Spring Flower And Table Update

Hello Spring time!!!

When we looked out our windows at least we don't see big fat flakes of snow like last Sunday. Still, from the window it looks pretty plain...UNTIL you go outside take a closer look. Then you can see little leaves starting to grow on the hydrangeas, lilys are poking out, at least one of the wedding fuchsias shows signs of life, tulips are up and just waiting to blossom, raspberries have little shoots coming up, and the crocuses are in full bloom!! On this second day of spring here are some photos of what's growing in the back yard.

Our Table Continues to Grow

St. Patty's Day marked the end of winter quarter. So far we have all the pieces cut, all the veneering is done, the moldings have been made, cut, glued (see pictures below...I'm good with glue), and we've started sanding. If we're not careful we might beat our 2012 scheduled finish date.

Alaska 2009

BRRRRRRRRRRRR

We had another successful weekend trip. Aaron and I are hope and have finally warmed up from our trip to Anchorage. It was a perfect weekend.

We got to spend time with our good friend Karen. She never got a chance to properly "check out" Aaron before we got married. Rest assured he got the official "nod" by the end of the weekend!

Highlights were ---

• Anner nearly froze. Okay, it wasn't cold for Anchorage, but cold for Seattle. We've been home for a week and I'm thawed out now.


• Aaron saw his first ever moose! Two of them, in fact. Mama and her yearling, munching on trees in some foothills in Anchorage.


• We saw the start of the Iditarod for many places. We walked around and wished mushers good luck. We watched the start on the street. We watched from inside some offices. We watched from a few blocks up the road to see the dogs in full stride. The dogs are SO excited to run. Most mushers hold them back with a fleet of handlers, multiple sleds, a lot of dead weight and a heavy foot on the break. The dogs still seemed thrilled to get to run. There's nothing like it. This includes a picture of us and Martin Buser, currently in 22nd place.

• We took dog sled rides and decided we'd like to come back for a real dog-sled tour someday. I can't wait for that! Anyone want to join us?

We had Jane's birthday party at an Anchorage institution: The Moose's Tooth, a wildly popular pizzeria. Happy 29th Jane! (not actually her birthday picture)

• We went to the mushers banquet and bid on Iditarod wine, and more importantly - we we're big winners.

• Aaron got his first pair of Carharts -- ooo la la!

All in all, we had a great time!!! I just love going up there. It was fabulous to see Jane and Karen. I'll visit good friends no matter how cold it is.

A parting shot, "a good day for a bike ride":

A Man and His Safety Glasses: Woodshop Revealed

It took 3 1/2 quarters but we finally remembered to bring a camera to Woodshop class. We should have been taking pictures all along but better later than never, I guess. Here's a picutre of Aaron in action.
This week we realized we've, eh hem..."misplaced", one of our pieces of wood. We're not sure where it was "misplaced" to. We're checking all over: Garage, woodshop storage area, areas in the house like 'behind the washer' in hopes it'll suddenly just pop up! Like, "TADA!!! Here I am!" as if the missing piece is just playing a funny little joke on us. Ha Ha. When really, we either never made it, we lost it, we threw it out, it fell out of the car...who knows but I'm pretty sure it's gone. That is, if it ever existed. I'm sure we can spend at least a few weeks looking for it and a few more weeks remaking the 48" x 2 1/2" nicely planed piece of lyptus wood.

No matter what: this is going to be the best table EVER!

You can never have too many clamps!

Today Aaron and I veneered the top of our table (still on track to be completed in 2012). I got Aaron some clamps for Valentine's Day (nothing says, "I love you " like a set of bar clamps). That whetted his appetite and he found a clamp sale. One thing led to another and now you know what we need.... a clamp holder. Anyway... here's what veneering looks like.

We also planted our new finds from the flower and garden show. That just made us want to have even more so we went to the nursery and got even more flowers. Like clamps, you never can have too many flowers. Our bulbs are busting out of the soil AND we even have our first bloom. Thaaank goodness. Between the one crocus and Griffy signing, we know spring is nearly here.

Flower Show / Lion King Whirl Wind Tour

Holy Cows whatta day. In short:

I left work early and Aaron met me downtown. We sprinted to the convention center for the 21st annual Northwest Flower and Garden Show. It was stunning as always. We were guest bloggers for the 2nd time. It should end up on: http://www.mygardenblogs.com/NWblog/ sometime tomorrow.

After about 3 1/2 hours of buying exotic tubers and bulbs and saying "hello" to our favorite dahlia dealers (The Dahlia Barn) we grabbed a little dinner on the go, wrote the blog from my office, and then headed to the Broadway Tour of Lion King. Let me just say ALL the hype is true. Mark it on the calendar, I was misty before the end of the first number. It was AWESOME!!!

Here are some photos from garden day.

Stunning Orchids

Sadly, we'd kill them waay too fast to warrent buying any.

Anner's first dahlia purchase of the day.

Aaron & Anner at the Dahlia Barn (3rd dahlia purchase of the day)

We want one of these!!! What mystery and suspense....

I need this too! A giant wood carved eagle surrounded

by circles of heaths and heathers. It'll go great in the

the front yard.... a nice compliment to the flag.

HAPPY INAUGURATION DAY!!!

After celebrating my birthday in California we kept the party going with a fun and festive Inauguration Day Brunch with as many people as we could convince to go to work late. There were 10 of us total. We had a huge, beautiful brunch that would have normally gotten a lot of attention but on this day no amount of homemade food could distract from the heady history being made. We were all glued to the TV. No one talked. There was a little misty-ness and we hummed a long to the National Anthem.

Most of our guests left in the next hour or two but I stayed glued to the TV for the next 14 hours.

I called mom first thing in the morning, as the scones were going in to the oven. She tends to sleep. The phone rang. She answered and without saying hello, "you're bothering me!" At least I knew she was awake and watching. I told her I'd call her after the cemerony, which was still an hour away. I called later in the afternoon. Mom picks up the phone, "stop interupting". After that I decided we could catch up on Wednesday. I later heard my cousins got the same response. I guess none of us wanted mom to miss it and thankfully she didn't!!!

Happy Birthday Month!!

HOLY COWS - WHAT A FUN BIRTHDAY!


Aaron and I spent my birthday weekend in California. We were invited to a wedding reception but spend an additional 3 days there. I expected California to be totally stuck up and boy was I wrong! Everyone was really nice and very helpful. It was a great birthday. Mostly it was nice to have 80 degrees, sunshine, and a breeze. As I type, it's back to snowing here in Seattle. Our bults started to sprout after the last snow melted. I don't know what they'll do now. Stay tuned!


Out and about on my birthday. I take HDR with me whereever I go...



We ate at all sorts of local Greasy Spoons. Home fries everyday. YUMMY!




Check out the giant pine cones?!

Air Force One at the Reagan Museum.

Never too far from Boeing; wheels from Air Force One

Aaron and Ronny. Together at last!

Sunset at Robert H Meyer State Beach (a little traveled beach on our way home from the Reagan's).

Sunset at Seal Beach

Nixon's birthplace

Aaron's mustang.... SO COOL!

Inauguration Count Down

Aaron surprised me tonight by decorating the house for our Inauguration Brunch on Tuesday. Like the new table, pictures don't really do it justice.

See you back here in just five days.

Real Live Grown-Up Furniture!!!!

In an effort to make our house more homey I've really been pushing for "unpacking". My idea is to actually take everything out of the box its in and put it somewhere in the house! Aaron is onboard with this concept and that's why two weeks ago he suggest we go furniture shopping to get some nice shelves and various things so we can start putting out some of our pictures, books, art and alike. You know: the stuff that makes a house a home.

We headed out to the furniture store where we saw a beautiful Indian rosewood dining table. We've seen them before but they are always in castle size; not ity-bity-cute-little-house size. After 2 1/2 years of looking one appeared. Unfortunately, a dining table wasn't on the shopping list. It's the one thing we had and were reasonably happy about. Lucky for us the furniture store had an unrelenting high-pressured sales women who even did us the favor of calling us at home....twice. We lamented it all afternoon and measured and remeasured our dinning nook. Then: we caved. A week later we were picking up our new fabulous table, chairs and dresser for Aaron. I mean, once you're buying why not justify it by getting at least one thing that was on the list in the first place? As a bonus we were able to get it in one minivan trip. Amazing.

LOADING THE VAN

THE VAN ALL PACKED UP


TESTING OUT THE TABLE!! Pictures don't do it justice.
Trust us - it's BEA-U-TI-FUL

CHECK OUT THE GRAIN

AARON'S NEW AWESOME DRESSER