Lots of Excitement

We got our first out of town visitors!! Ryan's brothers and sister in law came to visit for the last week and a half. We did a little Seattle action the first weekend, seeing the sights, playing disc golf, and getting some use of out the new pool table in the apartment lounge area. This past weekend, we got to go visit Vancouver. It is an awesome city, and I'm glad we live so close to it so if I ever need to flee the country for a day or two...that's where I'll be! We walked around the city for a while the first day, and headed into Stanley Park to go to the Vancouver Aquarium (which was sweet, and apparently we saw Steven Seigal there too) and watch the sunset on third beach. On the next day, we headed just north of the city to check out the Capilano Suspension Bridge and do the canopy walk through the forest. It was a really long suspension bridge over a rather deep canyon...a little scary and shakey! It's amazing how close the mountains and forest park areas are to the downtown area. It was really only like a 15 minute drive to get to the bottom of a mountain to go skiing. We did not, however, go skiing. We saw some really great scenery though, and thoroughly enjoyed our international weekend.

[Aaron, Brandon, and Ryan in Seattle]

[Vancouver City Center]

[Jellies at Vancouver Aquarium][Park in Vancouver][On Third Beach][Sunset on Beach]

[Suspension Bridge]

Snow Delay

I didn't get a snow day this time, but it did snow a little last night so I got to go into work 2 hours late today. Compared to the snow in Michigan, this is really silly, but i did accumulate about 3 inches on my car that i had the pleasure of clearing off this morning. 

Easy Day

This weekend was nice and relaxing. Saturday actually got to the point where I was wearing short sleeves for a while! It was nice and sunny most of the day, so we enjoyed some good times walking around outside and checking out some of the local thrift shops and a little art store over in Capital Hill. Since I am a huge sucker for deals and coupons and such, I signed up to get e-mails about deals for the Space Needle, which is normally a greatly expensive tourist attraction. I got an e-mail recently about an online deal for 75% off of the annual pass for the Space Needle. That means that I can go up with one guest as many times as I want for the year. Since we'll be starting to get some visitors soon and the Space Needle is a big thing to see in Seattle, I got 2 annual passes, so 4 people can go up each time with them. They really pay for themselves the first time you use them since it's normally $16 per person to go up. Anyway, that was the long way of saying that we finally went up the Space Needle this weekend! By the time we got to the top the sun was just starting to set so we walked around to see the views during the day then went inside for our free beer and wine (compliments of being a first time annual pass user) then went out again to see the night views of the city.And, of course, I tried out some more recipes this weekend, although not as much as usual because we still had lots left over. I tried to cut all the recipes in half this time and there still ended up being a lot of food. I just need more people to feed! I love my little heart shaped muffin molds, so I used them again to make some corn bread muffins. Sooooo good. I also made some apple scones and Ryan made some really tasty chicken fingers.

T-Shirts

I taught myself how to screen print a few weeks ago and am still trying to play around with it a little bit. My first attempts came out pretty well, but for some reason the last time I tried to make a print, the screen didn't hold up as well as I had hoped. Perhaps it's due to my hasty homemade screen techniques. We shall see in the next attempts.

CNO

Part of my job right now is that about once a month I have to stand a 24 hour watch in which I pretty much just answer a phone when people call in to report incidents around the base or emergencies or things like that and then I would make sure the correct people are notified and that the situation is taken care of. I have been working on becoming certified to do this, and last Friday and this yesterday (Tuesday) I did a follow along watch standing to get familiarized on my duties. Nothing terribly exciting happened while I was training, just a few calls about minor fires or injuries. But last night, I got to meet a Naval celebrity shall we say. The CNO (Chief of Naval Operations) came to the base for a visit. He is the highest ranking person in the Navy, and works with the President of the US of A. Part of my watch standing duties involved me making sure that the he, and his entourage, made it to the hotel ok and didn't have any problems checking in. So when he got in last night, we met him at the hotel door and introduced ourselves to him and such and helped them all in. There were all kinds of secret service people around and bomb sniffing dogs walking around. It was pretty amusing. So that was my job excitement last night.

I also got to greet the CNO, his entourage, and a congressman this morning as they came in to have a reception and proceed to a tour of the base and such.

Good Foods

So this Valentines weekends was full of lots and lots of food, mostly all home cooked. I have recently acquired a couple of new baking cookbook (one about muffins and one about breads) so I've been excitedly trying out several of the new recipes. This weekend, however, involved much more than homemade breads. Saturday night we cooked up some giant Alaskan king crab legs that we bought at the pike place market earlier that day. I think this may have been the first time that I have had king crab other than our traditional Dougherty Family Christmas party. They turned out fabulous, and I definitely had a super full tummy after that one! I had also tried out a recipe from my new bread book for some onion focaccia. That took a little longer than I had anticipated to prepare, so it didn't end up being ready until after supper. Sunday night was fajita night, and I also tried out another bread recipe for cinnamon rolls which turned out quite nicely. Monday (which I had off for President's Day) I made a chicken pot pie, which was also my first attempt at making homemade pie crust. It all turned out lovely, although I didn't have quite enough dough to make a full lattice top for it. Oh well, next time. That night, I also consulted my muffin cookbook again, and made some chocolate chip muffins in my little heart shaped silicon muffin molds. The color and shape makes the baking experience just that much more exciting.

New Set of Wheels

I got my new car last week. And yes I am thoroughly aware that I "downgraded" a little from a GTI to a Jetta Sportswagon, but I was feeling the change and I thought the Sportswagon would be a fine asset for my new home here in the Pacific North West and its outdoor adventures! It also has a stick shift, which surprisingly enough I haven't lost manual skills. It might get a little difficult in the city though on some of the really steep hills. I have yet to have to attempt to conquer that battle though.