Seattle: Part 1

We spent the weekend in Seattle for the CK Scrapbook Convention, but the surprising part is that it was all Rick's idea. We got a flyer in the mail about a month ago and he thought it would be something I would enjoy doing, so he set it all up, making the reservations and even helping me pack my supplies.

We stayed at the Hilton in Bellevue, which is where they held the crop nights.

This is the view from the hotel. It looks nice outside, but the sun and blue skies only lasted for a few hours before the clouds and rain moved in. So for the majority of the weekend it was kind of cold and rainy. Typical Seattle weather, I guess.

The vendor fair and all the classes were held at The Meydenbauer Center. The hotel offered a free shuttle to and from the fair, but dorks that we are, we decided to drive there ourselves. Mistake. $13 for 3 hours of parking? I think we'll take the shuttle next time.

This was my first time attending the convention, so I didn't quite know what to expect. I was thinking the vendor fair would have more product specific booths, like a Basic Grey booth, a Cricut booth, and so on, but it more like online stores with miscellaneous product. So in that way, I found the fair to be a little hit and miss. I was really hoping to see some of the latest and greatest from Basic Grey and October Afternoon, but that didn't happen.

I ended up buying mostly loose paper sheets and a few embellishments, but nothing to write home about, as they say.

Thank goodness for Rick's fancy phone and all the games that came with it. There's nothing like Sodoku to keep Tyler occupied for endless amounts of time.

The crop nights were from 7:00-11:30 p.m downstairs in the ballroom of our hotel.

Friday night was the busiest of the two nights...it was packed in there! They had around 350 scrappers stuffed into that room. And again, since I've never been to a crop before, I didn't know what to expect. But I found the whole thing to be overwhelming and really distracting. 

The first night I tried working on my Project life, but the environment was so awkward that I didn't get very much done. I found that I kept sitting there watching what the other people were doing.

And my luck wasn't much better on Saturday night either.

I sat at a different table with different people, but that didn't seem to help. I just think I was unprepared for the whole thing. I should have bought a kit or something that was predesigned to work on. Something that didn't require much thought or concentration. Or, if I had taken any of the classes, I could have worked on those projects at night. Oh well, I'll know better next time.

Here's what I tried to work on Saturday night. A two page layout of our 4th of July weekend in Portland. That wasn't going anywhere fast, so I went back to working on my Project Life and at least I can say that I'm all caught up with that now.

So if I go back next year, I'll be sure to take some of the classes. Those were a much bigger deal than the vendor fair and I'll have something to work on during the crop nights.

Easy Cheesy

It was Tyler's pick for dinner tonight. Easy Cheesy Quesadillas. A recipe he's been hounding me all week to make. We would have gotten to it sooner, but I was too busy making the most delicious Beef Burgundy, which he did not appreciate by the way, and the famous Tuscan Chicken, which he didn't appreciate either. Hmpf, well we'll just see how he does now that it's his turn.

The recipe was super simple to put together.  The only real prep work I had to do was chop a little bit of onion and shred some cheese....the rest was up to him.

The first step was heating up the filling, which was a mixture of shredded chicken, salsa, onion, and green chilies.

Then he divided the filling mixture onto two tortillas, sprinkled them with cheese and then topped them with two more tortillas.

After 15 minutes in the oven, the quesadillas were nice and crispy on the outside and gooey on the inside.

Then it was time to eat! We added a little bit of sour cream and salsa to the top of our wedges to make them even better. Okay, so the quesadilla dinner wasn't as fancy as the Beef Burgundy I made earlier this week, but according to Tyler, his dinner was much tastier.

Craftiness

Last month when we were at Joann's getting the things for Tyler's Halloween costume, I also ended up buying several apron patterns and multiple yards of fabric. The patterns were only 99 cents a piece, so I couldn't really pass them up, but once I picked out the fabric, I was sort of committed. So while I still had the sewing machine out, I decided to dig in and get them done. Well at least one anyway.

So here's the first one. It's got kind of a retro feel to it. But can I just say one thing....bias tape is the worst. The.Worst.

It came out cute though, right? I'm in love with the cupcake fabric. The neck straps are kind of funny and might take some getting used to, but it's so cute....who cares.

Happy Anniversary, Girls!

Yesterday marked the two year anniversary of the day we adopted Coco Bear and Carmelita from the Humane Society. Two years to the day. And how did we celebrate? With a trip to the vet. 

I hate always being the bad guy, but the girls were due for some immunizations. Rabies and Distemper boosters.

What the ......!?!

What do you know about this?

Sorry girls, it had to be done. Now how about a nice can of tuna? What, I said I was sorry?

Good Food and Fun

Over the weekend we were out running errands and stopped to eat lunch at Flaming J's. We don't eat there too often, but the food is fantastic. It's the best Chinese food in Yakima, as if there was any question. But it's been so long since we've been there that Tyler actually forgot about the place. He started protesting as soon as we pulled into the parking lot....."but, this isn't where I wanted to eat". We went in anyway, knowing that after one bite he would change his mind.

While we waited for our food I pulled out the camera. You know me and my project life....I'm always taking pictures of anything and everything. I told Tyler to give me a smile and he gave me the famous head tilt, to which I told him it looked like he was drinking with his ear. That made him roar with laughter and (the best part) I was able to get an honest smile out of him.

Then our food came. I had the Chicken Yakisoba....what can I say, I'm a sucker for noodles.

Tyler had the Teriyaki Chicken. Super yum!

Afterwards, we headed over to that great park we discovered last month. We're running out of time before the really cold weather moves in, so we're making use of the semi-warm days that we have left.

The Lowest of The Low

I'm not quite sure what happened, but November hit and I've been completely drained of all energy. At first I tried blaming it on the lack of daylight we've been having lately. All of a sudden I'm like Max. As soon as the sun starts to go down around 5:00, I just want to go to bed. I feel like I need to go hibernate or something.

I also tried blaming it on my workouts. This week was the last of the third mesocycle of STS....in other words, I was finishing the program. The weights were higher than ever, making the workouts that much tougher. And on the days off from STS, I've been running. Previously, I'd been running 3 miles at a time, but that finally got too easy and I had to bump my run up to 4 miles. So this week I ran 8 miles. The last 4 were a challenge, because like I said, I've been struggling with low energy levels. But somehow I made it through.

Then this afternoon I had an appointment at the Red Cross. Those vampires were after my blood once again. Normally I don't mind going, but today I just didn't feel good about it.  I had visions of fainting on the floor, which is not a good sign. I went anyway, but thankfully didn't get very far in the process. My iron was too low.

But not just low, it was super low! I mean it was so low that the machine didn't even register a number, it just said 'LLL'. At first I thought it had errored out, but no, I guess all those Ls stand for low, Low, LOW! Low iron is nothing new for me, I struggle with it all the time, but I've never seen it so low. Ever. So yeah, it was  kind of shocking to see. But maybe this is the real reason I've been so crazy tired.

I think I need to go eat a giant steak, spinach and bean salad or something with a ton of iron in it. Or maybe chug my bottle of liquid iron supplement.

Happy Halloween

This morning we headed over to The Home Depot for a special Halloween kid's workshop. They were making cute little pumpkin baskets and being that it was Halloween, the kids were encouraged to come in costume. So that he did. (Hey, anything to get another use out of his costume).

But I think all those feathers were getting in the way a little bit because his nails kept going in crookedly. So he took off his hood and had a much better time finishing the project.

And there's his finished basket. Easy Peasy. Instead of getting a pin to put on his apron, they gave him a handful of candy for the basket. Yum. Bite sized candy bars.

Back at the house we started to get ready for the Trick-or-Treaters.

In the bottom basket we had mini tubs of play-doh for the younger kids.

And regular candy  in the top basket. Lots of chocolate this year.

Rick never got into the carving mood today, so I was all alone in that department. I made a tiki pumpkin....you like it?

As usual Rick stayed home to pass out candy while I took Tyler trick-or-treating around the neighborhood. He got a lot of praise for his costume, but did get confused several times for a chicken. What can I say....it was dark!