Hello Seattle!

Life is good. It really is. I don't hate my job, I actually just got a raise :) I have started doing things with my friends instead of being a hermit and I found someone that can do my hair. (all of the important things in life right?) But for reals I am quite content with life right now. What has been happening as of late? Well...I have still been working a lot. Leaving my house at 5:45am and getting home at 5:45pm is not the funnest thing in the world. But it makes the weeks go fast so that I get to the good stuff...the weekend :) I love and super love having Friday off every week. It is soooo nice. This last weekend I was able to go over to Seattle with my friend Joanna. It was so much fun! We stayed with my old roommate Jamie. It was a blast to see her and hang out. Who knew that you could have so much fun just a short drive away. It did however remind me that I am getting old...I was/am still SOOOO tired. Friday and Saturday night we didn't get to bed till around 2am. That in and of itself should be fine but the problem is that I can't sleep in anymore :( I super love to sleep in. Seriously. It was one of my talents. But apparently that is in my past. I can't sleep in later than 7:30. Oh well...anyway... what I did while I was over there. We went to Pike Place Market. Honestly this is one of my favorite places in all of Seattle. We got a huge boquet of tulips and daffodils for Jamie for letting us stay at her place. They were amazing! Then we spent some time down on the Pier. We got the Seattle City Pass (Which BTW is awesome) so we took the harbor cruise. It was fun to play the tourist. After that we ate at the Crab Pot. I have always wanted to eat there but never really had anyone that wanted to go with me (or the $$ to shell out for it) So I decided that this was the trip I would do it. It was amazing. Plus what grown adult doesn't want to wear a big bib. After that we went to the Space Needle. We went around 9pm. It was fantastic! We were able to see the city all lit up and it wasn't too busy. We sat up there for a while visiting in the lounge. We stayed till they closed at 10. Then we went over to Alki Beach. It was beautiful. It was however a little freezing. So we didn't stay too long. The next stop was to see the troll (or Ogre) under the bridge. I have always wanted to see him because of his appearance in 10 things I hate about you. It was awesome! After that we decided to call it a night. The next morning we went and did a session at the Seattle Temple. It was cool to go through a session there because it was my first temple. After that we went over to Experience the Music Project and the Sci-Fi Museum. To be honest...I didn't care for EMP but I did like the Sci Fi Museum. I am pretty sure though that if I didn't have the CityPass I would have been mad that I "wasted" my money. After that we took another ride up the Space Needle to see the view in the daylight. Then it was off to the Pacific Science Center...man...that place is old! It smelled weird and was quite lame...but we saw an Imax movie about Mars...it was alright...kinda reminded me of my mission (Imax movies were everyone's favorite P-day activity) By that time Joanna and I were exhausted...so we went over to UW campus and met up with one of Joanna's friends and had some Thai food for dinner . It was delicious. After that we headed back over to Jamie's house to take a much needed nap! We hadn't quite decided what we wanted to do that night. We wanted to find a good Jazz club to go to but didn't want to spend a billion dollars. So we dolled up, bought a couple rockstars and headed back into the city. We went past the jazz club and saw that everyone coming in and out was dressed up much more than we were...so we decided to drive around and see what else we could do. It was quite fun to just drive around and people watch. :) After much contemplation (and several laps around downtown) we decided to go get dessert at the Hard Rock Cafe. After that we decided we should call it a night.The next morning we packed up and made it back for church in Kennewick. Phew...are you tired just reading it? I am! Anyway...It was fun. I loved it! I think I really needed it too!

So moral of this post. Seattle is fun, Life is good!

An Ode to Roommates

Ok so as I write this I am super bummed that my girls aren't going to make it this weekend from the other side of the state for our roommate reunion. Luckily it will happen in the next month. :) They are great girls and I am super stoked to see them again! So with this roommate reunion I have been thinking a lot about my past roommates. Now I have had a lot of experience with roommates...53 different experiences that is. Yep that is right...From the time that I moved out when I was 18 till now I have lived with 53 different girls. Good news is that I have met some super awesome people in that group. Even better is that I have learned a lot from all of them. Now things weren't always rainbows and butterflies...actually all 53 could probably tell you that I have annoying habits (namely that I hate and I mean super hate doing dishes) But we had some good times too! Here are some of my favorite roommate moments. (In no particular order)

The Exercise Ball : Who knew that such a simple thing could be so fun! We had a big blue exercise ball that kicked around our apartment for months. One day someone decided that it would be a great idea to pick it up and run after someone and bounce off of them. We then learned that if you started at opposite ends of the room and ran full blast at each other that you could get a really good bounce and fly in opposite directions. It sounds kind of retarded but seriously...one day when you are bored give it a try you will love it. (throw in a gray DI "rat suit" and man it's a party)

Apartment 56: I can't narrow it down to just one experience here. We had some fun times... whether it be the ice cream fight (i shudder thinking about ice cream in my hair, ears...well pretty much everywhere) or singing that Jessica Simpson song at the top of our lungs or fatty mcfat fat night when the sofa broke. Or the massive water balloon fight across the knoll. Or all of our weird untalent show "talents". Man...those were some good times!

The Revolving Door House: Oh man... what was it like 12 roommates in 6 months...phew...yeah... The wicker wonder. (what 25 year old actually shares a room and in that shared room has a day bed with a "tundra" bed...oh wait! I did) Getting all dressed up and then chicken-ing out of the ward prom so we ended up going to macey's instead and playing with toys and making mega nachos and watching a movie. Ahhh...Good times.

The Living Room Fort/Grey's Anatomy Marathon: Cinnamon Tree round 2. We built this amazing fort that seriously took up our entire living room. It was deluxe accommodations with mattresses and everything. Then once we built it I traded in a bunch of my movies to buy the seasons of Grey's Anatomy from f.y.e and we spent a some days watching them in our fort and eating ice cream. Weird? Yes. Fun. Yes!

I know that there were many, many more fun times....anyone reading that wants to post some go ahead...I love it!

But what I really want to convey in this post is that I have learned so much from everyone that I have lived with. I was talking to one of my former roommates the other day and you know there are some people that are just your "gente" they get you. You get them. I love how you can call, chat, text or whatever and just pick up where you left off. I am forever grateful for all those girls that loved me in spite of my faults. Taught me how to live with people and get along with people that weren't raised in the sticks with all brothers...and more than anything gave me a chance to have "sisters" I love you girlies and miss you all!