Happy New Year!

Happy New Year from Steve and I (Chewie & Yuri too!)

2011 was a pretty big year for us, who knows what 2012 will have in store. We do know a few things: we are going on a 18 day trip to Ecuador in April, we will be getting back into shape, we will be experiencing more of what this wonderful city has to offer. We hope: to have more visitors so we can show off this place we love so much, to get to spend some short trips to see friends and family members and to not have to go to any funerals this year.

While 2011 had a few sad moments, we lost too many loved ones this year, it had a ton of awesome moments. Steve and I were so busy this summer that I stopped documenting everything we were doing on this blog. So here is a short recap of a few things we did this year...

We made a huge life decision and Steve took a job that moved us to Seattle, WA.

We rented our house in Olathe, KS sold over half our possessions and made a huge move accross the country.

The move allowed us both to take amazing road trips(separately) with our best friends.

I quit my job and then found one quicker than I was expecting.

We visited West Virginia for Rebecca and Randy's wedding. We had a great time getting to spend time with family members we don't see very often. It also was Steve's first time in WV so we did some hiking and saw the bridge and gorge.I got to go and visit with some of my girlfriends in Omaha, NE for Molly & Ben's wedding reception. It was a good time, as it always is with my friends.

Yuri went swimming and loved it. Chewie hated it so there are no pics of him.
We did a good number of hikes. This one is from a 4 mile hike to a mountain lake. Steve got in and said it was so cold he felt his heart stop! It was so beautiful. Too bad I broke one of my toes hiking the 4 miles back to our car.

We took up some water sports. There is so much water here it is hard not to do something on the water each weekend. We did stand up paddle boarding in the sound and once in a lake.

We kayaked a lot also. This is us kayaking through the arboretum, which is really cool with all the lilly pads and secret passages. You even go under highways to get to it.

We had visitors this summer too. Steve's parents and Jessica came out to visit, as did Ellen and my mom and dad.

We celebrated our 2nd anniversary with dinner at one of the nicest restaurants in town.

We got to experience the Cardinals World Series Game 6 win from downtown St. Louis, with two of our best friends.

Goodbye 2011 we had a great time!

Road Trip Day 4

We spent day 4 checking out downtown Missoula. It is a really cute town. We went into a few shops, checked out a local brewery and had a delicious lunch.

After Missoula we headed to our stop for the night, just outside Spokane, WA. It was an easy drive. Our drive took use through Idaho.
We stopped really quick in Coeur D'Alene, ID to look out at the lake. It is a beautiful town near the boarder.
Then on to Washington, our final state of the trip!

Road Trip Day 3

The plan for day 3 was to go to Yellowstone Park and spend the whole day, plus day 4 there. Much like day 2, day 3 did not go as planned. Day 3 started out with a rough drive up and over a mountain.....a snow covered mountain, while it was snowing still! It was beautiful, but nerve racking. I drove it and I felt like I was driving for like 5 hours it really was only like 1 1/2 hours.

But we made it through safe and sound through the mountain and on to Cody, WY. Cody is the last town before Yellowstone, once you go through Cody it is an hour drive to Yellowstone, not a lot along the way but scenery. We made it to Yellowstone! Only to find that the entrance was closed due to a snow avalanche! Then next entrance(3 hrs away) was closed due to a rock avalanche and the next one was 7 hours away! Ugg

So we stopped and had a beer and figured out a plan, let the dogs run around and then we headed back to Cody very disappointed.

We were pretty bummed about our bad luck. Then the day was saved(somewhat)! We had been seeing signs all trip for awesome wild animals and we never had any luck spotting any of them. Because we had to turn around and drive back to Cody we ran into wild bison! These things were CRAZY close to us. I could have put my hand out the passenger window and touched them.. that's how close they were. It was AWESOME.

Then a few miles down we saw big horned sheep. They were cool too. Scary looking though. I swore they were staring us down the whole time we snapped pictures of them.

After turning around at Yellowstone we headed to our new stop for the night Missoula, MT.

Road Trip Day 2

Day 2 started in Wall, SD. We checked out Wall Drug, since our whole first day's drive we kept seeing signs for this place. It was raining so we knew our plans to site see might be thrown off. We did not expect to pretty much see nothing all day and drive in circles over and over again. Lucky for us there were a few stops we could make to save the day, they happened to all be revolved around drinking though.

On our way to the Jewled Caverns we stopped at Crazy Horse. Two trip tips for you: 1. Crazy Horse is a rip off. They charge you $10 a person to get in and then $4 a person to go down to see it. We paid the $20 to get in, which we regretted. You can get a good enough view of it from the visitors center, but for sure not worth the money. As you can see it was really foggy...
This is a scale model of what it is supposed to look like one day.
Tip 2 is make reservations to the Jewled Caverns online ahead of time. The long tour was all booked up for the day and the only one we could get into was 2 hours away from when we were there. We opted out of the tour since it was so far off. So after 2 failed attempts at seeing some cool stuff we returned to a little town we had driven through and had some drinks.
First at the Bumpin Buffalo..

Then at the Mangy Moose..
Then we were off to Mount Rushmore! Well so we planned on.We got to the entry and were told there was zero viability of the monument due to the weather.

So we made our way out of the Black Hills, but made a stop at a winery on our way out. They had some pretty good wines, all made from grapes grown in South Dakota.

After the winery we drove to Rapid City, SD where we stopped at the Firehouse Brewing Co for one more beer and dinner. We had buffalo brisket that was SUPER good.

Then on to Wyoming, where we hoped to have a better site seeing day tomorrow.

Road Trip Day 1

Sarah, Chewie, Yuri and I began our road trip Saturday, May 28. We covered a lot of ground the first day. The roads and traffic were easy and made the day fly. We started from Tom and Rebekah's house in Missouri.

Then into Iowa...
Then our last state of the day South Dakota, which I think turned out to be one of my favorite states of the trip.

Our first stop in South Dakota was just over the boarder from Iowa, Sioux Falls, SD. It seemed like a nice little town. We had a picnic lunch near the falls and then walked the pups around near the falls.


Back onto the road from Sioux Falls we saw signs for "The Corn Palace" It seemed to be close to the highway so we decided why not go see what this is all about. It sounded awesome enough. Advice from Sarah and I...skip the corn palace. haha It was more an auditorium than a palace and it is not as cool as it sounds. But the weather was nice so we were not too upset to be out of the car.
Next stop the scenic drive through the Badlands National Park.
The Badlands are AWESOME! A must see in South Dakota for sure.


We stayed the night in the town of Wall, SD that night. Looking back day 1 might have been the best day of the trip. We had some bad luck on days 2 & 3...more to come on that. :)

The Move is On!

The move to Seattle is now officially on! Two men came over on Wednesday and packed up the stuff in the house that I had not yet packed. And then the house was officially filled with boxes everywhere!

Thursday two different men came and loaded up the boxes and all the furniture into a truck. Don't worry our house did not take up this whole truck. It was maybe about a third of the truck. This took a large part of the day, but when it was done our house was empty. It was sad, but also a good feeling knowing that this is finally happening.

Whats next? Well it has already started...my good friend Sarah L, Chewie, Yuri and I are off on a 5 day road trip across the country. Be on the look out for updates along the way!