. Colin Firth was fabulous and it was nice to see Miss Helena Bonham Carter playing a normal human being. I was worried I wouldn't be able to watch her play anyone other than Bellatrix but she was quite convincing in this role. Geoffrey Rush was pretty great too. Quite the switch from his role in the Pirate movies.



Our new small group got together for the first time tonight!! We'd been hoping that someone would start a group a little bit closer to our house but it just wasn't happening so we decided to just go for it and we started one ourselves. We had a feeling we weren't the only people from our church who live in the southend and we were right! Eight people signed up for our group and there were 7 here tonight! We'll only be meeting every other week because of Steven's work schedule. The plan is to share treats and play games and just try to make friends who don't live so dreadfully far away. It went pretty well. They liked the lemon bars I made so that's always a step in the right direction. We played Catchphrase and Bang and talked about where people live and why they live so far from civilization. I think it's going to be a really great group. I'm excited to get to know them all better.

It's mid-winter break so no subbing this week but I've got a couple of interviews for tutoring jobs so let's hope for the best! Have a great week and happy birthday to Whitney by the way ;)

The Stairclimb.

The Stairclimb is exactly 3 weeks from yesterday! Steven will be climbing the 69 flights of stairs in the Columbia Tower in full gear with a whole bunch of other firefighters. And in case it didn't already sound like loads of fun, allow me to also mention that it's a race. Doesn't sound like fun to me. I think Steven might be getting a little nervous. He mentioned when we were driving into Seattle last week that all of the sudden he finds even just the sight of the Columbia Tower to be very intimidating. Steven's been squeezing as much physical training into his schedule as he can this past month. There isn't nearly as much time for that as he would like but they just got a new stair machine at the fire station so he's hoping to log some miles on that in the next few weeks.

Steven still has a long ways to go in terms of fundraising! All of the money goes to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. As a team, the Enumclaw FD has set a goal for themselves of $5,000. They do some fundraising together but most of it is up to the individual team members. Every little bit helps! If you think you would be able to donate even just $5 then please use this link to sponsor Steven http://www.llswa.org/site/TR/Events/General?px=1464073&pg=personal&fr_id=1161

THANK YOU!!!

San Fran and Everything Since.

The first thing I did before I left town (even before I packed my clothes) was to set out all of the snacks and things that I usually put in Steven's lunch everyday. I didn't want the poor guy to starve! Steven's one of those guys who will completely forget that we have any kind of food in the house and just live off of cereal and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. He really just can't be bothered to open cupboards and look for things :) It's actually really funny. He said having everything laid out like this helped a lot.

So, with the peace of mind that my husband would not be suffering from malnutrition when I returned home, I packed my little carry-on suitcase and I was on my way to San Francisco. It was so wonderful to see Paige!!! I can't believe how long it had been. We talk so frequently that it just didn't seem like it had been 5 whole months since the last time we saw each other. And I know I said this same thing after my trip last year but getting into Paige's car at the airport felt like such a treat! My own little piece of home and familiarity in a city that is still quite new to me. Thursday night we found an Indian restaurant in the Mission and took some Chicken Tikka Masala back to Paige's house and just talked all night. It was lovely.

I didn't sleep very well that first night. It was actually really strange to not be in my own bed with Steven. I was quite tired when Paige got up for work Friday morning but had to snap myself out of it when my friend Shannon showed up a few minutes after Paige left. We were planning on getting together but I hadn't gotten her last e-mail saying what time she would be there and as I was laying in bed thinking about falling back to sleep I could hear her outside yelling "Hellooooo?" Oh dear! She couldn't' find Paige's doorbell and there is a gate before you get to the front door so she couldn't knock on the door. I got dressed as quickly as I could and Shannon and her 18month old daughter and I hung out at a coffee shop for a while. I had such a nice visit with them. Serena's brother Toby (I used to babysit the two of them) was at school so unfortunately I didn't get to see him. Toby turned 5 last week!! I started babysitting him when he was just a year old. Or maybe even a little younger.

After Paige got off work we enjoyed a partially sunny walk around Lake Merritt. It was one of those days where one minute you were standing in the sun and got so warm you had to take your sweater off and then three minutes later a cloud has moved over the sun and you're shivering again. It was really nice to be outside though and we decided we were warm enough to make a stop at the frozen yogurt place.

And also a quick stop to wash Paige's car with squeegees at the gas station :)

Later that evening Paige took me to this really cool restaurant called Souley Vegan http://souleyvegan.com/ I can't say I've ever been too thrilled about the idea of vegan food (uh, no chicken, no cheese, no heavy cream, no butter...) but this was all so yummy!! We had black-eyed peas and collard greens and potato salad and corn bread and macaroni and cheese and barbecue tofu and yams and lentils and fried tofu and cayenne lemonade (which was very puckery and needed some sprite or soda water added to it methinks). Yum! Seriously, I'm getting so hungry just thinking about it all right now. I don't know how they made mac and cheese and corn bread without eggs and cheese but everything was delish. We even finished off our meal by sharing a slice of sweet potato pie.

We spent the rest of the night all snuggled into Paige's bed drinking tea and watching Denzel Washington in Inside Man. I was a little confused by the actual motivation of one of the main characters and I think they left out a few details but overall I enjoyed it.

Saturday we had a picnic at Baker Beach!! This all sounded like a great idea until we woke up to rain Saturday morning. On our way to pick up Erica I got a text from her that said "...are we crazy? It's sprinkling a little..." but we went for it anyway. The rain actually stopped just as we got there and we had a lovely little picnic.

We shared crackers and cheese and carrots and hummus and fruit and pretzels and almond cake. And the rain started pretty much the very instant we packed everything up.

We tried to hang out for a little bit longer at the beach but it was just way to cold and wet and we ended up practically running back to the car.

Paige and I thought it would probably be best to have another cozy evening. As soon as we got back to her house we were in sweats and wrapped in blankets, drinking tea, sharing kettle corn, a mango and almond cake and watching a movie called Fracture. Another rather intense thinker type movie but also quite good. When we were out and about earlier in the day we spotted a 24 hour doughnut place and we decided that we were determined to set out late Saturday night to satisfy our doughnut cravings. Well, true to the Paige and Steph nature, around 8:45pm we decided it was late enough and off we went. We felt pretty pathetic as we passed all of the still open normal doughnut shops en route to our 24 hour shop. Evidently a 9pm doughnut run doesn't require a 24 doughnut shop in San Francisco.

We took Sunday pretty slow. Around noon we were just finishing up breakfast and heading out in search of the Walt Disney Family Museum. We found it and we loved it!! We spent about two hours in there but I could easily go back and spend many more hours reading all of the stuff I left unread. The museum consists of 10 galleries. The first you enter has all of these baby pictures of Walt and tells you all sorts of things about his family and where he came from. You move through everything from him serving in the war to the start of Laugh-O-Grams, which went bankrupt, to the creation of Mickey Mouse and all that we know the Walt Disney Production Company to be. Even when they got deep into the Disney company and everything that was going on with that they still incorporated what was going on with Walt's family. I think my favorite part was probably all of the stories of him and his wife, Lilly. They were so in love! It was really quite sweet. I want to read books about them and maybe be just like them. It was interesting to see how much of a risk taker Walt was. He always wanted to try the next new thing and didn't allow much of anything to inhibit his progress. It seemed like with almost everything they did, at least in the beginning, if it hadn't been a success, like Snow White for example, they would have lost everything. It's amazing what he accomplished and the way that his legacy is going to continue all these years after he died. The very last gallery had the details of his last few days and then all of these terribly sad cartoons that had been published in all sorts of different newspapers. Cartoons with Disney characters crying and the world losing a piece of itself and all kinds of things. It made me wonder what it was like at Disneyland the day they announced his death. Did anyone go? Did they shut it down? Was it depressing or was it still just Disney and happy and magical and enchanted the way it always is? At the end we felt like we had just walked through a biography or a documentary. The museum really lived up to the Disney standard in regards to presentation. I was just really impressed with the whole experience.

Paige and I made dinner for her housemates and then fell asleep watching Emperor's New Groove. And sadly, that was pretty much the end of our weekend. It went by so quickly!! It just didn't seem right at all. I think Paige needs to move up here and live with Steven and I. We're just such natural roommates it's hard to believe that we live so very far apart these days.

It was really nice to come home though. I definitely missed Steven and I'm pretty darn sure he missed me too. He was at work when I got back so my mom picked me up from the airport. I walked in to a vase of daffodils and a love note on the kitchen table and then found tulips in our bathroom as well as on my bedside table :) I love flowers and I loved even more that he thought to get them for me. It was pretty tough waiting all day long for him to come home and he had to stay at work an hour late but he finally made it home around eleven and it was so so SO good to see him!

Our time together since has been somewhat limited but we're trying to make the most of it. Steven's schedule is out of control these days. All of his "days off" seem to be filled with firefighting stuff. I'll be really happy when he actually gets hired as a firefighter and is working just one job instead of two.

We discovered that we're actually really close to Flaming Geyser Park so we took a stroll around there one day. It was freezing cold (literally 27 degrees) but the sun was shining and it was just such a beautiful day to be by the river. There's another park nearby called Nolte Park and it's supposed to have a nice walking trail around Deep Lake. I'm hoping we can check that one out soon.

I finally finished taking down what little bits were left from the holidays. I still had some paper snowflakes in our front window since they weren't Christmassy and I was still really loving our Christmas card display. I was a little sad to take them down but it was time.

Steven and I also made a trip to Ikea! We'd really been wanting a new game shelf to put in the spot that's been empty since the Christmas tree left. We've looked at all of the local second-hand stores for a shelf because we didn't want to pay too much but we finally decided we might as well just go to Ikea and get something nice. And here it is...

Steven is very happy that we are now displaying ALL of our board games downstairs. It really bothered him that some were still tucked away in the guest room closet. Of course, he's already stressed about where he will put Shadows Over Camelot, Revolution and Mystery Express when he gets them. Who says he's getting board games for his birthday anyway?? Let's be honest, I'm sure he will :) we can just move the less frequently played board games back upstairs or maybe find a place to squeeze in yet another shelf.

In other odd news, our gigantic TV is on the fritz. We were watching Seinfeld the other day and all of the sudden we lost both the picture and the audio. The whole TV just went blue. We're not really sure what to do with it. I think it might be worth it to get it fixed but Steven wants to just save the money until we can afford a new flat screen. Don't worry, we only want a 60" tv and we saw the perfect one at Costco the other day for just $1,100. Uh, yeah, we might be waiting a while for that. In the mean time, I think we might need to get this ginormous tv out of here. It's taking up way too much space for something that doesn't even function.

So that's what's new with us.

Hope all is well!!

Weekend Away.

I'm leaving for San Fransisco tomorrow for a long-overdue visit with my dear friend Paige. I absolutely cannot wait and have been looking forward to it for weeks!! We're going to get Chipotle and eat frozen yogurt and paint our toenails and sing-a-long to all the Britney Spears songs (old AND new) and visit with Erica, who I haven't seen in over a year, and it's all just going to be absolutely fabulous. if I'm lucky we'll even get to watch Survivor!! Of course now that I'm actually leaving tomorrow I'm realizing that this is my first weekend away from Steven since we got married and that does make me a little sad. He will be working all weekend and we wouldn't have had a ton of time together anyway but it will be so strange to be saying goodnight over the phone again, especially since that's one of the things we were most excited to give up after we got married. The good news is there's no chance of me leaving my heart in San Fransisco as it will still be here in Enumclaw with my husband. Yes, I know, how cute and mushy and overly cheesy. I love it. I thought of it in the car and decided I just had to post it :)

Have a marvelous weekend and get excited for a fun new blog post when I get home next week!

Feelin' Good!

Woohoo!!! What a great start to the new year! The sun has been shining for 5 straight days now and I am just in the best mood ever! I turned in three different applications today: a substitute application with the Enumclaw School District, a substitute application with the White River School District and an application for a position to fill in for a first grade teacher while she's on maternity leave. That's the one I'm really hoping for!! (please pray with me!) I didn't know for sure if it was just for maternity leave or not but now that I know it is -- it's just SO perfect! It would start at the end of February and finish at the end of May. Just in time for our trip to Hawaii :) And it would be so fabulous to have another full time teaching experience in which I don't have to set up my own classroom and come up with all of my own material. How marvelous! I think it would really help with my fear of being a first-year teacher.

I'm so ready for my life to take off right now. I have all of these things that I want to do and accomplish and I'm so over procrastination right now! I'm going to start an event planning business. For real. It actually has a name now and everything. I've got 4 different wedding shows that I want to attend this month and just start networking and see how other people in the business work and I'm going to get a website up and running sometime in the next couple of weeks. I even have my first wedding lined up already! Eeeeee!

I haven't decided if I'm going to let the voice acting thing sit on the back burner for now or if I'm going to start moving forward with that also. It's going to be a bit of an investment to get the hardware and software I need to work out of my home, but if I start subbing a little more this month and next then that won't be an issue. I kind of need an income to start my little small business ventures.

I don't know if I've ever been so excited about a new year before, it feels good :)

Very Merry Marathon.

And no, I certainly don't mean the running kind, though I'm sure you knew that already since I'm not exactly the running type. Christmas was quite the marathon this year but it was SO much fun! The celebrations started on Thursday (the 22nd) when Mom took Tara and I to get manicures and then we met up with Grammi and Apanda for tea at the Queen Mary tea room. What a great place!


We each had a different kind of tea in our own teapot and then shared towers of treats!! We had mini quiches and cookies and cakes and fruit and finger sandwiches and it was absolutely delightful.

Steven was at work that day but we decided to open a couple of gifts when he got home that evening. It was sort of our "Christmas Eve" since we were planning to do our Christmas with just the two of us the following morning so we figured it would be okay if we opened a couple of gifts early. We each gave each other one and then together we opened a present from Steven's aunt and uncle and another from our dear friend Hilde.

Steven and I were so excited to give each other the presents we'd purchased that we could hardly sleep!

Here we are Christmas morning!! Haha! We had started waking up around 5am -- like little kids who can't wait a moment longer to open presents! We managed to stay in bed until 7:30 and then we made hot chocolate and started opening the dozen or so gifts we exchanged.

We got each other so many fun things! Books and DVDs and new jackets and cookbooks and a snuggie and cookies and pretty much just everything. Steven bought me a DVD with Mickey's Christmas Carol on it so we cozied up on the couch with all the presents and gift wrap strewn about and watched it together.

Continuing a tradition that we started last year, we went out to breakfast on Christmas Eve morning. It's such a great way to relax and do something special just the two of us before of the family chaos begins. We went to The Kettle in Enumclaw. It's a really popular restaurant that serves HUGE portions. We split a scramble, waffle and muffin and still had enough food left over for a big breakfast on Saturday morning!

We spent the rest of the day celebrating with my mom and sisters.

First the Christmas Eve service at church and then home for a dinner of salmon and wild rice (and rum slush!!) and then since Santa stopped by while we were at church (quite the Christmas miracle) we opened stockings (a new experience for Steven) and loads of gifts!

My mom bought Steven the Band of Brothers series on DVD. I think that might have been the most successful gift given this year. He carried it around all night. I got an ice cream maker and Mom also got us a gift card to The Triple Door, which I think will be a super fun date!

Following the gift opening, Mom and Tara and I piled on the couch to watch the Disney Christmas Sing-a-long. We used to have the old VHS version of it and I bought Mom this DVD -- I mean, Santa put it in Mom's stocking last year. It has some new songs and weird narration in between the normal old songs but we had fun with it anyway. Definitely laughed a lot trying to relearn the Toy Soldier song.

A little time for a few games of Ticket to Ride and then home for a good night's sleep before the craziness of Christmas day.

Christmas morning we were up bright and early and off to Steven's parents house for breakfast and presents. So early in fact that no one else was awake and we set off the alarm, which wouldn't have been that big of a deal if someone had told Steven the new alarm code when they changed it recently :) oops! Merry Christmas everybody! Time to get up!! We enjoyed a pancake breakfast with them and then opened loads more gifts. Including two more sets of movie tickets, a gift card to The Taproot Theatre, a gift card to an Italian restaurant in Tacoma and a new board game called Puerto Rico.

We took a few minutes to watch the Disney/Pixar short Prep and Landing -- Love it!! -- and then we were off to Papa and Grammi's to join the rest of the Parducci/Sodoma family.

They had already started opening gifts but we arrived just in time to see Tara get her periodic table of elements poster -- haha! My sister is such a nerd! I love it!!!!

I like to accessorize.

After gifts had been opened and we had been eating cookies and snacks for hours and hours, it was time to chill out a bit. Tara, Michael and Danny and I played a game of Bang. Steven went with my uncles to try to move a tree stump in Uncle Scott's yard and when they found that it couldn't be moved, ended up going Christmas-light-looking instead :) haha! I guess there was a house with a big Seahawks thing that Uncle Barry wanted to show them. Steven and the girls started learning the new Puerto Rico game and I helped Grammi in the kitchen -- making the gravy and eating turkey.

We ate a huge dinner, sat around for a bit, ate some cake and then started some pretty awesome games of Catch Phrase and Holiday Charades. These games with my family get incredibly noisy but are so so so much fun!! We laughed and yelled and played until 11pm. Steven and I were absolutely exhausted by the time we got home. So exhausted in fact that we didn't even leave the house the following day. We woke up, warmed up our leftovers from Christmas Eve and ate breakfast in bed while watching Despicable Me. It was a much needed lazy day and we pretty much just enjoyed all of our new gifts and the leftover Christmas munchies.

Monday we met up with my dad and his family for dinner at Maggianos and, yes, more gift opening. Phew! And that was the last of our Christmas celebrating. Steven was back at work this morning. It was a really fabulous first Christmas together though and we really just had the best time ever. We were so blessed that Steven had the whole weekend off like that. We know that it's probably not going to happen every year.

p.s. the weather people are predicting snow for tomorrow! Who knows, we might have a white New Years :)