Seattle December 10th-14th 2010

December 10th part of The Holley Pack boarded a plane bound for Seattle to visit my parents. We rarely travel over the holidays because it just isn't worth the headache, unless we are going to DisneyWorld, so we try and visit friends and family either before or after the peak holiday travel days. This visit was a little different because my parents had moved from their hour in Snoqualmie into a cute condo in downtown Bellevue. It was really great to be able to walk everywhere and explore downtown Bellevue with all of it's holiday decorations.

Cora was a fan of my parent's kitchen sink. Here is a cute shot of her getting an evening bath.

One evening after we had walked around the mall, which was SO crowded, we needed a little decompression. On our walk back to my parent's house we stopped in at a little pizza place for a drink while we waited for our pizza to take home. Cora was so entertained by one of the water glasses. She had us laughing out loud. She would grab the glass and make all sorts of funny sounds into it and her mushed up face was pretty cute too.

Before we left for Seattle I told Mike, "I don't care what happens, the most important thing on this trip for me is for Cora to visit Santa for the first time at the Downtown Nordstrom." So we made it happen. We got up and motored to downtown Seattle early in the morning in hopes of beating the lines for Santa. We kept her in street clothes until we were in the Santa building and then switched her into her "special" Christmas outfit. The whole time we were waiting in line I was crossing my fingers just hoping that she would cooperate and be happy to see Santa. On the other hand I would have been ok had she decided that Santa = scary and her first Santa photo would have been the classic kid screaming kind. But, thankfully the stars aligned and she fully cooperated. It was our turn and so I picked up Cora out of her stroller, walked toward Santa, bent down so she was at eye level with him, and she started kicking her legs and getting all sorts of excited. She ESPECIALLY liked his beard, so much so that when I went to get her back from Santa he whispered to me, "She has a really good hold of my beard." I think what he was trying to say was, make sure to pry her hand out of my beard before you whisk her away so you don't spoil the whole thing for the rest of the kids in line :)

We were able to grab a quick family shot for our Christmas Card which was so nice. It isn't often that we are all smiling and looking in the same direction, well at least in nice clothing.

After our experience at Santa's Village we decided to walk down to Pike's Place Market. Cora was kicking her legs the entire time we were in the market. She was so excited about all the cool things to look at.

We stopped at the famous pig to snap a couple of photos of us with Cora. I think somewhere my mom has a photo of me next to this pig.

We worked up a nice appetite with all the walking and settled on a Pirosky for lunch. I think I was able to eat about 1/2 of mine because the other half ended up in Cora's mouth. She was a huge fan of the Pirosky and what a perfect food for a baby.

Next we walked over to Westlake Center and caught the rickety Seattle Monorail over to the Seattle Center. I just have to say riding this monorail made me miss DisneyWorld even more, although this monorail ride was a little scary compared to the Disney Monorail. I think the Seattle Monorail is really more of a hazard. We strolled around the Center House and decided there wasn't much to do so we boarded the death trap monorail again and headed back to Westlake Center.

My sister Anna worked for Nordstrom for many years and her two most favorite departments were the shoe and handbag departments. We decided that since Auntie is so far away and she was probably missing her favorite department store we would take Cora's photo in the handbag department. Again, Cora got all excited as soon as we pushed her into the department. Look how freaking excited she is to have a L.A.M.B. bag on her lap. I didn't want to risk what she would do with a Prada or Mark Jacobs bag.

We eventually made it to Barnes & Noble where we relaxed and called Auntie Anna to tell her about our adventures in the handbag department and about Cora's visit with Santa. Later in the week we met up with my brother, Boyce, and his wife, Khristy, for dinner. It was really great to see them and for Cora to be able to see her Aunt and Uncle again. Cora really likes her uncle, but then again he is a dork, and babies like silly people. On our last day in Seattle Mike bought me an early Christmas gift. I have been wanting an Ergo Baby Carrier for many months and finally after fiddling with our Moby Wrap for the last time, we decided to suck it up and just buy the Ergo. I was SO happy and Cora immediately loved it. Here is a great shot of Cora and I in SeaTac Airport. The greatest thing about this photo that can't be depicted is that the entire time we were walking around the airport she was saying, "Mama, mama."