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Today is one month till our wedding! 31 days to be exact. I am actually feeling less stressed and starting to get excited about everything. There are only a few loose ends to tie up. Today we are taking care of one of them - going to get our marriage license. I hope that it is not as painful as renewing a drivers license, but we shall see.

After that I want to make a trip to Super H Mart because it's on the way home and I have been wanting to go there for AGES!!! I guess it is a huge Korean grocery store but they have lots of other things too.... Maybe we will have to pick up dinner there as well.

Other than that, we have just been trying to enjoy our summer when we can. Haven't had as many trips as usual so that has been nice. At the end of May we went to Iowa for a big party for my cousin's graduation. Then in June I had a bridal shower in Cincinnati (but there are no photos of that b/c I am the family photographer so I am rarely in photographs....)

the DuVall clan - this probably isn't even half of us!

At the beginning of June we had some wonderful visitors staying with us. Joe and Andrea Valley and their new son, Sacha. I really enjoy being the mom/host for my friends and family that I love so much. Someday I hope to have a huge house so that everyone knows they always have a bed to sleep in if they are passing through town. I guess I am like my own mom in that aspect. She can never have too many people in her house - no matter how small it is. Okay so maybe sometimes our apartment is too small. But our hearts and our dreams are big.

Joe and Sacha Valley at 1mo

I also went to Michigan at the end of July to surprise my dad for his 50th birthday! Definitely a fun little trip. Catherine and I made the yummy chocolate peanut butter cake from Smitten Kitchen. Dad loved it and he was definitely surprised to see 20 of us waiting for him at his favorite steakhouse. Also see photos of the hummingbirds at Dad's house - feeding them is his summer hobby every year.

Dad blowing out his birthday candles

We never got that brown couch that i talked about. I measured and it wouldn't fit through the front door.... oh well... there are other couches in the sea, I guess. Our landlord managed to get rid of our pigeons so we are now able to use this little back porch area as a seating area if we ever want to sit outside. I have a hanging basket, and a little lantern, and some other plants. And it has provided us with a way to get to know our neighbors a little more.

Steve hanging out on our "deck"

Recently we had some friends over for dinner and I made this cake! I will admit it was a great excuse for me to use the new cake dome I received at my shower. It is a lemon pound cake, also from Smitten Kitchen, but i decided to make it in layers. And i did a couple of other things differently. I put the syrup on when it was cool. The frosting recipe is one that my mom has always used and taught me how to make when I first started baking. Except that I added lemon juice and a little food coloring to get a nice yellow color. The cake was so good cold out of the fridge on a hot weekend. I think I will have to make it again soon. I did not have a sprig of mint to adorn the top of the cake so i used basil. At one point i was using a tiny sprig of dill. It had a very interesting look and I even thought, what would dill be like in sweet baked goods. Has anyone ever done that???? Maybe it's a bad idea...

the lemon cake

On the Monkey forefront, the supplements from the specialist were not working. Now we are trying B12 injections. I am giving them to her myself at home and it really is a heckuvah lot easier than trying to give her a pill or make her eat something she does not like.