Weekend happenings.

This weekend started off looking a little iffy, since Dylan woke up Friday morning with a nasty cough and a fever of 101. Luckily, his fever went away quickly and he was ready for some weekend fun. 

Here are a few looks at our weekend- playing outside in the leaves, going to Hee Haw Farms, and hitting up the ward Halloween party.

A few thank you notes.

Dear Sweet Spirit at church,


Thank you for leaving this beautiful mark and dent on my car door. Even though you did not leave a note on my car to identify yourself and/or offer to pay for the repair, Jesus knows who you are. Bless your heart. 

Dear President Uchtdorf, 
Thanks for giving such great talks that tell me exactly what I need to hear. Also, thanks for being a Silver Fox. Aaaaaaand I'm going to hell for typing that. 

Dear Kate Middleton/Duchess Kate,
Thank you for being absolutely fabulous. You seem like such kind and genuine person, and your style is impeccable. If you ever need an American bff, please call me.

Dear Dylan,
Thank you for being such a sweet little boy. You bring me joy every single day.

Lately.

What I'm reading:

What I'm watching:

{Friday Night Lights. Best show ever.}

What I'm loving:

My new gadget. I'm in love. Seriously, face time has changed my life! It's so wonderful to see my family every day without having to be on Skype in my basement.

What I'm loving part 2:

 Instagram! So much fun! Oh, and Dylan. Love him lots. 

The weekend.

As always, the weekend flew right by. I had things going on both Friday and Saturday, and we have finally reached the end of our three weeks of being busier than usual. Now the only thing on our books is Halloween in a few weeks. I love not having anything that I have to do!


Here are a few bits about my weekend...


1. I hosted Bunco on Friday, which was a blast. I cooked the delicious pulled pork that I've talked about previously and also the M&M cookies. Since it is so close to Halloween, all of the players were required to dress up. I was a leopard, complete with ears and a tail. I even drew on some whiskers. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures... and it was at my house!


2. I got my sorry self to the gym on Saturday morning. I ran with more intensity than usual, which kind of kicked my butt for the rest of the day. Whew. 


3. Dylan was invited to his best pal's 2nd birthday party, which was really fun. Dylan was all about the festivities, like the pinata and singing "Happy Birthday."

4. I may have watched the Kim Kardashian Ridiculous, Over the top Wedding Extravaganza on Saturday night. I'm aware that this show is completely scripted, but I cannot get past how overdone everything was. Made me a little sad for Kris Humphries, to be quite honest. And I didn't like the headpiece, or any of her dresses. Take that, Ryan Seacrest.


5. Dylan learned how to climb out of his crib on Sunday! Blast! Let's hope this doesn't destroy his lovely 3 hour naps. 


6. I also ate my weight in candy and baked goods on Sunday. Not good for the tush. 

October Birchbox!

My first Birchbox arrived on Tuesday, and I was so excited! Seeing that hot pink box in my mail brought me more joy that it probably should have, and it didn't disappoint. 

Here's a look at what I received in my first box:

1. Korres body butter

2. blinc mascara

3. The Laundress delicate wash

4. Caudalie night cream

5. Stila eyeshadow

I've tried everything except for the delicate wash so far, and I love it all! I don't know what I'm going to do when I run out... these Birchbox people are smart, because they get you hooked to all these fancy products and then you want to buy them when you run out. I really want to get a full-size version of the night cream, but at $68 for 30 ml I think that it'll have to wait. Blast.

I've heard of a few other people getting their Birchboxes and I'm surprised at the difference in the boxes! I thought that everyone got the same thing, but nope. You fill out a beauty profile and your box contents is customized for you.

If anyone is interested in signing up for Birchbox (just $10 each month), let me know- I want to get referral points :)

Dylan turns two: The party.

The weather was not great on the day of the party. It was freezing and rainy for the better half of the morning and it looked like we were going to have the party inside. Luckily, it stopped raining and warmed up by the afternoon, so the party was outside! 

Here are some pictures from the day:

 It was so windy that I couldn't get the candle to stay lit! Dylan ended up blowing out an unlit candle, but didn't know the difference. Yay, Dylan!

There were a few games: 1. Snake toss ("There's a snake in my boot"- get it?) 2. Pin the tail on the donkey

Yes, we did another bounce house. Ben is still shaking his head. The bounce house almost didn't happen, as the company had lost our order. (btw, the exact same thing happened last year with a different company!)I called them when they were 45 minutes late (still an hour before the party) and learned they had no record of my reservation, despite me having an invoice. They ended up coming at 3:45 with a dragon bounce house. It wasn't what I ordered, but I was so irritated at the company that I would have taken a princess bouncer if they would just get it to my house, dangit! So call Jumptown for your bounce house. Or don't.

Everything was great in the bounce house... until Dylan pulled out the power cord while there were still children inside! A few kids suffered short-term emotional trauma as a result. 

Dylan and his best pal P. When they first saw each other they ran screaming to each other. It was adorable. Dylan opened his gift right away and then was ready to play!

After consuming more sugar in two hours than he had consumed all week, Dylan's party was over. It was so much fun and I can't wait until next year's party!


Thanks again to everyone who came to Dylan's party!

Dylan turns two: The decorations.

I started planning Dylan's birthday party a few months ago (ok, really planning. I had been bouncing ideas around since the day after his first birthday party). For awhile I thought that Dylan would love an Elmo themed party, but from 18 months on he has been fixated on Toy Story, and so a Toy Story party was born. I didn't want the party to be 100% commercial Toy Story, so I focused on Woody, Jessie, and Bullseye and mixed in a cowboy theme as well. 

I found the cutest invites by Posh Tot Parties on Etsy. They were quick and easy to work with, and they had a lot of cute options. 

Then I went about finding a party decorations package. For Dylan's 1st birthday I made everything myself, and I realized that I could cut out a lot of time by finding some custom ready-made decor. 

I picked a package from KidsPartiesRock on Etsy and they customized everything for Dylan. The banner, centerpieces, food labels, water bottle labels... pretty much everything came from that custom package. 

Here are some pictures of the party decor:

 I went with the cowboy theme, which in my mind meant burlap, cow print, and bandanas. I stuck with red and yellow as accent colors, since the colors are both in Woody and Jessie's outfits. 

 The M&M cookies were home made using the recipe from Little Miss Momma. They were so delicious and worth the effort! The other cookies were from Costco. 

 The cupcakes were also home made and turned out great. I had a lot of people ask me if I got the cupcakes professionally done and I'm proud to say that they were done by me and my mom. 

I wanted to have veggies at the party, as some people didn't want to consume only sugar. I tried to play to the interest of the kiddos by having carrots and cucumbers in a little cup with ranch on the bottom. 
We also picked up some pizzas from Papa Murphys. I thought that 4 large pizzas would be too much food, but every piece was eaten!

 The party favors were sheriff stars and bandannas for all of the kids, which went along with the cowboy theme. A few adults wore them too!

Another favor was Hershey Bars. I loved that we had a custom wrapper, so everything stayed with the theme!

Here is the delish store-bought cake. I wanted to make a little cake for Dylan, but with time constraints we went with a cake from Target's bakery. It worked out great though and was the perfect with the little centerpiece that I found from the Disney Store. 


Coming next- Dylan turns two: The party.

Calling all cowboys.

Dylan had his 2nd birthday party, and boy was it fun. Here's a little preview:

More pictures coming soon. Thanks to all the family and friends who helped us celebrate!

The time that Dress Barn saved my life.

Last Saturday was the wedding of one of Ben's oldest friends. By oldest, I mean they've been friends since they were babies.... not like the friend is an old man or something. Anyway...

Ben was in the wedding party, so he didn't have to worry about what to wear (not that he would fret over it anyway), but I started thinking about what to wear at least a month before the wedding. I wanted something new for the wedding, which meant that it was time to start shopping.

I started at Kohls, as they often have really cute dresses for good prices. No dice. I found a lot of cute dresses, but they were all about 2-3 inches too short. Baaaah. I went to Target, but nothing really jumped out at me. 

I continued at Soel and Apricot Lane (two boutiques at the River Woods) and was again facing the same issue- lots of cute things, all too short. Not to be discouraged, I continued on to the mall.

Nordstrom was too expensive, Express was too trampy, Forever 21 was too short, Blend was too short... my oh my, I was starting to lose my steam. I found a promising dress at Macys, but it was a little more than I wanted to spend. I put it on hold in case all else failed. 

At this point, I was ready to give up. After a million stores and 5 hours of shopping, my hair looked like a rat's next and I was ready to buy a potato sack and wear it to the wedding. 

And this is where Dress Barn comes in. Also known as the store with the most unattractive name ever.  Honestly, the president of Dress Barn should have named the store Potato Sacks or Ugly Stick, because anything sounds better than Dress Barn. I think that I went to the store once in my life, because my mom dragged me there. You see how enthusiastic I was about this store?

Lemme tell you, this store has redeemed itself. Tons of modest, non- potato sack dresses for cheap! Not the highest quality fabric, but I wasn't looking for something that would last forever- I just wanted it to work for the wedding. I found a great dress and it was cheaper than anything I had tried anywhere. I was so excited that I may have scared the sales girls just a little bit. 

Here's a picture of me and the hubs at the wedding. I got my dress, necklace and earrings from Dress Barn, all for under $50. Wahoo!

I know this isn't the best picture of my dress, but you get the idea.

Bottom Line: Don't always judge a store by the extremely unattractive name. You may miss out on a great dress.