Day One of Adult Vacation

Our Caboose "room"
Originally uploaded by glass_identities

Last weekend was the best 4-day I have had in a long time. (It was a long weekend) We left Thursday night for a weekend getaway... no kids... no real plans. Just get in the jeep and head out. Well so I thought. Dave had other ideas.... He loves to surprise me and spoil me.. and I am in no way complaining. . I have so much to I want to share that I am going to post each day separately.

Thursday after lunch we drove north through the area where the Skagit tulips should be.... they are blooming a bit late this year so all we saw were a bunch of daffodils... still totally awesome...then we got on the ferry at Keystone going to Port Townsend. The weather was beautiful and while on the ferry there were sea lions swimming next to us. We got off and headed towards Sequim. I have to say... it felt as if Dave was a little rushed for this part of the trip. I know he had called ahead and reserved the ferry ride... that is suggested with this ferry.. it is smaller and runs less often and can fill up.. even after we were off the ferry though he seemed a bit in a hurry. We have this great book called Washington Curiosities. Quirky characters, roadside oddities and other offbeat stuff. Lots of fun stuff to check out in this book. One of the things I saw in this book earlier in the day was a fun looking bed and breakfast in Sequim where you get to stay in your own caboose. I told Dave about this and thought since we were going through Sequim we should stop by and just check it out in case we wanted to stay there next time. As we were coming into Sequim the Red Caboose Getaway was right there on the right side of the road. To be honest from the road it didn’t look like much… some train things in someones yard is pretty much it. The cabooses are rustic on the outside and someone went and put up a bunch of tract housing next them… but…the closer you get… the better this place looks. There is a big silver dinning car out front with one of the cabooses.. and then in a circle around a pond are the rest of the cabooses each on their own piece of track. Some of the cars are still a work in progress. Early in the day there had been a new (old ) caboose delivered. The plan is to have a total of 10 cabooses done up that people can stay in. I believe there are 6 finished ones at this time. Each caboose has its own theme and is done up inside. We stayed on track 2, orient express..( caboose in top photo) talk about romance. Wait I have to back up here…we pulled into the parking lot.. and I loved the place already.. wishing we had found it earlier so that we could have planned on staying here. Since we are here we want to get out and have a look around and see how much they are and how booked they are during the summer. We walked up to the “station house” and Olaf, the conductor comes out of the dining car to greet us. Dave reaches out to shake his hand.. introduce himself and says… to Olaf… “we have reservations for tonight” My mouth dropped and I smacked Dave upside his arm, thinking he is joking and being sort of rude….Olaf looks at Dave and says… track 2 is all ready to go. Into the office we go to get the key and are given a map with things to do and places to see and Olaf shares with us some of the locations for great food. All this time I am still not sure if it’s a joke or if we are really staying. With key in hand Olaf heads out and we follow. He opens the door to our caboose and oh wow… so beautiful. The colors the textures the smells… everything is perfect. When you open the door there is a big bed with lots of pillows and beautiful bedding. There is a gas fireplace in the corner burning low. The floors are a dark wood and in the back you can see a Big tub. I would have thought that the inside of a caboose would be rather crowded and dark. This is anything but that…. I could not believe how much room there was and how much light…. A lot of the light comes from the cupola in the center of the caboose. You can climb up there and look out over the whole “train station” It is a bit hard to take photos in the caboose that turn out great in there though… hard to show the feeling one gets in the caboose. It is rustic but it is elegant and romantic and beautiful. In the morning there is breakfast in the dining car. I don’t even know what to say here. It was the best breakfast!! Even Dave who does not eat some of what was served, baked apple, strawberries, He doesn’t like fruit, still said it was best breakfast he has ever had. They started us with the coffee, hot chocolate or tea… not just hot chocolate though; they have many flavors to pick from. Same with the juices, not just orange but a blend that was amazing. They then brought out the bread still warm and oh so wonderful. We then had baked apple with sausage/cornbread stuffing.. not something I would have picked.. but now that I have had it.. I will so go back for it. The dutch baby with strawberries and lavender cream… loved it!! It was all just amazing. I know I have gone on and on here…thank you for reading this. We will be going back to this place… in fact we were making plans to go again before we even left. If you ever are in the area it is a great place to stay. This is not a family/kid place… this is a place to getaway with your loved one and reconnect with each other or yourself, the kind of place you leave feeling spoiled and reenergized and ready to tackle the world. More photos on My flickr :) Please feel free to click around here and comment.

Thank you to Olaf and Charlotte for a wonderful stay.

Friday, Saturday and Sundays post to follow. Lots of animals, landscape and history coming.

Road Trip With Kids

lighthouse
Originally uploaded by glass_identities

Last weekend we took the two youngest kids and headed out on a day trip. We left really early in the morning and drove for a few hours then stopped and had some breakfast. We wanted to go to the beach but to try a different one. So we headed to West Port. We took the long way through some small towns that we had not visited before... checked out a great knitting shop and a chainsaw art shop that teaches classes.. Dave and John are both wanting to sign up for that. It was a beautiful drive through the country all day.. we did the best we could to stay off any freeways. WestPort itself was not very much fun.. they have a nice beach for surfing on but we did not find very much to do in town. We did love the visit to the lighthouse. Also found that the statepark in GrayLand is really nice and might be worth a visit. We had hoped to explore some areas near my mom for dirt biking trips this summer but the main road was closed due to an accident and it was getting late.... gives us an excuse to make another tip. We also have all decided we want to take a long weekend to explore Mt St Helens.

I put my etsy shop on vacation today. Surgery is next week and well.. I am looking forward to it.. to the break from having to do anything for a few days.. and really really looking forward to not hurting anymore. I am excited to be thinking about being about to go back to working full time...it has been over a year and i am done with all of this and really looking forward to it all being over.

Dave has a fun special weekend planned for us this weekend but he isnt giving me too many details.. whatever it is I will be taking photos and will be back to tell all about it ... well at least some :)

Click photo to be taken to my flickr where there are more potos with links.

Strength, Courage and Wisdom

I was listening to a great song this morning by India Aria that is called Strength, Courage and Wisdom when I noticed that treasury west was just about to open. So I used that title to make a treasury ( a collection of things from other sellers on etsy ) I would love if you could go check it out by clicking here and then when it opens please click on each shop and leave a comment at the bottom of the treasury so the people in it can see it. Thank you :)

Drop it.. pick it up... opps they all slipped off

Ok so two days ago I decided I wanted to knit... all of a sudden I just thought.. hey I want to do that. So off to the craft store to get some needles and yarn.. thanks to those who helped me know what to look for. Hurry home last night and open the needles and the yarn and off to youtube to learn how to make a fancy sweater. Ok I know I am not going to learn that in one night but I do tend to think big sometimes and forget my life jacket when jumping into things. The first vidio was great.. learned how to cast on using one needle... had no clue what the next step was.. browsed around some more vids... I love how the "Learn to knit for beginners" starts with 4 rows on the needles.. if I knew how to get 4 rows on there I wouldn't be a beginner.. well not as beginner as I am. After dropping the needles about twelve times.. they are so slippery.. and all of the yarn falling off the tip of them many times.. a friend, warmnfuzzy , showed up online and was able to talk to me one on one and walk me through it with some great pictures and directions she sent me. * thank you thank you thank you * I got up this morning and made a pot holder sized square.. only had a few holes in it.. learning quickly what not to do...now the yarn is staying on the sticks better so having less holes. I think tonight or tomorrow I may be ready for the next step. Possibly next weekend I can make a fancy sweater *smile*

Red Neck Bathroom Fan

I cant post any after pictures... yet.. but we are coming along in the master bath.. one more coat of paint on the walls then we get down to tiling..... I did take a picture of this and could not resist sharing it. We already have a new bathroom door.. did new doors on the whole house... so this old one we cut a hole in and bungeed the fan to so we can vent the room really good to the outside with the drywall dust and then paint fumes.