When we first moved here we noticed that there was a giant mural of old school Bothell with an ape (as in planet of) watching a procession of people on main street. We thought it was a joke by the painter … Maybe an inside sort of thing. Well, as of a minute ago I guess we were wrong? The image here shows that apes were banned from the streets in the 1800s.
Della read her grand-parents (who are in Greece) Alice in Wonderland over Skype. It’s sweet to see technology we take for granted used like that. Della went to bed happy …. We’re still awake with a bit of jealousy. The blue water of the Greek Isles would be nice right about now.
Thank goodness for some summer already. Today was a fine day of Popsicles poolside. Dells words of wisdom today included “you make Popsicles by taking some fruit (yes) grinding it up (smart girl) and then putting it in the winter (well all be, of course!).
We walked to the Fremont solstice parade today. It’s sort of Seattle’s version of Mardi Gras (strongly using the word sort of). Good to know that the high real estate prices and corporate move on the area doesn’t even dent the parade.
We now live about 1 minute from the Burke Gilman (long bike trail that takes you around the entire greater Seattle area). I (j) have been riding to work on the hill … About a 30 mile round trip. We’ve all been riding down there together … Dell took her little Trek down and covered some pavement.
We finally started pulling things out of the garage that were in dire need of some love. After parting the sea of cardboard, the Honda 599 has been de-winterized to it’s happy self.
As some of you know me (J) encountered a bit of a corner mishap last summer on Ben Howard road. Anyhow. A few well learned rules … 1) do _not_ let your friends take you on twisty back roads you’ve never been on before if you just started riding 2) ALWAYS wear proper gear (no jeans! ever!). I’d post the picture of my knee after the crash (it’s fine now) … but you’d be sad and 3) do _not_ let your friends take you on roads you don’t know if you just started. It’s been a year, all is well now.
The bike is a 2004 Honda 599 (hornet) – an Italian made Japanese sport/standard. Ginger is more than excited to put her gear back on and hit the road. We took an epic motorcycle class last year and got our endorsements and rode it as much as we could. For the geeks, it has some mods … including a two brothers exhaust, rizoma rearsets, spiegel headlamp, ohlins suspension, handlebar clip-ons, crg clutch …. Definitely a fun bike. A nice midpoint between a straight up sport and a standard. Handles really well at varied speed. You can ride it hard in higher RPMS if you want, or just lay back and take it easy. Both work.
J
Lexi Hazel Warren was born 4.10.10 at 4:19am. A healthy 6 pounds 9 ounces. We’re thrilled.
With not having enough on our agenda, we thought ‘hey, lets move!’.
It started simple. Our house was too small for a family of 4 (and a dog bigger than 2 kids) to live in. We searched all over Seattle looking for a new rental. Guess what? There aren’t any reasonable priced rentals bigger than our current house. The economic climate has created a new breed of landlords – landlords with huge, bloated mortgages to cover or landlords raising rent to match the other ones. Nonstop notifications to our phones of new listings and many many tours caused us to find a new path.
Before getting into that. One of our stories that sums up our house hunt. We go to see a nice (wait till the end) 3 bedroom in the sunset hill area of Ballard. The guy listing it was an agent, the photos online looked good. So we show up at the house to meet him. 5 minutes goes buy and this beat up 1970s ford truck rolls up. 2 guys – one little and one big – rush into the house before us without saying hello. A few more minutes goes by and the ‘agent’ comes out and invites us in. Sketchy right? Of course we go in! The house is all wood paneled, probably not remodeled since the 40s. It’d be nice after some sweat equity. He says ‘great house for a family, and I like you guys’. Mmmm, great. The third ‘bedroom’ turns out to be a giant wood paneled room (ceiling to floor) with no windows. Oh, and it’s also got a 100 year old oil heater in the middle of it. Rent? 1550$ a month. So we politely get out of there and the guy calls me for days and days leaving messages like ‘I’m holding it for you! call me!’. We never called him back.
We must buy a house.
Fast forward 2 months later. There’s about 30 days before the new Warren is due and we find a beautiful house in Bothell (15m east of Sea proper). Our friend Erica showed us a nice amount of homes in a small amount of time. This one clicked. After running through the lending and contract gauntlet, the house is ours. 2 mins from the downtown (pretty cute, 100 years old), a few minutes to the river trails & burke gilman and coffee/sushi/ale houses. Fenced yard, nearby parks for the kids.
Yes, we are crazy to of moved during the last month before a baby and tax time. But! With the help of friends and family we pulled it off … by ourselves, we’d of gone crazy.
Della joined the rank of two wheel racing. Meet ‘Fire Cracker’ – She’s red and likes to eat crackers. D already has braking nailed … Next, she’s going to take firecracker downhill.
Della has received the gift of hay fever. Trees and pollen = itchy eyes and sneezing.
From her songs … She’s walking around the house singing
Dust bunnies don’t know they’re sad when they’re in your eyes
Dust bunnies don’t know they’re broke when they fly
Dust. Bunnies don’t know they’re sad
Next,
?
