Our Easter

Easter + sun + + Samish Island + relaxing on the deck + Joe + Dad + Mom + Uncle Brad + the dogs + a good meal + pineapple upsidedown cake =  Heaven. I tell ya, there's something special about Samish Island. It's like time slows down and let's you savor the moment. 

Hope you're also feeling blessed on Easter Sunday! 

 

The Birthday Girl

Is there a better way to spend a birthday than with family with delicious food and wine? I think not. That's why we all enjoyed Taste of Washington for my Mom's birthday last Saturday. It was A-MAZ-ING! If you're anything like me, you wish you could have a bite of all the best dishes from all of the best restaurants in Seattle, plus a good wine pairing. Well, that's exactly what it was. For three full hours, we were tasting some of the best of what Washington has to offer. At the end, all we could think of was a good, long nap. How does eating and drinking make you so darn sleepy?!

Hope you had a wonderful birthday, Mom! Love you to pieces!

 Taking a little breather before the next round of food and wine pairings.

Seriously, isn't he adorable?

A candle passing

Last Tuesday, I was tricked. Duped. One might call it the smoothest and nicest act of deceit ever. So the story goes: since I'm Personnel Advisor at Chi Omega, I have to go to the chapter on occasion for personnel meetings with the President and Personnel Chair - to talk with members they're concerned with or members who have broken a rule. We've been trying to schedule a meeting with a member for a long time and my advisees finally said they booked the meeting. So Maddie was going to cover for me, but she said she had an appointment. So I asked another advisor who also had a conflict. Technically, I could do the meeting, but it was my only night to be able to run errands, so I was just hoping that someone could cover. But alas, no one could.

So I go to the chapter for the meeting. The Personnel Chair and President said the member was running late, so they asked if I could help them with something in the Chapter Room while we were waiting. So we go down to the chapter room. They open the door and I am about to turn on the light when I see my girls standing there, ready for a candle passing - a sweet little tradition that we do for the newly engaged. My jaw was on. the. FLOOR. I was shocked. It took awhile to understand all the coordination that went into this - seriously, how sweet! So after I got the full scoop - and realized how I made their planning that much more challenging - we decided to all get a drink together at one of our favorite college bars: The Duchess.

It was such a special night. I am incredibly grateful for all of the wonderful friends that Chi Omega has brought into my life. They're pretty amazing. Thank you ladies! And thanks to Maddie for putting up with all the challenges I threw her way in planning :) Love you all!

Truth

Considering my infrequent blogging lately, I felt like this struck a chord. I'm prioritizing a lot over blogging lately, but I promise I'll be back into the swing of things eventually. Just you wait. Hope you're having a great week!

pic/via

Majestic Mount Rainier

I'm not usually one for true nature pictures. I really like paintings or artistic prints of nature, but never have really gravitated to the real deal: nature photography. But when I saw this beautiful picture of Mount Rainier, I started to reconsider my stance on it all. What do you think? And do you prefer photography or paintings or something else completely?

P.S. I also really like these navy floors and wainscoting.
P.P.S. Speaking of art, I still think this is cute.

Outstanding in the field

On Sunday, we celebrated Johan's 5th birthday at Lil' Kickers in Redmond. Let me tell you, just watching 26 little buggers run around, kicking, yelling, laughing, falling - makes me exhausted! They have so much energy. But on the other hand, they are a-DOR-able! Hope you had a wonderful birthday, Johan!

Dreaming

We have a fun, little bonus room right off our bedroom and as you can see, it's a bit lackluster. It's a bit dark, has paneling and well, it has red carpet. It almost has a church cathedral-like feeling. We currently use it as an office/storage hybrid room, but I'm always dreaming up what we might eventually do in that room. Architecturally, it could be beautiful. While the space is a bit smaller, I'm loving the bright white room with wooden beams. The colors and simplicity are perfect. (If only we could have that view too!) At any rate, it's something to file away for the future!

Glamour Shots

We recently got a nicer camera to capture our lives a little more beautifully. We've wanted one since we noticed the difference between my Dad's fancy DSLR and our regular point-and-shoot used on our road trip and Sweden adventure. The DSLR just made everything come to life with the most perfect, balanced colors!

So far, I've taught myself quite a bit and I'm also remembering all of the little tidbits as shared by my Dad and Kathryn. Turns out, Joe doesn't want to always be my subject (but rest assured, I have quite a number of him too!), so my little furballs have been regular subjects. I play with different lighting, aperture and shutter speed to see how the pictures change. My favorite was shooting the ball of yarn with Fifi in aperture priority - focusing on her and then the yarn. The shots are so different, but use the same settings with a different focus. Pretty cool, huh? 

Once the weather is nicer, I hope to go on a few photography adventures to teach myself some more! Until then, don't be surprised if you get more Goose and Fifi shots...