Hi there!  I’m so excited to share this little photo session with you because it’s something I so wish my family had done forever ago!  My beautiful friend, Sarah, who I’ll talk to you about in a few minutes, has impeccable design taste.  It’s like a hint of West Elm, and a touch of Crate and Barrel mixed in with a whole bunch of other fancy brands that I probably know nothing about.  The first time I walked into Sarah and Kent’s Charlestown condo, I fell madly in love, only to find out, she and her hubs just sold it to buy a “fixer-upper” in a different part of town.  Their new place is stunning, and actually pretty perfect as is, but I know that my friend Sarah has about a million ideas bubbling up in that head of hers, and by the time she gets done with their new home, it is going to be out of control amazing.  Buuuutttt, before they put any work into it, they want to have a few photos in the place as it looks now.  I love this idea.  My parents bought an old Victorian house and “flipped” it themselves and are always talking about how the house used to look and asking me “don’t you remember that olive green rug that went all over the house?”  and the answer is, no.  I don’t remember anything because I was 1 and they have no pictures of how our house originally looked.  But adorable little Ollie here is going to be able to look back on these pics and when Sarah and Kent say “Don’t you remember when the house had two staircases?,” he’ll be able to say yes! And I love that I am the person able to document their house for them.

So now that you know why we’re here, I just have to tell you a little about my friends.  I met Sarah and Ollie when he was only five weeks old. Ollie is two days older than Leo and, by some magical twist of fate, Sarah and I both joined a new moms group in Charlestown which has pretty much saved my life over the past year.  Sarah won’t remember this and will obviously think I’m a total creep when she reads it, but I remember being so nervous to go to class.  It was the first time I had actually brought Leo anywhere and you know how it is to walk into a room of people you don’t know…well, add in a baby you don’t know how to take care of at a time when you are still feeling like an emotional wreck.  I remember walking to the building behind this beautiful new mom, a.k.a. Sarah, who didn’t looked phased in the least bit, with a pretty washed and brushed bun on top of her head, which simply made her a rockstar in my mind as I’m sure I hadn’t run a comb through my hair since pre-Leo.  And that lovely new mom saw me coming and waited for me to get all the way to the building and up the stairs with a stroller, which I had never done before, and even held the door open for me during the entire 5-minute fiasco.  Now this thoughtful gesture is probably something Sarah does all the time, but for scared, awkward me, it totally put me at ease.  Sarah’s got that way about her.  She is just so easy to talk to and be around and is always so calm and collected, even with a little baby strapped to her chest.  And honestly, she and her husband Kent are just so cool.  They have this way about them that I can’t really explain.  Maybe it’s how Sarah always looks effortlessly stunning, or how Kent can walk around Charlestown with no shoes on for a photoshoot and look like he owns the place or how they have this amazingly gorgeous furniture in their house that they don’t care if you put a wet drink on because it’s no problem if it gets a water stain (whereas I feverishly am shoveling out coasters to everyone I see to save my Craigslist finds).  And I have a feeling their little Ollie is going to be the exact same way, because really, what baby can pull off his little tight pants (that, no biggie, his parents bought at Target in Australia…see how cool they are?!).

Oh, have I mentioned Kent is practically a gourmet chef?  He whipped up some Buffalo wings for us.

Aren’t Sarah’s earrings fabulous?  Alex if you are reading this, ask Kent where he got these for her and go shopping!
Why hello, GQ.  Have you met my little model friend, Ollie?
I feel like Ollie’s saying, “Mom, stop being so silly over there, Dad and I are trying to have some guy time.”

Congrats on the new house, guys!  Can’t wait to see what you do with it!