Recounting Fall, part one: The Family Wedding and Our Tiny Flower Girl

The very last of autumn's leaves have faded and nearly all have fallen to the earth. The brisk and pleasant temperatures have disappeared all too quickly and we have suddenly found ourselves in the midst of what appears to be the onset of winter.

Now here it is, mid-way through November, and I haven't written on my blog for almost two months. But I simply must rewind a bit and share because the past weeks have been absolutely marvelous with the wonderful things filling them. In fact, October itself was downright epic.

I will not begin by backtracking in chronological order, but instead regale you with the single event that helped make October so spectacular: Matt's youngest brother got married! His bride and our newest family member is named Hunter and she is as sweet and lovely as they come.

The wedding was such a fun-filled, loving, and gorgeous event. Hunter especially poured so much of herself into making the details reflect her own lovely style.

I took lots of photos of the details:

Two different flavors of tea bags were inside:

I felt utterly honored and blessed that Hunter asked me to be one of her bridesmaids. {No surprise: I was the oldest one--yikes!} Back in 2008 I was asked to be a bridesmaid to my other sister-in-law, Jennie. How very sweet that both of my sister-in-laws asked me to stand with them on their wedding days!

Me and my lovely mother-in-law, pre-ceremony:

Here is the stunning Hunter, taking a final pre-ceremony once-over of herself. Isn't her dress just exquisite?

A quick photo op:

Not only were Matt and I both in the wedding party, but Makenna was one of the two flower girls. The other flower girl was our darling niece, Cora. If you recall, Cora is only 8 weeks younger than Makenna and having them as flower girls together was absolutely priceless.

We were all holding our breath to see how the girls behaved during their part of the ceremony. After all, this can be a precarious age with boundless energy and the inability to understand the importance of the occasion. We planned to have Hunter's youngest sister pull the girls down the aisle in a wagon. We didn't expect them to drop petals, just sit and look pretty.

The best photos we have currently are blurry iPhone pics, but still cute nonetheless.

{Makenna is munching on puffs as they wait their turn to go down the aisle. We'd sprinkled those in the wagon to help keep them preoccupied!}

{Thanks to our friend, Jalene, for capturing these photos!}

I am happy to report that both girls behaved during their part, and that they just loved being the center of attention! Cora blurted out "Dada!" when she spotted her dad up front and both girls smiled and waved at the guests. Then, when they reached the end of the aisle, Makenna decided to be a real ham and lay down in the wagon and thrust her feet and arms into the air. Of course this got lots of laughs and she loved that. She sat back up as they were being wheeled back out of the sanctuary and Makenna was laughing loudly and covering her mouth with her hands. I know the wedding photographer got a few shots of Makenna's comedic moment and hopefully I'll be able to share those photos soon!

The reception was a blast, as well. The girls loved socializing and dancing. They were both exhausted at the end of it all. {As were we!}

{I heart this photo!}

It was a really lovely, very memorable day!

The entire Perry family is thrilled that Aaron found such a beautiful woman, both inside and out, to join our clan and cherish as our own for the rest of our lives. Congratulations, Aaron and Hunter!

Happy 18 Month Birthday, Makenna!

Makenna has now officially reached a year and a half. She is so full of life, energy, giggles, silliness, and sweetness!

Here's a little update about what Makenna's like at this age:

• As most toddlers, she hardly ever sits still. She's a runner, jumper, and climber.
• This girl loves to dance. She dances on command, spins in circles, and walks on her tip-toes--clearly she'll end up in dance class!
• She still loves any and all strangers, which is very sweet, but also means we'll have to be more and more careful with her.
• She's adding new words on almost a daily basis. So far, we've got: Mama, Dada, Hi, Bye-Bye, Done, More, Up, Duck, Hot Dog {thanks to Mickey Mouse Clubhouse}, Doggie, and Amen. Then she jabbers in her own language all the time. Once she really starts talking, I have a feeling we won't be able to get her to stop.
• If you ask her about these animals, she'll tell you what they "say": Cow, Duck, Monkey, or Lion. Oh, and dinosaur, too.
• She is still a fantastic sleeper and a good eater on most days, though she has her picky toddler moments.
• She is still mostly wearing 12-month clothing. Her 18-month wellness check isn't until next week, but six weeks ago, she weighed in at 20 pounds and 3 ounces. I'm guessing she's somewhere in the 21 pound-range now.
• Makenna adores books and brings us book, after book, after book to read. I have many books of hers memorized word for word, cover to cover.
• She also loves to "sing" and sometimes when she's singing along, she will throw her hands in the air during the dramatic parts.
• She has upwards of twelve teeth now, including many molars.
• She has become more attached to the little bunny she sleeps with and her paci {actually, we call her paci the Hungarian word for it, which sounds like "Sue-mee", just because we like it!}. We want to wean her from the paci soon, but also want to make sure we don't do it in the middle of a teething episode.

And now, I would like to devote a moment to talk about her hair. 

I do love Makenna's hair and naturally, as her mother, I think it's gorgeous. Now that it's longer it has all these natural waves, too. But I also have a bit of a love/hate relationship with her hair. Most 18 month-olds do not have long hair like this. It is constantly getting messy from food and teething drool. She's too young to be patient enough to sit still for me to do her hair nicely so I always feel like it looks disheveled. Plus, although she has lots of hair, it's super-fine, which means it slides out of elastics easily. After any nap, I have to re-do the elastics in her hair because they have slid out. It's like her hair is an entity of its own. Still, I do love how unique it makes her! I am loving the blonde streaks that are appearing this summer; it almost looks like she's gotten highlights.

I might as well take this time to add in a few things I haven't mentioned before related to Makenna, though these are very belated thoughts.

• People have asked where we came up with Makenna's name and middle name. I had been holding onto the name Makenna as a favorite girl name possibility since high school. I first thought of it when watching one of my favorite movies, Somewhere In Time. {This film was incidentally filmed on Mackinac Island}. The main character in the movie is so lovely and elegant, and her name is Elise McKenna. That's when I first decided that McKenna would make a beautiful first name.
• Matt and I had differing opinions on how we should spell Makenna's name. He wanted the way that we spell it now {Makenna} and I liked McKenna. He didn't like the "Mc" because it literally means "son of." And his opinion is that the "Mc" should be for last names only. Makenna was my 2nd choice of name-spelling, and since the name Makenna was my suggestion in the first place, I agreed that we should go along with his preferred spelling and make sure he felt really good about it.
• We had the aforementioned discussion about the spelling of Makenna's name at various points during the pregnancy, but we finalized our decision in the car, on the way to the hospital in the middle of the night, after my water had broken.
• We chose "Rose" for several reasons. First of all, it's my favorite flower. We've both always liked the name "Rose" in general, but I felt especially drawn to it. We also felt that a shorter middle name sounded better with "Makenna."
• Since I was a teenager, I had also held the name "Katie" in my mind as one of my top choices for a girl's name. Then, not too long after we got married, a certain pop star made her way into the mainstream music world. {If you don't recall, our last name is Perry.} I was really hoping that her debut smash hit called "I Kissed A Girl" would be a one-hit-wonder and then she'd fade into oblivion. No such luck. She took the name I had wanted, and her real last name isn't even "Perry"!
• I never got a picture of my pregnant belly at 39 weeks. With our apartment-to-first-house move occupying so much of our time at 36 weeks pregnant, that was the last time we took a "bump" photo. It was on my "to do" list to get one last "bump" pic before Makenna's due date, but since she came early, it never happened. And honestly it just didn't cross my mind to do it at the hospital!

Makenna makes us smile and laugh constantly. What a joy she is to us! We can hardly remember life before her and we treasure her little life beyond all compare. Thank you, Jesus, for our darling little girl!

The Nursery

As soon as Matt and I learned we were having a girl, I knew exactly the color scheme I wanted to use for the nursery. I have always adored grey and pink--it was practically a no-brainer for me!

We chose grey walls with white furniture and lots of pink accents. This way, in the future if we'd like to switch the pink for another accent color, it will be fairly easy to do.

And now, welcome to Makenna's nursery...

My sister Erin found the adorable "big deal" decorative photo which I love so much!

I had found the mirror hanging above Makenna's changing table at Ikea years ago. The basket on her changing table and the baskets on her bookshelf were a steal at HomeGoods.

Below is what the bookshelf looks like after I straighten it up. As you can imagine, on nearly a daily basis, Makenna pulls off most of her books and toys. But that's what they're there for! {I just have to put it back at the end of the day--me with my OCD tendencies!}

The decor I'm most proud of is below. I came up with this original idea {and I say "original" only because we are in the age of Pinterest and "borrowing" ideas} whilst wandering around and around Michael's craft store when I was about 38 weeks pregnant. I found these adorable wooden cut outs which I painted white and affixed to canvases that I had spray-painted pink. I already knew exactly which Bible verse I wanted hanging above our baby girl's head.

The little pink toy chest was also a steal at HomeGoods. Makenna loves playing with all of her stuffed animals. They get lots of snuggles and kisses from her, which melts my heart!

It will be fun to see how Makenna would like to decorate her room when she's older, but for now I am throuroghly enjoying making her space girly and fun. The fact that she loves to go in there on her own to play and look at books makes my heart very happy.

If we have another girl, I'll probably not use pink in the other nursery as one of the colors. We have plenty of pink going on in our lives already!

{But I will tell you that Matt and I would love to have a boy--it's no secret!}

Shower Weekend

Last weekend, our soon-to-arrive baby girl was absolutely showered with love and generosity. I had two showers; one Saturday, one Sunday. And to say that both were just exquisite and lovely is the ultimate understatement. So much love, thought, and effort went into planning both, and boy did it show!

The Saturday shower was given by my best friend, Laura, and her mom, Diane, who was basically my "second mom" growing up through the years. The photos I have from my camera pale in comparison to the ones Laura took on her fancy Nikon. They came out so beautifully, capturing me with all the attending guests. Laura's going to give me a CD of all those photos and I promise to share them as soon as I receive them.

It was all so wonderful, and I got to reconnect with so many friends from my life growing up in St. Joseph. I miss them all so terribly much and it was so special to be showered with love by them all!

As if I didn't already feel special enough from that first shower, then I turned around and the next day and had another equally lovely and special shower in the town of Greenville, MI, where Matt grew up. There I was also reuited with so many wonderful friends who we rarely get to see now that we live on the eastern side of "the mitten." 

This shower had an owl theme, and oh my goodness, was it adorable! It was given by my dear friends Lynn, Jalene, and Aunt Joyce. These same ladies threw one of my bridal showers and let me tell you, these ladies sure know how to put on one amazing shower!!!

{Oh by the way, please don't judge me. I wore the same dress to both showers. You've gotta give a pregnant lady a break, right?!}

With soon-to-be Grandma

Well see if this little girl inherits my weakness for shoes.

She has to accessorize!

We received gift upon endless gift for our little one; the generosity was overwhelming! We really could never thank everyone involved enough for how loved you made us feel.

One very sad part is that I sent all the shower gifts from both showers home with my mom and Matt's mom for the short term while we are packing up our apartment. It was so sad to return home empty-handed! I just wanted to look through everything again and again. But it was too overwhelming to bring back so many gifts to our tiny apartment in the midst of packing up. We'll have it all again shortly, as we'll be moved into our house in approximately ten {count them, TEN!} days!!

Ladurée Love

Oh dear readers, you must go and visit one of my most favorite of all blogs {called This is Glamorous}, to see this absolutely lovely post about Ladurée!

Ladurée is a Parisienne tea room/pastry shoppe/restaurant, which ranks on top of my list of Paris "musts." It is dream-like and elegant and absolutely one of a kind. Oh, and they were the ones to make the 'le macaron' famous, by the way.

Read the post about Ladurée here at This is Glamorous. As ever on her blog, the photos give the impression of having stepped into another world; a world of golden light, soft wisps of fabric, old world glamour, and sheer elegance. You'll find a little history of the Ladurée establishment, as well.

image retrieved here

Flats

We all know a girl can never have too many shoes, right?

At the times when I have been abroad, walking naturally becomes my main means of transportation. This makes having comfortable foot wear imperative.

That's hard for me, however. I LOVE a killer pair of heels and I have been known to submit my feet to lots of pain and blisters for the sheer adoration of a pair of great heels.

But even I know that I must submit to my short stature and walk with my heels on the ground overseas. I won't say I've never worn a pair of sneakers, because I certainly have, but I usually prefer something more "cute" and stylish.

Enter ballet flats. These have been my staple in times abroad. They don't support feet as well as sneakers would, but they are definitely comfortable and walking-friendly.

Now, back home in the US, I wear flats any time I know I'll be doing a lot of walking {read: shopping). So I decided to pull out all my pairs from my closet and size up my current collection.



My latest addition: sparkly black flats from Hungary. They have definitely been my summer staple.



I wore this pair a ton the summer I worked in England. Also...do you ever have clothing or accessories that for some reason, you associate with a story? For example, I think of these as my Cinderella shoes. I can't quite explain it!

I always think I can only wear these on days when I'm wearing gold jewelry, which is less often. I'm sure it doesn't matter, but I can't help feeling that way.

These are the other pair I wore to death whilst in England.

Blue velvety pair.

I love these grey ones.

Another black pair--but slightly different because of the ankle straps.

I almost didn't model these for you, because I'm way embarrassed at my ankles/feet. They are a horrible mess of mosquito bites and mosquito bite scars from earlier this summer. They stand out so well against my pale skin! Sigh...

Anyway, seven pairs of flats--that's not too many, is it??