Seattle!

Hello!  I'm in Seattle for work this week.  It's my first time here.  Actually, the only other area in the Northwest I've been to is San Francisco/Napa area, so this is definitely a new area of the country for me.

I was up at the wee hour of 3am EST yesterday, which is what you want when you are travelling to a time zone that's actually three hours behind the one you live in (said sarcastically!).  It went okay.  I actually went to bed early Sunday night and slept for about an hour on my first flight to Houston.  I grabbed a bite to eat in Houston, then hopped on my connecting flight to Seattle.

On board my long flight of the two, I watched One For The Money, our in flight movie.  Meh, it was ok.  I haven't read the Janet Evanovich books, so I don't know if it lived up to them or not.  I have heard they're funny though.

I also finished reading The Art of Racing In The Rain.  The book takes place in Seattle so it was fitting!

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Holy tear-jerker!  I actually almost cried when reading the first couple pages, so I knew it was going to be rough.  I definitely held back tears throughout a lot of the flight.  It didn't help that I had just left Clyde for the week and already miss him terribly!  The book is great though.  If you are a dog lover, you should read this!

Eventually we started to descend into Seattle.  I was psyched to see all the snow topped mountains!

I arrived to beautiful sunshine, which is funny because it was POURING in Charlotte when I left and I think it's supposed to be pretty rainy for a bunch of the week there.  Seattle is supposed to have great weather the whole time I'm here!  I didn't even pack an umbrella!

After landing, I hopped on the Central Link Light Rail, which costs $2.75 (sweet!), and it brought me a block from my hotel in downtown Seattle.  Nice!

I opted to stay in a swanky boutique style hotel.  I love the modern feel of it!  (I'll tell ya more about where I stayed later this week).

I scrambled to drop off my things and freshen up, because I had exciting plans- meeting up with Emily and Cullen!  Emily have actually known each other for a while, since she lived in Charlotte while she was in culinary school.  The last time I saw her was when I was in DC, she was pregnant, and we were spectating together at the National Marathon.

Emily was nice enough to pick me up and take me to one of her favorite lunch places, Homegrown.

I asked what was good and she sold me on the beet and goat cheese sandwich.  Wow, so delicious!!  I must recreate this at home!

Cullen is just as cute in person as you would guess from all the adorable pictures you see on Emily's blog.

And he's kinda mobile now, so I think she's got her hands full!  We definitely had to stop him from eating the tire of his stroller at one point when he crawled over to it!

We had a great time chatting at the park and walking around a bit, before she dropped me back at my hotel, which is conveniently located close to Casey's work, so she was able to pick him up as she dropped me off.

I decided to explore Seattle a little bit on my own with what was left of my day.  I headed down to the water first.

I guess this area is the known as The Pier?

Apparently that thing at the end of the pier is actually a ferris wheel in the making, according to the local news I saw this morning!

I also wanted to see Pike Place, but by the time I got there it was almost 6pm and it was closing down.

I picked up some apples and a water and called it a night.  I really wanted to stay up to see the premiere of The Bachelorette, since it's filmed in Charlotte this season, but by about 9ish Seattle time, I was done (it came on at 9:30pm).

Anyway, it was a great first day in Seattle.  The city reminds me a little of Charlotte in that it's very clean and modern.  You can tell there's more to see and do here though.  I'm looking forward to the rest of my stay here!