Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Sunday, May 9, 2010
Happy Mother's Day
Hello friends and greetings from the Northwest!
First and foremost, Happy Mothers Day to all the amazing women in our lives, especially Patti Serafin and Mary Bailey (although between Erin and I, Patti definitely had a more difficult task). We love you and wouldn't be where we are today without you.
Erin and I have had an exciting and eventful month since our last update, so let the good news begin...
Starting June 14th Erin will leave the infant room at Hutch Kids and move upstairs as a co-teacher for Moons and Stars, a preschool classroom with children between 3-5 years old. She's looking forward to a diaper free room, shared nap time, and writing curriculum around interests of the children. In mid April Erin took the WEST-E, an endorsement test for Washington state elementary education (the WA version of the CSET), and as expected, passed with flying colors. Now if the schools were just smart enough to interview her...
Towards the end of April I was hired as the Chair for the Graduate Student Council, Seattle University's graduate student government. I'm really looking forward to the experience and President Father Sundborg already knows how to spell my last name. In other exciting news, I had an article published in Volume 4 of Magis: A Student Development Journal. The journal publishes pieces by current students in the Student Development Administration (SDA) program, practitioners in Jesuit education, alumni, and friends of the SDA program. My article is titled, "Spiritual Development for the Non-Spiritual: Supporting Atheist Students’ Exploration for Meaning and Purpose."
A few weeks ago, we took a day trip to Portland to visit some Cal Poly friends (Corrigan Speicher, Michelle Fox, Katie Gluck, and Heather Demosthenes).
After an unsuccessful attempt at Voodoo Doughnuts (40 minute line), we bounced around town, visited Powell's Books, and grabbed a bite to eat at Ringler's Pub, a McMenamins restaurant/brewery.
Finally, I'm excited to be able to get my hands dirty again in my community garden plot. Come summer we should have fresh spinach, kale, lettuce, basil, carrots, red onions, and chives.
We miss you all and hopefully now that we're consistently in the mid 60's those of you that have been contemplating a Seattle trip will finally book your tickets. Erin, myself, and the city of Seattle will be waiting for you.
Talk to you soon!
All the best,
Adam & Erin
First and foremost, Happy Mothers Day to all the amazing women in our lives, especially Patti Serafin and Mary Bailey (although between Erin and I, Patti definitely had a more difficult task). We love you and wouldn't be where we are today without you.
Erin and I have had an exciting and eventful month since our last update, so let the good news begin...
Starting June 14th Erin will leave the infant room at Hutch Kids and move upstairs as a co-teacher for Moons and Stars, a preschool classroom with children between 3-5 years old. She's looking forward to a diaper free room, shared nap time, and writing curriculum around interests of the children. In mid April Erin took the WEST-E, an endorsement test for Washington state elementary education (the WA version of the CSET), and as expected, passed with flying colors. Now if the schools were just smart enough to interview her...
Towards the end of April I was hired as the Chair for the Graduate Student Council, Seattle University's graduate student government. I'm really looking forward to the experience and President Father Sundborg already knows how to spell my last name. In other exciting news, I had an article published in Volume 4 of Magis: A Student Development Journal. The journal publishes pieces by current students in the Student Development Administration (SDA) program, practitioners in Jesuit education, alumni, and friends of the SDA program. My article is titled, "Spiritual Development for the Non-Spiritual: Supporting Atheist Students’ Exploration for Meaning and Purpose."
A few weeks ago, we took a day trip to Portland to visit some Cal Poly friends (Corrigan Speicher, Michelle Fox, Katie Gluck, and Heather Demosthenes).
After an unsuccessful attempt at Voodoo Doughnuts (40 minute line), we bounced around town, visited Powell's Books, and grabbed a bite to eat at Ringler's Pub, a McMenamins restaurant/brewery.
Finally, I'm excited to be able to get my hands dirty again in my community garden plot. Come summer we should have fresh spinach, kale, lettuce, basil, carrots, red onions, and chives.
We miss you all and hopefully now that we're consistently in the mid 60's those of you that have been contemplating a Seattle trip will finally book your tickets. Erin, myself, and the city of Seattle will be waiting for you.
Talk to you soon!
All the best,
Adam & Erin
Sunday, March 28, 2010
The Latest from Seattle...
We hope you're well and welcoming spring! It is finally warming up in Seattle, though cross your fingers that we don't experience the saying "April showers bring May flowers." Our upcoming forecast looks rainy, but we are ready for some sun.
It has been a fun, busy couple of months for us! Adam recently finished up his second quarter with another perfect report card and plenty of incredible feedback from professors. We recently added another infant to the mix in my classroom, and have one more starting in April. It makes for some pretty busy days, but we have fun. I am currently trying to decide what to do next year, whether it be follow my infants up or move to the preschool age.
We celebrated Trixie's birthday in February with a night of good friends, fun, and dancing!
Not long after her birthday, we were so happy to welcome back our favorite San Luis Obispo based band, Stilltime, for the Seattle-stop on their national tour. We had a great visit with our friend Nick and his bandmates, and as usual, they put on a great show!
Adam went to Chicago for the annual NASPA conference in March and had a great time networking with other professionals, spending time with some Seattle U colleagues, and reconnecting with some Cal Poly friends. He also took the opportunity to explore the city a bit and had a wonderful time!
Like I said, we have been thankful for some days of beautiful weather. One warm day, we jumped at the chance to be outside and headed to Volunteer Park for a stroll and game of bocce ball. As always, Adam was the winner, but I'd like to think that I held my own.
To cap off Adam's recent spring break, we traveled into the mountains of central Washington for a weekend trip with some good friends. Tobey the Toyota (my car) experienced its first drive through the snow to ultimately end up in sunny Leavenworth, a cute Bavarian town at the Riverdance Lodge, where we spent the weekend chatting by the river, relaxing in the hot tub, playing games, and hiking. We snapped many photos with the beautiful views that surrounded us.
On the way home, we did stop in the snowy pass to throw some snowballs. It was undoubtedly an adventure!
In the coming weeks, Adam will start spring quarter, I will take a test to finish transferring my teaching credential to Washington, and we hope to head north to experience the annual Tulip Festival. We are anxiously awaiting the warm, sunny spring weather so we can continue to explore more aspects of our new home. We also hope the nice weather will bring us more visitors like you! If you plan any trips to the Northwest, keep us posted!
Feel free to respond and tell us how you are doing! We miss you!
Love,
Erin & Adam
It has been a fun, busy couple of months for us! Adam recently finished up his second quarter with another perfect report card and plenty of incredible feedback from professors. We recently added another infant to the mix in my classroom, and have one more starting in April. It makes for some pretty busy days, but we have fun. I am currently trying to decide what to do next year, whether it be follow my infants up or move to the preschool age.
We celebrated Trixie's birthday in February with a night of good friends, fun, and dancing!
Not long after her birthday, we were so happy to welcome back our favorite San Luis Obispo based band, Stilltime, for the Seattle-stop on their national tour. We had a great visit with our friend Nick and his bandmates, and as usual, they put on a great show!
Adam went to Chicago for the annual NASPA conference in March and had a great time networking with other professionals, spending time with some Seattle U colleagues, and reconnecting with some Cal Poly friends. He also took the opportunity to explore the city a bit and had a wonderful time!
Like I said, we have been thankful for some days of beautiful weather. One warm day, we jumped at the chance to be outside and headed to Volunteer Park for a stroll and game of bocce ball. As always, Adam was the winner, but I'd like to think that I held my own.
To cap off Adam's recent spring break, we traveled into the mountains of central Washington for a weekend trip with some good friends. Tobey the Toyota (my car) experienced its first drive through the snow to ultimately end up in sunny Leavenworth, a cute Bavarian town at the Riverdance Lodge, where we spent the weekend chatting by the river, relaxing in the hot tub, playing games, and hiking. We snapped many photos with the beautiful views that surrounded us.
On the way home, we did stop in the snowy pass to throw some snowballs. It was undoubtedly an adventure!
In the coming weeks, Adam will start spring quarter, I will take a test to finish transferring my teaching credential to Washington, and we hope to head north to experience the annual Tulip Festival. We are anxiously awaiting the warm, sunny spring weather so we can continue to explore more aspects of our new home. We also hope the nice weather will bring us more visitors like you! If you plan any trips to the Northwest, keep us posted!
Feel free to respond and tell us how you are doing! We miss you!
Love,
Erin & Adam
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
A much-needed Seattle update
Let me start by apologizing for our delay in
sending an update from Seattle; we know you may have been anxiously
awaiting its arrival in your inbox for much too long. As it always
does, the holiday season made us a little bit busy on top of the
everyday adventures of work and school.
Following the Halloween shenanigans of "Reading, Writing, and
'Rithmetic" we celebrated Thanksgiving in Seattle and Erin made her
very first turkey. All parties agreed - it was delicious. Next up was
my birthday full of festivities including a party, trip to the Bodies
exhibit, Gameworks, and dinner on Lake Union. The next day I set off
for a California adventure, stopping in San Francisco for a visit with
my sister Jessica and her dog Porter, and then to San Luis Obispo, where
I was lucky enough to meet up with many of you (Erin is still getting
over her jealousy). We spent the Christmas holiday traveling southern
California to see both of our families.
To cap it
all off, we brought in 2010 at Kerry Park with an amazing view
overlooking the Space Needle and the incredible midnight fireworks
display.
We had some visitors in the past few months including my
sister Jessica, Erin's aunt Kate, and some friends from Cal Poly, Jeff,
and Karen. Karen was a lucky recipient of our "Seattle driving tour,"
which we have essentially perfected for our out of town visitors. Her
tour was at night which gave us a different view of the sights,
especially am empty Pike's Place Market. We took advantage of the empty
walkways to snag a picture with the Golden Pig, which stands right out
front by the famous fish throwers' stand.
She also
snapped a picture of us at Kerry Park with a night sky in the background.
Seattle seriously is beautiful. Please take this
as more incentive to visit us!
Our latest escapade was a trip to Portland to celebrate our
two year anniversary. We hopped in the car for the three hour drive to
see some of the sights of the city including the waterfront and Pioneer
Square. However, most exciting was the short drive to the suburbs to
visit Wilsonville, the town where Erin grew up. Having not been back in
10 years, this was really exciting for Erin, as we stopped at her old
homes, schools, and the hang outs that were cool to a middle school girl
at the time (bowling alley, family fun center, and Red Robin). We
documented all the stops with photos, including one at the "Welcome to
Wilsonville" sign.
With all this going on, we have still been working away -
Erin with the infants, and me with the college students. Erin recently
completed a humongous piece of documentation to demonstrate high quality
practices at her child care center necessary for accreditation. I had a
great first quarter of school and I'm two weeks into another...lots of
my free time will be spent reading in the upcoming months. Sorry Erin.
We hope that you are well and enjoying the new year. We wish
you lots of excitement, adventure, joy, and love in 2010! And as
always, we miss you.
All the best,
Adam & Erin
Adam & Erin
Sunday, November 15, 2009
We're not in California anymore
Hope this email finds you well and enjoying November. November in Seattle has prompted us to bring out our raincoats, gloves, hats, and scarves - it is getting cold! Though the rain has been on and off, it has been between 45 and 50 degrees during the day, brrrrr!
With that being said, we are still loving it. The leaves changed to all shades of red, orange, and yellow and we are loving the beauty of the Northwest. I am still working away, caring for the infants who are getting bigger everyday and developing their own personalities. Adam is enjoying school and work, and is just about to finish up his first quarter. He's spending less and less time cuddling on the couch with me and more and more time with his head in the books.
We celebrated our first Halloween in Seattle with the creative help of our roommate Trixie, who transformed us into the three R's - Reading, Writing, and 'Rithmetic. Our costumes were a hit with all those we saw that night. My book opened into a pop up book, which made it a little hard to navigate around the room, but was a great conversation starter and in case you're wondering, the red hat is my "bookmark."
We are lucky enough to continue to have visitors to our new home, as both my parents traveled through since our last update. My dad was here on business and treated us to a great dinner, and my mom came up for a weekend to see the sights. We took her to Kerry Park to overlook the city, and she snapped a picture of us there as well. Despite how bundled up we are, the view is still unmatched.
At the end of the week, Adam's sister Jessica will be arriving for her first visit to the city. It is great to have family willing to brave the cold for us.
We took advantage of our Veteran's Day holiday and kicked off the Christmas season. We made breakfast for some friends (at which Christmas music and the movie Elf played in the background), and then went to see Disney's A Christmas Carol in IMAX 3D. It was a great movie, very true to the story, and we got to wear sweet, 3D glasses - what more could you want?!?
Now we need to get to the Christmas shopping...
With Thanksgiving right around the corner (I'll be cooking my first turkey ever!), we hope you know that we are thankful for your love and friendships and enjoy getting such thoughtful responses from you to these emails. We miss you and hope to hear from you soon!
Love,
Erin & Adam
With that being said, we are still loving it. The leaves changed to all shades of red, orange, and yellow and we are loving the beauty of the Northwest. I am still working away, caring for the infants who are getting bigger everyday and developing their own personalities. Adam is enjoying school and work, and is just about to finish up his first quarter. He's spending less and less time cuddling on the couch with me and more and more time with his head in the books.
We celebrated our first Halloween in Seattle with the creative help of our roommate Trixie, who transformed us into the three R's - Reading, Writing, and 'Rithmetic. Our costumes were a hit with all those we saw that night. My book opened into a pop up book, which made it a little hard to navigate around the room, but was a great conversation starter and in case you're wondering, the red hat is my "bookmark."
We are lucky enough to continue to have visitors to our new home, as both my parents traveled through since our last update. My dad was here on business and treated us to a great dinner, and my mom came up for a weekend to see the sights. We took her to Kerry Park to overlook the city, and she snapped a picture of us there as well. Despite how bundled up we are, the view is still unmatched.
At the end of the week, Adam's sister Jessica will be arriving for her first visit to the city. It is great to have family willing to brave the cold for us.
We took advantage of our Veteran's Day holiday and kicked off the Christmas season. We made breakfast for some friends (at which Christmas music and the movie Elf played in the background), and then went to see Disney's A Christmas Carol in IMAX 3D. It was a great movie, very true to the story, and we got to wear sweet, 3D glasses - what more could you want?!?
Now we need to get to the Christmas shopping...
With Thanksgiving right around the corner (I'll be cooking my first turkey ever!), we hope you know that we are thankful for your love and friendships and enjoy getting such thoughtful responses from you to these emails. We miss you and hope to hear from you soon!
Love,
Erin & Adam
Monday, October 5, 2009
Greetings from the Emerald City
We realize we're a little late on this update, but we've had some exciting milestones over the last month and have been extremely busy.
Erin celebrated her 23rd birthday on August 27th and we had a day chalked full of adventure. Trixie and I surprised Erin with a birthday breakfast followed by kayaking on Lake Union. That evening I took Erin to her first professional baseball game and her name was on the scoreboard!
After the game we had a small surprise gathering at the house with friends and my present to Erin were a pair of tickets to see Wicked. Luckily, she decided to take me to the show the next week.
I started my assistantship in early September and have been loving it. During my second week I helped lead a retreat to Camp Brotherhood (http://campbrotherhood.com/) with 40 incoming first-year students and facilitated the cluster group, "2 Legit 2 Quit."
I've officially been a grad student for about one week. It's weird and exciting to be back in the classroom and have required reading. This quarter I'm taking three courses - Foundations of Student Affairs, Introduction to Research, and Multicultural Perspectives. It's all so real now that I have to dedicate large parts of my weekend to reading and writing.
In other fun news we've had some great visitors over the last month, Jason Mockford, Morgen Marshall and Angela Kramer. We had dinner and drinks with Jason on the waterfront, spent a day at the Bumbershoot music festival with Morgen and rode the Duck boats with Angela.
Last weekend Cal Poly played UW in a soccer match at Husky field and we met up with fellow alumni to support the Mustangs.
Miss you all, can't wait 'till you visit. Lots of love.
Adam & Erin
Erin celebrated her 23rd birthday on August 27th and we had a day chalked full of adventure. Trixie and I surprised Erin with a birthday breakfast followed by kayaking on Lake Union. That evening I took Erin to her first professional baseball game and her name was on the scoreboard!
After the game we had a small surprise gathering at the house with friends and my present to Erin were a pair of tickets to see Wicked. Luckily, she decided to take me to the show the next week.
I started my assistantship in early September and have been loving it. During my second week I helped lead a retreat to Camp Brotherhood (http://campbrotherhood.com/) with 40 incoming first-year students and facilitated the cluster group, "2 Legit 2 Quit."
I've officially been a grad student for about one week. It's weird and exciting to be back in the classroom and have required reading. This quarter I'm taking three courses - Foundations of Student Affairs, Introduction to Research, and Multicultural Perspectives. It's all so real now that I have to dedicate large parts of my weekend to reading and writing.
In other fun news we've had some great visitors over the last month, Jason Mockford, Morgen Marshall and Angela Kramer. We had dinner and drinks with Jason on the waterfront, spent a day at the Bumbershoot music festival with Morgen and rode the Duck boats with Angela.
Last weekend Cal Poly played UW in a soccer match at Husky field and we met up with fellow alumni to support the Mustangs.
Miss you all, can't wait 'till you visit. Lots of love.
Adam & Erin
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Exciting News
I am excited to write and let you know an important update in my new, ever-changing, Seattle life. As you know, I have been working as a support staff at Hutch Kids Child Care Center (http://www.fhcrc.org/about/hutch_kids/) since we moved to Seattle. It has been great - I have been floating in all the classrooms, getting to know the staff, and can happily say I could call all 100+ children by name. However, I have been itching to have my own group of children and my own classroom space.
I am happy to let you know that as of last week, I was given a promotion and starting in September, will be co-teaching the "Duckling" infant classroom at Hutch Kids. My co-teacher Tanya and I will have together a group of 6 infants, and we will each specifically be the primary caregiver for 3. Tanya has been an infant teacher at Hutch before, but has also been a support staff for the past few years. My administrators shared that they were really excited that I have moved up with children through the older classrooms, as I did at the ASI Children's Center, and hope that I will stay at Hutch Kids in the years to come allowing me to move up with my infant group.
I am thrilled for this opportunity and feel that it is a great chance for me to grow. Adam and Trixie did a great job of helping me celebrate by giving me a card, bringing home raspberries (my favorite) and cupcakes, and taking me to dinner. I say this promotion was just an early birthday present to myself. :)
Hope all is well with you. Just for fun - attached is a picture of Adam and I at Kerry Park, a beautiful spot that overlooks the city.
And if you are a fan of the TV show Frasier, it is also supposed to be the spot that gives you the view that you would see out of Frasier's apartment window.
With love,
Erin
I am happy to let you know that as of last week, I was given a promotion and starting in September, will be co-teaching the "Duckling" infant classroom at Hutch Kids. My co-teacher Tanya and I will have together a group of 6 infants, and we will each specifically be the primary caregiver for 3. Tanya has been an infant teacher at Hutch before, but has also been a support staff for the past few years. My administrators shared that they were really excited that I have moved up with children through the older classrooms, as I did at the ASI Children's Center, and hope that I will stay at Hutch Kids in the years to come allowing me to move up with my infant group.
I am thrilled for this opportunity and feel that it is a great chance for me to grow. Adam and Trixie did a great job of helping me celebrate by giving me a card, bringing home raspberries (my favorite) and cupcakes, and taking me to dinner. I say this promotion was just an early birthday present to myself. :)
Hope all is well with you. Just for fun - attached is a picture of Adam and I at Kerry Park, a beautiful spot that overlooks the city.
And if you are a fan of the TV show Frasier, it is also supposed to be the spot that gives you the view that you would see out of Frasier's apartment window.
With love,
Erin
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
One Month In
We've been Seattle residents for a little over one month and decided it's time for an update. Between unpacking, starting work, a busy social schedule and a kick-ball league, we've been non-stop since arriving.
It all started with our first weekend in town celebrating 4th of July. We celebrated with an afternoon of games in the park and a BBQ to follow. We watched the Lake Union firework show from a friend's house overlooking the lake. We took our first roommate picture with Trixie just before the BBQ.
The following weekend we waited with crowds of others on Alki Beach to witness the Seafair Pirates storm the beach to kick-off the 60th annual summer festival. On the way home we came across an intersection with special significance to us.
San Luis Obispo's favorite band, Still Time traveled up the coast for a weekend festival and played an amazing show at the Seattle Center. Adam was having withdrawls from Nick, so it was a timely trip. After the show we took our first trip up the Space Needle (For free! Thanks Lindsey!) and Nick came along for the ride. Nick and Adam took advantage of the romantic setting.
Our Kickball Team got off to a slow start (forfeited game one), but bounced back with a win in game two. Regardless of the outcome, we'll always enjoy 15% off at Leny's Bar after the game.
Something we have really enjoyed about Seattle is their abundance of cupcake shops. We decided to test out our three main options (Trophy Cupcakes, Cupcake Royale, and Sugar Rush Bakery) and have a cupcake tasting. Adam and Trixie went around town and picked up a Triple Chocolate cupcake from each location and we made a six category scoring sheet. We're happy to announce that Trophy Cupcakes was the winner and don't worry, we'll do our best to take you there to taste the goodness when you come to visit. Also, the Blue Angels made an appearance in Seattle in early August and we had a roommate picnic on Lake Washington to watch their spectacular show overhead. It was awesome.
We're still in love with Seattle, especially during the summer when it's warm enough to enjoy a Sunday night BBQ at the beach.
Miss you all, can't wait 'till you visit. Lots of love.
Adam & Erin
It all started with our first weekend in town celebrating 4th of July. We celebrated with an afternoon of games in the park and a BBQ to follow. We watched the Lake Union firework show from a friend's house overlooking the lake. We took our first roommate picture with Trixie just before the BBQ.
The following weekend we waited with crowds of others on Alki Beach to witness the Seafair Pirates storm the beach to kick-off the 60th annual summer festival. On the way home we came across an intersection with special significance to us.
San Luis Obispo's favorite band, Still Time traveled up the coast for a weekend festival and played an amazing show at the Seattle Center. Adam was having withdrawls from Nick, so it was a timely trip. After the show we took our first trip up the Space Needle (For free! Thanks Lindsey!) and Nick came along for the ride. Nick and Adam took advantage of the romantic setting.
Our Kickball Team got off to a slow start (forfeited game one), but bounced back with a win in game two. Regardless of the outcome, we'll always enjoy 15% off at Leny's Bar after the game.
Something we have really enjoyed about Seattle is their abundance of cupcake shops. We decided to test out our three main options (Trophy Cupcakes, Cupcake Royale, and Sugar Rush Bakery) and have a cupcake tasting. Adam and Trixie went around town and picked up a Triple Chocolate cupcake from each location and we made a six category scoring sheet. We're happy to announce that Trophy Cupcakes was the winner and don't worry, we'll do our best to take you there to taste the goodness when you come to visit. Also, the Blue Angels made an appearance in Seattle in early August and we had a roommate picnic on Lake Washington to watch their spectacular show overhead. It was awesome.
We're still in love with Seattle, especially during the summer when it's warm enough to enjoy a Sunday night BBQ at the beach.
Miss you all, can't wait 'till you visit. Lots of love.
Adam & Erin
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Adam and Erin make it to Seattle
After approximately 1200 miles of driving and over 20 hours in the car together, we can say with confidence that we still love each other. It was patchy at moments, but we're stronger because of it, and now we live in Seattle.
To everyone that thought we were crazy, we successfully packed the Toyota Matrix with room to spare.
The first leg to Sacramento was a long, straight shot through 104 degree temperatures in Bakersfield. Thanks to a good friend in Roseville, we had a place to crash with cold beers waiting. (Thanks Anne!)
We began the second leg at 5:30am and made some scenic stops along the way, including Erin's own, Bailey Hill Road.
We knew we weren't allowed to pump our own gas in Oregon, but we never knew how awkward it is to sit in the car while someone else pumps your gas...what are you supposed to talk about? The only serious traffic we hit was in downtown Portland, so we took the opportunity to take some pictures in the car.
After becoming best friends with interstate 5, we made it safely to Seattle to enjoy an incredible sunset in the park next to our new home.
Thank you for your support and kind words in regards to the move, we miss you already. Come visit us soon!
All the best,
Adam & Erin
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