Loving Tacoma

SO....there were places like Seattle that I made a second trip because there were so many things to see that it warranted a second look...even when I had hoped to not to return.  BUT..there some cities that I truly enjoyed.

Tacoma was one of those cities.  I returned or passed through Tacoma many times over the almost two months we were staying with Christina.  I truly felt at peace when I was approaching the town...it just had that appeal.  Add to that the wonderful museums.  It is worth the stop if you are ever in Washington.

June 8

Our first trip to Tacoma was to go to the Glass Museum.  I mentioned this trip in an earlier post as we were trying to find ways to entertain ourselves while waiting for Miss Madison.  We found out about it because of a summer program designed to assist military families enjoy museums across the United States (Blue Star Museums).

The glass blowers were amazing as they created their special art piece.  The museum also had a special exhibit.  Children were asked to design an art piece.  Artists then had the children assist in creating their design.  These pieces were on display the day we went to the museum.  There was a youth group in the classroom when we arrived.  Maybe their art work would be on display in the future.  The building was large with room for expanding the art displayed; however, it had just the right amount of art to view in an afternoon with young children.

The artistic nature of this museum did not stop at the doors.  There was a beautiful glass blown piece inside a pool outside of the museum.  I am sure it would be beautiful to see at night.  We then took a walk across the glass bridge.  The bridge itself was not glass but there was beautiful glass work on display.  We had a lot of time to look at the art pieces as we began a search for a puzzle geocache.  Somehow after all of our puzzling we did not find the right coordinates that would lead us to the final cache.  That's ok...you find some, you DNF some...that is the fun of the geocache hunt.  If it was easy, we probably would not enjoy it so much.  

This took us Union Station that looked a lot like the building on the other side of the coast in Washington DC.   It was once a train station as well but now it was being used as a federal court house.  It was once the end of the line for the transcontinental railroad with its last passenger train in 1984.   

Outside of the building was the statue that paid tribute to the history of the area...of a man with a suitcase.  Edward immediately tried to pick up the bag convinced it was full of gold!  Even with all three of them...the bag just would not move!  As I took pictures of them in their efforts, I realized that I never would have even taken much time looking at this statue alone.  I am so thankful the children are walking along with me on this adventure!  They bring everything into a new light.  Their energy is quite contagious.

We were allowed to enter the center of the building after going through a brief scan of our belongings.  It was a building with a few artistic pieces and some history of its days as a train depot.  It is nice to know this amazing architecture has been given new life and purpose so it can continue to be maintained.  I do not think a lot of people come into the building.  It was very quiet and the guards and staff we encountered were all eager to help us and answer questions.

 June 25

photo credit

When the older boys arrived, I was quick to make our way back to Tacoma.  We have always enjoyed finding the places mentioned in our state study books.  One place that sounded fun was "Never Never Land" outside of the Point Defiance Zoo.  It was supposed to be a park with large structures to represent nursery rhymes and fairy tales.  We circled the zoo several times looking for the location...I finally stopped in a parking lot to check the internet for more information.  We sadly found out that the park had been torn down in 2010.  Too bad...it sounded like it would have been fun.  

We followed the back roads to the other museums we were going to for the day.  I had not been this way as I had always gone the highway route.  Along the way we found a fire boat that Brendan insisted we should stop and explore more closely.  It turned out to be Fireboat No. 1.  It was built in 1929 and used for over 50 years at the Port of Tacoma.  It was the only boat protecting the area all of those years!

We parked by the Glass museum hoping to start there...however we arrived too early and the museum was not open.  So we made our way to the bridge.  The older boys tried there luck with the cache but there were still no different results.  

We planned to go to some of the other museums that were on the list of Blue Star Museums.  The first was on the other side of the bridge.  Now..I love a good museum but I normally do not go to state history museums....I have always found them...well...boring!  However, we arrived at the Washington Historical Museum and it looked interesting from the outside.  It was still a little early and as we waited I was getting second thoughts about going in...maybe we should go to further down the street to see what we could find.  Just as I was gathering all the children, the doors opened and we were waved in..."What's a few minutes early...we would love to have you here." So we entered into an amazing museum!  The entire place was meant for hands on learning and well made displays.   It was meant to be a history of the state of Washington but it seemed more like the history of the United States.  To add to the enjoyment the staff were very friendly and helpful.  There was even a scavenger hunt to make sure we did not miss the details in the exhibits.  The children walked away with a prize and a good start to our day!

We then passed Union Station...sure enough...the older boys had to try their luck at picking up the luggage!  Sean was convinced it was full of gold!  LOL!  They had no idea Edward had done the same thing just a few days before them!  

The next museum was the Tacoma Art Museum.  We thought it would be youth friendly as there was fun artsy work outside.  However, it was probably not used to having children walk through their exhibits.  I decided right away that we would not stay long...afraid the children would be bored and cause trouble.  There was, however, a LARGE puppy statue in the front lobby (the only real sign of welcoming children) that Zaira fell in love and wanted to hug.  The funny thing about the museum...I was the one who ended up causing trouble!  Henry and I had switched cameras earlier in the day...so I thought I had changed the camera to no flash mode...I took my first picture in a room obviously not intended for flash photography.  The security guard was immediately on his radio dispatching a level 5 disturbance in the gallery.  I apologized profusely but his dirty looks made it evident that he was not impressed.  We quickly went through the remaining exhibits and left.  

infamous photograph

It worked out well...the next museum was a much better choice...The Tacoma Children's Museum.  The best part of this museum for me was the size...had I chose...I could have sat in one spot of the center of the museum and seen all the rooms.  There were many activities for the children and it was a lot of fun.  The older boys were kind enough to sit back and watch the others play as well.  They might have even liked some the exhibits as well.  The favorite of all was the tubes that shot air through them...the children put balls and scarves in the tubes and sent them through the tubes to shoot out at random (or directed) locations.

We finally made our way back to the Tacoma Glass Museum.  I am glad we had the chance to bring the older boys back.  It was a lot of fun and worth the wait...since we had so many things to do in between.  Another fun day in Tacoma!

Many side trips through Tacoma were made as we traveled around the area...the bill for the toll bridge can attest to that....The Tacoma Narrows became our gateway to the "world" around us.  It was also the landmark that let us know we were close to the house when we had gone on our longer day trips.


One thing that kept us stopping was our little bit of Texas on the weest coast...Sonic Drive In.  We would often stop at this spot during happy hour sour our Route 44 drinks!

Taking Seattle by Storm

June 19

Our first trip into Seattle was so easy...we arrived before ten in the morning and we found a great parking place near the Space Needle.  We even had a discounted fee for arriving early.  We gathered all of our things so we would not return until the end of the day.  Our only plan for the day was to meet our dear friends Jane and Stuart in the afternoon.  It was a great way to explore without worry of schedules that might be delayed.

Within five minutes our walk led us to an amazing playground!  I think the children would have been happy to just remain at this wonderland the entire day!  All of the playground equipment had a musical ability.  There were wind chimes on the swings as well as around the park.  There was also a large xylophone that the children could play.  In the center of it all was a large jungle gym with different ways to move upward and slides to come down.  The boys spent most of there time on this apparatus.  Zaira found it interesting to run around a large open maze.

After almost an hour of this fun, I told them we should move on to other places.  They only left after I promised that we would return at the end of the day.  We ended up returning here with our picnic lunch as well.

We walked around the museum district but did not go inside as the admission was quite high and we knew we would want to return with Michael and the older boys.  It turned out to be a great reconnaissance adventure.  It helped that most of the museums had large glass fronts to allow us to see into the exhibits.

As we approached one museum, we saw very large metal flowers.  We passed by and I thought I had heard music.  I thought this an odd but nice feature but we continued on our path.  The music stopped once we were out of range.  Hmmmm...We wandered back by these flowers and we realized that the flowers only play when someone walked under them!  It was a lot of fun to turn the music on and off with a simple step.  Edward thought it was funny because there happened to be a protester outside one of the museums and when we had the flower play music it would drowned out the hollering protester.

After another hour of wanderings we had our lunch and played on the playground some more.

Then we chose to enter a children's museum knowing the older ones would not mind missing this place for the younger crowd.  The best part of the museum were the displays around the world and in the community.

Edward actually enjoyed playing the role of eye doctor, sales clerk, construction worker, waiter and short order cook!  Zaira was determined to have all the groceries put away for everyone in the area!  Brendan just took it slow and enjoyed the fun until it came time to making sushi!

We also enjoyed the museum's story time.  After listening to a story, the children created their own tree to put in the museum "forest" out of clay and other odds & ends.  Edward made the most original tree covered in candy canes and a tube for a trunk.

We finished at just the right time to meet our friends.  I saw them coming up the walk and it was like we had just been away from each other for a couple of days instead of several years.  We spent most of the time catching up with the lives of our children.  The children convinced our friends to return to the playground before we both went our separate ways.


Then the fun began...the nice city and easy traffic was not so easy to navigate during rush hour traffic.  It did not help that I went the wrong way on the highway and had to fight my way off the highway and back on the right direction!  What a mess!   It took me twice as long to get back to Christina and Shane...so glad they did not try to venture out with the baby.


June 22

Hey! hey the gang's all here...we picked up Sean and Henry from the airport three days later.  I was a little nervous after the trouble with traffic leaving Seattle.  However, we chose to stay the night and head to a different part of the city with the older boys.

I guess the phrase "Absence makes the heart grow fonder" is true for siblings too.  They were so excited to see each other...hard to believe what seven weeks can do...I was convinced the boys had grown a foot [We later measured and they had both grown two inches!]!

We woke up EARLY (I think we are all on Texas time still...older boys were definitely.) so we chose to skip the hotel breakfast and go to Pike Place Market.  This is a famous market that is actually in the old part of town with little shops that have been around for decades.  We loved the flowers and produce, but the children were not so impressed with the fresh fish!  We found a donut stand that showed their mini donuts being made right in front of us.  We were so early that the woman at the stand filled our little bag with almost double what we paid.  They were so hot we had to let them cool before eating them!  We continued throughout the streets seeing all the amazing fares.  Even though the donuts were great, we could not resist the wonderful aroma coming from the Russian bakery.  We each chose pastries to share as we headed back to the van.  BUT...not without one more stop...we bought a large bouquet of flowers to take back to Christina!

We then found the Klondike National Historical Site.  Normally, when you think of this era of the gold rush in Alaska, but many of the surveyors who went to strike it rich began their journey in Seattle.  This site showed the struggles and hardships of those who chose to take a chance...leaving everything behind...it also introduced the importance of those who stayed to supply the equipment needed for the journey.  It was very interesting...a great museum.  There was even a demonstration of how to pan for gold.  There was also a demonstration of how unlikely it was to actually make a good claim.  A wheel was set up with a small sliver showing those who would succeed.  We all spun the wheel but only Sean was a winner.  The park ranger told us that she spins the wheel every morning when she arrives and she has only landed on that spot once in eight years!  That would be my luck as well!


Before going back to the van, we walked to the next block over to Pioneer Park.  It was a small square with totem poles...a large chess board...and a memorial for firemen.  It might not seem like much but this is the oldest neighborhood in Seattle with restored buildings.  A nice walk before back to the van for the two hour trip back to Christina and baby.

Traffic was still hectic but I got out town quickly and we were back in time for lunch.

She's here!

12 June 2015

It all began with a rough night for Christina.  She was vomiting and feverish through the night and there was no sign up it letting up.  She was awake when it was time to take Shane to the boat.  Instead of coming home she decide to go in to see her midwife.  The medical staff was concerned so they decided to have her monitored all morning.

At noon it was finally decided to have her admitted and induce labor.  Shane and I scrambled to get things set at home and at the boat so we could be with her.  Just as I was about to leave for the hospital, Christina called to ask me to run a few errands before making my way to her...there was no hurry.

When I finally arrived at the hospital, the medicine to induce labor was being given to her.  We were all ready to meet Madison.  Yet we waited....and waited.

As the nurse told us...three hours into the "labor"...we were having too much fun.   SO...they bumped up the meds...then their friend Neil arrived to be a part of the fun.  We played a card game...letting Christina "win" jut because it was fun and everyone knows not to mess with a laboring momma.  Then Neil got curious about the medical equipment in the room.  His curiosity about one tool was so strong that he called the nurse in to ask her its use.  THEN the fun really began....it was sensor that moved the lights around the room to focus on the spot needed for surgical procedures..and the nurse agreed to let him play.  I think we all were having too much fun at that point...so the nurse decided to bump up the meds again!

Neil left and the labor pains became more intense.  Christina and Shane enjoyed a warm bath to help with the pains but there was no progress.  So then there was talk of breaking her water.  After much discussion between midwife and nurses...they told us to rest and wait.  So...I went home (5 minutes away) to be with the children and give Lexy a night's rest as well.  (Did I ever mention that this dear was 8 months pregnant and helping us with my children?  She is amazing!)

This was around ten at night and all went to sleep in their various places...but around two in the morning...I woke up and knew I had to go back to the hospital.  It just seemed like one of those moments in Madeleine...In the middle of the night, Miss Clavel turned on her light and said, "Something is not right."  I left a way for Edward to contact me and made sure all were definitely asleep and went back to see what was happening.  Sure enough...I arrived as the waters were being broken.  

Now things would progress...right?  NO!  We still waited and even though the pains increased there was still no progress.  Then the decision was made to give her an epidural.  By lunch time, I went back to the house...Lexy had returned at some time in the morning and all were doing well.  I picked lunch for Shane and I.  Lunch was not really enjoyed as we knew Christina could not eat but she was sleeping for the most part.

Just when we were all settled in place...we were told the time had come...if Christina felt like pushing they wanted her to try.  They actually woke Christina and Shane so it was kind of a slow transition but once she started...nothing was going to stop baby from coming.  I do not think I have ever seen a baby pushed out so quickly.  Well...actually I had never watched a baby born other than my own.  A very different experience...truly amazing!  I was very blessed to be a part of this event in their lives.

SO...baby Madison Rose arrived on June 12, 2015 at 1:57 pm.  She was 6 lbs 7 oz and 20.5 inches long.  I can tell you that I cried tears of joy to see her.  She is beautiful and so alert.  She is ready to take in everything....just a beautiful gift from God.