Yellow, Orange, and Blue Baby Boy Airplane Shower

In the past few months I have thrown 2 different baby showers for friends. 

This first shower was for Kristen and for a not yet named (at the time), little baby boy who's daddy is a C-17 pilot. 

I had the help of Kristen's sister-in-law Sara-Anne who soon because a sweet friend!

This was the banner for the facebook invite.

 I quickly learned that I love paying attention to the little details, but not stressing about the big things.

All the food with the help of Sara-Anne and her mom. Love when MIL's help!

Had to get a little creative with the drinks right?

And with banner's being all the rage.... I had to unclude one! And use maps because dad is a pilot. Ok yes they are road maps, but still! And yes, I happen to see my thanksgiving decorations in the background. Oops!

Another paper airplane banner. Doesn't my neighbors back yard look nice! Thanks Mike!

More mini paper airplanes on fantastic chocolate chip shaving cupcakes! Oh yum. Thank you Sara-Anne for introducing me!

We made personalized thank you notes, goody bags, and played 2 different games!

Love these ladies... Erin, Kristin (the mama to be), Laura, and myself. These 3 were key to the little girl baby shower that is up next! And yes, excuse the lens distortion. Clearly had the wide angle on for this shot!

And of course the day tons of people come over to my house is the day the wind blows all the leaves from the entire neighborhood, onto my front steps.

Thank you Sara-Anne for your help.

And thank you Kristen for allowing us to be a part of a day to celebrate you and baby Luke! (who yes, has been born for months now and now has a name.)

Urban Farmer Thomas

This is my husband Thomas.

He decided in a day that our front yard needed to be tilled. 

After hand tilling about 1/16th of the yard, he borrowed this beast from a friend.

I kinda want to photoshop 2 oxen in front of him. 

It would just be so perfect.

And then we came home to this...

My neighbor's idea of a good time.

I honestly could not stop laughing. I almost wet myself.

They even put a potato beside the sign.

And they kept yelling at people to stop and dig.

Oh buddy. These guys are the best.

Our yard is fully put together again now. 

After a week of being "those" neighbors.

And hopefully we will have grass in a few weeks instead of moss. 

Or the dead yard we had for the last 5 years.

And another good note. 

The sprinkler system works now for the first time in 5 years.

It is the little things in life.

And it is officially spring. These beautiful blues hold the beautiful yellows.

And as much as I would like to say it is just the reflections.... 

It is really just my dirty windows. Spring. Guess it is time to clean those bad boys.

Commencement Bay Boat Ride

Thomas and I found a groupon for a boat ride around Commencement Bay and couldn't pass up the ready made date. We decided to head to Shake Shake Shake, our new favorite burger place first so the rest of the time we could just enjoy the ride. That and I had not actually realized that we could BBQ on the boat. Oh well, less for us to carry. 

Cutest little place!

My favorite regular and sweet potato fries ever!

I have heard they have amazing milkshakes. I have yet to try them though.

So after dinner we headed down to the dock and jumped on board this little guy.

A bit of a bummer that you can't see Rainer to the left of the picture. Good ol' cloudy WA.

Love seeing Tacoma from a different point of view!

The "other" side of the mill.

Stadium High School.

I might have a small obsession with tug boats. Every time I see them out on the water it makes me smile.

Tacoma's own 2 ships.

The hill I drive every single day... And in the left corner you can see this hill Thomas runs 3 times a week! Crazy man!

The line of cars waiting for the ferry to Vashon Island.

The Narrows Bridge from Gig Harbor's view. Fun in spite of the yucky day.

Gig Harbor's little light house with Point Defiance in the background.

Gig Harbor humor.

 The cruise lasted for a few hours giving way to dusk and early evening. Created for some beautiful reflection pictures of downtown Tacoma.

Sweet little downtown Tacoma.

This guys is a fantastic date.

If you want an excuse to see Tacoma in a different light, this was a fantastic way. 

Seawillow Adventures was a fun, homey way and the owner often puts deals on Living Social or Groupon.

And of course I had fun taking tons of pictures. Because I always do.

Buying Hiatus 3 Month Update

December...

January....

February....

And now we are into March. We have successfully gone 3 full months without buying anything....

Except. 

I feel like there is always an except. 

Ours comes in the form of new food storage. I had really been wanting more glassware lately to swap out my plastic ware, but I am on this thing called a buying hiatus. So of course I can't buy anything.

Except....

I made up these rules that say I can switch things out that break.

And I feel as though switching out plastic (which really isn't amazing for you when it gets microwaved every day with lunches in it) for glass is a smart healthy move. And we didn't buy more then we already had.

Our very well used plastic ware. Clearly orange from spaghetti.

My new glass ware!!!

I bought a set of snap top glassware from Costco a few years ago and loved it. And then over the years I have bought a few lunch sized pieces of the non snap tops and realized that not only do they break, but they also are a lot harder to get off of frozen food.

So many different sizes!!!!

The Costco by my house has not carried these for quite some time now. So 2 weeks ago while Thomas and I were killing time before his flight to Vegas, we went to the Costco by the airport and low and behold... we found these. We also found that Ikea has individual ones perfect for lunches! I love this big pack because I needed larger sizes for general food storage, but yay! All different sizes!

So that is my rationalization. Yes I switched out 1 for 1. Yes it is for our health. And now that I have shared it with you, I don't feel guilty. :)

I still haven't bought anything else though! 

I am interested in what I am going to where to 2 weddings in the next few months. I might just have to borrow dresses from friends!

And finally, a friend of mine sent me a great article. This women decided to not buy her children anything new for a year. And in the middle of that year she became pregnant and give birth.

And she still managed to not buy anything. Well almost.

Check out her story here.

Inspiring.

West Tiger Mountain Trail 2 Hike - Seattle, WA

 I know it has been a while since I have posted, but mainly it was because we did a whole lot of nothing exciting in January. And then in February we were crazy busy! So I didn't have time to post! But here I am just a few weeks late. 2 weeks ago Thomas headed to Vegas for one of his best friend's bachelor party weekend. Meanwhile I decided to visit my sister up in the University District of Seattle. And we decided to go on a hike.

After looking at a few we decided to hike the Tiger Mountain Trail. We had both heard good things and we even looked up the info!

We were out the door and at the trail head at 9 am, which was awesome!

We took off and came to a fork in the road. A not very well marked fork in the road. And we took the road less traveled. The wrong road. 

 

We took West Tiger Mountain 3 instead of the Main Tiger Mountain. And we hiked and hiked and had a wonderful time. At one point we had a dog with us for about a mile. Eventually we met back up with the owner and handed him off. We met back up with her later and she kindly shared her map and distance with us. I don't know why I thought it was a loop. It was not and so at that point we ate a snack and headed back the way we came. 

After we took a few pictures.

Sisters!!!

My view the entire hike.

Loved spending time with Stevi and starting my training. But that explanation is for a whole other post. Crazy times up ahead for the Kucera household!