emerald city diaries – Page 83 – family + adventures + the emerald city

my weekend in pictures.

{the peonies that i picked up from whole foods last week are absolutely the most gorgeous & biggest blooms i have ever seen!}

{our house was featured in a before & after feature on west elm’s blog front & main on thursday. we were pretty excited about it!}

{cookies are the proper way to finish a lunch date, don’t you think?}

{on saturday we drove down to southern washington to pay our respects to my dear friend’s father who passed away a week and a half ago. mr. ayoub may you rest in peace.}

{aaron & sadie at the dog park.}

{we call her frog dog when she lays down like this.}

{on saturday we tried vegan pizza pi in the u district for dinner & it wasn’t too shabby. notice its awesome phone number.}

{aaron & i – well mostly aaron – installed a new toilet this weekend. more details to come this week (& by details i mean pictures).}

{i am enjoying dan brown’s new book inferno. it has taken me a long time to get back into reading a book for pleasure after law school. i think this is the third novel i have read since graduation. #yepiamscarredforlife }

{the view from i-90 this evening was lovely. we were lucky enough to get a warm, sunny sunday in seattle!}

i don’t quite know where the weekend went, but alas it is sunday night. we got a few to dos done around the house, but i feel like we had a pretty mellow weekend. also, to celebrate the first of june – is it really june already? – we got a nice dose of sunny weather which is always a treat on the weekend. makes me long for a summer vacation…

how was your weekend?

before & after feature {west elm blog}

as many of you know from our choice of house decor, west elm is my go-to place for anything we need around the house.

we are very honored & thrilled to be featured today on west elm’s home blog today, front & main! be sure to check it out here!

thanks west elm!
M

diy his & hers maps.

one of the gifts i made for aaron’s birthday was a framed his & hers map set. i had vintage maps of indiana & idaho that i picked up when i was antique shopping with amanda a few months ago. i had seen a lot of things pinterest, like here, here, & here, but i came up with a little something different.

supplies:

cardstock to make heart & banners
scissors
colored cardstock for background
maps – vintage optional
ruler
gluestick
letter stamps or pen
pencil

first i cut out two 5 x 7 inch pieces to fit into my frames. then i cut out a heart that was just a 1/2 inch or so smaller on each side than the 5 inch width. {sidenote: i find that when cutting out hearts, it is easier to fold the paper in half & draw & cut one side of the heart out. this way you have a perfectly symmetrical heart. think elementary school.} i opened up my maps & found the towns that aaron & i are from on each – alexandria for aaron & meridian/eagle for me. then i centered the heart on the town, traced around it, & cut out the heart.

to make the little banners, i cut out two strips of white cardstock that were 3 inches by 3/4 inches. i stamped “him” & “her” on each strip {being the stamping novice that i am, i got some ink on the edge of the stamp that showed up. i thought it looked sort of vintage-y so i left it}. then i cut out little triangles on each end of the strip. i glued one heart on one background & the other heart on the other background, & then glued on the banners to each piece.

have you made anything with {vintage} maps?

my {long} weekend in pictures.

{happy birthday aaron!}

{we had a birthday date night at pasta freska on friday. if you live in seattle & haven’t been here you should go. chef michael is awesome!}

{pleats & toe-cap for the birthday dinner.}

{we met ben & sarah at seattle center to see ironman 3. even though we didn’t go to the space needle, we saw it a few times & i feel compelled to take a picture of it every time i see it. anyone else do that?}

{we met our friend jerry at serious pie in south lake union for brunch on sunday.}

{aww, love. AL + MS = forever.}

{we followed up brunch with a screening of the new fast & furious at cinerama. who knew this was the sixth movie? #theyareallthesamemovieright}

{donned my fun bagley mischka shoes with my new kate young for target dress for our friends’ wedding.}

{it is hard to complain about the rain when it gives you a beautiful rainbow over lake union. gorgeous!}

{my wedding date.}

{i am half-way thru my rack it up challenge – 15 body pump workouts in 30 days. #bikiniseasonhereicome}

{needed a peony refresh this week. it is an expensive habit, but i am compelled to keep fresh peonies in the house for the entire (short) season!}

we had a fun long weekend filled with friends, family, & a bit of rest. no real projects on the house right now so we were able to spend our free time not enjoying the weather but enjoying the company of friends. we attended our neighbors’ wedding reception on sunday which kicks of the wedding season for us {even though we have already missed two family weddings so far due to distance. boo.}. i can’t believe it is the end of may already {where did the time go?} but i am looking forward to what the summer has in store! how was your weekend?

happy 3-0! {birthday}

happy, happy birthday to my wonderful & amazing husband who turns 30 today! i have been teasing him a lot about being an old man, but i am really so honored to be his wife & be celebrating such a milestone with him.

aaron – i hope you have the most fantastic & awesome day today celebrating thirty amazing years! here’s to many more decades & milestone birthdays!

{if you missed the birthday party recap last week, see it here!}

happy day husband!

aaron’s thirtieth birthday party.

as i mentioned here we celebrated aaron’s big 3-0 this weekend with family & friends. his birthday isn’t really until this friday, but since that kicks off memorial day weekend, we figured it would be a better turn-out if we threw the party the weekend before.

i have spent the last few months planning & making party decorations, so it was really awesome to see it all come to life on saturday. originally i was going to do a james bond theme as it seemed like a good use of aaron’s white dinner jacket from andy & hailey’s wedding. but then i decided that as much as it would be fun to have the guys dress up in suits & the gals dress up in formals, it would be better as a theme for a big sit-down dinner (which we don’t have the space for). so i decided a beer theme would be fun for aaron (since i knew there would be beer at his party anyways) & went with that. i was able to find paper goods in the theme of a beer tasting & recruited a good friend who brews home brew regularly as our beer master.

i borrowed a few ideas from pinterest {if you are curious, my pinterest board for this party is here} & will share those & my sources below. for now, enjoy the pictures! {there were a few more pictures taken at the party, but for the sake of our guest’s privacy, i decided not to put all of them up here.}

there were {and still are} thirty gold balloons hanging in our front window & each one {well, almost} has a happy birthday wish or favorite memory of aaron from our close family & friends. it means a lot to aaron & me to have received these beautiful notes & thank you to those of you who i harassed to get them to me in time for the party!

source & inspiration list:

paper goods – JacksMaster etsy shop
“30” in pictures – via pinterest
tissue paper tassels – via Linen, Love, & Lace blog
doughnuts – Top Pot Doughnuts
“happp birthday” candles & sparkler candles – Target
dress – Thakoon via Rent the Runway

thank you to everyone who came out to celebrate with us – we had such an amazing time! &, last but not least, happy {early} birthday to my wonderful husband!

my weekend in pictures.

{did this weekend seem long to anyone else? friday seemed like it was an eternity away, even on thursday! also discovered the #abeautifulmess app & am loving it!}

{headed down to pike place market saturday morning to pick up fresh flowers for the party.}

{i finally got some peonies!}

{the happy birthday candles that i got for aaron’s doughnut cake weren’t quite right – can you catch the mistake? #thereareonly2psinhappy}

{his & hers rubba slippahs (as they say in hawaii).}

{my own version of this now famous quote that i did for my grandmother’s 91st birthday.}

{aaron & i did a little spring cleaning at my grandmother’s house by sweeping up the leaves & needles around her house. #justcallushergardeners}

{sunday night wrapped up the weekend with taco time & the great gatsby to celebrate my grandmother’s birthday – this is what she requested!}

we had a fun birthday-filled weekend celebrating both aaron’s birthday (early) & my grandmother’s birthday (even though she says she didn’t want to celebrate being any older, so she is starting to count backwards!). there aren’t many weekend pics to share here, but i will make up for it mid-week when i get aaron’s birthday party post together. we had so much fun seeing lots of friends & family this weekend – we are very blessed! how was your weekend?

a fresh coat of paint: hallway edition.

one of the last remaining rooms in our house which hasn’t been painted was our hallway {the very last is the office, unless you count the interiors of closets, but i digress}. it is a pretty small space and has four doorways – to the living room, to the bedroom, to the bathroom, and to the office. the problem with the hallway was that it was yellow. the walls were yellow. the ceilings were yellow. it made you feel like you were inside of a butter dish. i would have painted it sooner, but i hate painting ceilings. a few weeks ago, i finally pulled the trigger and painted it all, ceilings and walls.

{the befores}

i decided that i should stick with a neutral color since this hallway {as mentioned above} connects nearly every room in our house. we have a pretty neutral pallet going in the house, but it was important that the hallway color look good with the living room color, the bathroom color, & the bedroom color. we happened to have some grey left over from our old living room at our townhouse, so i went with that. {it is martha stewart driftwood gray}

{the afters}

{the color is closest to what is shown on the very top picture // the “color scheme” in the house is well represented in the bottom picture}

how do you pick your paint colors? do you have a color scheme, or do you just pick the color for each room or space separately?

my weekend in pictures.

{on thursday evening i attended the anthro petite launch at the downtown store & got to meet joy from oh joy! she is as lovely in person as she is on her blog. #bloggercrush}

{i needed a few jelly bellys to get me thru my friday at work.}

{it is finally peony season – at least at whole foods. i am waiting it out until tj’s gets them so i don’t have to spend $12 a dozen. #mightbeworthit #peonyseasonbegins}

{saturday was a beautiful sunny day which called for a floral dress & my fun new oxfords..}

{i finally got a new wreath for the front door.}

{i ordered some moo cards & am so excited!}

{sadie was great at supervising yard work on sunday afternoon.}

{happy mother’s day to my mom! #circa1992}

{we finally hit 1000 miles on our new car. pretty exciting!}

we had a fun weekend with some sun & some storms. it was nice to get a few projects out of the way & gear up for aaron’s big birthday bash next weekend {spolier alert: he will be thirty!} we got a chance to catch up with both of our moms today, but since neither of them are in town, we took my grandmother out for a mother’s day dinner. how was your weekend?

happy mother’s day!

i wanted to wish every mom & mom-to-be out there a happy, happy mother’s day, especially to my mom, mother-in-law, & late mother-in-law! thank you for everything you do & have done to make us into the people aaron & i are today – we couldn’t have done it without you.

i saw this fun mad lib online this week & thought i would share. my answers are below. visit rue la la to create your own!

to my mom:

to my mother-in-law:

what are your plans for mother’s day? we are taking my almost 91-year-old grandmother out to dinner to celebrate {even though her motto is every day is mother’s day}.

*this is not a sponsored post.