freckles and blondie

Happy Holidays!

2011-12-16T08:00:00.000-08:00

Blondies Knits: Cowls Are The New Scarves

2011-11-30T18:47:00.001-08:00

This was an experiment. And it turned out awesome. I see more cowls in my knitting future.

Blondie's Knits: Experiments

2011-11-10T10:42:00.000-08:00

It seems like I'm on a new experimenting roll. First I finally stitched together (ableit roughly) the pieces for the bag and hand embroidered a little heart. Then I worked on my first cable knit hat!

What did I learn? Cableing a hat sure shrinks the width of it!

Blondie's Knits: Fall Hats

2011-10-22T21:51:00.000-07:00

We have not posted many crafting projects recently because well, we've just been plain busy. With all the travel we've been doing I have managed to squeak in two new knit hats. The one on the left is 100% soft and wonderful cotton and the one on the left is a sea cell and merino blend.

Viadoom

2011-10-22T20:22:00.000-07:00

The big story here in Seattle is that the Viaduct, part of Highway 99, is closed for the next two weeks which will likely cause major traffic jams throughout the area. They're tearing down the southern half of the viaduct and gave the public an opportunity to take one last walk on it this morning.

We will miss the Viaduct when it's gone, it's a beautiful drive and a super easy way for us to get around.

It was quite a trip walking around up there with no cars. A fun opportunity for sure.

One of the neatest parts was that they were giving away pieces of the Viaduct! They were actually starting to demo it while we were there and watched a tractor dump a fresh load of debris for the crowd to pick over. We came away with a 10+ foot piece of rebar and a small block of concrete.

Year 1

2011-10-02T08:00:00.000-07:00

Happy First Wedding Anniversary to Us!

And End of Summer Harvest

2011-09-14T19:46:00.001-07:00

I'm sure we've got at least another two good harvests yet to come, but this was certainly our biggest to date!

Jasper, Banff, Kootenay, & Glacier

2011-09-02T23:59:00.000-07:00

Athabasca River in Jasper National Park

Lake Louise from the Plain of Six Glaciers in Banff National Park

Near the Paint Pots in Kootenay National Park

Grinnel Glacier Overlook in Glacier National Park

Sushi at Home

2011-09-02T23:44:00.000-07:00

Our treat to ourselves on the first Sunday home from our camping trip. Made possible by fresh ikura and salmon from Loki Fish at the Ballard Farmers Market. Also, no sushi meal is complete without green tea.

August Garden Update

2011-08-08T19:20:00.000-07:00

Our garden is really coming along. We've picked two massive cucumbers, some blueberries, mint, and chamomile. Our chives are also constantly being used! Everything is growing so well.

We've also added lingonberries and "Pink Lemonade" blueberries to the mix!

Project: Plant Bench

2011-08-08T19:18:00.000-07:00

Our plants were starting to take over all our chairs on our back porch. So Zeke built a wonderful bench for them! I'm hoping eventually he'll make another one for sitting!

Kitchen Cafe Curtains

2011-07-04T11:31:00.000-07:00

Since we're not planning to move anytime soon, we've started to make little improvements to the house here and there. Replacing the old (and broken) mini-blinds with cafe curtains was our first step.

We bought a nice warm wood colored curtain rod and some cotton fabric from our favorite fabric store. Admittedly, this project took us two attempts. The cutting board we have wasn't big enough to easily measure the fabric and we had to do all the cutting on the floor (not the easiest place to measure things well).

We followed some basic instructions on making the 3 different kinds of edges you need for a curtain of this type and learned that ironing folds before sewing them makes such a difference!

Next up, curtains for our big living room window.

From Our Garden

2011-06-28T19:24:00.000-07:00

Our Wedding Is In A Magazine!

2011-06-22T18:33:00.000-07:00

Screen Capture from Eco-Beautiful Weddings

Our wonderful and awesome photographer Claire submitted our wedding to Eco-Beautiful Weddings, an online & print magazine specializing in green and DIY type weddings!

Check out the Summer 2011 Edition here, we're on page 86-88!

And yes, we know there is a little typo in there...

Our Garden At 1+ Month

2011-06-01T21:24:00.000-07:00

Even with not the warmest temperatures ever our garden is trucking along! We've also added some new plants;

Artichoke
English Lavender
Carving Pumpkin
Pansies
BBQ Rosemary
Sun Sugar Tomatoes
Jalapeno

Our romaine was being nibbled away by some kind of creature, so we put up a cage around that planter. The arugula, dill, tomato, and tea plants are growing like weeds. And we're getting swiss chard sprouts from the seeds we planted!

Slow Cooker Sundays: Apple Butter

2011-05-15T20:39:00.000-07:00

14 small to medium apples (we used a random assortment of pink lady, fuji, gala, and granny smiths)

2 tbsp vanilla extract

3/4 cup dark brown sugar (use more if you like it sweeter, most recipes seem to call for at least 2 cups)
2 tbsp cinnamon
1 tbsp ground cloves

Peel and core the apples. We used this handy tool because it also slices the apples up into smaller chunks.
Place the apple slices/chunks into the slow cooker and add the 2 tbsp of vanilla.
Cover and cook on low for 8 hours.
Mash the apples with a potato masher and stir in sugar, cinnamon, and ground cloves.
Cover and cook on low for 6 hours.
Let the mixture cool and then use an immersion blender to smooth out the remaining apple chunks.

Toasts, Excellent Toasts

2011-05-13T20:53:00.000-07:00

I don't think we need a lot of description here to describe the toasts at our wedding. Just looking at everyone's faces gives the perfect description.

If you're wondering what that pink substance is in everyones glasses, we toasted with pomegranate cider!

Wedding Slideshow & Restarting the Wedding Photo Posts

2011-05-11T21:45:00.000-07:00

I just watched our wedding slideshow again and realized that we never posted the link here, so there you go. Posted.

I also just realized that I sort of stopped posting about our wedding since we got back from our New Zealand Honeymoon. Since I already posted about our ceremony, the big group picture, and our scrumptious dinner it looks like the next post up should be about the toasts! And then we can get into the crazy awesome dancing pictures!

So stay tuned for the rest of the wedding posts!

And after that I'll have to finally start working on the slideshow/film that I've been promising everyone from our New Zealand trip. But first I have to sort the 1,600 photos down to a manageable couple of hundred.

Birthday Banner

2011-05-08T11:28:00.000-07:00

We celebrated Zeke's birthday yesterday and I made another banner out of the burlap & jute bunting that we originally made for the wedding. I followed pretty much the same instructions as I did for the holiday banner except I used navy blue cotton fabric with cream colored thread.

Since we still have a lot of bunting left to use, perhaps I'll put some time in to actually making a tutorial one of these days...

Naturally Dyed Easter Eggs

2011-04-25T10:53:00.000-07:00

We used these instructions from Apartment Therapy to dye eggs naturally! And the results were pretty great for a first try!

Step 1: Hard boil eggs and set aside to cool.

Step 2: Roughly chop up purple cabbage and place in a large pot with enough water to cover the cabbage and to completely cover the number of eggs you plan to dye. Bring to a boil and cover and simmer for about 30 minutes. Set outside to cool to room temperature.

Step 3: When the pot and contents have cooled, strain contents into a flat bottomed pot or jar large enough to submerge the eggs in. Add about 1/2 cup vinegar (all we had was Apple Cider Vinegar) and stir to combine.

Step 4: Place the eggs in the mixture and place in refrigerator. We let ours sit overnight.

A couple observations to consider for next time...
- The un-dyed spots you see on the eggs were the sides siting on the bottom of the pan.
- I picked the eggs up out of the dye matter with tongs and it appears to have scraped the dye off! So next time I'll be more gentle!
- Apartment Therapy suggests rubbing the outsides with a bit of olive oil and I bet that would be a good idea too!

Our 2011 Spring Garden

2011-04-21T20:23:00.000-07:00

We've started off the spring with a tea plant, romaine lettuce, chives, dill, thyme, sage, chamomile, mint, rhubarb, blueberries, arugula, and tarragon!

More Spring Blooms

2011-04-21T19:22:00.000-07:00

We've got tulips spouting everywhere! These beautiful pink ones are blooming in our front yard.

And brilliant red ones in the back.

Fiordland National Park

2011-04-03T20:11:00.000-07:00

I think Fiordland National Park on the South Island of New Zealand is the most beautiful place that I've ever been to. It's hard to imagine some place more amazing then this. I hope some day we are able to go back and spend more time here.

We took a cruise on Milford Sound.

And drove along the gorgeous Milford Highway.

We even spotted a Kea bird begging for treats along the roadside.

We kayaked Doubtful Sound and lived to tell the tales of the horrendous sand flies!

And we even spotted a Fiordland Crested Penguin!

Slow Cooker Sundays: Bacon, Chard, and Shallot Risotto

2011-04-03T18:10:00.000-07:00

4 1/2 cups chicken broth

1 pound bacon, cut into 1 inch slices

2 large shallots, peeled and chopped

1 bunch rainbow chard, washed and coarsely chopped

1/2 cup dry apple cider

2 cups arborio rice

3/4 cup manchego cheese, grated

2 tbsp butter

In a medium pot, bring the broth to a simmer with the lid on, set aside and keep warm.

In a large pan, cook the bacon. Be careful not to burn it and transfer the pieces to the slow cooker.

Pour the majority of the bacon grease out of the pan, leaving only about 1 tbsp.

Add the chopped shallots and chard, cook until shallots are translucent and chard is soft.

Add the dry apple cider and stir until the cider has reduced by half.

Stir in the rice and cook until most of the cider has been absorbed.

Scrape the mixture into the slow cooker.

Add the hot broth and cover.

Set on high for 1 hour and 15 minutes, stirring every 20 minutes or so.

The risotto is done with the rice is soft and most of the liquid has been absorbed.

Stir in the 2 tbsp of butter and the cheese until melted.

Spring Blooms

2011-04-02T19:59:00.000-07:00

All of the tree's in Seattle are starting to bloom as Spring slowly slowly slowly makes it's way to the Northwest. When we moved here we had this kind of ugly and scrawny looking bush in our front yard with green leaves, turns out in the spring it blooms with these beautiful and vibrant yellow flowers.

We've also got oodles of hyacinth flowers coming up in our front yard along with some tulips!

Long drive down the south island

2011-02-16T01:49:00.000-08:00

Over the last three days we drove from Abel Tasman, at the north end of the island, to Te Anau, at the south end.

On the first day we stopped at the 'pancake rocks'

Then spent the night in Hokitika

We hiked to the Fox Glacier on our way to Haast

And got lunch in Queenstown before making it to Te Anau

This is a pretty amazingly beautiful country all the way around and the few pictures we've posted definitely don't do it justice.

South on the North Island and North on the South Island

2011-02-10T19:37:00.000-08:00

Well, we headed down to Wellington to for a brief stay before taking the ferry to the South Island. It was a beautiful city which we really wished we had more time in.

After relaxing in Kaiteriteri Beach amongst a garden of fruit trees we then took a water taxi to Awaroa Lodge in Abel Tasman National Park, where we'll be staying for a few days. Thanks to my dad & step mom for the wonderful surprise we got when we arrived :-).

More of the Central North Island

2011-02-06T21:38:00.000-08:00

We've hiked to a beautiful waterfall.

And completed the Tongariro Alpine Crossing...

(that's Adina in the picture)

Central North Island

2011-02-04T19:54:00.000-08:00

Since leaving Auckland we've dipped our toes in the Tasman Sea near Raglan.

And spent a couple of hours underground in Ruakuri cave in Waitomo abseiling, zip lining, jumping off ledges, and climbing up waterfalls.

Around Auckand

2011-02-02T20:59:00.000-08:00

We've lounged on a beach...

And hiked up a volcano...

And We're Off

2011-01-29T08:00:00.000-08:00

Taken on my 2005 trip to New Zealand.

We're heading out on our 13 1/2 hour flight to Auckland, New Zealand for our 3 week plus and long awaited honeymoon. Wish us luck on our adventures along the way and if we can, we'll post updates when we can to this blog.

Our Tables

2011-01-26T20:00:00.000-08:00

Our tables were beautifully decorated by our wonderful wedding planner, Beth, of Amy Byrd Weddings, and her assistants with our home made menu cards, chocolate bar favors, green button mum blossoms, and little ivory votive candles.

We had originally thought about using the Incident Command System, better know as ICS, to name our tables, but we ended up going with the names of some of the places we will be visiting on our honeymoon to New Zealand. Which, by the way, will begin in just 3 days!!!!!

The menu cards that we made were actually different for each table. On the backs of the menu, we wrote a description of the place and what we planned to do there. If you put together one menu from each of the eight tables, you would pretty much have a description of our entire trip.

So just in case you weren't able to grab a look at each one, here is what you would have found by putting together the puzzle in the correct order.

Aotearoa

Pronounced ao tea’ roa

Aotearoa is the most widely known and accepted Māori name for New Zealand. It is usually translated as “the land of the long white cloud”. The name is attributed to Kuramarotini, the wife of one of the first great navigators to arrive in New Zealand. Upon seeing the new land she cried out “He ao, he ao tea, he ao tea roa!” (A cloud, a white cloud, a long white cloud!)

Zeke and Adina will be headed to Aotearoa for their honeymoon on January 29th, 2011. It’s summer time in the southern hemisphere then and they’ll be traveling almost the length of the long white cloud over the following 3 weeks.

Auckland

Auckland is the largest and most populous city in New Zealand. It’s located on the north island and has been ranked as one of the worlds top most liveable cities. Auckland straddles the Auckland Volcanic Field, which includes over 56 extinct volcanoes. There are still at least 14 large lava tube caves that run from the volcanoes down towards the sea.

Zeke and Adina will arrive in Auckland in January 31st and will be staying on Queen Street in the same backpacking hostel that Adina stayed at in 2005. It’s just a short 5 minute walk dow to the ferry terminal, where they plan to take a couple of ferry rides to Devonport, Rangitoto Island, and Waiheke Island. They plan to stay in Auckland for about 4 days.

Rangitoto

Rangitoto Island is the youngest and largest volcanic island in the Hauraki Gulf. It’s just a 20 minute ferry ride from downtown Auckland. It is linked by a causeway to a much older island called Motutapu. Except for one primitive campsite there are no dwellings or residences on the island.

Zeke and Adina will take the ferry to Rangitoto Island sometime during their stay in Auckland between January 31st and February 3rd. They plan take the short hike up to the summit and around the rim of the crater. They will also explore the lava caves and beaches.

Waiheke

Waiheke Island is the second largest island in the Hauraki Gulf of New Zealand. It’s about a 35 minutes ferry ride from the city of Auckland on the north island. Waiheke Island is famous for it’s scenic beaches and arts community.
Zeke and Adina will take the ferry to Waiheke Island sometime during their stay in Auckland between January 31st and February 3rd. They plan on spending time on some of Waiheke’s many beautiful beaches. They will also very much enjoy the ferry ride through the gulf islands and will probably rent bicycles to travel around the island for the day.

Waitomo

The word Waitomo comes from the Maori words wai (water) and tomo (hole or shaft). The Waitomo Caves are a system of over 300 caves that dot the countryside. There are three main caves; the Glow Worm Cave, Ruakuri, and Aranui.
Zeke and Adina will be taking the Black Abyss Tour in the Waitomo Caves on February 5th. They will abseil into the Ruakuri cave and spend 5 hours underground climbing, squeezing through rocks, tubing down rivers, and doing something called a flying fox. But they haven’t figured out what that means yet!

Turangi

Turangi sits at the southern edge of Lake Taupo on the Tongariro River. It is the main gateway to Tongariro National Park in the central part of the north island of New Zealand.
Zeke and Adina will be arriving in Turangi on February 6th and will stay just two nights. They plan to use Turangi as a jumping off point for completing the Tongariro Alpine Crossing, a full one day trek across some incredibly scenic volcanic geography. They will also probably spend some time exploring around Lake Taupo, which actually sit’s on the caldera of a volcano which was formed after a collapse during an eruption about 26,500 years ago.

Tongariro

Tongariro National Park is the oldest national park in New Zealand. It’s located in the center of the North Island and is designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. The park was the fourth National Park established in the world. There are three active volcanic mountains in the center of the park, Ruapehu, Ngauruhoe, and Tongariro.

Zeke and Adina are planning to complete the Tongariro Alpine Crossing on February 7th within the National Park. It’s a full day’s trek past active craters, steam vents, and jewel colored lakes.

Abel Tasman

Abel Tasman National Park is located at the north end of the south island of New Zealand. The park blankets the northern end of a range of marble and limestone hills and it’s interior is honeycombed with caves and potholes. However, the real reason to visit are it’s beaches, golden sands and gleaming azure water.
Zeke and Adina will be exploring the park for over 5 days starting on February 10th. They plan to take a water taxi from Marahau each day to spend time in a different area of the coast each day. They plan to take up lots of sunshine and enjoy swimming and kayaking on the coast.

Hokitika

Hokitika is a small town on the wild west coast of the south island of New Zealand. The town was originally based around gold mining but now is well known for green stone carvings.
Zeke and Adina are planning to stop for the night in Hokitika along their drive from Abel Tasman National Park to Fiordland. They picked the small town as a spot to stop because of the beautiful and dramatic pictures of the forested mountains towering over the black sand beaches.

Fiordland

Fiordland National Park covers the southwest corner of the South Island of New Zealand. It’s the largest National Park in the country and includes the Te Wahipounamu World Heritage Site. During the cooler past, glaciers carved many deep fiords, the most famous of which is Milford Sound. The region is one of the most rugged parts of the country with jagged mountains, dense forests, and deeply recessed fiords.
Zeke and Adina are planning to launch their exploration of Fiordland from the city of Te Anau. They would like to walk parts of the Milford Track and take a boating cruise through the deepest of the fiords, Doubtful Sound. They will arrive in Te Anau on February 16th and will stay in the area for about 4 days.

Our Favors

2011-01-24T08:00:00.000-08:00

For our favors, my mom and step-dad made us custom wrapped "Bees Knees" chocolate bars from their Life by Chocolate business that they own and operate. The print that you see on the side of the bars is our wedding quilt, which my mom also made for us.

Driftwood Sign Holders

2011-01-21T08:00:00.000-08:00

We knew we would need some sign holders for our table names, a guest book sign, and for our photo booth, so we made a special trip out to the coast of Washington State to gather some driftwood.

Zeke hand sawed 3/4" lines down most the tops of each of the pieces of driftwood (some eventually required a mechanical saw) and we printed all our signs on card stock to make sure they sturdy enough to stay upright.

So now we're left with all these beautiful driftwood sign holders with no idea what to do with them. Any suggestions out there? I would hate to just get rid of all of them.

Table Assignments

2011-01-19T08:00:00.000-08:00

We decided to do table assignments for our dinner in order to give our guests some direction on where to sit, but also to give them the flexibility of choosing their own seats.

We imagined lots of little ideas for how we could do the table assignments and ended up painted a large cork board with a dark brown paint and using tiny sewing pins to pin little cards with the guests names and table assignment. Due to some unfortunate events, some guests had to cancel at the last minute, so I had to rewrite one of the cards myself, but it all turned out quite well.

Our Ceremony

2011-01-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

Our ceremony site was the backyard of the house we rented. On clear days you can see the whole Carmel area, but for our ceremony a wall of clouds seemed to have perfectly formed just in front of the site. The clouds actually blew in and around the ceremony and gave it sort of neat affect, so I guess we were okay with it. We framed our little site with some pampas grass in tree stumps, that our wonderful florist provided for us.

We walked down the hillside to "All You Need Is Love" from the Across the Universe Movie Soundtrack.

This is one of our favorite pictures that Claire captured.

You can see the some of the poofs of clouds well in this picture.

Zeke's cousin Geoff officiated the ceremony for us and did such a wonderful and heartfelt job.

We included a hand fasting or binding ritual in our ceremony to demonstrate that not only the two of us were being bound together, but so were our communities. My two step-sisters brought the cord tied that was covered with ribbons tied by our closest friends and families.

And there it is! The kiss!

And here's the dip with the petals.

And here's the rest of the petals. Zeke's uncle took an informal, but great, video of the ceremony and you could see people picking petals off each other after the toss. It was pretty fun to watch.

Our kiss was supposed to be during the song "Photograph" by Weezer, but that didn't end up happening. It took a couple seconds but then the music started and we all laughed about it!

Rather than walking out of our ceremony we just chose to celebrate with our friends and family.

Our Petal Toss Cones

2011-01-14T08:00:00.000-08:00

We wanted to give something to all of our guests to be a little part of the ceremony, so we settled on a petal toss during our kiss (pictures of that later!).

We took the same Brown Bag Paper that we used for our invitations, folded the sheet in half, cut a half circle, and then cut down the middle of the fold. We rolled these into a cone shape and sealed it with stickers from Paper Source. We then made two hole punches at the highest point of the cone and threaded a navy blue silk ribbon through the holes and tied a good square knot.

The cones were filled with freeze dried Peony Petals and hung on the back on the chairs.

Guests Arriving

2011-01-12T08:00:00.001-08:00

These were such fun shots to see after the wedding. We had planned to be out there mingling with our guests but it just didn't work out in the end. I know I needed a bit of a breather after the whirlwind of photos we did. I am sad thought that I missed out on the mugs of lemonade and iced tea and the goat cheese stuffed apricots being served.

Special Flowers

2011-01-11T08:00:00.001-08:00

As a surprise for our parents and grandmothers we had these corsages and bouts custom made by Midori Designs.

I contacted her about creating a custom flower for us, a blue cornflower specifically, as we had planned to have those in my bouquet and Zeke's bout. (It didn't end up working out because of weather issues.) But these turned out so beautifully. She went through several different flowers and models until we found the perfect combination. The best part about these is that they will last forever because their made of a super light clay.

I would highly really super-ly even recommend Midori Designs for the flowers for your wedding or any kind of event. Oh and her hair flowers...amazing...

Our Programs

2011-01-10T08:00:00.001-08:00

Just like our invitations, we made the programs ourselves using Pages software and the beautiful tree that Amy created for us.

The inside had all of our wedding party and immediate family listed and the outline of our ceremony. The back had the names of our grandparents who couldn't be with us on the day and it also contained a couple of excerpts from my great-grandmother and grandfather's wedding book.

Burlap Table Ties

2011-01-07T08:00:00.000-08:00

These were just a simple craft that really gave a good touch to the look of our wedding. They were just simple 3 inch wide and 2 feet long strips of burlap.

A Big Group Picture

2011-01-05T08:00:00.000-08:00

One of our favorite things that we asked for with our pictures was a big group shot of everyone at the wedding and they really turned out wonderful.

We have this photo blown up a little bit on our hallway wall and it's so nice to walk by and see another face in that group each time. It really is a great memory to have.

Our Photos

2011-01-04T21:10:00.000-08:00

Well, after a bit of a holiday season hiatus, I'm back to work posting the wonderful photos from our wedding. This is the last set of posed shots that we took before the actual ceremony and it's so hard to narrow down the bests ones.

One of my favorite things about this set of photos is how different each of the locations are. It's almost hard to imagine that they were all taken just minutes apart.

This was the start of our first look. I loved the location we chose to do it at because of these pictures! I'm walking down the driveway of the house we rented and Zeke is standing just up the street, we literally were on a mountain top. So beautiful, I hope some day we are fortunate enough to go back.

This was my favorite part of my dress and really the only thing I wanted in "my wedding dress."

At Carmel River Beach the sand was made of very large grains and was so so so cold!

This one is in my top two for sure. It's on my computer screen at work. The colors are just amazing!

This spot was an amazing find! It seems so far away from the beach in this picture and looks so dreamy!

More dreamyness was found with this tree.

And here you go. This is our absolute favorite photo that Claire captured. Simply amazing. Someday I want to blow it up real big and have it custom framed. Oh someday...

Slow Cooker Sundays: Baby Back Pork Ribs

2011-01-02T18:47:00.000-08:00

We bought some ribs during the week and had planned to make them on the grill this weekend, until we found out that a burn ban was in effect. So I did some quick research on the internet and put together a recipe to make them in our slow cooker.

They turned out quite good and reminded me a bit of the pre-cooked ribs that you can make in the oven, I think the brand is called Lloyds, very tender and very flavorful. We also unfortunately ate them all before we got a chance to take a picture...

2 tbsp olive oil
1 half rack of baby back pork ribs
1 bottle Bards Gluten Free Beer
1 1/2 bottles of Organicville Original BBQ Sauce
Additional BBQ sauce for dipping

Pour the beer and BBQ sauce into the slow cooker and whisk together.
Heat the olive oil in a skillet on the stove top at medium.
Cut the rack of ribs in half.
Quickly brown the ribs in the skillet and then place in the slow cooker.
Flip the ribs around, coating both sides with the beer and sauce mixture.
Cover and cook on high for 1 1/2 hours.
Continue to cook on low for another 3 hours.

Happy New Year from Seattle!

2011-01-01T01:12:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year from Seattle!

We went down to Gas Works Park in the Wallingford neighborhood to watch as they shot fireworks off of the Space Needle at midnight. Very neat experience! Seattle sure knows how to put on a fireworks display...

Our Holiday House

2010-12-29T08:00:00.000-08:00

Our little house dresses itself up quite nicely for the holidays!

San Gregorio

2010-12-27T11:50:00.000-08:00

We stopped by one of our favorite beaches on our short trip down to California for the holidays and got to take some beautiful pictures with our new Canon S95 camera, consider this a test run for New Zealand.

Blondie's Knits: One Thick Cotton Scarf

2010-12-10T20:47:00.000-08:00

So as you may have noticed by our post about our first Seattle snow, it's certainly chilly up here in Seattle. Most of my scarves are also fairly thin on the width side of things, so I decided it was time to make a really thick one.
I can't stand wool, with the exception of cashmere, so I used on of my favorite yarns, Araucaina Nature Cotton. I did a simple 1x1 rib stitch for about 6 feet with 4 inches of fringe on each end. It turned out beautiful, heavy, and very warm!

The First Seattle Thanksgiving

2010-12-06T08:00:00.000-08:00

Our first Thanksgiving in Seattle was wonderful! The first turkey we've ever cooked was a success and we had Mary, Zeke's mom, in town visiting. We made pretty much all of the traditional dishes with just a few tweaks to them to fit with our tastes and my food issues, you can find all the recipes we made at my Gluten Free Travelette Blog.

The day before, we brined our turkey in a maple sage brine that we concocted.

We cooked up a pecan pie in a gluten free whole foods pie crust.

We also cooked up some eggnog which stayed cool in the fridge overnight for us to enjoy later in the evening on Thanksgiving.

The day of we got a nice fire going and had the house all cleaned out.

We got all of our recipes lined up and ready to go for the day.

The turkey ended up being done about 2 hours early, so we ended up pushing our whole dinner to more of a "linner". We set the turkey aside under tinfoil for awhile, so it stayed warm until it was time for Zeke to start carving. Which he did with excellent skill!

Our Thanksgiving spread, minus the turkey, of gluten free stuffing, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes with all the fixings, lingonberry, and gravy.

We had our table set up in the little breakfast nook we've got, with some hot mulled cider.

The gentlemen (and lady) getting ready.

2010-12-03T14:20:00.000-08:00

The morning of the wedding was, at least for me, surprisingly un hectic and a lot of fun. Even though we were going to see each other before the ceremony I thought it would be fun to get ready separately from Adina and (i forget whos idea it was) have a "first encounter". So shortly after waking up that morning Adina left to get her hair done and get ready in the upstairs bathroom. Everything was going great until I decided I wanted to get some breakfast - the kitchen was directly across from where Adina was getting ready. As I rounded the top of the stairs I was met by girlish screams and immediately ordered to cover my eyes. Our truly awesome photographer was, of course, there to capture the moment.

Finally with breakfast in hand I retreated back down stairs, collected my groomsmen, groomslady and the officiant to get ready. Despite more than a few difficulties with finding a good, and affordable suit for everyone to get Nate got all the guys on board with irish linen Ludlow suits from J-Crew and even pulled off some extra swank by going all out and having the vests delivered last minute, giving me a run for my money, and rocking the thee piece suits.

Monica had a dress made for her by Amanda Archer , the same person who made Adinas and the brides maids dresses. It was a "tuxedo" cut, brown to match my suit with green trim to match her hair, and our wedding colors. Very awesome.

The first time I went up to Al's Attire it was supposed to be to just check out a cool little shop that Amanda Archer suggested to us because we couldn't find a brown suit ANYWHERE. Al, on the other hand, thought I was there to get fitted for a suit. Turns out Al was right.

The ties were all made by Adinas mom, Kim. And because we couldn't decide on the green or the blue ones generously made us one of each for everyone.

For groomsmen/lady gifts I had to come up with something appropriate for the occasion and that showed the meaningful nature of them supporting Adina and I that day. I settled on cufflinks made by Sherry Truitt. In each set one cufflink had a map of Point Lobos and the other custom from each person. Nate and Geoff were where they were married, and George was where we met and bonded, Los Altos Hills. For Monica Sherri made me a pendant necklace, in the same style, with a map of Point Lobos.

So thanks everyone, it was an amazing day and you all looked the part.

Our First Seattle Snow

2010-12-03T08:00:00.000-08:00

As I'm writing this the temperature is supposedly dropping to 13 degrees. Mighty mighty chill for us California kids!

2010 Holiday Napkins & Tablecloth

2010-12-01T08:00:00.000-08:00

Since this was our first Thanksgiving in Seattle and our first Thanksgiving as a married couple, I wanted to make something special for it.

So I used the this pattern from the Purl Bee as inspiration and bought 4 yards of a cotton plaid fabric and 4 more yards of a cream muslin fabric. This is my first try ever making napkins or a table cloth and I think they turned out pretty okay for a first attempt.

Our Amazing Family

2010-11-29T08:00:00.001-08:00

Our family is amazing. They all got in on the hilarity of our formal pictures and that sure makes them special.

This one is actually my favorite though, I love the looks on everyone's faces and just all the fun and movement that's going on in this picture. I'm sure this one will be getting some wall space in our house soon.

My dad's side of the family.

My mom's side of the family.

With Zeke's side of the family.

With my grandmother, from my dad's side.

With my grandmother, from my mom's side. Isn't her outfit stunning! It makes me think of Diane Keaton or someone else classy like that.

With my mom, my aunt, and my grandmother aka the Ibarguen Girls. Having the four of us all together was really special for me since we haven't all been together in one place at one time in quite a few years.

With all the Pease, Beckstrom, and Zwan cousins! I thought this photo would be fun since it captures a generation of Zeke's side of the family.

With my stepsisters. They played an important part in our ceremony in starting our binding together.

With Zeke's brother and sister-in-law and our adorable, and highly active, niece and nephew!

Slow Cooker Sundays: Bean and Potato Chili

2010-11-26T08:00:00.000-08:00

This was fully experimental chili as I've been feeling a bit meated-out as of recent but they had a chili cook-off at my work which left me craving some chili and cornbread!

Perfect timing too as today was our first snow of the season here in Seattle!

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
2 large sweet onions, chopped
6 cloves garlic, minced
1/3 cup chili powder
1 tbsp ground cumin
1 tsp paprika
1 1/2 tsp ground allspice
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1 1/2 tsp ground coriander
1 1/2 tsp oregano
1 tsp ground ginger
2 cans kidney beans
1 can pinto beans
1 28 oz can crushed tomatoes
2 green bell peppers, chopped
2 large yukon gold potatoes, scrubbed and chopped with skin on
1 1/2 cups chicken stock
3 1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
2 bay leafs
1 tsp salt

Heat the olive oil in a skillet and add the garlic and onions.
Cook on medium low heat until translucent and softened.
Add the chili powder, paprika, cumin, allspice, cinnamon, coriander, oregano, and ginger.
Cook on low heat until fragrant, about 5 minutes.
Transfer the mixture into the slow cooker.
Add the crushed tomatoes, green peppers, potatoes, beans, chicken stock, apple cider vinegar, bay leafs, and salt.
Set time for 5 hours on high.

We'll be serving this tonight with the same cornbread recipe we made here along with honey butter.

A Holiday Banner

2010-11-24T08:00:00.001-08:00

I've been trying to think of ideas of what to do with the 200 feet of burlap bunting we made for the wedding and one idea I came up with was to do a little holiday banner to hang in our living room window. My favorite holiday items are of course the ones that say "peace", so I decided to use that.

First, I cut out the letters from a tomato cotton fabric by hand. Second, I cut the jute twine in between each burlap triangle, because they were over a foot apart and it wouldn't have looked too good that way. Third, I sewed the letters onto the each burlap triangle with a fairly wide zig zag stitch with a tomato colored cotton thread. Fourth, I tied the flags together and cut the ends short. Fifth, I made little slip knots on each end to hang it!

The banner fit perfectly in our living window and I'm thinking of making a smaller one for our kitchen on the left. I think "joy" might be the appropriate holiday word!

The Wedding Party

2010-11-22T08:00:00.000-08:00

We had an awesome wedding party.

While we could have easily had a huge one, we decided to keep it small to make it easier on us and so we wouldn't burden too may of our friends with the extra expenses of being in a wedding party.

Our wedding party was perhaps a bit unconventional and further proof that you don't have to do what you see in all the wedding magazines. I had a maid of honor and a bridesmaid. Zeke had a best man, a groomsmaid (yes, you read that right groomsmaid...), and a groomsman. We also included our officiant in our wedding party since if he wasn't officiating the wedding, he would have been a groomsman anyway.

Further proof that our wedding party is awesome.

And if you really needed it...here's a bit more!

The Brides Side

2010-11-17T08:00:00.000-08:00

Here I am with my lovely ladies! Right next to me is my maid of honor and then my bridesmaid. They're dresses were also made for them by Amanda Archer and I actually pitched the idea for these dresses because I wanted one myself! I had actually found it and bookmarked it on etsy to save my pennies for about 6 months prior to the wedding.

Looking through all of the photos of the three of us, I notice that there are a really high proportion of them where we're all laughing. And I realized that those are actually my favorites and why these two are my favorites.

Pretty Pretty Bridal Pictures

2010-11-15T08:00:00.000-08:00

So many of the photos that Claire took are the best pictures I've ever seen of myself, so I guess I do get say that I was darn pretty for our wedding!

This picture is one of my favorites and don't let the photo fool you, that horse was HUGE!

These last two are my probably my absolute favorites because they make me think of the beginning of a fairy tale. Love them!

Slow-Cooker Sundays: Turkey Chili & Cornbread

2010-11-12T08:00:00.000-08:00

So this is actually the first time I've ever made chili from scratch and it turned out pretty well! It had just the right amount of spice and flavor but it lacked body, if that makes any sense. I based my recipe off of the Cuisinart Slow-Cooker Cookbook, but made some changes based on the things we like and don't like. I keep reading that "real chili" doesn't have beans in it, but that's always been my favorite part! You can't have chili without cornbread and honey butter, so we took this recipe from Gluten Free Girl and altered it just a bit. Recipes are below...

Turkey Chili

4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 1/4 lbs ground turkey thigh meat
3 large garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
1 1/4 medium sweet onions, chopped
1/6 cup chili powder
1/2 tbsp ground cumin
3/4 tsp ground allspice
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
3/4 tsp ground coriander
3/4 tsp ground oregano
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1 28 oz can of diced tomatoes
1 15 oz can of kidney beans
1 green bell pepper, chopped into 1/2 inch squares
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/3 cup apple cider vinegar
1 bay leaf
1/2 tsp fresh ground sea salt

Heat 2 tbsp olive oil in a medium skillet on medium-high heat. Add the ground turkey and cook until browned.
Transfer turkey and any remaining liquid in pan to the slow-cooker pot.
Add and heat remaining 2 tbsp olive oil to the skillet on medium heat.
Add the garlic and onion to the skillet and cook until translucent and softened.
Add chili powder, cumin, allspice, cinnamon, coriander, oregano, and ginger to the skillet and heat on low heat until fragrant.
Transfer the onion mixture to the slow-cooker pot.
Add and stir in the diced tomatoes, green pepper, chicken broth, apple cider vinegar, bay leaf, and sea salt to the slow-cooker pot.
Cover and set the slow-cooker for 6 hours at low heat.

Gluten Free Cornbread
From Gluten Free Girl's Website - with my changes in Blue

1/4 cup sorghum flour
1/4 cup tapioca starch
1/4 cup potato starch
1/4 cup corn flour
1/4 cup sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon xanthan gum
1/4 cup butter, melted
2 large eggs
1 cup coconut milk
1 cup yellow cornmeal

Preheat the oven to 425°.
Combine the flours by sifting them into a large bowl. Add the remaining dry ingredients and stir.
Combine the eggs, melted butter, and coconut milk in a small bowl. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the liquid. Stir with a rubber spatula until everything is combined.
Stir in the cornmeal, whisking fast, until it is just combined. Do not over stir.
Pour into a greased 9 by 9 by 2-inch pan. Slide it into the oven. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until the sides of the cornbread are slightly shrinking from the pan and a toothpick comes out clean.

Getting Ready - On the Brides Side

2010-11-10T08:00:00.000-08:00

So I can't do my own hair in any special way, in fact I don't even know how how to really use a curling iron. Our wedding coordinator found Alisa from Heidi's Studio and she did a great job with what I wanted.

I did however do my own makeup after taking a lesson at the Source Spa & Salon in Ballard. And I actually did a great job!

Us ladies all ended up being ready about 40 minutes early so we had some time to relax and eat some guacamole and chips. We hung around in the kimono style cotton robes that I purchased for us all from Pretty Plum Sugar.

I also got to spend some time with my mom, which was absolutely wonderful. She was a very helpful and calming influence in the morning, which I am so appreciative of. What a great mom!

She helped me get all zipped up and set in my dress, which I'm sure wasn't as complicated as most wedding dresses, but it still required zipping assistance.

Overall, it was a very easy and relaxing morning. We did have over 40 minutes of downtime after getting ready. I felt sort of anxious the whole time because I just wanted things to start moving.

My Awesome Dress & Gear

2010-11-08T12:00:00.000-08:00

I got my awesome dress custom made by Amanda Archer. It was a long process (if you remember the original sketch was quite different) but in the end it turned out absolutely perfect! I wanted a dress that I could really dance in and twirl. The color is also more of a cream then a white and that band in the middle is a midnight blue. At the bottom is one layer of custom tulle as well.

For the ceremony, I wore Reef flip flops. The ladies had the same ones but with brown straps rather than cream colored.

I didn't wear a vail and the only thing I wore in my hair was a single blue cornflower made out of an ultralight clay that was custom designed and made by Midori Designs.

After dinner I changed into some flats to prepare for dancing. I found these on sale at DSW, they were so cute and comfortable and just a little flashy!

Our Wedding Rings

2010-11-05T12:00:00.000-07:00

We got our wedding rings from the same place that my engagement ring was from, Brilliant Earth. Both are recycled platinum and hammered. My ring has a line of Australian sapphires set in a channel.

Our Flowers

2010-11-01T20:32:00.000-07:00

Our wedding coordinator recommended our florist, Floral Design by Reina, to us and we couldn't have been happier with her! Reina was incredibly generous with us and our budget, had amazing ideas, and ended up saving the day when things didn't work out as planned.

After we got engaged and started thinking about flowers, the only thing we knew we wanted for sure was pampas grass, and then we got some other ideas that we posted about here and here. And I knew for sure that I didn't want a big poofy bridal bouquet because I'm not really big on flowers to begin with. Reina was able to come up with some great ideas and flowers we had never heard of.

And then it was the night of our rehearsal dinner and our wedding coordinator, Beth, had a phone call for us from Reina. Poor Reina had to explain to us that due to the unusually cold weather she wasn't able to get the California poppies and blue cornflowers that we had wanted. But, she had already come up with a back-up plan which even involved altering some other blue flowers to individually look like the blue cornflowers.

To be honest, when we got the call and Reina explained what had happened, it was totally disappointing. And when the flowers arrived the next day, it was a little disappointing not to see the flowers we had pictured for our wedding. But in the end it totally didn't matter and I certainly was not thinking about our flowers while I was eating our delicious food or dancing my heart out on the dance floor!

Our Photo Booth

2010-10-29T21:43:00.000-07:00

We had an idea that we wanted to do a photo booth at the wedding, specifically to give our guests a fun little activity to spend some time at during the reception. However, this was something that really didn't come together too well until just before the wedding.

It all started with the gorgeous wedding quilt that my mom made us. We wanted to display it and do something special with it at the reception.

We also happen to own a GoPro camera that we were able to set up and program to take still images every 10 seconds. It has a bit of a fish-eye lens to it as well, so it gives a funny picture.

Trying to figure out a way to set it up was a challenge until a very obvious solution dawned on us. We bought a bamboo garment rack back when we first moved to Seattle because we didn't have any closets. Since we moved into our new place, we've just been storing it down in the garage. So we set up the rack and then zip tied a long wooden dowl to the top of the rack and then just hung the quilt over the top. The quilt is big enough for a California King bed, so it has plenty of weight on it.

On a whim, I ordered some paper cut-out glasses from the Little Retreats Etsy Store and I'm so happy we did. They were adorable and so much fun! It was fun to see in the pictures which ones were the most popular.

The last piece of the puzzle was a little instructional sign. We wrote, designed, and printed it ourselves and then placed it in same sign holders that we created out of driftwood gathered on the Washington State coast.

Stay tuned for a post with all of the wonderful photos that we got out of our photo booth!

Our Food

2010-10-27T23:46:00.000-07:00

I'm working on another blogging project, Gluten Free Travelette, that I'm hoping to really make something of. I don't know what my ultimate goal with the project is yet, but I have at least a general concept for it right now. Anyway, I wanted to do a post about the food at our wedding which was tailored to my food intolerances. In some ways having an almost entirely gluten and dairy free wedding seemed like a brave move at the time and we are so glad we were brave enough to do it.

And getting back to the topic at hand, here is the post about our food that I wrote for my other blogging project;

Our wedding was approximately 97% gluten free and 95% dairy free. The majority of our vegetarian dishes were also vegan. So if you ever get married in the Monterey Bay Area and you're looking for a caterer that can accommodate a specialized diet, I would highly recommend Classic Catering in Pacific Grove, California.

The only items with gluten were the blueberry and applies pies that we bought from The Buttery Bakery in Santa Cruz, California and the beer we bought from Costco and BevMo. The story with the pies is that we tried to find a local bakery that would make gluten free pie's but we had no luck what-so-ever. And while I was prepared to make a couple of gluten free pies myself the night before the wedding, I certainly wasn't prepared to make 13!

The only items with dairy were our tray passed apricots stuffed with goat cheese and pistachios, the honey butter to eat with the gluten free corn bread muffins, half of the stuffed portabella mushrooms which had some shredded cheese in them, and both the gluten full and gluten free pies which contained butter.

I think the corn bread muffins were perhaps my favorite part of the whole meal and I think they were the favorite of the other guests that avoid gluten as well. When I asked Classic Catering if they could make gluten free corn bread muffins I suggested to them that the mix by Bob's Red Mill is quite good. I don't think they used that mix though, because Classic's corn bread muffins were way better, and I find that impressive. Gluten free baking from scratch isn't exactly easy to master, so I was very pleasantly surprised by the quality of the corn bread muffins.

All of the food was truly amazing and we received lots of positive comments from our guests on how yummy it all was. It's funny though, just like with our flowers the unseasonably cold weather of the year also affected our food. We were supposed to have persimmon and blueberry skewers but Classic's Chef didn't feel the quality of the persimmons he had were quite worthy. (Which frankly, I am impressed with because of the level of quality he gave us.) So the skewers became cantaloupe, blueberry, and persimmon skewers.

Like I mentioned at the beginning of the post, we bought our gluten full blueberry and apple pies from a bakery in Santa Cruz. But I made 3 gluten free pies after the rehearsal dinner the night before the wedding. To make it easy, I premixed the GF flour mix I developed earlier in the year in individual zip lock baggies. Then I used thawed out gluten free pie crusts from Whole Foods to use as the crust. I had originally planned on making 2 rhubarb pies and 1 blueberry pie, but I ended up not having enough rhubarb, so I improvised, again, the night before the wedding. We ended up with 1 rhubarb, 1 rhubarb blueberry, and 1 blueberry. To be totally honest, the rhubarb pies didn't turn out so well and that was probably because I used frozen rhubarb. The gluten free blueberry pie turned out amazing, but that was with fresh blueberries. To ensure that the gluten free pie made it to the gluten free guests, we gave the caterers little toothpicks tied with navy blue bows to stick in the gluten free pies to identify them. (The toothpicks were another DIY by the lovely wife of our officiant and our groomsmaid.

Toasts presented yet another opportunity to try something different to accommodate my specialized diet. Since I'm allergic to grapes, champagne was out of the question. So we ended up ordering a keg of pomegranate cider from Two Rivers Cider in Sacramento, California. It was wonderful as well.

When we would tell folks that the food at our wedding would be almost entirely gluten and dairy free we got a lot of confused looks. Sure we only had a couple of folks at our wedding with specialized diets that we knew about, but for anyone that knows anything about eating gluten and dairy free ... you can eat darn well without those ingredients and we wanted all of our guests to know that too!

I would highly encourage anyone planning a wedding with guests on specialized diets to look for a caterer that can meet your needs. One caveat to that though, I would encourage you to do a tasting with your caterer of the dishes you plan to serve at the wedding, just to make sure they really understand the special diets you are looking to cater to. We went to two different caterers for tastings and explained my dietary restrictions prior to the tastings. Classic obviously impressed us, but the other caterer actually served us dishes that I couldn't eat. So as always, do your research and don't be be afraid to go entirely gluten or dairy free (or anything else for that matter) for your wedding!

Our Photo Display

2010-10-27T18:04:00.000-07:00

This project was easy and very quick, once we figured out how to actually put it together. It really only took us one evening to make it.

First, we cut two long strips of burlap and then I sewed pockets at the end of each with opening towards the middle of the display.

Second, we cut and sewed lengths of jute twine in between each of the long strips of burlap.

Third, we cut and painted two wooden dowels and then slid about 5 loops of burlap that I had sewn onto one of the dowels.

Fourth, we slide the ends of the dowels into the top and bottom pockets of the burlap strips. The dowel with the loops of burlap when on the top side of the system.

Fifth, we brought the display down to the wedding and had my maid of honor, Rachel, and my bridesmaid, Sam, pick pictures that we and our parents had collected to display. We hung the display in a large window that looked out onto the patio we had dinner on, so we were able to double side the pictures!

Overall, I think this was a great project and really made a good conversation piece for all of our guests. I'm happy we did it and I hope someday we can find another use for this display!

Misc. memory from long ago.

2010-10-25T15:59:00.000-07:00

This photo was taken during my first trip down to San Diego to visit Adina after we started dating. As an interesting side note, one of the nights we went out to dinner with her room mate, Cara, and her new boyfriend, Mike. They are also now married!

Burlap and Jute Bunting

2010-10-24T21:07:00.000-07:00

Back in August, I mentioned here that I had officially picked up all the supplies for all of the crafts I had committed to doing for the wedding. And then in September, I had mentioned here that I had cut over 120 triangles of burlap.

And well, here is the final product! Over 200 feet of burlap and jute bunting!

My mom and I started off the project together when she was out to visit for my shower by cutting all of the individual triangles and then starting to sew them to the jute twine. It took a darn long while and it was messy! I didn't realize how much the burlap would shed, it reminded me of short dog hair, like a dalmatian.

The night of the rehearsal dinner we asked our officiant, Geoff, and the groomsman, George, to hang the bunting over the dance floor. They did an amazing and awesome job and they came up with the design all on their own.

One of the best parts was how great it made all of our pictures look during our totally awesome dance party. But more pictures of that to come later!

Our Invitations

2010-10-24T16:12:00.000-07:00

We posted back in June (here and here) about making our invitations ourselves with the help of some amazing family! And rather than taking our own pictures to post here of our final product, we decided to wait for the official photos that our photographer would be taking and boy are we glad we waited! Check these out!

The story behind our invitations is that when we were looking around for idea and everything we liked was earthy looking and had tree's on it. So we decided to ask our sister-in-law, an amazing artist, to design some sort of redwood tree for our invitations. She came up with this beautiful sequoia tree image and the stump you see on our RSVP card. Zeke's brother had them scanned at a high resolution and than our work began.

We used Apple's pages software to design the images and text, which happened to be called "handwriting". Overall it was really simple to manipulate the images and place things just the way we wanted.

We made a main invitation, a rehearsal dinner invitation, an informational card, and an RSVP post card.

We purchased all the paper at Paperzone up in Shoreline and bought two colors of card stock, a darker brown and moss green, along with the Green Grocer's Brown Bag Paper. We used our HP Inkjet printer and regular black ink cartridges to print everything and then used a double sided sticky tape to attache the Brown Bag Paper to the card stock.

We tied a navy blue silk ribbon around all of the pieces and placed them in a Brown Paper Bag envelop with a seal from Paper Source that looked like redwood bark.

Overall, we are so happy that we decided to make the invitations ourselves. They turned out so perfect and so personal, especially because of the efforts of our family. And once we got the process started, it was really fun.

Our Venue: Point Lobos Ridge

2010-10-17T20:36:00.000-07:00

The California coastline, especially the northern half, is probably our favorite place in the whole world. We have so many wonderful memories, including getting engaged, along the coast that it just seemed like a given that we would get married there.

If you followed our wedding planning from the start, we thought we had nailed down a venue pretty early on just north of Santa Cruz, but that did not end up working out... So we went back to the drawing board and ended up searching primarily on VBRO.com (Vacation Rental By Owner) and that's how we found Point Lobos Ridge.

We went up to visit the house, but we weren't actually able to go inside or really go on the property at all. We just got to look over a fence from a distance. But with the pictures we had seen on their website, we were sold from the beginning.

And now, after the fact, we're clearly able to say, that we couldn't have had our perfect wedding anywhere else...

Photos by Claire Barrett

Married

2010-10-12T21:34:00.000-07:00

Awesome Photo by our friend Chris Kerr

Well, we got married and it was an awesome and amazing day. One might call it even call it perfect. Right now we're enjoying not having to plan a wedding and just being married. We've gone and come back from our mini-moon to the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia. And we've both gone back to regular working lives.

Obviously we have a lot of posts to make about different parts of the wedding and lots of things to share that maybe not everyone got to see or knew the whole story behind. So be patient with us as we slowly get some posts up. We'll also wait until we've got our official wedding photos so we can tie it all together with Claire's wonderful photos.

Stay tuned!

Slow-Cooker Sundays: Black Bean Enchiladas

2010-10-12T20:46:00.000-07:00

Thanks to one awesome groomsman, we are now the proud owners of a Cuisinart Slow-Cooker, and thus have decided to start a new tradition; Slow-Cooker Sundays!

This week we decided to make the Black Bean Enchilada recipe that I found posted on Apartment Therapy a while ago.

Since the recipe contained cheese we decided to use a couple of varieties of sheeps milk cheeses, a manchego, a gouda, and mitica. We also omitted the peppers, because I just don't like cooked peppers.

Overall, it was a super easy recipe to put together and just forget about for about 4 hours. However, the enchiladas broke up a lot, so it was hard to actually pull out one individual enchilada at a time. But it still tasted great. I think we might try this recipe again but next time include some shredded chicken.

A (Brief) Tour of Our Living Room

2010-09-19T19:12:00.000-07:00

Well, for a brief moment when I took this picture the living room was not in total chaos. I'm sure it will still be be crazy until after the wedding. Then we'll get back to normal. Anyway, just thought I would share!

Makeup Brush Roll

2010-09-19T08:00:00.000-07:00

After taking a wedding makeup lesson and purchasing some brushed, I decided I needed a brush roll rather than just using the little plastic cases that came with the brushes. So I just sort of jumped in and made one.

Since it turned out so successfully, I may try to re-create it, and perhaps, GASP! create a pattern and instructions!

Bachelorette Getaway!

2010-09-18T23:42:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, I whisked away to Las Vegas for a bachelorette getaway with 2 of my favorite ladies! While we where there we ate some AMAZING food (check it out on my other blog by clicking here), checked out Red Rocks Canyon, visited the Atomic Testing Museum, and checked out some also really awesome outlets. (Someday, I'd love to go back there with some more $$ on hand!).

And, we did also partake in one night of bachelorette sillyness...here's a picture of me in my sash, veil, and giant flashing ring...

End of an era

2010-09-09T15:11:00.000-07:00

Goodbye Suby. You were a good car and we shared many good times. You were my first new car and it is with a heavy heart that I move on. You were my 6th car (8th if you count motorcycles) but lasted the longest - 5 good years.

And... hello Toyota! Meet my new 1993 Toyota Hilux 4WD. Looking forward to lots of good times.

A Trial and A Shower

2010-09-07T22:30:00.000-07:00

Labor Day weekend was all about the wedding!

My mom flew out from New York to spend some time with us in Seattle and then she and I flew down to California on Friday. Saturday morning bright and early we headed down to Heidi's Studio in the Carmel Crossroads Shopping Village for my pre-wedding hair trial. It wasn't the full extent of what it will be for the wedding, but more just of a chance to figure out the general concept.

Then we zipped back to Felton for my Wedding/Bridal Shower which Connie & Mary (my step-mom and future mother-in-law) put on for me! It was totally wonderful and I couldn't believe how many people where there! It was just a nice feeling and so nice to see everyone before the wedding!

Here's a quick shot of Sam, my bridesmaid, making me a bouquet for the rehearsal out of all the ribbons from the gifts everyone brought. She did a ridiculously awesome job! Seriously...professional quality.

120+

2010-09-07T13:02:00.000-07:00

Yes, that is over 120 handcut large burlap triangles. They will grow up to become 200 feet of burlap bunting for decorating our venue. If you have never worked with burlap before, it's messy and the little fibers are really pokey, sort of light dog hair. But it looks quite nice.

Crafting Is In Full Swing

2010-08-21T19:53:00.000-07:00

We're 42 days out and it's high time for some serious wedding crafting! I went to 3 different crafting stores today to find some of the many items we were in need of. One of them, Pacific Fabrics, actually gives a discount for materials used for a wedding.

Most of the projects on the list at this point are table decorations, programs, a photo display, the seating display, a menu display, and some special gifts for some extra special people!

VG and Michelle

2010-08-19T16:38:00.000-07:00

Got hitched!

Over the weekend we were down in California for some of our closest friends wedding. They had a beautiful ceremony at New Brighton State Beach campground then the reception at a vacation rental nearby that the wedding party family and friends all got together and decorated. The day went off amazingly, including us almost racking up a grand total of 10 no seatbelt tickets and speaking with three law enforcement officers, in two separate incidences, while we were traveling in/on one vehicle. All on the way from where we were getting ready, to the ceremony site. We ended up with a good laugh and a better story and no VG event is complete without something like this happening anyway. This was truly a day/night to remember and congratulations to the new couple, even if they did cut in line!

All I can say is that I can't wait to join them in October and hear about all of their adventures on their honeymoon.

While we were down we got some business done too! We stayed at Stew's (Adina's dad, thats him over there -->) house in Felton, which is also where Adina's upcoming wedding shower is going to be. And the place looks AMAZING! I wish I were coming down just to kick back and spend some more time there, I hope all you ladies enjoy it!

Lastly, to finish off the weekend, Stew and I ran by Al's Attire and picked up my suit while on the way to the airport.

A Tour of Our Kitchen

2010-08-03T12:00:00.000-07:00

We got this piece when we moved into or first Seattle house and used it in our pantry area. Now it works really well in our kitchen for all my flours and as a perfect place to display our mugs!

Our breakfast nook is still awaiting a nice bistro/bar table, but until then our Meyer lemon tree and lemongrass plant are enjoying the nice sunny nook.

Washer and dryer room at the end of the kitchen! It's so nice! And they work so well!

Our stove, fridge, and microwave (it came with the house too!). There's great built in shelving in this kitchen and a butcher block!

We LOVE our new kitchen! It's pretty skinny so for two people it's a little tight but there is a lot more usable space. Also our fridge is amazing, so big and so new. It's the newest one I've had since I started college. With the exception of our breakfast nook table and some nice curtains we're not planning to do much else to it.

A Tour of Our Second Bedroom/Office/Craft Room/Drum Studio

2010-08-01T20:37:00.000-07:00

That window looks out onto our covered patio. That BBQ that you can see came with our place!

Our desk and shelf set are currently serving as wedding stationary central. And that door opens up to a small closet.

That cabinet is pretty much full of various craft and project items. The drums are still in the corner here, but it looks like we have enough space in the room to set them up!

So as you can tell, this room isn't exactly well organized yet. We're planning to buy an air bed for the room and also to set up a table in here so I can use my sewing machine. Anyway, it's generally a work in progress. Hopefully we'll get an area rug in here as well so it's more homey when folks come for a visit!

Zeeby's Bag

2010-08-01T08:00:00.000-07:00

I finally finally finished this bag! I think I started it when we were still living in Capitola!

It's the Zeeby's Bag Pattern from Stitch'n'Bitch with Blue Sky Cotton.

Up until now a combination of time and intimidation of sewing knit pieces together kept me from finishing it. But today I felt like I needed to knit, so I sat down, tried to understand the instructions for sewing knit pieces together, gave up, and just sewed it together in a way that made sense to me!

A Couple of Peeks At The New House

2010-07-27T10:02:00.000-07:00

The Living Room

The Kitchen/Breakfast Nook Still To Be...

Our Bedroom.

Yes, that is a hanging basked of knitted items.

Ribbed Cowl

2010-07-22T08:00:00.000-07:00

Wow... it's definitely been awhile since I finished a knitting project. I think I started this one when I was in Alaska in April.

It's just a simple 1x1 ribbed cowl about 13 inches long.

Of course since it's been so long I can't remember how many stitches around it was or what the brand of the yarn is. I think it's a mix of cotton, merino, and silk, but I really can't remember.

Onward!

2010-07-21T21:10:00.000-07:00

Today, was a long day. I worked from 8pm to 8am flew to San Francisco (the only sleep I've had so far) and then had my first fitting for the suit for the wedding. And oh my is it sweet. I've been working with Al's Attire who was suggested to us from the person making Adinas dress. It's still in process but should be ready for pickup in a couple of weeks.

You can see it's not done yet. I asked for a retroey kind of rat pack meets mad men kind of a cut then went from there. It's brown wool and has a bunch of little accents and details which are in our wedding colors and your going to have to wait for. In the mean time here's one more shot...

Also I've started work with Swedish Medical as an Emergency Room Technician in their First Hill Campus. Im working every other Thurs, Fri, Sat, Mon, Tuesday nights from 8pm to 8:30am. It's not being a paramedic on a 911 ambulance but hey, it lets me live in Seattle and with my gurlie full time so all in all a positive thing. Though I do miss seeing everyone on my off days. Anyway I'll leave you with a picture of the front of my ED and an invitation to come up and visit us in our new place!

Engagement Pictures by Our Wedding Photographer!

2010-07-14T21:59:00.000-07:00

We got an amazing gift for our wedding. Seriously. Amazing.

I can't remember if I've mentioned it yet on here, but...my Aunt Suzanne (my mother's sister) is gifting us our wedding photography! Her good friend, Claire Barrett will be our wedding photographer and also did a set of engagement photos for us down in the Los Angeles area in the end of June.

Here are some of our favorite shots;

You can see more in the slideshow that Claire put together for us here.

Updates to Our Wedding Website

2010-07-07T21:59:00.000-07:00

As we get further down the road towards the wedding...87 days today...we're updating our wedding website with more information and more fun stuff!

I just added a slideshow of the engagement photos we took last November with the awesome Jenny!

And soon I will add another slideshow of the engagement photos we took 2 weeks ago down in Los Angeles with our wedding photographer Claire! For now though, here is a link to the slideshow she put together for us.

4th of July

2010-07-07T08:36:00.000-07:00

We drove about 5 minutes to the downtown Fremont area, parked our car, and walked the Burke Gilman trail to Gas Works Park in Wallingford. We walked straight through security since we had no bags for them to go through and easily through the crowds to find a seat overlooking Lake Union.

It was so easy and stress free. Almost unbelievable.

The fireworks display was amazing and sychronized with some great popular music. We both agreed, the best we have ever seen. Zeke even has some new favorite fireworks!

After the fireworks, the Presidents of the United States of America, played some of their hit's from when Zeke and I were younger, so that was great fun to sing along to! And it was just such a cool experience, especially considering that it was free!

Eastern Washington

2010-07-01T11:07:00.001-07:00

I had a workshop to go to out in Selah, Washington which is sort of in the south/central/eastern part of the state and Zeke was wonderful enough to come with me for the overnight trip. The drive was beautiful and we saw many places to go camping in the future. Below is a picture from driving back home to Seattle and in the distance you can see the Cascade Range which we drove over through Snoqualamie Pass.

We're Moving! Again!

2010-06-30T22:32:00.000-07:00

Well...we tried. And tried. And tried.

But our new Seattle home just was not working out. We came to a mutual agreement with our landlady about a month ago that we would amend our lease to a month-to-month version and start to look for a new place to live.

Lucky for us we found a place pretty fast! We signed our lease last week and we're moving in next Friday!

It's a two bedroom, 1 bath house with a garage, doors, closets, a dishwasher, washer and dryer, custom painted rooms (the living room is an awesome maroon color), hardwood floors, and a covered patio in the back yard! The house also has been certified (except for the maroon wall) by a Feng Shui expert! It's also only only a move across town in Ballard, we're going from 22nd to 9th, which is farther East.

So anyway, here's to our a better start to our new life in Seattle!

Visit To The Museam of Flight

2010-06-23T08:33:00.001-07:00

My dad came up to Seattle to visit us this last weekend and we all went down to the Museam of Flight on Saturday.

Super neat place and a very well done museam. I would love to go back actually and look closer at everything I breezed by!
We were also surprised with an impromptu air show of a bunch of helicopters that were visiting for the day!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Invitations Are Ready To Go!

2010-06-22T22:24:00.000-07:00

Well our invitations are all done and sealed in their envelopes! This is a task that feels good to have completed! Especially since this was a true DIY project, which we'll have to post more about later.

One of the best parts about our invitations was the help we had from our family. Our parents acted as great consultants, had some key ideas (thank's mom for suggesting Pages software!) and my dad even helped make them! And Zeke's (and my soon to be officially) wonderful sister-in-law created the perfect artwork for them. We can't even begin to express our gratitude for all of their help!

On a separate note...bummer on the stamp availability at our local post office. Not very exciting or creative, but they'll get the invitations out just fine!

Let Sleeping ... Lie

2010-06-14T21:50:00.000-07:00

Yup, that's a raccoon on our neighbor's front porch taking a snooze...oh Ballard...

Making Invitations

2010-06-14T21:26:00.000-07:00

So we looked at our options and decided to take the leap to making our own invitations at home!

We knew it would be quite an endeavor but it's actually really rewarding feeling! It's special that we're making all of the pieces of the invitation suite that we will be sending out to all our friends and family. And we're saving A TON of money!

Our invitations are costing us basically ink, paper, and adhesive.

It's also been fun to make them! We'll post more details and pictures later after they've been send out!

Our Save The Dates

2010-06-08T12:00:00.000-07:00

We made them on Cardstore.com and wow it was easy!

We asked one of my wonderful bridesmaids, Jenny (the one who took our awesome engagement photos last year) to put our date on the top of one of our sunset photos which were taken in the same gazebo where we got engaged.

It came out perfect and all we had to do was upload the photo to Cardstore and then write the text on the back of the blank photo post card.

Sites for Wedding Party Photos

2010-05-19T13:11:00.000-07:00

Yet another thing accomplished while doing our site visit was some scouting for possible locations around the property and nearby that would be good spots to take some wedding party pictures at.

Here are a couple of our ideas...

Identifying Spaces

2010-05-17T12:00:00.000-07:00

One of the major things we accomplished while during our site visit was identifying where all the different things will take place. So we identified the ceremony site, the way we will walk into the ceremony, the dinner area, the dancing area, where the DJ will go, where the bar will be, and where the girls and guys will be getting ready.

That last decision was made pretty easy because there was only one bathroom in the house with full length mirrors. And it also happened to be the biggest and prettiest one, so naturally, that was identified as the getting ready area for the girls!

The next biggest bathroom went to the guys and it has a bit more man cave feel anyway! Here is a quick, not so great shot of it...

Some Wedding Video Awesomeness

2010-05-14T21:01:00.000-07:00

Found this on My DIY Wedding Day. I think this is even cooler than that crazy dance that that one couple did down the aisle. The size doesn't show up to well on our blog so here is a link to the you tube site.

Just thought I'd share the fun!

Linens and Fabrics

2010-05-14T12:00:00.000-07:00

We also picked out our linens at our site visit, we are going for navy blue table cloths and a napkin color that I don't think made it into this picture.

At the bottom left of this pictures you can see the swatches from my dress (cream and midnight blue) and Zeke's original suit swatches (these have since been changed, but hopefully Zeke will write a post about this sometime later).