Seattle

We went to Seattle two weekends ago not only for our anniversary, but for our friends' wedding. So it worked out well, since neither of us have been to Seattle, it was our anniversary, and we got to be there for our friends' wedding. Win win win. The day before I made a bunch of chicken salad croissants and put together some snacks for our trip. We got up early Sunday morning and headed off. The drive wasn't too bad, just a little under 5 hours, and it wasn't very confusing, just...get on the highway and follow signs.

Unfortunately, we couldn't check into our hotel until around 3 or 4, and we got there around 12:30. But it was ok, because we had lunch. So we wandered around Pioneer Square and decided to have lunch overlooking the water. The weather was lovely, just around 75 degrees, with a slight breeze. I had done a bunch of prep work earlier that week, including looking up places for us to visit (free and paid, that's how involved I was), restaurants, and plenty of maps and directions.

where we ate lunch

Zak liked this old building and alleyway

I wanted to see the Waterfall Garden, since it sounded pretty cool, and we eventually found it. It was nice, small and we should've had lunch there, but whatever. We also found this nifty gem shop and spent forever in there. As Zak's been working on his gemology course for work (he's almost certified as a Gemologist, he recently got certified as a Diamontologist), I've spent some time learning and reading up about gems. It's been fun for me to be able to pick out different gems, and I can tell Zak's impressed with me. The only problem with those gem shops are that we want to buy a lot of different things, and settling on a cool gem or two is difficult. But Zak settled on a cool piece of clear quartz and a small piece of citrine. And he bought me some beautiful faceted lapis lazuli earrings. They are super pretty and it's hard to find faceted lapis, so we decided to go for it.

at the Waterfall Garden

After that we headed on over to where our hotel was. Neither of us expected Seattle to have so many hills! It felt like we were in San Francisco, and driving up and down the hills set me a little bit on edge. I didn't like it and was happy to have parked in the parking garage and not deal with driving for the rest of the weekend. Once we checked into our hotel, we just relaxed for a bit. The hotel was pretty cool, it had a Seattle's Best Coffee below it, so the lobby smelled great. And it was an older, European style hotel, with creative use of rooms, shall we say. Our view wasn't so great, but the bathroom was kind of cool, and it was nice to lie down in an air-conditioned space.

our hotel

the inside door had a full-length mirror on it, kind of neat/weird

Like I said, I had done a lot of prep work involving our trip earlier that week. I had a map of the area of our hotel and there were about a dozen restaurants that we could easily walk to. I had even printed out condensed versions of their menus. So we looked through all that information and decided on a Thai fusion type of place that had a satay bar and some interesting entrees. It was only a few blocks away, and we were seated right away. I ended up having crab cakes and a Thai coconut chicken satay, Zak had a fabulous Thai green coconut chicken curry that was out of this world. All in all, a great dinner and time was had. I got Zak this book about science and physics that I thought he'd like (he does, whoo!), he got me a set of pretty white gold hoops. His main gift we got in June, his chair he loves from Cost Plus World Market. So he has been enjoying it for awhile.

The next morning, we had several hours to kill, since the wedding wasn't until 7 that evening. And we were only about 5 of 6 streets down from Pike Place, so we headed on over there after we checked out. We were able to leave our car in the parking lot and walk over there. It was a pretty cool area to explore. And it was definitely nice to have just the two of us walking around the packed market, I kept thinking to myself how glad I was I didn't have to push around a stroller or look after a toddler! We saw the guys throwing fish and all of the beautiful flowers. We poked around in a bunch of eastern Asian shops, and to Zak's surprise, a few of the shops were playing a CD that his family had gotten in Nepal, a Tibetan Buddhist Chant CD. It made me giggle, he was so excited about it and chanted right along with the monks.

first look at the market

with the golden pig named Rachel!

I loved all the flowers, everything was so pretty!

so goofy

My mom and brother told me that we HAD to find this chowder place that they ate at when they were there a few years ago on a school choir tour. They had both found the same place, independent of each other and raved about it to me. I'm like my mom, a bit skeptic about any clam chowder that isn't hers (hers is pretty good), but she convinced me to try it, because it was amazing. We found it and split a bowl of traditional clam chowder and boy, was it delicious! We also ate at Jack's World Famous Fish place and had fish and chips. Yum!

go find this place and eat the chowder

yum!

oh Zak

a really pretty rooftop garden that we were jealous of

We just wandered around the market area, finding cool shops and food. It was hard not to look at all of the fresh fruit, veggies and fish, because we knew we couldn't take anything with us that needed refrigeration. But it was pretty neat, still. Once we were done with the market, we walked up near the water and pass all the shops and touristy sites. We didn't have the time (or money) to visit the Space Needle, but maybe on our next trip. We had a fun time just walking around and looking at everything, and being in a big city.

I wasn't interested in what ginger beer tastes like, but was thrilled to know I'm apparently very successful at making it?

this picture was his choice, not mine

at a cool poster shop, took this for Kenny!

Zak and his SUPER MANLY snack of jerky and smoked pepper jack cheese

The wedding was across the water, in Bellevue at a place called Robinswood House. But we got over there about an hour early, so we found some parking lot in some shopping center and read/napped for a bit. The grounds at the venue were beautiful, lots of flowers and a nice place for the ceremony. We felt a bit out of place, but we knew one couple; Zak worked with the gal at work, and they had just recently moved out of Moscow. So it was nice to at least kind of know someone. It was a pretty small wedding, about 50 or 60 people. The ceremony was simple, sweet and heartfelt. Erika and Mat both looked great and so happy, and hardly noticed the rest of us!

sitting in the seats, waiting

still waiting

the happy couple

I zoomed in mostly for Erika's dress, which was beautiful

The reception was nice, the decorations were really pretty. The colors were black and teal, and the tent looked really great, it had lots of pretty teal fabric everywhere. And the centerpieces had candles with the same blue and purple orchids Erika had in her bouquet. One of my favorite parts was that the table names were different cuts of diamonds, which is appropriate since Mat is now the manager at Zak's work, and Erika used to work there, too. There were a few toasts, dancing and lots of delicious food. Their cake was great, too. I was slightly jealous of the awesome blue glitter frosting, it looked pretty neat.

pretty centerpieces

it tasted great, too!

with the newlyweds :)

We had to leave around 9:30, right as the main dancing started. We were going to stay in a hotel in Yakima because Zak got a type of corporate coupon, but we decided we'd ask his grandparents if we could stay with them, instead. The drive wasn't too bad, just a bit longer than we would have liked, but we got there around midnight thirty and prompted crashed.

The next morning we visited with his grandparents for a few hours. And we got to take home a bunch of fresh garden goodies! We picked a ton of blackberries and apricots. We also got a few tomatoes, peppers, plums and a cantaloupe. And about a dozen or so cucumbers, because we wanted to try pickling them at home (will post about that soon). The peaches weren't ready, but hopefully we'll be to get some in a few weeks. So we left with a haul, and were super excited about everything. I promptly came home and made delicious apricot freezer jam that I can't decide if we're going to keep all the jars or if I'll give one or two of them away. We have made pickles, that have turned out really well and I'll post about it on my recipe blog in a bit.

we wanted to take home this cute kitty

our garden treasures

So, we had a great trip. It was a bit surreal to already be celebrating our second wedding anniversary, where did the time go?! We had a bit of a crazy year, but survived it for the better. It's been so great to be married and have our own life together. We're pretty happy. :)