early morning thoughts: beach trip and bachelorette

I've been out of the action for a few weeks... Sorry about that! (A few weeks' worth of updates can be found on my little guy here and on my Rutabaga here.) Summer term is kicking my butt (lots of reading, projects/presentations due every week, the usual excuses), but I have TWO weeks left and only ONE paper left (we're going to ignore the reading for a moment) and that makes me feel great. Two whole months of summer vacation before I have to start classes again! (we're also going to ignore that I'm having a baby in October and thus will most likely end up starting my reading/papers for fall classes in August...) Didn't I say that June would be crazy? I think I foresaw this, but if I try to find the post I'll end up not finishing this one. Let's assume I did, because I'm bright like that.

The OTHER crazy June happening is also over in ONE week (Yikes!) My friend Anna-Lisa is getting married and I'm in the wedding, so we've had all sorts of excitement -- dress fittings (don't even get me started...), parties, last-minute details, and OH, by the way, Benjamin is going to be ring-bearer. So I'm going to have to figure out what to dress him in and how to effectively get him down the aisle.

In line with all of that, we planned a bachelorette party for last weekend, and we (ok, I) decided that it should happen on the coast. In my defense, I decided this back in February, when my husband had a job and I wasn't in the middle of summer classes. The other bridesmaids got on board, but our plans stalled out around the time my boy stopped having a job, for obvious reasons. So in the past month we've had to find a beach house (large enough to accommodate the 16+ people who were invited), organize our weekend, and somehow make it full of bachelorette fun. Yeah!

We ended up having to rent a house for 2 nights so Corey and I took the other night as a brief get-away. We were both kind of dragging our feet over the whole thing, bummed to be spending a lot of money when there is little coming in, but as soon as we got there all of that changed. Isn't that the way it always works? The house was absolutely amazing, with 2 levels and tons of space, not to mention beautiful views of the ocean. We had rain on Friday, which was unfortunate, but it was fun to hear it splattering against huge windows while snuggling up together on the couch. On Saturday we played around at the house until after Benjamin's nap, and then we took a trip down to the beach to introduce the little guy to the ocean. So much fun! The bachelorette guests (and guest of honor) arrived right around 3, which is when Benjamin was needing another nap, so I sent Corey back to Portland with a sleepy baby and geared up for a night of female-ness. I won't go into the details of the party, although I have plenty of pictures and stories, because some things are better left mysterious ;-) I will say, however, that we had a blast -- and took full advantage of the beach for sand sculptures -- and that it was a really relaxing night. We ended up having 8 total women (as opposed to 16+) but that meant plenty of room for sleeping and a generally cozy atmosphere. Hooray for success!

AND now we're back to the last minute prep / crazy life. This week I have to pick up my dress, find something for Benjamin to wear, organize the departure (bubbles? bird seed? what do we think?), double-check on the wedding night hotel accommodations, and start a final project for school. You'd think that means I won't be posting again soon, but it's a fun form of procrastination, so you never know ;-)

Some pictures from our weekend:

the house