Seatthole
We spent 4 days in Seattle this last week. We have more friends in and around Seattle than we do in probably the rest of the states combined. I don't know if that's great or sad, but at least we have friends somewhere. Amber's friends, the Jelacics, graciously let us stay at their house while we were in the city.
We were able to visit most of the places we enjoyed while we lived there and spent plenty of time driving from point A to point B in the process. Amber and I both decided that we do miss Seattle but we're glad we don't live there anymore. Too many people, too many cars. We don't have an iphone either so fitting in is impossible!
We had breakfast with Robert and visited his studio in Ballard. The kids were awful. In the second picture you can see Amber pinning Lincoln down and Zia sobbing in the hallway because she couldn't spell "Washington." Sigh.
We went to the Ballard Locks because "they were close." The kids were unimpressed with the hydraulics but very interested in the gift store (which was one of the themes of the trip, I guess). This is the small lock empty and being cleaned.
We met up with Will, Leah and Django at Dick's even though Django and Leah don't even eat hamburgers (how did we end up with so many friends that don't eat hamburgers or donuts? Heh.). Django's van made a good place to eat lunch.
We drove over to Carkeek Park, one of our favorite parks in Seattle, where we destroyed ecosystems on the beach.
There's ALWAYS a molester van at the beach.
We also hiked around a did a couple of letterboxes. Our letterboxing total for the trip was 10 finds and 2 boxes MIA, which is pretty spectacular considering at least one child was breaking down at any given time.
All the magnolia and cherry trees were blooming in Seattle. Very pretty. At least it is spring somewhere.
Ate some Thai food at Krittika's.
Bought some shit at Archie McPhee's.
We went to the zoo with Lela and Kate, who are close to Zia and Lincoln's age. The kids always wanted to know what was "next," but somehow were never interested in the current animal.
Lela and Zia. Zia was very interested in all the grafitti and quickly learned the differences between tags, throw-ups and pieces. After I took this picture she wanted to know if she could be arrested for taking a picture by the grafitti.
An abandoned tennis court in the middle of the city.
Having a snack.
Throwing rocks into Lake Washington with Kate.
And that's about it. Now that we're home the cat is in great need of love and there's a million other things to catch up on. So I better end there.
Probably Not Spring
I haven't really felt like blogging lately. I don't seem to have anything positive to say so rather than have everyone leave comments like "Children are a blessing!!!" I skipped on the blogging for a couple weeks. This last week has been better since we were able to go outside most days. There's still a glacier in the driveway but most of the snow that's been around since Thanksgiving finally melted and the ground is thawing some (which means we are almost to the "muddy" season).
The kids like to explore the irrigation ditch when it's frozen. Hopefully they won't be so interested in it when it's not frozen until they're a little older. Lincoln wouldn't stop running on the ice even though he kept falling over and over again. There was a neat layer of ice crystals on some areas of the ditch.
Here's Lincoln enjoying his birthday balloon. Do you think this picture might appear during his high school graduation? He told Zia "Pee part big!" in the shower one night.
Boomer is doing OK and only pukes occasionally (he eats literally anything that isn't nailed down and he gets into things in the kitchen sometimes). He is enjoying exploring the vast boundary-less outdoor world. He's hunted pheasants, killed a snake or two and climbed almost every tree we have. Here's him with a kill and in a tree. And wrapped up in a picture that Zia took of him.
For a couple of days Lincoln was obsessed with making paintings. He painted a lot of these left-handed. 
Most of this last week was spent assembling a new playset for the kids. We bought the kit at Sam's Club in Billings and hauled it home last weekend. I spent two full days building it and then off and on for several more days. No wonder it was cheap - it took 20+ hours to put it together. It was fun because it felt like I was building something without having to measure and think about what I was doing.
The kids will enjoy it I think and have already spent some time playing out there as "Batman" and "Wonder Woman." And since we're in Wyoming the house got its own decoration courtesy of Grandpa Mark finding dead stuff along side the road.
And lastly, a couple more pictures of the family!
