Seattle Day 1

We got our rental car, a nice safe Volvo, from the itty bitty airport and drove towards Seattle. We are staying across Lake Washington in Bellevue for the first two nights. Timmy wanted Pizza so we jumped of the freeway and drove until we found Bellevue Square. It looked like a nice new shopping mall and we thought for sure we'd find a pizza joint. Turns out we found an awesome one called Pagliacci Pizza where I took this picture! A Vespa on display! Daddy happy.

We checked into our hotel. After a little bickering about the fact that we didn't have our two-room suite, they gave us the Olympic suite which is sweet! I'm sure it won't compare to our next hotel, but better than a regular room! Tim and I took well needed afternoon naps and showers after going non-stop for 1 1/2 days. Clean and refreshed, we then decided to start our fun part of the day at Seattle Center.

We started with the Experience Music Project which is so very cool. It is the curvy silver building. We bought a family membership which was cheaper than paying individually. The place is filled with music history and has an amazing studio where you record an album for free. After going from sound proof room to room and adding each piece (keyboards, vocals, drums, guitar, etc.) you can listen to your work and buy it if you like. We didn't buy, but we may go back and try tomorrow since we have a year long membership!

Next we had some appetizers and milkshakes (Timmy had a beer - shock) at Revolution Bar & Grill and then looked at all sorts of memorabilia at the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame. It is in the same building as EMP and the membership covers both. While I'm certainly not a Trekky or anything like that, there was some really amazing stuff and like EMP, very interactive and media overloaded. For you F.O.D out there, they currently have on display the hat worn by the Wicked Witch of the West in 1939 and the batman suite worn by George Clooney. Not sure why those two things stuck out, but anyways.

Everyone hates me for it, but I can't resist the madness of these cutesy cut-out tourist trap photo opportunities. This particular one was the back of a park bench in front of the musical fountain by the Key Arena. We walked all around the various buildings and attractions at Seattle Center before meandering a few blocks down to the Olympic Sculpture Park and by pier 70. I really enjoy going off the beaten path and through the fabric of the city.

At dusk we went back up to the Space Needle and took some fantastic sunset pictures. Timmy hates the exterior elevator and crouched in the corner like always. He'll have to do it again tomorrow because I bought the 24 hour tickets so we can see the sights during the day as well.

We were beat and didn't even desire dinner so we drove back to the hotel and crashed around 9:30. I got up at 6:00 and did a few hours of work (yuck) before writing this post. I'm going to try and avoid it for the rest of today, in fact, my PDA is on silent so I can't even tell when I get an email. I backdated this post so it appears at the end of the correct day. My boy and my baby are still sleeping.

Hope all is well in your part of the world!