and aiden makes three...

i now pronounce you Mr. and Mrs. Carter!

2009-07-08T12:35:00.000-07:00

we did it! we ran away to Vegas a got married. well i guess technically we didn't really run away. we had this planned for a few months, be we were trying to keep it to ourselves. we didn't want to invite anyone. i didn't want people to get offended cause they weren't invited, so not inviting anyone solved this potential problem. just the 2 of us. the way our relationship began.

may 11, 2009 we made it official. we got married at the little chapel of the flowers at 4 in the afternoon. just us, the minister and the photographer, who was also our witness.

while we were getting ready in our hotel room i felt like i was going to throw up like every 5 minutes. nerves i guess. all of it went away as soon as the limo arrived. now for the rest of our wedding story in photographs. ( i edited all of these , the originals are on my myspace page)

i know this isn't a great picture of it, but i made my head piece. its Russian veiling, a peacock feather ( with an "eye" in the center) 2 peacock feather ( no "eyes"on the sides), some swarovski crystals, 2 white feathers also on the sides and a broach in the center bottom.

i also made Noah's boutonniere and my broach with feathers for my sash

completely devastated

2009-02-05T22:27:00.000-08:00

i just found out that my grandma has small-cell lung cancer. stage 4.

my new nephew!

2008-11-10T14:36:00.000-08:00

born October 18Th, 2008. 7 lbs 14oz. 20 1/4 inches long.

hedgehog or is it hedge hog?

2008-10-22T10:11:00.000-07:00

the other week i was looking online for a costume for Aiden. there are a lot of cute ones out there and some not so cute ones... examples of some not so cute

i personally find this costume to be a rip off. i could just be me though.

and this one... um can you say scary?

i wanna see the parent who would put this on their baby. it looks like he is popping out of the basket ball!

NOW ON TO THE CUTE ONES!!!

this guy is so cute i just want to nom on his little cheeks! flying monkey from wizard of oz

this guy is pretty adorable too. and cause its cold here at night this one would keep him snuggly. bat costume ( i think you know that though)

i saw this one and fell in love with it. isn't this little hedgehog cute!?

it was this one that was my inspiration for Aidens costume. i have most of it made. i KNOW for a fact that it isn't going to look the same. 1. its a different color. the body is brown and has a tan tummy patch/circle 2. Aiden probably wouldn't wear the head so i didn't make one. he is going to have his nose painted and maybe his hair spiked, we shall see about that one though. and 3. the quills/spikes aren't going to look like that. i have the body already made i just have to make the quills/spikes, but they will be two toned.

oh and i also made the ears. they are going to go on a hoodie that will be under the costume. and i think i will leave the ears sewed on cause i love kids with ears on hats and sweaters. i think it looks so adorable.so thats where i am at, now if i could ge tit finished! wish me luck. i will post pictures of aiden in his costume either before we go out or the next day.

christmas in a landfill

2008-09-24T08:13:00.000-07:00

a few Christmases ago i bought Noah a razor. not just any old razor. i hunted and pecked through all of the ones that they had in the store, maybe 10 or so, to pick out the perfect one for him. because he has crazy thick hair, it had to be pretty bitchen. so i found this one...

its self-cleaning, you just have to throw some new liquid in it every now and again. it also has a trimmer in the side, which is probably standard in most razors, but I'm a girl, what the heck am i really going to know about shaving my face. but i thought this razor would get the job done a whole lot quicker, which would make Noah want to shave his face more often, so that i wouldn't have to kiss a man whose face felt like 10 grit sandpaper. i was hoping that he would use it everyday because it was so quick... the joke was on me, once a week still, if i was lucky.

so yesterday i was searching through a box underneath my bed and came across 2 bottles of the cleaning solution, so i put it on the counter in our bathroom. later that night i tell him that i took them out as we are both standing in the bathroom.

me:"look what i took out for you. where is the razor?"

Noah:"oh i threw it out."

m: "what do you mean you threw it out?"

n:"well i haven't used it in a while, so i threw it out."

m:" you threw it out?"

n:"ya."

m:"what do you mean you threw it out?" i seriously did not believe him

n:" the last time i used it, it was pulling the hairs"

m:"so you just threw it out? that was like a $5 part! it could have been fixed!! and you threw it out?!"

n:"well walmart doesn't carry them anymore."

m:"YOU CAN BUY THEM OVER THE INTERNET! i found them online, remember?"

n:"oh."

m:"i can believe you just threw it out! that was a few hundred dollars! and you just threw it out! how long ago?"

n:"like a week ago"

so i was seriously debating going out to the trash can, that was going to be picked up tomorrow, to go search for it. it was only a $5 part, that's all that it needed. a $5 fix on a $200 razor, and he just threw it out! i was SO mad about this last night that it was all that i could think about. so a wee bit later i ask him "well like HOW long ago? a few days or like a few weeks?" he tells me "a few weeks" well its a good thing that i didn't go searching for it in the garbage.

the thing that upsets me the most is that it was a Christmas present. i didn't have $200+ dollars just laying around so i had to put it on lay-away, i did some searching to make sure that it would be one that he used and liked. i thought that i did a good job. i was pretty upset and hurt that he just thoughtlessly threw it into the garbage. and its not like we have the money to just buy him a new one. even if he didn't like it we could have sold it on eBay and got a little bit of money back. if i would have know that he was even THINKING about throwing it out i would have stopped him.

i was so mad last night, i could have beat him.

guess what i got for my birthday!?!!

2008-09-08T08:43:00.000-07:00

the stomach flu! hooray for birthday presents.

i think i found my wedding invites

2008-08-30T13:06:00.000-07:00

Isn't it gorgeous?!click it!! its clickable! :0) it is letter pressed. and it is exactly how i want them to look, color, wording, everything. but it will cost a small fortune. good news is that it is only 1 color and not 2 . 2 colors would have been a lot more. now all i have to do is find a local company that letter presses. do you know of anyone that is cheaper than $1000 for 75 invites? i think it's wrong when the invites cost as much,if not more, than the food or d.j. i could use all of the help i can get. who /what did you use when you got married?

PART 2 of S.P.A.W... the location

2008-08-21T08:07:00.000-07:00

The place is called River Oaks Hot Springs. to the right is River Oaks Golf Course and to the left is River Oaks Hot Spring and Spa. so its a little confusing if you are looking for it. but its gorgeous. above is Noah and Aiden walking down towards the huge pond/mini lake.

this is the gazebo. you can get married here. its cute, but not really my style. its on the property so it is still an option.

view from the gazebo looking left

view from the gazebo looking right

this is the amphitheater. it is most likely where we would want to get married at. this is looking out towards huge pond/mini lake. i think it is really pretty.

view from the bottom of the amphitheater looking up. its on a slight hill, so we would try to figure out how to seat everybody without chairs( they aren't allowed on the hill). maybe with rows of fabric that everybody could sit on so the wouldn't ruin their dresses and slacks. oh and if we choose to have it here its probably going to be a semi-casual wedding( though no jeans please) so everybody isn't dressed to the nines and having to walk around in the grass getting their heels stuck. i know from experience from a few weddings i was in.

this is the pavilion where the reception would be held.

looking in toward the kitchen.

I'm in the same spot, but now looking out towards the pond/lake. gazebo left amphitheater center.

side view of the pavilion.

this fan is towards the kitchen. it is huge! i guess why the company is called big ass fans. funny.

this is a sneak peek at what I'm doing for Alicia's baby shower. they are coffee filter roses. her shower / I'm turning 27 is in 2 weeks! 2 WEEKS I'm kind of freaking out a bit. hopefully everything will come together nicely, if not God help me that it does.

because it could happen to you

2008-08-15T16:13:00.000-07:00

you can find all of these pictures and WAY more right HERE

send me my birthday money early 'cause i'm spending it on Alicia!

2008-08-13T09:05:00.000-07:00

J/K but not really. the just kidding is about sending money. and the not really is because any extra money i have is going towards my little sister's baby shower, which happens to be on my birthday. oh and gifts i want to make her too. i found so many cute ideas on another blog that i read called homemade by Jill and i think she found these ideas on other blogs. there are some amazing ideas.

isn't this cute?! the instructions make it look super easy to do.

and this guy too, looks super easy to make

stroller quilt, ties on the top and the bottom folds under and buttons

so you can keep the baby's feet warm

crib rail guard, really cute

happy birthday banner, just might turn into a "welcome baby Wild" banner

this one doesn't look so easy but i really like it!

i LOVE this idea! the baby wont be able to use for at least 3 more years, so I've got plenty of time to make it

this one too! crayon roll, baby wont need it for a few years

burp cloths, i think these are really easy too

next post: planning Alicia's baby shower :0)

because i would NEVER want this at my babyshower cake

2008-08-11T12:06:00.000-07:00

this, i stumbled across at this great website called cake wrecks. she shows these crazy cakes that people have actually PAID FOR. that one of the rules, that it has to be made by a "professional" i use the term loosely, because wait til you see these cakes. there is a wedding cake in there that will make you want to cry. cause if that was me on my wedding day i would be so upset/angry. and i would do exactly what the bride did.

some of the cakes are pretty crazy. if i was a baker i would never do something like that and then send it to the customer knowing that they probably wont like it. if you know me then you know how crazy i am when i make stuff. i have to make sure its perfect. i dont like to half-ass anything or it will eat at me until its done right. so check out her website and if you come across any crazy cakes let her know. she will most likely post them on her page!

3 weeks and not a peep A.K.A. a REALLY long post

2008-08-04T13:17:00.000-07:00

out of the 3 weeks that I've been M.I.A. from blogging, i have been pretty busy. i had my nephew for 2 of those weeks. my sister wanted to go to vegas for a week without kids so i took Kyle and Alexis' dad took her. Kyle is a boy who likes to stay busy. he is almost 8 and has A.D.D. so when i say busy i mean, wanting to do something new EVERY 10 minutes. so while he was here we did all kinds of things. there was no staying home and being lazy( OK MAYBE there was, just a little bit).

my sister drove him down from lake Isabella after she got off work, so they didn't get here until that evening. i had just gotten back from the water park ( it was $10 for me and Aiden was free, couldn't pass it up) and thought that kyle would REALLY love to go. it was being built when he was here last year, and i told him last year "oh, well maybe next year". so this was "next year" and he doesn't forget anything. so we HAD to go, i couldn't get around it. when he finally gets to my house, i let him know that we will go sometime during the week, probably Monday or Tuesday. that was my first mistake. all day Sunday he kept asking me how many more days till we go to the water park. or the one that drove me crazy, he would say " i wish we were( insert something OTHER than what were are doing here)". FINALLY the day comes. he is excited beyond belief. i guess if i were 7 and got to go to the water park all day, i would be excited too!

excited!

too bad you cant really see kyle's face

smiley guy

not so smiley guy. he didn't want to be held by kyle

handsome little man

this one i called the toilet bowl, cause you go down the tube then you spin around the inside then it shoots you out of the bottom into a little pool of water.

this is what kyle wanted to go down last,he said. can you see him in between the 2 slides, ya that tiny little speck? that's kyle. you might need to click on the picture to really see him. once he got up there it must have looked too crazy cause he didn't end up going down the slide, just back down the stairs. i kind of don't blame him.

but in kyles defense, he did go down these 2 million times. i think he said that he liked the red one more. top of the slides.....

......bottom of the slides.

the rest of the week i ended up watching my friends kids while she was at work. so he had a 4 year old boy(Ryin) to play with and Aiden had a little girl(Ellie) 2 months younger than him to play with. the boys had a water gun fight, made a huge mural with chalk on the back porch and watched a ton of movies. and of course, i have NO pictures. way to go auntie!

on to the weekend! we originally were supposed to go up to Etna for Noah's grandparents 50Th wedding anniversary/ family reunion, but money was tight so we had to change our plans and tell everybody we weren't going to make it. that's why i took kyle for the week cause i thought that we weren't going to drive all the way up there. well Noah's mom calls and gives us gas money to make it up there. this was mid week AFTER i already had taken kyle. kind of short notice. i was stressing out about the drive. 535 miles & 9 hours in a car with a crazy toddler and a 7 year old boy with A.D.D. , not my idea of fun . plus i knew i was going to have to be the one sitting in back with them both. Mitch and Noah in the front cause they were switching off driving. lucky for me, my car has a DVD player in the back so that was one crisis averted. whenever we stopped to get gas i would let them out so that they could run around and get some energy out.

on the way there

that would be the sun. it was so smokey on the way up

if you can see through all of the smoke, that is lake Shasta. which looked REALLY low.

black butte summit

Mt. Shasta through all of the smoke

almost there and he is getting restless.

FINALLY we get there, its about 9:30 pm. we, like everybody else, are sleeping in tents. luckily Noah's mom already set ours up so we didn't have to set up tents in the dark. she also set up an air mattress for me and Noah . score! his grandparents have ten acres up in Etna. 2 huge grassy pastures, everybody camped on one with tents and motor homes. the other pasture was for games. they have horseshoe pits and boccie ball to keep us busy. they also have a projector and screen for movies once it gets dark. that was really cool. and to help me keep kyle busy there was a swimming pool, and 10 mules. Noah's grandpa runs a mule pack/trail riding business. i think that explains it right. oh and to keep the grown ups busy after all the kiddies went to bed the was PLENTY of alcohol.

mule rides to keep him busy.

2 of many tables for the party

playing in the tent.

we spent a short weekend up there. i wish we could have stayed longer, just so i could get to see what all it has to offer. the ride home was a little more pleasant than the ride up, thank god.

on to the next week! we started off this week with the fair. it comes to town for about 2 weeks and has a day where the kids are free. can you guess which day we went? kids day! they have all kinds of stuff on kids day.home depot does some thing every year. last year the kids got to choose out of about 5 things to build Alexis (who was here last year) and kyle chose to build a wooden boat. this year they got to choose to decorate a kids size home depot smock or to decorate a piece of tile. kyle want to do the tile. he painted it to look like the American flag. the tile was shaped that way so it worked out perfect. i did get a picture of it... but its on my phone. next we saw my friend Brian at the fireman's booth. he showed the kids around the fire engine. kyle got to sit in the drivers seat.

kyle got to sit in the drivers seat.

Aiden got to meet Smokey the bear. i used to work for the Forest Service in high school so Smokey will always hold a special place in my heart.

every year they always have some kind of eating contest. last year it was a hot dog, kyle placed 3rd! this year it was an ice cream eating contest. we looked everywhere to find it. even ask the information booth. we couldn't find it. but we did find the face painters!

kyle got his face painted with an awesome looking spider!

last year they had a cake decorating thing for the kids and i told kyle that we could do that again. too bad we wandered around for ever looking for the ice cream thing and we missed it! arrgh. but we had fun while we were there. though i didn't get to eat any of the yummy fair food i normally get. i only got a corn dog that i had to share with a starving toddler, so not much for me. i wish i could have had a funnel cake or maybe even one of those yummy cinnamon rolls with the cream cheese frosting. looks like we will just have to go to the fair when its in Bakersfield.

for the rest of the week we pretty much stayed home but did a lot of fun things. we had a water balloon fight 2 days in a row. Noah even got to join in on one of those days. we let the dog out to play in the front yard,let her chase a football while Mitch, Michelle, Noah, Kyle, Aiden and myself were all playing out front. Michelle's 18Th birthday was the week before and i promised her a cake so kyle got to help me with that. she loves pink and she loves zebra so this cake was perfect for her.do you see that dark spot on the top right? Aiden touched the cake and i had to smooth it out at the last minute

homemade butter cream icing and cake recipe you can find here. incase you are wondering, that is strawberries and whipped cream in between each layer.

on to the second weekend! finally my sister gets here on saturday, again after work so she didnt get here till the evening. i made her dinner so that we would have to go out to eat and haul all of the kids around. the next morning she had promised kyle that we would go to the beach, so after a yummy breakfast of pancakes, eggs, bacon and 2 kinds of muffins( blueberry and lemon poppyseed) we loaded everyone up and headed down to pismo. while we were there we saw 3 DOLPHINS!!!! i was so excited to see them, that of course i didnt get any pictures of them playing in the surf and doing tricks.but i did bring my camera. now for some pictures of pismo fun!

Noah and Aiden

Aiden being silly

Kyle

my sister is going to kill me for this one. but she doesnt read my blog so she wont even know. this is a picture of her (yvonne), her dad mike, her daughter Alexis ( top left) and kyle (top right).

so thats how i spent a good chunk of july. what did you do?

semi-planning a wedding....... the dress

2008-07-08T14:59:00.000-07:00

when we first got engaged and were planning our wedding (some time ago) this was the dress that i found and fell in love with. the detail was just amazing to me. the beading and that bustle were oh so pretty and because i didn't want something too princessy and poofy this dress was perfect. until i tried it on. i had just given birth to my handsome son not more than 4 months before, so needless to say i wasn't the shape/size i wanted to be. with my lovely mom pouch in the front and beautiful back rolls showing through the see through back of the gown, i was the picture of not-so loveliness. i was devastated. i drove all of those miles to get THIS dress and now it wasn't a option.

so i ended up buying a dress, after trying on what felt like a million, but i am still not 100% about it.

i wanted something sleek and stunning, and not a dress that i had to have 10 girls hold up just so i could go pee. i have been looking around and have totally fell in love with the 30's and 40's old Hollywood glamor gowns. I've been looking on wedding websites, photographer websites and realized that this was the bride i wanted to be. not a cupcake bride, not a country bride, not a goth in a purple wedding dress bride (I've seen it and it's hideous), those are not my styles. i wanted a timeless look, i didn't want my grand kids to be looking through my wedding album and by snickering at me, like I'm doing to ALL of the 80's brides( that was SOME hair and lace back then wasn't it).

also while looking around i fell in love with 2 things this gorgeous ostrich wrap

and these types of veils, cage veils i think they are called

i really love the ostrich wrap because 1. it will cover my tattoos for the photos, 2. it just beautiful, and it beats that whole sash around my shoulders bit. and 3. it just adds even more to the old Hollywood glamor effect I'm going for. so there is where i am on the dress for my wedding. what do you think?

semi-planning a wedding...... the location.

2008-07-03T11:22:00.000-07:00

isn't this what you start with first? or is it you pick a date first? either way, I've got nothing. i know what i want.... or do i? well i like garden style weddings. i think that they are beautiful and there are a couple of location around here that fit my liking, like this one.... Hummingbird House....

or like this one.... Rancho Llano DE Los Robles.....

then there is another part of me saying that because I'm in wine country why cant you have it at a winery? a lot of the places are VERY pretty. the perfect time to have one would be in the fall, but for us that is a bad time of year.... everyone in our family has a birthday in the fall/winter. but the problem for me is how pricey it is. i know of one that is so pretty, but because it is also a bed and breakfast, you have to rent the whole place( rooms included) if you are going to have a wedding/reception past 4 pm. like to the tune of 30k. too rich for my blood . at most of the wineries you can only drink their wine and champagne (understandable, they run a business not a charity)and you can't have hard alcohol ( i thought this was a celebration) and some allow beer (whoo hoo). it 's not a huge deal i know, but my family isn't the wine type so now this REALLY wouldn't work.

but there is also the beach. we live SO CLOSE to the beach , it would almost be a crime not to do it there. but there are a few things detouring me from this option. 1. the weather, it can be so unpredictable. windy, foggy, rainy, extremely hot. 2. you couldn't have a reception there, so that's 2 sets of directions you have to give people who have already driven hundreds of miles to see you. 3. there are miles of beautiful coastline how could i pick just one spot.

argh. too many choices for this very indecisive mind of mine. help!