Birthday (x3) week...2011

Last week was ridiculous... even more ridiculous than the same week in past years. (I think it's because it's been the first time that my family has all been in town for bday week since I was in high school?!?!) So here's a recap on birthday week 2011. Warning: No pictures. I was having too much fun to document it :)

On Monday, August 8th, Matt and I headed to Ankeny for dinner with the Brubakers (check out their fun family blog here) and the Marsdens. Unfortunately, Clint actually wasn't able to come because Norm (their puppy) wasn't handling the noodles he found at the dog park the previous day. (Luckily Gable was fine even though he tried the noodles too. Unfortunately he's already been introduced to a variety of people food.) It was a fun night filled with great conversations and lots of laughs! We probably stayed out too late though... especially given our busy week ahead.

On Tuesday, August 9th, I turned 27. It's kinda weird to say that... 27. It sounds older than I feel. After work, Matt and I decided to celebrate by a visit to Adventureland. It had been a couple years since we'd been there and our trip to Okoboji reminded us of our love of rollercoasters, so why not?!?! It was a really fun date night. Kinda took me back.... back when we had just started dating we went there with some of our church youth group friends. We did really well with our selection of rides until our second to last one of the night. It was a little too "spin-ny" so it's good the park closed shortly after we got off.

On Wednesday, August 10th, we went out to dinner at Mama Lacona's for my dad's birthday (well, they brought out free birthday dessert for mom and I too). Grandma, Jackie, Becky and Matt were all in attendance too. We followed up the delicious Italian food with presents at mom and dad's house. Jackie got to open presents too so it felt very reminiscent of Christmas. I got some really cool gifts which I'll eventually get around to posting about.

On Thursday, August 11th, we celebrated Mom's birthday by seeing a show at the Funny Bone Comedy Club. The comedian, Willie Farrell, is actually a local Des Moines-ian and was hilarious. There were a couple times I was laughing so hard I was crying. He plays off the audience for most of his show and we were sitting close enough that he started talking to my dad which was cool. One of the funniest parts was when a man sitting in the back hollered out to Willie because he wanted to talk about his work... which was selling mouse traps. lol. But what made it worse was that he was just so incredibly drunk and kept trying to say more and more; he didn't get it when Willie tried to segue-way into a different joke. Eventually this man got to spell out the website address of where people could go if they wanted hand-made mouse traps... not even a second after the man finished yelling out the web address, another patron added " slash redneck". The crowd went wild. It was so hilarious. Even Willie cracked up and couldn't add anything funnier to the joke.

On Friday, August 12th, Matt and I headed over to Amy (Matt's half-sister) and her husband, Geno's, home. Geno's 50th bday was on Saturday and they decided to have a happy hour at their place. It was nice to be able to help them celebrate. Tricia (Matt's other half-sister) and her husband, Robert, were there too and only live a block away. They have a 9 year old vizsla, Ruby, so a meeting between  the two vizslas also occurred that night. Pics of that to come.

So that's birthday week 2011. It was amazing and jam-packed. I was exhausted by the time we finally hit the weekend but it was so worth it!

Stacy's having a baby!

Stacy and I met our freshman year of high school. We were both awesome french horn players and our friendship grew from that connection. :) Back in March when Matt and I were in Omaha, I got an exciting phone call from Stacy. Her and her husband, Matt, were expecting a baby! So excited for October 26th!

Last month Stacy was in town and decided to expand her registry to include Babies R Us. And I got to go along. It was a super fun day but I had NO IDEA how many decisions a soon-to-be mom has to make! Here are some of the pics from our day together!

Checking out the bouncers with her mom

Apparently baby swings have gotten super complex

Testing out the gliders with her sister, Brit

New body pillow for a better nights sleep

It's good for feeding once the baby gets here too.

He or She?!?! Can't wait to find out in October!

Gable update!

I know you've been wondering about Gable so here's some pics of him over the last month. 

This is a sand volleyball court in a park near our house. He gets to run around here at least every other day. And boy does he love it. He really goes crazy running around in the sand.

It's rare to get of pic of Gable like this. He either wants to eat the camera or is busy eating something else. 

 

Best buddies. (Please disregard my sweaty, just-walked-Gable-in-90-degree-heat look.)

See. He doesn't like to sit still for long.

I think he was trying to eat my hand here.

Such big floppy ears. And he must have been hot - his tongue doesn't normally hang out like that. 

Aww. This is why we're head over heels in love with him!

Due to the heat, Gable finishes every walk with a drink of cool water / dip in the pool.

"Seriously mom. Quit taking pictures of me."

"Feed me!"

Bed time. 

He starts the night in our bed and then when we're ready for bed he goes into his kennel.

Mil. wau. kee.

Back in June we took a fun little vacay to the land of cheese... Wisconsin. My cousin Stacey lives there and my aunt Peggy and uncle Steven were visiting from New Jersey so my family drove up from Iowa. Plus my aunt's sister, Julie, and her husband Dick, live in Milwaukee too. It was a fun, relaxing weekend. Friday night we all went out to dinner at Cafe Hollander in Tosa Village. They had delicious food plus a hundred types of beer on the menu - no joke. And for those of you who know me, beer isn't really my thing but I find a few that I really liked.

On Saturday, Matt and I tool a walk down to the Tosa Farmer's market in the morning. Then we enjoyed some pool time before heading to the Lakefront Brewery Tour at 2:30pm. 

Milwaukee has a lot of breweries that we could check out but rumor has it that the Lakefront Brewery tour is the best. And it definitely didn't disappoint! It costs a few bucks to take the tour but you get big drink samples and get to take home a pint glass at the end! Here's a few photos of us having fun that Stacey & my sisters took. 

My aunt's sister, my aunt, my mom

Geez, it was sooo sunny out!

We enjoyed dinner on the patio at a mexican restaurant. Unfortunately we didn't plan out our drinking too well since we went beer on the tour followed by margaritas at dinner... after dinner we were pretty much exhausted and called it an early night.

 

tequila shots for these 3!

The fun continued on Sunday with brunch at Julie & Dick's. Then a trip to the Milwaukee Art Festival at the Milwaukee Art Museum. There were some cool pieces of art there but only Stacey ended up purchasing anything... well, actually Peggy purchased a print for Stacey for her birthday. You can kinda tell in this pic I snapped, but it was super foggy down by the lake and we couldn't get any pics of the museum. We also did lunch dinner lupper downtown too. 

Monday morning we did breakfast at a cute little local cafe and then stopped at the lake before the drive home. 

Overall, we had a great trip! And I'm impressed that we all survived the 5.5 hr ride together. 6 adults in a suburban is a lot!