I have recently returned from another trip to Seattle with the husband to visit my sissy, her husband and little Maya! My sister’s kid is about 6 months old now and I understand now what it means when people say “It takes a village to raise a child.” It was certainly good practice for the future little beer and baking kiddies. While it’s a lot of work, you kinda miss that busy happy energy after you aren’t around it anymore. I really have an amazing family.

We arrived on Thursday evening and went straight back to my sister’s house for some downtime. The following day we stayed home with Maya for most of the day before making it to our first beer stop of the evening. We started with Chuck’s Hop Shop in Greenwood which is the type of bottle shop I wish we had here in So Cal. It’s a community spot that welcomes puppies and babies with open arms. The atmosphere is so laid-back and the beer selection is pretty damn incredible.

Afterwards we regrouped with my sister and went to Populuxe Brewing, which is a brewery in Ballard that I have been wanting to visit for some time now. I loved the outside of the space with its cute blue house-like building that was really aesthetically pleasing. It was pretty small inside with limited seating options that expanded to an outside area equipt with wooden benches and a fire pit. I had the saison which was decent and I really liked my sister’s cider. This little brewery shows lots of character and promise, I hope to be back soon.

The next stop was Stoup Brewing which was right around the corner from Populuxe. We spent the remainder of the night there sampling beers and enjoying the evening. My personal favorites were the porter and the hef and I know Sean really enjoyed their bitter. I was so impressed with Stoup and loved their concept so much I even bought a sweater.

The following day we had a road trip out to Port Townsend to stay for a few days which I will go into detail about in part 2! Cheers!