when in Buffalo…

…do as the Buffaloes do. Or, Buffalonians, rather.

And that would be to eat wings, of course.

It was a beautiful 81 degree day here yesterday and after a balmy walk with the dog, Mom, Josh and I met Andrew for lunch at the Bar Bill, a local watering hole and wing favorite. It gets pretty packed on weekend evenings (hey, it’s a small place), but summer lunches under the awning are just great.

Mom and I shared a beef on weck sandwich and we all enjoyed some of their wings. Josh is even more of a wuss than me when it comes to spice; I think he let a wing touch his lips and then announced he couldn’t go any further. (I will admit, my spice tolerance has gone WAY up since moving here–now I don’t have to ask the servers at Thai places to make my dishes milder–due to my wing consumption. I sure hope that’s the ONLY thing that’s gone up…)

After licking our fingers, I showed mom and Josh our new house–the owners were nice enough to let us come for a visit. I even did a little recon–finding out exact paint colors and eyeing sizes of things and such–and they’re even going to leave a couple pieces of furniture I’d had my eye on AND those cool house numbers Andrew and I had admired! SCORE (and what a blessing)! They are just the nicest people alive 🙂

We spent the afternoon in EA, walking the village. Mom popped into Vidler’s and was even able to find a couple things she needed (a single zipper pull, anyone?), as well as some things she “didn’t” (a pair of Birkenstocks from the place Andrew used to go as a kid). After refueling with some drinks from Taste, we headed home to await Andrew’s arrival after work.

We went back into the village a bit later to drop Andrew at a co-op meeting and I drove mom and Josh around a little to show them the high school and a little more of the village. After a quick visit at the Nye’s house, we popped into Fowler’s to see Abigail and so I could stock up on some chocolate (mostly as gifts, really) with my Groupon, before catching the 9 p.m. showing of the new Spiderman movie at the Aurora Theater. Andrew Garfield makes a great Spiderman–go check it out!

On the agenda today: Niagara Falls and Pasquale’s Pizza…what else?

family visit

Mom and Josh are here visiting!

(So happy to have them here, but I swear! I can’t catch a break this summer…it’s just one crazy day after another! When am I supposed to have that ‘down time’ I’ve been waiting for?)

We picked them up at the airport at 9:30 and went straight to church, where we heard Jim and Jill Kelly talk about her new book and their struggles and faith–very neat to see them and loved hearing their testimonies.

Then we headed to Elmwood to get some Saigon Cafe Thai for lunch before walking around and popping into different shops. Scored a major find at reimagine, a trendy consignment home-goods place–some small retro Pyrex/Corning saucers that match the teal-rimmed ones I found at Goodwill in Ohio! We also started eyeing this amazing black-and-wood two-tone long table for our new house…

We (well, more like Josh and I) wanted some ice cream and after seeing the wait at Watson’s, Andrew announced that he was taking us to Condrell’s, a local long-established ice cream and chocolate shop. We enjoyed sundaes and sodas before heading home to rescue the puppy (who’d been cooped up for 7 hours–thank you to Mom and Dad Layer for giving him a comfort break once during that time!) and start marinating dinner.

After a walk and a quick female-only trip to Target, we all settled in to watch This Means War (cute, but super predictable and a bit more risque than I anticipated), before turning in after midnight…

Andrew’s already off to work, I’ve been up since 5:30 working on an article and doing my morning thing, and our two visitors are still asleep! Although Josh did open his eyes and speak coherently for a bit while I was up putzing in the kitchen.

We’re off to the gym later this morning, then meeting Andrew for lunch at the Bar Bill for wings, then seeing our new house (!), followed by an afternoon in East Aurora. Sigh…I’m happy.

carolyn’s lingerie shower (a.k.a. the cupcake post)

Abigail (and I, I suppose) hosted Carolyn’s lingerie shower yesterday. Obviously (and somewhat unfortunately), I won’t be posting ALL the good photos from the par-tay since there may have been some “unmentionables” laying around…lingerie and otherwise.

(We even took a great group photo…while standing under all of Carolyn’s gifts that were currently hanging up on display. Photo fail.)

Here’s the bride, with her sparkling strawberry spritzer and personalized sash:

If you can’t read it, it says “Future Mrs. Tatlow.”

But, the stars of the show were really these babies:

High-heel cupcakes!

Andrew’s mom found out about them on one of her morning shows and they’re featured in this cupcake book. Abigail and I (well, mostly me–the perfectionist in me took over, I think) made chocolate and vanilla cupcakes and assembled them for the shower. Honestly, not all that hard to do, but getting them to stand up straight was just a bit tricky. Totally worth the effort.

And, Abigail wanted to re-create something she found on Pinterest:

A zebra-striped cake! She and I were both flying a bit blind the other day in my kitchen–due to a lack of directions and the extreme heat of baking on a hot day–but I’d say we succeeded.

The adorable host, doing what she does best:

And can ya tell the girl likes pink?! Really, they both do. We’re all already at a loss wondering what Abigail will do for her (eventual) wedding since between Carolyn as the bride and Abigail as her maid of honor, there is pink EVERYWHERE.

I wonder if Abigail has seen Steel Magnolias…(Check out the first entry under ‘Dialogue.’)