SCENES FROM FATHERS DAY

We loved celebrating Father's Day with all of the special fathers in our lives. We had a delicious meal with my family and Jon's family. I have always loved that our families get along so well and feel like one big happy family when we are all together. It's such a special time when we can all get together! -- Jon is such a natural father and it's amazing watching him father Soren. Soren is crazy about Jon and so am I. ;)

OUR TRIP TO THE MOUNTAINS

On Saturday we got back from a week in the mountains. Jon and I were celebrating our 4 year wedding anniversary with Zach and Leah who were also celebrating their 4 year anniversary! We are definitely the "stay-cation" type, so the idea of staying in a cabin for a week, cooking our own food, relaxing, and taking it easy was right up our alley!

We drove up to North Georgia and rented one of those amazing vacation rentals (which is the best!) We also brought Soren along, which was a new adventure. This was our first big trip with him and he did really well! We had one little melt-down on the way to Zach and Leah's but he mostly napped during the rest of the drive and was great at the cabin. Going out and about with him more makes me so much more confident in taking him places!

I've been trying to really unplug a lot lately and that's just what I did on our vacation. I left my phone and computer in our room for the most part and just checked a few things here and there or used my phone to read books from my kindle app. It was just what I needed and so wonderful. I get into such a bad habit of checking my phone for the sake of checking it and wasting precious time. I'm trying to learn to just look at it during certain times of the work day and essentially putting it away after work and on the weekends. My heart is to be "all there" for my family and enjoy all of these moments. :)

To sum it up, it was such a laid back getaway and just what we needed!!

PS - Also, thank you all SO much for your incredible words of encouragement and support about our announcement yesterday. We have been so excited about this new journey and we can hardly wait to launch the site in July! 

MOTHER'S DAY WEEKEND

It was so special being able to celebrate my very first Mother's Day. We didn't plan much but we spent a lot of time as a family and it was my very favorite. We went to a baseball game to see my sister perform the National Anthem. I got to see my best friend, Jenny, be a mommy for the first time and see little Rowan in the hospital. Visited Stone Mountain park and had a picnic (we have a season pass and have been loving our walks and time there this year)! ON Mother's Day we went to church, afterward we met up with my parents, siblings, significant others, and Jon's parents to celebrate over brunch at a quaint little restaurant in Grayson.

Jon and I spent the rest of the day together with Soren, going out, watching shows...it turned out to be such a relaxing day. Leading up to Mother's Day I wasn't quite sure what type of traditions we would consider or what we should do to celebrate both Mother's Day and Father's Day. It's kind of crazy getting to the point where it's time to make your own traditions around your family. -- Jon and I decided after a successful first Mother's Day that we would make it a tradition of keeping it simple and make it a family day. I can hardly wait to celebrate Jon in June. :)

On a side note, I saw some beautiful posts honoring mothers on Instagram yesterday. Many of them recognizing and sending love to mommies who had their little ones taken away too soon, women who ache to be mommies, women who have lost their mommies. All of the beautiful moms. I wanted to second those sentiments and send celebration and love to all of you. What a beautiful time to recognize all of the women in our lives. Happy (belated) Mother's Day.

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY

These pictures are so special to me for many reasons. First of all, we hardly ever get snow in Atlanta. Soren was born on a snow day and two weeks later (yesterday) we got to enjoy more snow together in our cozy neighborhood. :) As well, these are our first photos together as a family of three. We are just completely enraptured by Soren and love learning about him and getting to know him more everyday. :) Feeling pretty blessed to be celebrating Valentine's Day with my two favorite guys!

Wishing you a very happy Valentine's day from the Wallace family!! xoxo

CAPTURED: GET OUT OF TOWN

Sometimes you have really bad days. Sometimes bad days happen a lot easier when your pregnancy hormones are raging and all technology is out to get you. ;) Friday was that type of day for me. I woke up feeling bleh-sad-weird-unmotived and as the day progressed little things kept building up and making it more and more BLEH.

Jon knew my day was not-so-hot and being the loving and sweet husband that he is, he surprised me by coming home early from work with my favorite drink from Sonic at hand. He's been so attentive and sweet during this pregnancy. It's been so wonderful to have him by my side, taking such great care of me. I love him SO freaking much!! We had talked about going out of town on Saturday, but in a spur of the moment decision, and after realizing it was much needed, we decided to take a late night drive to Greenville, SC, and stay in a hotel.

We spent the majority of the day on Saturday enjoy the downtown area. We went to the Holiday Indie Craft Parade, visited a few pop up shops and ate some delicious BBQ at a local restaurant. We had such a laid-back, restful time, it was exactly what I needed. It has seriously been an emotional roller-coaster of emotions during this third trimester! I am SO completely thankful for a mini trip away and for Jon. I couldn't have made it through the weekend in one piece without him. :)  

CAPTURED: THANKSGIVING

It was such an honor for Jon and me to host Thanksgiving at our place for the very first time. Usually Jon and I go out of town to celebrate Thanksgiving with his extended family and then celebrate with my family on the weekend, but due to some changes in our normal plans, we got to all gather together at our place for a wonderful meal.

We decided to use the "living room" that we are planning to convert into a dining room for our dinner. Since we didn't have enough tables and chairs we used six 2x4 fold out tables and extra folding chairs to make everything work. We used a roll of craft paper that we already had for a tabletop cover, our plates from West Elm, plants from around our yard for decoration, and we painted names above each plate. Since this room isn't wired for electricity, we decided to string bulb lights from the ceiling to give it an "al fresco" feel. I love having the lights up like this, it adds so much character to the room! -- Jon and I can't wait to invest in some tables and chairs to make this look more permanent.

This year's Thanksgiving was very special to us. It's so wonderful having our family together and sharing a delicious meal. I loved every minute. :)

CAPTURED: FAMILY MOMENTS

I so treasure family photos. Before my mom started her chemo treatment she wanted to make sure we got some good family photos taken. We set up a tripod in my parents' backyard last Sunday and snapped a few photos. These are so special and I'm so thankful to have them. :) I love these people!

I hope that you have a wonderful weekend, friends! I'm planning some home projects and date time with Jon this weekend. Also, I haven't been able to reply to all of the comments yet, but thank you all SO much for all of your sweet and supportive comments on my post about my mom the other day. It meant so much to me and was such a blessing. Thank you for being so encouraging and sharing some of your stories with me as well. Love all of you bunches. :)

TEXAS STYLE COUNCIL RECAP

Yesterday, Jenny and I returned from an amazing weekend in Austin attending the Texas Style Council. This was probably our all-time favorite conference of the year. We had so much fun networking, meeting new people, meeting friends in person, learning, and enjoying Texas. :) It started on Friday night. We were invited to attend a dinner hosted by Minnetonka. We got to meet a handful of other amazing bloggers that have worked with Minnetonka, got a peek at their new line of shoes, ate delicious food and mingled with some awesome ladies. You can get more details from our dinner over on Tieka's blog! After the dinner on Friday, we attended a clothing swap party hosted by Lulu's. It was hectic and awesome. Jenny and I each scored some great pieces that we're excited to wear. :)

Saturday and Sunday were filled to the brim with amazing classes taught by awesome bloggers. There were so many incredible sessions to choose from it was hard to pick! Saturday ended with an amazing dinner with some of my favorite ladies and a "Prom" party complete with a dance-off and superlative awards. Jenny and I were able to connect with a lot of great companies during that time and have fun with our new friends. Some of these blogging ladies sure can dance!! Sunday was the last day, but we ended it with an after party and more great conversations. It was so sad to leave on Monday, but we were so thankful to have the opportunity to attend the conference and connect with so many amazing people. I knew I liked a lot of the bloggers attending, but after meeting them, I just love them to pieces! What a supportive and encouraging community to be part of! Can't wait to go next year!!

Top photo credited to Tieka of Selective Potential