The first one leaves the nest...

We all made the pilgrimage to Asheville for Tara's wedding this weekend. We all thought she'd be the last to jump into matrimony, but what a surprise that she's the first! The wedding was very beautiful, with perfect weather, lots of good girl-time, family time, and many wonderful memories. Here are some pictures from the weekend (there are too many to choose from!):

On Friday the bridesmaids got their nails done, we practiced at rehearsal and had the rehearsal dinner - check Carrie's blog for pictures. Saturday evening after a big picnic at the Peterson's house, we had a shower for Tara at La Paz.

Karen (Tara's mom) with a few of Tara's gifts



Karen and her "girls"

And then came the big day...

Pre hairdo

Post hairdo








"But I just want to see what's going on!"














Our exit was a little unorthodox, but lots of fun. It was the song that goes, "Celebrate good times, come on!"










Ryan and Ryan came up for the festivities






Our former academy chaplain, Mark Witas did the hitchin'

Sure... we know what we're doing...

Thank God for girlfriends

Carrie and I took a quick trip to the lake with the Heilmans after my furniture got here on Friday.

Sabbath afternoon we headed to the Riverwalk for a big group picnic with the Heilmans, Grandpa Rilea (Carrie's), Hollie, Brooks, and the Ryans. How nice to be able to spend a little more time with Tara before the big day. Its rarely that we're all together!


On the way back we spontaneously decided to donate blood at the Collegedale church


This morning was the annual Southern Union Pancake feed. Ryan's dad, Stanley came too!







Here's the self-portrait of the weekend.

The Largo queen moves in

I'm so glad Mary Jane convinced me to go shopping on Labor Day! I've been looking at bedroom furniture here and there for about 6 months and finally came across some that I liked at the right price at a furniture warehouse here in town. Its a queen size bedroom suit made by Largo.

Out with the old...

Preparing a pathway

In with the new











The rug MJ & Randy bought for me goes nicely don't you think?

Testing it out with my company. Carrie is here on her break from Highland and Tara came down for the weekend since she is back from NZ.
How nice to have so many people here to share it with!

AMAZING (and there's a happy ending!)

Sabbath Rest

A trip down memory lane... Mary Jane is sorting through a bunch of stuff in preparation for ... (have the beans been spilled yet? hmmm...). So we went through a box of Fisher Price Kitchen stuff that we all used to play with. I couldn't pass up taking a few things. Ryan used to have this story memorized about Shep the German Shepherd that saved the boys start to finish. Oh, the books from our childhood... the best stories ever... Loony Coon, Clever Queen, Spunky's Diary, Bernstein Bears, Swift Arrow, Taught by a Tiger... need I say more.

Tutt tutt, I'm soaked!

God answered my prayer, it rained! After weeks of 100+ scorching weather, what a relief. But next time I wish he would hold off until I'm back in my car on my way home... or at least when I know where my car is in the parking lot...