The grayest skies you've ever seen are in Seattle(in winter)

Over New Year's weekend we took a trip up to Seattle where Casey served his mission. We bought tickets to a Titans vs Seahawks game back in September when everyone thought the Titans were going to be really good(Casey's biggest worry was they would already have the playoffs locked up by this game and wouldn't be playing their starters) and it turned out they had a really rough start to the season and didn't end up making the playoffs. Either way though, Casey was pretty excited to go up and see the city, visit with friends, and see his favorite team play. Lucky for us, one of Casey's missionary companions moved back up to Seattle to go to the UW and we were able to stay with him and his wife at their house instead of a hotel. They were great hosts and helped us a ton. Thanks so much Ben and Mandy for putting up with us for the weekend. Here are a bunch of the pictures from the trip.

View of the Seattle skyline from Kerry Park.

Abby and I on the famous pig out in front of Pike's Place market where they throw the fish.

This is one of the fish from the fish-throwing booth. Casey said it looks like the same fish that was there 6 years ago when he lived up here.

It was cold so we took a break from walking around all the booths and got a cup of hot chocolate from the first Starbucks store.

Here is a picture of us out in front of the market that Mandy took. We mostly bought food there because Casey said he didn't want to just bring home a bunch of junk and he said there are more booths and better stuff in the summer so if we come back, I can get some stuff then. One of the few things we did buy was a hat for Abby. They had a booth that made the cutest little knit hats and she actually kept it on her head pretty good for most of the day. She sure thought she was cute stuff with it on.

We went to the cheap T-shirt store across the street to get some souvenirs and they had these shirts right next to each other. I almost bought one-I am team Edward by the way-but decided I wanted to save my money for some of the other stuff we were going to do later.

Ben and Mandy took us to the lobby of one of the really nice downtown hotels where they had all of these really cute gingerbread houses. In case you can't tell, the one in the picture is from the muppets. The other picture is Casey and Ben playing checkers on this really neat touch screen that simulated your movements really well. Casey said that when one of the pieces got jumped you actually had to remove it from the board yourself and you could throw it and hit some of the other pieces if you weren't careful with your movements.

After we finished at Pike's Place, we had to hit up the Space Needle so we took the monorail over. Abby was exhausted by the time we got there because we had done so much stuff that day that she was just ready to go to sleep. She was out for most of the trip up to the top and while we walked around up there-she must have been really tired, because it was freezing on the side where the wind came in off the sound. She woke up just as we were getting ready to leave so we figured we would get a few more pics with her awake at the top. Costs like 17 bucks a person just to go up there so we figured we would get our moneys worth.

After we ate some tasty Thai food for dinner, we had to visit a couple of spots before we went and got dessert. Here is me out in front of Top Pot donuts. They had a food network show about this place that I watched and I wanted to get a picture in front of it. It was supposed to be named Top Spot and the S fell off the sign and they just left it and changed the name. One of the highlights of the trip came right after we took this picture when we went to Old School Frozen Custard. Ben and Mandy told us how great it was but I just assumed it was a little ice cream place like Cold Stone. Nope. It was way better. We loved it. We even had a hard time sharing bites with Abby because it was so good. I wish they had something like that in Pocatello.

This superfan guy was driving this around in the parking lot before the game. It was funny and we wanted a picture so he stopped it so we could take one.

We wore Seahawks gear to the game that we bought at the pro shop. It was all on sale because it was the last game and Casey does like the Seahawks. So, since we were going to be sitting in the Seahawks season ticket holder section we figured we would go with the flow. We rooted for both teams-which I'm sure the people around us thought was weird-but we decided since the Titans really had nothing to gain by winning the game, we would root for Chris Johnson(Titans) to break the record for most yards in a season by a running back and the Seahawks to win the game.

Our seats were pretty good. We were only like 15 rows behind the Titans bench.

Here are two of Casey's favorite players on the Titans-Vince Young and Chris Johnson. One of the cool things that happened during the game is that Johnson went over 2000 yards for the season which I guess is pretty rare-only 6 rbs have ever done it. So that was pretty cool. He also broke the all time yards from scrimmage(whatever that means) record for a season which was cool.

The Titans won the game 17-13 and Johnson broke the record so were went home happy.

So, all in all it was a really fun trip(except for the 14 hour drive up there in a snowstorm with a crying baby-which was what I imagine hell to be like-the drive home had good weather and was actually really nice and was only 11 hours). I would like to go again. In the summer next time though, and possibly without the baby or at least when she is a little older. When we pulled into Pocatello I told Casey I didn't realize how small Pocatello is and how few places we have to eat. It was a great experience and I'm glad we went. Casey was excited that I thought Seattle was a pretty cool place. It was a really nice break from things and a pretty relaxing trip. Thanks again Ben and Mandy for all of your help. You guys were awesome.