Florida Pictures

I came back from FL with some good pictures of Jacob and me...hope you enjoy!

I was about 17.5 weeks pregnant in these pictures, so you can't really tell much...can you? Sometimes I looked pregnant but most of the time I just looked very well-fed. ;)

At the beach...

Dave took these for us...

He likes me.

He splashed me...

I like him too.

Funny...maybe I don't look pregnant because I was wearing men's shorts. They apparently don't make those in maternity. Who knew?

Life Update

Soooo...what's new. Well, I'm still pregnant, for starters. I've gotten concerned emails from folks wanting to make sure I was still in a motherly way, since I haven't said anything else about it lately. So yes, I'm still pregnant! I'm now almost 22 weeks along, and I'm definitely starting to show, if I wear maternity clothes. If I wear regular clothes, I just look like I ate way too much. For a long time. But I have a few maternity skirts and that makes all the difference in the world. I actually look pregnant. Used to, I'd try on some clothes someone gave me and say to my mom "ugh....this makes me look pregnant!" Now, I try on clothes and say "look, Jacob!!! This makes me look pregnant!!!" Funny how that works. I’ve had a hard time finding maternity skirts so I finally bought a few pair of maternity jeans (Goodwill) and turned them into skirts. They’re nice, but my closet consists of denim, denim, and more denim right now. Jacob likes denim best, so I guess that’s a good thing!

I've also started to feel the baby move, which is exciting, I think. For the first few days I really couldn't figure out what it was, but then when it kept feeling the same way, I figured it out. I first started feeling it a little at 18 weeks, and then a lot more regularly around 20 weeks. Jacob can also feel it now, for the past week or so, which is cooler than cool, if you ask me. The first time I held his hand there and he actually could feel something, I cried a little. It was so sweet. According to "What to Expect When You're Expecting," Baby Ellis is now over 8 inches long and weighs nearly 1 pound!

I met with my midwives several weeks ago and really liked them. There will be two of them working with me and we'll start regular check-ups and visits around 6 months. I love the hands-off approach, as far as that goes...I don't have a disease that needs to be treated...I have a baby! The midwives did one check-up the day they came out (they come and check me at home) and everything looks good and normal....including the baby's heartbeat. :) It was 156, which puts it in the girl range, but my boy cousins all had girly heartbeats, so you can't go by that, I guess. We're not having an ultrasound (unless there's a need for one...) so what we’re having will be a surprise. For those of you who didn't know, we are planning for a home birth. Maybe that's a little off-the-wall, but hey...what else did you expect??!! "Normality???"

Okiedoke...what else...oh, I'm not sick anymore, thank God. I was really getting tired of throwing up every single day. I've never been sick much (at least as far as stomach stuff goes) so all that getting sick was aggravating! I was really sick for a few weeks (I want to say weeks 9-14 or so) but I've been good for a while now. Now all I do is eat. And eat. And then eat some more. But really, I only eat whenever I'm hungry, which puts it at, oh...every 17 minutes. I love salt. Salt is so good. I started craving chocolate covered pretzels (chocolate AND SALT....life is good!) a few weeks ago, so somebody (who shall remain nameless but has a lot to do with my present condition...) went out and bought me a bag of chocolate covered pretzels. When those ran out, he made some more for me. Then we went to Florida (more on that in a sec) and he bought me a BIG one at a chocolate shop. Nice guy, I think. I also LOVE salt and vinegar potato chips. Oh, yes, they're on my diet. Everyone has to have the right amount of salt, vinegar, and potatoes in their diet....didn't you know that? Anyway, kettle cooked is the best, but any kind will do in a pinch. I'm in trouble since the family store started carrying (since someone lodged a complaint with the owners...) kettle cooked salt and vinegar...I've already had two bags. Individual size, of course. They're just so good! Not that this has anything to do with the chips, but I have finally gained a few pounds....just 4, I think, last time I weighed. But that’s been a couple weeks ago now, so…yikes!

About that Florida thing....Jacob and I were able to make a trip to GA and FL to see all of my family there around Christmas. I got to take him to family get-togethers where he met all kinds of distant cousins and other relatives and he really loved that. Haha. Not. We did some sight-seeing stuff in FL and walked on the beach and all that sort of fun stuff and that part was really fun. By the time it was all said and done, we were gone for about ten days and were sure glad to get home. Vacation is nice, but home is home. My family ended up staying a full two weeks or something...we met up with them some once we got down to FL, but we didn't travel or stay together.

I think that'll be all for now...I'll talk to y'all later.

Maybe. No promises...

Wedding Pics!!!

So, I've finally gotten some of my pictures online so I can post them now! I'm going to try (haha) to keep the writing to a minimum...we'll see how well that works!

Reception Decorations...I covered cans with scrapbook paper that went with my colors (turquoise and coral) and alternated those with plain ol' mason jars, decorated with coordinating ribbon. These all were filled with water and bright, cheery flowers and set on all the tables at the reception. My main thing was trying to make it look nice without spending tons of money and I think it turned out pretty well. I saved cans to decorate (from cooking a few months prior to the wedding,) so no additional costs there. We already had lots of pint jars, so all I had to buy was scrapbook paper and ribbon. The flowers came from Walmart. I decided that fancy flowers were just not worth the extra money and I really liked these that Walmart had. You should have seen Mom and me the morning of our wedding...we checked out at Walmart with armloads of the flowers!

I made my cake and took it to the church the day before the wedding, and then assembled everything there the morning of the wedding. 

When I ordered my bouquet, I got a few extra roses for decoration...

The board the cake is sitting on is a piece of 3/4 inch plywood that I had left from a table my dad had built me, so I got him to cut it in a circle a little bigger than my bottom tier and I glued a piece of the matching ribbon to cover the edge. The coral decoration is all piped buttercream and the turquoise is just plain ribbon...had to be removed as we cut it. 

I have a million pictures of prepping, but I only have certain ones uploaded right now and I figured it would be better to post what I did have instead of waiting for a lot more to upload. Maybe I'll get to that soon!

Here I am...all made up, decked out, and ready to go. A few other financial specs...I bought my dress and veil online, from a private seller. It was $200 and I had it altered. I spent a total of $300 on the dress itself. I bought a crinoline slip off Ebay for $20. I knew I wanted a bit of turquoise (my take on my something blue!) in my necklace so I kept my eyes open whenever I was out and about. I bought my necklace at some store in a mall...can't remember exactly which one...it was $5. Couldn't find any earrings to match until the week before the wedding...found them at Goodwill for $2, if I remember right. My shoes also came from Goodwill...white flat sandals, new condition...$2. I was on a tight budget and I wanted everything to look nice, so I tried to keep an open mind...not get too picky...and everything came out wonderfully!

One of Jacob's cousins did my hair and makeup.

Dad's first look...

And then it was time...

I don't have any more of the ceremony right now...just the formal shots afterwards. It'll do for now. Let's see...for the music before the ceremony, I spent a week or so listening to LOTS of wedding music on Amazon and finally decided on a few songs. I made a CD of my selected songs, including a bridal march that I fell in love with, and made a detailed list of the songs, times, when to play what, etc. Jacob's cousin's husband handled the sound booth for us, for which we are so very grateful! This wedding was definitely pulled off by several key people and we couldn't have had such a wonderful, glitch-free day without everyone's help! 

So, to get on with formal shots. There are a lot!

There are lots of kissy pics. It got old shooting all those. Not.

My favorite pictures were taken outside. We had beautiful weather right up until it was time for us to leave...storm clouds started rolling in when we rolled out. But the weather was gorgeous for pictures!

One of my absolute favorites...

LOVE this one too...

We were laughing here because the photographer said "ok...you can stop kissing now..." Naaah that's alright....

There was a road right behind the church and it was pretty out-of-the-way, so we decided it would look good to get pictures in the middle of the road. It worked for a little while, and we got some really nice shots...

Oh, remember how I said taking pictures in the road worked for a little while? Well, a police car drove by, so we had to get out of the road...it was really funny.

Then we went back in the church to finish up formal posed shots before heading to the reception...

Is it me or does he look scared?!?

I know this one's goofy, but I love it. It's our "we're tired of pictures and our faces hurt from smiling...can we go eat now?" look...

That's all the pictures for now. I have a lot more of the getting ready, the reception, and just fun random pictures, but they're not online yet. The internet I'm on is a little slow right now, but maybe I can get more uploaded soon! This is better than nothing though, right?