Getting Around

One of the awesome things about our house is that it has a Walk Score of 90, which means there is a lot within walking distance of us. We had some errands to run yesterday (going to the bank, dropping off Redbox, and picking up something for dinner) and we were able to do it all in a short walk. There are several bus stops around us, too, so Nick is able to take any one of three buses (whichever gets to the bus stop first) on his way home from work, which is pretty nice.

There isn’t, however, a nice way for me to get to work via bus. 🙁 It takes me about 45 minutes to get to work in the morning and an hour home in the evening (yay traffic). I usually see several other Smart Car drivers during my commute, though, and their smiling and waving helps makes the drive more bearable. 😛

Categories: Daily Life, Jobs, Seattle, Townhouse | 1 Comment

Bus to Downtown

I am going to Casual Connect (a conference about the casual game industry) in a week and a half for work. The conference is held in downtown Seattle, so it’s nice that there isn’t any travel involved other than a bus ride. It turns out that there’s an express bus that goes from our place to downtown really quickly, so Nick and I decided to try it out today.

Bus Sign

A funny sign on our bus

We left our place a little early so that we could take care of a few errands before the bus arrived, but I guess the bus before ours was running late because it got to the bus stop just as we got there! So we decided to forgo our errands and take that bus instead. It only took twenty minutes from when we left our house until we got to our stop downtown. Wow! Granted, it will take longer when I go during the week because there will be more traffic and I won’t be so lucky with the timing. 😉

Pike Place Market Loot

Our loot from Pike Place Market

We went to Pike Place Market to get a few things for dinner. We got some paprika from Market Spice, fresh produce for dinner the next few days, and some yummy apples and Rainier cherries to snack on. 🙂 We had a little time to kill before our bus arrived, so we went to Gelatiamo to get some gelato for breakfast, lol. We caught a glimpse of the Seattle Great Wheel while we were downtown, too. I think it was the first time we’ve seen it since it was officially opened. For those who don’t know, the Seattle Great Wheel is the latest edition to the Seattle skyline – a big ferris wheel on the Seattle waterfront that just opened two weeks ago.

After our fun morning downtown, we did a little furniture shopping, which I’m sure we’ll blog about soon.

Categories: Daily Life, Outing, Seattle | 1 Comment

Living Room & Bedroom Redecoration

Living Room

Living Room

Our rug arrived yesterday! Hooray! We weren’t expecting it for a few weeks, so we were delighted when we got a phone call saying that it came in early. I fell in love with the rug when we first saw it 2 months ago and although we’ve done a lot of rug shopping, we never found one we liked better.

We went furniture shopping on the 4th of July, which is when we purchased our sofa. We visited a dozen furniture stores to get ideas and we ended up finding a super comfy couch that we really liked. We weren’t planning on buying a couch that day, but we couldn’t pass up the 4th of July deal on it.

Bedroom

Bedroom

After 6 years of not being able to sleep in because of the sun shining through the windows, we knew we wanted curtains for our new house right away. Neither of us were very knowledgeable about picking out curtains, but I think we did a decent job. We found some dark brown curtains that block a lot of light and a set of sheer curtains. The sheer curtains also came in a “curtain scarf,” so we got one of those, too, to make it look pretty. The curtains match our bedding set really well and give the room a nice finished look. And we love that the sun won’t be able to wake us up unwillingly anymore! 😛

 

Categories: Home Improvement, Townhouse | 3 Comments

Tandoori Chicken and a BBQ

Our New BBQ Grill

One of the things that Marie and I were really excited for about getting a house was the ability to have a barbecue grill. This was a high priority purchase for us since summer just started and something about summer time grilling is just so appealing. Today, Marie’s dad, Larry, came over and we went grill shopping with him. Marie and I had already been scouting out grills and found two different style grills in our price range and size at Lowe’s. After having Larry take a gander at them and approve of either, and with some extra help from a friendly sales person at Lowe’s, we made a decision and went home with a grill. It only took the two of us just under an hour to assemble it. Assembly was easy, and the instructions were clear to read so it was a breeze.

Tandoori Chicken

While Larry was over we cooked tandoori chicken for dinner. He’d never had it before, but it’s a favorite of ours since discovering tandoori chicken last year. To fancy it up a bit we grilled red peppers and made saffron rice instead of the standard white rice. Of course we also grilled up a couple of naan breads to accompany the meal. It was a hit and Larry said he’d love to help us eat it next time we cook it.

 

Categories: Cooking, Townhouse | 1 Comment

Settling In

Blooming Clematis

Clematis in our Backyard

It’s been almost 2 weeks since we moved in to our new house and it totally feels like home. 🙂 We still have some boxes to unpack and decorations to put up, though, which is probably why we haven’t uploaded many pictures of our place yet. Expect some soon, though! In the meantime, enjoy the picture on the right of the clematis (thank you for telling me what it was, Mom!) that is blooming in our backyard.

I started my new job as a software developer at a start-up game development company on Monday. I’m really excited to be working there and I know I’m going to learn a lot. My first few days were mostly setting up my computer and whatnot, but I started diving into code on Thursday. The guys I work with are pretty cool. The worst part is the commute, but I can more or less set my own work hours, so I’m trying to find out which times are best for driving.

The weather in Seattle has been really nice this week. The forecast for the upcoming week looks very summery, too – sunny and highs in the low 80’s. That’s a little hotter than I like it, but I’m not going to complain while the rest of the country is dealing with 100°+ temperatures. 😉

Seattle Weather Forecast

On July 1, Seattle enacted a plastic bag ban. Nick and I have been using reusable grocery bags for the past year, so it’s not a big deal for us, but we have to be extra careful not to forget them now. With our house, we also have a food and yard waste bin, which is new for us. Between food and yard waste and recycling, we find that we don’t produce that much actual garbage, which is kind of nice.

We met the couple we bought our house from earlier this week. They had some mail in the mailbox that didn’t get forwarded, so we said they could stop by to pick it up. They were really nice, friendly people and we enjoyed meeting them. They filled us in about our alarm system and told us that the shoe rack they left was custom-built for our house by her father, so they were happy we were using it.

Main Bathroom

Main Bathroom

One of the first decoration projects I tackled was the main bathroom. We only had one bathroom’s worth of bath mats, shower curtains, towels, etc., so I knew we would have to get something for the main bathroom fairly soon. I wrestled with various color palettes before I found a green and white shower curtain I liked and I picked the rest of the bathroom accessories based on it. The result is pictured on the left. Nick and I are really happy with it and smile every time we walk past the bathroom (it’s such a cheerful green!). Now we just need to find some art or something to put on the walls.

We also bought some curtains for our bedroom and a sofa for the living room that we’ll show off in another post. 🙂

The weather was really nice this evening, so Nick and I went for a walk around the neighborhood. We stopped at Joy Teriyaki to try out their teriyaki. We both liked it, but I think it could have used a little more teriyaki sauce. Yelp reviews for Joy Teriyaki recommend their Mongolian menu – especially the huushuur, a Mongolian pastry filled with beef, onion, and garlic. We’ll have to try it out next time!

Categories: Daily Life, Home Improvement, Jobs, Restaurant, Seattle, Townhouse | Comments Off on Settling In

Crunchy Tortilla Chicken with Avocado Dip

Marie and I recently became the owners of two new cookbooks thanks to the communications team at the Information School and their generous and unexpected house warming present! Today we decided to try out one of the recipes from the “Bite Me: A Stomach-Satisfying, Visually Gratifying, Fresh-Mouthed Cookbook“. This cookbook is pretty awesome. It has some great photographs in it and it’s a ton of fun. The other cookbook is a less goofy and a bit more zen. It’s called “Simply Organic: A Cookbook for Sustainable, Seasonal, and Local Ingredients“. The recipes in this one are broken down by season and there’s a harvest pot roast on page 148 that almost makes me want the colder fall weather to get here (even though it’s only been in the 60s for the past few weeks).

The recipe we decided to try out first is called Crunch Tortilla Chicken with Avocado Dip. It was delicious and has earned a spot on our cook frequently list. It does take a bit of prep since the chicken has to marinade for 2 hours, but other than that it’s an easy recipe and we keep most of the ingredients for it in the house. A jalapeno pepper and avocado are the only ingredients we’d need to go out of our way to pick up.

The only thing I would change is to prepare some Spanish rice or something a little more exciting than corn with it next time. We also had avocado dip left over, so we’re going to try it on tacos tomorrow. If that works out we’ll probably plan tacos for a day or two after this meal in the future, otherwise we’ll cut the dip portion in half.

A special thanks to Daisy, Lisa, and Lori for the awesome house warming present!

Categories: Cooking, Townhouse | 1 Comment

Exploring the Neighborhood

Hello! Sorry for the lack of posts the last few days; Nick and I have been busy unpacking, nesting, and exploring. 🙂

Dick's Drive-In Restaurant

Dick’s Drive-In Restaurant

Grandma came down to have lunch with me on Wednesday. Grandpa repaired a drawer for us that needed some minor fixing (thanks, Grandpa!) and Grandma brought it down with her. There is a burger restaurant called Dick’s by us, whose chain is a Seattle icon. Dick’s was founded in 1954 and is Seattle’s oldest, continuously operating fast food restaurant. Somehow, Grandma had never been to Dick’s (!!!), so we walked over there for lunch. We had burgers, fries, and milkshakes and then walked around the neighborhood for a while.

Lake City Farmers Market

Lake City Farmers Market

On Thursdays, Lake City has a farmers market, which is conveniently just a few streets down from us.  Nick and I walked there after he got off work on Thursday to check it out. They had all sorts of local produce and some local restaurants had tents where they were selling food like wood-fired pizza, crepes, quesadillas, etc. Nick and I came home with some strawberries that were picked earlier that day, broccoli, and a pretzel from Kaffeeklatsch, a local German bakery.

Safeway Parking Sign

Safeway Parking Sign for Fuel-Efficient Vehicles

Today, we did a little shopping for our new home. I think we’ll post pictures tomorrow. We’re really excited about our new additions. 🙂 Fred Meyer (a Kroger-owned grocery store) is the closest grocery store to us, but I’ve been wanting to check out the Safeway (another grocery store) down the street, which looked really nice. Well, today we had to get some ingredients for dinner (Nick’s writing a post about our dinner right now), so we decided to visit the Safeway. OMG! When we got there, we saw there were special parking spots in front just for Gunter (see picture to the left)! How awesome is that?!? It definitely earned the Safeway some points, lol. Then, we went inside and were like ooh this is nice. The staff was very friendly, too. I think we’ll still go to Fred Meyer for some things, but the Safeway isn’t that much farther away, so I’m sure we’ll shop there frequently. 🙂

Categories: Daily Life, Outing, Seattle, Townhouse | 2 Comments

Seattle Apartment – Before & After

Yesterday’s move from the apartment to the townhouse went well. Thankfully, the weather cooperated and there wasn’t any rain. We had two pickup trucks to haul our furniture and each truck took two trips, so we were done pretty quickly. The only casualty was a spare glass Pyrex measuring cup… and we had a few minor dents in the walls/ceiling and a scratch in the wood railing. Overall, not too bad. Thanks again to everyone who helped out! *Hugs*

Nick and I have spent today settings things up and unpacking. No pictures yet, but we’ll probably have some tomorrow. Nick cooked dinner on the gas stove for the first time tonight. He’s very happy to have gas again instead of electric. 😛

I put together some before and after photos of the apartment. The before photos are on the left and the after photos are on the right. Sorry that some of the before photos are old; I forgot to take pictures before we started packing. Whoops!

Bathroom:

Apartment Bathroom

Bedroom (the loft):

Apartment Bedroom

Kitchen:

Apartment Kitchen

Living Room:

Apartment Living Room

Office:

Apartment Office

Categories: New Apartment, Seattle | 3 Comments

We Have TV… and PBS!

TV and Stand

Nick just finished hooking up the TV and components… and we’re very, very happy to report that we have PBS again! We don’t watch a ton of TV, so we just have an inexpensive indoor TV antenna that we use to pick up basic channels. PBS was the main channel we watched back in Michigan, but we weren’t able to get it at our apartment in Seattle. We get FOX and a few other channels now, too. Pretty cool!

Categories: Daily Life, New Apartment, Seattle, Townhouse | 2 Comments

We’re Online

We just got our internet connection working and our computers are now set up! We’re fully online! We’re still working on unpacking and getting some boxes stashed in closets and storage areas. More posts coming later (with pics too)! 😀

Categories: The Move, Townhouse | Comments Off on We’re Online