the good stuff.

here's an update for y'all

• we made it to Illinois! yay! we have a nice apartment and we live in a good part of town.
• we welcomed Anna into the world on July 30, 2011!
• this is, of course, why i'm sure you visited our blog, so we'll get to the good stuff: the pictures of Anna.

Anna's first encounter with Mommy. 3:20 am. after 25 hours of labor.

Anna's first encounter with a scale. She doesn't seem to care for it too much.

Anna's first encounter with Daddy. she seems to like him just fine.

16 hours old and starting to look less like an alien.

Anna and mom, 4 days old

8 days old.

Anna and grandma Flo, 9 days old

17 days old

Aunt Patti visits, 25 days old

Anna likes the bath, 4 weeks old

Daddy and Anna, 1 month old

Anna smiles, 5 weeks old

Pregnancy Pics

For Lauren, who harasses me endlessly for preggo photos. Here you go.

8 weeks--anniversary date at This Is the Place State Park. They do an awesome pioneer Christmas.

13 weeks

21 Weeks, at the Hoover Dam bridge

28 weeks, 3 days, at work.

Annnnnnd, for your viewing pleasure, a little glimpse of the little nugget coming your way the end of July.

Anna Margaret Lovett, 27 weeks 6 days.

Our Apartment

Well, I promised Lauren these pics months and months ago....so, here they are!

Front Room, from the front door. Proud of the valence I made. Also proud that our plants are still alive.

Front Room, to the right. Yes, those are Star Wars Christmas figurines. sigh.

Front Room, from the kitchen. Trunk serving as coffee table.

Kitchen, business end.

Kitchen, from the business end. w/d to the left in a closet. Yes, we did hang the shelves and pot rack. pretty cheap from Ikea

Bathroom. Don't be deceived, it doesn't actually have a portal into a quaint French street. unfortunately.

Bedroom.

massive closet.

you're missing a picture of the office, because it's not in a picture-taking state. plus, it's not all that exciting.

So, there's our place! We love it here, and plan on staying as long as possible! (which may not be too long, since Alexander has at least one acceptance letter: Texas A&M!)

i guess...

it's time for an update on this blog (6 long months later). here you go.

1. I am no longer in graduate school, after a long and complex (and traumatic) experience. I'm so glad to be out of the lab and to not be doing something I dislike so much!
2. Now, I'm working part-time at a retail store, and I love it. It's not stressful, the people I work with are super nice, and the store itself has a really great environment.
3. Alexander is GRADUATED!!!!!!!! Hurrah! He also has applications in to 5 grad schools. They are: MIT, Purdue, Texas A&M, UI at Urbana-Champaign, and Georgia Tech.
4. The now-graduated Alexander is looking for jobs in Civil Engineering and spending the interim scanning all of our old school notes and papers so we can recycle them and reduce the amount of stuff we'll need to move when we go to grad school.
5. yes, it's true, I'm pregnant! This is another reason that I'm glad I'm done with grad school for now. I'm due July 29, 2011. Here is our first peek at the little one:
(you can see it's fingers right above the face. awwwwww)
6. We're spending a lot of time relaxing, organizing, cooking, and really enjoying the last time of our lives that we'll be able to do all of those things sans children.

So, there's our update. I'll try to blog more, and maybe take some pictures of our apartment for Lauren :).

Cheers!

Wedding recap: Dress

I once wrote this post about finding a dress. Stephanie did a wonderful job with my dress. It was modest, beautiful, and unique.

Originally, I wanted a tea-length gown; tea-length is playful and beautiful. I'm tall, so tea-length is very flattering on my height. BUT, as the gown was coming together, and I put it on in its full-length version, I just couldn't tell Steph to cut it off.

My favorite part of the dress would have to be the cuffs. They add so much to an otherwise simple dress.

Okay, enough with the words and on with the pictures.

Bridals. Hate the hair, love the dress. A-line, full, fits almost perfectly.

See what a difference the hair makes?! the bottom is finished in this shot, and you can see my winter boots peeking out. they were so warm.

the cuff!

buttons all the way down the back. I really wanted these, but the really ended up being a hassle--coming undone the whole day!

a good shot of the bodice. and sarah and gaelin, two of my besties.

wedding recap: photographer

Well, I guess it's high time that I begin a wedding recap. I went through my old blog to check out the planning, and I'll hit each topic in the order in which they originally appeared. I'll also throw in some stuff that didn't make it to the blog the first time, and some extras. I hope you enjoy!

One of the first things I chose was my wedding photographer. Wedding photography is really important to me because it's one of the few things from the day that lasts. My parents didn't hire a photographer, and I'm sad that there are such few images of them from their special day, and I didn't want to make the same mistake!

I researched a ton of photographers, and I picked Duston Todd. I was very very very pleased with the photographs! (he's not much of a businessman, but I'd do it again for the beautiful pictures he took). Duston was funny, easy to work with, and knowledgable. I'm especially grateful for his suggestion to wear warm shoes for the pictures immediately after the marriage--my feet would have been very frozen had I just worn my wedding shoes, and you can barely tell!

I'll now leave you with a few photos--a couple from each session we had (engagement, bridals, wedding), and his work will be featured again and again as I recap the events.

Enjoy!

what's up

• We moved! hooray! the place is still in a shambles, but it's a good space, and I'm excited to put it together!
• We took a train trip to Albuquerque to visit Alexander's parents and his sister, who lives in Las Cruces with her little family.
• On that trip, we got to meet our new little niece, Devoney!

Baby Devoney

Alexander and Baby Devoney

Stephanie, Sabey, and Devoney

• I'm back at work now
• Alexander is having fun unpacking and cleaning and stuff before he starts school next Monday.
• I'm starting a TAship at East High School--I'll be working with the Science Academy class there. I'm excited to try my hand at something new!