sunset hill/golden gardens

Yesterday the sun peaked out so we decided to take a walk to the beach. The first photo is on Sunset Hill. If you notice how far down the marina is in the photo, that is how far you have to walk down to get to the beach. The path is a little further up the street and consists of a series of steep staircases and hiking trails. (You can also walk the long way on the bike trail which is much less steep and is probably an extra mile.) The beach pictures came out pretty dark even though it seemed bright to us (in comparison to normal winter days.) They had several fire pits, so I'm thinking bonfires are in our future.
In both the first and second pictures, you'd have a stunning view of the Olympics if it had been a clearer day.
It's funny that we moved to an opposite corner of the country and we are still 2 mins from the beach- even though it's a completely different kind of beach. I look forward to many sunsets in the future!

the green roofs are coming

(image from www.greenroofs.org)

As I mentioned last week, we made a visit to our library down the street. I had no idea what the point of putting grass on the roof was so I did some research on it. Read about it here.

Speaking of plants, many of the books we got were about gardening. Nate was out in the garden this weekend. (I was being lazy inside and not feeling well.) He got rid of a gigantic plant by the garage that did not look like it belonged in WA . In it's place he moved the ridiculously heavy cement sink that used to be in the basement. That will be our bed for planting herbs. He did a lot of work raking as well. The only thing not done is disposing of the gigantic branch that fell off our neighbor's pine tree. I don't want to have to pay for the city to take it so I think we should toss it back over the fence into their yard. They are lucky it didn't damage our house when it hit. Nate said I was being cranky. =)

We also checked out a Rachael Ray 30 min meal book and have been trying recipes. Some have been good; most have been misses. All of them have gotten us eating more veggies than we had been previously so I suppose that's good. The kitchen is really well laid out for us both to be in there and not bump into each other. The best recipe by far was a chicken piccata pasta toss- here. I'd recommend using less than a full pound of pasta and choosing a whole wheat one. The sauce is flavorful enough that you can't tell it's whole wheat, but there wasn't quite enough for a full pound of pasta.

While exploring this weekend, we found the best grocery store ever (and only 5 mins down the street). We used to love going to Trader Joe's for all of the unique things, but they don't have everything you need for a weekly trip (trash bags, cat litter, diet coke, a deli counter.) Ballard Market has to be the best idea ever. It's 50/50 with regular grocery store items and unique/organic things compared to about 90/10 at our regular grocery store. It's arranged with the organic stuff mixed in with the regular stuff so you can see what the price difference is without going across the store to the organic aisle. They've also got a ton of stuff from local companies and the best produce section ever. Best of all, I didn't feel like a tool like the one time I went in Whole Foods to use the bathroom.

first weekend of the new decade

It's bedtime but I'm trying to be better about blogging this year. A quick summary of our weekend:

• Had a fun time ringing in the new year with some friends (by the way, Seattle watches the ball drop in Times Square on delay instead of something on the west coast live- wtf is up with that)
• Finally got library cards and checked out our local branch. Found lots of books about gardening in the pacific nw so we can start our vegetable garden. Also found they have tons of the Food Network chefs' cookbooks so I'll be trying some new recipes this week.
• Put away all of the christmas stuff. We were the only people who put up our lights on thanksgiving weekend and the only ones who took them down on new years weekend. I thought that was standard but seattle is working on some other schedule.
• Got living room furniture courtesy of my parents!! We are so excited to have a comfy couch, though we have to wait 6-8 weeks for delivery because we picked a custom fabric.
  
• Speaking of my parents, my mom turned 50. They had a fabulous looking party last night and I wish I could have gone.
  
• Gave the house a good cleaning/ finally finished unpacking from TX
• Got lots of reading in

We were very productive this weekend, leading me to believe every weekend should have 3 days. I'm thankful another federal holiday is right around the corner...

last post of 2009?

I feel compelled to summarize the year so here it goes:
- Rang in the new year in London on our honeymoon. Had a frost bite scare but my toes recovered!
- Took a quick trip to FL for a friend's wedding.
- Started a new job.
- Moved from basement apartment to our top floor apartment.
- Bought house and moved again a few months later.
- Went to Austin for Christmas, visiting Perla, and meeting our new niece.
- Celebrated 1 year anniversary yesterday!

Next year we're hoping for a slower pace so we have more time to spend on the things that got overlooked last year. One of our goals in buying a house was having enough land to grow a vegetable garden. Starting in Feb we can begin planting! I also want to make more time for reading, trying new recipes, and exercising. I had to cancel my elliptical because the ship date moved to when we were on vacation, so now I'll have to reorder it. I would like to say I have a plan for improvements to the house, but I feel like the house has a plan for itself. I'm sure as soon as one thing breaks, it will lead to other projects so I don't want to get my heart set on anything cosmetic just yet.
Happy New Years, everyone!

Texas Photos

Leighann posted all of these to her Facebook already, but I figured I’d post them here for anyone that isn’t on the Facebook wagon.

 

View Full Album

Salmon Bay Photos

I was walking around our neighborhood the other evening and came across this park on the edge of Salmon Bay. The Bay sits between Lake Union and Lake Washington on the East, and Elliot Bay (Puget Sound) on the West. The bodies of water are connected by the Ship Canal and the Ballard Locks. The park overlooks where the Bay reaches the Sound. The sun was setting behind the hill (Magnolia) and it was really pretty. I snapped these pictures with my cell phone, so they aren’t super detailed, but they stitched together nicely.

Photos are here

London Photosynth

My laptop died the other day, so I’ve been going through the long process of recovering some of my stuff off of it, mainly photos.  I came across a bunch of panoramic type photos that I took on our Honeymoon that I had sort of forgotten about.  I’ve always wanted to give Photosynth a try, but didn’t really have any good photos for it.  So, here’s one.  I’ll post more if they are any good.

left overs

Why do I hate leftovers so much? I was looking forward to them all day until it was time to heat them up, then I talked myself out of it. I turned to Nate and said " I wish we had more of the asparagus ravioli we ate last week." Then I opened the freezer and there it was. We can't figure out where it came from or remember buying another bag. I hope the freezer fairy brings me some Ben and Jerry's oatmeal cookie dough ice cream next...

super quick update

- Sewer fixed.. we hope
- Got a new, bigger christmas tree with some led lights for nerdy flair
- 1 week until doug and helen's baby arrives
- 2 days until my parents come for thanksgiving
- Sun came out today for the first time in awhile and instantly gave me a headache

That Was Fast

We officially feel like homeowners, and it only took a month and a half!  We finally got over the fact that our plane tickets to Austin weren’t going to come down in price any more and just bought them.  We accepted it, and moved on.  Leighann went to cook dinner, and I went to take care of the cat litter and get the trash out ( side note, Seattle has ridiculous trash and recycling rules - http://www.seattle.gov/util/Services/Garbage/GarbageatYourHouse/WhatsAcceptedasGarbage/index.htm ), so I headed downstairs to find three inches of standing water in the basement.

It turns out our lovely flat sewer line backed up, just like we thought it would.  We had really hoped to get more than 6 weeks out of it.  We got a plumber out to clear the line and the water all drained away.  A few hours of cleaning and a few hundred dollars later and it’s back to how it was.  Isn’t owning a house fun!?  We don’t really know what caused it, but I’m willing to wage dollars to donuts that it had something to do with the fact that this has been the 10-day forecast for over a month now: