i said yes.

(credit: magbooth.)

all smiles. thankfulness. great laughter.

it's been a harsh winter.

because of this

and this (both taken by tim at his bachelor party)

this seems more and more necessary.  deebs got it good.

unfortunately my chimney is bricked in and capped off. so silly.

the cold makes me sassy. and hungry.

so much time has been spent by the oven with warm, yummy things inside of it.

oh, and our wedding is right around the corner (13 days).  this huge smiles continues on.

less than 20.

 

our dear friends tyler and noel designed our invites.  i'd love to share of photo of that on here when i can.  tim and i are fans of both of their art, and seeing a collaboration was pretty incredible.  click on the link to tyler's blog.  he just won a few awards. it's pretty awesome.  he and a whole lot of people are pretty pumped about it.  we also had kinship press (see the process here) print our invites.  they were wonderful to work with and did an excellent job.  i highly recommend them for any of your future screen printing needs.

less than 20 days before tying the knot with the most incredible, wonderful, handsome man i know. (jus sayin.)  things have been ridiculously busy, which makes me more and more excited to a honeymoon that expands more than 10 days.  hellsyes.  it seems if there's not even time to squish things in between squished things in mine and tim's schedule.  stress piles up and then it just gets stupid silly.  i'm looking forward to this celebration to happen, and i'm definitely looking forward to living it up and enjoying it with most loved ones.

of christmas (season) past.

circa 1986

circa 2007

"[G]ive thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of G-d in Chr-st J-s-s for you."- 1 Thessalonians 5:18

May you give thanks to the One who has blessed us all so generously in an immense amount of ways throughout this year.  Happy Christmas!

strader traditions begin

 

Photo by Jason Crigler (i had to share with you one of the handful of great engagement photos jason shot of us.)

Being just a month and a half away from our wedding, Tim and I both have been swept up in this wedding whirlwind.  Lately it's been all about tying up the loose ends and seeing small glimpses of the final product.  We've been finalizing menu's, typing addresses on type writers, and filling in the missing links here and there, and here again.  

It was wonderful last weekend being totally (ok, almost totally) distracted from wedding stuff by having a few Christmas celebrations.  Tim will be gone for a few weeks over the holidays, so we celebrated our Christmas with making two of the many cookie recipes passed down from Tim's great grandma. These cookies were so tasty, and a huge reason why they were so good is because it called for not one, not two, not three...but four sticks of butter!!!!!!  The nice thing is we had so much we had to freeze the leftover dough to enjoy later.  We also made way too much homemade eggnog and roasted duck....but have been feasting on both all week!  We look forward to starting our own holiday traditions together, and keep some that's already been started.

revitalize five.

Sitting Bull trumps Princesses...always.

a mid autumn snack.

Sunergos. Nord's Bakery. Tim's wonderful taste buds.