Spontaneity

We had no plans for the weekend. We had thought about it all week..."what are we going to do this weekend?" Well, after an uneventful, lazy Saturday morning, we decided to be spontaneous. We walked to downtown Redmond, then hopped on a bus to downtown Seattle. From there, we hiked down to the waterfront, and caught a ferry to Bainbridge Island. After hoofing it around Bainbridge for a while, we were ravishingly hungry, not to mention a bit overheated (it was mid 80's on this lovely cloudless day). We popped into a small cafe, and made the mistake of being seated prior to looking at a menu. It was a yummy meal, but we walked away with a weeks worth of food budget out of our pockets...Ouch! (Did I mention we have suddenly become a frugal couple?) We walked back to the ferry docks just in time to walk on the 7:10pm ferry back to Seattle. After a hike back up to the bus stop, we hopped back on the bus headed home. We made one last spontaneous stop getting off a couple stops early to grab a blizzard a DQ for the warm walk home (hey, we already blew our budget...what's a few more bucks!?!). Ah, a very nice day!


A token picture taken just for the purpose of posting on this blog (i.e. proof)

Not this time

Well, turns out that the home owners accepted the other offer (they had three, of the three, two were good (ours was one of the good ones, but I guess not good enough)). They wanted to keep us as a back up, but we didn't want to be kept on the hook, so we just said "no thanks." It is a little disappointing, but we have been praying that God's will be done, so we are content to keep our eyes and ears open so we can continue to follow His lead. I guess the only sad part is that Doug put his car up for sale so we would have extra cash for the purchase of the home, and today he has to deliver it to its new owner. Again we are praying that God's will be done, so maybe this is all part of our Creator's grand plan. Doug says "when you pray for open doors, the open doors don't always lead where you expect them to go."

Birthdays, 4th of July and more

Time sure flies when you are having fun! June flew by with our cruise, then a visit from Atlanta friend David, then a week long celebration of me getting old. Woot! I actually worked on my birthday, but I brought in cupcakes to celebrate. The real celebration took place at mom and dad's where we splashed in the kiddy pool, ate out at the Wok About Grill, then came home to homemade cheesecake with fresh picked raspberries...YUM!!


Then July snuck up on us. Johnny got older too (Happy birthday from afar!). We celebrated the 4th of July with friends at their house on the lake and enjoyed good food and lots of fireworks (so many that it was nearly 11:30pm by the time they got to the "big ones").

The Thursday before the 4th, we peeked at some houses, and to our surprise, we actually liked them. Our favorite one was an older home with tons of squarefootage (K and J...I think we would have more than enough space for you to stay on furlough). So, today, with stomach(s) churning, we put in an offer. We won't hear back until Friday as the owner is out of town at the moment, so until then just know that we will be on pins and needles.

Anyone up for a BBQ?

We splurged today. We somehow got it into our minds that chicken tastes better straight off the grill. So, we went out and bought little Weber grill. I am sure the 70 degree weather and sunshine helped with this decision. We had the chicken marinading while we went out in search of the grill. We brought it home, set it up, and fired it up. We then enjoyed yummy moist BBQ chicken, and hopefully we will have many more chances this summer to grill.


A man and his grill

Alaska Cruise - day seven - Victoria BC Canada

Victoria was a late stop. We didn't arrive at this port until 7pm, so we had most of the day at sea. We slept in a bit, then joined up with the Beggs to play Catan and cards. We had our last fancy dinner on the boat after packing our bags, then headed out to explore. This was the first port where we weren't immediately at the center of downtown as we stepped off. We picked up a map, and chose the shortest walking tour to town (30min). Once we got downtown we had a beautiful view of the Empress hotel and parliament buildings along with the setting sun. We walked back in the last rays of daylight, then headed to bed. Tomorrow morning we will be back in Seattle, and that will be the end of our cruising adventure...for now :0)

Alaska Cruise - day six - Ketchikan

Ah, another Alaskan shop 'til you drop massive tourism town. The town was a little bigger and a little busier than the previous two towns, but there wasn't a whole lot to do except for shopping. The streets were lined with jewelry stores and souvenir shops, so after an hour of wandering around we decided we would prefer relaxing on the viewing deck of the boat. From the viewing deck, we watched a bald eagle fly by and land on the roof of a house nearby. We also watched the crew on the next cruise ship over participate in emergency water raft maneuvers in their outdoor pool. We stayed at our perch while our boat left the docks in hopes of seeing whales. We saw some porpoise, but finally gave up on seeing whales. While we were in the middle of the boat, we heard people talking about the hundreds of whales swimming right by! We ran out to the deck to see, and caught a glimpse of the end of the pod swimming by...mostly just tails and fins, but still very cool.

Alaska Cruise – day five – Juneau

Today was a stop at the mining town of Juneau. We woke up, had room service deliver breakfast to our room, then headed out to the town in search of Chad and Sarah. We found them, but split up again to do our own tour of Juneau. We took a tram up the mountain side, and marveled at the views from above. We could see our cruise boat along with three others at the dock, and had a great view of town. After hiking about a bit up top, we came down and window shopped for a bit before heading back to the boat. We then relaxed in the viewing deck area and ended up seeing three sightings of whales! However none of our pictures turned out that great of the whales…they were hard to catch on film (or should I say memory card ;0)) We took a gamble, and gambled at the casino this evening. We bought in with $10, won some more, but left with nothing. Oh well, it was a fun use of ten bucks. After some games with the Beggs, we are now heading to bed.