Vacation Day 2 - A Birthday or Two and a Wedding (with about 3 million photos . . .maybe!)

If you are just peeking in today, you can catch up on Day 1 of our vacation before continuing on with the journey on Day 2.

I'm going to warn you right now that this is photo overload - and I even narrowed down the photos to the favorites/most fun.  I took over 400 photos on this day and am sharing about 40 with you :-) 

As I mentioned in Day 1, everyone slept in (some more than others HA!).  At about 11:30 or so, my brother and his boys came to our room.  May 7th happens to my nephew's birthday and he happened to turn 13 - May 7th is also the big wedding day!  I didn't want him to feel left out so I had brought along cupcakes, candles, birthday hats and gifts (we also celebrated Papa's birthday - the boys had been waiting to sing happy birthday to him for weeks!).

 The boys LOVED the balcony.  It was fun to watch them interact and just enjoy the nice breeze that was blowing in the morning.

 Josh picked these cupcakes out from Walmart before we left home - they are Detroit Tigers inspired :-)  Do you know what is super sad about this??  Not one single cupcake every got eaten!  We sang happy birthday to Seth and Papa and then went right out to lunch - the afternoon ended up being packed full and we didn't get back until after 11:00 that night . . .then we all left the next morning!  I hope housekeeping enjoyed them :-)

The birthday boy!  (He HATES having photos taken!)  Seth got to pick where we went to lunch . . .well he didn't want to so his brother picked for him. . .and we all headed to Red Lobster (YUM!)  Braedon and Seth would not wear birthday hats but both Josh and Nate did . .. one of the waitress' at the restaurant even took a lobster out of the tank for the boys to "pet". 

My sister-in-law, Lynnette, was in charge of the decorations for the reception and met us at the restaurant . . .at which time Darryl and I found out that she needed our help.  Of course, we are always willing to help (in other words, we weren't about to tell her no - if she needed help, we wanted to be there for her!).  Our original plans for the afternoon had been to go swimming, give the boys baths and get to the wedding about 30 minutes early.  Instead, we went back to the room, gave the boys baths, got ready and left to help set-up.  We were very thankful for my parents willingness to get the boys ready and bring them to the wedding for us. 

The rest of the day was the wedding so I'm just going to post pictures - some will have explanation, some won't :-)

 These are my two wonderful nephews, Braedon and Seth - they are becoming fabulous young men whom I am very proud of!

 Sadly, I did not get any photos of the reception decor - we were rushing to get it done and it was hot and humid.  The photo above shows the mason jars with flowers that were hung on the ends of the aisle though :-) Yes, the wedding was outdoors and I can say that by the time the wedding started there was a beautiful breeze blowing, the sun was shining and it was the perfect day for a wedding. The wedding and reception were held at Polen Farm in Kettering, OH and I can see why Alicia fell in love with this place when she saw it the first time.

 Don't you just love those little ties??  I think that you are seeing a sneak peak of next years Easter Outfits (And seriously, I think I will rent them from Men's Warehouse - they are like $5.00 each and considering the fact that they wouldn't wear them again - it might be cheaper!)

 Alicia's dress was beautiful and very unique.  It had the appearance of a wrap around and just flowed perfectly.  She looked beautiful!

 The boys were more than a little unsure about their flowers (which were almost bigger than they were!) 

 My brother Jeff and his son Brandon.  Brandon graciously video taped the wedding at the last minute. 

 My cute little ring bearer's before the wedding, dancing on the gazebo to the music.  I could not get a photo of both of them looking at me for anything!

 The beautiful flower girl - my niece Kate!!! 

My brother Jeff and his wife Nora :-)  (You may remember that she was diagnosed with lung cancer a few years ago - doesn't she look fabulous??? She is doing wonderfully well!)

 My sister-in-law Lynnette and her two boys, Seth and Braedon (My brother is the pastor doing the wedding)

 I love this photo - the girl in the back is my niece-in-law, Erin.  I love the softness of this photo.  Erin is a worker and a giver - she steps right in where ever help is needed and is not afraid of taking on any task.  She is a wonderful person!!

 The wedding begins - my brother and Alex, the groom. 

 This is my nephew Micah escorting one of the bridesmaids.

 My niece, Marisa - the maid of honor - and the best man, Clay.

 Don't you love them??? Here's the deal.  We didn't practice with the pillow on Sunday evening but had practiced with the boys holding hands.  The pillow kinda threw things off at the wedding because Nate had no one to keep him from getting distracted :-)  When Josh got to me, he said "Look mom - a pillow, you can have it" :-) 

 My brother, Kel, and the bride - don't you love this photo - it shows TRUE happiness! 

 Nate wanted to sit by the boys so he sat on the floor in front of my nephews :-)

 Very proud grandparents and very proud parents :-)

 This is one of my personal favorite photos.  It is during the ring ceremony - I love the blurred photo with the flowers in focus. 

 With the wedding being outside, they did not do a unity candle but instead did the unity sands.  Such a great memento from the wedding.

And this is my "money shot" - I knew it when I took it - this is the one I'll be putting on my wall :-)

 Yep, this is the whole family.  I had to had to hand my camera off to someone else and they took the shot at an angle meaning that most of the faces are hidden.  I'm hoping the photographer got a better shot - I want one for my wall!!

 Darryl kept the boys entertained outside the reception hall (it was in a beautiful old barn - such a cool place).  Remember I said how beautiful the weather was for the wedding?  Once the wedding was done, the clouds started to roll in and pretty soon the rain came in huge sheets.  The timing was perfect because we were all indoors!

 My sister-in-law Nora and my niece Brittany :-)

 I think Josh was getting very animated because he could hear thunder - which he doesn't like!

 The pouchy lip - I think Nate was told by either myself or Darryl to stop running . . .he doesn't like to be told no :-)

 My brother Kel and his wife Debby.

The first dance between the new couple :-)

 My brother Kel dancing the Father/Daughter dance with my niece.  While photos were being done between the wedding and reception my sister-in-law Lynnette was outside with my brother trying to teach him how to dance HA! I need to say again how thankful we were for my parents being there to help.  My brother Ken and his family had to leave early to head home so someone had to gather all of the stuff that my sister-in-law had brought to decorate.  My parents graciously took the boys back to the hotel (I really think they were ready to go too!) and my husband and I stayed until the end to help tear down. 

Last but not least - brothers :-)  My nephews Kaleb (he's married to Erin who I mentioned above) and Micah :-)

It really was a beautiful day.  I wish that I could have gotten a photo of the boys with the bride and groom and also with us and the grandparents but it wasn't meant to be.  I also wish I had gotten a photo of the boys with the whole wedding party but I didn't realize that they were taking so many more photos after the wedding . . .oh well.  I have some great photos that I'm proud of   - next time there is a family wedding I'll be more pushy with getting family centered photos HA!

Day 3 of vacation will post on Wednesday - tomorrow will be a great "Too Cute Not to Toot" post :-)

Vacation - Day 1 - A Day of Travel with a little Wedding Rehearsal Thrown In for Fun

Over the next few days I have lots of fun things to share about our recent vacation. 

Our vacation started on Sunday Morning, May 6th.  The nice thing about this vacation is we didn't feel the need to get up at 4:00 AM to hit the road.  The distance we had to travel wasn't too long and we couldn't check into our hotel until 4:00 PM.  Instead we got up and finished a few things here at home like emptying trash cans and all that fun stuff.  We had planned to leave home by 10:00 but we actually got on the road at about 9:30 - the boys were so excited to be going on "'cation" that they just wanted to get in the truck and go!! 

The boys did fantastically on the trip - the Busy Bags where a huge hit - the cookie sheets and anything magnetic were true favorites the whole trip.  (As a side note, on Saturday, the 12th, we got in the truck to go somewhere and they boys wanted to know where the bags were HA). 

The trip to Dayton was very uneventful, to be honest.  We had no traffic jams, very little construction and even took two lane high ways thanks to Mapquest ;-)  We stopped for lunch around 1:00 and went to a Taco Bell (the boys choice).  It was the smallest Taco Bell I have ever seen - like room for 20 people to sit.  We decided to go to McDonalds but the boys had their heart set on "'dilla's" so I got in line to get them to go. . .. the guy taking orders had one tooth.  Seriously.  I threw up in my mouth a little.  Ick.  After getting the boys lunch we went to McDonald's where Josh ate his whole "dilla" . . .Nate ate all of Darryl's fries and then ate mine.  Oh well. 

We pulled into our hotel at 3:55 - pretty good timing I think :-)  Here was the catch.  My dad had booked all the hotel rooms so that we were all together (my brothers and their families, us and my parents).  We were about 2 hours ahead of my parents . .. the Hotel clerk was not going to let us check in without my dad's signature but, after some "sweet talking" from my husband the guy finally gave in and gave us our key.  (THANK GOODNESS!!!!)  We were able to get moved into our room - which connected to my parents room.  It had a great balcony on it too  - it was perfect for the boys!  By the time we got everything moved in, it was time to get ready for the big Rehearsal.  My niece, Alicia, was getting married!!!  This wedding has been much anticipated so we were very excited to be heading to her apartment for the fun :-) 

 YES!  The boys had the honor of being ring bearer's in Alicia's wedding so in honor of such a great occasion, I ordered the boys these fabulous shirts from Katie Kouture Bourtique on Etsy.com.  The shirts were fantastic and Katie was wonderful to work with plus the turn around time was pretty quick.  I don't know why I didn't think about this - but I should have ordered the shirts one size larger so the boys could wear them longer - Nate's may not last the summer because he is growing so fast!  Needless to say they did get tons of compliments on their fun shirts :-)

 Can you see how much energy Nate has?   YIKES!!  He was wired!

My Three boys :-) 

 Once we got the Alicia's apartment, there was a great cookout before the rehearsal.  The rehearsal was held outside of her apartment because the wedding location was being used Sunday night.  It was beautiful in both location and weather :-)  Pictured above is the groom, Alex, my brother Ken (the pastor) and my niece Alicia.

 The guy holding the football is one of the groomsmen - he was so good with the boys without even being asked :-)  They Big boys were playing some catch and he would include both Josh and Nate in the game too.

 The boys were beyond thrilled to have Papa and Nana there - here they are playing the drums on Papa's belly HA!

 Such cute Ring Bearer's and they did AWESOME!!!!!  I was so proud of them - especially considering the fact that they had ridden in the truck for over 5 hours, had about 30 minutes of down time in the hotel room, been around a bunch of people they really didn't know, and it was about an hour past their bedtime!!

After the rehearsal, we headed back to the hotel.  When we pulled into the hotel parking lot, Josh had a little bit of a panic attack.  See, he is a very routine driven kid and all he wanted to do was to go back home - he kept pointing to the road and saying "Mama, go that way - go back home now!!!!"  Darryl got him out of the truck and got him calmed down so he understood that we would all be together in the room.  Josh was fine once Darryl said that he would sleep with him.  Then, once we got in the hotel room and Josh figured out that Papa and Nana were in the connecting room - Josh hauled his pillow, blanket and bear to their room and quickly claimed a bed in their room HA!  My mom told me that Josh laid on his stomach on his bed and said "Ok Nana, lets talk" :-) hehehe  Well, the drama continued in our room because Nate refused the pack-n-play.  He wanted to sleep in the big boy bed.  So, we lined it with pillows and tucked him in - it took him about 10 minutes and he was out all night.  Yep, his first night in a big boy bed!!! 

Just for reference - we stayed at the Courtyard Dayton South Mall Hotel and it was a fabulous place to stay!!!  The only "down"side was that breakfast was not included but my husband went down both mornings we were there to buy some milk and the employee working the breakfast just gave him two of the little cartons of Milk at no cost so it was all good :-)  (I knew there was "no" breakfast so I had packed pop tarts and breakfast bars knowing that we would be going out to lunch anyway)
Day one was a big success!!! I can tell you that Nate slept until about 8:00.  Josh showed his head in our room around 8:30 or so and my dad followed him.  My mom slept until like 11:00 HA!!! 

Day 2 will post on Monday and will include a birthday and the wedding!!