Hills, Boats, and Holiday Magic

Hey everybody!
We are still loving the West Coast life and thought we should fill you in on some of our recent adventures!

So we have officially been out here just over a month and have some great updates:
1. We have an apartment! (albeit a very tiny one)
2. We love our neighborhood!
3. We are both employed!

Ok let's see some of the sights...
1st up: Our new place!

This is our bedroom! 

 The nice big closet (which was non-functional until two days ago. It is now full of clothing and shoes)

 Here is the kitchen/living room/dining room

The newly remodeled and lovely bathroom

Here is our 'hall closet'... umm it's too small for a hall!

 We did get a queen size bed for a great price after a week of sleeping air mattresses 

Oh and a free bookcase from a slightly sketchy man named Adam who was moving to Texas

This is still the only furniture we have in the main area... I'm thinking only beanbag chairs would fit!

The fridge decorations make it feel so homey! We did some coloring in our first still jobless days in our new home! Also thanks Professional Pharmacy for the Christmas letter!! Oh and Tara- Can you see your beautiful baby is the only picture we have gracing our refrigerator!?

And I collect shot glasses, Jen collects flasks. And no we are not alcoholics. We haven't even used any of these yet, but they will make for quiet the party one day!

2nd: Here is our neighborhood! Queen Anne! 

First a note, we are living in a one bedroom private entrance basement apartment in Upper East Queen Anne. We are just minutes from Fremont (another neighborhood Jen and I adore) and a quick hop from downtown. And if we walk a block or two we can see the beautiful Lake Union. 

Here are some lovely Christmas lights right on the corner where our house is

Here is Queen Anne Ave N which is a block from us lit up for the holidays! This is where all the shops are in our neighborhood

Lilly our wonderful landlord told us about 'Holiday Magic' in Queen Anne when most of the shops had special promotions, hors d'oeuvres, raffles, entertainment, and champagne! It was a great time to go and visit all the different interesting shops and chat with some of our neighbors! 

Below is an activity table at the Presbyterian church 

Here is Santa who was available for pictures at one of the local banks

These three are opera trained singers who were doing some magnificent caroling in one of the gift shops!

And nothing quite gets you in the holiday spirit like this ukulele playing, carol singing, Asian man!

Then we had dinner at the new fish restaurant called Five Hooks, their fish tacos are great!

Here is a picture of the hill outside our house. It's hard to tell here but it's a really steep decline then across the water you can see the lights going back up a steep incline! It's a hilly city! 

Here's another picture that shows you how steep it is, the road just drops down! Which brings us to my first accident in the West

On our very first weekday in our new neighborhood Jen and I decided to have a nice walk down the hill and across the bridge to Fremont for coffee and job searching... when not five minutes in I fell, twice and hit my left knee very hard the second time. Jen had to run home for the car to get me so I could wash my wound. Luckily it's not my first gross injury though this one was deepest by far. Jen says this picture doesn't do it justice to show how gross it truly was (this picture is taken maybe 4 days after it happened).

And here you can see my nice huge scab. It was quite the incident. It taught me to value traction over fashion on the hills around here. I underestimated the slope of the hill after the slickness of a light morning rain (won't happen again) and now I have a klutz battle wound from the West

Here is just another shot of the Space Needle. I passed by it as I walked downtown for my final interview with Stratacore (the company I am now working for!!) 

We went to church on Sunday (Queen Anne United Methodist) and they had this really cool art piece in the middle of the sanctuary (you can't tell bc of my crappy phone camera, but it's just strings of butterflies)

The sanctuary is just movable chairs in a semi-circular formation. It was interesting and we got to meet some of the congregation over birthday cake for a member that had turned 95 that week!

3rd: Today we visited Discovery Park in the Magnolia neighborhood. It's over 530 acres of woods, beach, nature learning center, meadows, and a camp. It's gorgeous and like a bit of wilderness next to the city overlooking the Puget Sound. 

Here is the lighthouse at the West Point. 

Here is the neighborhoods along the water just to the South of the park. 

Jen adventured over the driftwood down to the water. It's a rocky beach on this side of the park.

Here you can see some of the islands off the coast. People live there and commute to Seattle by ferry!

The lighthouse buildings were looking a little forgotten all the way out on the point! 

There were signs on the West Point that said don't feed or approach the baby seals. And we were wondering if they came up to the beach in the summer when we heard some seals barking around the other side of the lighthouse. We walked over and saw three of them playing right off shore!

Hey look! There is sun here in the 'Rainy City' It's glorious when the sun breaks through the clouds! 

At the visitor's center there was free holiday greens leftover from a wreath making lesson a few days ago. So we took some home and have it on top of our kitchen cabinets! So festive!!

On the way back home we stopped at the Interbay Marina to see some boats!

This kind of Native American tribal art is everywhere. This is a bird head (took Jen a minute to see it!) 

It's a cool northwest thing!

At the Fisherman's Terminal there's a bunch of fresh fish markets and some great restaurants! 

Yes everyone this boat is in fact named 'Twilight' I found it hilarious. Obviously those books are popular around here since Forks is just a few hours away down the coast! 

Jen just hopped right on the back of this boat! Lots of nice private boats out here and we can't wait to ride out on the lake this summer!! 

We had to get a picture in front the 'Salvager 1'! It was the most serious and intimidating looking boat we saw all day!!

After stopping for some supplies and dinner fixings, we got busy and made some Christmas cookies!! This was our first batch, and it was quickly followed by some chocolate chip cookies! Yumm!!

4th: Our employment
Just a quick word for everyone back home wondering about how we are doing with great and daunting job search: I got hired as a sales and marketing assistant at this great company called Stratacore! They are in Belltown (right by the Space Needle) and are a small and lovely group of people and I can't wait to start work. I go in for my first day tomorrow (Thursday) to do some part time holiday help and start my regular full-time hours after the holidays!
Jen is working retail at the closest mall in North Seattle. She is at a nice little women's apparel store called Papaya which has great deals all the time. She is still looking for nursing jobs but the hospitals and clinics seem to hold openings for quite a while and take their sweet time getting back to people. Our fingers are still crossed, but she's keeping busy and meeting new people at her temporary job!

That's all for this time! Hope you are all in the holiday spirit like we are!
Thanks for staying curious about our lives! We love and miss you all!!

Our first 2 weeks... PART 2

 The First Starbucks Store: 

(these pictures are for you Sarah Franz

...like I promised)

 The original, very first Starbucks store, started right here in 1971. Notice the original brown and white signs.

....it is just a tiny place

 

 The original store is right across from Pike Place Market down along the Puget Sound, but of course here in Seattle, a Starbucks or any coffee shop can be found on almost every corner in any neighborhood. 

I really don't mind...I love my daily cup of coffee!

 ...and of course we each bought a cup from the original shop.

The Fremont Troll under the Bridge:
Look for this famous troll in the movie, 10 Things I Hate About You. We drove by it and snapped a picture from inside the car and also captured all the other tourists trying to do the same. This is a troll made of concrete that was placed under the 99 highway bridge in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle.

Cupcake Royale:
Our trip into the neighborhood of Fremont consisted of seeing the troll bridge and also hopping over to Ballard to enjoy the delicious cupcakes from the small cafe of Cupcake Royale. Meghan had a Tiramisu cupcake; which I stole a bite of, and I enjoyed a warm cup of coffee. We continued to walk around Fremont and Ballard for the afternoon noticing the shops and local bars.

The Space Needle:
We were so close we could almost touch it! None of the locals visit this or view the city from the top. Its about $20 to ride the elevator to the top and then it also costs a lot of money to eat from the cafe or dine there. I met a girl who works as a waitress in the restaurant in the top of the space needle. She said the food is expensive. Unless a rich, nice, young man plans to take me there, I won't be visiting the top of the Space Needle anytime soon.

We met friends at a football stadium here to watch a flag football game. On our way out Meghan snapped a picture of the space needle at night.


REI:
Recreational Equipment Inc. originated here in Seattle. This is their first store. It's a large and impressive building with a huge, enclosed,  rock climbing wall in the front of it; which you can see from I-5. I'll have to stop in and get my ski boots to go along with my cross country skis.

The Elliott Bay Bookstore:
We decided to check out this huge bookstore which was once located in the downtown area of Seattle (Pioneer Square), but had recently been relocated to Capitol Hill. It had been listed in several books and magazines as one of the sights to check out, so we felt it was only necessary to do so. It is 2 floors covered with books. They even have hand written book reviews from anyone (mostly staff) who feels like writing their opinion. That's what is on the white papers hanging from the bookshelves.

 Hey look...a local Pennsylvanian! See, other people want to move out here too.

When we were at Thanksgiving Dinner at Meghan's friend Georgia's parents' house,we found out that their son's girlfriend decided to move to Seattle from Minnesota. She moved with no job and no car, and she made it! For all the doubters out there....it's really not that weird! 

We had a great first 2 weeks. We got familiar with the city and its neighborhoods. We even found time to apply for jobs and look for other housing options. We almost had a third roommate to get a 3 bedroom house with, but that fell through at the last minute. While we were out looking at housing options we met a lovely lady, who after getting to know us, and hearing about our journey across the country made it her personal mission to find us housing. She was a great connection for us, since we now live in her basement apartment! The timing couldn't have been more perfect for Meghan and I, but also for her as well.
We moved out of Meghan's brother's house the weekend after Thanksgiving, spending no more than our planned 2 weeks there. We can now affirm that Meghan and her brother really shouldn't try to live together again. They had trouble when they were younger...and they still do, but Meghan gave it a good shot. (I really did, but some people are just difficult to live with! And no Mom we really didn't fight, but it was time for us to get out on our own two feet and find a place to call home!)

So our time on Capitol Hill came to a close. We enjoyed our housemates for those 2 weeks too. I'd eat Tony's cooking any day, and I wouldn't mind beer tasting with Doug again either. We enjoyed getting to know the neighborhoods and downtown Seattle. We took the opportunity to see some of the tourist attractions, but of course couldn't see them all. There is still plenty of time for more adventures to be had.

For right now its off to Queen Anne....