PROM - and a day in Portland

Saturday night was a new adventure for me... I attended Oregon City High School's prom in downtown Portland to help the photographers (friends of a friend) run their check-in table. 

It kind of happened like this (while in the middle of a conversation with my friend, Amy):

Amy: I'm working next Saturday night.

Me: doing what?

Amy: helping my friends who are the photographers for a prom.

Me: PROM?!! That sounds awesome!

Amy: yeah it's pretty fun to see what everyone's wearing and watch the prom and all that happens.

Me: PLEASE SIGN ME UP RIGHT NOW.

I didn't even care if I got paid or not, the idea of people watching in that kind of environment and checking out the latest in prom fashion just sounded too fun! And it was!! And what was even more fun... heading into Portland with Amy several hours early to check out a few famous food places and try them out for the first time!

We parked on Kearny in NW Portland and I immediately fell in love with all the houses. 

GORGEOUS.

I'll take this one please. 

Or this one. 

Destination 1: Salt & Straw! Portland's most famous ice-cream parlor. Being a Saturday afternoon, the waiting line came out the door and wrapped around the corner. We waited 50 minutes - totally worth it! (I'm sure during the week it's not nearly so busy though.) I tried salted caramel, coconut with Petunia's salted caramel bars, and strawberry with balsamic vinegar and black pepper. My fave was the coconut.

This is my SUPER FUN friend Amy. We had a blast together and discovered that we are food-lover soul mates. Which means I need to be careful how often we hang out together because we'd both be happy to just skip from one restaurant to another all day long, people watching in between! Fun of course, but very dangerous!

Destination 2: Blue Star donuts! (Some say that they're better than Voodoo Donuts. As a person that hasn't had both, I'm sadly unable to weigh in.) We picked a couple each and saved them to eat at the end of the evening. 

{passionfruit with cocoa nibs & coconut coffee cheesecake. Both delish.}

After that we picked up some Pizzacato pizza and headed to Portland's World Trade Center.

{testing out the photobooth... just to make sure it was as fun as it looked, you know.}

I didn't taken any pictures at the prom because we were hecka-busy. And I loved every single second of it. If only I could have taken pictures of all my favorite outfits and couples! It was a pretty big prom, I think they sold 800 tickets, and probably a third of them paid to come through the picture line. I saw everything from capes and loo masks, to head-to-toe camo, to a Little Mermaid lookalike. FOR REALS. Oh... fun times!

I can't wait to help again next prom season :)

Friday Photo Dump

If you don't follow me on (or use) instagram, here's a bit of what we've been up to the past few weeks! 

- when Russ realized the new Annie movie (family movie night!) was a musical... with LOTS of songs.

- movie date with Kendall and a friend to see the new Cinderella. We loved it!

- coffee date with Jana and our sweet Annie who left for a semester of college in Germany the next day. (We miss you, Annie!)

- Target with boys. Am I right? 

Around the house. Enjoying spring, the breeze through the french doors off our bedroom, my Georgette Heyer collection, and warm summer-like days in the backyard. 

Kendall picking new glasses. And the winner was...

Window #3, Bob! (bottom left)

- massage bed face (worth it)

- Pioneer Woman's Creamy Lemon Bars. To die for. 

- I don't mess around. The cereal of my childhood (in New Zealand) is not easy to find!

- when your nephew is over for the day and makes a ninja mask out of his chewing gum with unfortunate results. 

- and the prettiest baby shower (and mama) you ever did see! It was so sweet and lovely, just like my friend, Violet.

Have an extra awesome weekend!

Monday Confessional

I've fallen (into our new zero gravity lounge chairs) and I can't get up.

No, really. Russ sent me off to buy a pair of lounge chairs Saturday morning so that I could "keep him company" while he worked on trimming trees that afternoon. 

(Russ's idea of a perfect Saturday afternoon: working outside on our property, with his wife relaxing nearby to keep him company.

Jodi's idea of a perfect Saturday afternoon: reading in the sunshine and possibly taking a nap too.

WIN-WIN.)

Anyway, I'm sure Russ meant zero gravity loungers when he said "lounge chair thingys", so that's what I was kind enough to purchase. And that's where I stayed the rest of the weekend!

Saturday afternoon's view. Very enjoyable.

Sunday evening's view. Miley approves.

These two approve as well. 

Happy Monday! You'll know where to find me!

Awkward and Awesome

Awkward:
- when the gas attendant pumping your gas is clearly 10 years younger than you but calls you "Hon" approximately 5 times before you finally pull out.
- when your 7-year-old son is caught red-handed DRAWING on the outside wall of his school with a marker like it's no big deal. Pretty sure we covered vandalism by the age of three!
- and moments like these:

{I have no idea}

Awesome:
- blog buddies who get together and learn new things with you, listen and share, encourage, and are excited about all the things that instantly make your husband glaze over when you try to tell him about them ;)
- when your 12-year-old son makes dinner for the family after you've had a full day and you get a night off from the kitchen! (WHY AM I JUST NOW MAKING THIS HAPPEN?)
- when you walk your little vandal into the principal's office so he can make his confession and ask for forgiveness, offering to clean it off himself, and he does such a good job and almost makes it the whole way through without any tears, so that you are so proud, and then the principal asks if he can hug him, and prays with him that he won't feel any more guilt because he's forgiven, and you are reminded once again how blessed you are to be able to send your children to a Christian school.
- Suuunshiiiine! And a beautiful and warm weekend ahead! I feel ya coming, Summer!
- when the tub is still your favorite playground:

The Weekend Report

Well, it's come to this. My life now revolves around driving my kids to their multiple activities, and if I can get two hours of uninterrupted time at home I count myself lucky.

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday all involved at least 6 trips to either the school, town, a practice, a meeting, a sports clinic, a friend's house, or somewhere Kendall was babysitting. I barely had any time at all to get through the book and a half that I still managed to read! ;)

A few fun activities did get squeezed in though...

Friday night we found out Russ was voted the 1A Girls Basketball Coach of the Year for the State of Oregon. Huuuuge honor. HUGE. So there was nothing for it but to go get celebratory BBQ wings and milkshakes! I was so thrilled for this guy.

{One of my favorite coaching pictures of Russ}

Saturday night, with Kendall at a friend's and Cooper at a Blazer game, we decided to take Blake out on a little date to a new Mexican restaurant in town, and when Russ asked if he could turn their big screen TV to the Blazer game, we were just in time to see Cooper and his friends on TV! Twice!

{The boys were very proud of the signs they made!}

Obviously, this eclipsed any previous highlight of Cooper's entire life and together, Cooper and Russell both floated on air the rest of the weekend :)

Sunday evening we visited some friends that just moved to our town and bought an amazing piece of property, and probably way overstayed our welcome because we were all... other people! Grownups to talk with! It was a lovely end to the weekend.

And now I'll just pretend I don't have 300 more places to drive my kids this week ;)

Guilty pleasure

{Raising readers}

Reading is the current guilty pleasure taking me away from more regular blogging. I only call it a "guilty" pleasure because I can't seem to do it with any semblance of balance. Cooking? Housework? Outside activities? A decent bedtime?

OUT THE WINDOW.

I am engulfed. And because I know this is how I work, and life just keeps getting busier and busier as my kids grow older, I allow myself the guilty pleasure of a good book binge less and less. But I do allow it! Reading is good for the soul! (It's also good for the vocabulary. Kendall informs me that mine is vast. Hehe.)

Georgette Heyer is one of my all time favorite authors and I have every single one of her historical romance novels. On my bookshelf and on my kindle. (If you love Jane Austen then you will love Georgette Heyer. Super clean. Very witty. Excellent dialogue. Just ignore her mysteries.) I force myself to wait as long as possible before picking one up again because I know that when I do, I will fall back in love all over again and reread almost all of them.

(THERE ARE OVER 40.)

I think it's been close to 5 whole years since I last went through them all and this past weekend I decided I'd waited long enough. I'm now on # 4 for the week :) 

I'll see ya when I see ya, is what I'm saying ;)

P.S. My very faves? The Foundling, Cotillion, The Convenient Marriage, Devil's Cub, Friday's Child, Frederica... I could go on for a while, actually...

Easter Doings

We had ourselves a pretty great Easter. 

There were kids choirs...

and singing (with microphones accidentally turned off)...

family photos (my sis and dad)...

more family photos...

and final-straw photos (wherein I promise to not make my children pose one single more time.)

There was family and friends and good food...

Easter egg hunts...

cute shirtless boys...

handsome shirted boys...

and then more egg hunts because the party never ends on Easter! 

Seriously, it was a wonderful day. I cried at least 4 different times in church, it was such a good service, and I am sooo thankful for Jesus and what He did on the cross for me. For us.

We celebrated after church at my sister-in-law's with Russ's family and a lot of friends, and then visited Grandma Tracy's for her famous egg hunt later in the day. The evening ended with a Cadbury creme egg and a movie in bed and if that doesn't sound as amazing as it was then you obviously don't love the creme egg like I do. 

Hope you had a happy Easter! 

Awkward and Awesome

Awkward
- when you visit your Nanna and she notices a small skin tag that has grown next to your eye and, thinking it's dirt or something on your face, tries to pull it off. Like, reaaally hard. And you're all, "Owww, that's attached!" as you yank your face away, and then you stare at each other in disbelief at what just happened. (And then die laughing.)

- when your boys decide to set up a prank for April Fool's and set a tripwire across the front door the night before (horrible, horrible idea), but then forget about it in the morning so one of them actually trips over it, and there are many tears, and then they quickly take it down in case they both get in trouble... hahaha.

- when you make the mistake of watching two tear-jerker movies back to back (The Best of Me and If I Stay), laying in bed next to your sleeping husband, so that by the time the second movie finishes you are in full-on silent ugly cry mode and have no one to share your trauma with... which results in you breaking down in tears while describing the second movie to your sister the next day and her staring at you in concern and telling you to "calm down".

Awesome
- when you replace a beauty product you've used for 10+ years with a different one and are thrilled at the change...

Mac paint in Bare Canvas is what I've always used as an eyelid primer before shadow. Works great but gets really hard at the end and the foil tubing cracks and is hard to squeeze product out. (Lasts forever though.)

So I decided to order Mac's new prep+prime 24-hour extend eye base after reading a few reviews online and I LOVE IT. I can't believe how nice if feels going on, is completely translucent, and holds shadow in place like it's on lockdown. No budging. 

(A good primer is so worth the $20+ cost. I use mine for years before it runs out and I have to replace it.)

(Okay, unpaid beauty review done.)

- when your husband is given Blazer tickets the evening that your 33-hour-long Scrap Around the Clock event ends, and takes the kids and a nephew, leaving you to decompress in a quiet, empty house for HOURS, which any mother knows is equal to heaven. Amen.