Our Family in Seattle
Jun 23rd 2008PamUncategorized
So here are the pictures that go along with the post from Friday.
Here are pictures of Five things that would never happen in Columbia.
5) Parallel Parking.
4) Bird Baths.
3) Strawberry’s in my front yard
2) Field trips to Alki Beach. (Willoweve is in the bottom right hand corner of the picture)
1) Bald Eagles on Sand Bars.
Ok, so since moving to Seattle Jason and I have experienced various things that would never happen in Columbia Maryland.
This week I thought I would share a few of those with my friends back home. So here is a list of a few things that would never happen in Columbia.
5) I would not be putting to use my parallel parking skills several times a week. Living in a city I get to parallel park often, sometimes at my own house between my trash cans and my neighbors minivan. Thank God Jason taught me how all those many years ago. 
4) I would not have a bird bath in my front garden and would not get to enjoy seeing Crows, finches and sparrows among others come to drink from it.
(Columbia associations don’t like yard decorations.)
3) I would not have strawberry’s and beans planted in my side yard.
(No vegetable gardens in our neighborhood back in Columbia)
2) I would not be able to go on field trips to the beach with my daughter and spend the morning building sand castles and be home in time for lunch. Can I just tell you how AWESOME it is to have a beach that is in reality within walking distance.
1) The number one things – Driving my children home from school on the last day of the school year I would not be able to pull over by the side of the road to take a picture of a Bald Eagle sitting on a sand bar. YES on Tuesday I pulled over to the side of the road hopped out of the car and got a couple pictures of a HUGE beautiful Bald eagle just relaxing on a sand bar. (I’ll post the pictures later this afternoon.)
I swear I am the most blessed person in the world. I have an amazing family, and I live in an incredible place. I love my home.
SO here is it folks… This is my official invitation to my Maryland friends and family.
COME VISIT ME!!!
I will take you to Mount Rainier and Seattle City Center. I will show you Alki Beach and Lincoln Park.
Maybe you will fall as much in love as I have.
Happy Friday everyone.
Well we did it.
Yesterday we put a deposit on a brand new Toyota Prius.
Just in time too. After working out for the gym, careful to park the van in the shade so it would be nice and cool when I got out we drove home.
The gym is maybe three miles from our house. with only one light between the two.
As I pulled into the car port black smoke billowed from under the hood of the van. Not the usual puffy white smoke, this was dark and foreboding.
Yes -puffy white smoke was normal – even after having been in the shop twice in the past month to have the problem addressed.
I popped the hod after sending the kids into the back yard to play and was greeted by small blue flames on the engine. Can you say PANIC!!!
I ran into the house and got the fire extinguisher – and dashed back to the car. In the minute it took me to do this the flames disappeared and left only pale gray smoke, then puffy white smoke that lasted another ten minutes.
Needless to say I am only going to be driving the mini van when absolutely necessary – hopefully not at all.
All this just a few hours after I put a deposit on our new car.
The problem being our Prius is not at the dealer yet. It will be arriving at the dealer in mid July.
http://www.toyota.com/prius-hybrid/photo-gallery.html this link shows a picture of the car we are getting. Ours is coming in Seaside pearl.
Happy Wednesday to all. I wish you good luck with your cars!
| Goal | 100 | Last week |
| Lost this week | 3 | .5 |
| lbs to loose | 93.5 | 96.5 |
This has been a great week as far as dieting goes. I joined WW and I am enjoying getting to know eating on plan again.
I did Weight watchers after I had Willoweve and lost 40 pounds between Willoweve and my pregnancy with Quinn but I haven’t really attempted it since. It seems to have worked this week.
So onward I go and we’ll see how it goes.
Goal for the week: go five miles on the elliptical every every day I am at the gym. I managed five miles once last week and and my goal is to make that my new standard.
Sorry I haven’t been blogging more but now that the kids are out of school I think our schedule should settle a bit – these last two weeks of school have been crazy busy with events and activities. Things should settle into a pattern now at least for a while.
I wish you all a happy Wednesday.
| Goal | 100 | Last week |
| Lost this week | .5 | -2 |
| lbs to loose | 96.5 | 97 |
I lost half a pound this week. Not bad.
I have set some exercise goals for myself. I am trying to add to how far I go on the elliptical each day at the gym. At the moment I can usually go 4.41 miles in 55 minutes.
My goal is to get up to 5 miles in 55 minutes. Yesterday was not a great day for the gym and I only managed to go 4.2 miles. I think I ate too little breakfast because I was really hungry during the workout.
So I’m still not happy with my chart for weight loss. There has to be a better way to track it. I am working on it now.
I’ve been to the gym 5 times this week. I hope to make it five times in the upcoming week as well.
So I keep hearing people from back on the East coast telling me how hot it is.
I think I’m jealous. Not that I want to be hot – but… well I’m a little tired of being chilly – not cold exactly but chilly.
I’m ready for summer. Jason has been told by natives not to worry yet. Apparently sometimes the Pacific North West skips summer. However we won’t officially know if summer is being passed over until July.
If by July 4th things haven’t warmed up and the sun isn’t out then we can expect to hop right from cool rainy spring to cool rainy fall.
Of course last summer was warm by now and July was spectacular and sunny and even hit the 90′s a few times. But I’ve been told that was an anomaly.
Honestly we haven’t lived here long enough to know for sure yet what the weather patterns are REALLY like.
Anyway I hope we don’t skip summer – I would miss the sun and warm weather. I suspect the kids would too.
Happy Tuesday everyone.
Whether tis nobler and more practical to purchase a green hybrid or a mini van.
The time is quickly approaching when we are going to have to replace our minivan. Currently the mini van is on life support – making frequent trips to the “car doctor” leaking oil by the quart and refusing to run on anything but premium gas.
Have you seen the price of gas – especially premium!!!! It is outrageous. I remember when gas was… wait – I think I will withdrawal that comment in deference to not sounding old.
Anyway the point is we are not going to be able to keep the mini van much longer. It is costing us more to keep it running every month then a car payment.
Beyond that I have to admit that driving around in the minivan makes me feel like part of the problem.
I mean:
It guzzles gas – attributing to humanities dependence on oil.
It has horrible emissions – attributing to lower air quality and potentially making my own children’s asthma worse.
It doesn’t help with global warming or the trees.
May argument has always been that because of the number of car seats/booster seats we needed we had to have a minivan. And we did. Three special seats will not fit in the back of anything else.
Now however Xavier is out of a booster seat. Willoweve is out of a car seat and into a much slimmer booster. We can fit all the children in the back of a car. For at least a couple of years – until their bodies grow to big.
I really want our next car to be a hybrid. I really wanted our next car to be a hybrid minivan – unfortunately they don’t exist in the US yet. But lets face it, we can get away with a four door sedan for a couple of years. Maybe if we hold out the hybrid minivan will come to the US.
So we have pretty much decided to go green and buy a Toyota Prius.
Now we just need to find one. Easier said then done – in this area they sell out fast. We’re in no hurry though. So we might put ourselves on a waiting list to get one soon.
In other words…. we decided to be … green.
Jun 5th 2008PamDiet & Quinn & Willoweve
So the other day my daughter had a play date with a little friend from school. They had a great time playing with ponies and dressing up.
Anyway on the way back to the school to drop Willoweve’s friend off to her mom there was a strange conversation. I am not entirely sure how it started but the part I was involved with went like this.
Willoweve: “I’m a girl and your a girl” directed to her friend “and we both have blonde hair.”
Her friend: “Yeah but my mom’s a girl too and she doesn’t have blonde hair, she has brown hair.”
Me: (thinking to chime in and be an active involved parent) “And I’m a girl and I have red hair.”
Willoweve’s Friend and Quinn at the same time: “No you don’t have read hair.”
Me: (Inwardly groaning knowing instinctively what is coming) “So what color hair do I have”
Willoweve’s friend: “Orange”
Quinn: “Black” ( I kid you not he said black)
Me: “Uhm, Quinn, why do you think mommy’s hair is black?”
Quinn: “Because it’s black.”
We spent the rest of the short ride to the school trying to determine why exactly Quinn feels my hair is black. We never really found a satisfactory answer from him. But hey he’s three.
And – he saved me from dealing with being told my hair is orange. I love that child.
It’s red – really – it’s red.
Ok so the old table wasn’t working. I’m gonna try this instead.
| Goal | 100 | |
| Lost this week | -2 | |
| lbs to loose | 97 |
Anyway – I gained two pounds this week. Not real sure what to think about that. I mean I haven’t been writing down everything this week so I guess that could be the culprit.
I got to the gym four times this week, so that’s good.
I am going to examine my options this week and see what I can figure out – I feel like I need something to help me out here.
I need to go back to my doctor about having my Vitamin D levels checked again. When I go I plan to take my food and exersice log so that I can talk to her about weight loss options and what she thinks might be the issue.