How 'bout them weddings?

I find that the longer I wait to blog something the less likely I am to do it. Because I did not totally want to ignore my best friend's wedding, even if she doesn't follow my blog, I've decided I must do it now....with pictures. :) Enjoy!

Dena, Julianna, Me - long time friends!

Ready to be a housewife, eh?

Bride & Groom

Juje and her parents

With the bridal party

D'Angelo's!

Cute kids

In front of St. Aloysius - gorgeous church!

Marc & Me

the Party

Best Friends since 1st grade :)

Hehe. Making Marc do my favorite pose.

Down the aisle

Mr. & Mrs. Yamamoto

With my nanny kiddos - Georgia, Madeline, Veronica, and Eleanor

Cake!

Precious. Julianna & PopPop

I got another boquet!

And here is the dance portion of my toast (sorry, it's not the best version, but it will stop moving around like crazy):




And Jeremy's Wedding....

Congrats to Jeremy & Rickie!

Boquet - check!

Marc & me getting ready for the long drive home from Twisp

Jer, Andrew, Me - the boys are all married off!

And just because it is super cute...

Jaden & my punching bag :)

Quick Takes - Vol. 8

1. Riley is still in the hospital, but will hopefully be home soon. There are still questions about her liver, but things are looking better. We are waiting to see if she will have surgery today or if we have to wait until early next week. She will be getting another feeding tube, but at the insistence of Stacey it will not be one going through her nose again. It seems like that has been causing enough irritations and problems and Stacey and Perry really don't want to have to repeat everything that's just happened. Thus, surgery. Riley will be getting G tube that will be surgically placed directly into her stomach. Thank you for your continued prayers!

2. The upside to Riley spending so much time in the hospital is that I've been getting to spend more time with Jaden. He has been joining me while I nanny and playing with the kiddos. It's kind of a win-win for everyone. More playmates for the kids, nephew time for me, and Stacey can spend more time in the hospital without Jaden going stir crazy.

3. Happy Birthday to Cameron! My cousins Jessica and Jeff's first son is turning 1 this weekend. I haven't seen him in awhile and I'm really looking forward to his birthday party. It will be great to spend time and visit with family. I miss them!

4. Congrats to Jeremy and Rickie! I'm headed over to Twisp tomorrow morning for their wedding. I don't make it over to Twisp very often as you can imagine. Actually, I've never been there. :) I'm looking forward to seeing Jer, meeting Rickie, and meeting Andrew's new wife (I missed their wedding last weekend while I was at Julianna's wedding). It should be a pretty fun day! I have tasks and fun planned for the 4 1/2 car ride each way too!

5. Speaking of Julianna's wedding, it was WONDERFUL! St. Aloysius at Gonzaga is absolutely beautiful. I was so happy and honored to stand up for Julianna and Mike in their wedding party. Julianna is my best friend, I think Mike is great, and they make a really wonderful couple. Pictures and video to come in another post soon from the wedding and the super fun reception.

6. It's been a nice week for catching up. :) I was able to get some emails out to a few friends, talk to Kelly who is back from Azerbaijan, visit with old friends at Juje's wedding, and spend time with my friend who is home for a week from Nicaragua. I really do feel blessed with such wonderful people in my life.

7. I just finished making some Lemon Ricotta Cookies. Yummy! If you want some, you should join me tonight at St. Vincent de Paul Parish at 7:oo PM in the Willenborg living room. We will be showing a documentary called Thine Eyes...A Witness to the March for Life. I've heard nothing but good things about it and I'm really excited to see it. I'm even more excited for January to get here so I can go participate in the march this documentary will be covering. Woo! Can't wait!

I've been tagged: 7 Things I Love

Carrie got me, so here I go...

1. The mornings I wake up early enough to snuggle up on my new chair (thanks Cinda!) and complete my morning prayer and read the bible before I rush to get ready for work.

2. Spending quality time in quality conversation with quality people.

3. Feeling sore at the end of a work out.

4. Unsolicited, excited, running, jumping hugs from kids and surprise pictures they have drawn for me.

5. Throwing away a to do list that has been completed. Also being unpacked - kind of a list in itself.

6. Living close to family.

7. My dad explaining my boyfriend and me as "ga ga over each other." :)

The tags: I'm supposed to tag 7, but I'm pretty sure most of my fellow blog peeps have all been taken by now, except maybe some sneaky people that I don't know follow my blog. So I will just throw out Stacey, Marie, Karlo (I'm not sure he knows I have a blog...), and Britta.

7 Quick Takes - Vol. 7 ...the I've been really busy and it's Monday and I need to quick take the last two weeks!

I've been busy and now it's time for lots of updates!

1. Most of you probably know Riley went back to the hospital a week and a half ago. She is doing much better now, her heart looks great, and things are again very optimistic. She does have a lot of bruising and irritation in her esophagus and stomach though. The feeding tube is also back in :(, but it could be worse. There are still a lot of questions a possible surgery to be done on the esophagus and stomach to help keep her food down. She seems to be losing and gaining weight and hopefully can find some consistency in the upward direction. For better updates, check out the Swenhaugen Blog. Thank you for all of the prayers thus far!

Jaden with the ouchie he got the same day Riley went into the hospital. Poor kid fell on one of his toy trucks.

2. Last weekend Marc and I participated in the Marci Jewelry Diamond Dash to compete for a $20,000 ring. We did not win, but had so much fun playing. For 2 1/2 hours Marc was on bike and I was running like crazy all over downtown Seattle. We were given clues via text message to a location and once we sent back the correct place, there was an additional challenge question to figure out. It took my body about a week to recover, but I would absolutely love to do something like that again...perhaps next year's diamond dash? And man, Marc and I came so close. We only lost by 12 points!! That means it pretty much came down to one question for us if we would have gotten a question we missed right on the first try. We were so close!!!

Waiting for the Diamond Dash to start.

3. Speaking of races, I'm hoping to get my next taste of competition at the 2009 Pineapple Classic. It's a 5k team obstacle course that you run with a pineapple! How fun! The race benefits go to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. I don't have a major connection to Leukemia, but I'm sure excited to participate in a fun race and give money to a charitable cause at the same time. :)

4. Back to last weekend. Right after the Diamond Dash, Marc and I had to keep on dashing and get ready for Caroline and Christian's Wedding. We didn't even have time to shower. Good thing it was a cold morning and we weren't very sweaty! The wedding was beautiful and the reception was a ton of fun with lots of dancing!!! Of course, I was pretty tired and couldn't dance as much as I would have otherwise. It was still a great time though. Congrats to Caroline and Christian. May God bless your new family!

We don't look TOO shabby, right?

4. The moment my dad has been waiting for...someone else to change my oil! My dad always changes my oil, but once I was out of high school and he noticed I had a lot of guy friends types he was always asking why they weren't changing my oil instead of him. I guess guys aren't as chivalrous as they used to be?? Or maybe they don't want to get dirty like they used to?? I don't know! Anyways, now I have Marc. The last time my dad changed my oil he taught Marc how to do it. This time around, Marc did it all by himself and my dad observed. Marc got an A. He would have gotten an A+, but I guess he spilled just a teeny tiny bit. Plus my dad thought it best to leave room for improvement. :)

Marc changing my oil.

And my dad happily overseeing him. :)

5. I helped Marc move last weekend. That was just one of many things keeping me busy. I'm really excited for him as this will be a much better fit and he'll actually have roommates who know how to clean up after themselves. And also, way to go Marc, he now has 3 jobs! I'm thinking I might get to see some friends a bit more often because some of Marc's new roommates are friends of mine and they hang out with our mutual friends. So now when I go visit Marc, I get the bonus of seeing more people I like. :)

6. Happy Birthday Little Perry!! Last week LP turned 9 years old. He's still cute, still likes to give me a hard time, and I have a feeling not much will have changed in another 9 years! So to Perry, Happy Birthday and I love you!!

PS Coldstone Makes amazing ice cream cupcakes...mmmm. You should go try them.

7. It's been a really wet Labor Day weekend, but I don't mind too much because I've gotten so much done and even relaxed all day Sunday. It was amazing and as a Sunday is meant to be! I hope you are all also enjoying your weekend as it comes to a close.

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I probably won't be posting quick takes this Friday again because I'll be off in Spokane getting ready for my best friends wedding. Yea Julianna and Mike! And a shout out to my friends Andrew and Daniella who will be making their vows the same day. May God bless both of your marriages!