Dinner time

Mmmmmm!  Delicious!  I love my spaghetti!

I think I have mastered the fork.

Yep, sure have!

Water fun

We are currently experiencing an unusual dry spell in and around Seattle.  Today is day 28 without any measurable precipitation.  Spring in the Northwest is usually pretty damp.  As a rule of thumb, don't expect summer to arrive until AFTER the Fourth of July celebrations.  If you plan on going somewhere to watch the fireworks, be sure to bring warm clothes, hot chocolate AND a rain coat.  As you can see from our back yard, we have had no rain for quite some time and the usual emerald colored grass is now the color of Kansas wheat that is ready for harvest.  But, I am not complaining.  Because of the wonderful warm weather, I have had many opportunities to go outside and play in the water.  

Denny Creek Hike

Amazing how the bubbling sounds of Denny Creek can mask the rumbling freeway that is just above the trees and over our heads (to the left) in this picture.  See how tiny we are compared to the trees and the massive I-90 overpass?

What a pretty hike.  This was one of the many small falls that we got to see along the river.  

Even though the storm that blew through a couple of weeks ago damaged one of the foot bridges and knocked another one completely down we had a good time on this hike.  Well, after it stopped raining that is...  (Seattle is still on track for a record breaking dry spring.  We were in the mountains where any type of weather goes.)  

As usual, we got to the trail head and realized that we didn't have our State Park parking permit so daddy and I stayed at the trailhead to eat lunch while mommy looked for the ranger station to get our permit.  During the 15 minutes that she was gone, the sky decided to open up and drop buckets of rain on our heads.  By the time she got back daddy and I were drenched.  We almost gave up and went home, but after eating lunch in the car, the rain stopped, our spirits improved and we decided to tough it out and hike for awhile.  We are glad that we did.  

We had already decided that our final destination was going to be the area of the hike they call the Water Slide.  After the slide, the trail gets steeper.  ...Daddy says I am a bit heavy to carry in the backpack so he will have to work his way to to steeper hikes as the summer goes on...   The water slide is a huge flat rock in the shallow part of the river where you can cool off on hot summer days.  Today was a bit cool to get in the water, but maybe one of these days will come back so we can play.  This is also the area of the hike where the second bridge had been washed away so it was good that we had already decided to turn back at this point.  All in all, we hiked a little over two miles round trip today.  Near the end of the hike I was able to get out of the backpack and stretch my legs a little before the ride back home.  Where, oh, where will we go next?

Can I have the camera?

It has been really nice outside lately.  I love to spend as much time out there as possible.  If I'm not inside eating or sleeping you can usually find me outside in my back yard or visiting the other neighborhood kids.  I love to play in the water and when it gets particularly warm, or even not so warm I like to run through the sprinkler and sit in a shallow bucket of water that mommy fills up for me.  I don't care that the water is cold.  I just love water!  

Happy Birthday, Daddy

Well, we didn't get any pictures of daddy's birthday, but I got a kick out of watching him blow out his candles.  Mommy made him a birthday brownie and put candles on it that would relight after he blew on them.  He blew and blew and blew and they kept coming back on.  I giggled so hard every time I saw a candle relight.  When mommy first brought it out, he said "there are only 10 candles on it," but after he finally got them extinguished he ended up blowing out more than the 38 candles that would have set this brownie on fire.  HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DADDY!

A day at the Zoo

The bear exhibit is one of the best exhibits at the Seattle zoo.  We are standing at the viewing window where the bears like to put on shows by swimming and catching fish.  It's amazing to watch these big bears up close and personal.  

The penguin exhibit is new this year.  Like the bear exhibit we were able to watch penguins swimming behind a series of glass walls.  By the time we got to this exhibit, I was pretty tired and ready for lunch so I didn't really pay much attention to what was going on.  

It's the Zoomazium!  After lunch we stopped by an indoor interactive learning/play center where all of the exhibits are nature-themed and appropriate for kids under the age of 8.  Behind me in this picture is a foam dinosaur egg that you can build up around yourself and then break out like a baby dinosaur.  I sat in it for a bit while mommy and daddy tried to figure out how the egg pieces go together.  I got bored waiting for them to figure it out so I went on to the next thing.  I'm playing with a zebra puzzle board here, but my favorite part was the gate that opens into the small kid area.  It wasn't anything special.  I just liked opening and closing it.  

Our last stop on the way out of the zoo was the family farm exhibit where they have a petting zoo.  There were almost as many volunteers inside petting zoo as there were goats.  When we walked into the pen all of the volunteers all had their camera phones out taking pictures of the goat who was kissing the miniature donkey.  I enjoyed this exhibit because the big goats didn't run away from me when I squealed with glee to touch them.  I thought maybe it would be a good idea to ride one, but mommy stopped me before I could kick my leg up and over it's back.  BUMMER!