A weekend in Seattle

We got to go up on another trip to Tacoma to spend time with my brother's family. This time, my cousin Stephanie was there with her family! At first it was going to be a girls and kids trip with Elizabeth, Stephanie, me and our little ones. We then found out that Seattle Fire Department was doing a practice employment test and Max thought that would be a great opportunity for a step up when they test in October. Since Max was coming and Stephanie was already up in Tacoma we drove up Thursday night and brought Todd (Steph's husband) along with us. We got there in the evening and all the kids were in bed so we put Charlie down and had a short visit with James and Elizabeth before we all went to bed. 

 In the morning everyone woke up, except for Charlie. Steph and Todd and Elizabeth made an amazing breakfast of pancakes, eggs, and sausage. Yum! Charlie slept through the morning commotion but woke up in time to get a cold plate of food. 

We cleaned up and played around the house and in the front yard until noon when we left for the zoo. No trip to Tacoma is complete without visiting the Point Defiance zoo. I think I've been there more than the Portland zoo. Max didn't come with us to the zoo because it was the same time as his practice test in Seattle. 

Cousins and Second Cousins!

We tried to get them to pose on the log, Charlie didn't understand why he had to sit still...so he didn't

Checking out the Sharks

we got to see a baby tiger and a baby leopard. 

My adorable nieces climbing on the snake!

Of course we had to stop off at the carousel. 

We came home and had a fun time playing in the front yard in the kiddie pool. Todd and Steph prepared an awesome meal of BBQed burgers. 

After dinner we put the kids in bed. Max and I did our Insanity workout in James and Elizabeth's newly cleaned out carport. It felt good to be outside! After our workout and showers we played cranium with all the adults. Loads of fun!

The next morning after breakfast, Steph, Todd, Max, me, and our kids all went to the Pike Street Market downtown Seattle. It's a great big farmer's market. We had fun looking at all the levels of shops. We ended up getting a large donut , that we all shared as a family, fudge, and a sea otter card, just the necessities right? 

I liked this umbrella art downtown Seattle. 

 After our parking meter expired, we drove a couple of blocks to meet James and Elizabeth at the Space Needle. Max had never been to the space needle, so we explored around it but when we found out that it was $22 per person to go to the top we decided to stay on the ground. Luckily there were plenty of fun things to do in the area. One of them was playing in this great fountain.  

My boys sure love being in the water.

I love these handsome boys!

Family photo op

Also, right next to the fountain was the Seattle Science Center and our OMSI pass got us in free there. We didn't think we would have time to go because we needed to get back to our car before our meter ran out and Charlie was exhausted. But Elizabeth told us about this awesome butterfly exhibit they had there, where butterflies fly all around. That sounded really exciting to us, we were right there and it was free so we decided to take 20 minutes and go see the butterflies.  We weren't disappointed.

The cocoons.  Some were breaking out as we watched.

We wished we could spend more time exploring the whole museum because it looked pretty amazing but Charlie was about to pass out so we decided to go back to the car and start the drive home. Charlie was more grumpy than usual so we had to make some extra stops to let him wiggle but we eventually made it home.

And yes, I do feel guilty that I have more pictures of butterflies than my adorable nieces.
Also, thanks to Elizabeth and Stephanie for making it such a great weekend.