My new favorite room

My house may be only a mere 1,000 sq ft, but I love it because it's mine.  Shem and I have been working very hard this summer to remodel our place to our likings (aka. mostly my likings) and we're finally at point where we can live downstairs again!  Good thing too because school starts tomorrow for Shem and Tuesday for me and we'll be busy teaching again.

We're not finished, but here is a sneak peak of my living room.  Remember the space ship?  Yeah, it's gone. :)  I hated that thing so much that when we decided to get rid of it for free on craigslist I don't think I fully understood it's worth because we got call after call for it!  A few people even offered us money for it! 

A nice brown paint will adorn the wall with the doorwall.  You can see a patch of "cafe latte" to the left of the doorwall.  The brown will also be in my kitchen with nice white cabinents and a new countertop hopefully by next summer...kitchens are big and take time for beginners like us.

Yes, I am reading Mockingjay and so is Shem...you can see the dust cover on my ottoman.

Check! Three years done.

Can I just say that I'm the luckiest girl ever!  I married a good man and we celebrated our third year of marriage without any break downs.  I don't know what my problem has been, but in the past, well, since our first Valentine's Day together when we were dating, something has always altered our special plans in a big way.  I either have the worst day possible (i.e. waking up crabby, hard day of student teaching, backing into someone car with my massive truck, then getting sick from some sub par Greek food.), or for some reason I'm just in a bad mood.  I think I've learned that for some reason I've had expectations for something amazing and totally different than what Shem had planned.  Finally after being together for more than three years I've learned to not break down.  It's weird, I know, but that was how I used to roll.  Shem has coached me through so many emotional feelings of mine and he's helped me to be a better communicator and he still loves me!

So, for our anniversary we decided to kayak down the cut from Lake Washington to Union Bay and eat at Ivar's on the water.  We did this way back in April of 2007 on a date when I was visiting Seattle before graduation.  Anyway, it is freaking scary kayaking down the cut!  It's a narrow canal with big boats going way to fast and lots of waves from their wake.  I paddled my heart out until we got to Portage bay where you can see the house boats.  I think that I was just nervous because the last time I was in a kayak was at Shem's Aunt Barbara's house in Annapolis, MD and her's were super tippy, so when I tried to get out onto the dock above me I tipped...it was very gross.  Thankfully this time I didn't tip.

Aside from having a fun time kayaking, dinner was amazing!  Shem ate this white salmon and I had some king crab.  I love fresh seafood and I love me some crab!  We also ordered this amazing dessert.  It was a chocolate cake creme brulee of calorie goodness! 

The kayaking, food, and company was perfect...thanks Love. :)

Shem under Eastlake Ave. bridge.

The boats on the dock at Ivar's.

I-5 freeway from below.  I love this pic.

Eastlake Ave.

This bench is made of the most beautiful wood!  Very good craftsmanship.

My meal. :)

Eastlake Ave. again.

The oldest houseboat in Portage Bay.

P.S.  All of these pictures were taken with our Sony point-in-shoot!  They turned out pretty good in my opinion.

Rialto Beach (Part 3)

Just for documentation sake, we were on this vacation from July 22-24th, 2010.

Our second day we planned to do some day hiking farther up the beach.  It was incredibly foggy when we woke up and for most of the day until around 4pm when we hiked back to our site.  This was a lazy day of hiking, but we had no desire to push ourselves like we have in the past.  After working on the house so much we really needed a restful break and we forgot my boots, so I didn't feel safe climbing over big rocks with my pack and no ankle support.  Also, hiking on the beach is a good workout!  We sank into the sand as we walked and walked over little rocks, climbed big rocks, and shimmied through fallen tree trunks.  Oh, and I was really afraid of slipping on wet rocks...I've had a few head injuries as a kid and I didn't feel like cracking my head open in the middle of no where.  Needless to say, hiking on the beach is a much different experience than hiking through the woods.

These pictures are from our day hiking on Friday and I took a couple from our hike out. 

Fog in the morning.

Above and below: our lunch spot...yeah, it was gray out. 

When the sun came out, it looked so beautiful at our campsite!

We built a huge fire!  I think the flames look so cool.

Our beach at low tide early in the morning.

Another shot of Rialto.

On the ferry ride back to Seattle from the penninsula with Mt. Rainier and a logging barge in the background.  These ferries are amazing!  They hold a lot of cars and passengers.

Rialto Beach (Part 2)

We've been busy prepping for painting tomorrow...well, almost today and I'm sure that my home is going to take on a totally different look and feel with some color!  I really wish that I had taken some pictures of the mess we created while working, but every time I thought of taking pictures it never really interested me enough to actually pick up my camera and snap a few shots.  I'll be happy with before and after shots, and hopefully the results will be just as shocking if not more. :)

Other happenings in the Thompson household are that we celebrated our third anniversary on this past Wednesday!  Shem and I are both like: "It has only been three years?!!  It feels like we've been married much longer than that!"  Should we be worried about this mutual thought? :)  I think what we mean is that we've been together long enough to not remember what life was life before marriage, or that we're so in love that it feels like we were meant to be from the beginning. :)  Anyway, I love him so much and I love how we've grown so much together these past three years, but more about that latter when I post pictures of what we did!  It was so much fun and we ate some super yummy food from Ivar's.

Here are more pics from Rialto Beach. I've only edited the first day, but I'm sure I have some cool shots from our second and third days too.

These are all shots from our first day.

The famous Rialto Beach Picture.  I have more of these from our hike back.

Hole in the Wall.  When the tide is low you can hike through it, but since the tide was too high we had to climb the ladder.  It was basically some stairs made in the dirt and it was very steep...scary.

After the Hole in the Wall we pretty much hiked over rocks like these with 30 lbs. packs on our backs.

Shem in the two man backpacking tent...doesn't he look hot?!

The homestead.

This is our same beach at high tide around 9pm.  I took some long exposure shots to make the water look dreamy.  I didn't have my tripod, so I cropped out the log that used to be in the foreground.