Seattle: Week 1

Well, we made it through our first week here in Seattle and we couldn't be happier!  Our stuff finally arrived (including my computer) and we already feel like we are at home.  We've had a pretty busy week.  Nate started the internship at Amazon working on the Musical Instruments team and has really enjoyed it so far.  The highlight of him working there (for me) is that on his first day he received a free Kindle Touch.  SOOO excited about that and I've already read 1.5 books on it... go me!  It has been interesting living here without a car but it actually feels really good to do so much walking.  I just have to sacrifice my fashion and wear my walking/running shoes but I just try not to look at my feet :)  Anyway, Nate had a pretty long walk to work (25-30 minutes) and he eventually broke down and rented a bike for the summer for pretty cheap and cut his commute to about 15 minutes.  I really lucked out because we live in an awesome location.  We are less than a mile from Pikes Place Market and the Aquarium, and a few blocks from the Seattle Center, which has The Pacific Science Center, the Space Needle, this huge International Fountain, a Children's Museum, etc., we live right off Puget Sound and can walk for miles up and down the waterfront, and we live right next door to Sculpture Park.  I know, we scored big time!  All these places are so close that even when we get a car (which will be next weekend), it would feel silly driving to them, so we'll still probably walk.  

My ONLY complaint about our exact location is that we are at the bottom of a couple of seriously steep hills.  Like, super steep.  To be honest, they are totally manageable when you walk it yourself, but when you push a super heavy BOB stroller with two grown little girls, with your backpack, camera, etc, you are already sweating after you make it up the terrible two's.  Those two hills lead to the Seattle Center, Amazon, Grocery shopping, and pretty much everything besides the aquarium and waterfront walking.  BRUTAL!

Anyway, here are a few a lot of pics from our last week.  We'll start with our place...

HOME: 

View of apartment from entry way.

Our kitchen.

Living/Dining room.

Hallway that leads to the two bedrooms and two bathrooms.

Example of one of our super steep hills.  This one isn't actually ours (it's at Pike's) but it's pretty comparable.  And yes, this is what I look like every time I push the beastly stroller up the hill :)

Looking down one of our actual hills.  This pic doesn't do it justice though.

 And just for kicks, here are a few pics of Nate and Ruby from this evening.  Rube was crying (I think she is teething) and so we gave her some Tylenol and let it settle in a bit before putting her back to bed.  She was PUMPED to be up with mom and dad.

SO excited :)

Look at her cheesing it up!

Such a daddy's girl!

Our first week we were able to get out a lot since the weather was awesome.  We went to the aquarium,  the Seattle Center, Pikes Place Market a couple of times, and some other places.  Here are a few pics from there.

AQUARIUM:

This guy was pretty funny.  I don't know if he just noticed Lyla and Ruby but he kept swimming back and forth and looked like he was just checking us out.  

Oh, Ruby.  She gave me this look after I was calling her and telling her she needed to stay next to me.  Apparently she was REALLY ready to move on to the next thing.

Cute girls.  Lyla is getting SUPER tall and almost all her shirts are either the right length and baggy or they are super short.  

Can I just say, how cute is Ruby's hair in a ponytail?  This was her first one ever and I think she looks adorable!

These sea otter's were so cute.  The two otter's above are a mommy and baby and the baby is actually nursing while the mom is cleaning herself or something.  The blob in front is actually the grandma and she was coating herself with oil from her butt :)  Gross but kind of cool to see.

Lyla with the river otter's.

Cute river otter's.

I think one of Ly and Rube's favorite part of the aquarium were tide pools where they could touch star fish, sea anemone's, etc.  One of the worker's actually took a couple of starfish and put them into a bowl and let the girls see the starfish turn over, and one of them was actually eating a muscle and we could see its stomach and everything.  Kinda fun.

Ruby's hair is getting so light and is getting a reddish tint to it.  Adorable!

After the aquarium we got some ice cream and headed up to Pike's Place Market, which was right up the street.  It was so fun to see what the hype was about and I sort of fell in love with the whole thing.  BEAUTIFUL flower's, fresh produce, random Seattle souvenirs, , men throwing huge fish, street singer's... what more could you ask for?  

A WALK:

Later that day we decided to meet Nate half way on his way home from work.  

Look at how beautiful this tree is!  There were a ton of pink and purple tree's like this all over the place!  This one is one we saw on the way to meet Nate from work.

PACIFIC SCIENCE CENTER/SEATTLE CENTER:

A couple of days later we met up with a fellow Amazon family (well, us wives and our kids did) at the Pacific Science Center at the Seattle Center.  I didn't get very many pics but here are a couple of cute ones...

Ruby loved this water spot and ended up soaking wet all over her sleeves.  She's a doll!

Lyla and Rube enjoyed watching a little science presentation.

After the Science Center, the girls and I wondered around the Seattle Center to see what was there and where things were.  We heard there were a couple of fountains that kids could play in.  What I came across I was not expecting...

International Fountain

Huge, right?  And every 30 minutes they blast some music and shoot the water out in rhythm with the music and typically end it with shooting water out the top with these water cannon's so the water goes SOOO high.  Kind of a fun place for a hot day!

The Space Needle is HUGE.

PIKES PLACE MARKET:

On Saturday we really wanted to go out and have some fun with Nate.  We decided to go to Pike's Place and the Mall.

The Silver Man at Pikes Place Market.  The guy charges $1 for a pic with him.  Lame, but we did it anyway :)

Nate bought me these BEAUTIFUL flower's for a late Mother's Day celebration since our Mother's Day was pretty crazy with moving and all that came with it.

Lyla and Ruby were totally captivated by these gospel singing men.  They insisted on getting out of the stroller so they could dance and clap along with them, praising the Lord! :)

And then today we went to our ward for the first time and it seems like a great ward.  The nursery is actually in a full-on basement dedicated to just the nursery.  This was only Ruby's 2nd time going to nursery and she did awesome.  Nate stayed with her for 5 minutes and she seemed fine and so he left and she did great the entire time.  And then the bishop wanted to see new families in his office after Sacrament and while we were in there, Lyla kept asking me, "Mom, can I go to my class now?"  So I took her to Primary and she went straight to her seat and didn't fuss or complain once.  My kids are awesome! And then to top our Sunday off, we had dinner with the same Amazon family we went to the Science Center with and we had a great time.

Anyway, have have been having a blast and we are excited for our summer here.  I have a feeling we're going to be a little sad leaving this place when the time comes.  It'll be bittersweet.  This next week will probably be a little less exciting since it's supposed to rain all week and with no car, that doesn't work out too well.  And then next weekend we are heading to Portland to visit our good friends the Kizerian's.

Life is good :)