Parents-Only Vacation: Day 3, Woodinville & Vancouver

Whoa! It’s Day 5 of the vacation and I’m a little behind on the recap.

Day 3, Woodinville, WA and Vancouver, BC

From my earlier post about Vancouver, BC, you can tell that Vancouver did not make the best impression on me. It was really due to a combination of things-dirty city, throngs of homeless people, crappy hotel & location, and a realization that Keith and I prefer being in parts of cities that don’t make us feel like we might step on a dirty syringe at any point. But, Day 3 wasn’t all bad. We started the day by heading out of Seattle to Woodinvile, WA, which is about 15 minutes north of Seattle. It’s a cute tiny little town, and it has nothing notable other than wineries and breweries. Keith at St. Michelle

We stopped at Château St. Michelle (We temporarily abandoned our stance against all large commercial operations, 'cause the tour and tasting was free. Yeah, we're that easy to win over). Since we got there relatively early, we got a private tour from Bob. Bob told us all about wine production in Washington and he let us sample some wines. St. Michelle is all over the place so you probably have seen it at the grocery stores. Decent wine, made better by knowing the history, in my opinion. And, Bob was also into cameras so he and Keith had a long and in-depth discussion about their SLR cameras while I sipped my syrah. Across the street was another maker of adult beverages-Red Hook Brewery. For a mere $1, we got a tour and a very healthy sampling round of all their beers. We were hitting the road after the tour, so we took it easy and sampled only a few brews. Good stuff, even for a non-beer drinker such as myself. See how I enjoyed? Trudi Sipping some Red Hook

The rest of the day was disappointing-we got to Vancouver, realized it’s dirty, took a long walk through what turned out to be the worst part (really a fine line between bad and good in this place) and walked past Gastown and through Chinatown. What a crappy Chinatown. Let’s just say that a few posters to the Yahoo TripAdvisor will be hearing from me regarding their rave reviews of the China Town and it’s “open air market”. If by open air market they meant a few long tables with vendors selling things from a dollar store, then sure, it’s a market. Blech. Today was also the worst day of missing the boys, and nothing makes you homesick more than missing your kids and not liking where you are. Thanks a lot, Vancouver. We did find an area of the city that has more young professionals than homeless, Yaletown. It’s clean and has lots of great restaurants and bars. We had excellent Thai food. Or, rather, I should say I had great Thai food. Keith was brave and ordered his food ‘hot’ (rather than playing it save with ‘medium’ or ‘mild’). Our tiny little Asian waitress questioned his choice twice, and gave him a knowing look, but Keith’s not one to shy away from a challenge, and insisted on ‘hot’. I won’t ruin Keith’s storytelling material, but I will say that he played with his food and sat and stared at me eating my meal (of perfect blend of flavor and spiciness) a good bit. That’s all that’s worth mentioning of that day. More about Day 4 soon!

A Letter to Vancouver

Dear City of Vancouver:

We hear you’re hosting the 2010 Winter Olympics. That’s pretty ambitious of you, considering you’re somewhat of a shithole. Admittedly, we just left the cleanest city we’ve ever visited, so it’s only natural that you pale in comparison. So instead of just judging you, we thought we’d make a few suggestions to help you prepare for the thousands of people coming to enjoy what your city has to offer.

1. Put the homeless people to work. Sure, the 2008 Beijing organizers got some flack for putting their throngs of homeless to work beautifying their city, but you have to admit that it’s brilliant. During the 3-4 mile walk we took through your city, we saw more homeless people than normal folks, so there are plenty of idle hands to put to work. While you’ve got the homeless gathered for instruction, you might want to go over the basics of using a bathroom. This will cut down on the urine smell that lingers in the salty air.
2. The swarms of flies. Where are we, Calcutta?
3. Bring in more Russian girls. The natives are not the best looking people, and all the hot chicks we saw spoke Russian.
4. Put a little thought into city improvements. Is the best time to rip up the major road through town at the beginning of summer vacations?

On the positive side, you do offer a wider selection of Cadbury chocolates, so at least you’ve got that going for you. And there does seem to be a small area close to our hotel that offers something for the senses that doesn’t make me want to cover myself in a hazmat suit. Another plus.

Overall, I’d say you have potential, but you’ve let yourself go. It happens. Take a good look in the mirror, and then pull yourself together. The winter snow can only cover so much.

Sincerely,

Not Your Biggest Fans

PS. We wanted to submit pictures for evidence, but our camera is pretty bling-bling, and we were too afraid to take it out of the bag.

Parents-Only Vacation: Day 2, Seattle & Fremont

Friday, 4:37 Pacific Standard Time, Seattle

Today’s highlight was a long afternoon nap. Seriously. I love sleep, and between twin babies, working and keeping the house running, there’s never time for those. Today’s nap was made better by an activity filled morning that wore us out.
Because of the three hour time difference we woke up fairly early. First on the agenda was the Space Needle. Our hotel is only a few steep blocks away from the Seattle Center, the park area that houses the Space Needle and various other museums and attractions. We got to the Space needle just as it opened, and enjoyed the views from the top before the observation deck became crowded. The views were great! We were exploring a different part of Seattle later in the day, so it was nice to be able to see out over those areas to get our bearings.

Next up for us was a little kayaking on Lake Union. Lake Union is a natural lake just north of downtown Seattle that canals were added to connect it to the sound. Its location makes it a perfect place for a little sightseeing-from the lake you can see downtown Seattle, some of the University, the area of Fremont and of course boats, and houseboats. The houseboat used to film Sleepless in Seattle is rumored to be on the lake, we didn’t see it. We kayaked for an hour or so, and then were tired. I imagine Keith was even more tired since we were in a tandem kayak and I took several opportunities to just sit there and enjoy the view, making him paddle twice as hard. Hehehehe.

Kayaking works up an appetite, and after a quick stop at a funky little park we headed to Fremont to have some grub. Hale’s Ales & Pub was great- it’s a microbrewery that had a brewpub and had a great lunch. Fremont is a really quirky little area of Seattle and we explored it before deciding that it was naptime.

Friday, Late. Very late

We met up with an old college friend of Keith’s, and had a great time. Good food, good conversation and a fun visit to an Irish bar with live music. Tomorrow we’re heading to Canada!

Parents-Only Vacation: Day 1, Seattle

Thursday, 11:43AM Eastern Standard Time, En-route to Seattle

We’re on vacation. Finally. Keith and I normally have fairly minimalist approach to traveling, we pack lightly and spend most of our vacations afoot, exploring the destination. But times are a changing, so for the first time this parental unit is going high-tech for a vacation: we’re loaded with electronics! We decided to bring the laptop (along with several other gadgets), which might not mean much to you except that we’ll try to do one or two blog posts along the way. Currently I’m typing while we’re en route to Seattle. This morning was an early, early start. I don’t know *who* picked the 6AM flight, but that person needs to have his vacation planning privileges revoked. Our first flight was to Detroit, and it was quick and uneventful. The most notable moment was when the flight attendant thought I snubbed him after he greeted me as we boarded. It was 5:45AM, I’d been up since 4AM with no coffee yet, we were crowded in the aisle of a very stuffy airplane, and I was anxious/preoccupied about leaving the boys for a week, and I was wondering if I left enough prepared veggies for Gran GG to feed boys, so sorry to Earl on flight 1122, I wasn’t very enthusiastic in my “good morning” greeting. I didn’t think my response was that bad, but it caused Earl to try a different language, so he greeted me in Spanish. I apparently have a little Latina flavor?

Anywho, we got to Detroit, grabbed a bit to eat during what we thought was a 2 hour layover. Turns out that Detroit is not in Central Time zone as aforementioned Vacation Planner thought, and we made it to the boarding gate just in time to board the flight to Seattle. So here we are, with a few dozen immediate friends, crowded & eager to arrive in Seattle.

More from us later, right now I have to perform a Circue de Soleil-esque acrobatic move to catapult over Keith’s enormous electronics bag on my way to the lavatory. That’s suddenly occupied again. Amazing how quickly an old lady who needed assistance boarding will move towards the lavatory once the “occupied” light goes off.

Thursday, 4:23 Pacific Standard Time, at the hotel.

I’m not sure why Frank Sinatra left his heart in San Francisco-‘cause Seattle is a gorgeous city, and feels very similar to San Francisco, just cleaner and with more attractive people. (Sorry San Fran). We’ve had a good first day, we arrived here around 11:45AM local time and made our way to the hotel. After freshening up and guzzling some water we headed out in search of the Pike Place Market.

The Market, I am disappointed to say, was less than impressive. Sure, there’s the fish being thrown, and some attractive stalls with flowers and fresh produce, but there are also some really random sh*t being sold in stalls that reminds me of a flea market that used to operate a few miles outside of Athens, GA. I have strong feelings about flea markets, so part of the Pike Place experience left me wanting a shower. We did grab a few fun bites, some caramelized butter cake at a Swedish stall and a huge apple fritter at another. Here’s Keith, partaking in a healthy* afternoon snack.

In the background is the stall where fish is thrown about. It’s a pretty exciting atmosphere, so exciting in fact, that a tourist passed out and an ambulance came to take her away. We saw her sitting up and talking after the circle of paramedics dispersed around her, so let’s hope she’s doing OK. We headed back towards the hotel, walked (for miles, it felt) through some parks adjacent to the water, which brings us to the present. We’re missing the babies, so we checked in with Gran GG, who sounds like she survived Day 1 of Ellerman Twin Bootcamp. Way to go Gran GG! We love & appreciate you!

Next up for us is the complimentary happy hour at the hotel (whoohooo!) and then dinner at a fun restaurant. Then some ZZZ’s ‘cause we have a full day tomorrow.

*We added some milk to complete the snack. That’s healthy, right?

4th Anniversary

Today, four years ago, Keith and I took the plunge! I can't believe it's only been 4 years, at times it feels like he's been around forever. In a good way, of course.

I'm always up for a little celebration, and today happened to be one of my days at home with the boys, so while Dada was on his way home, we prepared a little surprise for him...


What's in the bucket? A little wine I feel like I can relate to after a long day with two {sometimes} cranky babies.

We drank wine, we ate cheese, we reminisced, reflected and giddily talked about our upcoming anniversary trip to Seattle (killer whales!!). Then we cooked together and gazed lovingly into each others eyes over our creamy tomato & shrimp penne. I couldn't think of a better anniversary dinner. The candleholder on the table are from Grandma and Grandpa Ellerman's house, I like to think of them as good luck for our marriage, so they make an appearance at every special meal.


Here's to having a Rufus-esque marriage, Keith! I love you.