NKOTB

me & Amanda

Amanda was in town this weekend for the New Kids on the Block concert! It well surpassed all of my expectations. I was not expecting to scream like a 10 year old girl when they came on stage, but we all did! Anyway, they sounded great and looked good dancing. Yes, all retro dance moves were performed.


Joey is still my favorite! Gotta love the blue eyes and Boston accent!


Here are the boys doing Step by Step!

San Juan Islands

We celebrated our third anniversary back in October with a long weekend in the San Juan Islands. Here are some of my favorite photos from the trip. Better late than never, right?


San Juan Vineyards


Mona, the camel that lives across the street from the vineyard


what your pants look like when a camel tries to eat your leg


we stayed at the Friday Harbor House (on the left)


view of Friday Harbor from our room's balcony


we hiked and saw some amazing sights and wildlife: seals, purple sea stars, porpoise, eagles, bull kelp, anemone . . . but no Orcas


that big seal was not a fan of the small seal - a lot of barking was going on


lighthouse at Lime Kiln State Park


Cattle Point Lighthouse


Is it sad that this is the only photo of Mike from the trip? And yes, the mustache came with us.


getting ready to kayak


kayaking in the Haro Strait was by far the best part of the trip

free trees

For some reason I have never seen PhinneyWood before, but am really excited to have found it.

Tomorrow our neighborhood will be planting trees in the planter strips. We got 22 trees free from the city along with 1700 daffodil bulbs to scatter around the planter strips, parks, and roundabouts. Mike and I have 4 trees to plant at our house tomorrow. Anyone want to help? PhinneyWood will be around our streets to take pictures of the event!

election party 2008

Oscar

Oscar was not at the election party and I'm pretty sure he's not old enough to vote, but that picture is too cute not to post!

Mike and I hosted an election party last night. As we all waited to find out the fate of our country for the next 4 years we drank a lot of beer and ate a lot of tacos. It was great to see that our friends got out to vote (some made it to the polls for WA's last year of polls and some filled out their mail in ballots yesterday at Taco Bell). Polls closed at 8:00 PM Pacific here in WA and at that exact time Obama was declared the winner. Hooray for democracy!

SOFT in AZ

I just got back last night from a week long conference in Arizona. It was sunny and 95 degrees all week long. It was a nice break from the rain here in Seattle. The conference was held at the Arizona Grand Resort. Here are a few photos from my trip. I didn't bring a camera - all photos are courtesy of my coworker Brianna (she is a loser and wanted me to make sure I gave her credit). I put where everyone is from in the captions in case you don't know who they are.


the desert we hiked through


a very, very old saguaro cactus

I learned from Amanda, another one of my coworkers, that the saguaro cactus does not grow an arm until it is as least 75 years old. And Amanda is a native of Arizona so she would know.


Ed (WI), Brianna (WA) and me at a vendor happy hour


Asa (WA) presenting his poster on ethanol found in fruit and whether it will effect breath test results


Amanda (WA), Ryan (WI), me, Ed (WI), Brianna (WA), and Bill (WI) at the masquerade ball


without masks


me, Ed (WI), and Amanda (WA) dancing it up