New Chapter

photo courtesy our fabulous wedding photog, Stacy Reeves.

Hey y'all.
Wow, I have really fallen off the blogging train! It's so cliche, but I got engaged and then all my spare internet time was sucked into wedding planning. 8 months of planning, 7 friend/family weddings, moving, lots of work assignments and more, we had a wonderful, joyful wedding. We had a fabulous honeymoon in some of the most romantic cities on earth in Europe, and now I'm settling into a new phase in life-- being a wife.

I have several photo posts I'd like to share... and I never did blog about England-- the last stop of our European adventure in freaking 2008. That's so sad! I really would like to catch up here and move forward with what's going on now. :-) Like... some photos from the wedding and honeymoon... and just life in general!

What does it mean to be a wife, in addition to working full-time and having a very busy life? Got any tips? I wonder what our life will be like these next few months. I am loving things so far. It's amazing to have Zach to come home to every day, and it's fun to just live out the mundane things together. I hope I'll become better at cooking and cleaning though! :-) Working on it! There's just not enough hours in the day.

I've missed blogging. So... here I am, back on the wagon--I hope. I might post with less photos in the future. Maybe that would take less time. :-) It's a February-resolution, i guess. :-)

What's been going on in your lives? Do share! Better yet-- blog. :-)

Gruene love!

A few weeks ago I got to shoot engagement photos for Chris and Christi. I've shot couples before, but not engagement photos, and the energy was amazing! These two had a great time laughing and hamming it up, and I have to say these photos are some of my favorites. What made it even sweeter is both their first date and the proposal happened right there in Gruene, so it was only fitting for them to have their engagement photos taken in the same location. Hope you enjoy, and congratulations to Chris and Christi! If you'd like to see the rest of their photos, check out my photo site.

It's a love story, baby just say YES

This is an exciting post for me to write. Many of you who read my blog know the story of Zach and I. We first met 8 years ago at a homeschooling bookfair in Houston-- both our parents own homeschooling supply companies, and we met while we were working for our parents. I was 16--he was 19 and a college soccer star/ smoking hot model. His cousin Jonathan was also there. I made Zach sign his model card for me because I knew he'd be something great one day. 

We exchanged contact info and kept in touch for the next few years. His brother, sister and cousin went to A&M and I hung out with Zach there once. I worked at the State Fair of Texas in 2005 and called him up on a whim. We hung out and saw Gary Allan together. Though I didn't know it, he was attracted to me! This amazingly hot and cultured guy! Fast forward to January 2007. I moved to DFW for my new job right out of college and I knew 4 people in the area. So I texted all of them. Zach was one, and he called me up to hang out. I was super excited! First time we hung out was supposed to have been going swing dancing with Jashley and Grant

 but everything iced over. Zach and I hung out despite the weather, and we were steady companions for about a month before he confessed his feelings to me February 19, 2007.

I could write a book about how much our love has grown since then, but I'll spare you. :-) Fast forward to May 2, 2009. My birthday was just a few days before and Zach's is May 4, so his family held a joint birthday party. I guess you'll have to talk to him to get his side of the story, but 20 of his family and our friends gathered that evening and I was the only one in the dark about the REAL reason for the party. Here is some of the decor, food and cake Zach's sweet mom Sharon set up for us. 

Here we are! I'm wearing the new top Sharon gave me for my birthday with jewelry from Zach.

After eating, it was time for gifts. I was terror-stricken because I'd been practicing a song on the piano to play for zach for off and on-- more than a year. Sadly. Prayer for Taylor by Michael W. Smith is his favorite song and it's kind of hard to play! I was so worried about that, but it went all right. :-) Next was gifts. Here I'm opening the purse to go with my outfit and jewelry! :-)

Zach went to open his last gift supposedly from his cousin Jonathan...

"Jonathan's" gift to Zach was a stack of magazines, followed by a box wrapped in newspaper. He unwrapped it and it was a James Avery box. Any Texas girl raised right knows the James Avery symbol on their little boxes-- high quality sterling silver charms for bracelets and affordable jewelry for guys and girls. Since I myself had just received some james avery earrings from my brothers 5 minutes before, I thought to myself, "well maybe Jonathan got him one of those rings we saw the other day..."

Zach fished out of the jewelry bag a very not-James Avery ring... it was all sparkly... definitely not something he'd want! He said "I believe this is for you..." and held it out to me. I froze and started shaking/crying all at once because I knew what that was! He got down on one knee and in front of everyone asked me "Will you marry me?" What do you think I said?

Amid tears I did say yes. :-) And I was shaking for a good while.

Everyone there has been with us for the long haul and they were all waiting for this day as much(maybe more!) than me. :-)

It's still a little surreal that I get to marry my best friend!

We celebrated with our special birthday glasses and a wine made just for us... or so it seems. I'm so glad someone made this brand of wine!

Ok, on to the sparkly details, since if you're like me, you live for this stuff. :-)

Zacharoo designed this ring himself and went through Bova Diamonds, a company based out of Israel... hello! I love Israel! I feel like because my mom's family is Jewish and my first time out of the country was to Israel--this makes the ring EXTRA special.

The main stone is from Baseball Diamonds and it's a stunning and unusual pear shape. It's ringed and accented by a host of pave diamonds. All of which serves to make my ring a vintage-looking and unique part of me! ps- that is alfred's foot and pierre in the next pic. sorry. The cat's are enthralled with shiny things. sigh.

Thank you to all of you who have supported us both throughout our relationship. I hope this fills in the blanks if anyone was wondering the story! We've set the date for 1.10.10 if we find a venue available then. We're close to booking one... I'll keep you posted if you want!