our first year album

remember this adorable sign (with all my wedding colors) from our wedding??

Well my VERY VERY talented friend Summer made it for me after my special request! It turned out sooo adorable and perfect and one of my favorite details of my wedding!

My whole life I have been in awe of her family, and the creativity that they have! When we were juniors in high school we made a pack to 1. Go to FIDM (design school together) 2. Marry Abercrombie models (that was big then... remember the LFO song?? ) 3. Have Ralph Lauren decorated homes right next door to each other and raise our kids to be best friends too!

(us in past years...)

 

Well... Her now hubby Steve ruined goal #1. She ended up choosing U of A over FIDM to be with him....seemed to work out for the best! Goal #2 I think we scored in that area. They may not be official Abercrombie models but we have some good lookin' men!! #3 yeah... still working on that part.

Anyway... for my wedding gift she said that I would be getting it a little late. It just came in the mail last week and I was so so so so excited!!! Of course it was wrapped up in a perfect little box with a homemade card to go with:

Summer and her mother Barbara created an unbelievable "First Year" scrap book for us. Every page is layered with detail and decoration. It has a page for everything from Our Wedding Day to Birthdays, to our first home, us at our jobs, every holiday like halloween, easter, vallentines, St. Patricks, etc. The detail and time that was put into this is incredible!! Did I mention that the album is themed with my wedding colors? They didn't miss a detail!

Thank you my dear sums for such an incredible thoughtful, beautiful gift!! We can't wait to add our years worth of photos to it. You are so talented, and I hope that one day we do live side by side and my kids can be inspired by you too!! ( a huge THANK YOU to Barbara too!!!)

Love,

Adrienne

my bff

My best friend Kayla and her husband Gary a.k.a "Beav" came to visit us this last weekend!! It was so great to 1. have friends in town 2. have a best friend here whose husband gets along really well with my hubby and 3. its fall time!!

They flew in Thursday night to BWI Airport. We scooped them up and quickly headed down to georgetown to "CHOMP" as Beav would say. We took them to one of Colton's favorite places for dinner - Surfside, followed by a famous Georgetown cupcake!



This place ALWAYS has a line way way way down the street - BUT lucky for us it was a Thursday night - no one was out and we walked right in! This was our first time trying a Georgetown cupcake as well.... so we had to try and handful.

After making our purchases we headed down to the water to enjoy. I have to say...they are better then Sprinkles!! I always saw the line and thought that it couldn't be worth it - but I can see now while people wait. They are delicious.

Instant Bros (see below). Colton grew his mustache just for Beav...little did he know, Beav was growing his stache all week for when he saw Colton. Apparently the girls opinion does not matter on that subject...

 

 Afterwards we took a quick spin around the city to show the some of the monuments by car and a quick stroll through Arlington to check out the memorials there.

Friday Kayla and Beav had a full day downtown checking out all the museums and sites to be seen. That night when they got back we all headed down to Dupont Circle for the famous...

SHAKE SHACK! Have you been there??! If not you should go. I think Colton and I have been 4 or 5 times in the last month or so. They have the BEST Burgers and AMAZING ice cream concrete creations  In New York people wait HOURS to get into this place. Lucky for us the DC one isn't too crazy..yet. We chomped some more and enjoyed the delicious food and beautiful night!

Later we drove down to the FDR memorial. Beav had some Bro time with FDR himself.. and we are still not quite sure what Colton was doing...

 

After that we had to check out the new MLK memorial. I think the best part was walking around and listening to everyone's comments about it... 

"I heard Maya Angelou is so mad about blah blah she wont even come!"  

"Umm why is the artists name signed in chineese ..did you see that?!" 

"I dont get it...."

We thought it was pretty cool but not one of our favorites. The stone seemed kinda cheap - but still impressive none the less that someone carved that out of stone!

Saturday did not end up how we expected.... The ORIGINAL plan was to go to Taste of Bethesda, Check out a pumpkin patch, enjoy a beautiful fall day, guys go to Preisthood sesh then we all go to the Haunted Forrest!!

Well the rain crashed that party. Colton had to work in the am and it was freeeeezing cold outside!! So we took a drive through the country side and checked out some of the beautiful homes. Tried to go to Taste of Bethesda but it was rained out so just enjoyed some lunch down there instead. Made a trip out to Jimmy Cone (another one of our go to spots) and then headed  home. The guys went to Preisthood session and Kayla and I vegged at home. She did talk me into one her prego cravings... chinese take-out. I haven't had chinese in YEARS and was reminded why again that night. 

Sunday morning we headed to the visitor center at the temple to watch our church conference. Such a great session. There is something nice about getting dressed up and listening to Conference. 

Later on in the day we headed down to Arlington Cemetary. Colton's Grandfather and Grandmother have a headstone there. With our special "family pass" we were able to drive right in and up to his grave. As always it is such a humbling experience to see all those headstones and graves. It was very neat to see his grandfathers spot and hear about him. 

Edward C. Palmer (where Colton got his name...and his looks!)

                        

And question... Did THE Edgar Allen Poe serve in the military??

Monday morning Kayla and beav headed downtown one more time before it was time for us to take them to the airport. When they got back, we realized we didn't have enough photos together so we did a traditional Adrienne and Kayla photo shoot and then the guys naturally had their own as well...(however they had a hard time being serious)

 

 

(We miss you guys already thanks for coming to visit!!) Next up on the list of visitors....Grandma!! She comes this Wed and we are so excited!!! I have not gone to ANY museums since I have been here....so it should be a fun week of museums, fall festivities, exploring the city and just spending time with her. 

Happy October! :)

what to do on a rainy day

we have had A LOT Of rain lately. Last week rained straight from Sunday to Sunday. This week has been a bit overcast and now its around 60 degrees outside HELLO FALL.

When we have a little time off... our latest form of entertainment is to drive around the neighborhoods  and check out the homes and prices, and freak ourselves out that we are never going to own anything but this condo because it is sooooooo expensive out here!!

This home has become our favorite as of late. We may have driven by it, camped out front and stalked the tax website on it multiple times. Isn't it soooooo cute?!! Its around 2,000 sq feet - how much do you think this home costs?...take a guess... (I'll post in the comments section in a few days)

Then here we were last week on our rainy Labor Day stalking the home once again. Thank goodness for Krispe Kreme drive through for providing the snacks.

On Labor Day we took a rainy drive back out to the outlets across the ferry in Leesburg, Virginia. I love that drive and seeing all the beautiful sprawling property and HUGE homes...."on cheap land...because no one wants to live this far out".. Colton always adds.

Labor day weekend also brought my friend Mandy out from Newport Beach to visit Colton's friend Joe. She stayed with us at night and played by day with Joe (!!!) ( side note they met at our wedding...:))  On Sunday we had dinner with Mandy and Joe, Bonny and John and Allison (notice the new furniture!! minus the card table of course aka my "old" dining table).

After dinner was over, everyone left and we were left thinking... "we want to be the people leaving! now we are the "old" married people at home going to bed early... and we did. At 9 am lights were out and we were asleep.

This is a home I would LOVE to buy one day but really out of our price range. Its actually the home of one of my potential clients out here.. beautiful isn't it?

Work is slowly starting to pick-up. We have been advertising like crazy which is starting to show signs of progress.

This article also came out about me in Bethesda Mag... I really don't care for this image of me looking like I am about ready to pounce the camera... but it wasn't my choice so there you go.

Anyway...summer is over and we can't wait for fall!! Kayla and Beav are coming out to visit in a few weeks, then my Grandma comes for a week after that. Let the season of visitors begin!!

lesson learned; dont fix your man something our of a can for dinner.

Last night was one of those moments where in a split second you think.... "can i please go back to 30 seconds ago and re-think that move??!"

So Colton is known for going to the hospital for things like being electrocuted and shocked off a ladder, breaking his arm while riding a mechanical bull and having too much pride to let go... when it was time to LET GO. Breaking his arm while trying to get off a ski lift, losing his balance and being crushed by a rather large lady who was trying to get off the same chair...

Then there is me. I have never been admitted to the hospital in my life until I met him. Last year around this same week (days before he was coming out to visit me in Cali) i was so so so sick I ran out of clients home mid sentence with the fear of throwing up all over..just to make it home in time to have my Grandma drive me to an urgent care for my first time ever to get one of those shots in the bum to make the nausea stop.

So where is all of this going? Last night after a long week of early mornings / late nights for both of us i was rushing to make us some quick dinner before we ran out the door to see "Contagion". I opened one of those soup can with the metal tab tops and before i could stop myself... my right hand flung that lid off and sliced my left hand open between my thumb and index finger. I screamed in pain / shock and quickly ran to the sink. Colton quickly ran in the room ... took one look and diagnosed the situation "yup that needs stitches!! If that was me this would not be a situation where I would use electrical tape as i usually do"

UGH. so annoying. So off we ran to urgent care. The whole way there I am thinking can i please just go back in time to 20 min ago?? so dumb of me. Luckily Urgent Care was empty and we went right in, Dr. stitched me up with 4 stitches, gave us a $300 bill and we were on our way home in less then 45 min.

We had lost our appetites for soup so ended up going out to dinner and still caught the movie too.

Not too impressed with the movie. If you wanna be super paranoid go see it. We were both kinda disappointed.... plus as paranoid as i am in life i don't need to be watching that stuff!!

Anyways... so it's official. I am Palmer and continuing the hospital Urgent Care tradition. All is well now. Stitches come out in 10 days!