Up, Up & Away - Baby M's Shower

Two weekends ago, along with some of Adrien's friends and Claudia, we hosted a couple's baby shower for their baby boy who will be arriving in August. We had various ideas for what to do for the shower, and in the end, we went with a hot air balloon theme. I made the invitation below and had them printed at office depot on paper I got from the Texas Art Supply Store. Thankfully, her sister, Kendall, has pretty handwriting and addressed the invitations for us. If you'd like to use the invitation, you can download the image below here.

Claudia made a sign to greet the guest before they came in. We had a Curious George and the Hot Air Balloon book as the guest book, and also had the guests put colorful thumbprints on an empty hot air balloon as a keepsake. I printed off these free hot air balloons for a banner that can also be used as a mobile. Kendall made beautiful hot air balloons with flowers in the baskets that we placed throughout the house. Hope Adrien and Avi had a good time, and I can't wait to meet baby boy M next month.

Here's a photo from Baby M's nursery with some of the items from the shower.

Next post will be about our weekend in Fredericksburg, but if you can't wait, then Ryan's mom just started a blog! She posted about the weekend and you can check our her blog at: Just Living the Dream.

Social

At times I think of myself as a home person, but I am often told I am not. I guess these past few weeks, I would have to agree. I have been meaning to post a summary of things, but keep forgetting. I have about 20 minutes before going into work, so lets see if I can quickly get this all out.

At the end of June, I met up with Belem for coffee and then we stopped by Cutthroat for their end of the month social. If Ryan didn't cut his own hair, I'd think he would like going there. It is a cool barber shop for guys and at the end of every month they invite 2 or 3 vendors to come in while you check them out.

I got sick right before the fourth of July, so although we couldn't go out to celebrate with others, I told Ryan, I wanted a feast at home. I went to Kroger with him even though he kept telling me not to, and he was right. I was really tired afterwards. We had them steam a lobster for us and made lobster rolls that night for dinner. They were delicious! The last time we had rolls like that was from our family vacation in Vermont a few years ago, so I was very happy with that meal.

The following week, we went with some friends to the Houston Escape Room. Our friend, Adrien, heard about this from the Today Show and got everyone together to go. They give you a mission and then you enter a room. Once you enter the room, the door is locked and you have to find your way out and complete the mission in one hour. We found our way out, but we completed the mission 1 minute after our hour was up. So close! Right now they only have one room and one mission to complete, but hopefully, when they move to a new location, we can go back for a different mission.

The next night, we met up with Ryan's family for Houstonia's Burger Bash event. They had over 10 different restaurants there competing for the best burger. We ate way too many burgers that evening. We went to their gumbo smackdown last year and this was very similar. Lots of food, lots of drinks (this time bud, stella, and deep eddy vodka), photobooth etc. One of the people they had at the event was a lady named Cindi who cuts out silhouettes freehand in a little over a minute. It was amazing and I have always wanted one done. I love them.

I was suppose to meet up with Marisa and Kim the day following the burger event, but I ended up picking up a little puppy for my sister. The playdate ended up at my house instead so that everyone could meet little Luna. It was a full but fun house!

Saturday, I went to Ian's baptism in the morning and then helped host a baby shower for Adrien and Avi that evening at Claudia's. I'll write up another post about that baby shower next time. Sunday, we met up with my family and cousins for BBQ and to play with little Luna some more.

Off to work!

Seattle & Vancouver

Seattle has been on our list of places to visit for a long time. We've been told by friends and Ryan's parents that it is our kind of town and that we'd love it there. They were right. We loved Seattle. Again, we rented an apartment off Airbnb in the lower Capitol Hill area. Right below the apartment was a great bakery called Crumble & Flake, where we picked up pastries for a quick breakfast. I would love to have another one of their pistachio croissants or that chocolate kouign-amann. I think it was a good thing it wasn't open the last day or two we were there. This is already going to be a long post so here are some highlights:

Pike Place & Melrose Market, fresh flowers, gum wall, Beneath the Streets tour, ferry ride to Bermerton, Fremont Troll, free boat ride on Lake Union, seeing the Sleepless in Settle house, Canon, Rachel's Ginger Beer, Ballard locks, I didn't think the sandwiches at Paseo were worth all the time and effort to get there, but Ryan did, and lots of coffee (deconstructed latte/espresso and a caffe nico being the best).

We took a train from Seattle up to Vancouver and then flew out of Vancouver back home. The train would have been a lot more pleasant than taking a plane if it wasn't for this one lady in our cabin who yapped the whole time in a valley girl voice. Ryan said a little too loudly (not loud enough, because she didn't hear him) that he'd lose his voice if he talked that long. Those nearby laughed a little because they all knew what he was talking about. FOUR HOURS of this girl's life. If you'd like to know, she use to have all sorts of farm animals growing up. She also went into detail about the animals, what they did, what they looked like, what animals she wants to have again, etc etc etc. Anyways.... the views along the ride were beautiful and we arrived in Vancouver late that night. We met up with the person we were renting a studio from and crashed. While we were in Seattle, Sam, Ryan's friend from high school, commented on something Ryan posted and asked if we were heading further north since he lives in Vancouver. It was great to meet up with him for dinner and drinks on our last night in Vancouver. Highlights of that part of our trip:

The view from our studio, Meat & Bread, seeing the grizzly bear habitat on Grouse Mountain since I have a fascination with bears, Ryan not liking the chair lift ride up to the top where we couldn't see a thing, Capilano Suspension Bridge and all that around it, Granville Island Public Market, "Tank you for waiting" at Hamburger 2.85, walking around Gastown, visiting Postmark Brewing on their first opening day, the garden in Chinatown, and as stated above, meeting up with Sam.

We love to travel and this trip was a lot of fun. We have another small family trip coming up this month for a wedding and currently debating if we are going to plan another trip this year...