Holiday Tea 2010

Today I went to Holiday Tea with my BFF Shelley. I can't even say how delightful it was to spend a "Ladies" day with her. We did some holiday shopping and then headed over to make our reservation.

Shelley's rule is that you should always buy yourself a Christmas and Birthday Gift. I love and embrace this! It wasn't the nicest day, but we shared an umbrella and laughed as we walked down the wet streets of downtown.

I love tea and the Heathman's Holiday tea is not to be missed! The staff is SO friendly, everyone offers to take your photo and help you with your coat and just be so nice. All the ladies are dressed fabulously and the little girls are SO adorable. I saw one today who brought her teddy bear and one wearing a pill box hat with a hot pink netting for a viel. Very cute and chic for a five year old!

Thank You to my fabulous friend Shelley for being my date today- it was so lovely and I hope we can do it again next year! It is a wonderful way to start the holiday season, sharing a memorable afternoon with a wonderful friend!

Side note: I also finally had my camera on hand for a great shot of the Arlene Schnitzer Concern Hall. I got a good night time shot during the She + Him concert, but I love the day time one as well. I think this would be fantastic in B&W. I think I'll try messing with it tomorrow.

Random Crafts!

A while ago, I went to Albertsons for some groceries and I walked by a guy and his two kids selling lavender from their farm. I bought a bunch because it smelled SO good. I love the smell of lavender. I had no idea what I was going to do with it, but I bought it any way.

Fast forward a few days when I decided to dry it and put it in the closet for a few more weeks.

Fast forward to two weeks ago when I'm in the middle of cleaning out the closet and find the massive bunch of dried lavender...

What am I going to do with this?!?

So I found some scraps and made some little sachets! They ended up being the perfect little additions to some Christmas Presents (which I've already gifted, so no surprise was ruined)... I even managed to keep one for myself. YAY!
I even got to practice my hand stiching on the ribbon additions.

Deck the Halls...

This is our super awesome new ornament for the year. Steven found this at a small Christmas shop at the beach on our anniversary trip. We had to have it. Steven LOVES his OSU hoodies and this is a hand blown glass OS hoodie! It totally completed our tree this year. I can't wait to put it up again next year.

Speaking of hoodies, Steven got an award at work this week. Part of this award was that members of his group all got black hoodies because that is what he wears all the time. Now they all have matching black hoodies for solidarity. Awesome!

Black Friday AWESOME!

One of my favorite days of the whole year has to be Black Friday. While I enjoyed shopping this year and getting amazing deals on stuff for everyone on my list... What was really awesome was what we did after I got home from shopping:
Steven and I cooked our second turkey and invited Darren over for a second Thanksgiving turkey dinner- full of leftovers. Then we enjoyed our Second Comedy Movie Marathon! Our first marathon was in honor of mine and Darren's birthday's. We watched a lot of super funny movies and ate dinner at a local pub.

This time we did an ode to Bill Murray. At least, that is what it ended up being: Ghostbusters, Groundhog Day, Caddyshack and Ghostbusters 2. I couldn't believe that I got up at 5, was out the door by 5:30 and shopping by 6. Then I came home, ate another full dinner and watched four movies before finally passing out around 9 or so. I call that a great day!

Halloween Pumpkins!

Check out these amazing pumpkins! Mine is the one on the right with a tooth! Steven did the other two. We loved picking these out of the garden and then carving them. We're pretty impressed that we got such a good photo. Thank you super awesome camera. That's gotta be one of our best purchases of 2010!

Civil War 2010

All year we've been enjoying watching the Beaver Games at Darren's house with Pizza and other yummies. We thought we'd send the year out with a bang and do a Champagne Brunch!

We had yummy amazing waffles, piled high with nutella, mini chocolate chips, heath pieces and fresh whipped cream, berry puree for bellinis, fruit salad, scrambled eggs, bacon and lots of laughs.

I wish I could say the game went better, but at least we had good company, champagne and next year to make us feel better.

Here's hoping for a great Beaver Season in 2011!

Reunion Photos

Photos from our first reunion for this side of the family:

I wish I had taken photos of all the kids in our pumpkin patch, but I only got Colin and Brooke. They are so cute. I wish they'd smiled in the one I got of the two of them. I'll see about posting that later.
I love this sign. I painted it quite a while ago and it still looks great. I don't think we got too much out of the garden this year. The weather was horrible!
When he will sit still and smile for me, I can get some good pictures of him! But usually he's too busy being a little boy. A rare moment- look at that little angel.
The other little angel and "Gigi"... I love this one.Finally- Gigi takes a ride! Look at that smile, style and sass! I love her!!

2010 Christmas Card Crafting...

My Mom and I decided to make our own Christmas Cards again this year. Last year we took a little break and did separate things, but we're back this year with two new designs. I am so excited at how they came out. The pity is that you can't really see the details from here:The "Santa" is adorable, he's got some glitter on the top of his hat and we did two different colors to go with the different color backgrounds. The "Angel" is embossed in either Silver, Gold, Red or Green depending on the background color. I'm loving the angel stamp so much! But, since we only (only!) did 100- 50 for me and 50 for her- I have to fill in with some other things to meet my list requirements...

So I found some adorable photo cards and I printed four different photos. Here are my two favorites:
Steven and I at our second wedding from this year. Antique color edit by me and my Mac.
Steven and I at the third wedding this year- The Berny-Lang's know how to party! B&W edit by me and my Mac as well.

I'm so ahead of the game that I think I'll be able to print labels too, so addressing and putting cards together should be a snap! Go me!

Midnight Blogging. Woo!

I ate too much chocolate (is there such a thing?), too late in the evening and now I cannot sleep. So I will attempt some midnight blogging.

First, a word about my blogging absence:
Our internet provider lured us with "wicked" speedy internet advertising then when we proceeded to use the internet constantly during working hours (Steven) and again in the evening (Wii Netflix Instant Queue streaming) they decided that we used too much and cut our "wicked" speed. So I cannot post photos while Steven is working. Which is the time that is convenient for me to blog. Hence, the midnight blog and probable lack of photos. For now at least.

Onward to the updates:

We spent Labor Day in Astoria doing lovely Astoria things like visiting the Astor Column and the Farmers Market and walking on the beach, and seeing CHRIS AND MICHELLE GET MARRIED.

Chris and Michelle tied the knot in one of the most lovely weddings I've been to in a long time. The church was absolutely stunning and the ceremony was very touching. Then the reception totally kicked some major butt. It was a pretty epic reception. In fact, I need to email Chris for the playlist they used, because it was legendary. I danced all night (and most of the night in my shoes- go me!) and Steven even got out on the dance floor! We had a lot of fun getting to see old college friends that have moved away and catching up with them. We stayed up way too late and got up early the next morning to help clean up, which we were happy to help out with. As a thank you Michelle's Dad passed on a bottle of champagne- YUMMY!

After that amazing weekend we had some downtime to practice canning. We went out to my parents house and Steven made his now famous roasted red pepper sauce and we got to can 6 pints of it. We'll be going back to do some more soon!! It was a total family affair as I helped prep, Steven cooked, Mom attended to the jars and Dad worked the pressure cooker. We had a lot of fun and I can't wait to try out some other things. I love seeing home canned goods in my pantry. It makes me feel better about what I'm eating because I know what we put in there.

After that we had a second Family Reunion at my parent's house. Last year we had a large party for my Dad's side of the family for Grandma's 100th birthday. This year we decided to host a smaller gathering for my Mom's side of the family, for no particular reason other than it was a heck of a lot of fun! I couldn't have asked for it to go smoother in terms of preparation and execution. Everyone came and camped out and we had a bon fire and roasted marshmallows and ate and ate and ate. I came home with an extra couple of pounds for sure.

Mom, Shelly and I sponsored the "Friday" night meal- a Mexican Fiesta. While Steven gets all of the credit for cooking a top notch meal, I have to say that it was, in fact, my idea. Although, I did kind of steal it from Tara's grad party. Bygones. Suffice to say that we had a massive taco/nacho/fajita bar with choices of marinated flank steak, shredded rotisserie chicken (done on Dad's BBQ!) and grilled shrimp plus ALL of the fixings. On Saturday Mike and Shannon smoked an entire pig for pulled pork sandwiches. I have never seen the pulled pork before it gets pulled. There is no work at all, if you do it right, it just falls right off. It was so tender and yummy. Pretty sure that Steven is excited about getting a smoker now. Just wait. If it comes out half as good as that, it will be money well spent. And because its Steven, it will probably be even more awesome.

After four days of partying and living it up at the reunion we came home exhausted. I spent quite a bit of time recovering from lost sleep and trying to shed some of my "I had a brownie for breakfast because we are camping!" weight. This last weekend we played low key and I finally feel rested up. Which is good because I told Shelly I would recover her dining room chairs as part of her Christmas gift. I'm trying to remain calm and trust in my sewing skills. I recruited Mom to help out. We picked out some amazing fabric for the chairs and curtains. I'm using her as a curtain guinea pig. Curtains are my next thing that I want to get good at making. We also tried a new fabric store- The Mill End. I had never been there, but we met THE MOST HELPFUL EMPLOYEE EVER. He seriously chatted us up for like an hour detailing to me how exactly to sew these slipcovers. So awesome.

In terms of sewing and crafting, there are Christmas presents to finish up, more babies on the way and all of Sister's new projects. I shouldn't be bored any time in the near future.

I'm looking forward to my favorite fall things- Picking pumpkins at Mom's and maybe trying some Apple Picking! Of course, I've already decorated for fall in here and it screams halloween. I got some lovely orange roses at the store today and they look great on my table. I made myself my first set of napkins on the serger- Serged Rolled Hem! Go me! The fabric is adorable and I have some left for cocktail napkins and also I have an apron half finished. I love that I get to make something for me. Finally. :)

Beyond the orange in the house there is always rooting for orange-it can't be said enough- Go Beavs!

More Baby Gifts/ New Serger...

Steven was kind enough to purchase a Serger for me for my Birthday. It is pretty amazing. I was a little nervous to use it because it is very different from a regular sewing machine and it can be difficult to operate if you aren't used to using one. Well I'm proud to say that I got it threaded and made three receiving blankets in about an hour. It took me a lot longer to watch the videos on my laptop and thread the machine than it did to actually make the blankets. But it was really good practice for me and I'm really excited to get to know my new machine. It is a great thing to use for garmets and upholstery and I'm most excited to make drapes and curtains.But the baby gifts will be put to good use for Darrel and Carrie who just had a little baby girl Payton:I made three large receiving blankets, two burp cloths and a "Baby's First Blanket" for little Payton. They will be mailed back east soon.

Congratulations to the Thorson Family on their newest additon!

Julie's Birthday!

Our good friends Shelley and Kevin were so kind and took us out for dinner on my Birthday this year. We went to Fennoil in the Pearl and it was SO yummy.

She weighed down my birthday present so that I wouldn't know what it was. The pink one smells amazing, and it is called Celebrate Love Body Wash. The green one hasn't been opened yet, but it is Celebrate Life. Very cute!

This is my best shot of the night! This wine was so tasty and the most unique color I've ever seen. I love this photo so much:A fantastic group shot of us:I love when they do a special dessert at a restaurant. This one was over the top. The coconut sorbet was to die for.I love that I always get a good photo of these two together. I can't wait to scrapbook this for Shelley. It was an amazing night with good food, good times and lots of laughter. It was a very memorable Birthday, Thank You SO much!

Vacation:: Day 4

For our fourth day of vacation we asked our friends Melissa and Ryan if they wanted to go on a hike with us. I warned them that I am a big wuss and hiking usually causes me to not be able to breathe so well and I have to go slow and stop a lot an am generally a pain in the butt. But they still agreed to go with us and so we headed out on Thursday at about 10:30. We went straight to Vista House and enjoyed a beautiful sunny day with almost no wind at all! It was really a perfect day other than a little bit of fog in the distance.

Then we went up to the falls and were amazed to find a parking spot. We were flabbergasted at how many people were there on a weekday lunchtime. It was pretty crowded at the base of the falls.

After much wheezing and finally agreeing that we should let me set the pace, I lead the group to the top. Everyone was happy to make it, but especially me!

Steven took this photo of me on my new iPhone. I'm so happy here! It is the second time that I've hiked to the top. It is still a most spectacular view. I love this rock- last time Steven and I had our picnic here when we got to the top. This time all I had was water and goldfish snacks, but they were still awesome.

Here is Steven taking a break from snapping gorgeous photos and having a snack.

Afterwards, we stopped at The Viewpoint Inn on our way back into town. Melissa wanted to see the Twilight place where they filmed. It is so lovely there. The sun was shining and it was just beautiful. After we got some pictures we decided to go to Bella Cupcake in Gresham, which has Red Velvet cupcakes on Thursdays. On the way we were headed down Stark Street and I looked up from my iPhone to see a kid. All of a sudden he throws down his bike, rips off his shirt and by now the car has passed him, so I turn around and he pulls back his arm and lets a punch land on the boy who has been throwing rocks at his back. It was the most amazing slow motion punch I have ever seen. He just pulled it back and let it fly. The other kid (on the receiving end) literally fell backwards into another buddy. It was most epic.

At which point Ryan says "Welcome to Gresham".

It was all very funny, we were in histerics in the car.

After cupcakes we headed over to Foster Burger where we were going to eat an early supper, but they didn't open until 5. We had an hour and a half to kill and so we went to HUB/Hopworks and had beer samplers and an amazing pretzel appetizer with stout mustard. Amazing.

After beers we finally did get to Foster Burger and here are the guys enjoying the Foster Road Pile Up. It was an awesome burger place and I highly recomend it. They have the place plastered with vintage and new concert posters. It was really pretty cool.After this it was all we could do to get ourselves back home. It would be really hard to top such a great day with anything, so Friday we spent relaxing and getting ready for the weekend.

A big thanks to Mel and Ryan for spending pretty much an entire day with us! We had so much fun, we have to do it again sometime soon. I feel ready to try another hike, though maybe not the one that Ryan has in mind... sorry Ryan!

Vacation:: Day 2 and 3

For our second day we went North instead of West, up to Mt. St. Helens. It was a great little road trip. However, we were both a little disappointed that we got about 10 minutes of "clear" mountain viewing and the rest was either partially or fully obscured by fog. This made us really sad, but probably not as sad at the people who didn't bother to show up until the afternoon and didn't get to see the mountain at all.

We took our time wandering around the Johnston Ridge Memorial and read up on all the stories of the day. We went into the 'movie' and were not really impressed with the forced emotion. We laughed at the end when, in dramatic fashion, the curtain rose to supposedly show the mountain as it is today... which was supposed to be juxtaposed with the final image of the movie- Mt. St. Helens, pre-eruption. However, when the curtain lifted, it was pure fog bank. Someone joked on the way out that they should have a large photo for days like that.

Back in the parking lot we were noting all the state license plates represented. We saw a family from CA walk out of their car and layer up in sweatshirts and pants. We saw a family from TX crawl out of the car wearing Twilight gear from Forks WA and various others from Vancouver BC, UT, NV, OR, WA and, most suprisingly, ME!

After making it home before rush hour traffic, I bought tickets for She and Him when they come to town. Melissa and I are going to make it an EPIC Ladies Night Out. I can't wait. I'm sooooo happy to see Zooey Deschanel LIVE!

Our Day 3 was very laid back. I was able to have lunch with Shelley G and get a few errands run in the morning. Then I was joking to Steven that we needed to take something out to my parent's house and he said "Now or Someother Time?"... So we decided on 'now'. We packed up our planned pesto dinner and made it for 4 instead of just 2. Delicious!! We were even able to stay for longer than usual because we had no reason to rush home. It was a great spontaneous trip.

Vacation:: Day 1

For our first full day of vacation we went to Cannon Beach for the day. This is growing into our yearly tradition. We do a picnic at Hug Point and spend time doing our favorite beach things. We take long walks in the sand, take photos of our favorite large rock and wander in and out of shops looking for treasures. Our day was nothing short of awesome. We walked ourselves silly and loved every minute of it. We weren't even that disappointed that it was raining almost all day.

I snapped this pic with my iPhone:
I love how this commemorates both our special day and a special day in 8/9/10. I can't wait to frame this.

We ended up at JP's for dinner and it was delicious, as usual:I can't stop thinking about that chicken cordon bleu. Luckily, we found a recipe for it while we were in a coffee shop looking at books from the area! Steven's promised to make it for me sometime soon. Another great way to hang on to the wonderful feeling of being on vacation.

More aprons!

The latest in apron fashions!Yes... I did do a "U of O" apron, but it is a gift for a U of O grad! So that makes it "ok". I'm still a Beaver at heart.

All of these are actually gifts for people getting married this summer. I have yet to make a apron for me to keep! Soon... Soon...

A little bit of vacation prep....

So, as I'm sitting here on the floor of the apartment, Steven is busy working on our "Annual Anniversary Playlist"...

We like to incorporate a few traditions to our Anniversary celebration each year and this is one that is both fun and interesting. We have some songs that always make it on the list like:

• Into the Mystic- Our first dance song.
• Brighter Than Sunshine- a mutual favorite that Keith sings background vocals on.
• Change of Heart- Gotta love Petty!
• Romeo and Juliette- A classic for us.

This year we have some additions that come from places that other people might find unlikely. For example:

• Kiss on my list- Hall and Oates, This is from a totally fun scene in "She's Outta My League", which we both find hilarous and have to sing along to.
• Several Glee tracks, 'Its My Life/Confessions and Don't Stop Believing'- We LOVE this show so much and it is so much fun to sing along in the car and pretend that we are amazing vocalists.
• The Theme from Duck Tails- Because we bought it on DVD and watched it this year.
• The Theme from Firefly- Also watched this year and LOVED it.
• Here with You- The theme from "Roswell" and totally up Julie's alley!
• The Theme from Mario Brothers- Because Steven literally played for an hour each day this spring on the Wii. Hilarious.
  

Yesterday I made brownies and muffins to prep for Steven having the entire week off. Then this morning I made cookies and slaw for our picnic tomorrow. We will not be missing out on any food, that is for sure. We're always looking forward to time off, but this year our "Road Trip" vacation is going to be really special. Keep on the lookout for some awesome photos.

Ethan Photos!

I snapped some more photos of Ethan last week. He's turning out to be quite the little test subject. I really love this age. He's just starting to make some adorable faces and I've captured a few priceless images. I really love trying my hand at editing now as well. He was simply adorable and I love him to bits."Now, here's what is going on today"

"Oh My God."

I LOVE this B&W of his face. This quilt was made by his great grandma.

The blue of his eyes and the quilt make this antique setting beautiful.

The Sturges Wedding

We went to the Sturges wedding two weekends ago. The Bride is a big baker, so I made her a special apron for her big day. I was really happy with the "C", which was a new thing I was trying out. I am excited to put this to use on another apron I'm working on. Steven, Larry and the Groom. Brian is one of Steven's oldest friends.
The entire wedding was "Carnival" themed, and the candy buffet was too cute. She also had home made jams and lemon curd! Yeah, I snagged three lemon curds- enough for a lemon meringue pie! (I got mine, Steven's and Larry's). She also made her own three tier cake and the buttercream was divine.
THEY ALSO HAD A COTTON CANDY MACHINE. BEST.WEDDING.EVER.
Her cake topper was obviously hand made and so cute. Her dress was reflected by the little wooden bride- it was very original!
The sun was super hot out, but we still got some shade. Me and my sweetie in the sunshine.
Me and Tara before the dancing (slow dancing only- they were afraid that barn floor might cave!) and toasts.
Best of Luck to the newlyweds Brian and Carrie!

Short Update...

• So as you can see, I've finally got the "uploading photos" back down to a science. Only problem is that it still takes a lot of time to get all the photos uploaded. But at least you can see our awesome photos again!
• Mr. and Mrs. next door are really starting to annoy us. The dogs and snoring were just the start. Now they're starting to live outside the confines of their apartment. They do this by keeping a ridiculous and useless metal cage thing on their porch. Also, they put out a kiddie pool for their pets to cool off in. In the middle of the common area. Their porch looks like a white trash trailer park. Thankfully we don't have anything invested in the property value of our place. I also ran into Mr. next door at Five Guys Burgers right before the fourth weekend. Marlene was with me and it took me a while to realize that he was the SNORER!
  
• We have a wedding coming up in two weeks, so I've been working on an apron for the bride. Also got the finishing touches on another apron for our September wedding. Then there is the Fourth of July sale fabric that I got for a steal that is going to be another apron and a set of cocktail napkins. I'm very excited to start those projects.
• Last week on Friday I went with my parents to pick up my second cousin from the airport. He just returned from his third tour of Iraq and my parents were storing his car. It was great to be able to give him a happy welcome home!
  
• Today I've spent the morning blogging and organizing magazines and other office projects that I was behind on...Now I think I'll head down to the pool. Its a beautiful day and I've got reading to do.
  

Fourth of July Weekend- Sunday

We started the day on Sunday by making our annual stop at KFC for some fried chicken to take to the Potluck up at Wildwood. It was a really gray day and the temperature up there is always at least 10 degrees cooler than in town, so it was gray and cold! Therefore, not too many photos from up there- we mostly just stood around the fire and tried to keep warm... and ate! Also- there was a rousing game of UNO for a while.

Steven and I went on a small walk to see the fish viewing window:
This is kind of a cool photo because you can see under the water through the window!

Then we went back to the house and relaxed, ate some more and watched TV. Steven worked on the internet at the house and we got ready for fireworks! Steven always gets me my required "sparklers" for the beggining of the show. This year he also got the "Champagne poppers" and so I am doing sparklers and Tara is simultaneously popping a popper. We're dorks. Look at our faces! LOL!

These are some more dorky pictures of me and my sparklers, but I posted them because we finally have a camera that can do the "double exposure" or what ever it is that gets the cool glow from the fireworks. If I had any idea of how cool these pics could be I'd have tried some more stuff. Next year we'll know what to do!After the kids play with the sparklers, Steven gets to work on our little show! I tried taking good pictures, but the smoke kind of keeps them from being awesome. We'll have to try to find a big show over some water next year to get some really good shots.His finale was pretty awesome though. He's a great firework show guy! Thanks for putting it on for us Steven! He's a real keeper. :)