Hunter's New 'Do

Before I jump into blogging about our recent trip, let me start with the end.

 This morning while getting ready to leave Aunt Kile and Uncle Chris' house, Hunter helped himself to Chris' electric razor in the bathroom. By the time I realized he wasn't in site, it was too late. My first reaction was shock. Obviously. And then laughter. And more laughter. He was so proud of his new hairdo!

I thought about buzzing it while we were there, but I thought Perry needed to see this first hand, so we waited until we came home. I did the buzzing. I couldn't help but make him into this "old man". 

Again, he loved this look too. But there was no way I was sending him to daycare looking like this! 

 So I buzzed the rest of his head. JP saw him getting his pajamas on and whispered to me "Mom there's a baby in the house!" "No, that's your brother" "Ohhh, not baby Gavin?" *Que the 7 month old we spent the week with*
Anyways here's the many new faces of Hunter.

This is him now on my lap, well, now he's sleeping. After a long weekend, he was in bed by 6:30 tonight. He came upstairs not too long ago and it took me a second to adjust to his new look. Normally he rests his head on my shoulder and I put my cheek on his head when we snuggle...not tonight. He has head pokies! So long beautiful curls!

Emilienne and Colin's Wedding Weekend: Part 3

Emilienne and Colin had a gorgeous wedding the other weekend. The view was perfect. The weather was perfect. And the two of them are so perfect together. I'm so so happy for them!

Here's my little ring bearers. JP was very excited to walk down the isle, but Hunter *made* me carry his pillow for him. I was SO thankful to have my sister-in-law there to help! I'm pretty sure I lost Hunter 3 times before the wedding! I found him just in the nick of time!

During the wedding, two of the bridesmaids and two groomsmen and a few various other people read a few passages. Perry read "The Art of Marriage", which I thought was very fitting for him.

Here's one of their *first* family pictures with their little dog Jalipenna.

After dinner and the speeches, they had a photo booth that I somehow missed. Super bummed about it!

During the reception, my boys ran around for quite some time! JP also had his pouting moments too!

Like typical Hunter fashion, he can always be found throwing something...

But of course, they were also found dancing as well!

Perry and I were also caught dancing...

More times than not though, I was found shaking my booty!

Perry and I also made it a point to dance with the camera man : ) He photographed our wedding last year and my sisters wedding in May. Rarely does the camera man make it into pictures! Kudos for the great shot!

I heard the best gift you can give to the bride and groom at their wedding is to have fun at the reception. I completely agree!

Mission accomplished!

Emilienne and Colin's Wedding Weekend: Part 2

I cannot tell you how excited the boys were all weekend to get their suits on. They've been referring to them as their "dancing clothes." "Mom is this my dancing shirt?" "Mom! Look at my dancing shoes!"

 They were too stinkin' cute!!

 Okay, actually all three of my boys were so handsome! I wish we could have gotten a family picture!

 So for now, here's the boys and I. 

 Emilienne had these super cute signs made to reserve rows for us. I just loved them!

 Goldfish and gummy dinosaurs kept the boys quiet and occupied during the wedding. JP toted the bag of Goldfish around for quite a while!

 All the flowers and decorations were outdoorsy themed. Each centerpiece was a little bit different, but the same at the same time. They turned out great!

 Of course, JP couldn't stay out of the dirt before the ceremony...oh boys...

 Colin's sister-in-law made the cake. I love it! Some day I'll be able to stack a tiered cake... It tasted amazing! Had a raspberry filling in it!

 I snapped a few photos of Emilienne that was playing during the picture slideshow. She was a gorgeous bride!

 And though she forgot the flowers when she walked down the isle, she definitely had them for pictures!

I love when there are "different" things at weddings! Instead of doing a sand ceremony by pouring two different colors of sand together, like Erin and Cameron, or the unity candle like Perry and I, Em and Colin did this hand print mold. Super cute idea!

Emilienne and Colin's Wedding Weekend: Part 1

The long wedding weekend has already come and gone! It flew by! Emilienne and Colin had perfect weather all weekend. It was simply gorgeous out! Festivities started Thursday evening with a barbecue with family and friends. 

 We were lucky to have (Perry's) cousin Dustin make it over from Japan. He was so great with the boys. Here they are on the same team going against his brother John in a water gun fight. The four of them were soaking by the end of it! 

The evening ended around a campfire with Emilienne delegating tasks for the upcoming days. Surprisingly Hunter fell asleep before JP! 

 I baked two dozen cupcakes before the campfire on Thursday then woke up early on Friday to make more and get them frosted. I forgot my frosting recipe at home so I had to wing it from memory, and did pretty good! I was however six cupcakes short on frosting so I had to make more. Kudos to me for color matching! I created a total of 45 cupcakes, but I think some of them were hijacked before the dessert reception after the rehearsal dinner. 

 Em and Colin picked a beautiful backdrop for the ceremony!

 As soon as the flower girl arrived, JP fell in love. She had gorgeous curls that Hunter was fascinated with, but ultimately I think JP won her over.

Hunter- "I like your fingers. Did you paint them?"
Sarah- "Yeah. I've never seen a boy with painted fingernails before. Why are they pink?"
Hunter- "Just cuz I like them."

And that's when I had another "Yep, that's my little boy" moment...

 Aren't they so cute?! Cameron was asked to officiate the wedding and he did an awesome job!

 Aunt Mary put together all of the flower arrangements. She did a fantastic job! This one sat up near the alter. She also put together the bouquets and the centerpieces. What an amazing lady!

And here's one of the few pictures I have of Hunter from the weekend. He was literally everywhere and into everything. He and his new friend Henry once attempted to drive off in a golf cart...

*** Lemon Party ***

I have been waiting and waiting and waiting all summer long to have the deck done so we could host a barbecue. The time *finally* arrived...with 5 days notice. I knew this was going to be probably my only chance at having a lemon party this year.

I don't recall exactly how I came up with the idea. I think I saw a fellow blogger have a watermelon party and then opted for lemons instead. Turns out I'm not the first one to have a lemon party! Who would have thought?! I didn't have time to do everything I wanted to do, but I made it work with what I had. 

Here's a link to my Pinterest board for my "Pucker Up Lemon Party".
Let me tell you about the details!

We had lemon-themed napkins. I made them myself a few days before. Super easy, but VERY time consuming!

I had centerpieces too! I stood in the vase isle for about 20 minutes trying to figure out what I wanted to do. Eventually I decided on this. I knew I wanted to do something so you could see the lemon slices. I love how they turned out. I created 4 of these pretty things. One for the food table, two for the dinner tables, and one for the coffee table.

 The coffee table with it's centerpiece. I last minutely bought the yellow table clothes for the eating tables. As you can see Hunter diving in, we had lemonade (with lemons in it) and iced tea as our beverages.

Our dinner menu:
Grilled Lemon Chicken
Potato Salad (that Perry bought)(Not sure he caught the lemon theme completely)
Salad with the famous Dustin family dressing (which had lemon juice, and I added a little bit of lemon pepper to it)
and Corn on the Cob (seasoned with lemon pepper)
You can't have dinner without dessert: Lemon Bars.
This was my first time making Lemon Bars and they turned out to be a HUGE hit! : )

I've got to give a shout out to my wonderful husband for grilling and preparing the rest of the food while I was at work. He was a trooper!

I was *so* glad my sister-in-law and her parents were able to make it! I just love that family! We were also able to enjoy the company of Perry's brother and Grandma and Grandpa. 

 
After dinner we had fun playing croquet. One of my favorite outdoor games : ) Especially when there is a lot of people!

And kudos to the boys who were rockstars the whole night! (PS Hunter dressed himself...that's all him!)

Remodel of the Deck: Update 5

Let's see where I left off on Update 4...which I didn't realize was over a month ago!

Perry finished putting up the railing around the main deck and then started painting the roof. Just last week, we finished painting the railings and the stairs (once he finished them).

 Originally the stairs came off the "front" side of the deck. Perry moved the rock and concrete slates and then began work on building new stairs. They're now closer to the garage and make the deck the deck feel a lot bigger. 

So in the meantime, the ladder was how we got up and down. Kind of a pain when we barbecued one night! No matter how many times we told them not to, the boys climbed the ladder up and down and scared the geezers out of me every time. 

But lucky for us, the stairs were only down for a few days. I spent my last set of days off painting the stairs. Yay. Once that was done, Perry painted the floor of the deck with the "Restore" paint. It gives it a rough texture, but it looks great! We still have a few spots to paint on the roof, but all the stores here are out of the stuff we need so the finishing touches will have to wait. 

Meanwhile we're having a BBQ on Wednesday to show off and break in the new deck! I'm super excited about it! I think this will be my only attempt at a Lemon Party, so with only a few days notice, here's goes nothing!

Haircuts!

I finally broke down and took the boys to get their hair cut. Aunt Emilienne's wedding is this next weekend so the boys *have to* look cute! Let me start off by saying Hunter hasn't gotten his hair cut since....February? JP lucked out and had Aunt Em cut his when we were in Oregon in May. Hunter could get away with it because of all his curls! JP....not so much. 

Just so you could actually *kind of* see how long his hair was, I attempted to comb out the curls into one big poof....that way someone else wouldn't have to try to comb out the knots. And yes, I do believe we caught him mid-poop : )

And JP was cranky so I attempted to give him a mo-hawk, which he loved!

I was so impressed with these two boys at the salon! They sat still the whole time! I was such a proud momma! Perry bought them a bag of donuts for behaving. When getting Hunter into the car, he placed them on the roof and forgot about them. I drove home, and then back to Wal-Mart, over to Albertsons, got gas and came home. They were still there upon my arrival. Perry was STOKED! Apparently he chased me down the street in an attempt to stop me to retrieve his donuts when I left. : )

 Here's my handsome JP with his shorter 'do. It stands up a lot on top. Nothing new, it did when he was first born too!

 And my Hunter baby. He looks so much older now! 

  By the end of the day, I was super exhausted. This is what happens when I try to lay down to power nap...dog pile on mom!