More Wedding (Photobooth) Photos

The two weddings over Labor Day Weekend had drastically different, but fairly standard, photobooth set ups. Backdrop, goofy hats, fun props, etc. And while the pictures are nothing remarkable, they are pretty much all we have to show (as of right now) from the weddings, so I'm going to share them anyway. Maybe once some of the professional photos come back I'll share some of those as well; I know the photographer from my brother's wedding got some pretty great shots of William!

We Survived

One weekend. Two weddings. 550+ miles apart.

We survived, we enjoyed it, but man did we need a few days to recover (and I definitely feel like I could use a few more!)

Saturday my brother got married (finally!!), so we started the festivities on Friday night and then were up and out the door by eight to start preparations for the big day. I was a bridesmaid, Darrell was a groomsman, and William was the ring bearer, so we all had responsibilities to tend to throughout the day (although pretty much all William had to do was look cute, and of course he nailed it). Even though it was pretty busy, it couldn't have been a more perfect day, and we are soooo glad that these two finally made it official!

Sunday we were up bright and early (to the tune of 3:15 am) to drive to Sioux City to catch our flight to Chicago for the wedding of one of my close high school girlfriends. And as if the whole situation wasn't crazy enough, I was also the Maid of Honor. Thankfully, we had no issues with flights or public transportation, and I made it to the hotel in plenty of time to partake in all the pre-wedding festivities (which included getting my makeup professionally done--a must after the early morning we had!). Even though we were exhausted, the dance at this wedding seriously rocked and we stayed out on the floor until midnight--and I daresay we would have stayed longer if the DJ hadn't had to shut things down. I wish these two fools didn't live in London, but we couldn't be happier for them!

I do have some photos of us from the weddings (although right now they are all photo-booth photos because you're kidding yourself if you think we actually remembered to take our own camera out and take photos), but I'll post those tomorrow or next week so I don't completely overload this post. And maybe at some point I'll update things with my pregnancy, considering I'm almost at the halfway point (which--by the way--how is that possible?!?!?). Hope everyone had a great Labor Day weekend!

Weekend Away

I'm actually a week late on this, and I should probably work on getting that last Christmas post put up before it's March or something, but whatever. Last weekend Darrell and I made the trip out to Chicago for a good friend's wedding, and we left William behind with my parents. And I'm happy to say that we all survived the ordeal. In fact, I daresay we all had a good time--we actually enjoyed getting away for the weekend (hitting up the outlet mall near our hotel certainly didn't make matters worse, although I bought more for William than I did for me), and my parents loved all the time with William. And William? Well, he had toys, food, milk, and plenty of loving, so I'm pretty sure he was perfectly content (although he was certainly happy to see Mom and Dad by the time Sunday night rolled around). While we certainly aren't jumping at the bit to leave him for a whole weekend again soon, we will definitely be taking advantage of Grandma and Grandpa's overnight services more frequently!

And just to prove that we did actually have a good time (and because picture-less posts are boring), here's some pictures from the wedding!

Darrell and I being super mature. NBD

Acting boring normal

With Steve and Ashlee, who we carpooled with (and who are getting married in August--Can't.Wait.)

With the beautiful bride!

College buddies--we were all goalkeepers at Wartburg!

So Darrell and I always do these self-portrait shots; it's kind of become a thing. Inevitably, though, someone always asks if they can take the picture for us and we have to awkwardly explain that no, we like the self-portrait look

Photo booth fun!

And even though William doesn't really look like he is enjoying himself too much in this picture, it's the only one I have to share of him from the weekend (apparently my parents didn't feel the need to follow through on our whole "it's okay if you send us a picture every hour or two" request).

Saturday morning pancakes courtesy of Grandpa (and for the record--even though it may look like they were letting him eat the raw batter, supposedly it's just his yogurt. At least that's what I've been told)

The Year of... Weddings?!?

Waaaay back in April of 2012, I posted about how our lives were progressing into their next "cycle". While we were still having a handful of weddings to attend each summer, the number of people who we knew that were pregnant was far surpassing the number of people we knew who were getting married. And that trend continued full-force into 2013, which I dubbed "The Year of the Baby", thanks to not just our own pregnancy but the pregnancies of (at the time) six close friends (and Will and Princess Kate, of course). And after I made that post I learned of one other close friend due with a baby at the end of 2013, and two friends with babies making their arrivals in early 2014. So imagine our surprise when, quite without warning, 2014 turned into "The Year of Weddings". It started innocently enough: a close college friend got engaged in late 2012 and planned a February 2014 wedding. A high school friend set her date for April 2014, just over a year after she got engaged. My brother and Macy got engaged right before William was born and booked their venue for August 2014. And then in the summer of 2013, the proposals started spreading like wildfire. There were two additional college friends who picked dates in August (thankfully, neither are the same weekend as my brother's) and a third college friend who set her date in May. My cousin got engaged and jumped at a rare opening at the venue she wanted in June 2014. A close high school friend got engaged in September, and planned a quick turnaround with an early January 2014 wedding (which, sadly, we had to miss at the last minute due to weather. I'm still incredibly bummed). And then one of my nearest and dearest friends got engaged over the holidays, and is (tentatively) getting married the day after my brother.

Now, don't get me wrong, I couldn't be more thrilled with all of this. I loooove weddings. The only reason I'm even ever-so-slightly bummed is that these friends are pretty much the last of our friends to get married, and they are all cramming themselves into the same year instead of giving me weddings to look forward over the next couple of years. Plus, nine weddings in one year gets EXPENSIVE. And I'm not just talking about gifts. Our weddings are spread out throughout the Midwest, with events in Minneapolis, Chicago, Madison (WI), and Omaha, just to name a few. We're going to log some serious miles on our car in the next nine months. And I couldn't be more excited.

Wedding Fun

Look at me go! These photos are from a wedding that happened LAST weekend (as in, TWO days ago), and I'm already getting them up on the blog! Woot!

Of course, it helped that we had pretty much no plans on Sunday (thanks, in part, to my parents being otherwise busy with stuff), so one of us was always available to watch/hang out with William while the other could get stuff done (and, in moments of great productivity, William was able to entertain himself so we could both get stuff done). So now I don't have as many house "chores" to worry about this week and can actually take some time to get "me" stuff done. Or just play more with William and not feel guilty about it :)

Anyway, enough rambling, here are some of the pictures from the wedding of one of my good friends; we went to school together kindergarten through senior year, and for a good number of years she lived down the street from me. She and her now-husband are currently living in/going to school in Minneapolis (which, ironically, is where five of my nine closest friends from high school have relocated to--and I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a part of me that wished we lived up there too), so we don't always see them as often as we'd like, but the great thing about good, old friends is that we can always pick right up with where we left off no matter how long it's been!



There's a group of ten of us from high school that have all stayed pretty close, as evidenced by the fact that all but two made it to town for the wedding. And the two who were absent had pretty good excuses; one just had a baby on July 25th (although, to be fair, the matron of honor--back center behind the bride--had a baby on July 19th. But she lives in Minneapolis; the other friend lives in NC), and the other (who lives in St. Louis) is due with her second baby in two weeks. You've seen a lot of these faces on the blog before; Katie (far left) got married April 2012, Linda (the Asian) is the one Darrell and I visited in London, Whitney (super cute chevron print dress) hosted my baby shower in the cities (complete with adorable elephant cake), Amy (behind the bride) got married February 2012, Ashley (long silver necklace) is mama to the super adorable Kinley (and has baby number two on the way!) and Hannah (to the bride's right) will show up in almost all of the posts for the other girls (and hopefully will have a wedding post of her own soon--we're all anxious for her boyfriend to pop the question!). I know I've said this before, but I'm so blessed to have such a wonderful group of friends who have (quite literally) been there my whole life (Hannah, Katie, Kristen, and I have known each other since kindergarten--somewhere I have a picture of all of us on the first day of school all those years ago!). There's no doubt that we still cherish and enjoy each other's company all these years later!

I was also determined not to make the same mistake I made at my sister's wedding and not get a family picture, but unfortunately William was not in the mood to cooperate.

William being too cool for the camera

Pause during the photo shoot to clean up a little spit up

William even less interested in the camera

Finally got William looking at least somewhat at the camera only to have the image be out of focus (and have half of William's cute face obscured by his pacifier). Oh well.

And I just have to share this last picture. Not-so-little Kinley (she'll be three in September!) has taken this crazy obsession with Darrell. No joke--she almost had a meltdown during the reception because she came to our table one time looking for him and he wasn't there (he was just in the bathroom, but she thought he had left). So I just had to snap this picture of them hanging out--so precious!

Tim was also trying to get in on the baby loving--although we suspect he was doing that mostly to impress the girl he was
with (and I mean that in the nicest way possible--Tim is like a brother to me so I'm allowed to give him sh*t)

Amanda and Nick's Wedding

Well, it's only a month after the wedding, but I finally got my hands on some pictures (and some free time!) So here's a little bit more about the day I gained my only favorite brother-in-law. I should note that my sister hasn't gotten her pictures from her photographer yet, so once she gets those I'll probably end up posting more pictures (because I'm pretty sure she got some cute ones of William), but for now these will have to do.

What, are you surprised I started with a picture of William? Wouldn't you? Look how cute he is!!

Our "limousine" for the day

Husband and Wife!

My dad and sister busting out some swing dance moves. And we didn't have to call an ambulance for my dad after the dance--major win! (Although the local firemen were tending bar, so he would have been in good hands)

William and I getting our swing on during the father-daughter dance

Love this shot with my favorite little cousins! (They're probably more like second cousins once removed or something... But really, who's keeping track?) 

William getting loved on (there was plenty of this going on all day--spoiled little boy!)

William learning how to do knuckles

Happy little boy (and girl!)

Dance party!

I still have no idea where Darrell found that cowboy (ish) hat, but it came in handy during "The Devil Went Down to Georgia"

No family photo though... It's looking like the shot from the photo booth might be the only one of all three of us (and--really--one of the only ones of Darrell and I together)--whoops!!

Photo Booth Fun

So my sister and Nick had a photo booth at their wedding, and it was the first wedding we'd been to where they had one available. I seriously wish we would have taken more advantage of it... But now we'll know for next time we're at a wedding with one!

This might actually be the only family photo that exists from the wedding. Minor fail

Some families have in-laws.... Our family has out-laws :)

I seriously regret that Darrell and I didn't take a picture like this with William. You had better believe a photo like this is now on my "to-do" list

All of the cousins on my dad's side of the family--love these guys!