Keeping Up With the Allens

Back Country Adventures

For a few years now Alex has wanted to explore a part of Crystal Mountain called “Southback” that we had never ventured out to. Southback {aka “South Back Country”} is an out of bounds, but avalanche controlled, part of the ski resort we call our home mountain. The area is massive, large enough to be its own small ski resort. There isn’t a chair lift to get you to the top, so you have to hike! That right there is why we’ve never been there before.

This is a photo of "The King" that I took while we were traversing towards it. — This is a photo of “The King” that I took while we were traversing towards it.

I am a lover of skiing and a lover of chair lifts. I don’t want to work that hard for my turns. From time to time I can be a bit whiny and demanding, so I had previously put the kibosh on hiking to go check out Southback. I’m not sure why, but this past weekend I became more open minded and decided to go for it with Alex.

It's not often that I strap my skis to my back and hike up a mountain. — It’s not often that I strap my skis to my back and hike up a mountain.

Even though the sun was out, the ski day started off a little rocky for me. It just wasn’t my day. I got caught on a tree root, made some terrible turns, the lift lines were endless and I just was not feeling like I was very well put together. I needed to re-set so we decided to go in early for lunch before heading out on our adventure. I had packed some chili in our awesome Thermos, so we had a hot, “free” lunch to enjoy! After our bellies were full we set out to explore new territory.

Our excursion took us about an hour and a half from the time we left the lodge to the time we got down to the main lodge again. We rode up a chair lift then traversed across to the ski area boundary where we had to take off our skis and begin hiking. We probably only hiked for 10-15 minutes before we were able to put our skis back on and do some more extreme traversing. Once we finished our traverse we came out from the woods into an expansive wide open powder field. It was amazing!

A terrible photo, but here is a picture of Silver Basin, which is where we skied.

At the same time as we arrived, the fog rolled in. We didn’t get the full extent of what we skied because the fog limited our visibility, but as far as we could tell, it was amazing! Both of us had a great run and made some awesome powder turns before we met up at the bottom of Silver Basin. All in all it was a fun change of pace, but I’m not expecting to do that every weekend!

This Week’s Happenings

Not a whole lot is going on right now – well, not enough to warrant its own blog post, anyway. In any case, I’ve compiled what’s been happening lately over in our neck of the woods.

Today Jackson turned 10 months! He weighs about 70 pounds. He definitely has some growing to do still – I noticed today that his head needs to catch up with the rest of his body. As a 10 month old his favorite things include: digging in the backyard, going for walks… lots of walks, playing with other dogs, terrorizing Henry, chasing Henry around the house, and generally doing what we don’t want him to do. In all fairness, Jackson really is a good dog. He’s adorably sweet and he has certainly found his place in our house – usually on top of our feet wherever we’re standing.

Jackson has grown to love playing fetch.

We began Monday, Wednesday, Friday runs with Jackson this week. Lately we have been realizing that we just can’t tire our ~~little~~ big pup out enough. We are hoping that running will do the trick. Monday marked our first official “family run” and we ran about 3 miles. We had run with Jackson in the past but it was more of a run-walk, whereas this was a solid 3-mile run. Much to our surprise, Jackson did awesome! This makes me so excited for summer.

Alex's new running shoes :) — Alex’s new running shoes 🙂

Our big trip to Europe is quickly approaching and we are FAR from ready to go! We booked our hotels in Spain and Switzerland last week but still need to get England and Amsterdam locked down, as well as our flight back to the US. Another thing that is on our to do list is figure out what we’re doing with Jackson. I am in the process of “interviewing” dog sitters for Jackson. I am certain we’ll find a good family who will be able to watch him while we’re gone, but it isn’t easy to find a home for him to stay at for nearly 30 days. Henry has a fabulous cat sitter already, so he’s taken care of.

This is what Jackson looks like after a 3-mile run.

As a preparation for part of our Europe trip Alex and I decided we’d like to learn to speak a bit of Italian. We will be in parts of Italy where tourists aren’t common and we’ll be attending an Italian wedding so we thought it would be nice to have a few words in our back pocket. We have been using a website called Duo Lingo for a few months and have started to build a small vocabulary but we’re realizing that we really need to step it up in order to be able to have very basic conversations and communicate a little bit in Italian in just a few short months. We are planning on hiring an Italian tutor with the hopes that she will be able to bring us up to speed. I think we’ll start with one session a week and then when we get closer we might increase to two. We’ll see!

Our weekend was pretty low-key. Alex and I got the rare opportunity of having a lunch date on Friday! It was awesome – I met him at his office and we walked up the street to Homegrown, an AMAZING sandwich shop, to grab a bite to eat.

Lunch date at Homegrown in South Lake Union

Friday night Alex went out with some friends and I stayed in with a spasming abdomen. Saturday we met Ali, Tyler and baby Vivian {and Glory, their dog} at the dog park and had brunch with them afterwards. We did some errands and came home to get a few things done around the house before going out for dinner at Naam Thai and a glass of wine at Bottlehouse. We had originally planned on skiing on Sunday but Alex just wasn’t feeling well enough so we stayed home.

We just adore this girl! How is she 13 months already!? — We just adore this girl! How is she 13 months old already!?

The weather was really nice on Sunday so we took Jackson for a long walk through the Washington Park Arboretum. We spent the rest of the day relaxing and getting stuff done around the house.

We’ve got some good stuff on the menu this week. The lasagna we had for dinner on Sunday was so so good and I can’t wait for pork carnitas tonight. They have been cooking in my crock pot all day and I can’t even pick up the pork without it falling apart. The rest of the week has mushroom ravioli, gnocchi with sausage and peppers and mushroom risotto… lots of mushrooms and pasta this week!

This Week’s Happenings

It hasn’t felt like a particularly busy last few weeks but I guess things are happening and making time fly by, as per usual. Here are the happenings around the Allen household this week:

View from Alex's ski tour. — View from Alex’s ski tour.

Alex enjoyed a ski tour with Carrie and Patrick last weekend. They skinned up a trail somewhere near Stevens Pass, took a break at the top and then skied down. Carrie and Patrick are some of our favorite people to ski with and now Alex is elated that they’re getting into back country skiing, too.

Kicking his feet up after a long hike up the mountain!

We have got ourselves a VERY naughty puppy. Month 9 has been one of the most difficult months so far. I think it’s been so tough in part because Jackson hasn’t been neutered yet, but also because we have been having a really inconsistent schedule and routine the last few weeks. It’s also hard because we know how darn good he can be and when he behaves like a jerk we know that it’s not his true colors, so that makes it all the more frustrating.

This is one thing that our lovely dog destroyed this week.... Naughty dog! — This is one thing that our lovely dog destroyed this week…. Naughty dog!

In other Jackson news, our pup had his first grooming appointment earlier this week. We had taken him to the groomer a few times a while back to get used to her and to get a bath, but this week was the first time he got a haircut and all that good stuff. He came back looking even more handsome than usual! Now if only she could groom some good manners and behavior into him, it would be even more worth the $70 price tag.

Henry has found a new spot to sleep recently. He’s been curled up next to the pillows on our bed and couldn’t look sweeter if he tried.

We made it a year without having cable TV! I really shouldn’t brag about that because it certainly doesn’t mean we didn’t watch TV over the last year. We canceled our cable package and relied on Hulu Plus and Netflix for our TV fix. With the X Games this weekend and the Olympics in a few weeks, alongside my love of watching the Food Network, we decided to get a cable TV package again. It’s literally $13 more each month {why did we cancel in the first place!?} than our current Internet package, plus $10 for an HD DVR, and we’ll be canceling our $15 Hulu Plus account, so it’s basically a wash. I am looking forward to having cable again!

The weather has been sooooo nice this week! It almost feels like spring {sorry Minnesota friends/family!}. We have sunny skies and flowers and trees starting to bud and flower here in Seattle. This nice weather in Seattle does not make for great ski conditions, though, so I’m going to be okay when the rain and cooler temperatures come back so that we can get some snow in the mountains.

Alex stayed home from work two days this week because he got the nasty bug that’s going around. He is on the mend and back at work now but still isn’t 100%. Finally after 18 days my cough turned a corner and has now almost subsided; however, my abs feel like I’ve been doing nothing but sit-ups for those 18 days and I can’t hardly use my upper ab muscles. Oh the joys of being sick!

Our well-stocked "pharmacy" — Our well-stocked “pharmacy”

This week was my second Pilates session with Mary, my friend and new Pilates instructor. I am so happy that I’m able to take some time out of my week for a Pilates lesson. I am loving it!

We’ve got some good food on the menu this week. I am excited to take some chili with us to the mountains this weekend. It’s such a great lunch on a ski day!

Nancy’s Birthday Weekend in Seattle

My mom came out to Seattle to celebrate her birthday this past weekend. It was a big birthday for her so I thought it would be fun to let her escape the chilly Minnesota weather and come hang out in Seattle.

She arrived on Friday evening, which was her actual birthday. We went up to Bottlehouse, our neighborhood wine bar, and celebrated accordingly. My mom had some pink champagne and Alex and I shared a bottle of wine. It was great to catch up and start her visit off right.

When we got back home it was time for cake! I had made a chocolate angel food cake, which is what my grandparents used to make for my mom. It seemed like the cake was a big hit!

Saturday morning we woke up before the sun. Alex had planned a back country ski trip with Patrick and Carrie that day, so I got up with him and dropped him off at their house. When I got back, my mom and I took Jackson for a walk before getting ready to head to the spa.

I made appointments for my mom and me to get pedicures at my favorite spa out in Redmond. It’s such a luxurious pampering experience and I thought it would be a great birthday treat for my mom. We started off on the wrong food {heehee} because the spa had booked us in two separate rooms, so we began our pedis apart. Thankfully we were able to get moved into the same room eventually and finished off the appointment together. While we were in different rooms we chose our nail color, and lo and behold, we ended up selecting the exact same color!

Not long after we got back home, Alex returned from his ski excursion. We said our hellos and he quickly let me know that he had fallen ill while he was out for the day. I put him to bed and ran out to the pharmacy to pick up some stuff to hopefully keep whatever he was getting at bay or at least lessen the illness. Having just been quite ill myself I did not want him to have what I had!

It’s amazing my mom didn’t hop back on a flight on Saturday and hit the road with two sick-os under a very small roof that she was sharing with us! I still have a pretty bad cough {16 days and counting! Yes I have been do the doctor.} and Alex’s new illness kept him in bed for the rest of the weekend.

We had reservations for dinner on Saturday night at Daniel’s Broiler, a fabulous steakhouse just down the road from my house. Alex ended up skipping out on dinner so he could try to sleep off his bug, while I coughed my way through the meal. Despite the circumstances, we had a great dinner. Daniel’s is such a treat – fantastic food, great service and a really nice ambiance.

Sunday didn’t bring a whole lot of excitement. We took Jackson for a walk and sat around my house chatting for most of the rest of the time. My mom played the “mom” role of taking care of both of us and making us rest, which was probably a good thing, so we had a really laid back day before taking her to the airport mid-afternoon.

It is always so nice to have family and friends come to visit and get the chance to spend some quality time with them. I’m glad my mom was able to come spend her birthday with us in Seattle!

New Year… New Exercise Goals!

It just so happens that Alex and I both got new jobs that have opened the doors to new exercise goals and routines around the start of the new year. It looks like our new fitness track will coincide with everyone else’s new years resolutions! Neither one of us has any specific goals with our fitness plan other than leading a healthy life that includes regular, consistent exercise and a well-balanced diet.

Both Alex and I were probably in the best shape we have ever been in over the summer, with him training for his 200-mile bike ride and me running all the time. Unfortunately, our busy schedules and lack of follow-through resulted in us “falling off the bandwagon” a bit this fall and winter. We have gotten a slow start to ski season, so we don’t even have that as a regular form of exercise either. It’s great that we both have come up with independent plans that should work for both of us to get back into a regular routine.

Alex joined a gym near his new office and has been loving his new exercise routine. One of the benefits his company provides is a reimbursement for exercise equipment, so he stocked up on some new gym clothes and got a yoga mat to kick start his new habit. Alex has been going to the gym 2-3 mornings per week to start his day by lifting weights and doing cardio. He is also planning on starting yoga next week!

For at least a year, if not three years, Alex has been talking about wanting to do yoga or be better at stretching regularly. It is incredible that he is finally making that happen! I can’t wait to see how well he likes it.

One of the new running outfits I got over the summer.

Once the sun decides to rise before 8:00 a.m. I plan on getting back into running a few days per week. I am so excited to have Jackson as my running buddy now that he’s basically fully grown. It’s perfect timing, too, because he is starting to get to the point where our 3-mile morning walks don’t tire him out anymore!

I just started Pilates instruction this week and I plan on taking my Pilates class from Mary once a week. I might even mix in some mat workouts at home if I’m feeling particularly motivated. I am also planning on adding a couple days of weights at home to my fitness routine.

It’s been nice to ease into our new fitness routines slowly so that we don’t get over amped and drop them right away. I think that we are both really motivated right now and are using our change in jobs to jump start a new healthy lifestyle in the new year!

A Pampered Day

Sometimes days of pampering are in order! This “pampered day” I had yesterday was one of those instances.

Alex’s Christmas gift to me was a gift certificate to get a facial. I had been dreaming of getting a facial since mid-summer and I was so excited to have a gift certificate to go and do just that. There is a new place in our neighborhood called Holiday Skincare that I kept hearing rave reviews about, so, to support the local business my neighborhood, I decided to get my facial there.

My facial was amazing. I’ve never had a facial before and boy is it awesome! It was so relaxing and my skin sure got the royal treatment. It was glowing and looked incredible afterwards. I think I’m hooked – I can’t wait to go back {of course just on occasion!}.

Rewind a few hours to the start of the day… I had my first day of Pilates as well. My friend Mary is in training to become a Pilates instructor and is offering private Pilates lessons. Now that I have a bit of extra income from my second job I decided I can use some of that for a weekly Pilates session.

I had done Pilates mat workouts before, but never in a Pilates studio using machines. It was a very different workout but I think I will really enjoy it. I am looking forward to getting better, stronger and more comfortable with the equipment. It really makes my days better when I start out by exercising.

What an amazing day to be able to spend some quality time on myself! It makes such a difference to do that sometimes.

Bryan & Sarah’s Trip to Seattle

Alex’s cousin Bryan and his bride to-be, Sarah, just came out to Seattle for a long weekend visit us. Alex and I went to college with Bryan at Iowa State, so I know him quite well. It was a treat to get a chance to spend some time with Sarah since the two of them started dating after Alex and I left Iowa State and we haven’t had many opportunities to get to know her. Bryan and Sarah arrived on Thursday from Chicago and brought some terrible weather with them. Thankfully we didn’t let a monsoon ruin our fun weekend.

Once they arrived, Alex took them downtown to do some tourist things, like see Pike’s Place Market and walk around, but the weather was so bad that they came back to our house pretty quickly. Later that evening we went up to the Bottlehouse to show Bryan and Sarah our neighborhood. They all split a bottle of wine while I had some hot tea since I was under the weather from earlier in the week.

On Friday the crew headed out for Crystal Mountain to get a day of skiing in. There was a bit of fresh snow on the ground and no crowds, so it was a day full of great skiing. I wish I could have joined them on the mountain but I still wasn’t feeling well enough.

No different from college, we spent all day Saturday drinking. We started the day off on Saturday with brunch at home. I made ham and egg cups, along with muffins, fruit and coffee and we lingered for a while before driving out to Woodinville. Our first stop was at Red Hook Brewery. We grabbed a table and had some lunch while watching the beginning of the Seahawks game. After our meal we took a tour of the brewery. The brewery tour comes with a beer tasting portion and everyone was feeling pretty good after that!

Now that everyone’s bellies were full of beer and bar food, we ventured up the road to a winery that we had never been to. Our first winery was Gorman Cellars, right in the heart of the tourist district. I was still not feeling 100% so I didn’t taste any wines, but it sounded like everyone really enjoyed the wine. Once the tasting was over we went next door to Patterson Cellars to do another tasting. I really like Patterson and was disappointed that I wasn’t able to try the new wines on their tasting menu. Safe to say, we’ll be back!

After a full day of drinking, we decided to cap it off by going to a cocktail bar. Why not!? We went home for a quick siesta and then grabbed an Uber {taxi service} and headed for Capitol Hill. Our first stop was at Le Zinc, a French restaurant with a swanky cocktail bar. The bartender there also works at Bottlehouse, so it’s fun to visit him in a different element. I had Chris make me a hot toddy, which was fabulous, and Alex and Bryan had a spin-off of an old fashioned, while Sarah had a whiskey ginger, but with ginger liquor instead of ginger ale.

We moseyed a few blocks away to Quinn’s for a late dinner. Alex and I love Quinn’s. It’s a restaurant that has some “normal” food like a burger and chicken, but then they have more “foodie” options like wild boar sloppy joe or bone marrow. Everything we’ve had there has been fantastic. It’s a fun place to take out of town guests who are up for trying something funky.

After a good night’s sleep we woke up and had our final stop on the tourist train. We took Bryan and Sarah to the Hi Spot Cafe, our neighborhood brunch spot, this morning. It’s always a favorite of our guests.

It was a great weekend with Bryan and Sarah! We had a great time showing them our city and neighborhood and look forward to seeing them in August at their wedding.

The Flu

In case you haven’t heard, the flu is going around. It’s a mean and nasty virus and unfortunately I did not escape it. I spent all week in bed and missed the entire week of work. I don’t think I’ve been so sick since I was a child. Being sick still, I missed out on skiing on Friday, as well as wine tasting yesterday. More on that later…

Alex was such a gem and picked up a lot of slack while I was unable to help out. He didn’t complain once about getting up by himself at the crack of dawn to take Jackson for his walks and he was at my beckon call when I needed another ginger ale or when I needed him to reaffirm that I still had a fever. He sure wasn’t shy about poking fun of the fact that I don’t get the flu shot, though. In any case, it was great to have him take such good care of me and get everything ready for Bryan and Sarah’s visit to Seattle this weekend.

I am on the mend now and almost back to normal with just a bit of a lingering cough. I’m looking forward to getting back to work tomorrow!

Jackson’s Adventures with the Cone

Not 30 minutes after Alex picked Jackson up from being boarded after Christmas was he sitting in the vet’s office waiting to be examined. Jackson had extremely bad hot spots on his genital region, likely from anxiety, that had gone unnoticed while he was boarded for 5 days.

The vet cleaned him up and sent Alex home with a cone for Jackson to wear to keep from licking the area, along with pain meds and some ointment.

It’s safe to say that Jackson hates wearing a cone. Jackson was quite uncomfortable but loved the time when the cone would come off for him to go for a walk.

It took about a week for Jackson to start ignoring the area enough for us to allow him to stop wearing the cone. Now it has been just about two weeks and he is back to his normal self!

Alex put some of his underwear on Jackson to alleviate the need for the cone... this was all in good fun! — Alex put some of his underwear on Jackson to alleviate the need for the cone… this was all in good fun!

Start of the Washington Ski Season

The weather in Washington has been awfully dry this winter which means it hasn’t snowed much in our Cascade mountains. This is quite disappointing for the skiers here! Our ski season started with two days in Breckenridge over Thanksgiving, and thankfully yesterday marked the end of our dry streak.

Usually our ski season starts in mid-November with decent coverage. Our first ski day is always about getting back in a rhythm and working out the kinks, and yesterday was no different.

We packed up our ski gear and loaded up the car the night before so that on Saturday morning all we had to do was roll out of bed, get dressed, put the skis on the car and get our food ready to go. We’ve got a pretty good system down for food on ski days. Both of us really enjoy having a hot breakfast and a hot lunch when we’re spending the day on the mountain. Alex whipped up some breakfast burritos for us to wrap in foil and take in the car with us to have on the way to Crystal while I heated up some carrot ginger soup that I had made previously. We have a big thermos that works really well for soup or chili that we use most ski weekends, in addition to a smaller thermos that we bring coffee in. It works out really well for us to bring our own food – it’s healthier and much less expensive.

Eating soup and a roll in the car after skiing.

Yesterday we left our house just before 7:00, which put us at the base of Crystal at 8:45. We left about 15 minutes later than we had hoped to, so we’ll have to be a little speedier next time. Jackson came along with us so before we went skiing we took him on a little mountain adventure of his own.

There is a groomed path through the woods that we let him run off leash on. Usually there’s a lot more snow, but since it’s been so dry there was just enough snow for Jackson to run around in.

By the end of our walk Jackson was good and tired. We left him in the car for a bit while we skied a few runs. He has toys and a comfy spot to lay in the back of our SUV, plus his fur coat keeps him nice and warm.

On our first ride up the chairlift we were greeted by Mount Rainier!

It was such a beautiful day to kick off the start of 2014 and our ski season in Washington. The views from Crystal Mountain on a clear day are unbeatable.

We didn’t ski a ton yesterday, mostly because the conditions yesterday were less than desirable. The snow pack was probably lower than I had ever seen it and it was incredibly icy across the mountain. We did get a few awesome runs up in Powder Bowl, so that made it more worth our while.

We ended our day by doing some avalanche beacon practice drills. There is a spot near one of the lodges where they have transceivers buried in the snow for you to practice finding with your beacon and probe. I got an avalanche beacon for Christmas from my dad, so it was a great opportunity to get out and practice using it. I sure hope I am never in a position to have to use it for real, but it’s nice to know how it works!

Jackson, Alex and I had a great first day at Crystal this year and we all hope it’s the start of many more to come.