we’ve had a month full of wonderful weddings, the first of which was the walker/morell event in los angeles on october 7th. ryan and melissa are good friends and former co-workers, and we’ve always considered her fiancé (now husband) chris one of the nicest dudes ever, so we were super honored when we received an invitation.

besides, what better excuse to hop in the car, road trip it down to socal and leave ellie behind to spend a little quality time with grandma? (thanks, grandma!) oh and when we heard the wedding would be catered by in ‘n out, we KNEW we had to be there.

we’ve done the drive before but it felt especially long, so we were super excited when we arrived at hotel palomar in westwood. it just sounds fancy, doesn’t it? the view of the surrounding neighborhoods from our room on the 19th floor was magnificent, and we stopped to peer out the window at the spanish style houses below at least several times a day.

we took it easy the first night and walked about a half mile down wilshire boulevard to a restaurant called palomino for dinner and drinks. despite my head congestion and not being able to taste much of ANYTHING very well, i had a delicious maple marinated chicken salad and ryan had fresh trout. the food, the drinks, the service and the ambiance were all wonderful. needless to say, we were pleased.

we woke up bright and early the next morning (after a night of sleeping on the most comfortable hotel mattress in existence) and walked down wilshire again for breakfast. nothing fancy, we just went to denny’s, and when we got back to the hotel, we took a nap! those of you with kids know this is a rare occasion and we enjoyed it to the fullest.

post-nap, i walked to a local salon where a lovely french girl curled my hair and made me feel quite pretty. ryan retrieved the car from valet and picked me up so the wind wouldn’t ruin her hour’s worth of hard work, and we headed straight back to the hotel to get dressed for the wedding.

from there we cabbed it with the adorable ciji and doug (another of ryan’s co-workers) to the smogshoppe, an unassuming but totally charming event venue aptly described on their web site as “LA’s greenest urban oasis.” it totally is!

the moment we walked in, i fell in love with all the personal touches and quirky, colorful decor. there was a candy table topped with an array of vintage style candies, brightly colored name tags in the shape of little flags, and each table was named for a beatles song.

the ceremony was short and sweet. melissa was escorted down the aisle by her dad and met a beaming chris surrounded by their best friends and family members. her aunt read some love letters her grandparents wrote each other during world war II, it was pretty much the sweetest thing ever. the reading was followed by vows, rings, smooch and applause, and all was joyous.

then we partied, ate, drank, danced and made new friends. after getting sufficiently drunk and sweaty, our lovely friend bev graciously drove us back to our hotel and we called it a night. thank you, bev!

and thank you, chris and melissa, for including us in your special day. we had a truly fabulous time. best wishes for a lifetime of love and wedded bliss!

the weekend before easter, i attended my lovely friend flo’s baby shower <3 it was a beautiful saturday afternoon in concord and flo's sister janina and good friend lynn turned her backyard into the perfect garden setting for the tea party-themed shower. the centerpieces and other decor were très adorable!

and don’t get me started on the food! i could have eaten the entire plate of those fried bananas. luckily i restrained myself … the shower was very intimate and i’m sure more than one person would have noticed ;)

after eating, sipping iced tea and socializing, it was time for games. shower games are always fun, but they usually frustrate me because i often get SO close to winning i deserve a prize but i don’t get one because, hello, second place! i’ve gone to so many showers and gotten second place in so many games it’s kind of become a syndrome. argh!

but flo’s was the shower that changed everything (thank you, baby trapp)! i didn’t come in first place in just one game … i came in first in TWO GAMES! ok, there was a tie-breaker for one of them, but i won! two games! april 16th will go down in history as the day i became a winner :D

first we played my new favorite baby shower game, one i’d never played before. we were each given cut-outs of different parts of flo and brian’s faces and were told to put together a single face made up of the features each parent hopes the baby will have.

i didn’t win (i didn’t even come in second, awww), but i did guess several of the features right and it was the most hilarious game ever. notice claire’s incredible attention to detail with the bow in the hair (third from right, below). baby trapp is a girl, after all :)

we also played how big is mommy? and the price is right game where you have to guess the cost of specific baby items, but i sucked horribly at both of those per usual :)

and now, since you’re dying to know, the games i did win: guess how many stars and the don’t say baby clothespin game. i couldn’t believe i won the guessing game because i’m usually terrible at those. i *always* guess a number at least 100 over. it’s embarrassing. so when janina said 108 and i realized the number i had guessed was 108, i almost peed myself! ok, not really. but i was pretty excited. i had just won my first baby shower game EVER!

the second game i won came down to a tie between me and the incredible mandy. we each had a whopping 11 clothespins. for those who don’t know the game, each guest starts out with five clothespins. if you say the word “baby” and someone calls you out, you have to give them one of yours. the person with the most clothespins at the end of the shower is the winner.

luckily janina had a few questions ready in case of a tie. the tie-breaker? what is the most number of times flo has gone to the bathroom in one day since she’s been pregnant? i won’t share the answer out of respect for the privacy of flo’s bladder ;)

mandy guessed six less than the correct answer and i guessed two more. i was closer, so i won (it probably wasn’t completely fair since i’ve gone through a pregnancy and remember how often i had to go to the bathroom, but mandy graciously accepted second place and i wondered incredulously at the fact that i had won first place in not one shower game, but two)!

after gift-opening, picture-taking and a little more socializing, it was time to call it an afternoon … and a truly enjoyable one, at that. we came, we saw, we ate, we drank, we played, we laughed and we showered the mommy-to-be with love and well-wishes.

thank you for including me in your special day, miss flo! i had an amazing time with you and your lovely friends, no wine necessary :) what a lucky little girl your daughter is to have you as her momma <3

it’s almost wedding season! which means we’re smack dab in the middle of shower season, and with her wedding less than two months away, last weekend was maria’s turn to be celebrated :)

i didn’t know anyone there besides the bride herself, but i had a lovely time nonetheless. the weather was gorgeous, which made for a nice time of enjoying food outside, and all of maria’s girlfriends are so open and friendly i never felt awkward, not even for a moment.

and now i must showcase my amazingly gorgeous (somewhat brain-like) cheese ball (the first one i’ve ever made, which is why it’s such a big deal). also note the loveliest spring wrapping paper ever. thank you, papyrus, you are my fave <3

all the food, games, gifts and guests were fabulous, and while it may have had *just* a little to do with the fact that i got to leave ellie home with ryan, i had a really relaxing, wonderful time.

thank you so much for including me, maria! i’m honored that ellie is going to be your flower girl, and i can’t wait to bawl my eyes out while i watch you and jon exchange vows next month <3

for most of the first year of her life, ellie was bald. she came out with a little hair, sure, but it fell out quickly and left her with just a little tuft in the back. she looked very much like a little old man. we’re not ashamed to admit it.

between the ages of one and two, however, her hair really started to grow in. dirty blonde, extremely fine, curling up at the end … in other words, the cutest hair ever. but recently i noticed it needed a little cleaning up. it was little disheveled, a little wild. so, we thought, haircut time!

i asked my friend tara where she takes her girls (one of them being ellie’s BFF jenna) and she recommended cool tops in san ramon, so we made an appointment.

ryan and i discussed the possibility of bangs all week, but he wasn’t totally on board. in fact, he was downright anti. he thought her hair was perfect the way it was (of course), but we had to get it cut eventually! a trim at the very least. and at the last second, on our way there, i changed his mind.

kind of.

ok, he wasn’t happy about it, but he let me have my way, and i’m soooo happy he did :)

ellie did GREAT. she sat in a little red mercedes and pretended to drive while we waited for the lady to begin. she wasn’t too thrilled about wearing the little robe (she refuses to even wear bibs at home), but i whipped out the m&m’s and she gave in. “if you keep it on you can have some of these!” i said. i know her so well ;)

then the lady put caillou on tv. how did she know?! ellie sat through the entire haircut hypnotized by everyone’s favorite bald canadian.

and when it was over, she picked an orange ribbon and admired her new look in the mirror :)

hooray for ellie!

THE END!

this is the first year we decided to go all out and get a folded card as opposed to the past three years when we’ve gone with flat ones. it was a little more expensive this way, but with all the awesome photos nikki took, it was impossible to choose just one :) and seeing how they turned out, the extra cost was totally worth it!

front:

inside:

the small print under the photo of ellie reads:

“be my youth / my kissing booth / my little sweet tooth / my beauty and truth
be my one / my day in the sun / my little pop gun / the best thing i’ve done”
-the weepies

special thanks to the lovely kat for hooking us up with the tiny prints friends & family discount. we saved a cool $50!

baby lily’s arrival is just around the corner (october 20th or somewhere thereabouts), so yesterday loretta, shirley, ellie and i drove out to manteca for carerra’s baby shower <3

it was held in a private room at this fancy recreation building of a really cute housing development. apparently someone knew someone who knew someone who lived there :) it was the perfect place for a party. the decor included lots of pink and diaper cakes galore, and carerra looked as beautiful as ever in her pretty satin dress and perfectly styled hair.

it was nice to spend a little time with the girls of the family. rodi and abby were there, as well, and we met a nice little girl named samara who was quite enamored with ellie (as was ellie with her). they had lots of fun playing together with balloons and … cherry tomatoes? :)

carerra got a massive pile of gifts, including frames, blankets, baby essentials and plenty of adorable outfits to start lily off on the road to becoming a fashionista. and while we can’t wait to meet her, we’re hoping she doesn’t decide to make an appearance tomorrow like someone did so soon after *my* shower ;)

thank you for a lovely afternoon, ‘rerra. we love you!