Category: Uncategorized

Thursday    

The much awaited day of the trip. *cue wedding bells*  Andy and I didn’t need to be at the ranch until 12:30 and since we were up at the crack of dawn every day of our trip, we had plenty of time to burn before we headed down the highway. (sleeping in on our vacation didn’t happen at all since it was hot as hell and being a hot sweaty mess didn’t bode well for comfort)

We tried to visit as many beaches as we could on our trip. I had come to really love and anticipate those quick stops.

Those quiet peaceful moments filled with just our thoughts and sand between our toes was exactly what we came on this trip for. A lot of just “us” time.

Our beach visit was short lived and we headed to the venue to meet up with the bridal party to get ready. The rest of the day was filled with lots of laughter and anticipation for what would seem like the fastest afternoon in time. Speaking from experience, your wedding day goes by so quickly and is filled with endless amounts of love and joy. This day was no different.

The venue was filled with beautiful plant life and views and the cottage we got ready in was a spot I wouldn’t think twice about moving in to.

All the ladies got ready and prepped while the guys headed over with the guests to the private beach.

The rest of the afternoon became one sweeping fast moment. We had pictures and last minute jitters on our way to the ceremony. Tears were shed by proud papa’s and we were given the last run down of our instructions. The ceremony was short and sweet. It was blissfully quiet with waves crashing in the background. Eternal love and faithfulness was promised and kisses exchanged. It was simple and perfect.

The bride and groom took pictures afterwards before we all loaded up on the boat and set sail back to the reception.

The camera got packed up once it was time to celebrate and the rest of the evening involved a beautifully golden and colorful sunset, a gourmet dinner, wedding cake and toasts, dancing and a room filled with glowing happy people.

It was truly an honor to be a part of my friend’s special day and I’m blessed to have been able to stand along side of her as she married her best friend. It was an experience unlike any other, and I’ll just throw it out there. If any of the rest of you are thinking of doing a tropical wedding, I’m totally there.

While most lawns are still green, and the weather is still favorable, it’s hard to see the white topped mountains and not be thinking about winter that’s at our heels. Sooner than later our days are going to be a whole lot shorter and a whole lot colder.

So when you get a dry sunny day you make the most of it and get some fresh air. Which is exactly what we’ve been up to this week. With two toddlers whose neighborhood friends are now back in school, we start to get stir crazy being inside all the time. We can all benefit from going out to explore the great outdoors.

We invited grandma and grandpa to tag along and loaded up the kids and the dog and headed to Reflection Lake. Which is only about 20 minutes from our house and right off the main highway, making it an easy and convenient hiking spot.

Sharky especially loves adventures. Where he can run and jump and swim. There was other dogs to sniff and people to check out. Puddles to jump in and sticks to chew. Even a tiny princess found her way to the trail that day.

The main trail loop is short with a few pit stops to enjoy. Like this wildlife viewing tower. Which the kids had a blast on. It came with some pretty spectacular views on top of being a massive jungle gym.

The rest of the trail the kids and the dog ran free. Sharky made an attempt to swim out to catch a beaver (yeah right dog), and the kids played in and out of the trees as if this very spot was our own backyard.

It’s not often enough we take the kids and the dog out to be wild, and crazy and loud. Away from cartoons and nap times. Inside voices and household rules. To explore and not have limits and just be, kids.

We had such a good time, this morning when we realized we were lucky enough to have another sunshine filled day, we ate breakfast and finished up our coffee and packed everyone up again to run errands and stop for a hike on the way. We live right above a nice golf course that is host to several trails perfect for a quick getaway.

It was a crispy 32 degrees when we started out and the small ones weren’t to keen on that. Luckily they have a really sweet daddy who packed them until it warmed up a bit. A hike in freezing temps isn’t the most appealing when you could be at home in your sweats all cozy with a fresh cup of coffee. But it’s almost indescribable when the sun gets higher and hits you just right and warms you right down to your toes. Add that to a dog who couldn’t be running any faster in and out of the brush and a little girl whose toes are toasty and she’s ready to skip and sing along the trail.

Our destination was just a couple miles from where we parked the Jeep, and it was worth the chilly walk.

Reid took a snooze in the backpack while Hayden and Sharky jumped in mud puddles. We sat and basked in the sunshine knowing we should be enjoying every moment we can in this beautiful weather. We made our way back to the Jeep with hot soup and sandwiches on our minds. Oh, and hot chocolate with lots and lots of marshmallows.

The rest of the afternoon was spent doing yard work and finishing touches on Halloween costumes. Oh, and making the Pioneer Woman’s perfect pot roast. You guys, it was SO GOOD. And easy. And delicious and tender. And made the house smell fab. Is that convincing enough?

Our day was simple. But perfect. The rest of our week has gymnastics, and bunco and Halloween parties, and baking and pumpkins to carve. But you better believe that when we need to wind down and get some fresh air, you’ll find us here.

Wednesday

Other than needing a vacation desperately, we had a purpose for this trip. I was part of a wedding. So Wednesday and Thursday were devoted to whatever the beautiful bride needed. Our rehearsal was actually a day spent on the beach where the wedding was taking place. It was pretty exhausting but we managed.

The wedding was being held on a private beach that’s part of Kualoa Ranch. We met up with the group at 9 to catch the ferry over to the beach and the guides ran through the do’s and the don’ts. We had paddle boards and kayaks at our disposal. Volleyball and badminton. Scuba gear and beach mats. And a couple boats trips you could choose to go on. We had packed a lunch and drinks and had the afternoon to “rehearse”.

We as a group decided to take a ride on the glass bottom boat and try our luck at seeing some turtles.

Round trip it was only about a 30 minute venture but the water was gorgeous and we were fortunate enough to see a handful of turtles. Not the best picture but you get the idea.

After countless paddle board trips and kayaking, lunch and volleyball, we got down to business. The bride and groom gave us the deets on the next day’s excursion, which took all of 15 minutes and then it was back to the ferry to head to the parking lot.

The wedding location itself was beautiful. But so was the driveway to get to it!

It was a small winding road that was surrounded with fruit trees. Banana, guava, starfruit, papaya and mango. Sugar cane and coffee trees. There was no way we could leave without snagging some.

Kualoa Ranch is home to where several movies were filmed, most notably Jurassic Park. You can take a tour on horseback or ATV, even zip lining. We missed the cutoff for the tours so we just walked part it to get the jist.

We had hours to spare and more island to explore. We had been given a few suggestions on places to eat and we found one quickly once we hit the coastal highway.

Turns out it’s fancier than it used to be because it was featured on Diners, Drive Ins and Dives. Which I’m wondering if it was a ‘dive’ because it now has a hand washing station. Getting classy. It really was delicious though and hit the spot.

 

We pin pointed a route to take us the rest of the way around the island and got back on the road. My favorite part? The tunnels.

We took a few pit stops and hurried our way back to the North Shore in order to catch the sunset.

Waimea Beach. Without a doubt, my favorite place on our trip where we enjoyed the sunset. The sand was super soft and the water was perfectly warm and inviting.

We found a deserted spot and sat down to gaze at people as they enjoyed the day coming to an end.

Now for the exciting part. Waimea Beach is home to a very popular spot for rock jumping. Most of our people watching was done on this side. We watched countless people climb up and take the epic leap.

 

And the award for best jump goes to:

Hysterical. Probably not for him but definitely for those that watched. The sunset was just as you would imagine a sunset on a tropical island would be. Breathtaking. It simply got better as it got later.

Before we lost all light we walked back towards the car, rinsed our feet off at the faucet and took one last glimpse at that amazing view and packed in for the night. This trip was proving to be more than I could have imagined.

 

Andy and I just got back from an amazing trip to Oahu, Hawaii. It was

THE BEST.

That’s putting it lightly. This was our first vacation with just us. Our first real vacation ever really. I was pregnant when we dated and after Hayden was born our time alone wasn’t any longer than one night. Once we got married our honeymoon got put on hiatus when I got pregnant with Reid. Kids ruin everything.

Kidding.

So being in my friend’s wedding in Hawaii was the perfect reason for this kid free vacation to really happen. My sister in law is the bomb.com and took a week off work to stay at our house and watch the two little terrors.

We were there for 5 days and 5 nights of total bliss.

Monday

Our flight left at 2:45 which gave us plenty of time to sleep in, finish packing our bags and hug and kiss on the kids for a bit longer. Then it was game time.

 

We arrived in Honolulu just before sundown so we could get one quick glimpse of the city.

It was dark on our drive to the North Shore where we were staying so we didn’t get the full effect until morning. It was worth waiting for…

Tuesday

We hurried and showered and threw our beach bag in the car and began our ventures on the island. We stayed on Turtle Bay Resort’s property but not at the actual resort. They have several buildings of condos that are available to rent. It saved us a few hundred dollars and we had so much more space and privacy. Plus, it was only a short walk to the resort itself and it’s beach. Which was our first pit stop.

I found that people watching was soooo easy and entertaining on this trip.

We were in serious need of coffee and food so our beach visit was cut short and we found a coffee shop and local fruit stand to load up on goods. If someone ever offers you a fried banana, get one. Or 6 like we ended up with.

After cruising the highway a bit, we couldn’t take it any longer and pulled off to jump in. Even with rain showers and wind, the beach was heavenly.

This spot too proved to be a fantastic people watching spot.

The wonderful part of a vacation with no kids is we have no schedule. No naps to worry about, bottles to plan for or meltdowns to deal with. We could lay in the sand, drink cocktails and relax without a care in the world.

 

 

We spent the afternoon exploring beaches and food trucks. Anything served in a fruit vessel has my name on it.

After lunch we found a sunnier spot to plant our beach bums. The colors were almost surreal.

 

After completely frying our bodies, we headed back to clean up and change and walked down to the resort for drinks and a Hawaiian sunset. It was the perfect ending to our first day in paradise.

Stay tuned for more..

  

Last Sunday we had the pleasure of celebrating our favorite little man. (It’s just taken me a few days to write about it.)

Having celebrated a first birthday before, and a few more after it, I can tell you if you do nothing else, EAT CAKE.

Hayden’s birthday falls right smack in the middle of winter, so having a summer birthday gives us a nice break from inside parties.

We kept it simple. A BBQ with family and friends. I didn’t go overboard with decorations, and just made sure we had lots of food and of course, cake.

How adorable are those name balloons. So in love.

We stuffed our faces with delicious food and watched as all the kids ran and played and eagerly awaited to dig into dessert.

Reid didn’t disappoint.

As lots of little eyes peered in, we gave the nod to help him out and soon he was swarmed with tiny hands grabbing gobs of cake as fast as they could before their parents stopped them from total sugar overload.

Once the smash cake was just that, smashed cake, we stripped down the frosted boy and gave him a quick scrub.

Note to self. Next time don’t add so much soap. Some minor eye irritation occurred due to excessive bubbles to the face . Oops.

A scrub a dub and rinse, fresh clothes and onto opening presents. Reid got spoiled by everyone and now has his own growing collection of big boy toys all his own. Including a truck that we have to actually hide from the big kids so it doesn’t get destroyed. It’s that much fun.

It was a beautiful evening with our wonderful family and friends and we couldn’t feel more blessed to have celebrated with you all. Until next year….

Reid has reached toddler status.

I’ll save you the long speech about how life wouldn’t be the same without him, and it’s so emotional that he isn’t a baby anymore.

I’m not emotional today because he’s turning one. I’m emotional because we made it through the first year. It was hard. REALLY hard. In all honesty, his first six months about did me in. He was fussy, and spit up constantly. He never slept and screamed even when you held him. Car rides weren’t always pleasant and it seemed like he was sick all the time. We dealt with sensitive tummy issues and I tried cutting out countless things to help. I cried what seemed like everyday and was convinced that I was losing all sanity. He co slept for months and we eventually had to use the cry it out method as a last result. Which wasn’t fun for anyone.

But then it got better. And each day he became happier. We made it over feeding hurdles and soon we all got more sleep. He reached milestones with leaps and bounds and it was as if it happened overnight and one day we no longer had a difficult baby, but the sweet little boy that we know him as today.

He is a dream to be with and keeps us all in good spirits. He is all boy and just wants to play and wrestle, build and get into things, and we most definitely don’t have issues anymore getting him to gain weight.

If you were to walk into our daily routine now, you would never guess he was an awful sleeper. He sleeps a solid 10 hours a night without a peep and with a simple yawn and a tuck into bed with his pacifier, he’s out like a light.

He loves to follow Hayden all over the house, always gives his mama lots of snuggles and has so much love for his daddy. Once Andy gets home from work, I know I’m basically chopped liver to Reid. Which I’m alright with. His intense love for his daddy is quite possibly the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen. It borders on ridiculous.

 I am over the moon excited to see what the next year with him brings.

Happy birthday little mister. You are our one and only.

Holiday weekends are where it’s at. Not that we ever need a reason to hang out with friends and family and play until the sun goes down, but at least on holidays it makes us feel like we have a purpose for it.

We started out the weekend with the city’s 4th of July parade.

It was overcast and sprinkling but that didn’t stop us from enjoying the view and the most important part, getting lots and lots of candy.

Music and dancing galore, and everyone that entered the parade did such a fun job. We had lots of favorites.

Even the furry ones enjoyed the show.

The kids got their bags and buckets filled with goodies and had already devoured half of it when the parade came to an end with the loudest ones of all. The firetrucks.

 The day was just getting started. The daddies took the babies and dogs and hit up the store while us mamas took the older kids to a movie.

Then it was back to the house for games and a barbecue. You can never have enough barbecue.

We filled the table with chicken, and hamburgers. Pulled pork and rolls. Watermelon and coleslaw. Potato salad and baked beans. The works. Oh, and of course, corn on the cob.

And no celebration is complete without s’mores. Lots and lots of gooey, messy, delicious s’mores.

If you’ve kept up with the news, you might have seen that most of our state has been on fire recently. Consequently, no fire work show for us. We didn’t let that kill the party though, and Hayden and the kids played until they were covered in dirt and marshmallow. She only made it to the couch before she crashed for the night.

Sunday brought the sunshine so we wasted no time at all in loading up the boat and kayaks and heading to the lake. Everyone else had the same idea as we were surrounded by families tubing and swimming their hearts out. We even had the tiniest of navigators.

We jumped in and swam and played until the babies needed a nap and headed back to shore to unwind and catch a couple more hours of those perfectly warm rays.

We took our sunburned bodies home and filled our bellies with more barbecue. Baths and pajamas out the way, we curled up with a movie and were out for the count.

Now this is what I would call my all American dream.

Today Andy and I celebrate our second wedding anniversary so it felt necessary to reminisce a bit. Everyone says their wedding date is the happiest day of their life. My wedding was the happiest time in my life.

Andy and I had been organizing this wedding ourselves, down to every tiny detail for a year prior. We got married in our homestate, Idaho, and flew down a month before the big day. We spent so much time with family and old friends, and it was a constant state of bliss. We didn’t worry and stress about the little things. We enjoyed each moment and anticipated this day we had been so eagerly preparing for.

Everything was perfect.

We had an outdoor wedding and the weather was beautiful. No one misplaced a tie, or a dress, or even worse, the rings. The food and the flowers showed up on time and intact. We set up the morning of without a hiccup. There wasn’t a single detail of that day that wasn’t amazing, it exceeded every single one of my expectations.

It was simple and romantic. Laid back and fun. Elegant yet not over the top. We had a hand in everything involved, right down to the centerpiece boxes Andy hand built.

Our friend performed the ceremony and we were surrounded by all the people we love.

Then the real fun began. We had the BEST musicians. Two things that were on the top of the list were really good food and really really good live music. I think we hit the mark on both. People still make comments to us on how wonderful the band was. Andy’s brothers and cousins helped grill, the beer was on tap and we all laughed and danced and had the time of our lives.

It was as if time paused for a brief moment when I stepped out of the car in my wedding dress, and in a blink of an eye it was over. Life was in fast forward and it was everything that is magical, and memorable and special. We ditched the party for a quick limo ride to Hogans for wedding shots and made it back in time for a few last songs before the sun set on our beautiful day. The following day we invited everyone back for brunch and got one last day to soak in time with our very favorite people. Every second of that weekend I hold dear to my heart and nothing will compare to it.

Happy Anniversary to my sweet, loving, caring husband who has the biggest heart and the most unconditional love for his wife and family. You make every day one to remember and it’s only just the beginning.

xoxo

Everyone loves a delicious drink. Whether it’s alcoholic or not, a really good drink can make your evening. Turn your party into a paaaartay. Or perhaps make your Tuesday night feel like it’s already Friday. Or if your like me, you make yourself a cocktail in order to do the dishes.

freshly squeezed orange margarita: on the rocks

We bought a case of oranges recently, and weren’t eating them fast enough. So turning them into cocktails seemed only logical. I juiced 2 oranges, and zested one of them beforehand. Cut a couple wedges to save for garnishes as well.

Use your orange zest and combine with coarse salt or sugar. I like a combo of both. Be sure to be sparse with your zest or you’ll end up with really wet salt that won’t stick to your glass.

Using one of your orange garnishes, wet the rim of your glass and dip your glass in your orange salt, coating the entire rim.

Now onto the liquor. Any tequila will suffice, because for me, the triple sec makes the drink. I also like to fill my glass with ice and dump in the shaker. Other wise I end up making a drink much bigger than my cup. Which is fine. You just drink the rest from the shaker. I mean…..

In your mixer, you’ll add 2 parts orange juice (2 shots) and 1 part liquor. In this case, half your shot is tequila and the other is triple sec. My golden rule for making cocktails is less is more.  You can always add extra liquor if your drink isn’t strong enough. If you add too much to begin with, adding more juice or soda ends up throwing it all off and often your drink just isn’t what you intended.

With the lid on tight, shake. And shake. And shake. Then shake a little more. You’ve shaken enough when the shaker is really cold and now covered in condensation.

Pour in your prepared glass and garnish. Best served with a side of sunshine.