Auntie Travis & Uncle Courtney!

We have been waiting SO IMPATIENTLY to write this post...and with his/her little heartbeat officially heard, we can finally announce the news!!! :)

No, we're NOT pregnant (one step at a time!) - but two of our very best friends, bridesmaid and groomsman, ARE!! THE ZEIERS ARE OFFICIALLY BECOMING A PARTY OF THREE! And T and I could not be more excited. We have been WAITING for this moment pretty much since they got married....and almost two years later, it's finally here!

Let's rewind.

Travis met Steven when they worked together at Mohler, Nixon & Williams and instantly became best friends. Steven was engaged to Karla at the time, whom neither of us had met yet, and Travis pretty much just told Steven that we were coming to their wedding...even though we weren't invited (since invites had gone out way before)...and luckily Steven was totally on board to have us crash! They got married at Casa Real at Ruby Hill Winery (it was at their wedding that we fell in love with the venue - that's where we're getting married! AND their wedding date is 3 days before ours...so they will get to walk down the aisle together at our wedding right after their anniversary - ugh, it's so romantic, I start crying just thinking about it) so we got all dolled up, slipped into stealth mode and crashed like PROS. Over time, we became the infamous "wedding crashers" that is still joked about between families to this day! (We also made a brief cameo appearance in their wedding video...proof we're not as stealthy as we thought, but still awesome). It was only a few weeks after that Karla and I formed one of the most amazing friendships I've ever known...and the 4 of us have been nothing short of family ever since.

For those of you that don't know the Zeiers, we highly suggest you track them down and meet them at our wedding. They are truly two of the NICEST people...you know those kinds of people that become your best friend within 30 seconds of talking with them? Yeah, that's Karla & Steven. When you put two wonderful souls together to make a new, mini one...well, we can only imagine how blessed and beautiful that child will be. Karla has been dreaming of motherhood since, like, forever...and to know that all their prayers and wishes are being fulfilled is so magical. Together, they're the dream team of parenthood and such an inspiration to us.

Aren't they just the CUTEST? Yes, yes they are. And their baby is bound to be even cuter...if that's possible.

It was only a few months ago that we were joking about what would happen when they have a new little one...and somehow, T and I landed the new titles of Auntie Travis & Uncle Courtney. We know the titles are a little mixed up, but it kind of fits...this peanut will have so many actual aunts and uncles who love him/her so much, and this way they're certain to always laugh at their silly, psuedo aunt and uncle with the mixed-up names :). Karla & Steven are literally our extended family, and we cannot wait add one more.

We love you guys, and we love little Baby Z so much already!! Welcoming him/her into the world will be one of the best days ever...and who knows - maybe when you're a few babies down the line, we'll catch up and give them a baby buddy and grow our families together. :)

With lots of love and baby fever (haha, kidding!),
C+T.

P.S. Shopping for baby clothes/toys/things is my new favorite activity...SO. MUCH. CUTE.

The Smyths are smitten...and now married, too!

We've officially declared 2013 the year of weddings, since we've gone to a few and know a bunch of couples who have tied the knot already - and it's only JULY. Since T and I have always wanted a Fall/wintery wedding, we've loved seeing a totally different perspective and so many seasonal details in all these rustic, summery weddings! There are so many creative ideas floating out in the wedding world (how people planned weddings before Pinterest & Style Me Pretty, I'll NEVER know), and it's so fun to see how couples put all the pieces together and create a day that is so them...and that's exactly how Sharilyn & Nick's day was.

T has known Nick since their Bellarmine days (so naturally they have that "Bell Bromance", as I like to call it), and interestingly enough, I met Sharilyn at the Bellarmine reunion last year. One thing that's for sure - S+N are totally meant for each other. They celebrated their 5 year anniversary the day before their wedding...can you say romantic? Not only was the date perfect, the weather cooperated quite nicely too! After our experiences with a few hot weddings and preparing for another, we were quite surprised when Mother Nature brought on that classic Morgan Hill breeze, and actually even chilled us! Jenny & I were wearing Ben & Jerome's suit jackets for awhile until Jason brought out of whole stash of jackets from his car - thanks for the gentlemanly gesture, guys! The weather was definitely a welcome suprise. Things certainly heated up when we got out on that dance floor...and watched Jerome bust a move like no one we've ever seen. I swear, at one point the videographer was just following him around and cracking up - S+N, we're definitely going to want to see that footage one day! (wedding movie night?!)

The Smyths said their "I Do"s at Guglielmo Winery and...well, you know...we're a HUGE fan of wineries. Vineyards on vineyards on vineyards...we felt right at home. Every inch of that place was painted in their stunning wedding colors - they combined N's favorite color (teal) and S' fav (yellow), which was so personal - she even texted me the next day saying "I can't get over how gorgeous the colors were!" The combination of personalized, rustic details, a gorgeous bridal party, a mexican buffet for dinner and a layout of sweets that put us both into a massive sugar coma (a candy bar AND a dessert bar - umm, YUM) made for a truly special night. S+N say it was the best day of their lives - and that's about as perfect as a wedding can get. :)

S+N - we've loved being involved in your engagement, and your wedding was the cherry on top. We look forward to returning the favor and partying with you at ours! N - be warned - we witnessed you breaking it down, and we're expecting those same dance moves to make a reappearance at our wedding! And S - you better save a "get down low" dance with me, since you won't have a 10 pound dress on! ;) Cheers to you, lovebirds.

Until our next adventure (or wedding!),
C+T.

The year of pictures, pictures...and more pictures.

WE LOVE PICTURES. Ok, ok...I love taking them slightly more than Travis does...but we both love looking at them later and taking a trip down memory lane. This year, being engaged has brought us the wonderful blessing of LOTS AND LOTS of pictures.

We just recently took our engagement photos with our extremely talented photographer (who also is the sweetest and most adorable lady on the face of the planet), Ashley Maxwell of Ashley Maxwell Photography! I've swooned over Ash's photos since basically the beginning of time, so when it was time for us to book our wedding photographer, it was a no-brainer. I'm pretty sure I emailed her before we were even engaged! We are beyond thrilled to work with her, and it was such a fun day taking our engagements. Just a little bit of proof of what a creative soul she is - she took us out to a little winery in Lodi that was unlike anything we had ever seen...the pictures will do the talking.

 Wowza. Love that barn.

Here are just a few...

 

&

I mean...who wouldn't want to take a photo with a horse?!

We cannot WAIT to see what she does with our wedding!

A couple months before that, we took some really fun pictures with some of our dearest friends Luke & BreAnne Cunningham of 1985 Luke's Photography for a "Save The Date" shoot...they took us all over Anderson County Park and got really creative with some of the photos! We brought along our parents' wedding photos too - of course, Luke & Bre made the photos totally frame-worthy and a wonderful surprise gift to our parents that certainly brought some tears to the moms' eyes. :)

Sun peeking through the trees...lovely.

We adore L&B - they're SO FUN to work with!! And take amazing photos, obvi. :)

AND, if that wasn't enough, one of our very best friends Erin Cutler of Erin Cutler Photography took us our to our favorite secret spot in Saratoga and captured us some more...

 LOVE this ring/watch shot!

 His & Hers Starbucks!

 Classic. Erin knows us so well.

We're so thankful to have all these wonderful photos to last us a lifetime...and to remind us of this sweet, sweet time in our lives. To all these amazing photographers & our friends - THANK YOU! More to come I'm sure...stay tuned. :)

C+T.

Hi, Napa. We're back.

With the wedding a short 4.5 months away and summer activities in full swing, we find that our weekends are getting booked up quicker than they’re coming – not a bad thing, but exhausting nonetheless! We kind of need weekends from our weekends...and T & I were in desperate need of a getaway, a detox day. Needless to say, we weren’t going to find that in the Bay Area with emails and errand reminders right at our fingertips, so we snatched up the first free Saturday we’ve stumbled upon in weeks and ran up to the one place that holds nothing but pure bliss – Napa. There’s something about this valley gem that just soothes the soul…I’m fairly convinced that Napa only has happy people. Really. We meet so many people at every place we visit…and everyone is so genuinly HAPPY. Maybe it's the wine...or maybe it's just Napa. It’s sort of like the second we enter the valley, we can feel the relaxation set in. Ahhhh.

Our friends love to tease us about our love/obsession with wineries. Yes, we do love tasting the wine, but it’s really the overall feeling of a winery that is just so charming…we’ve visited over 30 wineries in the course of our relationship, and have YET to see one that is not breathtakingly gorgeous. Half the time we just hang out at the winery for a while after tasting because the views are to die for. Miles and miles of vineyards, sunshine, mountains…dreamy. With our total and complete love for wineries, it only makes sense that we’re getting married at one, right? :)

On Saturday, we visited this random little winery that was never really on our radar – Heitz Cellars. The wine was great (I believe we bought a Zin and a Port), but it wasn’t until we walked out onto the back patio that I died and went to heaven – a canopy of trees shaded the patio with benches lining the sides and a gorgeous fountain right in the middle…and if you were to step off the edge of that patio, you would find yourself in a SEA of vineyards. It looks a little something like this, but BETTER:

 











Swoon.

We always go up to Napa in the winter months – we have an annual trip in January that we LOVE, and on our last trip in February, we took the plunge and became wine club members at Markham Winery…and now that we have to pick up our wine shipments, we have an excuse to go back every few months!! Genius. Not that we can stay away anyway, but at least now we can justify it. J Plus, life really isn’t complete without a sandwich from Oakville Grocery from time to time.

Those winemakers sure know how to do life right. T and I definitely spent a large majority of Saturday daydreaming about moving to the Napa Valley (Moss Adams actually has an office in Downtown Napa!) and living a lovely life as winemakers…welcome to YEAGER CELLARS…haha, kidding of course and a tad unrealistic, but hey – it’s impossible NOT to fantasize about a Napa life. J For now, we’ll treasure it as our favorite getaway spot. We’ll be back soon!!

Until our next trip to Napa (which will likely be soon...),

C+T.

We are so cheesy...pose twins.

Happy Birthday, America.

The 4th of July has always been one of our favorite holidays - when you combine family, friends, summertime weather and a crap load of FOOD, you really can't go wrong. We're still learning how to split the holidays between our two families, but every year we've packed up and headed up to Tahoe with the Nolet crew for an amazing weekend at my uncle's house in Incline Village. For those of you that haven't been to Tahoe in the summer, drop whatever you're doing right now and GO. Really. It's an EXPERIENCE. Boating, jet skiing, hiking, frisbee-ing, BBQing and the most incredible fireworks show right on the lake. Patriotic perrrfection.

This year, the 4th unfortunately fell on a Thursday, and while MoFo was kind enough to give us Friday off as well...Moss Adams was not as generous. T found himself stuck in the office on Friday...which made a Tahoe trip a tad bit inconvenient. BUMMER! While my parents headed up there and my sister Megan made her way to Chicago to be with her boyfriend, T and I put our annual 4th on hold and rearranged plans. We were kind of excited to have this year all to ourselves...and to see what the heck the Bay Area does on the 4th. We were impressed!

We started our day EARLY and trekked down to Morgan Hill to check out their infamous 4th of July parade with our best friends Jason & Jenny. It was early enough that it wasn't scorching hot outside (as it would become later that day) and we had a blast hanging out and watching (what I'm kind of ashamed to say) the first 4th of July parade I've ever seen. Very cool, and very patriotic! Jason wasted no time grabbing that tri-tip sandwich from a local booth, and I enjoyed watching T drool uncontrollably every time a '69 Camero rolled down the parade. It was fun to experience Jenny's family tradition and see where she comes from - Mo Hill treated us quite well. :)

We were definitely excited to head down to the Yeagers' house for some BBQ, family time and.....AIR CONDITIONING. The Yeager family is one of a kind - you've got my father-in-law sweating his face off just to BBQ the perfect tri-tip, T's aunt sketching some illustrations for a book she wrote on the couch, my mother-in-law's best friend making mudslides and pina coladas, T teaching the whole family how to play Candy Crush...and, of course, I'm passed out on the couch happy as can be. :) The best part came after all that - we found ourselves in the midst of a huge fireworks show right above us! No crowds, no craziness - just backyard bliss. Thanks to the sketchy guys at the park with their (what we only can assume are) extremely illegal fireworks - we sure enjoyed the private show! Oh, and for not blowing up the house...much appreciated.

Needless to say, while we missed Tahoe, our 4th at home turned out to be pretty perfect. Pretty excited to see what next year has in store - maybe a destination 4th...Hawaii, anyone? ;)

Until our next adventure,
C+T.