Weekly Roundup

This weekend brought on a terrible, terrible tragedy.  But, for now, I’m going to skip talking about it. 

On a more chipper note, Peanut had a first semi-successful overnight trip.  She woke up and cried about 3 times last night but did fall back asleep.

She also absolutely loved being at the beach with her family.  As did we.


(PS- My brother-in-law caught a lobster (he goes out diving for them).  It was almost as big as the baby.)

And a very happy birthday to my bestie, Kerry!

Let’s see what you may want to catch up on…

I finally got around to writing a little about our wedding day.  Read it here and here.

Peanut has enough food to last a lifetime.  No kidding.

From Wordless Wednesday,  here are cats in a sink.  I can’t stop laughing. [A Recipe for Sanity]



I’ve been away doing something or another for my company’s bi-annual meeting most of last week.  You must read Gina’s post about the raft competition and other madness we had to endure. [Running to the Kitchen: Brownstone adventure park]

Have you been catching up on everyone’s 7 Links?  Did you happen to see this one?

How was your weekend?

FF - lessons from a 6 month old

Don’t you want to see the world through their eyes?  Because more days than not, I do.

I love the way everything is so new and amazing to Peanut, so here are some lessons I’ve learned from my 6 months old.

 

<center><a href="http://www.livinglikethekings.com/search/label/Friday%20Five"> <img src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5105/5671375328_fa84c29f3f_m.jpg" /> </a></center>

 

1.  Wake up and take on each day with a smile. 

 

 

2.  Know what you want and reach for it with all of your might.

 

 

3.  Laugh.  A lot.

 

 

4.  Explore new things with all of your senses.

 

 

5.  Have fun with everything you do.

 

 

Got a Friday Five?  Link up! (Please put the link to your post, not the blog).

How I became the queen

Do you love my corny title?

Catch up on part one of our Wedding day here.

And a very happy anniversary to the love of my life.

Now back to the story.

Jon and I still hadn’t seen each other, and after getting dressed and taking some pictures, the girls and I had some celebratory champagne (you know, just to take the edge off).


(don’t worry, the little girl was drinking water)

Once outside, we saw the limo pull up and the girls helped me get in.

That limo, peeps, smelled disgusting.  I have no idea what had gone on the night before but I could guess.  It smelled like puke.

The girls and I all held our breath the best we could and made the trip to the Church.



Fun fact for ya - the air conditioning at the Church was broken.  And they only had a couple of fans set up.  Oh, and it was a sweltering 90+ degrees.  To say that we were all sweating would be an understatement.

Nevertheless, we made it down the isle.

My dad held me tight as we walked down and we whispered jokes to one another to keep each other from crying.



Jon waited nervously (I’m guessing by the way he was standing and smiling at me nervously) and took my hand from my dad.

We went through a very short ceremony (I believe I told our Justice of Peace to keep it under 10 minutes), but Jon still managed to say “I do” about 2 minutes before he was supposed to.



And before we knew it, we were married.





We all climbed into the limo, cracked open the beers, hiked up our dresses (we were sweating), and eagerly celebrated.

The reception went off without a hitch.  We ate, we drank, we danced (don’t worry, I requested the Chicken Dance, the Macarena, and every single other corny song you can imagine).  I’ll let the pictures do the talking.

























Happy anniversary, my love.  And here’s to many more.

4 years is a lifetime

Tomorrow marks 4 years since Jon and I said those two little words that legally bound us to one another.

In honor of that, I’ll tell you about our wedding day.

First, your should catch up on our love story here.

Second, let me set the scene - we’re barely 24 years old (kids!) and we were dating for 8 months before we got engaged and waiting barely 9 months after our engagement before we got married.

Any who, let’s take it back to July 28th, 2007.

Jon and I decided that although we didn’t do any of that other stuff right (moved in together, then started dating, then got engaged), we would spend our last night before marriage apart.  Jon stayed at his mom’s house (she lived local to where we were getting married in Western mass) and I stayed at the hotel near our reception place.  My sister decided to stay with me since she was my Maid of Honor and because the hotel lost my parents’ reservation, they stayed with us too.  As weird as it might be to someone to have their entire immediate family spend the night with them before they got married, it was actually pretty amazing.  It was the last night that I got to hang out with my family before I started a family of my own.  It was amazing to be this close to the people that brought me up to be the person that I am today. 

That morning I woke up at 6am (which was super early for me back then) with a feeling of complete calm washing over me.  I was freaking out over everything from the guestbook to the guest list to the limo for days before our wedding.  Yet that morning I woke up and felt at peace.  I pulled out a book I brought with me and read for just over an hour until the alarm rang and my sister woke up.

We stayed in the same bed just like we did when we were kids. 

She woke up excited and immediately started planning out our whole day.  My parents woke up shortly after that and we all headed downstairs for breakfast.

In the hotel lobby I ran into some of our guests and greeted them excitedly.  I barely ate anything.  Following breakfast, the Bridesmaids and I had hair and make-up appointments.



It was down pouring outside, but none of that seemed to bother me.  The rain stopped for about 2 minutes while we ran from the car to the hair appointment, 2 minutes while we ran from the hair appointment to he make up appointment, and again when we were finished. 



Back at the hotel, I snuck into my parents’ room (they were finally able to check in) and stuffed my face.  Then I saw my roommate from college checking in, so I hung out with her and another friend for a while.

Finally, it was time to get dressed.



Tomorrow I’ll tell ya all about the actual wedding.

Wordless Wednesday

I hope to remember these tiny baby toes for as long as I shall live.

 

 

Canon EOS Digital Rebel Xsi

Focal length: 50mm

1/30s

f/1.8

ISO 800

Edited in Adobe Photoshop

 

Link up your Wordless Wednesday posts (please link directly to the photo post, not your blog).

Baby food to last a lifetime

This past weekend, after a trip to Wholefoods, I decided to make enough baby food to last trough the rest of Peanut’s baby food stage.

Well, not literally, but I did make a lot.



I started with this:
Zucchini and yellow squash from our garden.
Apples
Pears
Peaches
Plums
Sweet potato



Don’t they look delicious?

And of course, my immersion blender.



Plus my “cookbook.”



Then I started with the items that needed to bake since they take the longest.





De-boned peaches and plums.  I also put the sweet potato in the oven.

While these puppies were baking, I was boiling/steaming the rest.


Zucchini, pears, apples and yellow squash - pureed.

And after everything cooled off, I put it in ice cube trays.



(This is just the boiled stuff!)

I actually ended up having to run out and buy more ice cube trays to finish the job.

But now we have about 150 ice cubes of baby food to mix and match as we please.



We even have a few new foods to introduce to Peanut like plums and peaches.

Do you make your own baby food?

Did you know I used to cook for my dogs?

My kid likes to chew on things

Did you notice that the nice pretty Onesie stickers all start out like this:



But end up like this:



Let me show you why.


Hi mom.  You want me to sit nicely for pictures?


Then perhaps you shouldn’t put this nice white toy next to me.


I’m just going to chew on his arm a little.


Then swipe it all over the sticker.


And rub it in, for good measure.


Oh, were you trying to fool me with a paci?




You were wrong.

Obviously.