Weekend Walk

I was just talking to Jacob about how awesome it is that we live in a state that has so much to offer and so much beauty. How we don't have to save for a long time in order to see and do cool things. We are able to go on mini vacations in our own state whenever it's possible. That's such a blessing.
I remember when we used to live in TX, we would plan then save so we could go on one big trip a year. That wasn't fun at all. The six years we lived in TX has been the only time that I felt trapped. TX is so big that at the time it wasn't feasible for us to go on a three day weekend road trip whenever the kids had an extra day off.  Either because we didn't have any trip money saved up or I wasn't able to get time off from work. We spent a lot of weekends at home. The only thing that saved us from dying of boredom especially during the summer months was that we lived in an awesome master planned community that had a lot to offer to its residents.
Although there's really not much to do in Tucson it's a good thing that Phoenix wasn't far and that San Diego was only a seven hour drive. Because of this, we still managed to do a lot of fun activities during our time there. That's when we got into going to farmers markets and U-pick farms.

Here in Washington there's endless things to do, just like back home in San Diego. Ever since I became a mother I always made it a point to do fun things over the weekend. I've learned how to plan family outings with little or no money needed whenever we weren't able to splurge.

In one week we visited two new parks ... two awesome parks at that! We've been here about a year and a half and we barely found out about these parks. I'm just glad that we now know about them.

The park we visited over the weekend was Seward Park which sits right off Lake Washington. There are two ways to reach this park. One way is to come from the Seattle side which you would first need to drive through somewhat of a bad area but then it gets nice. The other way is to come from Bellevue way. This is the best choice.
This park is super cool. It has several trails with the main one being a paved trail and not to mention Lake Washington surrounding the entire trail. Oh, and there's lots of trees that provide wonderful shade throughout.

This trail that we embarked on was a 2.4 mile loop. I didn't think much of it because I was too busy gawking at the water, boats and the houses along the shore. I was enjoying my walk, stopping whenever Riley stopped to pick up a flower or to pick up rocks. I was in no hurry whatsoever. I knew that Sydna and Nathan would get bored from all this stopping so I gave them the ok to go ahead of us and enjoy the trail at their own pace ... and so they left.
One thing I forgot to do before our walk was to stretch. BIG mistake!

It really was a nice day out even though I missed my clouds ... but there was a light breeze which made my walking experience an enjoyable one.
Sometimes the trail would get busy and other times there wasn't a soul in sight. That was nice.

During our walk, a lonesome butterfly flew up to Riley and circled around him, then it flew away and came back and rested on the dirt right in front of him. I've heard that spirits manifest themselves in butterfly form. Hmm. It is written that this park does have some interesting background to it, as in Spirits roaming the area. Anything is possible.

This girl had walked past us and I noticed that Riley was staring at the dog and as she kept walking and we walked a bit behind them Riley kept saying, "hi doggy, hi doggy" and that's when she stopped and let Riley pet him. I guess she figured that Riley wouldn't shut up unless she gave Riley the satisfaction of petting her dog. Lol.

We had been walking for a while and I noticed his cheeks getting red so I handed him his water. He liked walking along the small dirt path on the side.

Then, all of a sudden, the canopy of trees parted. A big chunk of Lake Washington was exposed. Gorgeous!

We saw several speeding boats, jet skies, canoes and kayaks!

But he was mostly interested in playing with rocks and getting his hands dirty.

So glad I remembered to put on sunblock on the both of us. The sun was out in full force.

As soon as I spotted a bench under a shady tree I sprinted towards it. By this point we had been walking for about an hour so I decided we would stop for a bit at mile post 1.5. I needed to rest and to refuel. We brought a light lunch and ate while we took in the scenery.

Sydna and Nathan came back and found us. After we were done eating we continued on our walk. As we were looking at boats I saw that Riley had stopped walking and sat down on the ground. His little legs were tired, poor thing. He was breathing heavy and so I asked Jacob if he could carry him. He didn't whine, I could just tell that he was exhausted and that made me feel bad. He was more than happy to be able to hitch a ride on daddy's shoulders.

We came across a dock. We saw ducks and geese resting on it then we glanced over at the lily pads and spotted ducklings and turtles. It was pretty neat to see.

The playground is near the parks entrance. Riley saw it as we drove past it to the parking lot and he asked to play ... we promised him that he would after our walk. So as soon as we came upon it and he saw it he made a run for it. I guess by this point he had regained his energy, lol.

I really liked this trail. No hills, it was paved, lots of shade, super nice scenery and I loved that it looped. Pretty cool that there were several restrooms along the way. Not for my sake ... it seems like the men in my life seem to always get the urge to pee when we're out.

This is another area around Lake Washington where there's a trail but less crowded. Looks very relaxing to me. I even told Jacob that we should come back and walk on this trail just the two of us next time we visit. Doesn't it look nice?

Leaving the Bellevue way. We love to drive on the floating bridge ... just not during high winds though.

This little guy was spent. He fell asleep fast once we got in the car. Nathan did too. We had to wake him up once we got home.

Surprisingly I didn't get a headache but my feet were killing me. By nighttime they were super achy. They still hurt a little the following day. That's lame right? Seriously need to go on walks a lot more.

Limiting Monotony

We didn't leave the house at all on Monday and Tuesday. We packed. Those days were also a bit on the warm side, mid to high 80's.
I've said it before and I'm saying it again ... routine is not for me. It's good for the kids to have but not for their momma. It.wears.me.down!

So on Wednesday I took the kids to the park. It was cloudy and breezy, felt so good and because the weather was like this there wasn't many people at the park. That's always nice.

After throwing rocks at the lake for a while this little guy started running back to the playground. You know how fast they can run right and I don't like to run so I sped walked as fast as I could but I was still not catching up to him and he thought it was a game. He was laughing and looking back at me. Well, while he was looking back he fell in a mud puddle. I wanted to laugh so hard but I didn't. I couldn't help but smile though. He got up and immediately looked at his hands and legs and said "Oh No!". The look on his face was so funny and he was so devastated that I didn't even think of getting mad or irritated about his shorts and sandals being all muddy.

So I held his hand and told him that we needed to walk to the restroom to clean off the mud. I called Sydna and Nathan over and gave them a look and told them not to laugh at him ... because then that would be mean and Riley would have gotten upset. Oh they did laugh but Riley couldn't see them because they were walking behind us. The entire walk to the restroom he wouldn't stop talking about what happened. Retelling the story to his siblings, over and over in a most depressing way. So dramatic.
I rinsed off his legs with cold water. I was surprised he didn't complain about that. He was still distraught about what had happened.

He became a bit nervous when I picked him up to dry his legs with the hand drier. He kept saying no and calling sister {tito} to rescue him. Lol. Too funny.

You know what bothers me? Seeing shoes by the front door or anywhere inside the house unless they are neatly placed inside a closet. Right now the kids and Jacob leave their shoes by the front door. It looks terrible and although I hate it I decided I wasn't gonna stress over it. I did tell Jacob that at our new house shoes are gonna be left in the garage. He agreed. So several weeks ago I found a cool shoe rack at Target.com. It can hold up to 50 pairs of shoes. That's awesome. I'm going to make a home for it in our garage. It should arrive this coming week.


On Friday morning I was feeling a bit stressed. I have all three kids at home and I just needed at least an hour by myself, well Riley was with me. When it comes to teenagers and toddlers I would choose a toddler over a teenager anytime. Anyway, I went to schedule a haircut appt then I walked two stores down to Hallmark. Sometimes browsing a store can be therapeutic. They already had some Halloween decorations. Neat! and I began talking to the cashier about San Diego. Well, as I walked in the store I heard the lady talking to a customer about her recent trip to San Diego and so when that customer left we began talking. She kept saying how gorgeous it is there and wishes she could move there. That was nice to hear from someone that has lived in WA for a long time, given that Seattle is such a gorgeous city as well. Anyway, she said that her sons baseball game was in Point Loma and said it was very pretty there which it is and I asked her if she went to the lighthouse. She said no. OMG! I felt sorry they missed such a beautiful landmark and told her that if they ever visit San Diego again that she needs to check out the Point Loma Lighthouse and a visit to Coronado is a must. I didn't want to say too much because I don't want to be that annoying person that just wont shut up ... but boy, was I dying to tell her about all the other awesome things there is to do and see in my hometown.

I didn't feel like cooking dinner on Friday so I had plenty of down time. I watched two movies back to back while Riley slept. I couldn't believe he slept that long since he hasn't really been napping that much lately and when he does his naps have been short.
He was being so lovey dovey. So sweet when you're kids love on you without asking them to. Just melts my heart. So while he sat on my desk and in between hugs and kisses I snapped this cute picture of him.
He totally looks like his daddy.

And this cat has turned into My cat from hell {you know like the show}. Ever since I took her to the vet and she had a thermometer placed up her butt she hasn't been the same since. I'm sure it's not a good feeling but she's so ungrateful. So I'm ignoring her right now until she stops being such a dog {to put it nicely}.

So for dinner we had burgers. We hadn't been to Five Guys since May 19th!! for crying out loud. This is the only place I'll eat a burger from.
Riley is still not into burgers. Inconceivable. So we had to get him some noodles. He does eat fries though but didn't eat many because I got the cajun fries and he said they were too spicy, lol.

After we were done eating we drove over to a park. I wanted to take a walk and take in the pretty views so I told Jacob to drive past the playground. Sorry little guy, no playground this time.

The trail goes all the way back as far as the tree line goes and beyond. It's quite a long trail, one we didn't walk to the end because my little guy was getting tired which we purposely planned this way so he could fall asleep in the truck on the way back to the house. Once summer is over and we get more constant cloudy days I want to come back here and walk it 'til the end.

Made constant stops so Riley could throw rocks in the water and we also saw turtles sunbathing on rocks.

Saw a gaggle of geese, about sixteen of 'em. Not friendly creatures. I got bit on the leg when I was trying to feed one years ago but we didn't know they hissed. I told Nathan not to get too close and he did so he got hissed at, ha! It would have been fun if one would have chased him. That would have topped my evening.

The only reason why I would like to fast forward these next three weeks is so we could already be in our new house, unpacked and begin to enjoy it. Then only then we can begin our new chapter in our lives of being homeowners once again and calling Seattle our home ... for however long God plans for us to be here.

Hoping not to be stuck in the house all weekend long.