Last Christmas, Grammie gifted the entire family with rooms at the Inn at Presidio for the upcoming wedding. This hotel is absolutely amazing. I wish I had captured more pictures of the gorgeous details. The original wood floors, the antique doors, the art work and furnishings... it was so beautiful.
The thing that wasn't beautiful about the weekend was the HEAT! No joke, the weekend before the trip, I went out shopping for some warm sweaters and fall clothes for our trip up north. I have never, ever been to San Fransisco when it wasn't chilly. Even in the summer. So the whole weekend before we left, my Type A planning mode kicked in and I created perfectly labeled ziploc bags with outfits for each kid for each occasion complete with shoes and accessories. Annnnnddd they didn't end up wearing any of it. They did wear the hap-hazard junk I threw in the top of the luggage at the last second when I checked the weather app and saw projected triple digit weather.
We arrived on Thursday night which did have a nice chill in the air. But Friday was 103 and even though this picture says that Saturday was supposed to dip back down to 90. It did not. It was actually 105 on Friday. The best part (sarcastic tone here) is that there is no air conditioning in the entire city... anywhere. Including our hotel. Dear Lord, it felt like we were in a sauna. I texted my parents pictures of the kids at the hotel and teased that we were actually staying at a nudist colony. We were all in underwear all weekend with icy cold baths and wash cloths abound.
This sweet nugget was not having it! She was so uncomfortable and refused to sleep anywhere but in my arms which made us even more toasty. There was very little sleep happening in this gorgeous hotel we were staying in.
But on the plus side, the breakfasts every morning were a dream come true. Every morning had a bit of overcast to it which gave us the false sense of hope that it might night be so scorching... but alas it burned off much too fast.
There were these incredible hiking trails across the street from the hotel. We only took advantage of them early on our first morning there. But I was so glad to score this picture of Gram with all of her grandies in the gorgeous Presidio setting while we could.
We made few trips out into the city while we were there. An attempt to walk at Pier 39 turned into all of us feeling grouchy, sweaty, and even light-headed... so back to the hotel we went to just relax in our underwear again. Ha!
Across the street from the hotel they have this gorgeous field of grass right in the heart of the Presidio where food trucks come and games get laid out and families post up for a day of fun. It was such a neat setting.
We did make our way over to Fort Mason on Saturday for the rehearsal. This is Aunt Erika with her two sisters.
Xander stepped in as baby sitter extraordinaire. Taylor adores him and his hat.
Sweaty but happy to be together.
All of the girls went to get our nails done. It was Emmerson's first time ever so I had to document this little rite of passage. I was a little nervous because in true Emmerson form, she threw a mini tantrum about having to go. She would have much rather stayed at the hotel to play rough with the boys. But... the sparkling cider in fancy cups and the starburst candies next to her chair quickly won her over.
She picked out "gold like her Grammie" for her toes and then I convinced her to do pink on her nails to match her other little flower girl side kick.
It was a success! She did pick off some of the nail polish before the wedding but hey, you win some, you lose some.
I only got this one picture of the rehearsal dinner. The food was insanely delicious. A 4 course meal at a beautiful restaurant. But I could not stop laughing at how ridiculous I felt. It was an outdoor setting on the back patio and I was holding a bottle in Taylor's mouth with one hand, while twisting and blowing on Emme's spaghetti with the other hand and I am pretty sure sweat was dripping off of my nose in the process. I may have thrown a few ice cubes down my dress at one point. No, seriously, I did. But in these crazy moments Dustin and I always lock eyes and give each other knuckles and say, "we're doing it." And we did. Memories made for sure.
And then the wedding day arrived. You saw all of those pictures in the post prior. But what you didn't see was the behind the scenes practice in the hotel. Of course wearing nothing but underwear, the kids practiced their responsibilities as the "husher" (as Donovan called it) and flower girl. They walked Grammie back and forth, back and forth while I pumped and tried to slather on some makeup.
All in all it was such a lovely weekend. The time with family was precious. We all vowed to do the exact same trip together again some day when weather would be more favorable. But I honestly wouldn't change a thing about the entire weekend. It was all so much fun.
On the way home, we stopped by the cemetery to take a moment to be with "Poppa." It was Taylor's first time there and it'd been a couple of years since we'd stopped by. It seemed fitting after a weekend being with family to be near to him in this way. But it almost made it even more sad because we had missed him so much all weekend. Dustin was obviously emotional, and Emmerson, so sweetly snuggled up next to him to offer her hand as a sense of comfort to him.
Donovan read the words on Poppa's stone out loud so that Emmerson knew what it said. It both broke my heart and filled my heart at the same time.
So thankful for this family of ours and for trips like this that we get to enjoy and make memories together.
