Two Things I Luuuuuuuv

Entertaining & Photography

Yes, it's true. I confess, I love and crave entertaining and photography. Put the two together and I am in, as we say down south, "Hog Heaven"! Speaking of photography, this past weekend marked another "family photo event". All eighteen (YES, 18!) Sackett's, plus two lovebirds celebrating their 66th wedding anniversary (Grandma and Grandpa Dunbar - Marlene's parents), came to our house last Sunday for burgers, celebrating, and family pictures.

Here's our grill master cookin' up some delicious beer burgers! Sorry about the smoky/blurry picture.

Noah, Charles, and Luke

Happy 66th Anniversary Grandma and Grandpa! Now some folks may think this cake looks too good to eat. You are wrong. And isn't that what pictures are for anyway? Take one savory bite and you will be hooked! Hall's Takes the Cake is a guilty pleasure of all Fort Wayneians. I was introduced to this heavenly place when I ordered Sam's very authentic Ohio State Buckeye cake for his 32nd birthday. Here it is:

I can still taste the four layers of chocolate cake and buttercream frosting, then more chocolate cake and buttercream frosting, and then even more chocolate cake and buttercream frosting....get the picture? Obviously, I'm a fan!

Ok so back to the topic at hand {entertaining and photography...seriously keep up}. I take pictures of everything, and I always have my camera on hand no matter where I go. But, when it comes to entertaining I never think to take pictures of what's going on. Tragic huh? It is a habit I must break! But until then, I want to say "THANK YOU" to Dean and Christine because most of these photos are courtesy of their thoughtfulness and amazing Nikon 300D. I dream of owning this camera one day...

Left to Right: Amanda, Ella, Nathan, and Owen

Nathan eating {and loving} the cake...or maybe just the frosting.

Keri and Leona. Please take a second look at Leona's adorable roley poley thighs. Don't cha just wanna squeeze 'em!?

Sweet little ladies, Amanda and Leona.

Noah and Charles are clearly conspiring a master plan....

Okay, the moment you've all been waiting for....family photomontage!

The Sackett's - We just barely fit everyone in the frame, which begs the question "When Sam and I decide to have children, where will we put them?"

The Sackett's + Grandma and Grandpa Dunbar (on right)

Les and Marlene with their beautiful grandchildren. Kids from left to right: Luke, Amanda, Leona, Ella, Nathan, Owen, Noah, and Charles

Here they are again. All looking in different directions and with various facial expressions! I love this picture!

The Original Sackett's: Aaron, Dean, Marlene, Les, Matt, and Sam

The Dean and Christine Sackett Family + Grandma and Grandpa Dunbar

The Matt and Keri Sackett Family

The Aaron and Allison Sackett Family

The Coolest Sackett Family

Marlene and Les Sackett

Well this pretty much wraps up our fun-filled family weekend. I have to say it went by way too quickly and I already miss seeing way too much of everyone!

The Happiest Birthday

I told you here that this past weekend was my father-in-law, Les Sackett's, birthday. We also celebrated my nephew, Noah's, 9th birthday! In my opinion, it was their happiest birthday ever! Why is that? I am going to tell ya in pictures!

Friday Night (post manies and pedies) the whole Sackett family went to a TinCaps baseball game. Everyone had a blast as you can see!

Me and Sam

Left to Right: Amanda, Ella, Noah, Owen, and Matt

Left to Right: Dean, Luke, Sam, Charles, and Noah

Leona dancing for the dance cam. She's such a cutie!

Left to Right: Amanda, Noah, Keri, and Owen

Les and Marlene

Christine and me

Amanda and Aaron

Amanda and Allison

Saturday we celebrated Noah's birthday at his house. Watergun wars, friends and family, yummy cake, and of course tons of presents!

Dean and Christine

The kids are getting ready for the water fight.

HERE'S THE BIRTHDAY BOY! Determined, isn't he!?

Sam and John enjoyed the water fight almost as much probably even more than the kids! Courtney, John's wife, and I are married to kids ourselves. What can I say? It keeps life interesting, fun, and never too serious!

Kids vs. Adults Sam and John

Clearly up to no good....

What a day! I cannot stop smiling because of all the fun things we squeezed into one weekend (and I haven't even told ya'll about Sunday yet). Noah was so excited that Luke, Charles, and Amanda were here to help him celebrate his 9th birthday!

The Sackett Girls

Pinch me because I must be dreamin'! The four Sackett boys and their families are together for a weekend of some long anticipated family time. Dean, Christine, and their three kids, Luke, Charles, and Amanda, live in Tokyo, Japan, and they are in town for a few days. And trust me, we are taking advantage of every second we get to spend with them! I told you a little bit about them here. But this time I promise to take lots of photos to go along with my blog posts.

Yesterday was Les's birthday and he and his four boys went golfing at the Sycamore Hills Golf Club, a golf course designed by the one and only Jack Nicklaus. You may recognize some of these photos because Sam and I live in this neighborhood. We do not live on the golf course, though, nor are we members of the golf club. No, we aren't ballers. Luckily, Matt and Keri Sackett are in fact ballers and members of the club. Below are two photos courtesy of Sycamore Hills Golf Club.

While the boys were golfing, we Sackett girls had some plans of our own. Plans to rest, relax, catch up on life, and pamper ourselves. Marlene so graciously offered to babysit all eight (YES, 8) grandkids while the boys golfed and the girls went out for some R&R. First, we headed to D.T. Nails to get manicures and pedicures. I am obsessed with their massage chairs. You know it's great day when the toughest decision you have to make is choosing a new nail polish color. I just love the polish names that OPI comes up with. I want that person's job. Hmmmmm, and this color shall be named 'Sackett-to-me'. It's red and flirty, of course! Ok, so back to reality...we had our nails done and then headed to a bookstore to do some shopping before Catablu, a closeby restaurant, opened.

Left to Right: Christine, me, Allison, & Keri

I had never been to Catablu and the food is delicious divine, fresh, and taste bud ticklin' good! After a day of treating ourselves like royalty we headed back to reality (a.k.a. Les and Marlene's house to pick up the kids).

My yummy calamari. Presentation is everything!

Thanks for a wonderful afternoon sisters! And that was just the afternoon...we had big plans for the night too!

HAPPY {early} 34TH!

Knock, knock, knock. Ding, dong. "Who could that be?" I wondered to myself. "WHAT!? The FedEx man delivering Sam's birthday gift two weeks early. No way!" But that's exactly what it was!

So here is why I am super excited about his birthday present coming early:

Ummmm, what's the point of having a torn grill cover? An even better question, and probably what you are thinking right now, is why do they still have it when clearly it's not doin' the job?! Dumb...

Yah, my thoughts exactly! So I decided to give him an early birthday gift and then I made a surprise sign....

Then added to the sliding glass door decor....

And hid it all behind our black and white kitchen curtains that I LOVE so very much...

Trust me, the first thing Sam will do when he gets home (after giving me a big hug and kiss) is open the kitchen curtains because we love the natural lighting in our house.....AND.....wait for it.....

SURPRISE!!!!

But that's not all! Not only did I surprise Sam, but he surprised me! ...with a dozen beautiful red roses!

Happy Friday! I know our's is!

Troubleshooting

FRICK! Blogger has officially made me go crazy! Is anyone else having trouble posting videos or do I just  lack the intelligence it takes to get this thing uploaded!? The video says "upload complete"; however all you (my followers) see is a flippin' black, blank screen - Exhibit A: Get Sassy! The help icon is less than helpful!

Any advice? Please email me at jenisackett@gmail.com. Thanks!

On The Water

 

Sam and I had a fabulous July 4th holiday weekend at Lake Ouachita with my parents and our nephew, Hunter. I got some great amazing videos of my Dad waterskiing, and even my Mom let me take a video of her slaloming. Not that she could stop me because she was in the water; I got her approval to post it! Sam, Hunter, and I also skiied and tubed. It was a very relaxing weekend filled with friends, family, Arkansas sunshine, southern cookin', and watersports! Here are a few pictures and I will show ya'll some videos in a later post.

Pictured below is my Dad. He is a brilliant slalom (just one ski) waterskiier. Seriously, the best I've ever seen. Just see for yourself below and check out that lean! His elbow is almost in the water, which by the way, is a trick he could pull off not so long ago.

Here is Sam on two skis jumping the wake. He gets better every summer!

Mom slolaming for the first time in 2 years! Look at 'er go!

And here's Hunter skiing on two separated skiis for the first time ever. No more tied together skiis for him!Sam stayed in the water to help Hunter keep his ski tips up.

Let's get some tubing action, shall we!? Been doing it since I was a kid and still can't seem to get enough!

Daddy's Girls - I was so happy that Brittany joined us at the lake for a day!

FIREWORKS SHOW!

Mom, Dad, Sam, and I took the boat out Sunday night to watch fireworks. Watching fireworks on the lake is one of my very favorite things to do!

"Here is your wine selection for the evening, madam."

Q: How many men does it take to anchor a boat?

A: Two, of course! You need one man to "show ya how it's done" and the other man is there to take notes on this difficult, scientific process. :)

I love it that Dad loves his TriDelta t-shirts.

Mom and Dad celebrated their 30 year anniversary on June 20, 2010. They spent their first July 4th as hubby and wife on this lake, just like we did! You may think I am cheesy, but if you know me, then you know I don't care.

Okay, so normally I do not swim in the lake at night, but I made an exception on this particular night. I don't really have a good reason for being scared to swim in a lake at night other than the fact that extremely dark water is scary and there's also that 50/50 chance of meeting the Loch Ness Monster!
 
1-2-3 JUMP!!!

And as always, the beautiful sunset was breathtaking.