Dares and Dinner in Seattle

Our family of three met my parents, brother & sister-in-law, and aunt and uncle in Seattle for a long weekend at the beginning of August.  After a 7am flight and long nap at the hotel, we met up with my parents and took a monorail to the space needle area to find Alex and Coady.  The monorail is one of three topics Collin remembers from Seattle (the others being kayaking and Jan's Italian greyhounds).  

It was a beautiful day to enjoy the park and join the crowd in the fountain area.  After being cooped up on the plane, Collin had a great time burning energy in this grassy field - 

He looked on as the fountain sprayed in different directions and heights.  We soon noticed the "dare" was to touch the center of the fountain, so Alex and my dad ventured down the hill.

My dad was unsuccessful -

But Alex made it -

Not to be outdone, Cas and Collin jogged down the hill -

And crashed at the bottom as Cas hit the slick tile.  Do you see Collin in the air?  The onlooking fountain crowd all took a collective gasp as both went down, Cas cushioning Collin's fall.

After a few tears from the surprise and only a small cut on Cas' wrist, the boys gave the victory sign that all was well.  I had only brought band-aids for Collin, and I took great pleasure in the fact that Cas sported Cars band-aids the rest of the trip.

Collin and Aunt Coady re-unite -

And he spent some time discussing deep two-year-old thoughts with Uncle Alex -

Alex had a conference in Seattle, and we used the conference discount at the downtown Westin.  The problem was when we asked them for family-friendly seafood nearby, their criteria was a place with a child section on the menu.  That's what we got for staying in such a nice hotel.  So we ended up at a fancy restaurant at 7:30pm, or 9:30pm central, with our 2-year-old in tow.

At dinner that night, I was given a bib for my messy cioppino meal.  The table mocked me, but sweet Coady asked for a bib too so I wouldn't be singled out -

Cas' hand unfortunately covers his glass to ruin the humor of the photo, but he was drinking white russians & Collin was drinking milk -

After our delicious dinner and no huge tantrums at the restaurant, we considered our first day of vacation a success . . . capped off by lights out for all three of us within 20 minutes of entering our hotel room!