Walk Around Town

Yesterday we walked down to the arboretum and visited the Japanese Garden. Part of the Arboretum was closed and we ended up taking a longer scenic trip around. Sam was fascinated by the huge fish, especially the dead one being eaten by a turtle. Ah, the circle of life.
Sam made a wish in the Kobe lantern.
We ended up back in Capitol Hill later in the afternoon for some frozen yogurt. Sam checked out Jimmy Hendrix and we all checked out a cool new-to-us toy store, Izilla Toys, where Sam got some magnetic letters and reading workbooks.
While we relaxed in Cal Anderson Park, I managed to get a few rows in on my new scarf.

Hiking in Paradise

On Saturday, we finally made our way down to Mount Rainier, the mountain in the Pacific Northwest. Yes, there are many mountains in this area, but this one really dominates the vistas. We weren't really planning this trip, but when we woke up and Ari realized his afternoon plans were canceled, we quickly packed up and headed out the door. We weren't prepared for the 3 hour drive to get there (it looks so big from and close to Seattle) or the difficulty adjusting to the altitude, but did end up enjoying ourselves eventually. We spent our time in the area called Paradise--just about rightly so, I'd say. Here are some pictures for you to judge for yourself.


We were about 5500 feet up, though no where near the top at over 14,000 feet. The snow line was at about 7000 feet, though there were a good handful of pockets of snow at our level on a warm, sunny August day. One of the guides told us that the snow had only just mostly melted a few weeks ago. We read in Sam's book about Washington state, that Mount Rainier is the snowiest place in the world, out of places that measure snow! Sam threw a few snowballs, saw a few waterfalls, saw a glacier, stopped to smell the wild mountain flowers, and made a friend. While it admittedly took us a bit to warm up, Sam's opinion went from "this is NOT the greatest trip ever" to "this was a really good idea you had, Daddy." All told, we were on the mountain about 6 hours which included a much needed lunch break at the Paradise Inn.

You can see many more pictures from our day at Mount Rainier on my flickr site here.

Back to the Blog with a Birthday

Well, I'm sorry I've been incommunicado for the past week. We had a fun trip to Maryland to visit many of Sam's cousins...

...including the newest one of the bunch, Baby Will.


We spent most of our time swimming (and, ahem, eating). Sam was excited to practice his Olympic "dives" into the shallow end with (and even sometimes WITHOUT) swimmies. Not bad for a kiddo that hasn't been in a proper pool in the past year. Seattle fountains, wading pools, and lakes just aren't cutting it, so we're hoping to get him into a swimming class this year. He's certainly game, and as he says, "brave enough to go under the water."


I will continue to post some pictures and details of our trip to Maryland, but for now, I just wanted to make sure today to say:

Happy Birthday, Guggie!

By the way, in case this picture is confusing to some: that is not Guggie pictured above; it's me (at age 5 apparently). (Thanks, Dad, for scanning this for me.)

Onboard Blogging with Baby Blanket

We're on our way to Maryland! On the plane I've been working on finishing up this baby blanket. Hopefully Sam won't drop too many stitches as I let him admire it. And hopefully the intended baby will not be reading this blog before I finish and gift it. If you are, please don't tell him. ;)

By the way, I sent this post from the plane using my iPhone. How cool is that?

This Land is Our Land

Yesterday evening we were frustrated that Sam would not share the details of what he does and what he learns at school each day. Today he came home and told us he learned a new song. Hallelujah!



And now here's the remix version. Enjoy!

Seattle Adventure with Sam and SAM

As promised, here are a few shots from our downtown Seattle adventures yesterday. "Adventures," of course, being subject to perspective. One thing about exploring the city with a 4 year old: most everything is an adventure...to him, to me, or, on occasion, to others. It's either new to him or newly complicated for me. We rode the bus down to check out the current exhibit on impressionism at the Seattle Art Museum (SAM). It reminded me of my most favorite museum in the world, the Musée d'Orsay in Paris to which I long to return. Admiring the art with Sam, we didn't get to spend as much time as we would have liked, but actually, we did devote a surprisingly satisfying amount of attention on the exhibit. As we have learned to appreciate: Some is better than none. And, who knew that Sam could get so interested in impressionistic paintings of ships, windmills, or boys reading--to name his top favorites? Of course, in the interest of full disclosure, he was most amused, as always, by the toilet in the permanent collection.

We took a quick trip through Pike's Place Market (which per usual on a summer Sunday was insanely crowded) to pick up some spices and watch some cheese making.

Then we walked down the waterfront to the SAM Olympic Sculpture Park.

As we wound down, we grabbed a quick early dinner, hiked to the closest #12 bus stop, waited and waited for the bus, detoured to the bathroom, then waited for the bus again. Ahh, the boy slept well last night!

Beginning the Blog

I'll start with a project.

Yesterday, while checking out a local yarn store I had not visited before, I picked up some Rowan Colourscape, the new yarn in colorways designed by Kaffe Fassett, as an impulse buy at the register. When I got home, I quickly finished up my slouchy llama hat and cast on for a simple seed-stitch scarf with the new yarn. It's beautiful.

I call this project Seedy Berrylicious. It's just a seed-stitch pattern (cast on 17 stitches on size US 10 needles). I swatched about a dozen stitch patterns before settling on this simple one to highlight the long and gradually changing stripey color sections. I don't think this will be my last project with this yarn, so stay tuned!

In my non-knitting life, today we had "downtown adventures," as Sam calls them. I took a few pictures on my iPhone, which I'll upload later, but for those tuning in only to see Sammy, here he is enjoying his breakfast this morning.

Bagel Smile.
Regular Smile.
Sam's question today: Um, Dadda, why there better bagels in the world?
For breakfast he ate 2 whole ones with cream cheese and lox. He's our bagel boy.

Oh, and here's that lovely llama hat knit out of 2 skeins of Miski Mirasol using the Slouchy Copy Cat Hat pattern. It is so soft and stretchy with lots of violet bits, and this picture really doesn't do it justice. It was a fun, quick knit finished in several days--including a bit of knitting at the Mariner's Stitch-n-Pitch.