Where the hell did 2011 go?! I’m not sure. But Christmas was awesome, as always. My family opens gifts on Christmas Eve, because we are rebels…. Ok actually it’s because we are not morning people. We drank a lot of alcohol, and my grandma and I danced to a DVD of Polish music (Mazowsze, see the video below). My brother burned stuff in the backyard. My mom made an absolutely delicious dinner. In other words, it was a typical family gathering – and I loved it!

I really love giving presents. My family and I got Eric two awesome things I’ve been dying to give him: a Kindle Fire and a gift certificate for skydiving. Now I have my Kindle back (he’s been reading the Song of Ice and Fire series) + Eric will finally be an official family member (according my dad, one needs to jump out of plane to be part of our inner circle).

This year was photography heaven for me! I got a new lens (macro), a new tripod (mine is falling apart), a lens bag, reflectors, and an old Duaflex IV. Eric parents gave me money, which I used to buy an external flash. See? Photography heaven! But really I just loved hanging out with my family!

CLICK BELOW for pictures!!

Mazowsze is awesome!

The newest member of the family<3

My mom and brother

Moi

(Here is Gary snoozing under the tree…)

I did get a tiny vacation for Eric and I’s 1 year anniversary. We got each other video games, because we are super-duper gee-golly romantic! We also spend the weekend in Sedona in a rented cabin next to a small lake & creek. I took this picture as we were out petting the owner’s cats (we can’t help ourselves):

You can see more pictures from our trip [here]. We also stopped by Jerome to go to the Puscifer store, which was amazing. Even more amazing: seeing Puscifer live 2 weeks ago! I already loved Puscifer, but I was absolutely blown away by the show. If you haven’t seen them live yet, you should.

What else? I am now 25. I feel old. Thanksgiving was fun, and I’m super excited for Christmas this year. So instead of rambling about the non-interesting things I’ve been up to, I’m going to go finish wrapping presents/xmas decorating!

(without much help from Eric or Gary, I imagine…)

The first time Eric called me he was really nervous and shaking. Which is kind of funny, because Eric is always cool as a cucumber and I’m the anxious shaky one. Anyway he called me up and I asked if he wanted to come with me – I was about to go take a picture of Jerry’s Drive-In Liquors sign. He agreed (thank god). Not surprisingly, I got lost but he knew the way. We drank orange soda (“I do I do I do-oooo”). I exposed him to my eclectic music collection and my accompanied crazy singing/dancing (which shockingly didn’t scare him off). Of course, I took the picture (see below). That was August 27th 2003.

We were friends for quite a while before that, but that night was our first time hanging out outside of school. I feel like it foreshadowed some things to come: me having really random ideas that Eric goes along with, me getting lost but Eric knowing the way, our love of varied music, and just our general ability to have fun together no matter what. We had a great night that night, and it was one of the many fun times we’ve had together the past 9 years!

On the way to our wedding ceremony we passed Jerry’s Drive-Thru Liquor Store and smiled.

Every night for the past 10-ish years I’ve engaged in an EPIC BATTLE… with my cat. For my pillow. Tragically, Gary (my cat) wins every time. It really is a battle – my life is in actually in danger. I’ve woken up a few times with 16 lbs of stupid cat curled up ON MY FACE. I always have the constant threat of sprays of cat snot, tickling whiskers, and being stepped on as he re-arranges himself. I’ve tried a variety of methods to get him off my pillow, to no avail. He won’t even migrate to Eric’s pillow! I’d like to think that’s because he loves me more than Eric, but I think it’s just because he likes to make a nest out of my hair. Unfortunately, I’ve gotten weirdly used to it. So when Eric and I travel I can’t sleep because there isn’t a giant purring blob of fur surrounding my head… Oh well, I love my gary berry<3

I decided to go grocery shopping today since there’s no food in the house. Unless I feel like eating the powder at the bottle of the cereal box in some expired milk. Which I probably wouldn’t notice since my nose is so stuffed up.

Anyway, I decided I wouldn’t put any make-up on or do my hair or anything. No point: I already look like I got hit by a truck. Might as well go whole-hog. And anyway, I go to the store a few times a week and have NEVER seen anyone I know.

About 2 minutes into the store and I realize I’m not physically ready for this… but I soldier on. Must, get, juice! Neeed vitamin C! … Walking around in public with my horrific face/hair and "lets pretend these aren’t PJs" outfit is becoming rather amusing to me (defense mechanism?). and then what happens? I run into 2 PEOPLE I know. First is a guy that had a huge crush on me most of high-school – and probably now regrets it. The other was the mother of my jr. high best friend … who can now report back on my apparently miserable state.

I caught this lovely cold from Eric and I’s recent trip to Chicago. I’ve been meaning to update about it once I was feeling better… but I’m still sick. So you’re stuck with this really random and uninteresting post. Sorry.

Well now that I’m absolutely exhausted and super congested, time to go to French class! At least those nasal sounds should be easier..

We had a rather “nontraditional” wedding, which shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. First of all, I wore a black wedding dress (made by my grandma) and Eric wore a white tux. We had matching custom-made Converse with our wedding date embroidered on the side. My bouquet and was made from beads on twisted wire (as were the other bouquets and boutonnieres) that I made with my mom.
(as usual, click to enlarge)

(this post is crazy-long and riddled with pictures. click below to read the rest)

Our wedding party was also ‘different’ – my brother was my “man of honor” and my friend Audra was my bridesmaid (matron?). Eric’s best man was his brother Patrick and his groomswoman was his sister Christine. My brother had an awesome kilt!

We took all of our pictures before the ceremony – I don’t think anyone likes to wait an hour and half between the ceremony and the meal. Everyone is just thinking “GIMME MY FOOD!!” (or maybe that’s just me…). So we headed down to the ASU Art Museum and took our formals. Obviously, doing this meant we saw each other before the ceremony. We had Eric close his eyes, walk outside (with help lol), and then open them. That moment was actually really emotional and one of my favorite parts of the day.

After that was all done it was time for the ceremony! Our processional music was Sigur Ros – Staralfur (that I edited a bit). We had our parents go down the aisle before us as part of the “combining of two families” theme. Eric and I went down the aisle together. If I’m going anywhere, he’s going to be by my side! And vice-versa, of course.

We wrote the ceremony ourselves and Eric’s uncle was our officiant (ordained through the internet, lol) Both of our brothers read readings we selected. We had our families exchange vows, such as “Do you promise to stand next to them but not between them?” (to which they said “we do” etc). Eric and I answered our vows together – so instead of us both saying “I do” we said “we do” (except for one vow each). My favorite vow we came up with is probably “Do you promise to entertain each other’s nerdy moments and forgive their absurd ones?” At the end of the ceremony we sealed our vows with a high-five and a kiss.

After the ceremony we signed the stuff we needed to sign and made it all legal and such. We took a few more pictures while everyone had their appetizers. I hear they were delicious but I don’t know – I didn’t get any! We were pretty giddy at that point, so a lot of those pictures are goofy (more than usual, lol) or include us giggling. Then we sat down for dinner. The sun was setting and we had a bunch of candles and twinkle lights – it was beautiful! Eric’s brother, my brother, and my mom all gave toasts that made me cry. A lot. My mom and brother cried too, so there was a lot of crying going on on my side of the family.. which seemed to make everyone else cry. The serving people got choked up, hahaha.

We ate our delicious dinner and hung out with our guests. One of the many nice things about having a small wedding is that we actually got to spend time with everyone! We had our first dance to Metallica – Nothing Else Matters and half-way through we switched so I danced with my dad and Eric danced with his mom. We also stabbed our cake (cutting is for wimps) and our guests got cupcakes (amongst 029348023894 other desserts my mom put together). Basically we spent the entire night having a BLAST with people we love. What more could you want? It was everything we hoped and dreamed it would be AND MORE.

Some other details: Since our ‘theme’ was books (hm, wonder who came up with that) our centerpieces were stacks of red and black books. They were mainly history and math books, so show our different interests. We also made origami flowers from book pages. Our favors were bookmarks I designed. Our guestbook was library cards I made that people wrote on and gave back to us. We made our cardbox with some round boxes we covered with pages from math books (on the top) and history books (on the bottom).

To see all the pictures go [here] for Part 1 & [here] for Part 2

p.s. I’ve been putting off posting this until I got the pictures back from the photographer. It took a few months so this usually-neglected blog has been even more stagnant. Sowee

It was after a Navajo cook-out with my (ex)co-workers that I ended up in the ER in excruciating pain – where I ended up puking mutton and frybread all over. The doctor told me I had a burst ovarian cyst and would be fine in a few days. She gave me pain meds and sent me on my merry way. I spent the next 24 hours hopped up on pain meds and STILL in excruciating pain. I finally went back to the ER – I didn’t want to pay another co-pay, but Eric insisted once my hysterics woke him up from the other room. This time they did a CAT scan, ultrasound, etc. Turns out I had an ovarian cyst that enlarged my ovary to the size of a lemon (rather than an almond). Not only that, but it had twisted and cut off its own blood supply. In other words, my right ovary committed suicide. I was rushed to surgery and had it removed. I was told by one doctor that the pain I went through was worse than childbirth. Instead of coming home with a baby (ew), I came home with a 5 inch incision and 6 weeks of recovery. However, after about 2 weeks I was back to my usual running around-ness. I have a wedding to pull together!

A week from today I will be officially married to the love of my life, my other half, my one and only! I’m super excited. Well, when I have the time to be excited. Mostly I’m just trying to make up for lost time (damn you ovary!) and pull everything together. I’m going to be pretty much M.I.A. the next couple weeks. Once I get back I plan on doing more posting, especially sharing pictures since I got a new toy….

There’s other stuff going on but, honestly, I don’t have the time! There’s just not enough hours in the day.
Stay tuned for lots of rambling about the wedding and honeymoon!

Love<3

In other scary news, as of July 7th my brother is now legally an adult. For his birthday I got him a kick-ass shirt from Hot Topic and contributed to a sky-diving gift certificate. Jumping out of planes is kind of a family tradition. My dad got him golf clubs – maybe he can be a golf nerd like Eric now? At any rate, I love him so very much – Happy Birthday Boo!!!!

Eric and I also celebrated our 6 year anniversary! He got me a purse, and I got him a toolbox. It makes us look pretty 50’s suburbia/borderline-sexist, but hey – it’s what we both wanted (I’ve been drooling over the seatbelt purse for years!)… We also went to our favorite restaurant, Ruth’s Chris. I almost died of happiness right there in the Crème brûlée. Seriously though, how has Eric put up with me for this long? I don’t know. I do know that I love him. Muchly.

Our new house is pretty awesome. Every day we are faced with some new project – a million little things that are infinitely interesting to us but probably not to anyone else. It actually makes me feel kinda old (or at least like an adult). I never thought I’d be all that excited about blinds, but my cordless top-down-bottom-up 1/2” single cell filter shades made me jump up and down and clap like an idiot. Our cats feel the need to “help” with every project – especially when we have to build IKEA furniture. It’s adorable, but counter-productive.

We finally got the pool all clean and swimmable. Well, I say “we” but it was really all Eric. And here he is, enjoying the fruits of his labor with the first jump into our new pool!!:

In other news, Eric and I went to Vegas to see Flight of the Conchords. They were in Phoenix a while ago, but Eric got sick at the last minute and we weren’t able to go. He felt really bad and surprised me with this trip to make up for it The concert was AMAZING. They played a bunch of old favorites and a few new (hilarious) songs. We both grinned/cracked up like an idiot the entire time. You need that once in a while, you know?
We stayed at the Venetian again. GOD I love that hotel! We got $25 of slot credits with our room reservation, so we decided to try gambling for the first time. After $6 we stopped due to boredom and never spent the rest, lol. We went to the Cabo Wabo cantina (Cabo is my fav alcoholic drink) a couple times and got blasted on delicious margaritas. All in all, it was just the relaxing weekend we needed. And this trip is just more evidence that I have the best fiancé in the world. Just sayin’…

I suppose the craziest news is that.. Eric and I finally got our house!!! It only took 14 months of waiting, despairing, yelling at the bank, etc… but really, it was worth the wait. We signed the papers a little over a week ago and moved in IMMEDIATELY afterwards. We’re still not done moving – turns out we have a lot of crap. However, we’ve bought most of our furniture AND put it together. The most recent thing we got was our patio set, and the "no assembly required" sticker just about brought me to tears (of happiness). Damn you IKEA! (I still love you<3)
The most difficult thing to move were my books. Books are rather heavy en masse. They are currently strewn all over our front room/dining room while I work on cataloging and arranging them (see picture). I’m kind of putting that off until later this week when Eric is out of town for an actuary seminar) for 5 days. Arranging my books will keep my mind (some-what) off missing my love
Basic info on the house: in Gilbert, 3 bedroom, 1650 square feet, pool/spa, awesome, cantbelieveitsfinallyours. The rest you will have to find out when Eric and I throw our housewarming party … or when I post pics eventually.