And later on Skyler's parents, Desiree and Stephen, took us out for a drive to see the island. We stopped at the lakes; Lake Josephine and Lake Florance for a bit.
Surpisingly we all woke up just after 8am on Christmas morning. This is my first year not spending Christmas morning with my family. We've always woken up somewhat early and still do because there are still younger kids in the home. So I thought that surely while we were here, it would be different because Skyler's sister would be the youngest, just days away from 18. But to my suprise everyone just happened to get up early.
We had a lovely Christmas morning. We all exchanged gifts. Then I called my family in Utah. I was envious of the snow they were receiving on Christmas. Later on, Skyler's dad asked if I wanted to learn how to make apple pie. I jumped at the chance. Skyler has always raived about his dad's famous homeade apple pie so I wanted to see how it was done. He had already made the filling so I learned how to make the crust. I just sat at the barstool while he did all the work. I was quite surpised how easy it was. But maybe he just made it look easy;) He made 2 apple pies and 2 pumpkin. We partook later on. I'm not a fan of pumpkin pie so I had the apple. It was delish! I'll have to 2nd Skyler's praise of his dad's great pies! While Stephen was making the pies I noticed it was either raining really hard or snowing outside. I went to the window and sure enough, it was snow! On Christmas! It made my day for sure.
Stephen got a remote control helicoptor for Christmas. He and Skyler played with it a lot. Men are always boys at heart! The helicoptor is a little out of control!
The next morning Skyler and I took the ferry and headed up to Seattle.
After parking, our first stop was the downtown library. It's way cool looking inside and out. Very modern style and architecture.
We stopped somewhere and had a late breakfast and some hot chocolate. Then we walked through the Pike Street Market Place. We weren't there too long because our 2 hour parking was already almost up! To be honest, the 2 hour parking thing became quite a pain. We couldn't stay anywhere longer than that until later on when we realized the underground parking was much better because you can stay longer and it's cheaper! There are always musicians playing outside in and around the market. Here is a video we got of one of them.
Next we drove to The Smith Tower to get a view of the city. However, they were on a lunch break so we took a walk down to Pioneer Square.
We went into the very large antique shop. I haven't seen such a large antique shop in my life! So much stuff! Then it was back to Smith Tower. They charge $7.50 for a view of the city. It was definately a good view.
We chose to go up on the top of the Smith Tower rather than the Space Needle because it was much cheaper and the Smith Tower was much more charming with it's oldness;) The building was finished in 1914 and at the time was the 4th tallest building in the world.
Our last stop was Olympic Sculpture Park. We only stopped here only for a bit because we wanted to beat rush-hour traffic and make the last ferry of the night, for weeknights, which is at 7:30pm!
The following day, it was raining, but Skyler and I wanted to take our own little drive around the Island to get out of the house for a bit. Because it was raining, we didn't get out of the car much, except to get some shots of the lake.
Stephen went with us the next day to explore Tacoma. First we took a drive over the Narrows Bridge, then we went more downtown Tacoma to the Museum of Glass. We chose not to pay to go inside, but just admire the Chihuly Bridge of Glass right next to it. I think I liked it more than Skyler and his dad did. I could totally read their faces and this is what they were thinking "yah, cool, a bridge, with glass stuff all over, ok let's go and get out of the rain!"
Stephen wanted to show us around an area where he had worked where they had some cool looking homes. Here is one of them. Most of them didn't look this old. They had very cute homes in this area.
We had another Seattle trip the next day with just the two of us. Out of curiosity, Skyler wanted to check out Kurt Cobain's old house, which isn't too far from downtown. I couldn't have cared less, but I went along with it. There is a little park next to where he lived with a couple benches, trees, and a walkway. The benches had things written all over it for Kurt. Afterwards, we spent most of the next little while at the Market again. I had a huge craving for clam chowder in a bread bowl and just had to have it. We went to lots of restuarants, but not all of them had the bread bowl. I even found a place that had them and was in the middle of ordering, when he interrupts me to say they are out of bread bowls. I stop ordering and we leave. I had to have my breadbowl! We finally decided on Lowell's for lunch. It's in the middle of the Market and they have a view of the water. The lunch was quite good. Skyler suggested we go see a movie. We booked it (walked really really fast) to the theater. We went to see Juno. We grabbed a malt at a place called Johnny Rockets, a little 50's diner outside of the theater. Mmmmmm yummy! We walked around the Westlake Center then called it a night.
We attended church with his family on Sunday. Because they live on an island, they have a small branch with very few people in it. They hold meetings in a home that has been transformed into a meetinghouse on the inside. I remember counting how many people were in their sacrement meeting and it was something like 9 or 10 people including us! So different from our ward! We have an abnormally large ward. We were made to feel very welcome because with that many people, 2 visitors is a big deal! With a small branch like this, pretty much all must participate. Skyler was asked to pass the sacrament. He was the only one to do so. I was asked to give the closing prayer in Sacrament Meeting. I really liked having the small, intimate classes. It seemed to make people feel more comterable sharing and helped people to be more real.
New Year's Eve was pretty chill. We started the day off making belgium waffles with whipping cream on top. We had this many mornings here. Mmmm yum. And we are still making it now that we're home. Soon enough our figures will prove it! I would have liked to spend New Year's in Seattle, but seeing as the last ferry that night was at 7:30pm, that was not plausable. So we just spent another relaxing day at the house. Later on we played cards with his parents. It's a game called 'Hand and Foot'. We played it many times with them while in Hawaii in October. It's a pretty fun game! As it neared midnight, we toyed with the idea of going to the restaurant on the island where Cambree, Skyler's sister works to get some dessert and watch the old people in their drunkeness. But opted to just snuggle on the couch and watch the fireworks at Seattle Center from the space needle on tv. The fireworks show ended up being quite hideous. The news people built up the show so much. It sure made me stoked for the show. Then came midnight and the fireworks and music started as expected, then not too long after, the fireworks stopped but the music kept on playing! The audience, and Skyler and I sat holding our beath, hoping it would return, time goes by with nothing. Poeple began to "boo!" Poor pirotechnicians, they must have been going nuts! Well, eventually they came back on, but the music was totally off and ended far before the the fireworks were done. The fireworks stopped again, then came back. Oh, it was so sad and funny all at the same time.
We had a great time staying with Skyler's family. Thanks for letting us stay with you! We love you! I've uploaded more pics of our trip on flickr if you'de like to take a look.
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