Wenatchee Weekend Fun

This weekend Joe and I were in Wenatchee visiting my family. We had a great time! We had a ton to do, but we managed to fit it all in, plus have time to relax by my aunt's pool for a bit.

My aunt was making fun of the fact that we were laying in the shade.

It was my dad's birthday, and since there was so much going on this weekend, he kind of got shafted. But we did spend a lot of time together, I dragged myself to family breakfasts with him at the unearthly hour of 7:30 a.m., and we fit in a movie as well - The Sorcerer's Apprentice. It was actually a pretty decent movie!

My dad is so great and didn't complain one bit that his birthday kind of got lost in the mix. But it was still important for me to spend his day with him (since I haven't been able to the last two years), because he is truly an amazing father! Love you dad!

The dogs had a fabulous time running in my other aunt's yard. They seriously love running in the grass and laying out in the sun. Every time we go there, I realize we really need to find a place with a yard.

Saturday night was my niece's bachelorette party! We had so much fun hanging out with family and friends at my sister-in-law's house.

My sister-in-law and her sister.

The bride-t0-be (on the right)

I was also able to have my own wedding dress fitting this weekend, but I'm not posting pictures of that! I'll just say that I'm extremely lucky to have a friend who is a seamstress - she made me feel so beautiful in my dress, and she is going to do such a fabulous job.

Stay tuned for pictures of my niece's wedding day!

Great Pictures of the Pups

I've been wanting to share these pictures for a while, but have been a little bit busy posting about the big move and getting settled in. But now things have slowed down a bit, and I know you all love seeing photos of the cutest members of this family!

Stuart took these pictures a few weeks ago while we were all hanging out at our friend Laura's house in Maryland.

Peek a boo!

"I wonder how I could sneak some of that wine..."

Man and dog. My two boys. *love*

"MY toy..." *cuddle*

New Jobs

I am very happy to say that both Joe and I have fabulous new jobs! Joe already had his set up before our move, and is working as an associate at Wells Chiropractic. There are two offices, one in Bellevue and one in Renton, and he will be splitting his time at each. He loves it so far and with his 10 a.m. - 6 p.m. schedule, he has it good!

I interviewed with Trupanion, a pet insurance company, once we arrived in Bellevue. They had interviewed me by phone while I was still in Connecticut, but ended up hiring someone else since I was still a couple weeks out from my move to Bellevue. Well, luckily for me, that person quit on her first day, so they brought me in to see if I was still interested. Um, yes please! I started last Wednesday and I couldn't be happier.

I am their "Internet Journalist" and basically I get to blog about pet-related issues all day. And you can bring your dog to work here! (I currently share my office with two of my co-workers puppies, and eventually I'll bring either Ava or Jack in with me.) Combining my two favorite things - writing and pets.... could there be a better job for me? To all my internet-savvy friends out there, you should add the pet insurance blog to your RSS Feeds, and follow Trupanion on Twitter and Facebook.

And of course, I have to put in a plug - if any pet owners are looking for pet insurance, consider Trupanion. I know I'm biased now, but from what I've learned, they are a great way to go. :)

Moving into Our New Place

After our pit stop in Wenatchee, we headed up (sorry OVER) to Bellevue to pick up our keys to our new condo that we are renting. We had seen the place on video and in pictures, but hadn't seen it ourselves, so we were a little nervous. But luckily, we really love it!

It's super small (only 790 square feet!) but everything is really new and modern, which we love.

We picked up the keys on Tuesday, July 20th, but unfortunately, our stuff wasn't scheduled to arrive until the following Monday! (This is due to a miscommunication that led to them picking up our stuff three days late. Huge bummer.) So, we were back to sleeping on the floor on an air mattress in a completely empty apartment. It was like camping, sort of, and would have been totally fine if our air mattress didn't have a hole it in. We went to bed on a nice firm mattress and by midnight we were laying on the floor. Anyway, it was an adventure.

Joe's parents came up that Sunday, the 25th, so they would be there to help when our shipment arrived on Monday. They brought Joe's nephew, Zach, which ended up kicking a ton of ass (for us, not so much for him) because he's a strapping young 16-year-old who is SUPER strong and was able to help us a ton with moving in the heavy stuff. (I own a lot of books. And after this move, Joe said I'm not allowed to by a single new book until we buy a house and know we are done moving. haha.)

We were able to get the trailer unloaded in about three hours and called the moving company who came and hauled it away. Perfect!

It was nice having Joe's family here, since he hasn't seen them in over a year. The dogs loved having their grandparents here as well, since they kept slipping them treats (bad grandparents!!). I called them the 'weak links', as was evident by the dogs' rapt attention during meal time.

Weak Link #1: Joe's dad

Weak Link #2: Joe's mom (with their dog, Roxy)

Joe and I both started our jobs on Wednesday, the 28th, so we've been slowing unpacking the boxes. I finally got everything unpacked today, which is a huge weight off my shoulders. I swear, I'm a freak. If one thing in my life is unorganized, my whole life goes crazy. But now that the house is more or less in order, I can start organizing other things. You know, like that small event I'm hosting in two months. :)

Pit Stop in Wenatchee

Sorry for the lack of posting. We finally made it to our final destination and have been waiting for internet and for things to settle down a bit. But I have a few updates, so I guess I better start.

We crossed our final state line (into Washington) on Saturday, July 17th. We actually made it early in the afternoon, so I got to spend a lot of time visiting with my family. We basically just relaxed and enjoyed being out of the car all day Saturday.

Me and my dad in front of the sign my aunt made for our arrival.

The dogs got to run to their heart's content in my aunt's back yard, which they loved. They were very happy to be out of the car, too.

Once Ava got all her runs out, she was content to snuggle up again. Like always.

On Sunday my brother and sister-in-law invited us over for a pool party. My niece came over as well, with her fiance and their son, and we all had such a great time.

Me with my nephew Mason.

My niece and her family.

My brother, my older nephew, and my baby nephew.

Me and Mason.

After getting completely sun soaked, we made our way back to my aunt's and slept like logs! We woke up the next morning (Monday, the 19th) to head to Bellevue to pick up the keys to our new condo!

Yellowstone National Park

First of all, beware of this post, because I included way too many pictures. But a lot of why I blog is so I can remember everything and I just loved this whole day and I couldn't choose between pictures. :)

We woke up super early yesterday morning in Cody (people outside our hotel room were talking - loudly - about jackalopes). We took the dogs for a walk and found a little coffee hut, then headed back to get ready for the day.

We left Cody around 9:00 a.m. and got to the gates of Yellowstone at 10:00 a.m. We forgot it was a $25 entrance fee, but once we got into the park and starting seeing everything, we knew it was totally worth it.

We started seeing buffalo right away! Buffalo are so cool looking. They are huge and slow and they just look at you as you pass like you couldn't interest them less.

This guy was laying right by the road and I imagined him saying "The damn paparazzi!"

We stopped at one of the large tourist buildings to walk the dogs and get lunch. The dogs had LOTS to smell and explore!

Then we had the most amazing experience! Joe had been saying since we started this trip that he wanted to see the bear. He had me on 'bear watch' every time we were in a place we thought bear might be, and as soon as we entered the park, we started chanting, "bear, bear, bear". Of course, we thought it was just all talk. We didn't think we'd actually see one. Well, we turned a corner and there were all these cars stopped in the road. We looked on the hill and there was a grizzly bear! AND two cubs!!

It was so awesome! Everyone was just in total awe. Joe had brought his binoculars with us, which was so lucky because we got to see them in total detail with those things. And those cubs were so incredibly cute. They looked like adorable stuffed animals.

We stayed until the threesome meandered their way up and over the hill. It was the greatest experience!!

A little way further down the road, there was a huge backup of cars and a ranger standing at the side of the road. Another bear! This time a black bear, with her cub, resting at the foot of a tree in the shade. You can't really see much in this picture, but they were there!

They kind of blend into the shade, but can you see them?

After the bear sightings, we started thinking about what else we really wanted to see. Joe said a moose, since he had never seen one before. So, as a joke, we started chanting, "moose, moose, moose" - it worked before! And I kid you not, about 20 minutes later, we came upon this guy!

We could not believe it! He was a little further away than the bears, but you could still see him pretty clearly. We tried our chant for bighorn sheep too, but I guess our luck ran out. haha. That was the one thing we wanted to see that we didn't. But we did see more buffalo and some elk!

Jackson looking at the buffalo.

We passed through Mammoth Hot Springs. We didn't stop, but drove around the little area, and there was an elk laying right in the middle of all the people.

Once again, Joe didn't let me drive all day. He had fun driving through the park.

Bubbling waterfall.

On our way out of the park, we saw these guys hanging out on their own little island. It was pretty cute.

We were in such a good mood when we left the park. We had such an amazing drive through there. The dogs were good and we were ready to head into Bozeman, about two hours away, for the night. We hadn't made a reservation, but we didn't think we'd have a problem. Boy, were we wrong!

Every hotel in Bozeman was booked! We got back on the road and I started calling hotels in every town I could find on the map along I-90. I called Belgrade, Manhattan, Three Forks, Deer Lodge, Butte, and more. All booked!!

Finally I enlisted my mom's help, hoping she could find something online that I wasn't finding. She gave me phone number after phone number, and every place I called - booked solid. Seriously, the entire state of Montana seemed to be booked. We didn't want to drive all the way to Missoula, but we had no choice. We started calling hotels there. All booked! We started worrying that we were going to have to drive straight through to Idaho! Joe started getting all pumped up, saying that he wanted to just load up on coffee and red bull and drive straight through to Wenatchee!

Well, my mom finally found a hotel in Missoula that when I called, had rooms available. And they were pet-friendly. I was a little worried about a random hotel that literally had the only rooms available in all of Montana. I mean, was there a reason people didn't book there? But mom read me the reviews and everything seemed okay. So, we booked it.

We arrived around 10:00 p.m., absolutely exhausted. And it's not a bad hotel. I did my usual checks and everything checked out okay. And this morning all still seems well. Joe had to take a picture of the bathtub and the walls, because he thought it was so funny.

bright blue!

concrete walls!

I slept like the dead last night and Joe said he felt like he was in "My Cousin Vinny". Lots of noises, including a train that ran right by our hotel. I never heard any of it. Maybe he'll finally let me drive a little today so he can rest.

All in all, we wouldn't have traded the time we spent in Yellowstone for anything. We should be in Wenatchee today!

A Scenic Drive to Cody, Wyoming

We got a good night's sleep last night at the Landmark Country Inn in Murdo. Jackson loved his cushy, comfy bed, that he got to sleep in all by himself.

Seriously, doesn't he look comfy?

And just a couple more pictures of this hotel:

Right outside our room.

The hotel lobby.

Once we left Murdo, we headed down the road (gained another hour) and made our way to Wall Drug. We found this little tourist trap on our way out to the East Coast. There is literally nothing for miles and miles and miles in South Dakota, but then all of a sudden you start seeing these billboards for Wall Drug. And they last for literally, like 200 miles. When you finally get to the exit for Wall Drug, you cannot help but stop, because you've seen so many signs for it. It's brilliant marketing! Let me show you a few of the signs we saw:

For miles and miles. It's hilarious. The rest of the trip looked like this:

Fields and mountains.

More fields and more mountains.

So, when we got to the turnout for Wall Drug, we of course stopped again.

A huge dinosaur welcomes you.

The town is like a little western town.

The 'main drag'.

Joe and I took turns going into the store and looking around, and staying out with the dogs. It was already starting to be a hot day.

A random display inside the store.

A huge jackalope you could ride.

We bought some snacks and some special chocolate (tequila lime and spicy huckleberry flavors) and that's about it. It was just fun to go inside and look around. It's such a tourist trap, but totally worth the time.

Then we got back on the road.

Miles and miles, just like this. Isn't South Dakota beautiful?

We passed into Wyoming and took the scenic route to Cody, where we planned to stay the night. Most of the trip was slow, but beautiful. But we did hit some construction.

We off-roaded it in the Toyota.

Ava was jolted awake by the bumpy roads. (Yes, at this point she had dug her way underneath Jack's bed to sleep.)

After several more hours on the road, we made it to our destination of Cody. We got a cute little hotel downtown, and we settled right in for the night.

Joe was tired after all the driving.

Ava was tired after all the.... sleeping.

I got right on the computer to start blogging. (You are welcome.)

Joe went out to get dinner (Subway) and wine (which we drank out of the plastic glasses the hotel had available.) Classy, I know.

Cheers!

Tomorrow we are heading into Yellowstone! We are looking forward to the drive through the park. We are hoping to see more wildlife than we saw last time we went through. Should be a leisurely day tomorrow.