Lately...

Holy toledo.  It's been over a week since I've blogged.  That's a wittle bit shocking to me!  I mean, it's not like we've been crazy busy or anything...I guess we've just been savoring our last little bit of summer and I have jumped on here to document all of the fun things we've been doing.  Woopsies.

So instead of doing individual posts, I thought I'd just lop all of our happenings lately into one big post...with oodles of pictures to accompany too.

So, ever since my last post all about my LOOOOOOVE for my new camera lens, I've been loving it and completely snap happy with it.  It is definitely going to be my go-to lens. I am just in love.  Anyways, my friend Chelsea was in town, and she wanted some family photos!  I was super stoked to take their pics (cutest family ever!) and test out my news lens.  I was sooooo happy with the way her pics turned out (a few below...more over here at my photog blog if you're interested)!  Thank you Chelsea for letting me snap your family!

A couple Saturdays ago we threw our good friend Lauren a surprise birthday party at one of the local wineries here.  It was oodles of fun, and completely successful on the surprise end.  Our little group of friends loved being kidless for the afternoon (and the day was absolutely gorgeous! about 80 degrees and no humidity...almost unheard of for STL July!) and just getting to chat and catch up with everyone.  One of our good buddies had just gotten engaged, another one expecting their first kiddo, so we had so much to catch up on.  It truly was a great afternoon...I sure hope we can do it again soon!

I've been diligently continuing to document my #PatrickandWalter adventures.  I have close to 30 (shocker!) different pics of this duo snoozing.  To spare this blog post of A LOT of pics, I'd just toss in one collage one and tell you to hop on over to Instagram and search #PatrickandWalter to see them all.  They're pretty darn cute...and hilarious! if I do say so myself.

I have also concluded that Patrick is officially a rock...and can sleep through anything.  Even a photobombing crazy mom with a flash and a loud camera snap, or a dog in his bed.  Quite impressive.  #momspying at its finest.

Our good buddy Braxton (okay, Scooter's good buddy) spent TEN WHOLE DAYS with us!  I have tirelessly and tirelessly told Braxton's mom Lauren over and over how much we love having him and whether it was 2 days or 10 days or 100 days we would and will always lovingly welcome him into our house!  Scooter and Braxton have such a good relationship (check out their own hashtag on Instagram at #ScooterandBraxton) and are such good buddies that it is hard not to love when he comes to visit.  Anyways, Scooter really had an awesome time with his furry little BFF for the 10 days he was here, and then proceeded to sleep for the next several to come down off of his Braxton high.

Back to more camera lovin'.  Yeah, I couldn't go much longer without re-routing this post back to my love for my new camera lens.  The beauty of this new lens is that it's super sharp, and gives a "blur" effect to everything else that it's not focused on.  Mike lovingly told me he never thought he'd spend so much money on a lens that makes things blurry.  Oh, he's a funny one.  Anywho, here are a few pics I've snapped recently with my new lens, which I love oh-so-much, and may never take off my camera body!

Whew.  Okay, back to what's been happening lately.  We have spent a great many of minutes at the pool as of late, which has been awe-some.  Actually, we definitely haven't gone as much as we'd have wanted, given the unseasonably cool 75 degree no humidity days we've been having as of late, but we have gone nearly every day it's been warm.  And I've officially concluded that Patrick is a fish.  This kid loves the water oh-so-much.

For a couple days we got to tool around in my aunt's Mustang before my uncle came up from Florida to borrow it while he was in town.  To say Patrick loved riding in a convertible is an understatement.  He was completely overjoyed and so excited to be riding in a car with the top down!  Plus, the weather was just gorgeous (not too hot) and it was just right for convertible weather.  We did make a cruise in it to our favorite ice cream stand--The Custard Station--too.  It was so much fun cruisin' around in that for a few days!  I think Mike probably enjoyed it most of all.

We did get to have a little ballpit playdate with some friends too!  I use to work at MRH with Kari, and she brought her two kiddos over for a morning playdate in the ballpit.  I don't know who had more fun: Corbin, Adelaide, Patrick, or Scooter!  Us mamas really had a good time catching up (which, shockingly, was really our first time all summer to do so!) and watching our kiddos play.  I loved watching Corbin warm up to Scooter--at first wanting nothing to do with him, then asking him to play in the ballpit with them, to then posing on the couch for a pic with him!  So darn cute.

I will end this uber-long blog post with this adorable pic of my boys.

Which, I should add was a recreation of a similar pic I snapped exactly a year ago today with my police-clad boys in nearly the same positions...with just a smidgen change of size and outfits.  I die.  So.darn.cute.  I am such a lucky gal...and I am thankful each and every day for this.