friday favorites

hellooo, friday (and september)!

if you follow me on twitter then you know I spent last saturday through tuesday at my parent's house with my family patiently waiting for my dad's arrival from afghanistan. he spent a week debriefing in new jersey and was supposed to be home on saturday. my older brother jeremy and my 9 year old nephew jordan came on thursday  from virginia to be here with the family. we waited and waited and waited. every day dad would call and say his flight has either been delayed or cancelled. we tried to pass the time by playing badminton and kickball, tossing around bean bags and playing at the park. we also ate entirely way too much food.

he called on monday and said that he finally has a plane ticket for tuesday and will be landing at 12:07pm. my mom, jeremy and jordan left to pick him up on tuesday. it figures that the day my dad is coming home, the weather decides to go from hot and sunny to gloomy, cool and rainy. depsite the sprinkling rain, I grabbed some of kingston's sidewalk chalk and decorated the pavement in front of my parent's garage with a big welcome home sign. it also figures that an hour before they pulled up into the driveway, it started pouring rain and completely washed my sign away. I quick whipped up another welcome home sign on a few pieces of paper and taped it to the front door.

kingston and my dad were always close. they were best buds! my dad left for afghanistan when kingston was 9 months old. he came to visit for 2 weeks when kingston was 14 months and it didn't take long at all for kingston to remember who his goofy grandpa pederson is. for the past couple weeks I've been reminding kingston that papa is going to be home soon. so when we ask him, "who's going to be home soon?" he smiles and yells, "PAPA!" he also points to his picture whenever we ask him "where's papa?" we weren't surprised one bit that an hour after seeing and playing with my dad, kingston warmed right up to him and started calling him papa. it was pretty awesome to see those 2 back together again. (lots of pictures coming soon, friends!)

I'm happy to be back and am slowly but surely catching up on my favorite blogs! check out a few of my favorite things lately...

stephanie tweeted about this website. every single picture is adorable and creative, so many inspiring shots.

happiness for your walls? yes please. these illustrated decals are adorable and perfect.

if you are slightly obsessed with blue mason jars like me, then you're going to love this tutorial on how to make your own blue jars.

I stumbled upon this seriously awesome DIY chalkboard banner. I made kingston's 1st birthday banner, and I'm definitely using this idea for his 2nd birthday banner.

I someday hope to have a little girl, and this flamingo themed baby shower is such a cute idea.

I really want to make these antipasto kabobs before summer is over. yum!