Monique & Daren's Wedding

Well, the wedding was absolutely beautiful!! The weather was wonderful (low 90's) and the ceremony & reception were just as wonderful. I started crying as soon as the wedding party came around the corner (I'd been feeling it build up since I got up that morning) and I pretty much did not STOP crying until we were on our way to the reception. :( But, as I told others, it was a happy-sad cry. I'm VERY happy for Monique & Daren and I'm thrilled that I could be there with them, but I will sure miss Mo. Don't worry, though...I've already added it to my "places to travel" list! Wahoo!! ;o)

Now...the pictures. Before I start, please take note...for EVERY picture, if you click on it once, it will open up to a bigger screen and you will be able to get a better look at it. ENJOY!!!

I arrived an hour and a half after they started taking pictures, so I got one of D & M with all of the nieces and nephews and another one of everyone visiting BEFORE the wedding ceremony.

Now, this next picture is hard for me to talk about. It was a "bridezilla" moment of Mo's. She decided that she did NOT like where the ceremony was set up (because of the sun), so she kind of forced everyone to help her move things.
.
Oh, yeah right...like MO would do that!!!! :o) After some discussion by MANY people involved, it was decided that it would be better to move the ceremony setting BACK about 15 feet so that everyone (bridal party included) could be in the shade for most of the ceremony. So, everyone that had a free hand started moving chairs back...including the bride and groom!!! :o)

But what did Grandpa Ray do to help? Why, he held Mo's flowers!! What a gentleman!!! ;)

Monique & Daren with Dean and Scott. Dean & Scott had a part in the wedding ceremony...Dean spoke, Scott prayed.

Monique & Daren with John & Esther. I *love* this picture!! :o)

Then, it was TIME FOR THE WEDDING TO START!!! I included the following picture because it's the only one I captured of Daren's mom & dad, Loren & Lil.

Monique & her Dad after he just walked her up the aisle.

Dean is sharing his message.

The group of singers. I believe that the title of the song they were singing was "Homes of Zion". Monique might have to correct me on that one later. It was a beautiful song and the singers really did a nice job with it!!

The vows.

After the vows were said, rings exchanged and the kiss to "seal the deal," Mo's nieces and nephews sang a hymn from our hymn book, number 226, "O, Teach me how to love." They did a FANTASTIC job!!! I was SO impressed with them and VERY proud of them!! :) (P.S. -- Mo's step-mom, Karen, made the dresses for the girls. Aren't they cute?! This is a good picture, too, to kind of see what dress Monique's sisters, Melody & Michelle, chose for the wedding. I'm not sure where they bought them from, but I thought they were very lovely!)

.

Daren & Monique as Mr. & Mrs.!!!!!

I caught this picture as they were walking away and I think it's one of my FAVORITE pictures from the day. I just love the simplicity of it.

Saying congratulations and some visiting before the reception.

At the reception. My job for the wedding involved taking pictures for the guest book, so my personal pictures of the reception aren't very organized. I was happy with what I captured, though!

The next couple pictures show the "damage" done to the car! Yes...these pictures were cropped to protect the reputation of those who had a hand in this car makeover. ;o) They were actually very nice to Daren & Mo's car, thank goodness. :) If you click on the first picture, it will open up to a larger view and you can see the GREAT pictures that someone drew on the front windshield of Daren & Monique. It was quite hilarious!! ;)

Signing the marriage license to make it official.

Getting ready for the bride & groom to make their get-away! We had BUBBLES to blow on them as they ran through!! :)

I didn't do so well on this shot, but Daren & Monique are right in the center of this picture. Click on it to make it larger, if you'd like.

THE END!! It was an absolutely LOVELY day and I think that Monique did a wonderful job with putting this wedding together. It was simple and elegant and heart-warming and special. I was glad to be there and I hope I "captured" the day in a way that's acceptable to all of you!! :) If there is a special something you'd like to see from the day, please let me know! I may be able to get my hands on a picture taken by someone else and I could possibly post it here. That being said, if you were at the wedding and want to e-mail me some pictures to post, please feel free to do so! I sure wouldn't mind posting pictures here that others took as I know that I did not capture everything! :)

It's here!!!!

Well, the time has arrived for me to go to Monique & Daren's wedding!!! :) I'll be leaving later this morning for the five hour trip, so please keep your fingers crossed for a safe, uneventful drive. My friend, Brent, is riding with me, so that will make the drive tolerable. :)

The weather forecast for tomorrow looks good, too! The temps are supposed to be in the low 90's (ugh!) but no thunderstorms are predicted, so that's good. Even if it does rain, though, we'll manage. Isn't there some old saying about rain being good luck on a wedding day? Anyway, for Mo's nerves, we'll hope for a DRY day!! :o)

Monique will be at the rehearsal dinner tonight, so instead of sitting by myself at the hotel, I will be going to supper with my good friends, John & Esther. I am really looking forward to that! :) It will be good to catch up with them!

The wedding will be at 10:30 AM tomorrow (Saturday) with a luncheon reception to follow. Be thinking of them and sending happy wishes their way!! :o) I hope to be home tomorrow night but not knowing how long the day will be, I'm not going to promise pictures until at least Sunday. Come to think of it, I really don't know if I'll be able to get pictures up until later this week! Sorry!



hahaha... Just kidding!!!! :D Pictures by Sunday night!! :) Enjoy your weekend!!!

Three down, ONE to go!!!

Wahoo!! I just finished another class!! :o) I just submitted my final paper for my history class on American women's experiences and now I am DONE with that class! Yay!! My paper ended up being an eight page paper, so that wasn't too bad but I am still glad to be done with it. Really, it was the easiest of all of my classes so I can't complain. I'm just glad that I can have some FUN now!! :o) I have one more class to finish up and with that class, I have two discussion posts to participate in next week and then we get a week to study for the final exam on August 6. Other than that, I'm done with that class, too. Yay! :)

Classes for the fall semester will begin on August 23 and I'll be taking three classes this fall. Hopefully it won't be as intense, though, because I'll be completing the courses in 16-week time periods rather than eight (like this summer has been). So...a little bit of a break before I start again! I'm just HAPPY to be almost done for the summer!! WAHOO!!! :)

Mosie

Today is kind of a sad day. My good friend, Mosie (Monique or Mo to some of you) is moving on to a new town. She is going to be marrying Daren soon (end of July) and they'll be living on a farm located smack in the middle of some great plains. It's only about...TWELVE HOURS from me!!! Ugh!

I am excited for her and I know that they'll be very happy, but I am going to miss having my friend living a block away from me!! Fortunately, I'll get to see her a couple more times before her big wedding day and permanent move. *sigh* Change is never easy, is it? I'm excited for Mo, but I'll miss her lots!

Congratulations and best of luck to both of you!!! :o)

PS -- Mo, if Daren doesn't want his picture on my blog...well, then don't tell him it's on here. ;o) Just kidding! I hope he doesn't mind!! :)

This just in!

Apparently, I'm cynical. :) I had mentioned the other day what my friend said and that other friends are 50/50 on whether or not I'm cynical. However, this weekend, we looked up the definition and although a lot of them say "motivated by selfishness" (which I do not believe is me (and if YOU think that's me...don't tell me)), right smack in the middle of the definition it says, "Doubtful as to whether something will happen or is worthwhile." I must say that I'm not usually so skeptical about whether something will happen, but I do often question if the "thing" that's happening would be WORTH happening (if that makes any sense). :) So...I guess I'm a cynic! I'm not so sure how I feel about that, but I guess that I really can't argue it because that's how I feel! My thought process is usually, "Yes, it's fine if you want do that (whatever "that" is), but I really don't know if I think it's worth the energy that goes into making it work!" So there you go! Another mystery solved. :)

*sigh*

My last post had been titled "Wednesday" (because I was talking about what was happening for that day) and I realized just now that I thought it was Wednesday at the time that I was writing and it was really only Tuesday. *sigh*

I hate when you have days at work where things happen and you feel like you're being treated like a 10-year-old and you feel like you should go take a time-out in your room or something. All because of how people approach you with a situation. *sigh*

For some reason I have been feeling SO tired lately and I'm not sure if it's just the warm weather outside and so I'm not sleeping that well or if I'm just not getting enough sleep. All I know is that the biggest effect on me (besides feeling tired) is that it makes me want to cry over the smallest things. I hate when my response to something is that I just want to cry. Dad has always said to me, "Cry over something worth crying about." and today's situation was NOT worth crying about, but because I feel so tired...I just wanted to cry. *sigh*

On a positive note, I have tomorrow off of work. Wahoo! :) I have a doctor's appointment in a near-by city and then I'm going to do a little shopping. It will be a nice, relaxing day and I plan to enjoy every minute of it and the nice weather we're having!!! :) *sigh*

On another positive note, my car is all fixed up and cleaned up and I have it back full-time now. Yay! I had to take it back in yesterday so that they could re-do some things and now it's in tip-top shape. The only downer is that the person who cleaned my car must have taken out the sunshield (that you put in the front window) and they forgot to put it back in. So...it's gone and now I need to go buy a new one. *sigh*

Tuesday

So, I was reminded again today how much I hate confrontation. Even if it's not angry confrontation and is perfectly calm, I still don't like it. I worry too much about hurting people's feelings. Why can't I be better with that kind of thing? It's like I operate on two options with confrontation: 1) hold it in and never say a word, hoping it will go away, or 2) let my anger get the best of me and then I say things I regret and end up apologizing anyway. Oh, whatever. I'm just glad that I'm not a manager of people. I don't think I'd do real well. :)

Well, I thought that once I finished another class, I'd have little more free time on my hands, but thus far, I have not felt that way! :( What's up with that, anyway? Maybe it's because I've not really put much effort into my classes since I turned my paper in on Sunday. Hmmm...I might be on to something. :)

So, my friend told me the other day that I'm cynical about men. For those of you that know me, do you agree? I've asked a few other friends about it and so far the response back is 50/50. I'm not sure if they're afraid to tell the truth or if half of my friends are oblivious to some characteristic of mine.

I had to get to a drain last night that's located UNDER my dryer. I only found out that it's under my DRYER after I had pulled the WASHER out from the wall. Sheesh. Needless to say, the floor under the washer AND dryer are all clean now. That's a plus, I guess. :)

I have had some ants roaming around my bathroom for a few days, so I put out some Raid-killer-ant-food-traps and voila...ants have not returned. But then I found one in the kitchen yesterday, so I put a trap out there. I really don't know if it's the traps that worked or if it's the fact that the remaining ants could smell the death of their "ant friends" that I had smushed prior to my purchase of the traps. I like to think it was a combo of both. :)

Okay, all for now. Just thought I'd throw a little info out there to make your world a better place. Ta-ta 'til later! :o)

PS -- I just watched a crow eat two worms and let me tell ya something...they don't CHEW!! I mean, even though spaghetti is easy to slurp down, don't you usually chew it, too? Well, why wouldn't a bird chew it's food? Gross.

Two down, Two to go.

I just finished up another class! Wahoo! That's two down and two more to go. One of the two left actually "officially" finished today but he gave us a TWO WEEK extension on our final paper. I don't have to have it submitted unitl the 23rd. WAHOO!!!! My fourth (and final!) class will end on August 6. I already feel less stressed!! Yippee!! :)

On a side note, check out this wild video of Jocelyn's baby girl who is ROLLING OVER already at only 11 DAYS OLD!!! (When you click on the link, the page that loads will have a black video box in the middle...just press the play button in the left hand corner and the video should start playing.) Anyway, I've never seen such a thing!!! Go, Briley, Go!! I don't know what Jocelyn feeds her, but it must be some good stuff, eh? ;o)

Generation Y

My Mom shared this with me in an e-mail today. :)

The Silent Generation are people born before 1946.

The Baby Boomers are people born between 1946 and 1959.

Generation X are people born between 1960 and 1989.

Generation Y are people born between 1990 and now. Why do we call the last one generation Y? I did not know, but a cartoonist explains it eloquently below...Learned something new today:

Now, make someone else laugh. Have a great day!

Friday Update

I got my car back on Wednesday but they didn't do a thorough job with things so it's going back in next Wednesday. This time, though, it seems like I'll be using the loaner car that the rental shop owns, so we'll see how that goes.

Things are going okay with finishing up my classes. I didn't get as much accomplished this week as I wanted to due to a 14-page take-home exam (front to back pages, mind you), but I'm still plugging along!

Tonight, I have to post in the discussion groups of two of my online classes with the assigned readings, write a two-page presentation paper, and start a research paper. The end is in sight! :)

Another Rental

So, my car is in the body shop getting "internal" repairs taken care of. I took it in yesterday and they thought it would only take a day, but that I should plan on two. I'm glad I planned on two because I haven't heard from them yet! I got another rental car, though, and they said, "Do you want a car or more of a small SUV?" I said, "Small SUV!!" :) This time, it's ALL covered by my insurance, too, so that's even more fun! :) (I willingly paid a little extra for the last rental.)

So, here's what I've been driving for the last 24 hours...a Nissan Rogue. I like it, but I definitely like the Buick Enclave (that I had a couple weeks ago) a LOT better. This little Nissan has some serious "get-up and go," though! It's been fun! :) I'll be glad to have my OWN car back again, though! :)

All for now!

Last Week of 12 Credits!!!

So, this is officially my LAST week of having 12 credits (four classes) for the summer session. I am SO excited about that!!! This was probably one of the dumbest things that I've ever attempted to do! Live and learn, though. I will have knocked off four classes in a short time period, so I guess I should be glad about that. It was tough work, though. I'm not sure if it was worth all of the time and effort. All it saved me from was having to take three classes in the spring. My fall schedule will be three classes (nine credits) and my spring schedule will now be two classes (six credits). After that, I'll be DONE! Yahoo!

So...this week, I will accomplish the following: Read 28 chapters of readings from various textbooks; write a final paper that's due tomorrow (Wednesday); complete a take-home exam that's due on Thursday; complete a paper that's due on Friday; complete a 10-page paper that's due on Sunday; start a six page paper that's due next week; start studying for an exam that I'll have next week (in the ONE online class that I'll have through August). My point? I'll have a VERY busy week.

All for now! Hope you have a good week!

Happy 4th of July!!!

Have a wonderful Fourth of July holiday!! It's my favorite holiday of the year and I plan to enjoy every minute of it!! :o)