Thursday, August 26, 2010

Our Spring '11 just got a little busier...A whole baby busier.

Yup. Craziness.
I am 12 weeks and due March 9 which means I will mentally prepare myself for any time after March 11th since my kids like their Momma's belly.

Hello baby!
I went to the doc for the first time yesterday and she decided to have me go in for an ultrasound this morning to verify how far along I am. Todd was able to come with me to the appointment which was a plus and we were able to watch the little thing dance and twirl 360's and jump around like crazy.
What can I say...we produce the lively kind.

Curled up in a ball.


Not quite as curled up.

Stretched out.


Waving hello.

This pictures is Fisher's favorite because you can actually see the little bum. The ultrasound tech got a good laugh from the baby showing the backside.


Here is a normal backside shot to show you that that baby does not look like an alien as the picture above would lead you to believe.
Now we can't wait for the next ultrasound in October to see if we will have another little wild man (which would be fun) or if just maybe there could possibly be a little pink bow waiting to happen...

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Port Angeles, WA

Figured I might as well continue on with our summer travels since I don't have a lot of other things to blog about. After riding the ferry, we kicked off our journey by driving to Port Angeles. Stop No. 1 of our Twilight tour :)

It was gorgeous. You will hear a lot of that about my Washington trip in general. I fell in love with it and our little mini trip to Port Angeles, Forks & La Push was icing on the cake of me already having fallen in love with Seattle.

Cooper spent a lot of time smiling and looking out the window.
(On a side note- we moved him into his big boy car seat yesterday and he loved it!)

He also spent time eating peanut butter crackers and making an absolute mess of himself.

As I mentioned, the drive was so pretty. We took a little pit stop here so I could take a picture.

...Or two.

I was having a hard time watching for signs so I could get a decent picture.
We made it!

This sign is on the other end of town. We saw this one on our drive back from the rest of the trip.

So I don't know what I had in mind but it was not this. Port Angeles is literally a port. Duh, Meagan. I did not expect the water and boats and piers and beautiful views.
I don't think the name of this street was Main Street but it WAS the main street. On the right corner is the "Dazzled by Twilight" store. Down the street is the dress shop. On the left corner is the movie theatre and right down from there is Italian restaurant and bookshop.

The store was closed but we posed for pictures and hit it up in the next morning.

Can't believe I am here!

The visitor centers in all the towns of this area used Twilight as a marketing ploy.

You know you are in Twilight territory when...

THE movie theatre. It would have been better if "Face Punch" was showing. :)

When we checked into our hotel they gave us a pamphlet for taking the Twilight Tour. It had all the sites and addresses of points of interest listed for P.A., Forks and La Push. One of the locations was the dress shop where the girls go shopping. This is the store that they use and supposedly they have Bella's prom dress inside. It was closed when we were trying to peek in.

However....from my days (back in the day) of spending way too much time online reading about Twilight, I know that Stephenie Meyer actually described this store as the one they go dress shopping in. It is closed now but still fun to see.

This is one of the bookstores they referenced in the pamphlet. It had the best Twilight gifts out of all the towns and stores we visited.

This was bookstore number two. We actually did not make it into this one because it was getting cold, late and we were hungry.

It was funny though because as we were wandering around looking for the second bookstore we came across this alley. It was definitely the alley that Bella finds herself in trouble.

Now on to the little Port Angeles-isms.
There were paintings all over town on the walls of buildings.

They have a local group of young vampires...except for the girl in the green sweater and Jansport.

There were teenagers popping out of trees left and right. It startled us a few times and this did not only happen here. I guess it is a small town thing to do because we also saw it in Forks.

There was a cute little polka dotted wheel barrow that Erin and I oohed over.

They had a random buggy that captured Erin's heart.

I guess Port Angeles has a rooster that makes hens happy.

And the last quirk of this small town was that they do not drive normal cars.

While I enjoyed my calm trip without Fisher, there were a few times I missed him and thought he would have enjoyed something. This big octopus named "Rocktopus" was one of those times.

And I thought he would have loved playing at this park right on the water.

While taking a stroll on the beach we learned that beach logs can be dangerous, there is a Hollywood in Port Angeles, there is no bike riding, skate boarding or rollerblading along the pier and.....what??

Oh yeah...you have to watch out for sewage overflow. So maybe the water was not quite as appealing after seeing that sign.

While down on the beach, a big black dog ran up and started jumping on me. I had to take a picture when his owner informed me his name was Sam. It probably wasn't even the dog's name...probably another tourist trap for people like me to gush over. :)

Loooove it.

This was an enormous seagull who refused to fly away no matter how close I walked.

Between the bird, the boat and the water, I could have happily sat there for hours.

Port Angeles is beautiful not only because of the water, but the mountains behind the town. This isn't the best picture, but PA is settled with mountains on one side and the sea on the other. How picturesque.


One of the piers.

Cooper loved looking around but it was cold!

And it only continued to get colder. He was a good little trooper.

To warm up, we decided to go re-live Edward & Bella's first date and eat a little Italian food at Bella Italia.

I could not believe we were really there!

Since I love ravioli, it only made sense for me to order the "I'll have what Bella had." Just kidding. I did not actually request that, but I did order the musroom ravioli and a coke. Erin was kind enough to take a picture of me although it was a little awkward because the place was packed and it is not a very big resurant. We had already attracted a lot of attention with a baby, Erin being noticably pregnant and Robbie paying close attention to his wife and my baby. I heard a group of guys joking about polygamy and it probably did look really funny.
The evening only grew more interesting as we experienced the fine waiting service provided by the staff at Bella Italia. We had one waitress fresh off a smoke break although she was NOT smoking the typical cigarette. Then we had the one who could not remember anything we ordered and had to come back multiple times to ask us. Finally there was the crazy stalker chick who would walk up to our table, lean over as if she was going to say something but would instead proceed to stare at us as we ate...and then leave. It was borderline creepy but really funny at the same time. Cooper had decided he was done for the day so Robbie spent most of the meal taking Cooper on a walk outside and around the resturant. It was great having both Erin & Robbie around to help out. :)

After dinner we drove (a whole two blocks) back down to the water. The sun was setting and with the boats and piers it was so beautiful. Pictures do not do it justice.

I could defintely live by the water.

I may not swim in it, but I would spend a lot of time smelling, listening and looking at it.

Cooper enjoyed his night in the hotel room. He had had a lot of practice on our drive out across the country. He continued his new habit of pulling all the toilet paper off the roll and decorating the room. I guess he gets it from his mommy and all her TP'ing excapades in high school.

Goodbye Port Angeles.
Hello Forks.