When it rains, it pours...

Which is exactly what it's been doing here all weekend. Not only did this week deliver up some actual honest to goddess fall weather, it also brought the delivery of another wonderful Milla package!

Friday's decidedly 90's grunge-inpired outfit featured several Milla goodies, including the zip-up denim jumper dress and floral leggings which arrived in this latest package, and the boots which were an earlier gift.

If you follow her blog (and you should, because she lives in something of a dream world, trust me, I've witnessed it!) then you've already seen the gorgeous carved leather hair accessories she's been crafting and wearing so beautifully.

I was SO excited to find this little leaf (along with an equally lovely butterfly) tucked into the pocket of an amazing leather bag (which I'm sure will be making an appearance before long). It is absolutely the best ever fall accessory and I keep getting compliments from strangers every time I wear it out!

Milla and I love coming up with themes for the thrifty care packages we send one another. The fun part is that the themes will often just present themselves based on what we happen to find, which adds a little bit of magic to the whole process I think :)

For this package, Milla came up with a super fun 70's/90's fall back-to-school theme, based on two vintage teen magazines that were also part of the package. An early 90's Seventeen magazine and a magazine called Sassy from the late 70's (different from the one that was big in the 90's). These being the decades we both most often look to for style inspiration (and I'm sure a big reason that we have such similar stylistic tendencies) made this package so perfect!

The backpack which arrived pre-adorned (vintage sun/arrow boyscout pin added by me) took me straight back to my college days in the 90s. Even Lucas, when he saw it, made a comment about how it was like traveling back in time (something that Milla and I aspire to do as a team one day, incidentally ;)

This is what I wore on my now biweekly trip with Clover to the public library. We go to storytime, return books, and check out new ones to read. We go through A LOT of childrens' books each week and it turns out my new old backpack is just perfect for lugging them around on our library trips!

The obligatory silly Clover outfit shot :)

nom nom nom...

In other seasonal news, check out the bounty from our compost heap. Lucas harvested all of this just from volunteer pumpkin and squash plants that sprung up out of last years compost!

Oh, and the title of this post was not only in reference to the weather. In addition to the awesome package from Milla, this week also brought: a swap invitation from another favorite internets gal and style inspiration, which I'm very excited about, an amazing 70's vintage sweater dress gifted to me by Oosa (mother-in-law and beautiful bride from my previous post), and then just yesterday, I unexpectedly received another very special package from yet another lovely and infinitely inspiring blogger... all posts for another day!

Wedding on the Farm

Ok, ready for a little time travel? We're going back to this time last month, the weekend I first started coming down with my dreaded cough to be exact. As I mentioned, during my time away from Blogland, there were several blog-worthy events that occurred. The first being my mother-in-law Oosa's beautiful wedding.

Remember back when I went wedding dress shopping with her? Well, you finally get to see the amazing dress she found in action!

Obviously, that's not it, haha. That's the adorable vintage dress that my sister Val gifted me straight from her very own closet to wear for the occasion. I tried it on to borrow and it was such a perfect fit that she said I could keep it, awesome sis, right? It's the sweetest dress and I just adore it.

Val was also in attendance as the official photographer and spent her time at this wedding behind the camera. She then got married herself the very next weekend! You'll be seeing plenty of her in my next catch up post :)


The wedding was a bit surreal for us because it took place on the same farm where Lucas and I got married seven years ago (bringing back lots of memories) and where Clover now attends preschool (when we arrived, she was like “Mama, where are all the kids?”).

Mr. and Mrs. Scarecrow all decked out in bride and groom attire at the entrance were one of many parallels with our own wedding.

Oosa was such a radiant bride, absolutely glowing! Val took this photo in front of a mural painted on one of the walls in the bedroom that was used to prep for the ceremony. I love how her hair blends with the mountains in the background.

Lucas’ sister Kelcie putting the final touches on the bouquet she made for her mom.

Kelcie’s oldest daughter Chiara wore her aunt Zoe’s dress that Kelcie hand-made for her sister's wedding over 15 years ago, even the lace work was done by hand!

As you can see, the dress was gorgeous on our lovely niece Chiara. She and our nephew Jonathan were also in our wedding, though just little kids at the time.

This little kid was pretty excited about her very first flower girl gig :)

Clover did such a great job leading off the procession of grandchildren with her cousin Fiona. Her dress is one that has been handed down through the cousins and once belonged to Vida in the polka dot dress in the back. So many adorable dresses making their way through the girls of this family!

And of course the dress we've all been waiting for, doesn’t it look beautiful on her? Geoff, the groom, was visibly blown away (and rightly so!) as Lucas walked his mom up to her husband-to-be. I don’t think we could have found a more perfect dress.

That was such a great moment when one of the resident farm cats decided to wander up during the ceremony and check things out :)

The ceremony took place up in the field, under the same wise old oak tree that yours truly spoke her vows beneath. Though the weather was a bit drizzly early on and looking like it might even rain, as if summoned by all the love in the air, the sun broke through the clouds just as the ceremony was getting underway and it turned out to be a gorgeous day.

As for the ceremony itself, it was a lovely series of truly special moments. The joining of two people quite obviously brimming with love for one another… so wonderful to be a part of.

Geoff’s son and daughter-in-law performed the song for their fist dance. There's a little video I took at the end of the post. It was soooo sweet, 70 years old and just beaming away at each other like a couple of kids :)

Speaking of kids, the cake table was a popular hang out spot with the little ones.

I love this picture that Chiara took of Clover.

My brother-in-law Tim’s 40’s/50’s swing/blues band played. That’s him on stand-up base. They also played at our wedding, back when they were a brand new band. Our tiny dancer danced her little heart out with auntie Zoe.

Most of the photos in this post were taken by Val, and some by Chiara too, with cameras much nicer than mine, but this last one I took as the moon was rising over the farm and the party was winding down. I’ll leave you with that little video I mentioned before :

Aw... :)

Tropical Interlude

I know, this is about as non-autumnal as it gets, right? I guess it's tough to get into the fall spirit when it's 90 degrees outside. We've been enjoying a glorious Indian summer here this past week, complete with those warm nights that are even rare for us in actual summer.

My sister-in-law Isolde thrifted this wrap dress in its unwrapped state and then gave it to me upon realizing that it was in fact a dress and not an apron, haha!

With the weather reports calling for cooler temps ahead (it's foggy and cool right now and may even rain tomorrow) I decided to ignore my previously mentioned inclinations toward fall dressing and just go tropical for a day. It will most likely be many moons before I can wear this dress again.

Another weekend, another birthday in the park...

Yesterday's outfit was my answer to dressing for fall on a day that still kinda feels like summer. Even though it's been warm lately, I'm feeling drawn to autumnal colors. In this case... pumpkin hued orange, shades of brown, and my favorite right now, deep foresty green.

Speaking of which, I'm loving this little crocheted vest I found at the New To You Thrift's everything-for-a-dollar sale. It's a perfect light layering piece for those warm fall days we seem to get plenty of. I also found the nude silk tank at the same sale and I'm liking them paired.

I think everything else has been blogged before except maybe the pretty green shell with gold leaf necklace that, unfortunately, you can hardly see. It was gifted to me by Milla and I wish I would have taken a detail photo of it, but I wear it a lot, so next time!

Clover's little 60's vintage outfit (dress thrifted by Isolde, jeans by me) went so perfectly with the felted red and white flower hairclip made by Anne. Clover and I wear these hair clips a lot. I happen to be wearing the green and blue one as I type this :)


I'm so excited that our friends (and former next door neighbors) Angelina and Christian moved back to town last week and just in time for us to be able to join them for a lovely day at the park to celebrate their sweet son Finnegan's second birthday! Um, how adorable is the motorcycle jacket tee?

Finn's great grandma sparkling away in the sun, she was such a sweet lady :)

Close-up of Clover's cute hairclip. Anne, you really should sell these, we get so many compliments on them!

Birthday boy with papa above. Dappled sunlight under the oaks. A soft blanket thrown over crunchy fallen leaves. Plenty of presents for little hands to open :)

Ah, the pony rides, always a favorite. Clover tried out a new one this time. His name was Rusty, and Finn got to ride good ol' Midnight.

Angelina's vintage dress was fabulous and she looked all willowy and gorgeous, backlit, while coming down the dusty trail. A kindred spirit when it comes to thrifting and vintage, I'm so happy to have her back around :)

Mini pumpkins, the perfect October birthday party favor!

And before I go, thanks for all the well wishes you guys, I'm feeling much better now. Annoyingly, still not 100%, but I feel functional again which is good, very good :)

Sometimes you've just got to write this stuff down...

Conversation with Clover on our drive to The Farm the other morning:

M: It's a cloudy day today.
C: There's no clouds.
M: You're right, it's more of a gray day. The sky is like one big cloud today.

C: Mama, why is there a sky?
M: Hmm, uhh...
C: Is it so the birds can fly?
M: Exactly. Now how did you get so smart?

(photo source)

Happy Birthday Dear Clover...

Ok, so first order of business… our sweet Clover turned 3 last week! We had a little party for her at the park on Saturday and she had fun opening presents, riding the carousel, train and ponies and bouncing in the jumpy house with her friends and cousins, oh, and of course there were cupcakes :)

Unfortunately, the second order of business, “Where the heck have I been?”, is not as much fun. I’ve been sick for weeks you guys, with a nasty respiratory infection which began with much coughing (to the point where my ribs have become so sore that coughing can be quite painful), headaches early on from all the coughing, complete lack of energy, and then fevers too.

After a couple of weeks of this it was obvious that it was not getting better, it was getting worse, so I finally went to the doctor on Monday and got some antibiotics for the infection and I’m taking lots of ibuprofen for the fevers and chest soreness.

Things seem to be improving, so thank goodness for that, I’m SO sick of being sick, and ready to get back to business as usual, including blogging and (internetting in general) which I just haven’t had the energy for lately. I do miss it though, and I’m looking forward to getting some new posts up and finding out what all my dear bloggy friends have been up to as I get my energy back.

Seriously though, I could not have picked a worse few weeks to be sick. We’ve had so much going on, another reason I’ve had no energy left. First there was Lucas’ mom’s wedding, then my sister Val’s wedding, then the Handcar Regatta, then Clover’s birthday… all events that I was really looking forward to and would have loved to have experienced without all the varying degrees of discomfort that I was in while doing so. BUT, I do have pictures, so there will be some catch up posts coming up. Stay tuned and bear with me… I miss you guys!

p.s. Did you spot the miniature pony way in the background of the present opening photo?

Clover and her cousins got some pets in as we were leaving the park :)

p.p.s I'd just like to mention that being sick with a three year old to look after can be tough, real tough, and much thanks and love goes out to my dear hubs for putting in all the extra Clover time lately!

Sugar and spice and everything nice...

Labor Day weekend in Santa Cruz. Visiting with our friends Kristen and Eric and their daughter Zoe… kiddie rides at the boardwalk, father/daughter tide pool exhibit poking at the local Natural History Museum, dress-up dance performances in the backyard, wandering about in the garden at Wilder Ranch… just a few of the activities that kept us real busy. It was all about the girls, and I’d say they had a blast!

Playing around with Rollip again :)