Baby Shower {Little Monkey}

Saturday, we celebrated the upcoming arrival of my niece, Maddi at a couples shower of family and friends.

Her nursery is monkey-themed, so of course the shower theme had a great jumping off point.  My sister-in-law Jessica did a great job putting it together.  

 

They even had advise cards for guests to fill out.

Diaper cake decorations...brilliant!  There is a great tutorial on how to make them here.

 One of my favorite things from the shower: Maddi cookies!

 The food was mexican themed... so I brought my Aunt Linnet's Spinach Queso...so good.

My other favorite thing from the shower, was that everyone brought a book to sign instead of a card so that they could start Maddi's library.  I was so paranoid that they were going to get two of the same book, I picked one that I had never heard of in hopes that no one else would.  

We ended up bringing: 

She got some really great books...and surprisingly each one was different!  

I can't wait to meet sweet little Maddi!

Oklahoma!

On the flight to Oklahoma, I had the title song from Rogers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma stuck in my head... "Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down the lane..."


It really was windy there!  We had a great weekend visiting with family and celebrating the wedding of my dear cousin Alyssa.


Here are some picture highlights:


The rehearsal wouldn't have been complete without a ribbon bouquet... 

 

Rehearsal Dinner at BJ's (can you tell there was mood lighting?!?)

The Helveston/Ludtke girls!!

Bridal lunch at Blu's - complete with delicious cupcakes

and super cute favors!!

 

the lovely bride halfway through the hair process ;)

and the cake!! Yum - I love me some butter cream icing!

There was a lot of fun and sweet moments to be had.  

Congrats to the happy couple - Mr. and Mrs. Ross Sandlin!!

Christmas & New Years

Christmas was a fantastic 7 day event!  


Day 1


We kicked it off with the annual Honeycutt Christmas Party.  It was a great night of food, fun, family...and Dirty Santa Bingo.  Imagine this: the rules of white elephant and $5 mystery gifts, but instead of getting a number, in order to get a turn you have to win a round of holiday Bingo.  


These were our spoils (hint: the Scrabble SLAM was mine):

It was Italian theme, so what a better contribution than delicious Chocolate Truffle Cheesecake.  I hardly ever make cheesecake, since it is last on Wesley's long "I love desserts" list.  Thankfully, the rest of his family loves it, so I didn't feel guilty.  I was able to snap a photo just before we cut into it:

Day 2

Another day of Honeycutts!  The highlight was the all too intense monopoly game.  I confess, monopoly is not one of the games on the top of my list, so Penny took my place on Wesley's team:

 It was a good match - they won!

Day 3

We spent Christmas day with my family.  It was so great and relaxing.  I LOVE my family! In true Helveston tradition, we had a fabulous Olde English Christmas complete with standing rib roast and yorkshire pudding.  The dogs got these to nibble on:

Candy cane rawhides!

Day 4-6

Our Christmas present was our trip to Charleston for New Years.  

We had a great time roaming those gorgeous streets, shopping at the market, and eating at Charleston's finest.  My favorite place was Poogan's Porch.  It is a life experience must!  If you need a direction - the shrimp and grits are to die for.

Day 7

Probably the most exciting day of all was yesturday....when Wesley got offered a job!  He will be starting as a programmer at Supply Point Systems on Monday!!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!