I LOVE Weekends

I just wish they were so much longer. Today is a hard Monday.. with my parents being here last week it feels as if I had an extra long weekend. Had such a wonderful time visiting with them last week and I am excited that they will be back the end of September :) Thursday night we went to dinner with them at Gerry Andal's, which happens to be one of my favorite restaurants and then my oldest son came over for a drink with us all after his shift at work, it just amazes me that I have a son old enough to sit in a restaurant and order a beer... I do not feel old enough for this. Then again my next youngest is married and in the marines..in less than a year my "baby" will be 18 and done with high school. Time really happens in the blink of an eye.

Patrick is 21

After we left the restaurant we decided we were not ready to go home so we headed to the casino for a bit... played a few dollars in the slots and then just sat in the bar for a bit and listened to some music did some people watching and had a couple of drinks. It was a nice night.. just relaxing and enjoying our time together.
English Boom

This weekend we spent time caching and hiking and playing in the woods and on the beach. We sat in restaurants and visited. We drove around shopping and talking and even went and visited some friends from years ago. It was a great weekend filled with time together. We did some hiking on Saturday on some trails near Stanwood, there are a bunch of trails in these woods and the trail we picked had four caches on it. After the last cache and a mile into the woods... I sort of decided I knew the way back to the jeep... which I did.. but the trail I picked ended up being not a really good one.. as in... it turned out to be an animal trail that did not go very far and we had to bushwhack for some of it...right through the berry bushes... which was not so horrible... the laughing while trying to avoid stickers was a bit harder.
Hidden Cache... or not so hidden :)

Sunday we ended up a bit closer to home even... we went after a couple of caches on the English Boom here on the island, this place is amazing and so beautiful. There is a nice trail to start out on... and then you come to a big ditch... well the tide was coming in and we knew from reading about them that we might not be able to get to these... yet looking around we were not sure low tide would help much. We decided to take a jump over the ditch... well there was a big stump in it so it worked out well, we stepped on to it and walked across then jumped over to the other side and carried on our way. The first cache was not so hard at all.. only so many places to hide it.. and then... even though we knew the next one would be impossible.. we had to go and check out the area... and yes it is impossible (without getting soaking wet) at high tide.. but low tide it should be easy enough.

There is a cache on that boat... but need low tide and boots to get it!

Heading back was a bit of an adventure.. well only in one spot.. the ditch... see the tide had been coming in the whole time we were out walking.. so by the time we got back to the ditch.. there was less of the stump... now I know in photos it does not look like much.. but... for me.. it was scary... the water was moving around this stump and it was yucky brown color and the stump was sort of floating a bit more now.. and I had to do some big jumping to get across.. basically I aimed to where I wanted to go.. told Dave he better catch me.. and closed my eyes and jumped.. with lots of praying (that sort of sounded like cussing out) I did it and it was not nearly as bas once I was done... this geo caching is bringing out the adventure side of me.. sort of... lol I tend to be so focused on getting to the cache that I get some tunnel vision and then when it is time to head back I have some different views on things.

This is the stump... lol not so scary looking now!

Weight Loss Wednesday

Well I have been home a week... and no weight loss... but... I did not expect any really. I was so happy this morning when I climbed on the scale and looked down to see I had not gained any weight. My parents have been here this week and my dad loves to take us out to eat.. and I love to eat. Had pizza for lunch the other day at Jimmys, It is really good pizza and then yesterday mom and I shared a piece of homemade apple pie and ice cream for lunch. Thank you so much Dad :)

When they came over on Sunday I did a lunch of cheese and meat and crackers... a big fruit platter and a some veggies.... I love the little snack lunch type stuff... enough of a selection that anyone can find something to enjoy. They are also so easy to get all put together.. then you can have them in the fridge and be ready to go anytime. I enjoyed sitting around the table snacking and visiting and knowing things were not too horribly unhealthy :)

I have gotten back on the treadmill and I will be back to walking on the beach. Also have some hiking plans (with caching) planned for this weekend. I am doing situps/crunches (or whatever they are called.... pretty much I lay on my back and hate the world while trying to keep my core (yeah it is in there somewhere) tight and scrunch my knees to my chin as much as possible) I have been told this will get better and if it doesn't I am going to owe someone (yes I know you read this) some pain.

Today I weighed in still at 236

~Michelle

Crazy Wonderful Weekend

This last weekend was crazy wonderful and very busy. I love our three day weekends.. I just wish we had even more time... would be nice to work 2 days a week and have a 5 day weekend... but even then I am sure I would not get enough time.

Friday we slept in and then headed out to run some errands and do some shopping. When we were on vacation we bought some cowboy hats and well... I wanted some boots to go with mine. Dave has wanted boots for a long time... but since his accident a few years ago...(busted up his ankle really bad) he was not sure he would ever be able to do cowboy boots again. We did find one pair in Mt. Vernon that he was able to get one and walk in.... but... they were not awesome. We had looked online and new there was a place south of us with a lot more selection in the bigger sizes.. so decided to head there on Saturday.

We also have started shopping for a new kitchen stove. Which has not been a wonderful experience. We built our kitchen around a beautiful stove we had bought.. it is a slide in... dual fuel... so stove is gas (and works even when the power is out ) and the oven is electric ( bakes very evenly) I loved my stove.. until July 4th when it decided to turn it self on and keep heating up until it started smoking and we had to flip the main breaker to get it to stop getting hotter. I am so thankful that we were home and caught it before it melted and burned our house down. Doing some research we learn there was a recall because of this issue... but we had not know thing because we had bought it used when someone else redid their kitchen to stainless.

We head out to do some stove shopping.. since the stove part still works and it is just the oven that we can't use... well I have not been in a huge hurry... too hot to be doing too much baking. I am thinking we will find a new stove for $600 or so. Yeah well.. I am so wrong.. a normal stove.. sure there are some to pick from at that price... but a slide in.. well we only get about 3 options that are under $2,500 and there is nothing fancy about these stoves... the same damn stoves as the $600 free standing ones.. just the one we need does not have finished sides or a back... but it cost that much more :( At this time I do not want a stove... I am trying to to figure out how else I can do baking... I can think of a lot of other things to spend that much money on. Plus we have to figure out what color we want... right now everything we have is black.. but we will also be updating the dishwasher soon.. and someday the fridge... we are thinking of going to stainless.. but.. with a lot of black in it.. so that we do not look totally unmatched until everything has been replaced.. it has become a bit more stressful than I was looking forward to... might not have a new stove until Thanksgiving I am thinking.

So back to boots... we did end up going on Saturday to Renton Western Wear and we did find some boots... Both Dave and I found ones we liked and Missy found the ones she had fallen in love with in Colorado. Not only did we find ones we liked.. they were on sale.. they were on sale enough to cover the sales tax so that was sort of nice. they did not have the ones Missy loved in stock so we had to order those for her. Means we get to go back in a couple of weeks and pick them up. When we got home Saturday we decided to put on the boots and hats and get dressed up a bit and head out. We ended up casino hopping and had a great time. We started off at one casino... the machines were paying ok.. but.. the people were sort of skanky there.. had a meth freak playing at machine.. and then a guy sat down and started pounding on his machine... just not the feeling we were looking for. Headed to the next casino and even though the machines were not paying.. the people were having fun. Figured we would try another one on our way home.. and the machines were so and so and the people were fun... we ended up spending the most time there.. ordered some drinks and some food and enjoyed sitting at the bar people watching :)

Sunday was a relaxing day.. parents came over for lunch (they are staying at a camp ground not too far away for a few days ) and we sat and visited. After they left we decided to head out and check out a few of the new caches that had posted while we were on vacation. It was nice to be caching again... we did not do as much as we would have liked on vacation.. and the weeks before had been sooooo busy with other stuff..so it felt really nice. We found a new area to explore... found one of the caches in the area, Annie which was in a very Beautiful area... when there we saw that there were two more caches on an island there... but.. you have to go all the way back to the starting point and take the other trail... as there are big waters to go over otherwise. So we are planning on packing a picnic next Friday and heading out there after my Doctors appointment. Looks like one cache is at the top of the island so we will bring hiking boots :) We did tackle one cache.. it did mention that "part of the trail was a bit rough" and it was only 200 feet from the jeep... we figured no problem... turns out.. it was 200 feet straight up a rock mountain... it was straight up... which was hard enough.. coming down I had a sit and basically slid down, while praying. Oh yeah and watch out for the barbwire fence. The view from the top is well worth it though.

This week I am looking forward to spending time with my parents.. some caching... some working on art projects.. and just visiting a lot. I am also looking forward to going blueberry picking with a friend.. and now the picnic on Friday with my honey. I also plan on getting some beach time in.. and doing lots of sit ups. Will explain that one on Wednesday :) My life is so good and I am so much more than spoiled rotten :)

Pictures

Just some photos I took while on vacation... been posting a few on my flickr account.. (click here to view ) and will be posting more as we go through them :)

Bridge that they are building in Denver

Georgetown loop runs to here, where the train depot and museum are. I took this while Dave was checking the GPS to see where the cache was... it was not on this sign.

Once again taking pictures while caching.. we were on a foot bridge and this was marked as a 1 for easy.. and we spent a good 30 minutes looking.. and have no clue where it might be :(

At a rest stop and Dave was around the back of the tree grabbing the cache while I am again providing some cover and taking some photos :)

I do just love tree photos :)

Weight Loss Wednesday

First weigh in after vacation... and I am happy to report I am down.. just one pound. I had hoped to be a bit more as I know I walked a LOT and it was hot and I sweated a lot (thought for sure I had sweated off a few pounds) and I did drink a LOT of water. We also only ate out a few times and we kept it real ( pretty much ) when we ate out... example is that when we had pizza we did get bread sticks... but we also did get a small pizza thin crust to share. We also did have dessert... but we split it. You can read/see about the places we ate out at on my kitchen blog. In the old days we would have had the bread sticks.. and a large thick crust pizza and each our own dessert.

With that being said.. I *am* happy I am at least down a pound... with the walking and the watching what we ate... we also spent a lot of time sitting on our backsides while travelling around and we did tend to eat a lot later than is good for us.

See all those stairs and the tiny ants on them... those are people.. Dave and John also climbed 118 more to be able to visit the look out and take this picture.

Even though this weight loss is not going nearly as fast as I would like.. I am happy that it is moving along and keeping on track.. it may take me a year longer than I had hoped.. but.. I know I can reach my goals. As for the getting healthy part.. that seems to be going really well.. no way last year I would have been able to do most of the stuff that I did this year. The hike up 224 stairs at Seven Falls not only would not happened last year.. I would not even thought to attempt it. I not only made it up the stairs this year... I also went on a 30 minute hike while at the top to see some other falls.

One day at a time... by this time next year I can not wait to see what I will be able to do :)

weighing in at 236

~Michelle