Seattle Part 4 - Sunday Morning

After stuffing ourselves once again at the amazing breakfast buffet we headed out to the Woodland Zoo. Since we had three attractions to cover that day as well as the drive home we started early. Arriving at the Zoo right when it opened had its ups and downs though. A lot of the first animals we got to were still sleeping and since it was day light savings 9:30 was still really 8:30 am to them. For the first hour of our walk though we barely saw another person though. This was nice because it was quiet and the animals were relatively close to us at each enclosure.

~She Lion~

~Rawley standing about 1 foot away from 2 HUGE Brown Bears~

~Rawley & the Komodo Dragon~

~Jaguar...which I thought were black~

~Rawley's favorite of the day - The Penguins~

The Woodland Zoo was really neat and totally different than our zoo here. Here it is just a bunch of huge cages out in the open. The Woodland zoo is more of a little maze type trail all around huge enclosures that resemble a more natural habitat for the animals. A lot of the trail is only 4-8 feet wide with huge trees on both sides. It would be a great place to go on a hot day because there is so much shade. I nice leisurely walk through the whole thing could take up to 4 hours I would assume. We power walked from exhibit to exhibit and skipped one path. It took us 2 hours. It was a great way to start off our day though and given the chance I would go back.

Seattle Part 3 - Saturday Afternoon & Night

As I mentioned we got lost on our way to target and ended up going straight for lunch. We had planned to meet Elijah at McDonald's by the Science Centre. The problem was when we got there a line of about 30 teenagers come outside of McDonald's and across the parking lot. As Teenagers left groups of 20 or more came. There was no way we were eating there. So we waited to Elijah and then headed to the food court...which was closed because of a power outage in the building. Boo. After walking for 30 minutes looking for food I was no longer a happy girl. I was tired and hungry (it has been 6 hours since our breakfast) and felt we were wasting out time. So we gave up on food and went to the Science Center hoping there was some kind of food there.

Thank goodness there was a cafe. They were out of almost everything but corn dogs.. I am telling you that was the best tasting corn dog I have ever had in my life. I hate Corn Dogs so I must have been hungry. Once we were all fed it was time to start exploring. Now The Science Center is not quite as cool as our Science World but it was still a lot of fun. We spend 2.5 hours walking around in there.

~Rawley & Elijah changing the ramp pattern to see what happens to the ball~

~Taking a look outside through the Periscope~

~Rawley's enormous head in the funky mirror~

~Rawley played Tic-Tac-Toe against the robot and won, Elijah tied~

~Me sitting at the Giant Table~

After we were done at the Science Centre we headed up to Bonnie's. That is a family friend of mine and Elijah's Oma. We were able to get a pleasant but too short visit in with her. Between needing to feed us and the kids and then sharing the floor with 4 kids....we didn't get to chat as much as I had hoped. We will be going back down to see her in July once Baby is here though.

We also had to head back to the hotel with enough time to take Rawley swimming. We stayed at a hotel with a pool for that very reason and this would be our last chance. The pool was a little cold and I would have been happy to sit in the hot tub instead all night, but Rawley begged and pleaded for me to go in the pool with him. Once I finally agreed I got in and he stood on the side saying it was too cold. Eventually we were both in the pool and got to have some fun.

~Ready, Set, JUMP~

~This one turned out blurry but I love Rawley's pose in it~

~Rawley's idea of swimming~

Once again Rawley wasn't in bed until well after 10pm but as soon as his head hit that pillow he was out! I planned by night a little better this time. I had my cellphone MP3 player and my headphones, I took some melatonin and had some chamomile tea before bed. I slept like a baby. From 11:30-6. If Rawley & Ryan snored I had no idea. We did lose an hour of sleep though which was kind of a bummer.

Seattle Part 2 - Saturday Morning

Saturday morning we got a pretty early start as Rawley woke up early. We started out day with Continental breakfast at our hotel. It was amazing. It is buffet style and we had plenty to choose from. They had a warmer with eggs and biscuits & gravy, cups of yogurt, 3 cereals, 4 kinds of toast and make your own waffles. There was a batter dispenser and 2 waffle makers. They were yummy. We all pigged out because well it was free food. The best kind.

We were on the road by 9 am and headed to the Aquarium at Pier 59. We were a tad early by the time we got there and parked, it was really cold and windy and I had to pee to we went to Starbucks. At 9am that is the only thing open. Rawley got a child sized steamed milk with caramel.
Rawley wanted to see all the shows at the Aquarium but we only had time to see one of them. We watched two divers feed and talk about fish that are common there in the Washington waters. Then we walked through the whole tour. Rawley held the map and told us where we had to go. Because we skipped the 2nd show we were able to walk through the entire Aquarium and spend time reading about most of the stuff. The tour starts off with all the domestic fish including our JellyFish
and our star fish, urchins, sea cucumber, shrimp, snails......
Then we moved on to the Tropical fish, which were amazing, they are all so beautiful and brightly coloured. This may not be one of the more beautiful ones, but I sure like it.

Then we moved on the information about whales and the live Sea Lions & Otters. The otters were so cute.

In total we spent just over 2 hours in the aquarium. It was a lot of walking and standing so I was actually quite relieved that is was time to go have lunch and meet Rawley's friend Elijah to take them to the Space Center. We had planes to stop at a Target on our way there but by the time the GPS lost us among the tall building and we missed a few turns from it...we had already wasted too much time.

The GPS proved to be a challenge the whole trip. Rawley will be happy to tell you all about how Ryan and I got mad a lot at it. Over all I am glad we had it. We made little stops here and there at places we would not been able too find, and it always got us there eventually. The problems were plentiful though. A. when we were right in the city it often lost us among the tall buildings therefore we would miss turns or make wrong turns sending us in circles. B. the lady is not very clear with her directions or pronunciation...so it was hard to know what she always meant (example. The I 405 was referred to as I4West5). and C. Seattle is just messed up. Their exits are not just one exit, it exits and then splits into 3 different places. So you know you have to exit but then are not entirely sure where to go; their roads turn weird and split often....SO "stay to the left, exit right, and veer left", is a very confusing comand when there are 8 road options in front of you and the are driving 60 miles per hour.

Seattle Trip Part 1 - Friday Night

Friday night we headed out to Seattle right from my work. We stopped for dinner at Subway in Lynden then headed straight through. We arrived at the Space Needle at about 8pm. Our CityPasses that we bought gave us the chance to do it twice in a 24 hour period. This gives you the chance to go up once at night and once during the day. It is a good thing we tried to take advantage of this by going Friday night on our way into town because we never had time to go up again. Rawley was very excited.

Once up the space needle there were all kinds of interactive tv/computer screens where you could learn about the history of Seattle, find cool landmarks, and watch a full 24 hour day take place. The last one was Rawley's favorite. It was 4 tv screens together with a panoramic view of Seattle and you started at midnight and could turn the dial as fast or as slow as you wanted to watch a whole day take place. It was neat to see the sun rise and all the shadows move across the town. It was also really cool to see all the boats that come and go in a day.

This is a view looking straight down from the outside viewing deck. It was mightly cold at 9pm on a windy day to stand outside on the viewing deck but I sure and glad we did it.


Rawley and Ryan took turns looking at parts of the city up close. They did have some binocular things that were for kids. They had a stool placed by them , but Rawley was still too small that all he could look at through them was the sky.

When booking our hotel we had a choice of getting a room with an extra bed at the cost of $20 per night. We had a pretty tight budget to go by to make this weekend happen and $40 plus tax was a lot of money so we decided Rawley could just sleep on the love seat or on the floor. Well there was no love seat and pretty much no room on the floor. I don't know what pictures they had on line for adversiting but they were not pictures of our room. Luckily for us besides sleeping we spent less than 2 hours in our room. Unlucky for Rawley: he had to sleep under the table. At first he was a little peeved about the idea but he got over it in about 10 seconds and never said anything about it again. Both nights he was not in bed till at least 10pm and so exhausted from our day that he fell asleep within minutes of laying down.
Friday night was a rough night for me. I don't sleep well on the best of nights but at home I have a fan to drown out Ryan's snoring/heaving breathing. Friday night I had no fan. AND I had two Snorers/heavy breathers....... I slept maybe 4 hours in total. Rawley was up by 6:40 on Saturday.

Thanks For The Heads Up

This week we did not have enough bread or cheese to make Rawley lunch for today. I knew this on Sunday but thought I would just figure something out Thursday night and all would be fine. We were suppose to go out last night anyway to the store so I would pick something up for him.

Yesterday did not quite go as planned... I went from work to the hospital (I'll get to why) and spent 3 hours there. I had 2 loads of laundry to do once I got home. Ryan could not have started it because I was wearing the pants that needed to go in the dark load AND the white sweatshirt that needed top go in the white load. Once I was out of hospital there was no time to go out. It was a mad mad house of :
passports? check
birth certificate? check
marriage certificate? check (because I have not got a new passport yet)
clothes? check
Citypass? check
money? check
dvd play...camera...video camera...toothburshes.......check..check..check..check

I guess you get the idea. So this morning I was going to get up early and get Rawley up early leaving us time to run to PriceSmart to get Rawley some lunch. I did not get up early. I was tired and wanted my extra 40 minutes of sleep. We got up at our usual time... rushed through breakfast, dressing, last minute packing and were finally out the door.
Late mind you.
Now Save-On-Food is open at 6am so I just assumed that PriceSmart (being the same company) was as well..they say you should never assume because it makes and ass out of you and me........
We are now late, the store is closed and Rawley still does not have lunch.
Safeway was open but once we got inside Rawley took forever to decide what he wanted. I didn't even know those Lunchsnack things had so many options. It used to be Ham or Turkey with yellow or white cheese... Now you can have tacos, fajitas, pizza, nachos, hotdogs, nuggets, or crackers and cheese.... Gee wizz.... Have they never seen the McDonalds commercial... "Kids love to have a choices.....it just takes them a while".......Come on Rawley.......

Finally he picks his lunch and we fly out the door and off to daycare.... As I am hanging up his backpack I see the notice posted above the sign-in sheet

"Friday March 12th... Spaghetti with Garlic toast for lunch, Please just pack snacks"......

Tammy "Um where was that sign yesterday?"
DayCare Lady "oh, I think it got posted later in the day"

okay then.... "Rawley don't eat your lunch....save it and you can have it on the way to Seattle tonight."


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Side note: Hospital

Wednesday I started to experience some pretty intense chest pains. I ignored them thinking it was just heartburn. Wednesday night I was in a acute pain.... Still thinking it was heartburn I did not want to go to the hospital and make a fool of myself. I huffed, puffed, cried, waited it out. Ryan talked to his dad who thought it sounded more like gallbladder attacks or gallstones. Yesterday I made it through most of the day then near the end the pains were back, I was dizzy and having trouble breathing. The nurses hotline told me to go to hospital as did Ryan and his parents...so I went.
In the end it is one of two things.
Gastritis or Gallbladder.
Doctor is leaning more towards gastritis.. She changed my meds to something stronger than Zantac. Now that I am almost 25 week I can take better stuff.. If in 6 days this meds have not kicked in they will order an ultrasound and check out my gallbladder.....
Today so far I feel fine.

I have my bag packed with all the drugs I could ever need and I will take them and enjoy my wonderful weekend in Seattle....while eating small frequent meals that are non-greasy. Pretty much if the food has no flavour what-so-ever it is safe for me to eat.

Have a great weekend everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No Tupperware For Me

I got a message in my inbox yesterday that a friend was having a Tupperware Party at her house. I immediately got excited because there are 2 things I really want to get from Tupperware. I don't know anyone who sells it so I replied and told her that there were some things I wanted and could I please order them even if I can't come to the party...

As I waited her reply I went online to the TupperWare website to find the item numbers and price. My dad has always had the big green (they are no longer green) vegetable crisper in his fridge for all the carrots, celery, cucumbers and what not. I remember it being handy because you wash all your veggies and then they are just there ready to eat. My grandma also has the same container and I long for one. This was the first item I really wanted. I have also been looking for cereal containers for the cupboard. I found some at the grocery store but they are so ridiculously large that I wouldn't have room for them. So I wanted to get the nice TupperWare ones.

Then.....I found then on the website and realized I maybe should have looked into it a bit further before telling my friend I was going to buy them....

I ended up eating my words and sending a email back to her along these lines......

"Well the cost of what I want from TupperWare is about the same as the swing I want to buy for baby. I can only have one or the other. I have a feeling when the baby is screaming because he just wants to be rocked and I have to pee or eat or do laundry I am not going to give a damn if my veggies are crisp and my cereal is organized...Guess I am not buying Tupperware."

~It seems like a pretty obvious choice~

Maybe I will check out Value Village and MCC, they sometimes have TupperWare there.

New Purse

I got a new purse for Christmas was Ryan's Mom & Dad. When it arrived it was the wrong colour which was a bummer. It took awhile to get all the information for an exchange and then for me to actually stop procrastinating and send it away for an exchange. The replacement purse..in black instead of brown arrived on last Friday. The cool thing about the purse is that it comes in two colours: black and brown, then it has a bunch of different shells that you can put on it. The purse is magnetic (earth magnets as to not deactivate credit cards and such). So you buy the purse once and then buy different shells for it to charge it completely.
I love this idea because sometimes you want to have a pretty purse for the evening but don't want to move everything from your one purse to the other. This way I don't have too. I just take off one shell and put on a different one. If I feel plain I can leave the shells off and just have a cute black purse.
It also comes with short and long handles which are pretty easy to change up. So, far I am loving my purse. Rawley decided I should use the blue shell for now and I really love it. I also have a pink shell and a brown one (both of which I have no pictures of at this time).
Here is the link just in case you want to check it out. http://www.michebag.com/



Rawley managed to survive the morning wait at the Lab. We arrived at 6:25am and sat there till 8:02. It was surprisingly pleasant. We played a board game, then we played Go Fish while Rawley text messaged back and forth to Grandma Pat. Shortly after he got bored of both of those a really nice man came and sat beside us. He was quick to make friends with Rawley and chat about stuff. He was also good at making Origami. He told Rawley that he was making him something and from that point on had Rawley's full attention. He made Rawley a blow up frog and a box. Some how that managed to take up just over and hour and a half and then we were free.

~ Rawley sending texts to Grandma..his spelling is getting good.~