Despite all the forecasts of snow there was none. It was definitely a chilly morning but no snow. This wasn’t going to stop us from completing the number 1 priority of the day which was getting snow chains for the car. Apparently when (if) it does snow round here then it is difficult to get up the hill to our house which means I will be working from home unless I have some chains. So we quickly discounted the idea of getting any for my car but we did need some for the VW though so that we can, after Christmas, put our chains on and head up to Snoqualmie to go ski-ing.
With the local news channels forecasting snow there had been panic buying of snow chains across the week with people waiting up to 3 hours to get theirs. We however went to Sears – a department store with its own garage – and got our chains within 10 minutes. Over the next few weeks we need to practice putting them on which I’m sure won’t be easy – certainly not as easy as it looks when they give demonstrations on the local news!
After leaving Sears we went over to Kirkland for a mooch round the shops – much to the boys disappointment. First of all though I was in desperate need of a haircut so I went into Bombay Clippers while Tracy and the boys went down to the waterfront. This was my first “professional” haircut in the US since I had my hair cut in the Excalibur hotel in Las Vegas on our honeymoon. After that hair cut we had bought a box of Krispy Kreme donuts and eaten them as we drove from Vegas to Death Valley. This time we walked around kitchen and Christmas shops. By this point we were all obviously starving, so we booked a table at the Barking Frog in Woodinville. We drove over there, into the boonies, and had a fab meal. Well Tracy and I did – the boys left the Barking Frog with two little boxes of food and the words that they would be having it reheated for their tea ringing in their ears! I had roasted chicken breast with pumpkin ravioli. I would have loved to have walked out with a box full of that for my tea but I’d scoffed it all and there was none left!
From the Barking Frog we went across to Chateau St Michelle to get a couple of bottles of the dessert wine we like. We had planned on doing some wine tasting too but it was far too busy – they clearly like their Saturday afternoon wine tasting round here. The boys were mightily relieved that they weren’t going to be subjected to wine tasting but instead they got dragged to the mall to do a spot of shopping! They weren’t happy! After a quick trip to Macys home store – to get some champagne flutes – we did go to Build a Bear to ease their suffering. Toby got a polar bear called Fluffy and Harry got a winter bear called Tubby (named after his Dad).
Much to their relief we went home after this. We’d only told them we were popping out in the morning to the shops and 6 hours later they finally arrived home again and were able to play balloon football. Poor children – what an awful day they had. They have been promised a quiet day at home tomorrow although we do need to pop out for a Thanksgiving turkey and then who knows where we’ll go after that!
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