all caught up!

So my past two posts have been about visits from family. Now that I am all caught up with those, I want to write a rundown of everything else I've been doing that I would consider blog worthy. To be honest, I could probably write a whole post about how I felt when I woke up this morning. Because waking up to sunshine and 65 degrees on Jakes birthday weekend felt wonderful! I love Saturday mornings--no pressure to get stuff done, and Wesley is home to play with me and Jake! So here I am, writing this post before I set out on a walk with plans of working off a few calories and soaking up every ounce of Vitamin D that I can manage! Now on to my updates :)

At the tail end of my weekend with mom and the sisters, my cousin Jerai made a quick 2 day stop in Provo before flying to Oregon to visit her own fam. It was so fun to see her!!! Sadly we didn't take as many pictures as I would've liked, but here are a couple good ones :)

Unfortunately, Jake was asleep when we took these, so he's not included. Oh well.

Cute little boyd!!!! Poor kid had allergies and was dripping giant crocodile tears the whole time!

I threw Sydney a bridal shower a couple weeks ago. I was nervous to throw one without my trusty "shower team" (aka, Jessica and Jerai), but it turned out really nice!

This was in the entry way--a Raffle with prizes, and the party favors

Preparing the food. mmmm

Chocolate drizzled hearts on the cupcakes were so fun to make. Thank you Martha Stewart!

Meghan came down for the shower with Caitlin--Jake's favorite little lady hands down! They stayed for a while after the party to hang out. It was so much fun!!! Jake even shared his cars with her (an epic gesture)

Sorry about the partial nudity.. they had just eaten spaghetti, and no one wants to get that out of a clean white shirt :)

Last month I was hired to do some bridal hair for an old friend from my Paul Mitchell days. I also did her mom and the bridesmaids! It was so fun to get my hands into some fun updos. I used to do weddings all the time, but haven't been doing them as much since I had Jake. I forgot how much I enjoyed it!

I got together with some other beauty school friends for the reception. It was so nice to catch up with them.

April showers bring May flowers--Yeah yeah, I know the rain is important. But I realllyyy love the sunny days in between! We snapped a few pictures at the park last weekend and I thought I would share a few before I wrap up my post.

Jake loved feeding the ducks!!! After a while we noticed that tons of fish were joining in to eat the crumbs in the water. Jake was so excited about them! He kept leaning over the dock saying "You want this?" again and again, throwing crumbs to them. We may need to get a pet goldfish in the future :)

Jake is cutting his two year molars--all four at once (really NOT fun). But I can't think of a better time for that to happen. With a weekend full of nothing but sunshine, lots of birthday presents to unwrap, and a trip to the zoo, Jake will have plenty of distractions to help him forget about his toothaches. With all that said, and with all my pictures posted and labeled, I think I will stop writing about my life, and go live it now! Thanks for reading! ;)

wedding planning weekend

I feel like my muse has gone missing, because I have really been struggling to find the inspiration/motivation to keep up my blog!

And thats ridiculous, because I have had so many wonderful things to blog about in the recent past.

So muse or no muse, I am going to tell you about my week with all the girls in the fam! I should start by talking about that fact that my kid sister Sydney got engaged a few weeks ago. It's actually been in the works but unofficial for a couple months. She had already decided the approximate time of the wedding (july 20th) and the place (utah)--so until the rock was in place, we were covertly planning. Finally towards the end of March, the ring was secured and we began openly and furiously planning.

July may sound far away, but Sydney flies back to VA in about a week and will stay there and work until the first of July. So, we had a lot of things to organize in just over a month! On the last weekend in March, my mom flew over from Virginia, and Jessica packed up Sawyer and flew in from Phoenix. We spent 4 crazy days finalizing plans and having a blast together! Jessica stayed a few extra days longer than mom, and as usual, it all ended too quickly. Here are pictures from the long weekend!

Jake loved having Grandma for a visit!!! He was so excited to show our house guests all of his toys and especially his matchbox cars.

Nostalgic walk through BYU campus. Syd had some artwork on display at the Library, so we went and checked it out!

Touring the reception center. We will be celebrating in pretty much the secret garden. It's gorgeous!

Shopping!!!

On this outing, I figured we would only need one stroller since I have a perfectly useful double, and even with Meghan and her babe Caitlin along, it worked out great! Only one person had to man the stroller, and the kids just rotated taking naps and being able to run around and stretch their legs! I can't tell you how in love with my stroller I am. It's just that wonderful :)

At Chipotle--the one and only place where Jake will actually eat the food! Fortunately it's my favorite as well! :)

On Sunday afternoon, being a week before Easter, we went to the park for a little egg hunt! Along with my mom and sisters, Syd's fiancee Mitch, her roomie Rachel, and of course Wesley, came to watch the kids find chocolate treasures. Grandma was thoughtful enough to bring the boys adorable Easter baskets, and supplied the chocolate as well!

Naturally Jake's basket was Lightning Mcqueen. What else??

Cute story--my mom brought a bunch of chocolate for the hunt. There were tin foil wrapped bunnies, race cars, and lady bugs. Jake would NOT pick up the bugs. (What little boy doesn't like bugs?) In fact, when we finally convinced him to collect them, he would simply pick them up and bring them to Sawyer. He was all over the bunnies and hogged all of the cars (obviously) but he was nice enough to put each and every lady bug into Sawyers basket.

Enjoying their spoils :)

By the way--Jake LOVED Sawyer. He really loved playing the "big brother" role, and Sawyer is such a tough kid that he was really able to keep up with his crazy older cousin. In fact, The day I took Jess and Sawyer to the airport, Jake started sobbing when he realized that Sawyer was going away. He had big crocodile tears running down his cheeks and kept saying "Sawyer!!!!! come back!!!!! noo!!!!" Break my heart why don't you. Seriously, does he even know what he does to me? Its been a couple weeks and he is still asking for Sawyer on a daily basis. Oh Jakey, you kill me :) I tell you what, Jake may have been a late bloomer with the talking, but he has more than enough spunk to go around!

Ok, until next time. I'm still not caught up, but this post puts me a lot closer!!! Thanks for reading, and taking interest in my life!

happy/sad

I have lots of catching up to do because we have had quite a bit going on around here the last couple of months! For today I will just continue on where I left off a couple posts ago, when Wesleys mom flew out from Thailand to meet her new grandson. Mid-February (when Melanie's baby Mark was about 3 weeks old) Grandma Hurst came to stay! We actually live just down the street from Melanie, so we were able to spend time with them almost every day. Jake loved all the attention from Grandma, and the opportunity to spend lots of time playing with Scott!

A few days into the visit, we found out some bittersweet news. Wesley's grandma (his dad's mom) had become very sick and was in the ICU at a hospital in St George. The sweet part was that Wesley's dad was able to fly over to see his mother, so we were able to see him as well. The sad part is that Jakes great-grandma Hurst ended up passing away a couple weeks later. I didn't know her very well, but from the little I knew, she was an amazing woman. It was sad to see Wesley's family mourn her passing. It's comforting to know that she is at peace, finally not in pain, and able to rest.

During that month we also witnessed Mark's baby blessing. My sister Sydney came up and took a few pictures of the family which was great. I just have a handful of pictures to post up from the month, but I hope you like them! Thanks for reading :)

the mischief makers.

I just loved this picture I took of Mark sleeping on grandpa :)

So, I know that Syd is the real photographer in the family, but I have started learning a little bit myself! With a little help from Sydney, and hours sitting with glazed eyes in front of my photoshop software, I think I'm starting to do an ok job. I took some pictures of baby Mark when he turned a month old. They were inside the house, so the lighting wasn't great, but I still thought they turned out nice. Here are a couple of my favorites!