grant got married.

my brother got married on january 17! i still sort of can't believe it, that all three of us are old enough to be married and have now done so. when b and i first got married and lived in LA, grant was still in high school and my parents lived an hour away so we hung out with them all the time. grant and i used to go to midnight movie premieres together, b used to go shooting and play video games all weekend with grant and my dad, we always played games together and went shopping and goofed around. i sort of still feel like that is our reality, as if i've forgotten that grant has since graduated, gone on a mission for two years, went off to college AND now has gotten hitched.

anyway, whitney -- my new sis in law, who i didn't actually meet until the wedding (lol) -- is from rigby, idaho, so they decided to get married in the idaho falls temple. in the dead of winter. in a place that has a super tiny airport not easily accessible from seattle. awesome! we rented a minivan and drove 12+ hours to be there, but more on the road trip later. we got in on thursday afternoon and friday morning we all got up and got ready together. my parents rented a big house in idaho falls (vrbo is THE best use of the internet in the history of the world, in my opinion...okay, maybe not, but i sure do love it with my whole heart) for them, us, my sis & bro in law, my grandparents and my aunt & uncle to all stay in together and it was so fun. then we headed to the temple!

it was a blur: quick sealing, standing outside in the freezing sunshine, then photo time! mr & mrs payzant:

jack was so cute and excited to see uncle grant. he fell in love with aunt whitney in about five seconds and followed them around the rest of the day.

our little fam, freezing our butts off (it was 26 degrees):

after the ceremony we went to a luncheon at the church for some delicious bbq. jack hung out with his buddies the whole time (i love this pic below). i took him on a potty break at one point and said, "isn't it so nice to be with our whole family?" and he replied, "yeah, it's really nice to be with aunt whitney. can she move in with us?" 

we went home for about five seconds to try to put hudson down for a nap, then it was back to the church for the reception! the cultural hall was decorated super cute and they had a hot chocolate bar and cinnamon rolls. it was tasty but i was starving. ;)

we hung out with these two the whole night, probably my favorite people on the planet. hudson and jesse share a special bond.

sister photo shoot! 

more family. 

b's ridiculously talented cousin made the cute matching ties for the boys. obviously hudson was thrilled to be looking so adorable. 

and where was jack for all the festivities, you ask? oh, just shadowing whitney's 8 year old sister presley. he literally followed her around the ENTIRE night. i saw him like twice, one of the times stuffing a giant cinnamon roll in his mouth. (we intervened.) he was in heaven following the big kids around and it was the first time in his little life that i've seen him just run off and play independently like that for the whole night. so cute. 

then it was go time and b and jesse sent the lovebirds off by shooting fireworks off in the parking lot. i did my part to decorate the car. :) 

the next day was saturday and we all just hung out. i love nothing more than to be surrounded by my family with nothing to do. we all fall into the predictable activities we've been doing my whole life when everyone gets together -- the girls go shopping, everyone goes to a movie, the boys sit on the couch and watch golf, we all go out to eat. all the grown ups went to see the new jack ryan movie but my parents and i took jack to see frozen. we had dinner at cafe rio and ate cupcakes to celebrate my mom's birthday and played card games all night. it was perfect. 

sunday morning, we cleaned up and packed up and got on the road. one last meal all together at the gem of idaho falls' culinary industry, smitty's pancake house:

then we said goodbye and headed back home. the road trip actually wasn't quite as horrible as i was expecting, though i still DEFINITELY prefer to fly with children than drive anywhere. i packed about three million activities for jack to do and just pulled out one after another; between those and snacks he did pretty well and ended up just needing to watch a movie for the last hour of each leg of the journey. hudson, on the other hand, was less easy since he can't do much. we drove during his naptimes so he slept a lot, then i'd stuff him with baby food and mum mums and once he got sick of that we'd have to stop and let him get out of the carseat for a few minutes. 

part of the glory of the trip was our sweet swagger wagon -- those things are so comfy. tons of room to spread out, doors that close automatically, a third row that folds down...i almost wanted to buy one. almost. ;) 

the only thing that made the drive bearable was that my AMAZING friends let us stay in their awesome home in wallace, idaho. wallace is close to the halfway point between seattle and idaho falls, so we only had to drive six hours before crashing for the night and then drive six more hours the next day. the home is more than 100 years old and they have been updating the interior over the past few years. it was so cute. 

fun fact: wallace is also the town they filmed dante's peak in. if you have seen the movie you might recognize some of the downtown. wallace is an old mining town with an adorable downtown. i wanted to stay there all week. 

we were so, SO grateful to be able to break up the drive by staying there. not to mention it was fun to soak up a little small town atmosphere. the house is right down the street from the red light garage, a delightful restaurant with license plates all over the ceiling that doubles as an antique shop. we ate breakfast there on the way to idaho, and we walked over there again on sunday night to see if we could watch the seahawks game. (the house didn't have cable or internet and the seahawks were playing the 49ers for the NFC championship, so basically the entire state of washington was chomping at the bit to see the game -- us included.) 

no one was inside except the owners and another couple, and the restaurant wasn't even actually open but they let us come in to watch the game and they made food for us! hudson started getting fussy toward the start of the 4th quarter and i wanted to leave, but the owners turned down the lights and told me to put him to sleep there. ha! it was so fun and such a memorable way to watch the game -- especially when the seahawks WON and now they're going to the super bowl!! 

if you're ever passing through wallace, i highly recommend paying a visit to the red light garage. 

after six more hours on monday we were finally home! we arrived to find a sunny seattle and it felt SO good to be home. twelve hours later, b left on a business trip to boston -- so he didn't get to relax much, but the boys and i got right back to our regular routine. it was great to see my family and i miss them already, but it feels nice to be home. 

valentine swap

i hardly ever blog here anymore (my life is now documented via instagram -- who's got the time for blogging?) but i really hardly ever blog over on the stationery place, the stationery blog i started back in 2008. then, every january, i make a giant comeback to orchestrate the great handmade valentine swap. this is the 4th year in a row we've done it and every year gets better and better!

sign ups are open until january 24 and we've already got close to 200 people registered -- with a TON of international swappers this year! i'm excited to see what everyone comes up with. click over for details if you want to sign up :)

2013 in review

for FHE this week, we talked about ending one year and starting a new one. i printed out this cute worksheet from 30 handmade days and asked jack all the questions -- it was so cute to hear his answers and i can't wait to do it again in future years so we can compare. hopefully he can continue to share with emery for many years to come. ;)

i've been feeling all nostalgic all day, thinking about everything that happened this year. i can't believe everything we packed into the past 12 months -- best of all, hudson joining our family! -- but it's so fun to look back. here's my annual blog review (pretty sparse when it comes to blog posts...ha); and in case you're interested, here's a look back at all my previous recaps going back the past five years: 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2008

• baby hudson was born! we've had kind of a crazy time adjusting to being a family of four, but he's the cutest. from his first smile to his first bath to his blessing to learning to sit up, crawl, eat food and giggle at jack -- i've loved watching him grow. 
• jack had the biggest year EVER. got a big boy bed, got potty trained, became a big brother, started preschool. 
• i quit freelancing to be a full-time mama (and i only miss working a tiny bit ;)
• b traveled a ton for work (all around the country + overseas x2) and launched the new xbox one
• ...AND he got to take a full month-long paternity leave! we had visitors, took a family vacation to the oregon coast, saw paul mccartnery in concert
• we took an awesome babymoon to hawaii 
• we spent thanksgiving in utah and did christmas on our own here in seattle

and that's a wrap! can't wait to see what 2014 has in store. 

hudson at six months

this month, hudson hit his half birthday! it's true what they say -- time flies so much faster with the second kid. i feel like i was still pregnant with him last week. ;) here's a little look at how he's grown each month -- i always wanted to do a comparison like this with jack, but we didn't own a nice camera until he was too old. ha. (please note jack's arm holding him onto the chair...hudson is a wiggler, that's for sure.)

huddy is pretty much the cutest. he's always been a mellow baby, up until the past couple of weeks -- i'm going to blame it on teething, because i can see his little bottom teeth trying to pop through and he's been uncharacteristically super-grumpy -- so i'll forgive him for that. he's totally social and loves to be around people; if we leave him alone in a room for a second he'll immediately start squawking until we return. i'm rewarded with a giant gummy smile and a "haaaah!" any time he sees me. he definitely makes you feel appreciated.

he's accomplished all sorts of milestones over the past month. he's mastered baby food and inhales at least three ounces of cereal, fruit or veggies at every meal, but he doesn't have a pincer grasp yet so he can't feed himself puffs or anything. (mum mums, on the other hand, buy me at least 5 minutes of complete silence at a time. amazing!) he's getting pretty good at sitting up so we let him ride in the shopping cart like a big boy. he's finalllllllly sleeping better at night (i had to make him cry it out a couple nights to overcome the horrid up-every-three-hours habit he'd developed) and takes two solid naps a day. and most exciting of all, he's army crawling! this kid is everywhere -- he's happiest when i let him just cruise around the play room, chewing on scoping out everything in sight.

he is endlessly delighted by jack and giggles at everything he does. christmas wasn't a big deal to him but he loved chewing on the wrapping paper. and he's got the funniest little nose squint thing going on when he's mad about something (or when he's impatiently waiting for food) and it cracks me up. 

i'm happy to report i'm finally starting to feel like i can handle the two-kid situation...better, at least. :) it's been a bit of a learning curve for me to accept my time & energy limitations since i've got two demanding little people with me at all times, but it's a good kind of life change. hudson is adorable and exhausting all at the same time. we love this kiddo! 

christmas 2013

guess i better get caught up here before the year is over! christmas last week marked the FIRST time in seven years of marriage that we didn't travel to see family for a holiday -- every year before, we alternated between my family and b's family for thanksgiving and christmas, but this year we decided we were ready to try it on our own. we spent christmas day just the four of us, here in seattle, enjoying a low-key holiday and creating our own traditions. it felt a tiny bit lonely at times, but we skyped with all of our family and had a nie quiet day at home.

leading up to christmas, we had so much fun getting into the holiday spirit. seattle has some really cool activities in december and we took advantage of as many as we could -- from our stake's live nativity to the annual argosy boat parade (we sat on our favorite lake washington beach and watched the decorated boats float by with choirs on board to sing carols). we even woke up to snow one day!

we had one tragedy in december -- our camera's SD card self-destructed on christmas day, deleting all our pictures of christmas eve, christmas morning and jack's adorable preschool christmas program. we were heartbroken. i'm going to try to get some video & additional pictures from the other preschool parents for your viewing pleasure (seriously, no one should have to go through life without watching jack act like a melting snowman...no one! ;) but until then, just enjoy this gem. 

finally it was christmas eve! my family always went to the movies on christmas eve growing up, but i didn't feel like attempting that with hudson (b and i brought him along to a preview screening of saving mr. banks a few weeks ago and i spent 3/4 of the movie rocking him in the back, no way will i be doing that again soon) so we just put him down for a nap and watched rudolph the red nosed reindeer and ate popcorn with jack. we got fancy fast food for dinner, watched the nativity video and put cookies out for santa before tucking the kiddos in bed and getting to work. it is so fun to play santa when your kids are old enough to know what's going on! i also made hudson a stocking and barely got it done in time. 

christmas morning came and we got off to a slow start since the boys slept in. jack even requested a bowl of cereal before he checked if santa came! crazy. we were so spoiled by all of our family across the country and had such fun surprises under our tree. santa brought jack his first bike (a lightning mcqueen bike, natch) and a mr. potato head, so he was pretty pumped. hudson got a push toy and a sweatshirt...it's a tough life when your life is full of your older brother's hand-me-downs. ;) 

we stayed in our sweats, played with toys, talked to family and watched christmas shows. i made a tasty christmas dinner -- ham, twice baked potatoes, rolls, and my great-grandma's famous cinnamon applesauce, yum! -- and we went to bed. merry christmas to all and to all a good night! 

thanksgiving in utah

last week we went to utah for thanksgiving! we hadn't been back to the beehive state in a whole year and wanted to introduce hudson to the fam (not to mention gorge ourselves on all the delicious utah eats) so we thought turkey day was as good a time as any.

i had to fly solo with the boys to utah because b flew straight from florida, where he'd been for a work event. jack and huddy did great on the flight, though we almost missed boarding the plane...i need to work on giving myself more time to get through security. ;) we stayed with my in-laws and jack was in HEAVEN the whole time with so much attention from grandma & grandpa.

tuesday, we met up with my sister at the new city creek mall in downtown. i loved it! such a cool spot right across from the temple. we had brunch at blue lemon and then took a few pictures (for our christmas card, so i kept most of them off the blog ;).

jack thought the indoor creek was amazing and ran all over the place (^). and, this pic below cracks me up. such an accurate statement of where me & b are at in life. :) 

after photos, we said goodbye to rachie and headed across the street. jack totally recognizes the salt lake temple as the place mommy & daddy got married, so we were excited to take him there. it was a beautiful day and they were setting up all the christmas lights so it was really fun to walk around the grounds. 

we went into the visitors center to see the christus statue and jack was SO cute. as soon as we walked up the ramp, he started whispering and told us it was a reverent place. we sat on the chairs in front of the statue for a while, and he asked a few questions about heaven and jesus and heavenly father. then he walked up to the statue and asked me if i would take a picture of him. so cute to see how spiritually in tune little kids can be. 

wednesday i practically had the day off from being a mom -- i got my hair done and then b & i went to see catching fire, all while my in-laws watched the kids. it was AMAZING. so nice to get a little break!!

thursday was thanksgiving and we tried something new this year -- we went to a restaurant (the little america). it was nice to get to relax a little bit instead of slaving away in the kitchen -- not that i ever slave away because no one ever lets me contribute to the meal, but you know. i'm sure someone would be slaving away. ;) unfortunately...jack was acting weird before we left, and spent the whole meal laying down with his head in my lap saying his stomach hurt. as we were paying the bill, he totally barfed. luckily i had brought a barf bag just in case and managed to keep most of it contained, but it was still GROSS. my first barf experience as a mom and i survived! it was totally humiliating and disgusting and i couldn't wait to get out of there. 

he only got sick once, luckily, and we just went home and watched football and had pie with the rest of the fam. what a memorable day. 

on friday, i did a little black friday shopping and we went down to orem to run some errands in our old hood and eat at cafe rio, then we flew home on saturday. so long utah, thanks for a great visit!