Sunday, November 16, 2014

the rest of the ceremony and pix

Chad

Tarrah and PopPop

Ceremony

They're married!!! 
Quick - photos with the restless, hungry littles!

Poor Hector was vacillating between hysterical laughter and crying.

And Duke. Well, he wasn't in the mood for pictures.

And he wasn't having ANY of it! 

Not a lick of it!!

(I love my kids!)

Saturday, November 15, 2014

walking down the aisle

The lovely Greer...

 ...and the just as lovely McLaren
(There were a few other bridesmaids too.)

And then came the kids...all nieces and nephews of Chad and Tarrah.

Basically, our littles were there to simply provide entertainment for the processional. 

Maddie, as the oldest flower girl by far, was given the task of pulling Chad's baby niece in the wagon. She dutifully and carefully set off down the aisle.

She did fabulously!

Chad's nephew, Hector, was a ring bearer and dutifully set off after Maddie holding his pinwheel. 

And then Duke set off with his pinwheel behind Hector. Part way down the aisle, it fell off because he was shaking it so much and having so much fun toddling with it down the aisle. 

I retrieved the pinwheel and fixed it, and re-sent Duke back down the aisle. 

With London (Chad's niece) and Maisie close behind.


Happy!

London carried forth, doing a beautiful job. Maisie realized she was quickly running out of petals. 

 She dumped the remaining few. 

Bewildered as to what to do, she turned around upset and turned back toward me. I tried to discreetly (hah!) shoo her back down the aisle toward Daddy. But she couldn't spot Daddy in amidst all the people.

But I convinced her to head down the aisle once again when Duke came running back down the aisle crying because his pinwheel had once again fallen apart. 

That was all it took. Maisie was NOT going down that aisle. I took our two crying children out the back of the aisle, quieted them down way off to the side, and then walked them around to the front to take our seats. 

It was just a classic toddler bridal party scenario! The beauty of it though is that people just laugh and love it. Little kids are just plain old cute, and especially so when dressed up. 

Friday, November 14, 2014

waiting around

We were waiting around for a long time prior to the begin of the ceremony. 

What a pretty little flower girl! 
She's already been a flower girl twice in her little 3 year old life. 

Lovely big flower girl. 
Three times over now. 


Hey, people! I'm the ring bearer!

And my handsome program-hander-outer.

Oh yeah, so handsome. 

Okay, for real now. Handsome 8 year old. 

 Jez and Caleb were quite dapper in their little bow ties and ties as they gave programs to guests. 

I love my sons! 

Thursday, November 13, 2014

Getting ready for the wedding

Some fancy big nail-painting being done. 


Pretty girlie fingers for the flower girls!

I just LOVED how Maddie's hair came out. We played around with a few things prior to the wedding but I landed on this. 

Saturday, November 8, 2014

Rehearsal Dinner

So the BIG EVENT of July was Tarrah marrying Chad!!! Here are shots of the rehearsal dinner, which was in a family's backyard entertaining area. Just amazing! Like a venue...but it was a backyard.

Braden gettin' his groove on!

Nearly 12 years now! :)


Beautiful, eh?

Friday, November 7, 2014

wedding prep

The BIG EVENT of July was Tarrah marrying Chad!!! Family came into town. Some of us helped Susie, as she was preparing a portion of the food for the wedding reception.


 It looks like Aunt Gail is sleeping, but I must have caught her blinking because she was doing anything BUT sleeping! She and Aunt Louise worked for hours peeling and chopping.

Caleb was LOVIN' this t-shirt Uncle Thad gave him. Star Wars, baseball, Cincinnati Reds, all in one—doesn't get much more exciting? ;)

Aunt Gail gave Duke and Maisie her cucumber peelings. Duke sat there and played with them for a solid 45 minutes! Isn't it amazing what can capture toddlers' attention at times?

Maisie got to help Aunt Louise with some peeling, which she was thrilled about. Maisie loves to have jobs to do!

And Maisie loves to be silly, too! :)


Tuesday, November 4, 2014

the zoo

We took a day to go to the zoo with the kids. We had been so busy, so it was nice to spend a day together.

Duke was relishing his hamburger—and Braden and I couldn't stop snickering. I'm telling you, this kid is hilarious!

And CUTE!!!

And check out this gem of a photo I snapped. I took it right as Braden was sneezing. Nice!

And look at this precious profile...she's my little sweetheart.

And then I've got these two other goofy kids! They may look like me but they sure do have some of Daddy's personality. 


Maisie and Duke had so much fun going through the prairie dog maze. 

And how do you choose which of these photos to post? 




You don't. You post all three. 

Oh yeah...there were animals at the zoo too. Prairie dogs.

Turtles

A pretty pond

Some koi fish in the pond in front of us. 

We are standing in front of the pathetic new farm exhibit at the zoo. There was a donkey, the koi fish, a goat I think, and get this—ONE chicken. Really?? We sure walked by a lot of empty exhibits. It's not the zoo I remember going to every year as a kid. The National Zoo needs some help.