Virginia in June

Before I get too behind, let me finish our recent vacation recap.  After we left beautiful Los Angeles, we took the cross country LA to DC flight and spent the last few days of our US trip in Virginia with my family.  Let me just interject that our flight did not have a single baby changing table on board (what?!).  Poor Gretchen had to endure diaper changes in some pretty creative places during this 5 hour flight.  (If anyone from Continental is reading this, please install changing tables in your planes!  Have you ever known a baby to use the same diaper for 5 hours??) 

Once we landed in DC, Gretchen met her other two, very excited uncles!

Gretchen hanging out with Uncle Chris

Look at those thighs!  Uncle Robbie and Gretchen bonding.

During our DC stay, we had a good mix of general housekeeping appointments (the dentist, the DMV, etc.) and fun visits with friends and family.  It was an especially big week for us because Jon and I celebrated our 3rd wedding anniversary (wow!), my 30th birthday (even bigger wow!) and Robbie's 22nd birthday.  Here is the adorable joint birthday cake Chris got for Robbie and I:

Check out our cutie, younger selves

In addition, my parents graciously hosted a whole slew of our friends and their babies at their house so that we could see as many people as possible on our short trip.  It was so wonderful to see everyone, thank you all so much for traveling all the way out to see us, especially on a Friday afternoon.  It was fun, chaotic, and exciting to introduce Gretchen to all of her little buddies (many of them new to us too!)  Here is our attempt at capturing all of the little ones in one photo:

As you can imagine, it was exciting

Also, Gretchen met her buddy Evan Humkey for the first time, the two were born only TWO DAYS apart!  I know Gretchen will be grateful to say she is the older one of the two (until she's about 25) and we look forward to future joint birthdays with the Humkeys.

During the extremely hot week, we were able to take Gretchen to a friend's pool for her first non-bath-water experience.  Mom accidentally forgot her hat, so we had to be extra careful, but she seemed to really like the water.

Pay no attention to our lack of tan...it's winter by us!

It was an amazing, whirlwind, fun and much-needed trip home.  Thank you to everyone to came out to visit us, our friends are so understanding and thoughtful about our always-packed schedule when we're in the US.  Thank you to my parents for making this week as fulfilling and easy as possible, it was a great recharge for us.  Our trip back to Argentina did not include any celebrity sitings, but it was just as seamless as the trip to the states.

Since we aren't there to celebrate together, I want to send a big "Happy Birthday" message to my dad, who's birthday is tomorrow.  Happy Birthday Dad!  Gretchen talks about you all the time, and can't wait to see you in a couple of months!

Happy Birthday Papa!

The Newest Mr. & Mrs. Gill!

Wow, is it over already? It's crazy when an event is planned for so far in advance, and anticipated for so long, and then it's just over. That's how I feel about Dan & Lian's wedding, along with our recent whirlwind trip to the US. I cannot believe it's already over.

There were so many factors brought in to make this trip a success and I am pleased to say that they all came through with flying colors. First off, the documentation. Gretchen's Argentine passport was the last piece of the travel-ready puzzle and it arrived a mere 4 days before our departure. (I also had to chase the delivery man down the street in my slippers because he said I took too long to answer the door, but that's another story...)

Then there was the mildly insane travel itinerary. Could we really take our 3-month old on a multi-leg, multi-continent, and cross-country trip all in a matter of 10 days? The answer is yes, with a beautifully behaved 3-month old, you certainly can.

She's already sleeping, before even taking off

Gretchen took the flight with a grain of salt. I was skeptical once I saw that the bassinet that we had rented was this strange plastic thing that attaches to the wall, but it worked like a charm and gave us the freedom to get some shut eye on the plane. You will notice that she is wearing her fashionable "gorgeous" bib. This comes into play when I tell you that on the other side of Gretchen's bassinet wall, in the last row of first class, the champ himself, Mike Tyson, sat with his family (I think I read that it's his 3rd wife, and he's turned over a new leaf...) and 4-month old baby. When we landed in Houston for our connection to LA, we shared an elevator with the Tysons, which is when Mike (we're on a first name basis now.) asked "Is that the gorgeous baby from the plane?". Yup, Mike Tyson called our baby gorgeous. He had a little help from the power of suggestions from the bib, but he said it nonetheless. Needless to say, Gretchen was an angel on the flight and she continued her amazing behavior throughout our trip.

Our reason for flying home, and the first stop on our trip was to Los Angeles for wedding festivities. I was not my normal paparazzi-self, but I did get a few shots of Gretchen at the beautiful kick off party that was held at the Santa Monica beach club on Friday night. It was a wonderful way to start the weekend off right, and Lornie and Thom were thoughtful enough to even include a birthday cake for me, Lian, her brother Jake and cousin Matt, who (incredibly) all have birthdays in a 4 day period.

Here is Gretchen lovin' on her Auntie Missy

And everyone can see she only has eyes for Daddy

The weekend continued with a Joshua Jackson sighting at our hotel pool/restaurant. Note that we were too weenie to ask for a picture of him (as we were with Tyson), so we took this ridiculous shot with him in the background. He is also with his girlfriend, Diane Kruger, who (I'm told) is apparently much more famous, but since Jon and I are currently obsessed with the TV show Fringe, and we are both of the Dawson's Creek fan club, we were pretty pumped about JJ.

More importantly, that night was the wedding, which was a complete blast! Here are some photos of the lovliness:

This picture of the 2 families is beautiful, but check out the background! The whole inside of their wedding venue was lined with these unbelievable plants. My poor little windowsill planters were jealous.

Me and my handsome husband at an early June outside wedding that was not 100 degrees. Ahhh, the memories of sweating through my wedding dress 3 short years ago.

The picture-perfect bride and groom with Dave Durante officiating the wedding in what has to be the most sincere, touching ceremony that I have ever heard. Bravo, Dave, Bravo.

In a rare moment of awake-ness, Jon and I posing with our precious baby girl.

And this black and white clad angel is Roberta (pictured with Lauren Durante and thrilled-mother-of-the-groom, Lornie), the savior of reception fun. She voluntarily held little Gretchen for hours while Daddy and I tore up the dance floor. Thank you so much to Roberta and Diane for allowing us to have a fun-filled and worry-free reception night.

We had a fantastic time in LA, only to be followed by a wonderful visit to Virginia (available in an upcoming post). Thank you to the Gills for a wonderful wedding weekend, thank you to Dan for finally giving Jon and I a sister and Gretchen a real-live aunt, and special congratulations to the new Mr. & Mrs. Daniel Gill - one of the happiest couples I know.