Our First Anniversary.

I would like to start by saying yet again that I cannot believe we've been married for a whole year already!! I love it. It was such a special day to celebrate with Steven and we had a wonderful time together.

(I made this picture nice and big so you can see my tiny kitchen in the background -- actually not really but as long as you can see it please notice the calendar on the fridge, M&Ms bag on top of the fridge, Lucy magnets, one year anniversary card from Papa and Grammi, brand new paper towel holder, yellow gluggle jug from Paigey, and open bag of See's candy.)

Steven didn't get home from work until shortly after 8am yesterday morning, which gave me plenty of time to clean up the kitchen and get breakfast started. He came in with a rose (good man, now if I could only teach him that those aren't just for anniversaries...), which was perfect because then I got to use this pretty bottle that I bought for the wedding last year. We had breakfast burritos and chocolate milk and then I gave Steven the photo book. I have been really excited about it and it was so so so hard to not tell him about it. We really enjoyed looking through it together and remembering all of the fun (and silly) stuff we've done this past year. I intend to make one every year. I also purchased a six-pack of Jones cream sodas with a new photo on the bottles, but I didn't pull the special sodas out until later on. Cream soda isn't something we generally have for breakfast. I loved the idea of recreating that special wedding favor that we so adored and think we might have to start a collection: Jones soda bottle with Steven/Steph lovey-dovey photo for each anniversary. Since we have 4 different ones from the wedding we're up to 5 already.

One of our favorite moments of the day was hosting the newly engaged Tim and Annika for lunch -- Tim proposed late yesterday morning on Mt. Peak. Annika was so surprised (we had made "plans" to go on a hike with them and then at the last minute Steven "had to go to a fire" and we couldn't make it so they went a hike just the two of them) and she had the biggest smile on her face when they arrived at our house afterwards. We shared salmon and champagne and our special days with one another and it was just lovely.

After they left to celebrate with their families, Steven and I were off to check into our hotel. We didn't go far but it just seemed like it would be more fun to stay in a hotel for the night. Steven found a really nice place called The Hotel Bellevue. We spent our wedding night in Bellevue so it was special to be there for our first anniversary as well.

The room was beautiful with a big bed (felt like almost double the size of the one we have at home), and a tiny balcony, and a huge TV, and a bathroom bigger than our living room. After checking in we only stayed long enough to set our bags down and change our clothes since we had dinner plans in Seattle.

Steven made reservations for us to go on an Argosy dinner cruise. It was a beautiful night for a cruise. The boat stuck to the shoreline for must of it and it was really cool to see all of the bluffs and shores and beach houses. We saw Magnolia, Bainbridge, Blake Island and lots more. The food was pretty good but not amazing. I think what you're really paying for is the experience. It's pretty unique to be able to enjoy a four course meal while getting a tour of the Puget Sound on a beautiful sunny evening. Actually, the fruit and crab legs were pretty fantastic and I definitely enjoyed the champagne and chocolate dessert :)

He wore his wedding tie, I wore my wedding shoes -- we were very stylish (and color coordinated too)

We asked some lady to take a picture of us... she didn't do a very good job. We really didn't care about the flag but she insisted on getting the whole thing in the shot. Silly. I chose the white dress for two reasons: 1) it felt somewhat bridal 2) it makes me look tan. (and also, I have like 4 white/cream dresses that I keep wanting to wear but my opportunities for dress wearing this summer have mostly been for rehearsal dinners/weddings and you just can't wear white to those things unless you're the bride...)

I hardly took any photos at all! I know, so unlike me, I would usually take hundreds on an outing like this. But I guess I just couldn't take my eyes off my handsome husband long enough to take pictures.

I mean just look at him! Jeans, a new pair of Reefs, a TIE, his shirt is TUCKED IN and the Ray Bans add a perfect touch. Sexy man. This sealed the deal -- as soon as we have enough money to get him a new wardrobe those 14 pairs of black shorts are going straight to Goodwill. He looks too good in nice clothes to keep wearing the old shorts.

After the cruise we went back to the hotel. I had brought a bottle of wine from our wedding and M&Ms and Jones sodas and crackers and salmon spread but believe it or not, we were both asleep by 9:15pm. No joke. So we had all that for breakfast :) Don't worry, we did not drink the whole bottle of wine. Fortunately we didn't have to check out of the hotel until 1pm so we just got to lay around all morning enjoying the soaking tub, comfy bed and cable TV -- we actually watched a National Geographic show about prison life for almost 2 hours, haha! It was relaxing and peaceful and so special to be in a hotel together. Definitely a treat.

What a great day! Maybe we should make anniversaries more than just an annual thing :)

One. Whole. Year.

Today Steven and I get to celebrate our first wedding anniversary. I absolutely cannot believe it's been a whole year already! Time flies when you're having fun, right? It has been a truly wonderful year and definitely more fun than not. I am so blessed to have Steven. He is kind and patient and loving (even when I'm unlovable), he's super sexy (um, hello, can you say fire fighter?), he's funny and makes me laugh all the time, he's compassionate and tender-hearted, he's intelligent and the best ever board-game player, and I am the luckiest girl in the world.

Dear Steven,

I love you the most. Thank you for being my husband. Can't wait to celebrate with you today.

With love on our anniversary,
Steph

Wedding Season.

I love weddings. I think they're beautiful and fun and exciting and magical and they make me feel all super happy and excited. So far this summer I've had the opportunity to attend five weddings. Actually, I've done more than attend them. I've had the pleasure of of somehow being actively involved in each of them.

Towards the end of June I assisted a Woodinville area wedding planning with a wedding at Novelty Hill - Januik.

This wedding had lots of great things going for it. First of all: the flowers were gorgeous. Maybe I favorite part. It was at this wedding that I was first introduced to Glassy Babies. Evidently these glass candle holders (small colored ones in between bouquets) were on Oprah's list of favorite things and if I understand correctly, they cost about $40 a piece and come in a huge variety of colors. I don't get what the hype is all about.

Another of my favorite features: definitely the paper lanterns. I really want to know where the bride found these. I think the different colors, shapes and sizes add so much dimension to the room. What an easy and fun way to decorate! Love it.

The place settings were simple but beautiful.

Another of the lovely centerpieces. I know you've already seen one but I couldn't decide which I liked best. This wedding also had a Molly Moon's truck serve ice cream to the guests. Yum! What a fun idea.

The second wedding of the summer: The Lewis-Raney wedding. I got to spend the first weekend of July watching my dear friend Lena marry the man of her dreams.

AND I was lucky enough to be one of her beloved bridesmaids. (Like my dress? T.J. Maxx. $40. Nine West. Perfect fit.)

Lena's decorations were fabulous and so uniquely Lena. The strips of fabric and lanterns and twinkle-lights set the perfect mood for this joyous event :)





The apple votives were my idea, thank you very much. So incredibly Yakima and the color of the apples fit perfectly -- couldn't resist. I did notice a few people actually munching on them though. Hmm...

The flowers came all of the way from Pike Place Market.









Wedding number three! This one was a lot more work for me, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Joy and her man Cody were married the third weekend in July at the Wine Country Farm in Dayton, Oregon and I had the pleasure of people their day-of wedding coordinator. It was a beautiful, sunny and extremely hot day but Steven and I worked hard to keep the party going. (I couldn't have done it without him.)

Aren't these centerpieces great? I have to admit, I didn't fully get the vision until I saw them on the tables. They were fun and simple but still made a very bold statement. Very Joy. That little cup holding the mints is one of their favors -- it says "Eat, Drink, and be Married" on the other side of it.

This place has a great view! What a beautiful spot for the ceremony. Afterwards Joy and Cody went for a ride in a horse-drawn carriage.

Dried flowers in buckets on shepherd hooks. And the coolest part: at the end of the party you pull out the flowers and the bucket is already full of birdseed to throw at the happily departing couple! Genius. Joy and I purchased the flowers from Pike Place back in early spring. Again, I didn't fully get the vision but they came together beautifully and how nice to not have to worry about putting together fresh flower arrangements at the last minute.

The 4th wedding was near the end of July. I had planned to assist a wedding planner at a wedding at the Harbor Club this particular evening but ended up subbing for another assistant at a wedding down the street. Here at the Olympic Sculpture Park.

Wow. What an interesting venue. Actually, the venue itself is pretty nice and the staff is amazing, so incredibly helpful, but I just can't imagine having to plan my wedding around this art! They did a great job though. They incorporated the raindrops into everything. The bright colors were actually really neat and definitely striking.

This I love. I want to create one for Steven and I. This was certainly one of my favorite things. The couple had a graphic designer (sister of the groom I believe) create all of their printed materials. It was a unique way to have a sense of continuity in this chaotic environment.

 The bar area outside. Yet another gorgeous day for a wedding.

Genius. I love how they covered the photo booth. Actually, I covered it, but I love how they measured it and had these things printed out. So so so cool. Everyone loves the photo booth. If it fits into the budget I think it's a great thing to have. Definitely works in place of favors. Wonder if the cost works out to be the same. (Although I think our favors were pretty great.)

 Wedding number 5. This was actually today and I'm not going to tell you where it was because I'm feeling a bit complainy about it at the moment. I had to work really really hard today and it was the first time I've assisted an event planner and thought it was really unfair that I wasn't being compensated. Mostly, I just wasn't warned about how much physical work there would be and I'm paying for it now. I would have at least brought a different pair of shoes.

And it did look pretty nice once we were done. Unfortunately, 5 hours later when the ceremony ended we then had to move the chairs back down to the main patio area and place them around the preset tables while trying to navigate our way around the 100+ people who were milling about drinking wine and fanning themselves. By this point it was 90 degrees and I was so sweaty and tired it was just ridiculous. (I might have felt better if I had had more to eat than a Mars bar and a large glass of chocolate milk all day.)

The candy buffet turned out great though. We made that little box off to the left to hold all of the little baggies that guests used to pack up the candy.

The cake stand was pretty cool. I had never seen one like that. I also really liked how they brought in all different kinds of china. The mis-matched pieces worked well together.

This was a very pink and purple wedding, which obviously isn't my thing, personally, but I thought everything looked fabulous! It was exactly what the bride wanted and she did a most excellent job of planning it all. I actually thing the pink and purple was a lot of fun and I'm impressed with all of the different ways she found to incorporate the colors.

It wasn't a terrible day and I'm glad I was able to help but let's just say I won't be going back to this venue unless I am attending a wedding or being paid a considerable amount :)

It's so fun to see how different everyone's "dream wedding" is. Well, I must admit, I have about 20 different dream weddings but still, it's cool how everyone has completely different visions for their weddings and how they can be so uniquely personalized.

Next weekend we get to attend the Piehler-Glazner wedding in Southern Oregon. We are so excited for Jeremy and Ronnie and cannot wait to celebrate with them and their amazing families! I figured that weekend might need it's own blog post.

And now it's time for me to get some sleep! Tomorrow I get to celebrate my own wedding day with my man. We have a fun day planned out and I just can't wait! It's going to be the best first anniversary ever.

In the Summer Time.

I must admit that I haven't done a great job of keeping up with the blog this summer. Things have been moving very quickly around here and while it's nothing new for us to be busy... well, I'm not really sure how I've managed to neglect the blog so but here's an update with a few highlights from the summer thus far. There are loads more photos on facebook but here are just a few of my favorite moments.

One of the first sunny days of the summer (sometime back in June) -- Steven and I  decided it was time to venture out and see what (if any) good parks are around here. We visited Lake Wilderness in the morning. It was very peaceful and we even saw a bald eagle so of course that was a big hit with me. We spent the late afternoon walking around Deep Lake at Nolte State Park. Unfortunately, a week later the state passed a law that you have to pay to park your car at state parks -- $10 a day! We haven't been back since. Maybe next summer we'll just get the $30 pass.

Sunset from Redmond. I was at a stoplight and couldn't resist snapping a photo.

Steven and Tara and Nathan having way too much fun in the bouncy house! They actually tore it one point in time because Tara kept falling over and pulling the whole house with her -- it was really funny. I think this must have been late June also, after celebrating Father's Day at the Celtic Bayou in Redmond (Cajun food meets Irish pub).

Date Night -- Steven and I have had a gift card to the Adriatic Grill in Tacoma since Christmas! To celebrate Steven officially quiting his job with Rural Metro we decided to use the gift card (we had to drive to Tacoma anyway to drop off Steven's uniform). When Steven called to make the reservation they asked if we were celebrating anything special. He said, "Nope, just a date night." So they decorated our table for our date night. I thought it was really funny.

The first weekend in July I spent in Yakima for Lena's wedding (photos on facebook and in a future "Wedding Season" blog post) and Steven had his first day of the new job!! It was a very big weekend for everyone.

(Early July) The badge-pinning ceremony!! It was kind of a silly little ceremony but they really didn't have any other way for friends and family to formally celebrate the six new hires so at least they did something. It still kind of felt special and I got to pin Steven's badge on and give him a kiss on the cheek so everyone knows he's mine. So that's good.

Poor Baby. This new job really wares him out!

Celebrating the new job (and the completion of the first week on the new job) with brunch at Salty's on a beautiful Saturday morning! When you're waiting to be seated you can hang out in the lobby area and drink hot cocoa and eat scones with raspberry jam. Yum! But with the cocoa and scones and the fresh little doughnuts that they give you when they seat you... you're almost full before you even get to the buffet. We really enjoy going to Salty's. It's such a treat and especially fun since the only two times we've done brunch there have been to celebrate Steven's graduation from the Fire Academy and his new job with the Fire Department. Now I need to get a cool new job so we have a reason to go there again...

After our Salty's brunch we spent the afternoon with Tim and Annika at Blue Highway where Steven purchased a little present for himself...

Yes, the new Smallworld game. And he even asked them to gift wrap it! Ridiculous. I'm thinking with all of the games that I have been purchased this past year that maybe it's time for me to get a new pair of shoes or something... Let's go shopping.

Enjoying the sunshine with Lena! She and Aaron live a short walk from Greenlake. It was so fun hanging out with her and sharing a drink from Chocolati and walking around the lake and hearing all about her honeymoon and flipping through the proposal/engagement/honeymoon scrapbook that she has already made!!! (I only just ordered prints to start scrapbooking out honeymoon... ) So so SO fun to have another married friend!! I'm very happy for the two of them.

The third weekend of July Steven and I spent in Oregon. We had the pleasure of attending the Senff/Blikstad wedding. Well, we weren't just attending, Joy actually asked me to be her wedding planner and it was such great fun! I couldn't have done it without Steven though. He was a huge help. We arrived Saturday morning for the rehearsal and rehearsal picnic. Then ventured into Portland for dinner at Deschute's Brewery with Scott and Kristen, spent the night at Jeremy and Ronnie's new place -- Ronnie just recently moved in and was excited to have visitors -- then spent ALL of Sunday doing wedding stuff before making the long trek home. Shouldn't have been that long of a drive but there was some crazy weekend traffic and it was taking for-e-ver. We finally stopped for dinner in Southern Washington at Azteca. The entire journey home ended up being about 5 hours.

Hilde's in town!!! I love this girl. Actually, she just left for Norway last weekend but she was here for a few weeks and it so fun to get a bit of her precious time in the States. She stayed the night with us in Enumclaw (games and ice cream!!) and then we dropped her off at the train station the next morning. Followed by games at Card Kingdom (Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries. Love it!!) and lunch at The Counter in Ballard.



We spent the rest of the afternoon at the Science Center. They currently have an exhibit all about the science of fear. We tested out this falling machine thing. They video everyone so you can watch all of the "fear faces." It's so crazy to see the same things happening over and over again --- eyes get really wide, eye brows go up, some people clench their jaw together. It's strange to think of fear as scientific but it was a cool exhibit.

 The last Sunday in July I had the pleasure of attending Ronnie's bridal shower! It was a very fun event (and a good excuse to wear a dress). And that evening we celebrated my birthday a couple of days early with family dinner at my mom's house. We had BBQ chicken (I love BBQ sauce. It's the best.) and baked beans and grilled veggies and fruit salad and apple crisp!

Tara came over a couple of days later for a rather odd day in the kitchen -- we made corn ice cream first. Sounded like a great idea to me but it really wasn't. I'm not sure how long I'll let it sit in the freezer before I just throw it away. The ice cream called for 9 egg yolks so then we had to make something else with all of the whites. We settled on butterscotch meringue pie. Also not the greatest idea. The butterscotch pudding layer was actually really tasty when we were making it and it was still hot but was a little too sweet to eat in the pie.

Later that week was my birthday, which was a huge success as seen in the previous post.

This past weekend Mom and Tara and I took in the sunshine with a little walk along the Kirkland waterfront. It was gorgeous! and the sun felt so good. Steven worked a 48 hour shift last Thursday and Friday so I got to have a little sleepover at my mom's house. It's nice to be back in the girls house but always always good to come home to my husband.

We finished our sleepover weekend with a lovely fire and smores. The fire was mostly fueled by Tara's crumpled up old homework... this was the part where she threw in an essay she thought she wanted to keep. She quickly changed her mind as it was engulfed in flames. Mom stayed up all night packing and Saturday morning I dropped the two of them off at the airport bound for Mexico! I'm so jealous. Amanda is off to Europe in a couple of days and Steven's parents are going to Long Beach and Papa and Grammi just got back from Roche Harbor and are going to Montana next week and I'm thinking, what about me? We'll plan something fun soon though... I hope.

So now you should be pretty much up to date. Tomorrow Steven has to work and I get to spend the day with Sue Piehler. We're driving down to Portland to deliver a bed to Jeremy and Ronnie's new apartment. And this weekend we celebrate our first anniversary. Can't believe it's been a whole year already.

Hope the summer is treating you well!