our wedding: pre-ceremony day one

welcome to the second post in the "our wedding" series! if you missed the first post detailing our wedding venue, you can view that here. while i know everyone wants to see all the "pinterest worthy" pictures and all that jazz, i want to detail (or at least go over) the happenings of the days that we were in fort bragg. if only just for me so i can remember because honestly, those days went by in such a blur! but don't worry, those pretty pictures will come soon enough!

we set out on our journey to fort bragg on the morning of may 4th. our caravan included my family, charles's family, and most of the wedding party. in our car, it was just charles, jc and i. jc has not been known as the best road tripper so i was a little worried about setting out on this four hour drive. but he did great! stayed awake the whole time (unfortunately) but stayed in good spirits. until we got about twenty minutes out from our destination. the last thirty or so minutes of the drive are through a very windy road up and over some mountains. i heard jc whining so i offered him an applesauce squeezy pouch which promptly got thrown up along with some chicken nuggets all over jc, his bear, and his car seat. that was fun. we pulled over and we managed to strip jc down and clean his car seat as well as we could and make it to our destination on time, just slightly puke covered.




we arrived first and were shortly greeted by our guests. everyone unloaded their cars, rooms were assigned and we started getting to it. like i said previously, we did everything ourselves. if i could have afforded to pay for a wedding planner or assistant or anything like that, i would have definitely paid for it because it was STRESSFUL! it took everything in my overthinking, overstressed out head to not freak out on everyone. i was just so thankful that everyone was super (beyond what anyone would expect) helpful and that our wedding day was finally here!

the weather was being very touchy. having our wedding on the northern california coast, i knew wind, rain and cold weather were all very likely. this day the wind was K-RAZY! so crazy i had to use a "K" instead of a "C". it looked like rain wasn't going to be a problem but the wind, oh man, it was bad. let's just say i was happy to partake in some "after the babies go to sleep" festivities.


to help ease my stress while the babies were awake, we took a trip down to the beach. the beach is a short walk from the house through meadows and fields. very pretty. we also had to decide for sure where we were going to have the ceremony. we had only visited the house once (and a year prior) before this day so our memory wasn't the best. but we found a perfect spot.



the boys help set up the tables and chairs that we rented from a local party supply business. i don't know how we made it fit on that deck but we did it. that was a major issue for me, worrying about how all of our tables and chairs were going to fit. when we picked our venue, we figured we'd maybe have 30 or 40 people who would actually want to make the drive out for the wedding. but more people really like us than we thought! we ended up with close to 60 guests so to say i was stressed about this would be an understatement. but it worked out and everyone had a place to sit!

we ended up having a very impromptu rehearsal dinner of round table pizza and sodas. classy, i know. i was also very worried about how the ceremony was going to work. we didn't have anyone to help direct us so we had to just count on everyone knowing when to go, where to stand, etc. over and over again charles had to be my reminder that it is not that big of a deal. yes it is our wedding but if someone doesn't walk fast enough or stand where they are supposed to, it is not the end of the world.

after the babies were put to bed, i enlisted the help of some of my bridesmaids plus one of the groomsmen's super awesome helpful girlfriend to make our bouquets. then there may have been some drinking. but the bouquets turned out great! keeping them super simple definitely made the difference.


now when i say we did everything ourselves, i mean it. we didn't even have a dj. and i kept putting it off so i ended up staying up way too late trying to go through ALL of our music to make our wedding playlist. the problem was that i tried to include charles in this task. we have similar music tastes but charles doesn't really understand what people want to hear or dance to at a wedding. super sad folk music the whole time? not going to cut it. i stayed up til probably two in the morning and still didn't finish it. i had to work on it the next day while i was getting my hair done! but hey, it all worked out in the end.

going to bed that night was not hard because i was exhausted but nothing could prepare me for the next day's events! check back soon for the next part of the series!

sidenote: most, if not all, of these photos were taken by our awesome friend mike. almost all the groomsmen are photographers and were taking pictures the whole time and for that, i am thankful.

the super friends go to tahoe

right before christmas, six adults and four children under the age of 3 embarked on our second group vacay. our first trip was to bodega bay earlier this year. this time, we rented a house in south lake tahoe.

it was a whole lot of people, in a small-ish cabin, with not a lot of snow but it was a whole lot of fun. next time, we'll definitely wait until january or february because we were all definitely disappointed in the snowfall (or lack thereof) this month. luckily, just a few minute drive up the road, we found enough snow to get our sledding on.

jc LOVED sledding. he would grab the sled out of whomever was holding a sled's hands, set it on the ground and sit in it like "alright, let's go!" as soon as he would reach the bottom of the hill, he gave high fives to everyone. with his little mitten hands. adorable!

the adults managed to have some fun adult time after the kiddos went to bed. we realized the first night that all parts of this house did a horrible job of filtering noise so we had to be mindful but it was ok. loaded questions, scattergories, hot tubbing, coffee with baileys and vanilla ice cream taste tests occupied most of our evenings.

i think the kids had a great time hanging out and playing together. we even had a little mini early christmas for the kids. we had turkey, mashed potatoes, and presents. all you need for a mini christmas.

all in all, we had a great time and i can't wait for our next super friend vacation!

i'm still alive!

i just wanted to check in, in case anyone was worried.... no one? ok that's fine. but seriously, i'm not sure why i haven't even logged into blogger for almost an entire week. charles was home for most of the week, i had to finish my final project for my photoshop class and i've had christmas on the brain.

i'm about to go tackle the project that is my hair so that i don't have to do it in the morning. we are going to take engagement pictures tomorrow! finally! now that we've been engaged for more than a year and half! then we've got jc's bestie's first birthday party. super amped for that.

so i'll leave you with a picture of our trip last weekend to go pick out our christmas tree. i'm pretty sure it's going to be our photo for our christmas card too. our plan is to use a photo from tomorrow for our save the dates for the wedding and send both our christmas cards and save the dates together. save on postage. because we are cheap like that.

i hope everyone is having a great december! only fifteen days until christmas!!!

happy thanksgiving!

It is Wednesday night, here in my neck o' the woods and we are smack dab in the middle of our Thanksgiving festivities. We already have one Thanksgiving dinner under our belt and two more tomorrow. Oh yes I plan on eating two Thanksgiving dinners tomorrow. Don't hate.

I just thought I'd pop in real quick and say happy Thanksgiving to everyone! My sister came into town last night and we got to hang out a little today. So of course we had a Glee marathon while JC took a nap. After he woke up, we continued with one more episode. Mostly because I knew this would happen.



That is what I am thankful for his Thanksgiving. Fun with family and friends and my baby's sweet dance moves.

apple hill

Wow I am so late with this post. I feel like I saw everyone else's pumpkin patch pictures three months ago and here I am, in November like "hey! we went to the pumpkin patch too!" But, in my defense, we did go on October 30th so it was kind of a last minute excursion.


Charles and JC

So a big group of us made our way up towards the foothills to visit the Central Valley tradition of going to Apple Hill for our taste of some autumn fun. There are a bunch of apple orchards, farms, vineyards, breweries, bake shops, pumpkin patches, Christmas tree farms all in one area. So much fun, most of it can be done for free or very little money. Beautiful scenery, all kinds of baked goods, crisp mountain air. What more can you ask for? I really want to try and go again before it gets too cold.


JC and his Grandma Stella


left to right: Charles, Brenda, me, JC, my mom, my brother, Jessica, Damian, and Garrett

The whole gang was myself, Charles, JC, my mom, my brother, our family friend Brenda, and our friends Garrett, Jessica and their son Damian. I was a little disappointed at the beginning because JC was kinda cranky, he was terrified of the cows in the petting zoo (they did smell pretty bad) and wanted us to hold him constantly, did not even want to walk at all. And of course, we forgot his stroller. He hates that thing anyway. After lunch (pulled pork sandwiches, hot chili, and cinnamon rolls) he was in a much better mood. We went to another farm, where there was a pumpkin patch and more room to run around. Then we couldn't keep him with us! All he wanted to do was run around, climb up dirt hills, try to eat apples off the ground, crawl under trees in the orchard. He was out of control. But it was a lot of fun chasing him around, I must say. I love my little toddler.







He LOVED the pumpkins. He had to go around and tap each and every one. He also had to carry a little bottle of lotion around with him constantly.


This "running-in-action" shot almost made me pee my pants







And of course, he had to try and get as dirty as possible in his little khaki cords. He's like "who wants to see those stinky cows? these leaves are awesome!"







I can't wait to go again next year and make this a family tradition. I'm a little surprised at how important the idea of traditions have become to me. My family never had a ton of traditions and Charles's family didn't either. But I feel like this is something really important to do for our family and our son. Plus it's super fun to go run around and eat cinnamon rolls that are the size of your head.

wordless(ish) wednesday: happy halloween!

I've been itching to get these photos up. This is my first time opening my laptop in the last couple days. Had to take care of a couple orders of business first, speaking of which check out some of my new sponsors as well as some continued sponsors right over there -------->
I'm so happy to have them!

So, onto the Halloween festivities! This year was extra hard in the costume deciding department for some reason. We just could not decide what we wanted to be. The biggest problem I guess was that Charles was really adamant about all three of us matching. I actually can't wait until next year because I'm sure JC will be able to pick out his own costume and I won't have to worry about it anymore!

So after throwing around ideas for the past month, we finally decided that JC would be a baby monkey, Charles would be the daddy monkey (or, to be exact, a daddy gorilla), and I would be a zookeeper. I think it worked out pretty well.




This was JC's second Halloween but it was really his first time actually being able to trick-or-treat himself. Oh, we took him trick-or-treating last year and we shamelessly ate all his candy. But this year, he was actually able to walk up to the doors and hold his little bucket. It was adorable. He really started to understand how it worked at the last few houses we visited. Since Halloween, if you just say the word "Halloween" he runs over and points at his pumpkin bucket with candy in it. Speaking of which, I really should eat all his candy hide that sucker.




We only visited a few houses; I'd blame JC but I didn't think very much about walking around in boots with heels while trying to hold squirmy little monkey. My dogs were achin'. It was ok though because I really like to see all the other kids come up and hand out candy. We have this big inflatable cemetery scene that we have on our front yard so we get ALL the trick-or-treaters. We seriously went through about 9 bags of candy. We ran out and had to turn kids away while my mom ran out for an emergency candy run. Thanks mom! Next year, I definitely need to just get like 5 Costco sized bags and call it a day. Charles and I cannot just hand out one piece per kid, we like to give handfuls.

I'm super excited for next year's Halloween! JC was pretty scared of certain elements of Halloween this year (my brother wore a Bill Clinton mask and I think he may have scared him into being a Republican), but hopefully I'll be able to better communicate to him next year that it's all pretend and just for fun.

And just because I didn't have a blog this time last year, here's our costumes from last Halloween.




Where's Waldo family! Last year was so easy. My costume and Charles's costume were store bought. I knit JC's sweater and hat. Surprisingly, they don't sell fake baby glasses? So we bought some sunglasses and just popped the lenses out.

I love the look on his face, like "Sigh, these are my parents." Sorry JC, you never stood a chance.




This is how we rolled trick-or-treating. No shame in our game.




And one last one from this year. I cannot get enough of that sweet baby face.

{Linking up with The Paper Mama,a little king and i, and then, she snapped, Supermom, Live & Love Outloud, 5 Minutes for Mom, jenni from the blog and Baby Baby Lemon. Whew, that's a lot of linking up.}

week in iphone pics, w.23

I pretty much sucked at taking pictures this week. I've been slowly but surely trying to catch up after being gone last weekend so taking pictures hasn't been a huge priority. It's crazy how much two days can throw off your whole sha-bang. But we did manage to have some fun this week.

This week included my twenty-sixth birthday, Charles and I's eleven year anniversary, a food truck meet up just down the street from my house, boot shopping for me, coat shopping for the little guy and lots o' family time.

There is a very real possibility that I will get a new iPhone 4S tomorrow (or very shortly thereafter, since I'm pretty sure I'll have to be put on a waiting list). I cannot even explain how excited I am about this. I have a lowly 3G (S? I don't even know) so it would be a huge step up. Anyone get one yet? Better yet, anyone get one on Sprint? I am SO tired of AT&T, it's not even funny. I love my phone but I can't make a phone call to save my life. Talk to me about it.

Here's our pictures from the week!

Linking up with a good life and life rearranged!

week in iphone pics, w.17

I sucked at taking pictures this week. My bro is in town and when my family is in town, I get a little neglectful with my blog. So I'm doing it a little different and made my lazy grid with the pictures that I did take. I got to use some of my new found Photoshop skillz today! I wasn't joking when I said I didn't know diddly squat about Photoshop. I seriously only knew how to crop an image, add text, adjust levels and resize an image. I had no clue how to make a collage. I always use Picasa but it doesn't turn out perfect. Now I can use Photoshop and make my shtuff look all fancy! Yay for school!





JC grubbin on some pizza - giving Uncle David a big ol' welcome hug - cruisin' Goodwill, I didn't find anything but Uncle David spent like $12, which is like $200 in Goodwill terms - we found this AWESOME picture at Goodwill, I love how angry the littlest kid is - JC practicing his hand stand abilities - bathtime - I went to a comic store for the first time with my bro - we had some fun at a local music store, JC carried around those drumsticks the whole time - slappin' da bass! - an awesome food truck made a special visit to the 'burbs so we got to partake in some delicious mini burgers - JC doesn't care, he will show you his belly any and everywhere - Charles and JC worked on their construction skills



Don't forget the MyMemories Digital Scrapbook Software Giveaway ends on Tuesday night! Very low entries still!
{Linking up with a good life and life rearranged.}

wordless(ish) wednesday: gilroy garlic festival

Over the weekend we drove two-and-a-half hours (eeek) to visit the Gilroy Garlic Festival. I've always wanted to go but never had the chance. So as soon as I saw it mentioned over two months ago, I made sure I entered it in my calendar so I wouldn't forget. It was the perfect weekend because my mom came along and we even convinced our besties to come along too.

It was kinda far, really hot (I was a sweaty mess, but so was everyone else so I didn't feel as bad) and FULL of people but the food was scrumtrelecent (if you haven't noticed, I like to reference SNL, like, a lot). I'm talking corn dogs with garlic infused batter, beer battered garlic fries, garlic pesto pasta, garlic tri-tip sandwiches, and that was just what Charles and I ate. It was so scrumtrelecent that we didn't even get pictures of any of it before we devoured it. And we even got to try garlic ice cream (actually, everyone else did but I was too chicken). The babies had a fun time being together despite the drive and the heat. By the time we left, JC was definitely ready to head home but he was in a good mood nonetheless.

One more thing off my summer bucket list!



















Linking up with The Paper Mama.

week in iphone pics, w.11

Last week went by so fast! I feel like we did a million things but I also felt like I didn't do much of anything. If that makes sense. Add on top of that, my mom and my brother came up to visit for the weekend. I've barely touched my phone or the computer for the last four days. And it was awesome. But I have a whole slough of posts for the week including our trip to the garlic festival and JC's fourteen month post!!! I can't believe he's already another month older! Ok, a little late, but here is our week in iPhone pictures!



Monday, we had a grown up night at the state fair. I'm not sure why, but the ground in front of a food vendor's booth was sticky. Like, CRAZY sticky. The sign was definitely necessary. Of course there's the fair rides. You can see the Zipper in this shot; that ride has become our fair staple. Although, after this last time, I'm not sure I will ever willingly go on that ride again. And I just thought that food vendor would look cool "instagrammed". And it does.



Tuesday, I got a picture of my awesome new tint job on my ride. It helps tremendously with the heat, which I'm sure JC appreciates. JC had to have a squeezy pouch break on our way to pick up Charles for our picnic lunch. Do you see this crazy sandwich? It was out-of-control how delicious it was. Great, now I want a sandwich. We hung out by the pond for a bit before we had to drop Charles back off at work. And JC was a great helper in the kitchen while I was making dinner, which was (as you can see) spaghetti.



Wednesday, JC and I hit up our grocery store circuit. We checked out some peppers and JC insisted on holding the apple juice. After we hit up Trader Joe's, JC had to try the squeezy pouches that we got there. He's kind of a squeezy pouch addict.



Thursday, JC spent most of the day pushing that train back and forth. He was pretty much on a loop about twenty times. After Charles got home, I managed to sneak away for a dinner date with an former co-worker of mine. That is a Patron pomegranate margarita from Chili's. It was amazing.



Friday, we went out to lunch at one of our favorite Mexican spots. JC munched on some cheerios while we enjoyed our chips and salsa. My mom and brother came into town this day. When Charles got home from work, we enjoyed little serenade. And JC closed out the night by playing with a cat toy. And having the time of his life.

Linking up with a good life and life rearranged.

I feel like I have so much to do this week! I have like three posts that I need to write, my etsy shop is still in limbo and I need to keep up with everything at the house too. Hmmm, if only I didn't need to sleep.