Caleb

If there were, in fact, a finite number of words we could speak in a lifetime, I'm going to guess Caleb is nearly maxed out.
There will come a day when I won't hear his sweet baby voice ask me, "Why are you wearing that bra?"  or say "I don't care about that." or "But, I want to hit Cory". 
I will miss these days.  I really will.
In honor of all the words I've heard from him over the past 3 years, here is a wordless photo gallery of his life to date...

Old friends

I love old friends.  The ones who have known you for ages.  Before kids and husbands and adulthood.
There are a particular group of chicks that I dearly love. 
It's an interesting bunch.  We came together as kind of a mish mash of circumstances and ages and experiences. 

These hot mommas became friends way back...Back when tucking your shirt in was cool and Lennon sunglasses were hip.

Let me try to explain how we all became friends. 
It's actually quite interesting, well maybe not to you, but it is to me.
The cute little thing with the red shirt in the front is my cousin, Noelle.  We go way back, ALL the way back.  She's the only cousin I grew up with and has turned out to be one of my closest friends.  Can't get much better then that.
The chick in the blue jacket, LV, or Laura, if you like to be formal, happens to be a lovely person inside and out.  Laura and Noelle have been besties since high school.  Laura and Noelle were seniors when I was a freshmen so I've known Laura for a long time, but it took a few fun experiences like this...

and this...

to really solidify the friendship, which now that I think about it could be based on blackmail so as to never reveal what went on some of those nights!

And here's the pic again for a point of reference...
The adorable strawberry blonde in the striped shirt is Riggerts, or Erin or whatever you want to call her.  She doesn't really care much.  She went to college with Laura and Noelle and one year with me and married a friend of all of ours from high school, who we called Ron, but his actual name is Brian. 
Got that??
And finally, the lovely gal in the black happens to be one of those friends you can not talk to for months and not miss a beat when you chat again.  Although, she is, well, lets just say, a FEW years older then me, we met when I was in high school and I can honestly say, she made those years all the better.  She was fresh out of college at her first job and my brother and I helped her move in.  From then on, we spent ALOT of time hanging out.  We've only gotten closer over the years.  So glad she moved close to me!
And this year, we're adding a friend!

This awesome gal on the left...Jill!  So glad she gets to join us this year!
So, those are my girls.  My chicks.  My peeps.  I like em.
We're going to hang out this weekend and I'm uber excited.

Well that was anticlimactic...

I don't have a camera.  Its been disposed of.
And now I can't take ridiculous pictures of our new kitty.
He's sweet and gentle and has been surprisingly easy. 
I was expecting some kind of drama from the cat, but it's only been drama with the kids.
I've had to implement several "No one touches the cat for 30 minutes" periods to give poor Maximus a break. 
So far, no problems with the litter box, no whining about feeding him or changing the litter box.  Just pleasant.
Who'd a thought?!

No turning back

We are getting a cat/kitten. 
It's been a long time coming and I just hope we're not disappointed.
After a bit of a breakdown, Elijah made a compelling case to get a cat.  I told him to ask his dad, who is not exactly a cat fan.
Chad's famous last words, "That's fine, as long as you raise enough money." 
There was no predetermined amount that would be "enough", but that didn't deter the kids from going all out.
After much planning and discussing, Elijah and Autumn had a list ready to put on a lemonade/koolaid stand. 
They spent their own money to buy supplies, made cookies, made the sign, set out the table and chairs and sat in 105 degree weather to offer their delicious fare to the masses. 
And by masses, I mean alot of our friends who I texted. 
All in all, they made a pretty good amount of which I determined was "enough." 
They don't know it, but we're going to pick out a kitten tomorrow morning from a friend of friend who lives on a farm and has 9 kittens to pick from. 
Hoping we don't get the dud.
To be continued...

Wedding and Wiggin' out

Here you go! 
The wedding week post. 
Granted this is several weeks after the actual wedding, but better late then never.

These 2 beautiful people got hitched...finally! :)
I honestly cannot say enough good things about them. 
They are super de-duper smart.  And oddly enough, you would have no idea if you just sat down to chat with them! 
Unpretentious, charming, hilarious, generous, easy-going...did I mention hilarious.  They really are funny. Oh, and smart.

 This wedding was perfectly them.  Low key and beautiful. 

Katrina looked AMAZING! 

Isaac looked kinda Amish.

It was BLAZING hot. 

  Hotter than these gals!

The wedding was in the evening with an outside reception following.  Despite the heat it all worked out great.  The decorations were done by a good friend of mine who has a serious knack for this kind of stuff.  My sister and Katrina's cousins and I spent a few hours that afternoon assembling the centerpieces. 

There was ALOT of running around the hours before the wedding.  At one point, I was helping with centerpieces and ran over to the church to take one family picture. 

Upon arriving at the church, I see Elijah, dressed in jeans, tshirt and tennis shoes.  Flabbergasted, I asked Chad, who I had handed the kids over to the night before in quick desperation (more on that later), where his other clothes were?? 

I sent them back to the dorm to change.  On the way back, Caleb fell asleep in the car so he wasn't in the picture.  Wasn't too concerned about that. 

My brother, Jake, and I then sped back to the reception site to put out the rest of the candles, centerpieces etc. and then haul ourselves back to the church 5 minutes before the wedding!  Good times!

Immediately following the wedding, I ran back to the reception to light said candles...over 100 of them...with one lighter. 

I had the chance to visit with everyone there as I lit each table, which was great as many of them I had known most of my life and hadn't seen for a long time.

It was all lovely.  They had a few dances.

And the speeches from the best man, my brother Seth and the maid of honor, Katrina's sister, Louisa. 

My sweet neice, Lydia, kept wanting to talk to the "princess."  Thse was before and after she took a finger swipe at the cake!  She is amazing!

The food was an AWESOME buffet of appetizers. 

All in all, it was lovely. 

The boys even decorated the car!

Good times!!

I'm going to go backwards in time to the days leading up to the wedding, but wanted to write about all that first because all of the personal stress I had was not at all related to the beautiful event!

I was able to go to Missouri a week before the wedding, which had I thought about it I may not have done.  My grandparents I hadn't seen in 8 years were there so I wanted to see them as much as possible.

When alot of my siblings visit my parents at the same time we usually stay in an old dormitory on campus, which is oddly similar to what I would imagine a prison to be like, complete with cinder block walls, except you can come and go as you please.  Minor detail, right? 

Anyway, this is all great in some respects because we're all right there and can hang out and horrible in others in that we're all right there!  It echoes in the halls, the beds are uncomfortable and no one really sleeps much. 

And by no one, I mean Caleb.  He was a pill to put it mildly.  When he did finally go to sleep at night, usually around 11 or 12, he didn't sleep well and wouldn't nap during the day unless I drove him somewhere.

Well, in and amongst the fun we were having, and it was super fun  watching movies, shopping, eating, I was slowly starting to "wig out".  So by Wednesday I was spent which was the rehearsal dinner night I had planned my surprise "Butterfly dress reveal and speech" (more on that later).  Caleb again wouldn't nap, despite trying for over an hour in the dorm.  In tears, I finally picked him up and put him in the car for a drive.  I was upset, pissed and crying.  Chad wasn't getting in til right before the rehearsal dinner and I just felt totally overwhelmed and to be honest, pissed that Chad was only able to come that day and not before.  

I just wanted to rest and relax and it just wasn't happening.  So I drove, crying, out on an outer road along the interstate.  About 8 miles out, Caleb finally fell asleep and I turned around to head back, still crying and pissed. 

I missed a stop sign. 

It was on the outer road.  In place so that the interstate had an off ramp.  I just didn't see it and a semi was coming off the interstate.  To this day, if he hadn't honked I don't know if I would have seen him until I hit him.  I was just not there.

By God's grace, I swerved and missed him, barely.  After moving off the off ramp which I had swerved onto, I parked for a moment and tried to breath.  I was fine.  The trucker was fine.  I headed back to town, now pissed at myself for driving when I was so mad.  I stopped at Luke's grave and laid there for awhile til I calmed down enough to head back.  So I pulled it together enough to make it til  Chad got there right before the dinner, at which point I ceased parenting til after the wedding. 

I've thought about it alot over the past few weeks.  How I got to that point, why I drove when I was so upset, thankful that I didn't hit that semi.  It really snuck up on me, that sense of being overwhelmed.  There are times, I can see it coming, like a dark cloud, but I think I was too busy to notice how stressed I was this time.  I'm trying to be more aware.  Ask for help.  Take a breather. It's sure made me pause in thanks several times too.

All in all, I'd still say it was a great week, and I'm so happy with the memories that were made.

This post has gotten obnoxiously long so I'll post about my butterfly dress/speech later when I have some photos to share!!