looking towards the holidays

my favorite month of the year has come and gone more quickly than desired. it has been a mix of seasons that has been confusing to this southern girl, but also very exciting. we had beautiful flowers. and also had beautiful snow that caused all of my beautiful flowers to die. it is a tough choice around here! we have been able to enjoy beautiful pumpkin weather filled with tea and coffee on the porch with only a light jacket on and have even been able to ski the slopes! it is the best of all worlds out here.

i would say that the only disappointment so far has been our jeep adventure to view the beautiful fall leaves. we went in mid october and all of the trees had already lost their leaves! even though the leaves were gone, it is obvious that it is the most amazing place to view the leaves. aspens everywhere! at least we know the most perfect place for next year!

and until then, i am looking forward to lots of snow and the wonderful holidays! im in full gear mulling spices on the stove and picking out the most wonderful of scentsy scents!

love.

pining

super excited! i have been anxiously awaiting a fine frenzy's new album for a year now and it will finally be here in the next few weeks! here is the story of pines from alison sudol. very beautiful.

never so many ducks

well, autumn is most definitely here. it is really starting to get cold around here. we have already had two fires in our fireplace and i actually had handsome turn on the heater last night so that we could get the crispness out of the air.

i have decided to say goodbye to summer by sharing with you a super fun event that is held in evergreen called the dam ducky derby. there are many different vendors from food to books and lots of different games for kids to enjoy. anyone is able to purchase as many rubber ducks as desired and each one is labeled with a number. at the start of the event, the ducks are dropped into the river by the dam and they race down the river to the finish! a lot of ducks get stuck on rocks, trees and small rapids. the first 12 ducks to make it to the finish line win a variety of different prices ranging from cash to gift cards! unfortunately, our ducks did not win. there is always next year!

(wonderfully delicious tacos from the one love truck by one world cafe)

happy october! the start of the most wonderful time of the year! hopefully i will soon have photos of the beautiful aspens to share with you!

love.

home is wherever im with you

happy two months! and what better way to celebrate than to announce that we got our wedding photo package in the mail!!! and i may be a bit biased, but i definitely think our photos and video are the best ever! whitney and bethany seriously did the most amazing job! i definitely recommend glass jar photography to everyone for any occasion you can think of. there will be no disappointments! here is a link to their site as well as a link to their vimeo where they post videos they create. take a look and be awed!

and now for the exciting part, here are some of my favorite photos! and yes, it was terribly difficult to narrow down. in fact, it may not seem like i narrowed it down at all, but i did! and because of that, i apologize if you think there are way too many photos in this post.

one of the happiest days i could have ever imagined :) thanks to all of our amazing friends and family who were able to make the trip and celebrate with us!

love.

like father, like daughter

you know how people start to look like their pet? or maybe they look alike from the very beginning. regardless, here is a great example!

my loves (minus tulip), handsome and lily, on the way to our family hike over labor day weekend.

love.

tour de fat

over labor day weekend we went to a super fun bike parade in fort collins called tour de fat. everyone dresses up in costumes and rides around town on their bikes and then you finish in an area that has concerts, food and beer from the new belgium brewery. handsome wore his tie dye and coconut leaf hat we made on the honeymoon and i wore my caterpillar costume from a few halloweens ago. there were so many great costumes! i had two favorites that i saw during the parade. one of them was a group of friends who all used cardboard to turn their bikes into all different kinds of dinosaurs! the riders dressed in prehistoric/flinstones type clothing. i was not able to get a photo of them, but they were done very well!  my second favorite costume was done by a couple on a tandem bike. they were a camel and their heads were the humps! everyone seemed super creative and had a great time. i am super excited to enjoy this again next year and prepare a costume ahead of time!

we did see a few fatalities on the side of the road. a few were bad enough that an ambulance had to come. there are so many people that you really need to be careful about where you are going. luckily, none of us were involved in any tangles!

there are many different tour de fat parades hosted around the country. you should definitely find out if there is one near you. they are so much fun!

love.

what a find!

i highly recommend that you go to target if you have not been recently. mainly because i found these little guys in celebration of andy warhol!

arent they wonderful?! they were a great surprise find while walking to the checkout line. definitely a wonderful marketing idea to catch the warhol enthusiasts! i had to limit myself to only buying one of each color. 

and now for the hard part. deciding if i should eat the soup or not!

love.

"i think of life itself now...

...as a wonderful play that I've written for myself, and so my purpose is to have the utmost fun playing my part" ~shirley maclaine

i cant even explain how much i love our new home! of course there are things that would make it better, like not being an hour drive away from work, but it is perfect for us right now, in this moment. i love how there are so many new and adventurous things to do on a daily basis, how relaxing and refreshing it is to sit on the deck while a storm rolls in from the surrounding mountains, how amazing the stars are and especially how freeing it feels to the spirit. one thing i really love about living in the mountains is how you truly feel one with nature. all kinds of animals frequent your yard and even your porch. i am afraid of some of them when leaving for work in the darkness (bears and mountain lions) and i love others of them (hummingbirds and deer). yes, i have seen a bear by the house, walking through the yard in daylight! i have not seen a mountain lion and i am not sure i really want to. my favorite deer are the babies. these little babies are the cutest and prance around like they know theyre the cutest! i love their spots!

i think the hummingbirds are possibly the craziest animals out here. i have had one stare at me and almost poke me in the eye with its beak. i have even had one fly and hit me in the face! it is really cool because they let you walk right up to them and almost touch them! i first became intrigued by how colorful they are. some are green with red throats, some are a pale green and orange, and the weirdest ones are bright orange! sometimes i sit on the deck and watch them. they really put on a show by flying around dive bombing from the tops of the trees down to the lowest tree branches all while laughing at the same time. you probably think i am joking, but i am not. you should hear them! at times the male birds become crazy and constantly chase around the females while they try to relax on the feeder. i love these little birdies. i will miss them a lot when it is time for them to migrate south.

we are making the most of our time and experiences out here. we take lily on walks around our neighborhood, plan hiking trips and enjoy riding around in the jeep with the roof off. almost everything we do is done outside, even eating. this is definitely the way things are meant to be enjoyed!

love.

"summer, after all....

 ...is a time when wonderful things happen to quiet people"

you can definitely tell that the end of summer is near even though it is still august. the mornings and nights have been very crisp and feel like november to my southern skin! summer flew by way too fast for me, almost like it never happened. i think this is mostly due to the fact that i have not been constantly sweating and do not even know where the nearest pool or swimmable body of water is located. despite all of this, i am looking forward to being able to fit into my jeans (after losing the 7 pounds of honeymoon weight i gained) and throw on some scarves and over the knee socks! here is a lovely video made by andrew and carissa gallo for kinfolk. you can always expect beautiful work from both of these sources!

and because i am for some reason unable to embed the video, you can watch it here!

love.

*smile*

happy one month anniversary to the most amazing man and husband i could have ever imagined. i love you so very much and cant wait to share even more wonderful months with you!

love.

surprises make me happy

i love it when handsome decides to come home during the week (he works in colorado springs at the moment). we get to do things like eat leftover wedding cake and try out our new super fluffy pillows!

love.

we had a celebration!

this past saturday was handsome's birthday! he had to work in the morning, but we had a wonderful day once he got home!

the celebration included early morning cinnamon rolls (seriously early, around 5 am), a motorcycle ride to the wing wagon, drinks and live music at cactus jacks, a wonderful nap, a casserole with mashed potatoes and a delicious chocolate peanut butter pie while watching movies. we also laid outside on the trampoline and watched the meteor shower. it was amazing! the most perfect birthday! we love living out here.

love.