Spring Break Light Rail Outing

I managed to not cancel my planned days off this past week - these days coincided with some of spring break for the kids. The first day was busy with their annual checkups and then I had to run to a baby shower for a coworker. But Friday Ryan managed to take off work as well and we decided to go on a city "hike"/another light rail adventure.

We hopped on the light rail and headed for the Westlake stop. Both kids needed new shoes (M desperately so) and all the shoe stores that used to be near us are gone now since the mall is being redeveloped. M had apparently been suffering through shoes 2 sizes too small for the past several months (oops). They didn't have the shoes he liked in his kids size, but we were able to get the women's size that is equivalent (and pay $30 extra for them being women's instead of kids, sigh). 

Then we headed off toward the waterfront. The kids were getting hungry, so stopped at Lowell's for lunch and got a table next to the window.

After lunch we did a touristy thing and rode the ferris wheel. M was very anxious about this given their dislike of heights. But with lots of reassurance we got him to get on and realize it wasn't all that bad - the cars are completely enclosed and you're certainly not moving very fast. Some lovely views of the Sound and downtown.

Then we walked along the waterfront to Olympic Sculpture Park. The kids ran around on the grass while Ryan and I just enjoyed sitting for a bit. M described this piece as "some sort of art" (to be fair, he wasn't viewing it from this angle when he said that):

You could apparently walk 8+ miles if you followed the entire waterfront path, but our feet were tired. We hiked back to Seattle Center, grabbed the monorail to Westlake, then the light rail back home. I cannot overstate how much I love having light rail so close to us. Even though we had good bus access to downtown previously, it never felt as easy as the light rail. Trips like this felt like they required more planning and were therefore less likely to happen. And, of course, some of the places we can get to with light rail (Capitol Hill, for instance) were significantly more difficult to get to via bus. In my casual scrolling of unaffordable houses for sale, even when I find one I love I always end up realizing that they don't have light rail in walking distance and I can't give that up.

February and March Whirlwind

Things have been on the intensely busy side the past few months. I presented at a conference and my slides were due in February with the conference occurring at the end of March. That plus my usual workload meant for a stressful first few months of the year.

We've been trying to take advantage of weekends and light rail whenever we can to get out and explore. Back in February we went to Capitol Hill again, ventured to the U-District Farmer's Market (sans G, who was off skiing with friends), and met up with friends at the aquarium. We've never been to the aquarium before since it's pricey. It was fun to check it out, but especially now that the kids are older, not something I feel I need to do regularly. M really enjoyed the things he could touch and watching the otters - especially enjoyed the fact that an otter pooped in front of us.

We had a few nights with absolutely stunning sunsets that month as well:

In early March we were able to head out on our first hike of the year - we stuck to a fairly simple trail near what was once a coal mine. G had pretty constant commitments elsewhere for several weeks, so also missed this trip.

As we wrapped up the hike, M saw this sign and asked me "what does the pants symbol mean?". Took me a moment to figure out what he was talking about:

Sadly, I've been working every weekend for the past month and had to cancel some time off I'd planned on because our service was just too busy, so our outing opportunities have been limited. It's a whole thing with doing 24/7 on call, increasing acuity of our patients, and then also being expected to be part of weekend ICU coverage - we're going to be having some conversations with our manager about the absurdity of this (no other RDs take call and no one covers for us when we're out, so makes no sense that we're expected to cover weekend ICUs) and hopefully won't have to cover ICUs on the weekend.

I survived the conference presentation at the end of March and the next weekend I managed to pull off a small birthday party for M. Took a couple friends to the ice rink for skating - the public skate is usually pretty crowded but they had fun until their feet started to hurt from the rental skates. Then we headed home and they played video games before having donuts. It's the first time in a couple years that he's had friends over and it felt so much easier now than when they were 6 and 7. 

At some point I managed to make his birthday cake but then it sat in the fridge for a week waiting for me to frost it. It was a rather spread out birthday, which M said he didn't mind, especially as he at least got dumplings and presents on his actual birthday. For his cake, he wanted a simple design from the show Naruto:

Here's hoping things calm down a bit in the next few months - I'm certainly much less stressed now that the conference is over!