Letter #29 from Washington

This letter comes from Katie in Washington state (not to be confused with Washington,DC as she says many people do).She lives in the state capital with her husband and works in transportation.Olympia is a slow paced city of about 130,00o inhabitants and a "cute little downtown".She says there are many stores and retaurants to visit but it isn't such a busy city that you can't find parking,it's just right.She also said that Puget Sound dips into her town and that it's a great place to go sea kayaking with beautiful views of Mt. Ranier and the Cascades,which are also called Olympic Pennisula Mountains.On one side she has the mountains and ocean and on the other side is the high desert.

Her city is 1 hour south of Seattle (it's one of my must visit cities) and 2 hours north of Portland.So she seems to live in an excellent location.Her and her husband like to visit the city for shopping and to try new restuarants.She mentions her list of fave food is Indian (my fave,too),Thai,Japanese and all kinds of pizza. :)

Katie hasn't always lived in Washington,as a child her father moved around due to his job so she has lived in quite a few states.One of the things she mentioned which we thought was so cool,was that her memories of their vacations were not vacations at all,they were just moves to new locations.For example,they passed the Grand Canyon and Mount Rushmore on their way to their new house.She talks about how her parents made scary moves for a kid so much fun and I thought that was just fantastic!Can you imagine a move feeling like a vacation?I wish our moves felt like that!She has never lived in any place more than 3.5 years and she loves that because she loves exploring new places and meeting new people.Oh,she also mentioned that she drove a semi and lived in it for one year....talk about an exciting life!

One of the most interesting places she has lived in was Japan (one of our fave countries),where she taught English for 2 years.She had a Japanese boyfriend so she was able to do more things since that was his home.She got to go to a sumo wrestling event,which she thought was really exciting.She also mentioned an awkward event when an older woman invited her to dinner and the meal arrived....whole fish on sticks (cooked), but as she said,not many people here in the U.S. eat heads of animals so she didn't know what to do.Should she eat the entire head...eyes,teeth,etc?She decided to bite off the head so as not to offend her host and it turned out to be the best fish she ever ate!I think we all would consider Katie to be quite brave here. :)

Katie's hobbies include making art dolls with paperclay (I really need to see what this is,it sounds interesting) and is part of a quilt club.She also enjoys reading and has given us these book recommendations:"Dr. Zhivago", "West with the Night",and "Weep Not for Me,Dear Mother".

Below is Katie's lovely letter.We forgot to include the cute Japanese stickers she included that we loved!Thanks Katie so much for the letter and stickers!