40 days to repent, think on our sins, ponder and strive to do better. it’s a time to reflect on our relationship with God. to consider your journey with Him and challenge yourself to live a more fulfilling life that will give back to those around you.
giving up something for the season is always a big argument in my head. Jesus suffered, so what will i part with to remind me of Jesus’s sacrifices for us? how can i also better myself and become closer with God during this time?
you are dust, and to dust you shall return genesis 3:19
mass this morning was wonderful and a perfect start to the day. fr. ken presided over the service; it was a somber and thought provoking hour. i thoroughly enjoyed his homily about life and death…to look up from the grave and appreciate the world around you. don’t fret about the menial, petty things that can cause frustration within you but truly enjoy life in all it’s glory and positive aspects.
i’m excited for this season of lent..i’m looking forward to working on my commitments, the renewal of myself, and the renewal of all the things around me.
i hope your journey this season is a reflective and fulfiling one!
i was talking with jod the other day when we agreed to go in together on a gift for our friend, dawn.
dawn is pregnant with her fourth child! cray! i can see why, kids are so cute and family is so wonderful, that having little babies is awesome! it’s a lot work but having your own kids is just so adorbs and special!
it was quite cold. damn this polar vortex. the high today was only 7 degrees, ugh. not ideal for my baby girl. i did bundle her up all cute though! olive was ready to face the cold with me! our first stop was pbk. i met jodi and jett there to pick out a gift for dawn. we circled around and around until we finally decided on some really adorable items for the little babes! i can’t wait to give it to her!
after shopping, we skipped on over to panera bread for a quick lunch. i ordered a healthy choice of oatmeal, brown sugar, strawberries, and pecans…yum!! it was sooo good! we nibbled on our food and chatted away the rest of the morning together. we were catching up on the latest gossip, the latest baby talk, and about life in general…so many good changes and fun happenings soon. as always, it’s so good to hang out with jodi and jett. love them both! jett was definitely in the entertaining mood! he threw everything jodi had handed to him on the ground and amused everyone in the restaurant with his shrieks! that’s a cute little baby for ya! the little bugger thought he was so cute, in which he was!
[little babe olive in her bear hooded coat from our cousins kait and sara!]
[my selfie with jett…doesn’t he look amused?!]
[look at that chubby face! jett was grabbing for the phone!]
[jodi and jett]
i had an appointment with our nanny that afternoon, so after a few hours together i had to head out to meet her at our place. we said our goodbyes and parted ways on this cold but very sunny day! hey, at least the sun was shining! a sun shiny day always puts me in a good mood! 🙂
we trekked our way to jay and lori’s house a few weeks ago for a birthday party! it was aj and jake’s birthday! aj turned 7 and jake turned 3; they are getting so big…my how time flies! it doesn’t seem that long ago when i first met aj…he was barely two years old!
we drove and drove and drove to their house {close to a two hour commute!}. we finally got there and the party was in full swing, everyone was already there. the fun part about this party? it was a baby land. lori’s sisters, kari and christi both have little babies! kari’s baby is two days older than olive and christi’s baby is about a month older than both. here’s a crazy fact: gunner and olive are about the same age but he is almost seven pounds heavier than o!!! he was a brick house compared to little olive. wow, i know boys are bigger but wow!
[olive getting ready to party!]
[grandma and olive, the few minutes she let someone else hold her!]
we mingled with everyone and ogled all the babies but poor olive, she was not having it with other peeps holding her! maybe it was overwhelming for her but she was not happy being in other’s people’s arms. she let grandma and grandpa hold her when we got there, but after that? nope. she only wanted to be in momma’s arms. oh olive. you will learn, i cannot come to the rescue like that {um, like when momma goes back to work!}, although i wish i could.
[pizza and salad]
[aj and jake ready for their birthday cake!]
after a dinner of salad and pizza, we had cake and ice cream {it’s a birthday party, duh!}. now this was too funny, when it was time to sing happy birthday to the boys, poor jake had a freak out. little fellow was not in good spirits! as we were singing, he cried and then hid under his chair! so, that is why you only see aj blowing out the birthday candles!
[lol, jake freaked out so aj blew out all the candles!]
[opening up a lot of ninja turtle toys!]
[momma with a tired olive]
it was wonderful to see and hang out with everyone. it’s always great to chill out with family, to see beautiful babies, and celebrate special occasions together!
included in one of those things is dana buying her own place! i am so excited for her, what a grown up thing to do 🙂 she moved in a few weeks ago and we were in limbo on when we were going to visit her. either it was too cold and snowy for me to tote olive around or she had workers coming to her place on her day off and that wouldn’t be a good time as well. so, finally we agreed on a date {not without complications!} and we were able to see her on a thursday night.
hc came home and we relaxed for a bit before we gathered ourselves to head out the door close to 5:30pm. not ideal, due to the high traffic timeframe, but c’est la vie! we pit stopped at starbucks, although it was 5 degrees outside, i wanted an iced coffee. an iced grande vanilla latte to be exact! yum!
we scored rockstar parking in front and trekked our way to the front of the building. there were some residents coming home and they just let us in {at least we didn’t look dangerous…a man, a women, and a baby aren’t threatening!}! the building was gorgeous inside! i loved the entry way. so pretty!
[the foyer]
[dana and moi relishing in her beautiful condo!]
[olive pouting in dana’s new abode]
now this is hilarious! dana is having a good amount of work done on her place. the floors being re-stained, painting of rooms, new kitchen counter tops, window blinds, etc. so, we walked into her bedroom to find this. no, peeps, it’s not a work of art that you see or some might consider it a work of art! she doesn’t have her curtains or have had blinds delivered yet, so she taped up holiday wrapping paper over her window with blue painter’s tape! we could not stop laughing at this crazy looking display! oh dana!
this was too cute. rosie was scared? nervous? curious? over baby olive. she didn’t know what to do with herself. i don’t think rosie had ever seen a baby before! she was freaking out, barking, and pacing like a mad animal! olive was laying on the couch and dana was playing with her. rosie was acting so funny! as dana leaned over to play with olive, rosie kept leaning over her shoulder to see what was going on but she definitely didn’t want to get too close, in fear the baby might attack {lol}. how cute is rosie in this picture?!
[dana’s reading nook]
we got the tour {fabulous}, we relaxed {ahhh!}, and chatted. we absolutely love her place! we are so excited for her and can’t wait to see her complete the decorating {how fun!}
i was very excited to have plans with matt and ande. i absolutely love getting together with them. we are such a fun bunch, if i do say so myself!
we had planned to meet up on division street at prasino but this weather has been atrocious. it snowed the night before and during the day of our plans. after mucho texting with each other, matt suggested that they come over to our place instead. of course, i am not against that at all. it was a nice idea to be able to relax at our place without worrying if we were holding anyone up, since we gab non-stop.
i was all psyched to break out the stroller and traipse my way to the restaurant, since it was only a few blocks away. that meant i could get some exercise and get out but i was foiled by the weather again!
hc was actually working from home that day and took a lunch break when they came by. he met them at a local deli, rosie’s west town, and grabbed some bites to eat, while i stayed in with the babes. they came back and we sat down for some tasty food. ande was excited to see olive {she hadn’t yet met her!} and see her nursery!
i love the sandwiches at rosie’s!! it is so delicious. they have great soups, sandwiches, and desserts. it makes me happy to have such good, local businesses like that around us.
[matt and ande…some very good peeps. love them!]
[matching sweaters!]
[tiramisu and brownie desserts]
[the girls!]
[hc and i relaxing after our visitors. little o was napping :)]
after several hours of hanging out together and catching up on the latest news, it was sadly time for them to part. it was a really, really great visit in so many ways. mostly because of the wonderful news we heard from ande! we had good eats, they got to say hi to the baby, and we had such wonderful things to talk about!
thanks for coming our way for our lunch date! love you guys!
this year for valentine’s day, we had a cozy night in. in our pj’s that is…it was that cozy! we truly had a wonderful valentine’s day together. it was the best one yet!
my, what a difference a year makes! last year, we spent valentine’s day at one of our favorite restaurants, roy’s. you can read about it here. i wasn’t even pregnant with little olive yet either! now look where we are at! blessed with the cutest little cupid ever!
[cutie patutie]
this year, we had dinner at home and i couldn’t have asked for more! we waited for hc to come home that evening; he arrived at the door with a bouquet of beautiful flowers and a sweet, sweet card for me! we relaxed for a bit before hc started his cooking magic. he fancied out the dining room table, opened up a delicious bottle of wine {thank you to terry for the gift}, and started to whip up some amaze appetizers {oh em gee!}. i am a lucky gal!
[the cute card from hc // a few fun, valentine’s from us and others!]
it was a three course meal totally at our pace and comfort, which i was absolutely loving. the three of us sat down to nibble on the savory appetizers hc had made. stuffed artichoke hearts. they were to die for. so stinkin’ good. dangerously delectable. i wanted to eat the entire dish as my entree but i knew some more yummy goodness was on it’s way!
[the fancied up table // the amaze stuffed artichokes]
after noshing on some starters, we continued to sip wine, enjoy each other’s company, and chill in our warm abode. all the food was prepped, so once i started to feed the babes, hc started to cook up our entrees. we then sat down for our main course. words cannot describe how piquant the dish was! i was in love with every bite! i couldn’t thank hc enough for the best meal ever!
[the prepping of the soon to be devoured entree]
after our main course, we then devoured our decadent dessert from alliance bakery! hc had purchased a red velvet heart shaped cake from one of our favorite bakeries, down the street. we sliced it in half and savored every morsel of this rich, moist, sweet, yummy cake.
[olive’s first photo bomb // the wonderful, sweet red velvet cake]
[family selfie! doesn’t olive look amused?!]
it was the best valentine’s day yet. i have had so much fun celebrating it the past several weeks and it ended with a wonderful family night celebration this past february 14 ♥!
much love mes amies!
so now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 1 corinthians 13:13
the other snowy day, we ventured out to the land of nod to take some vday pics! here’s a sample of pics from the photo shoot from this past post!
the store had created a fetching backdrop for the pictures; patterned chairs, heart pillows, and darling stuffed animals to pose around with for the photos! katherine salvatori was the photographer who captured the fun pics for valentine’s day! the photo shoot was quick {the store was quite quiet, making it even better for us to play and shop!} and our afternoon evolved into a great time together.
the pictures turned out quite festive. here are a couple of the charming snapshots:
ya gotta love all of the festive stuff going on here. hearts, dogs, red, pink, oh my!
i love this one of grace. so precious!
happy love day to all! i hope everyone had a wonderful february 14!
i ventured out to my sister’s house this past week to celebrate a little love with the nephews.
i hit the roads during rush hour {ugh}; it was congested but not so bad! i was constantly moving and it didn’t take that long to get there. i was, at first, hesitant to travel out there because it was suppose to snow during the late afternoon, which is a recipe for a driving disaster!
i brought over valentine’s day cupcakes and i set the boy’s presents on the console as i walk in. it was too cute, they kept asking who those presents were for. i told them it was for two boys named reagan and bennett, i asked them if they knew who these two boys were. bennett looked confused but reagan blurted out, “that’s us!”. i told them there are more little boys out there name reagan and bennett, which made them giggle. 🙂
[it’s fat free…yum]
[olive chillin’ while we ate our dinner]
after a healthy dinner of portillo’s, we exchanged presents! it was so fun! i gave the boys their gifts, and they gave olive her gift. thuy had brought the boys and olive presents too! there was a lot of exchanging and gifting going on, the boys screamed out, “is it christmas?!”. lol.
[the boys with their vday presents // s’mores // alien pom growth on r’s face]
kim, r n b, had gotten olive the cutest stuffed animal that came with the most adorable tutu and headband! we dressed her in it and we were just delighted on how darling she looked! it was so precious.
[r + b decorated olive in valentine’s day stickers! // baby’s first valentine // wooden animal blocks]
[love her first valentine’s day card]
thuy had bought olive awesome wooden toys and a lovely outfit {so cozy and cute}. i love wooden toys. i want to stay as close as possible to just buying wooden toys {quite a feat but i’ll try my best!} for olive.
[thuy’s stenciled clutch gift for me! // auntie kim and olive {look at her face and skinny legs!} // adorbs outfit from thuy]
it was a very sweet evening with the family. we had a blast celebrating valentine’s day together. it was filled with lots of love, giggles, and charming fun.
have i mentioned that i loveland of nod?? yes, i did register there but i was in love with this store way before i became preggers.
it’s such a cute, whimsical, fun place.
***
we started out the morning with the hubs. he made banana pancakes topped with shaved chocolate and fresh, sweet bananas. we drenched the pancakes with vermont cinnamon maple syrup…yum! a big shout out to my dear friend olivia, who gave us this wonderful gift for christmas {along with a cook book that hc has used several times…delish recipes!}.
hc then left to go hang out with the bro-in-law, terry. they went to a cider fest at navy pier. so that left me and the kids to have our own fun for the day!
land of nod was offering their customers a chance to take valentine’s day photos with a professional photographer. how awesome! so, i packed up the kids around noon and headed out to the ‘burbs. the one thing that sucked?? it had just started to snow {boo}. that made for some heavy traffic out and i was already running behind {i forgot a crucial component to the bugaboo stroller and i had to turn around 🙁 }
anyhoo. we finally made our way to the store {it was quite pretty, though, with all of the snowfall…i have to find the beauty in the snow that we have been having!!!}. little olive was fast asleep when we got there…i didn’t want to take her out of the stroller {she was a tired peanut}, so grace and i took some photos together and the photographer took some pictures of scrunched face olive in her carseat.
[lol…she looked mad. rockin’ an 8o’s headband look]
after our pictures, the kids played together in the store. there was so much to look at. i was really loving their felt garlands. they had colored pennants, dots, stars, hearts, and clouds! the cloud garland was too darling to pass up, so i purchased one for olive’s room. a perfect addition to her cloud themed chambre.
[thuy just chillin’ at the kids table with her coffee]
[r being cute // photo by thuy]
[b being extra cute // photo by thuy]
we then shopped a bit at pottery barn kids, i had to pick up some gifts for some upcoming events {the next few months for us are going to be busy ones! birthdays, baby showers, vacations, oh my!}. i talked myself out of buying more valentine’s day trinkets {i was totally tempted. i mean, i can always find ways, ideas, or reasons to make or create anything crafty}. pbk has really fun decor but i’m dunzo for now.
after that, we went and grabbed lunch at cpk. the kids had your typical cheese pizza and plain pasta. i split a rustic pepperoni pizza with thuy and kim ordered quesadillas. as we sat there eating at cpk {they have huge windows surrounding the whole restaurant}, i could see that the snow was really coming down! it made me nervous to drive home because of the traffic we would face.
once lunch was done, we traipsed our way over to nordstrom to peruse their departments. i pit stopped at the women’s lounge to change and feed little o. nordstrom has such an awesome women’s lounge! i love their mother’s lounge…a cozy, comfortable place where you can feed the babes. while olive was feeding kim, thuy, and the kids went to west elm to shop around. the kids ended up decorating paper hearts for a good cause!
[the kids decorating hearts at west elm for st. jude’s hospital // photo by thuy]
i ended up going to my parent’s house to avoid the crazy traffic back to the city {i did not want to be sitting in a parking lot with the kids in tow} and thuy so kindly took grace, r + b to go see the lego movie, while kim headed out to finish up some things on her list.
[olive showing off her valentine outfit and her vday ‘beer’ belly // be still my heart…i love her so! // cherokee cardigan and pants, carter’s onesie…similar here]
i did dressed o up in a cute valentine’s day outfit for the so-called ‘sleep’ photos at lon! a soft, minty polka dotted onesie with a little mousey holding a heart balloon, a light pink cardigan, and heart printed pants. i also had her wear a flower headband. baby girl was not happy. she doesn’t like things on her head. but it was so adorbs though!
by late evening, we ended up all together, back at my parent’s house! kim came over after she did a few errands, thuy brought the kids back after the movie, and terry & rich came by after their escapades downtown. we then enjoyed the rest of our night as a family 🙂
