So it's been a little while...

I'm lame.

I spend between 30 minutes to an hour each day checking other people's blogs, catching up on what's going on in their lives, melting with each post about their children's recent adorable-ness, and being envious of the enormous photographic talent out there in the world. I get antsy when I see that someone hasn't updated their blog in awhile, and feel (neurotically) left out of their daily comings and goings.

So I thought that the least I could do was update our own page since it's been (gasp!) over a week since the last post.

I spent the majority of last week at our good friends Marcus and Tiffany's house painting their nursery in preparation for little Blake Steven who is due to be born in a scant 4 weeks (ack!). For those of you who might not know this about me, I actually really enjoy painting...the whole process. Imagining an overall change for a space, picking out coordinating colors, the tools, the cutting, the rolling, the touch-ups, and especially the finished product. So when Tiffany asked me if I would consider helping them get the nursery ready for Blake's arrival, I was more than happy to oblige. I didn't get any pictures of the room (none that are good enough to post anyway), but the room turned out really lovely. I think it's going to be a wonderful space for Blake to grow up in and I was so happy to be a part of the whole process!

My future sister-in-law, Monique, had her bridal shower on Saturday at The Painted Plate in Olympia which is an adorable store where you can purchase bisque-fired pottery pieces and glaze them yourself. The party didn't start until 7:30pm so my good friend Jen and I drove down to Centralia to visit with friends of hers from college, Michelle and Neil, who are both teachers there and who have recently brought their own little bundle into the world. His name is Owen, and he just turned 2 months old...and boy, is he adorable!
Their house was custom-built by Neil's stepfather and it is AMAZING! It sits on top of a hill that overlooks the entire Centralia-area. We could actually see the rain move across the town and head right for us...it was beautiful.

They also have a sweet little dachsund name Winnie who is just a hoot. She craves lots of loving (as you can see in the picture below). What she loves best of all is to sit on your chest with her neck in your face so you can give her zerberts. She could just sit there all day long...too funny!

After a really fun time meeting and hanging out with that adorable little family, we headed up to Olympia for the bridal shower. I used to really be into ceramics in high school and then took some additional classes in college, but that was over 5 years ago so I was a little rusty. But the idea for the shower was really cool. In lieu of a gift, each attendee was to come prepared to paint a piece of pottery for Thomas and Monique. Everyone was given a 4-inch square tile that would eventually end up as the frame for the mirror in their guest bathroom. We were given some loose perimeters regarding color (primary blue and green) and theme (frogs), but mostly left to paint whatever we liked. Now, I don't think I'm terribly creative, and I'm really glad that Thomas and Monique have a sense of humor because this is what I came up with...
(ha, ha...poop)

Jen and I wanted to do something else for them so we decided to paint a plate for them. A very long time ago when Erich and I were first dating we had gone to dinner at Cucina! Cucina! where they give you crayons and encourage you to draw on their paper tablecloths (classy!). I sketched a rough cartoon drawing of Thomas that I thought was so funny that we still have it hanging on our refrigerator today! What better than to eat off that face! So Jen and I painted the rim of the plate red and yellow stripes and I tried to recreate my cartoon rendition of Thomas...what do you think? (Oh, by-the-way, Thomas made an appearance at the bridal shower, but it wasn't co-ed)
All in all, we had a really great time. Erich and I miss Jen & Berto (Jen's boyfriend) terribly since we used to hang out all the time when we lived in Wallingford. So it was a real treat to spend such a fun day with her (the margaritas and wine helped too!).