Friday, June 2nd
I asked Trish about a month ago to see what we were doing for Amy's birthday and if we were going to include Jean since her birthday was a week later. She said she would get back to me after talking to Amy and Jean. A few weeks went by, and she told me what the plan was. I told her we would come up on Friday after work and stay through Saturday evening sometime. She said that would work perfectly.
The night before, Ben and I did some laundry and packed up our duffle's just so we didn't waste any time getting ready to go after work on that Friday. We both went to work, doing our normal routines, I got some stuff done during lunch and had a pretty chill afternoon. I was really hoping Ben's work didn't keep him late since they seem to do that often when we are busy after work and need to drive somewhere. Amy had chosen her birthday dinner at Hops and Drops so I told Trish we would just meet them at the restaurant. She said that was fine and that she would see us there.
We left just after 5:30 and expected traffic to be awful since it was a Friday and all, but traffic wasn't all that bad this time around. I was shocked. I texted Trish updates of when we left and when we got closer to Puyallup. When she got the Puyallup update, they were on their way to Hop Jacks. I updated that we had just gotten onto Hwy 410 and will be there shortly. She said, she will see us in a few minutes.
We got up the hill, had to stop at every single light and we finally made the turn into the complex where Hop Jacks was located. I found a place to park (this place was busy) and got out. Trish, Amy, David and Ed also got out the car (they had been chillin' for a couple of minutes) and we all walked in together. We sat in the bar area since we are all over 21. I looked at the menu and nothing sounded good to me. I honestly would have rather had a home cooked meal instead. Our waitress got drink orders, I just got a strawberry lemonade and a standard water, and we watched the rest of the Mariner game that was being played on TV.
We made some small talk; I tried asking Amy questions about her day and she said that she and David spent most of the day together which was nice. They hardly spend any time together and they've been dating for like 6 years or so. David had given her a necklace for her birthday earlier in the day and she said we could see it when we got home. I told her that was nice of him.
Our waitress came back with our drinks and got our food order. Ben got a burger, and I got the chicken strips and fries because nothing else sounded good. We chatted a bit more, talked about our week, we all agreed that we were thankful for the weekend and other random things that came up. I was disappointed in the food. It just wasn't that good this time around. Both Ben and Trish agreed with me. Again, we probably would have been better off having a home cooked meal instead.
We paid and continued the party at Trish's house. Ben and I unloaded our overnight bags, pillows and blankets and got comfortable for the evening. Amy had asked Trish to get her a cookies and cream ice cream cake, but Trish got the wrong thing and it just ended up being a cookies and cream cake. Whoops! Good thing she got some vanilla ice cream too. Amy turned 35 but Trish didn't have any 3's so she improvised. 2+1=3! After we sang to her, Amy opened her birthday presents while Trish dished up cake and ice cream.
Ben and I had treated her to a Friends Experience back in April, but I had already purchased a couple gifts months before. We got her a Friend's picture frame that could be a picture frame or a door decoration...like the one on Rachel and Monica's purple door and a Friend's card game. Trish got her some roses and David got her that necklace I learned about at dinner time. She went and got it from her room to show us and Ed got her a Thunderbird's T-shirt. She thanked us for the gifts.
I even brought up the extra Instant Pot we got from our neighbor Rhonda because I thought it would be a fun thing for Amy and Trish to learn how to use. It yields some pretty good food; it is easy to use and requires less clean up.
We played the Friend's card game and a round of Yahtzee while we snacked and drank beer.
Of course, we stayed up way too late. It was nice to go to bed when we did. It was a long, short week.
Saturday, June 3rd
The next day, I got up, got cleaned up, dressed and went up to the dining room to see if anyone else was up. Trish was up getting breakfast ready, and Ed was sitting at the dining room table. We had French toast, turkey bacon and eggs. I asked if she needed any help, and she said I could get the eggs and bacon ready and set up the table. Ben emerged from downstairs and helped out a bit. Once food was done, we yelled at Amy to get up because food was done, and we were going to eat it all. She finally came out of her room looking disheveled. We were not sure how late she stayed up watching TV. Of course, everyone had to have their gallons of coffee.
We ate our food, chatted about random things and asked Trish what kinds of stuff we could help her with while we were over for the day. We fixed the sink in Amy's room and noticed that the shower was going to need some work someday. Trish was aware but didn't want to think about it at that point. I tried convincing Trish to get the truck packed up to go to the dump, but she didn't want to go that day. I told her, we will next time we have an extra day to get it done. She knew I would hold her to it too.
We did a couple more odds and ends and then Jean arrived to spend time with us for the rest of the day. We spent some time chatting, we played a couple games, we celebrated her birthday since hers was on the 13th. She didn't want anything for her birthday except to spend time with family. We had burgers and brats on the grill, beans, potato salad and chips. We ate it out on her deck and enjoyed the nice day. We had the rest of Amy's birthday cake as dessert and sang happy birthday to Jean. We played a few more games before it was time for her to go back before it got too late.
We noticed her windshield was really gross so we cleaned it up for her so she could see better. We wanted her to be safe on her way back up to Seattle. We gave out hugs and told her we would see her again sometime soon. She thanked us for a good time. After she left, Ben and I got our stuff packed out so we could get ready to head home before it got too late as well. We thanked Trish for a good time and on our way home we decided to pick up a couple of geocaches and do one of the five waypoint Adventure Labs.
The first one we stopped at was near Sky Island. I saw one that had a ton of favorite points. I looked at when it, Itsy Bitsy (GC2644D), was placed, 2010...why haven't we gotten this one?! There wasn't a great place to park, so we parked inside one of the neighborhoods and walked into the woods. I wished we would have seen the trail from the sidewalk in, but it was obscured at the correct angle by sticker bushes. We opted to walk along the pipeline like dorks. We did get to ground zero but in the most difficult way.
I was surprised to see how big the spider was hung up in the trees but what a cool geocache! Ben and I signed the logbook which was inside part of the spider and got several pictures with it. I asked Ben, aren't you glad we stopped for this one? He said, YES! We walked back but this time found the trail we needed. It was easier walking back to the Escape from the cache.
I looked to see if there were any more caches we needed and saw that there was one of the WSGA 20th Anniversary caches and told Ben we could grab that as we do the Adventure Lab. The Adventure Lab took us to Victor Falls, the Sky Stone, a place that talked about the history of the area, we went to the town hall and the actual Bonney Lake, the town's name's sake. We grabbed WSGA20 - PS - Mole Man (GC9XA63) while we were over in that area. The cache was underwhelming but it's one more of the many to add to my passport that I probably won't finish but we will see how far I get.
We drove down the hill and got onto 167 to Hwy 512 to head to I-5. There was no traffic and we got home just before 9 p.m. We relaxed, ate some popcorn and watched a few episodes of the Big Bang Theory until it was bedtime. It was nice to see Ben's family and hang out with them.
Sunday, June 4th
The next day was a chore kinda day. We all went over to Grandma's house to mow the lawn. I got everyone rallied because with a couple weed eaters, a few lawn mowers we would be able to get a lot done with a lot of people. I do enjoy the phrase; "many hands make light work." Grandma's lawn was very high...in some places it came up to my waist while the rest of it was about knee high.
It took us about two hours to mow down all the grass and go over the spots that were really high. Now Grandma's yard won't look as creepy from the road when people drive by it or when her ladies come over on Tuesdays for their quilting get togethers.
I asked Grandma if she would fix Doug's "Mom Dog" hat, and she said she would, which is a big win. Doug had set it aside in the garage and I came across it one day and asked what happened to it. He said it was broken and didn't bother to ask someone to fix it. I took initiative and had Grandma fix it for ten bucks. She said it would be easy to do.
We took the lawn mowers, weed eaters and gasoline containers back over to Mom and Dad's house. I did some random chores at home, we brushed the kitties because they needed it, our house was getting super furry, made dinner, swept the floor, did some laundry, watched the Heat beat the Nuggets in the NBA playoffs and enjoyed the last day before we had to go back to work.
Next Adventure: A Courthouse Wedding
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