Labor Day Weekend in Seattle

Just after school began, we wrecked the kids' perfect attendance by taking them out of school to go to Seattle to see their Aunt and Uncle. We left on Wednesday night and were planning on staying with Aunt Kile and Uncle Chris. When we arrived at the intersection two blocks from their house, we discovered it was blocked by a hazmat team so Kile directed us the back way around, except when we got there, it was blocked by about 30 more emergency vehicles due to an ammonia leak at a nearby restaurant. Hearing that they were going to close the interstate, we jumped back on and continued to drive to Seattle before pulling over in Ellensburg for the night. 

Let me just say it's so peaceful to drive without kids fighting each other in the car. Night driving rocks, if you can stand to look at nothing but darkness. Ugh. I missed everything! Before we left the next morning, I occupied the kids while Perry interviewed via phone with his regional vice president. It took forever! Or maybe it just felt that way because I have rambunctious kids...

As soon as we settled into Em and Colin's house, the kids found the bubble gun and enjoyed chasing and popping bubbles out on the deck.

Before the rain hit, we spent a little bit of time at a really cool park, even though all I wanted to do was nap! The past few weeks had just been exhausting...

 The boys discovered there were dinosaur bones buried under the sand in the sand pit. They had so much fun pretending to be paleontologists! 

Shameless dinner time selfies. My kids look so thrilled.

 First thing Friday morning, we took the kids to the aquarium. I had never been to one before and was just as excited as the kids were to go! 

 Perry really enjoyed watching the sea lions. All the kiddies were fascinated by them too!

 In an attempt to get more pictures with my hubby, we took a quick selfie while at the aquarium. The last one before I chopped my hair!

 The kids could not get over the fact that there happened to be a "sleeping" fish in this tank to the point that Ms. Gail decided it was her job to make an impression of the fish. See that fish laying against the back wall? I'm sure it's dead. 

 I also attempted to get a decent picture of the boys, but this fish biting HD's ear was the best I could do for him.

 JP was just uncooperative. This is literally the best picture of him. Pretty awesome...

Before we left, HD stopped to check out the starfish exhibit again. Perry was getting antsy to go, but I didn't have the heart to interrupt HD's mini-lesson. He was curious! I love seeing him this way! It's rare to see him so focused.

As soon as we arrived home, Cami went down for a nap so Em could take me to the salon to cut my hair. To say I love it would be an understatement. If only I could re-create it!

We stopped home to pick up Cami and then Em and I headed to the airport to pick up Grandma Betty and John. Traffic was horrible at 5pm! Not looking forward to city driving in that regards!

In the morning ran a few errands and hung out in the backyard to waste time until Aunt Em got off work that afternoon.

While guys were practicing their golf skills, HD and JP found these monster slugs out back. I tried to convince the boys to race them, but they weren't too interested in that.

Grandma and Ms. Gail also spent some time picking blackberries from the massive bushes in their backyard. 

When the kids were getting restless around the house, we went to a near by park and played for bit before walking down to the docks to feed the ducks.

Who doesn't enjoy feeding ducks?! So much fun for everyone!

Ms. Gail and JP even had the opportunity to hand feed a duck!

We walked to the end of the pier and my stomach was in knots the whole time. While my kids can kind of swim, I don't know how they'd do if they just fell overboard. Perry and I were both anxious to get the kids back to land.

HD spent the rest of the afternoon making himself in to a box troll. He attempted to go down the stair and instead fell down them. He was fine and uninjured so I didn't feel the need to cover up my giggles. JP tried to dress himself in the outfit after HD took it off, but really struggled, so then I wondered how HD did it alone...

That night Em and I went out wedding dress shopping with Grandma Betty and spent a few hours trying on dresses until we found the perfect one. It was a long grey dress with sequence. So pretty on her!

 After lot of confusion on how to actually get to Pike's Market after parking, and lots of walking, our family met up with the rest of the group and strolled through through past all the vendors. I could go broke in there! 

 Before we started the long trek home, we stopped at Ivar's, you know the restaurant that pretty much only serves fish. I had 3 choices other than fish and went the seafood route ordering prawns. They were tasty but the fish smell from everyone else was not so awesome for me...

We crashed at Kile and Chris' that night so Case could finally see his cousins. Kile took the kids out to gather eggs in the morning. Ms. Gail was so exciting she started banging them together! We ended up just tossing those ones out! Hahaha!