Seattle Has ONE Nice Day

This Saturday the clouds parted and we had one day (out of 12 consecutive days of rain) to make some progress on our raised beds. We have devised a plan to keep the nasty neighborhood cats out of our veggie garden by draping bird netting over the hoops. And speaking of hoops...it seemed like a good time to take the hula hoops out for a spin!

St. Louis in less than 4 days

Last week was a multi-purpose trip to St. Louis. Colby attended and presented at the annual SAA conference. I decided to tag along so we could make it a family visit and to meet some of my colleagues at AT&T.

The absolute highlight of the trip was spending the weekend with Mike, Missy, Carlyn and Chris. They showed us a good midwestern time that included some serious youth sports action, BBQ and family togetherness. We miss them already!

Ribs 'n Thangs

Friend, colleague, and raconteur James was in Seattle from Japan for a few days, and we celebrated his return to the U.S. of A. with a good 'ol rib smoke. Started off with some homemade sausages for lunch, then smoked four racks of ribs to go with our cole slaw, baked beans, cornbread, and wasabi-flavored Kit Kats (James brought that from Japan). Then we all laid around and groaned while loosening our pants. Success.

First Climb of the Season -- Mt. Pilchuck, Washington

Well, my ski buddy Adam and I had planned to do some backcountry skiing and snowboarding up at the old Mt. Pilchuck ski area last weekend, and we took off from Seattle early Saturday morning with visions of spring t-shirt skiing (it was sunny and 60 degrees last weekend). However, as we approached the parking area we noticed things looking pretty green where we expected to be linking turns. Tough sledding for sure. So we ditched the downhill gear and strapped our snowshoes onto our packs and headed up the trail -- in the summer there is a hiking trail to the summit and a fire lookout tower. About halfway up the trail we finally hit the snow, and switched to snowshoes for the final ascent. Couldn't have been a nicer day with 360 degree viewed of the Cascade mountains from Mt. Baker to Mt. Rainier from the lookout. Looks like the end of ski season means the beginning of hiking season, which is just fine with me.

I Want to be a Freedom Dancer

Nothing says "Happy Anniversary" like a 1980's cabaret/theater production! Colby and I celebrated our anniversary a little early by taking in a show with good friends this weekend. The Soft Rock Kid was full of 8o's music and dancing that followed (very loosely) a Karate Kid story line. This was such an original idea for a show - singing and dancing and jokes about the 80's. It was all I could do not to run on the stage and join the Freedom Dancers. If only I had a pair of leg warmers in my purse.

Be Mine

Valentine's Day 2010 did not disappoint. Colby hand-made this Domo Kun night light for me. Domo is my favorite Japanese monster whom we became acquainted with on our trip to Japan last spring. Our special dinner was the handcrafted sausage that you see in the previous post. This particular sausage is the Hungarian variety. It was so tasty...like authentic Hungarian goulash in the form of a sausage.

SausageFest 2010

SausageFest 2010 was a huge success -- 50 lbs of pork shoulder cut up, ground, and stuffed into casings. Italian sausage, Hungarian paprika sausage, Southwestern green chile, and British bangers. Lots of sausage and lots of beer on a 56 degree Feb. 6 day in Seattle. Couldn't be much better.