Seattle

We finally took the trip we've been talking about for years (No, I am not being dramatic, we really have been talking about going since about the time we got married. . .)

I am convinced that traveling with a toddler can never accurately be called "vacation", but we did manage to spend some great time with Seattle. Thanks to the wonderful location of our hotel, we could easily see the downtown area on foot. Nolan was a champion city kid, letting us roll him around at top speed up and down the hills. And he got more than one amused look the day it was raining and we put the rain cover on his stroller. He braced both feet and both hands against the plastic as we rolled along and plenty of people thought that was very funny.

We had to take pictures in front of the typical Seattle landmarks, and Nolan was varying degrees of a good sport about THAT. . .(He was DEAD asleep when we got up to Queen Ann hill. . . so he didn't really have a choice about posing for these. Needless to say, most of his naps happened in the car over the 4 days we were there. He's not much of a sleeper away from home.)

We also managed to see MANY of Ben's old friends from the mission days, which was wonderful. Nolan did his best to charm them all, while simultaneously wreaking havoc on their homes. I THINK most of them have forgiven us. . .

AND, we located a wonderful cupcake bakery which ranks at the top of my list as far as bakery frostings go. . . Trophy Cupcakes. Praise heaven, they actually use butter instead of shortening in their frosting. Hallelujah!! And now I'm on a mission to concoct a snickerdoodle cupcake, because the one they made was so darn good. As you can see, Nolan was pretty excited about it too.

I had to include this last one because I found it so amusing. We went out to see Oak Harbor, one of the areas in which Ben served as a missionary, and we took the ferry on the way back. . . It was VERY cold and windy that day, but we got a picture anyway. . .

Doesn't Nolan look thrilled?