kelli visits seattle

i think our condo can be more accurately described as a hotel this fall. a very very small hotel ;) for anyone who doesn't know, kelli and i grew up across the street from each other and have a life time of memories together! 

kelli's trip was sort of an impromptu one, which was fun! she moved to san jose (from minneapolis) at the beginning of october for her boyfriend's job. his job requires a lot of travel, so while he was gone on a work trip, she was able to use frequent flyer miles to come up and see us for 4 nights! it was her first time in seattle and we had a great time showing her around. not to mention, i never wanted her to leave because it was like having a 2nd mom around here. my kids adore her and she is so good with them! here are some highlights from our long weekend together: 

- a trip to the locks (of course!), a night drive to kerry park overlook and through part of south lake union, university district, fremont, etc. 

- a bus ride downtown to pike place market with ashford (azalea was at school). we ate a cinnamon roll as big as our heads and some delicious clam chowder. 

 

- dinner out to the boars head bbq place near our house with thatcher's co-worker sloan (his first time meeting the fam). 

- lots of jammies, wine, and friends/sex in the city watching at home while the kids were asleep. it's been way too long since i've combined those activities! 

- a morning picking up mighty o donuts and taking them to carkeek park where we played on the beach/playground. 

  

- saturday night out in ballard. we browsed the cute shops, had an amazing dinner and drinks at a restaurant called stoneburner (cauliflower ravioli sheets with brown butter, anyone?), had a post dinner drink at ballard brewing co (beer for her, ginger hard cider for me). to end the night, we picked up a piece of peanut butter cream pie from the pie bar window and brought it home. best night ever. 

- a trip to the mall with ashford where we took turns going in stores and keeping him entertained. ha. 

- a latte a day! we ended up doing a vanilla latte taste test of sorts. each day we got one from a different coffee shop - pike place market, mighty o donuts, ballard coffee works, and the nordstrom e bar at the mall. i think mighty o was my favorite of those! 

- a trip to the ballard farmer's market where we loaded up on flowers and yummy produce.

- pumpkin carving/chili party at our place with another co-worker of thatcher's and his wife and 2 year old daughter. it was our first time meeting them. it was a fun night even if the kids weren't super into the pumpkins after about 5 minutes ;) 

now i need to figure out a way to make it down to san jose to visit her!