Since the Wedding...

It's near impossible to sum up nearly 16 months in a single entry, so I'll just hit the high spots!

After getting married on May 31, 2008, Tyler and I spent our honeymoon at Sandals Dunn's River Villaggio in Jamaica. If you've never stayed at a Sandals resort, I highly recommend it. It just feels nice to be pampered and waited on 24 hours a day. We loved it! We got home a week later, and I began preparing for my boards. I took my NAPLEX on June 27th, and then my MPJE law exam on July 3rd. I received my license to practice pharmacy on July 16th, and Tyler and I moved into a new apartment two days later!

Fall was spent working and enjoying some Crimson Tide football, as always... At the time, I was a floater for CVS, working all over north Alabama, and Tyler was working full-time and studying to finish his MBA in finance. After a couple of years of classes, Tyler graduated with his MBA from UAB in December 2008... With a 4.0 GPA, I might add. To celebrate, he and I took a trip to New York City the week before Christmas. The day after we returned to Alabama, we enjoyed those Trans-Siberian Orchestra tickets he had bought me for my birthday. Our first Christmas was so much fun! Family get-togethers, holiday parties, Christmas shopping, and our FIRST Christmas tree! (Tyler says only Buddy the Elf rivals my love for all things Christmas.)

Shortly after the beginning of 2009, Tyler and I began our house-hunt. We loved our apartment, but we were ready for a home of our own. After about six weeks of looking at homes in the Birmingham area, we decided on building a house in Kimberly, where our friends Drew and Sheri had been living for almost a year. We signed the contract on February 11th and started the hectic process of building a house.

After eight months of floating (which I loved), I decided in March to go on staff full-time at the CVS in my hometown, Oneonta. It's quite a commute, but I have enjoyed working in my hometown. I get to see people that I haven't seen since high school on a semi-regular basis now, and I especially love being able to have lunch with my mom nearly every day that I work. Every day when she finishes her mail route, she calls to see what I want for lunch that day. Maybe I'm a little spoiled... I just think God gave me the best mom in the world! (My co-workers love it, too, because she brings them goodies every now and then as well.)

Tyler and I celebrated our one-year anniversary on May 31, 2009, and we closed on our house on June 22nd! We LOVE our new house, and I am immensely enjoying decorating it! It's also nice to live a little farther outside the city, because we have a yard now, and we see all kinds of critters! Our favorites are the two wild turkeys (which we have named Pilgrim and Mayflower) that visit our backyard at least once or twice a week. But we also have deer, owls, bobcats, you name it.

In July, we went on a big family vacation to the Rocky Mountains. We all (Mama, Daddy, Ashley, Phillip, Grandma Sarah, Sonja, Randy, Noah, Tyler and I) stayed in a big log cabin in Breckenridge. We had a great time. We visited the Rocky Mountain National Park, rode four-wheelers in Vail Pass, shopped in Breckenridge, saw lots of wildlife (Mama and Daddy even saw two bears and a fox), and did a lot of relaxing.

Earlier this month (September), Tyler and I rented a two-bedroom condo in Gulf Shores and enjoyed a wonderful long weekend at the beach! Mama and Daddy came down and stayed with us for two nights, and we had a wonderful time relaxing at the beach.

Football season is now in full swing, so we are again enjoying some Bama football. We are still settling into our new house, so there is lots of yardwork to do (Yay Tyler!) and decorating to continue working on (Yay me!). We have also recently began our small group semester at church. Tyler and I are so excited to be a part of a young married small group led by Everitt and Ruthie Simmons, and we're so thankful for the opportunity to learn from a spirit-filled couple! I have also joined Ruthie's small group for young wives, which meets every Thursday morning (One of the few times I am available every week... Isn't God good?).

So that's our life for the past 16 months! Of course, that's the abbreviated version. I didn't even mention our first Thanksgiving, our first snowstorm, our trip to Kentucky, Tyler's bout with kidney stones, or our first experience at City Stages (REO Speedwagon!!!). Suffice it to say, we have stayed busy! And God is good... All the time.