Our New Married Life

Quick update on our lives as newlyweds:

We returned from our honeymoon in August and finally moved into our apartment. It took us a few weeks to get all settled in, but it's home now. We finally have some decorations up now too. We've enjoyed having a kitchen to cook and bake in and I love having a washer and dryer in the unit. I've been doing a ton of baking, and Corey has been doing a lot of the cooking. I knew he was a good cook, but I didn't realize that he enjoyed doing it. I've certainly been blessed by his cooking skills :)

Toward the end of August, I started school again. Second year of PT school! I still love it- I love the people, the material we get to learn about... it just makes me excited. It's been nice living closer to school. Corey and I have also enjoyed hanging out with my classmates. I love that he's gotten to known my friends from school better, and even more that he likes hanging out with them.

Thank you for your prayers for Corey's job! He has been working at Costco now for a little over a month. It's not far from our apartment and they've been able to give him quite a few hours. This has been such a blessing and such an answer to prayer! Costco seems like a great company to be employed by.

Oh I ran my first marathon earlier in October with some friends from school. Kelsey, Nicole, Nicole's boyfriend Trent, and I ran the Portland Marathon on October 7th! I think it was the craziest thing I've ever done. Didn't break any records, I was just glad to finish. Corey woke up at the crack of dawn to drive us down town and watch us run before he had to work. My parents had us over for a giant breakfast afterward.

Not too much else is new. We're still attending Rolling Hills Community Church. Corey still loves to fish and golf, I still love to take naps. We still love watching football together-- the Beavers are undefeated! Work and school are going well. We have wonderful family and friends, food to eat, a warm place to sleep- Life is good.

Honeymoon

We had a wonderful honeymoon in Jamaica!! It was beautiful and we had so much fun. We were blessed by Uncle Bill and family with a super fun ATV ride through the hills of Jamaica. It was awesome, we got sooo muddy! We had fun relaxing by the pool, kayaking in the sea, dining at the restaurants, enjoying gorgeous sunsets, and just being with each other. :)

Wedding & Photos

Well I realized I hadn't posted anything in a long time! We've been married for almost 3 months now. Our wedding was more than we could have hoped for- the weather was beautiful, our friends and family were there, the food was delicious, and somehow all the decorations turned out just right! Thank you to all the wonderful people who helped set up, decorate, and clean up. So much work went into our big day, and I'm so appreciative to everyone who helped make it perfect! It's funny, I didn't need to stress out so much in the months leading up to the wedding. Everything was perfect, but even if the weather hadn't cooperated, if the food hadn't shown up, etc... I still would've gotten to marry Corey and that's what it was all about.

God is so so good. Over the last few months He's really been teaching me to trust in Him. I feel like Corey and I have experienced God's great provision first hand, and it has blown my mind. I still struggle with worrying and trying to control situations, but God has continued to show me He has it all under control. When I look at all He has done for us, I feel so loved and blessed, and I can't help but feel peace about the future.

Please continue to pray for us as we continue on our new journey together. Pray we will continue to grow in love for each other and the Lord, and that we will pursue Him first. I feel so blessed to get to be Corey's wife and to have such a wonderful husband to navigate life with.

Here are some photos from our wedding, taken by Joli Photographie.

 Tables set up and ready to go, complete with the awesome wooden trays my dad made.

 

Ceremony site with our initials. My dad and bridesmaids helped me make those.

Our first look :)    

Bridal Party 

 Wedding Ceremony :)

 

Communion

 

So happy :)

Our First Dance

Dancing with my Daddy

 Reception

Marriage License

We got our marriage license today during lunch! Very excited. Also, one of my bridesmaids threw me a lovely shower this weekend. It was fun to see friends I haven't gotten to see in a while. This weekend my future mother-in-law is throwing a shower for me with family members. I'm looking forward to seeing family members from out of town I don't get to see very often. I feel so blessed and fortunate to have such wonderful friends and family, and to be gaining such a wonderful family through marrying Corey. :)

We Applied for an Apartment

Today Corey and I set off to look for a place to live. Our wedding is exactly 1 month from today and we were starting to get a little anxious (perhaps me more than him), that we didn't have a place lined up yet. I was excited and thought apartment hunting would be fun. It was a bit fun, but also very interesting, a bit sketchy at times, and slightly stressful. But we found a place! It's more than we wanted to spend, but it feels like a safe place and the property is well maintained. It was very important to both of us that we find a place that I would feel safe being alone at if Corey has to work late or whatever. Once we finally decided, then it was really exciting. We applied and put down a hold deposit. We should hear back toward the beginning of next week, and then we can start moving our stuff over there in a few weeks if all goes well. I'm so excited! I'm sure our parents are excited to get boxes of our stuff out of their houses. Right now the office of my parents' house is filled with stuff for our future home. :)

Corey is still in the job hunt, so please keep praying that the Lord leads him to the right places. I'm praying the right doors will be opened and that everything will fall into place. God is so good. We are learning to lean on Him and trust His plan for our lives. It's a little scary getting married and applying for an apartment knowing as of now, come August neither of us will be working. But the Lord has a plan, we just need to be seeking Him and His guidance.

Thrilled

Just had to say it, I am so thoroughly thrilled to be marrying Corey in 6 weeks!!! Bah, I can't wait. He comes home tomorrow from serving in Nicaragua with a team from our church. I'm so proud of the man that he is and how he's grown over the last few years. It's been so exciting to see the work God has done in him and through him, it inspires me to be a better person and the seek the Lord more. Lots of things still need to be worked out... recent photography challenges, Corey finding a job, us finding a place to live, etc. But I'm so excited and I feel peace that God will provide. Please keep us in your prayers if you think of us. Just a busy and stressful time, but we want to enjoy each moment. :)

Thankful for Good Friends :)

Down to 50 days until the wedding. Corey is in Nicaragua. I've been working on some wedding stuff. Honestly haven't done too much, but I did chat with our videographer today. He had some really great tips about some other issues we've been dealing with and then we just talked about a rough timeline.

I don't really have much to post about wedding stuff. Just felt like mentioning how awesome my friends are. Corey is gone and I didn't really feel like doing anything, just wanted to relax. But my coach had a reunion for at her house and a bunch of my old teammates got together. One of the guys is leaving Wednesday for a few years in flight school, he just graduated from the Navy where he competed on the gymnastics team for 4 years. Anyways, Sara had all of us over so we could hang out before Aaron leaves. It was just great to see them again. Sara and Matt have Connor who is almost 3 now, two of us are getting married in August, two of us are in physical therapy school, Aaron is in flight school, 4 of us competed in college gymnastics, a few are working now. It's crazy because we've known each other since we were little, and now we're all growing up. We spent hours and hours in the gym together each week for years, it's just awesome that we keep in touch and are still friends. I'm so glad that I went, so thankful for old friends. I feel so blessed. I'm very excited to get to celebrate and share life with friends like these. And I'm very excited to get the celebrate our wedding with so many wonderful people, our family and friends. It's such a blessing to have people who care for you, support you, and love you, and people you can feel the same way about. A good reminder that life needs to be lived together in community.

8 Weeks... moving on flower girl/ring bearer outfits

Quick update on the wedding planning. Getting excited, but also very nervous about all that is still left to be done!!! Ahhh.

Today I booked the hotel for the night of our wedding and the following night. Excited to have that done and out of the way.

I got my hair cut yesterday and my hair stylist and I discussed possibilities for how I'll wear my hair. I scheduled a trial run with him the week before the wedding.

Our invitations have been sent out, and I've received about 50 RSVPs... although waiting for about 250 people to let me know.

I've been finalizing the order with the florist.

I applied for my passport, it should arrive any day now.

I've started working on the programs, but it's going to be a while before they're done (have to meet with our officiant to finalize ceremony order) and then it might take a while to finish them up.

We've been working on center piece ideas ...

Then our awesome neighbor offered to help with the flower girl outfit, so we went to the fabric store today and got materials to make the tutu part! I love this cute outfit (except Karley's will be ivory on top, with ivory and light gray mixed on the bottom)! I feel so blessed that our neighbor, who I just met, is so willing to help! She even went to the fabric store with me and helped me pick out the material.

And here is what we're thinking of having the ring bearer wear :)

They're such cute toddlers in anything they wear, but I'm excited to see them in their little outfits!