Pepper Progress

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D + K: the floral test run

Last weekend Dannielle, Karen and I went to the LA flower mart to scope out the flowers in season that we'll be using for Dannielle's wedding in October. I really love the flower mart at this time of the year, the dahlias were nuts!! We went through everything again, discussing what she liked and disliked, and the vision for the arrangements, and we bought her pretty gilver vessels too.

Flower headquarters is going to be at Jerod and Karen's house so we set up shop there and got to working on a few test centerpieces. I had my mini apprentice there to help:

Luckily Dannielle loved the test arrangements. And I know it wasn't a fake love to spare my feelings either because girl had some opinions! We accented the first centerpiece with the peach mini carnations and berries, and she realized afterwards that their pops of color were kind of bothering her. She wanted more blush and less peachy pop, where it almost looks white but with a very light blushy-pink/peach color tinging pieces of it. The hydrangeas that we found were PERFECT. I'd hardly call them pink, blush is definitely more accurate. The petals were mostly white but ombréd out to the light pink. Btw, I'm making ombréd a word.  

So after some tweaking, we were happy with the colors, but it was still missing a flowy romantic feel that we were after. After going back through D's inspiration pics, we noticed her favorites had droopy greenery falling out of the arrangement over the footed bowl. The only greenery we had was the Queen Anne's lace so I did a little urban foraging in Jerod and Karen's backyard and found awesome little spiky droopy green leaf branches on a big wall of a tree. They worked out perfectly. And they're FREE-FIFTY-FREE!

This was the more monochromatic arrangement that had the berries around the edges. We didn't bring back any stock from the mart, but we decided that for the wedding arrangements, we'll mix in some blush-colored stock to the arrangements so they're not *too* white.

So romantic and pretty. I can't wait to see a whole reception area staged with these suckers. They won't be alone on the table either. Dannielle got little gilver votives for candles and some flower clippings to fill out the table a bit more. These arrangements are pretty substantial in size though.

And even the groom and their daughter Paisley approve! Kurtis is kind of a design snob (and I mean that in a good way- he's Art Center and super talented in art and design) so a thumbs-up from him was a relief.

And Paisley obviously couldn't stop staring at them. I hope she didn't eat the lisianthus like Sadie was doing.

I love this detail shot of the arrangement. That Green Mist is so pretty, like little floral fireworks. And the peach hypericum berries are my favorites. This one is going to be fun!!

Elsa's first haircut

It was time. Even though I sort of miss how she used to look and the feel of her little ringlets, I keep looking at Elsa now with her sassy little bob and exclaiming how damn cute she is! She went from a toddler to a little girl by taking off a few inches, it's nuts. She looks like a whole new kid.

We took her to my hairdresser/friend, Josie Maddox at Bouffant here in Long Beach, because it's a laid back little salon and I knew Josie would do a killer job. She has a little girl too and managed a squirmy kid and scissors like the pro she is. These are the before shots:

We even left a dread lock in there for Josie to see what we were working with on a daily basis. We got her set up with a booster seat, the iPad playing Yo Gabba, and TWO candy bracelets to munch on. Kid hair cuts are synonymous with bribing I've come to realize.

We modeled Elsa's haircut after Hadley's adorable do which we saw at Jamie and Chris' wedding:

She was too cute. Short of stealing her, we thought we could at least make our kid look kind of like her.

And done! Bouffant had a lot of candy in jars, which of course E zeroed in on pretty damn quickly. She got a melty mint or two for being so good and holding kind of still.

And you ready for the money shot? This one is going in her GapKids modeling audition application:

My little Twiggy...

Danielle + Kurtis- the inspiration

We Like Flowers is at it again! Which reminds me, we need to update that blog. Put it on the to-do list! Our friends Dannielle and Kurtis are getting married next month and WLF will be in effect. The bride has an army of helpers for this one, good thing too considering she has about 183 vessels. Luckily like 163 of those are candle votives, but still! It's going to be a very flower heavy wedding, so not much filler, just pretty pretty flowers. Here are some of her inspiration pics:



We're going with ivories, whites, light light pinks and peaches, and everything in blush tones. It's going to be SO pretty and feminine.

I can already smell these bouquets. I like the inspiration pics she pulled for the bouts too, but I'm a little scared of scabiosa pods in the bouts after Matthew + Kelly's wedding. Everyone's hair kept getting snagged by the boy's pods! We'll see.

All of the vessels are going to be in this "gilver" finish, which duh, means gold/silver. A classy metallic me thinkest.

The wedding is on the smaller side (thank god), so we're doing around 8 table centerpieces, but will have other arrangements for the altar, aisle, cake table, guest book table, favor table, oh my. The venue they are working with is amazing though, with walk-in coolers that we can store the flowers in the day before, a work sink, and will allow us in to work on everything early.

Really excited for this one. I'll post pictures from the mart today!

A few San Mateo stragglers

I just transferred the last of our Bay Area trip pictures to my laptop and these ones should have been included in the last post, so here's part 2!

Happy Marmie and dad's mandals:

Happy Abuelo and spilled juice on Elsa:

On our way to lunch:

Stopped to see a giant metal giraffe:

Going to the flower mart this morning! Next wedding up is for Dannielle + Kurtis. NO billy balls in this wedding! What am I going to do!?

Time with the G-rents

The week is up but we've crammed in some serious QT with the family on this trip. Elsa had a ton of fun visiting lots of parks, eating too many sweets, and playing with all of Nonnie and Marmie's toys they've been hoarding for her. 

We went to Los Gatos with my parents and Elsa ran around the fountain a few hundred times. She didn't like touching the water though (it looked kind of high-pressured) so Marmie tried pushing her in:

My dad *may* have had more fun at the parks than Elsa. Here he is rocking out on the Sway Fun while Elsa watched, perplexed at why he thought it was so much fun. 

Naked iPad time with Nonnie and Marmie:

I finally got them all together in one shot!

Elsa loves the idea of the pool, and has had a few good swim sessions, but we found out on this trip that 1) she's very careful around the pool and inches up to it slowly instead of jumping in, thank god, and 2) she does not like the diving board. Jeff was doing flips off of it (and causing tidal waves) and she was not a fan. She kept saying "I don't want- I don't like" and waving her hand at it when they floated close by.

 I think Grampa found out how tiring babysitting a mad active two-year-old can be. 

Thanks for all the QT family! We had a wonderful week and miss you all already...

Parks, Matthew, and toys

Elsa and I continued the tradition of visiting the Donut Wheel that Matthew and I have kept up for years, after I moved away. We try to always make time for donuts at least one morning that I'm back. She was being a shy girl and kept stealing glances at Matthew.

Elsa sneaking a peek at Matthew:

 Matthew sneaking a peek at Elsa:

 And then a shared gaze after he won her over with a piece of his chocolate donut.

We hit up a small park after breakfast but it didn't have swings (WHAT PARK DOESN'T HAVE SWINGS!?) so we packed it up and went to good old Memorial Park. 

Swings! And baby ducks!

And scary statues.

And shoulder rides. It was hilarious/totally sad because when Matthew took Elsa off his shoulders, she knocked off his cap and discovered that Matthew has a shaved head and apparently looked completely different to her with no hair. She freaked out. She was covering her eyes with the backs of her hands and saying "I don't like him!!" over and over. She was such a jerk. Poor Matthew. We decided to part ways at this point but as we were pulling away she was still crying but said "Bye friend... bye park".

When we got home we played in my old playhouse that my dad built for me when I was little and I found a bunch of my old favorite toys! It's such a neat feeling to uncover these familiar things that I spent SO many hours playing with after having not seen them for 25+ years. 

All of these guys came from our trips to Norway. Whenever we went to visit my dad's family, my parents would splurge on a few of these for us. I think they were just mine actually, I'm not sure what Jan got. I think they were a European Lego thing because they didn't have them in the States, but they have the Lego legs and arms. If anyone can identify these, let me know!!

And my Sparkle Princess Ponies! I gave away all my ponies and Cabbage Patch dolls a long time ago not thinking I'd ever want them again, but I'm so glad these guys were stashed away in that playhouse. Elsa wasn't too interested in them but she will be one day I bet. I washed them with her baby shampoo so they now smell like her.

My parents are going to be fixing up our old bedrooms to give Elsa a space in their house since she'll be out of the pack n' play the next time we visit, so who knows what else they'll uncover...

Visiting the grandparents and great-grandparents

Elsie and her great-grandparents! In San Mateo, gazing adoringly up to her tall Great-Abuelo: 

Elsa is not much of a hand-holder but she was happy to let Abuelo lead her along.

Back at Abuelo's home waiting for the Cuban espresso to be made. Elsa claimed Abuelo's recliner to relax with her iPad.

We also had a nice little visit with Grandma Mac and Dioji. She got grapes, these tasty fried banana Filipino churro things from Tess, and lots of stolen kisses from Dioji.

Then off to Grammie's! We notice how much Elsa has grown when she's being held by tiny Grammie. She has gotten so long!

Can't leave Grammie's without having some sweets! She got a hipster scarf bib and pound cake with ice cream.

Deep conversations between these two. At least telepathically.