Gabby's Birthday

Gabby turned 23 yesterday! We all met up in Seattle and went to the Seattle Aquarium then out to dinner at nearby Old Stove Brewing, which was yummy.  I can't remember the last time I went to the aquarium; it probably was when I was in elementary school.  There were lots of cool exhibits; my favorite was the river otters-so cute! So glad we got to spend some time with our girl on her birthday!

View of the aquarium and wheel from the parking garage.

Corey & Terrell

Gabby & Ethan 

Walk at Llandover Woods

Today we drove up to Shoreline to do a walk with Gabby and Ethan at a local urban park called Llandover Woods. It was a cute but short & steep loop hike. After we finished we decided to walk around the nearby neighborhood to increase our mileage.  The puppies also wanted to do some more exploring.  Scott and I decided we want to walk/hike at least 500 miles this year. So far we have done 31 miles so I’m hopeful we will reach our goal!

Holiday Weekend

It was so nice to have a 3-day weekend! Scott & I decided to tackle some chores and finally hung the curtains in our office which we bought almost two years ago.  The curtains and the curtain rod had been sitting in our office closet--we totally forgot about them! When I went in there last week to grab something I noticed them and so I told Scott, we MUST get these hung before the summer comes.  Our office faces south so we get a ton of sun exposure. I'm super excited that we finally did it!  We also tackled the garage, cleaning out a few items we were storing for Gabby that she no longer wanted as well as lots of empty boxes and miscellaneous items. We filled up the entire back of the car with the styrofoam we've been collecting for the past two years that we were finally able to drop off on Monday at the recyling place in Kent. Ever since Covid hit they have not been open on the weekends which made it much more challenging to drop it off.  

We stumbled across a new trail near us last week which we checked out on Saturday with the pups. They really liked it!  Afterward we gave them both baths which was very tiring.  We can still fit Rosie in the kitchen sink, but Harvey is so big now we had to use the bathtub in the main bath.  Let's just say he was not a happy camper.  He hated it even more when we had to blow dry and brush them.  He lost a lot of "stress" hair.  We had to do a lot of vacuuming afterwards!

We also watched Eternals finally now that it's on Disney+.  Both of us thought it was ok, definitely not a typical Marvel movie.  We scored it a B-.  

On Monday we met up with some friends for a lovely lunch at Boathouse 19 on the Tacoma waterfront. It was a really nice place & had great food. We also had a lovely view of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge.  Meanwhile Gabby & Ethan went up to Deception Pass to go hiking & birding. They had a great time! Unfortunately, Corey had to work so she & Terrell didn't get to do anything fun. 

Harvey being helpful while Scott was hanging the rod.

The finished product. Do you see anything wonky? We didn't realize until after we hung the curtains that they're two different lengths!  We had never opened them until now so it was pretty surprising & funny. We decided to put the shorter one behind Scott's desk and are waiting to see if anyone notices.  

The hiking route they took. 

It was super foggy this weekend and you can see some of it lingering.

Ethan is the tree hugger this time!

Random Happenings

Not a ton to post but wanted to mention it was Scott’s 55th birthday on Saturday the 8th!  After having to spend the holidays apart, it was really nice to have the girls down to celebrate.  They came around 3 o’clock and we played some of the games we got for Christmas gifts, had dinner, and then played some more games before Gabby had to leave to head back to Seattle. Corey and Terrell ended up spending the night and in the morning we caravanned over to Point Defiance for a hike with Teresa and her dogs Logan and Aspen.  It was a beautiful morning although quite cool.  Today we finished our one year 1000 hour outside challenge. Although we didn’t quite make it we ended up with 465 hours which is not bad considering we work full-time and we had the puppies to contend with. Part of that time Harvey was housebound but I think overall we did a pretty good job. We’re not doing that challenge again this year and Scott is happy because he got tired of having to count our hours but I’m glad we did it. Even if we don’t count our outside hours anymore we will try and get out as much as we can especially now that the puppies are a bit older and we can do some more road trips to hikes a little bit further away.

New Year’s Day Hike at Wilburton Hill Park

Happy New Year!  Hard to believe another year has come to an end! 2021 ended up being another year of Covid which was a bummer, but some positive things happened: Harvey came into our lives, Rozanne and Jarem came to visit, we completed 10 volksmarches and we got our new car Olaf. 

We decided to start 2022 with a hike so we met up with Gabby and Ethan in Bellevue at Wilburton Hill Park.  There was still a lot of snow on the trails, but not too bad. Some slips here and there but no falls. The puppies loved the park and getting to run around in the snow.  Afterwards we stopped at PCC Market for some food from their deli and bakery before heading home.  

Gabby asked us if we made any new year’s resolutions and I said that we hadn’t.  I’m just hoping for some return to normalcy around here. We hope to get back to some activities that we haven’t been able to do the past couple years like attending a Mariner’s game and a bit of traveling.  Fingers crossed!

We walked to the Botanical Garden but couldn’t go in as no dogs are allowed.

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