It turns out you actually do not have to fly to Holland to see fields and fields of beautiful blossoming tulips! In fact you just have to drive about one hour North of Seattle to the Skagit Valley to see rows and rows of tulips in every color imaginable! That is what we found this past Monday at the Skagit Valley Tulip festival!
We started out our journey with a trip to the tulip festival headquarters in Mt. Vernon. We easily could have gotten an entire “tulip tutorial” (tuptorial?) but armed with some valuable info and a map were anxious to check out the fields (we headed immediately towards Tulip Town!).

If fields of blooming color are what you want to see then this is the place to be! So many colors and so many varieties of tulips! Definitely worth the admission price of $5! Most in full glorious bloom, a few about to bloom any day now and a smattering of those, like this one below, that even though already dropping petals were still quite beautiful to look at.

And for those of you who don’t know my brother, the day would not have been complete without his interpretation of Tiny Tim’s infamous Tiptoe Through the Tulips. John did a great albeit embarrassing job and I think he knows he really does have to work on those high notes. This is a still shot from his performance, I will only post the video if you demand it!

And for a tiptoe down memory lane…really, do yourself a favor an listen to this, even weirder than you probably remember!

Tiny Tim aside, how lucky were we to have this glorious blue sky? Especially since when we left the house that morning the sky was gray and drizzly and we actually went through quite a downpour on the 5 North. Our perseverance through the rain paid off and seemed to pave the way for just the kind of day we had wished for!

And for this little girl, the rain left just enough puddles to splash in with her younger brother and splash they did – run! it’s a mud bath!!

For anyone who hasn’t made it to Skagit Valley I highly recommend the trip! I don’t know how long the blooms last but prime time seems to be now! From Seattle it only took us about an hour tops and the whole area is super easy to navigate.

The Tulip Festival website will give you lots of tips but we decided to go for lunch at the nearby town of La Conner. We waited about 15 minutes for a table at the Calico Cupboard Cafe (delicious!!!) and killed our wait time by looking at their amazing baked goods and by wandering across the street to the Next Chapter bookstore (great card selection too!).

(it seems grape hyacinths are a great accessory to tulips and we agree!)

With a little additional research I think you could find plenty of other things to see and do out in this neck of the woods. I do know that there are daffodil and iris fields (look for the pale daffodils and even the ones with a pale lilac color in them!). We had to head back to the city for our evening plan (when I said whirlwind I wasn’t kidding!).

There seem to be lots of festivals coming up in the Seattle area – a wild strawberry festival in June, apple blossoms in May etc etc. I don’t want to miss them! Cozy note – heck your own area to see what’s happening!

Seattle seems to be having a bit of bi-polar disorder these days and it is driving me NUTS! I have family coming into town this weekend and this is how I want the sky to look! Ok, a little rain will be fine, but please not like today where it is nonrelenting and frickin cold!!! I took this picture on a walk on Tuesday in the middle of the afternoon.
Oh wait, breaking news – it’s 6pm and the sun just came out……..oh brother….!!!

At first you fashionistas out there (and I know there are plenty of you!) might think this is a close up of a new Missoni print and that is a good guess but very very wrong!. This is in fact an aerial view of a tulip field in the Netherlands!!!! Pretty incredible right?

Thank you Lori Dunbar for sending me this awesome email inspiring me to check the info on the Skagit Valley tulip festival right in my own back yard! Who needs to travel to Holland? (well, actually I would LOVE to do that – old farm houses, windmills….)

According to the email this is what the Dutch landscape looks like in May as the tulips burst into life. The bulbs are planted in late October and early November. More than three billion tulips are grown each year and two-thirds of the vibrant blooms are exported, mostly to the U.S. and Germany . I guess that still leaves a lot of tulips for people to walk around and enjoy views like this!

Although I don’t think we have any windmills in the Skagit Valley I’d be happy just to see rows and rows of color and according to the website this cool (and by that they mean COLD!) and rainy Spring has been brought about “a spectacular tulip bloom”! I have family coming into town and this on this list of things to do!

I love tulips! There are actually so many varieties I have even noticed just walking around Queen Anne. I will keep you posted on the festival which I will hopefully make it out to! Don’t have a tulip festival in your area? I say go out and buy a bunch! There are so many gorgeous flowers out right now!

Happy Spring everyone!

Or maybe it was cake, birthday cake to be exact! This past Saturday night we celebrated fabulous friend Kimberly Dawn’s birthday at Sky City on top of the famous Seattle Space Needle! Believe it or not, my first time to the Space Needle and it’s restaurant (how is that possible?) and we really had a great time. Unfortunately we were running late and didn’t even get to go to the observation deck so I guess that just means I’ll have to go again – no problem there! Cheers Kimberly!

There were 7 of us gathered to celebrate this momentus occasion (Robert, Gavin, Stephany, Brian, Marc, the birthday girl of course, and myself) . We had decided on drinks and appetizers as the way to go (entrees are a little pricey starting in the $40+ range). Feeling a little “what the hell” a couple of us ordered some “smokin” cocktails – see Kimberly above with her blue bombshell! I had no idea the drink would really be “smokin and bubblin” but heck, there’s always a first and it tasted pretty darned good!

There were a lot of great choices on the menu and Marc and I shared the crab cake with apple slaw with curry aioli (delicious!!!) and the flat bread with carmelized onions, roasted grapes and shaved grana .

The winner of everything we ordered was the Pecan crusted goat cheese with cabernet blackberry syrup – what a great combo! I also sampled Kimberly’s mac and cheese with crab (yum) and clam chowder (also very good!).
Here’s a peak at the selection:

We drank a very good Merlot with all these yummies but my smokin cocktail erased any memory of what this wine was called right out of my head…ah, the perils of drinking…especially the perils of drinking things that have smoke coming out of them…

I think it’s safe to say the birthday girl had a wonderful time as I know we did! And as a side note, we celebrated Gavin’s birthday on Friday night with an after hour cake and champagne soiree at our house. We gifted Gavin with a depression glass cake stand, a vintage children’s book about hair and most importantly, a serving spoon with an ear of corn as the handle. If you don’t believe me just ask him. And I’m pretty certain this was his favorite gift – ever.
It’s official, birthday season is upon us!

It was raining quite hard this past Wednesday night so I thought it would be a good idea to pick Marc up from South Lake Union where his office at Amazon has just relocated to. So I wasn’t surprised when he called me but what did surprise me was his invitation to the “soft opening’ of the new Tom Douglas restaurant Brave Horse Tavern (connected to his office building!). I thought we were going to the official opening the following night? Marc asked me if I liked free food – hello, what kind of a question is that? As it turned out on that Wednesday Tom Douglas was giving away any food item on the menu as long as you paid for beer and filled out a questionaire at the end. What? YES!!!! I was down there in 5 minutes flat!

The burger did sound good but heck. I’m from Phillly and we love Soft Pretzels, especially when the are fresh from the brick oven and come with things like housemade sausage or clams or cheddar etc. My sausage arrived in a little black skillet and was roasted with a delicious BBQ sauce! I also had a crab dip which came with some overpowering Ritz crackers but who cares about crackers? The dip was delicious. Not the best combo with my pretzel but I can just never seem to resist crab anything!

Although they do serve alcohol, this place is all about beer – serving 26 on tap and I chose the Chuckanut – a light-ish lager which was perfect. Wish I could have eaten more and desert looked really tempting but we headed over to one of the two shuffleboard tables where we played many games (memories of playing Bocce ball in Italy!!!!). You can imagine how delighted I was when Tom who showed up to check out his new digs and walking by the shuffleboard coached me to be “gentle” with my shot! (Admittedly, I need a lot of practice with this game….)

We loved the warehousey ambience Brave Horse – lots of original brick with two new skylights over the shuffleboard tables. Lots of windows and rustic wooden tables, it is very cozy! Music was good and not too loud. I noticed an old piano on a small stage – will be interesting to see what happens there! This is a great place to just hang out, prices are great and the menu is fun.
Of course Tom Douglas didn”t stop there. Below Brave Horse is his new Italian “Cuoco” and next to Brave Horse is soon to open Ting Momo Tibetan dumpling house. Something for everyone? Why not! South Lake Union is hopping and I couldn’t be happier as it’s just a hop, skip and a jump from my house!
Hope to see you there and hope my shuffleboard skills improve!!!!

What a cozy book club I belong to! First of all, they rescheduled last Thursday’s long awaited get together when bad boy Craig had the flu – just can’t have the club without him! And then they are so patient with me skyping in! It’s such a funny and modern way to attend a dinner party/book club!

This book club’s discussion was my book choice Gary Shteyngart’s The Russian Debutante’s Handbook. I chose this book much like I did the very successful read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society- browsing through the bookstore and having something catch my eye. This book was a NYT best seller (always a good sign I thought) and I am fascinated with Russia and Eastern Europe and this described a fictitious city called Prava – like a Paris in the 90′s. To me that sounded like a fun read!

I’m pretty sure these Vodka shots would have helped make it a fun read- Nostroyva!!!

Yup, it seems as though “fun read” was the fictitious part! Although I didn’t hate this book by any means I had a helluva time just getting through it and couldn’t wait to be finished ! (hate that, such a waste of valuable time!!!!) I just didn’t care about any of the characters although the book did get better in the halfway mark but that is a long way to go before you like a book! Elizabeth seemed to like the book, Sara not at all, Meredith and Miriam thought it was ok and Craig couldn’t seem to get past page 30!

Super flexible super hostess Miriam somehow whipped last weeks Russian themed Stroganoff, perogis and cabbage with beef salad into this weeks fresh and delicious dinner. Boy, did I wish I was there to dig into that! I was especially bitter though when she brought out this incredible looking chocolate bread pudding. Did you know how much you were torturing me Miriam?

If a novel doesn’t inspire great literary conversation this group is never at a loss and the casting always brings everyone around and although we usually don’t name a director of our book’s film, with it’s Jewish theme this time we have chosen Woody Allen to direct. He is especially good with ensemble casts, and boy do we have one!

Our cast is as follows and yes, more than a few liberties have been taken. Sorry Woody….
Vladamir Glaskin – Michael Cera (sigh, who else?)
Challah – Ricki Lake
Vladimir’s mother – Elizabeth Taylor
Vladimir’s father – Richard Dreyfus
Vladimir’s Grandmother – Betty White (had to be!)
Fan Man – Ed Asner
Baobab – African American male “model” in the Porn for New Mom book Craig brought. This really makes NO sense at all, but so what, who cares?!!!!
Francesca – LeeAnn Rhimes or Karen Carpenter
Francesca’ s mom – Sharon Stone
Francesca’s dad – Michael Douglas
Baobob’s girlfriend Roberta – Selina Gomez
Groundhog – Danny DeVito
Gusee – Charlie Sheen
Magazine Editor – Michael Jackson
Morgan – young Tina Fey
Jordi – Erik Estrada
Frantisek – John Cusak
Gusev – Gary Busey
Work out/Church guy – Sly Stallone
SKINHEADS
Ed Norton
Eminem
Courtney Love
Groundhog’s girlfriend – Cher
Jan the BMW driver – Jason Statham
NEW YORK EXTRAS
Shirley Temple Black (???)
Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson
Lindsey Lohan
Jessie Eisenberg
Natalie Portman
Andy Samburg

PRAVA EXTRAS
Mila Kunis
Viggo Mortensen
Adrian Brody
super models Natalia Vodianova, Karolina Kurkova and Carmen Kass
Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brinn
Mikail Barishnykov
All the thugs from any Guy Ritchie film doing Russian accents
Mel Gibson and Oksana Grigorieva
Olga Korbut and Nadia Comeneci

Sure to be an Academy Award winner!!!!

Stay tuned Bad Boy and Girls, our next book is Elizabeth’s choice – Olive Kittridge by Elizabeth Strout.

Meeting date tbd but lets get READING!!!!
Much love and literature to all!
Yours truly,
and

Finally, the weekend is here – Cozyland just lives for them these days! Work has been a super grind for months now but will end soon with the future tbd…! Funny how work can really interfere with my creative process! In the meantime I’m looking forward to a lovely weekend and thought I’d post this beautiful image that just makes me happy – this would have been a very nice way to wake up! I do love tea out of a silver tea service but in the meantime I have a very nice tea cup that does the job just fine! So, adventures to come and stories to tell – including the Thursday night meeting of the Bad Boy and Girls Book Club and a couple of nice restaurants we’ve been to. Stay tuned!