More Family and Engagement Pictures

I received the rest of our family and engagement pictures in the mail the other day and was blown away by them! Honestly, at first I was a little scared how they might turn out, but I LOVE ME! I think the photographer did a great job and we got some GREAT shots, especially for the little that I paid for them. Here are just a few of them… All photos taken by Jacki Arnold. You can find her at: JB Photography or email her at: j.bma@live.com!

Time to get back to working on my final paper for my class, almost done…

Hope you enjoyed!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Apparently I get sea sick!

Who know?! We went out on Lake Michigan about two years ago and during that fishing trip I was able to keep all of my cookies down. I vaguely remember feeling a little queasy when I sat inside the cabin of the boat, but thought that when I went outside and was reeling in some fish that it went away and I handled the boat ride pretty good. This time... not so much! And I wasn't the only one...

We all got up bright and early at 2am! Jay and I were going to let Ayden sleep until right before we had to leave, get him dressed, and then figured he would fall back asleep once we got on the road. You know how kids are when they are in the car and they are tired. Doesn't take much to make them pass out. Turns out, Ayden was super excited about going fishing and heard me get in the shower (yes- I showered at 2am... I have this thing about feeling dirty and grimy in the morning and really love my morning showers) and got up as well. He was bright eyed and busy tailed and couldn't stop talking. He had two cinnamon rolls for breakfast, which in hindsight probably wasn't the best idea (as I personally opted for a small bowl of bland cheerios just to put a little something in my stomach). We left for the marina around 2:45am, and started the hour long drive there.

There's nothing like having to watch for deer on the road at almost 3am in the morning, and thankfully we didn't hit any on our drive, but we saw 5 or 6 along the way. One being this monster buck that Jay got really excited about. Ayden stayed awake for the whole drive, although at one point I think he was almost asleep, and my shouting 'deer deer deer' over and over probably didn't help put him to sleep. I really just didn't want to hit any deer, okay! We can't afford to have a vehicle out of commission!

We left the marina on the boat at 4am and headed out into the vast darkness... little did I know that I wasn't going to enjoy much of the next six hours. I was fine on the cruise out to the fishing grounds. We were going relatively fast and I wasn't feeling any rocking back and forth motion. I stayed sitting outside because I knew going inside wasn't a very smart idea. And... then we slowed down to get the fishing started. Thats when I was dumb, went and sat inside to get out of the way so the captain could set up the lines and started to feel a little queasy.

And, so did Ayden. Unfortunately those cinnamon rolls he had for breakfast ended up in Lake Michigan. I felt so bad for the little guy since it looked like the start of his first 'big' fishing trip was ending up in a disaster. We quickly found out that if we kept his mind off of it and kept him talking and thinking about the fish he felt a little bit better. It was about half way through though that he was decidedly arguing that we return to the marina.

I had bouts of nausea while on the boat. I would feel fine for a while, hold some conversations, take some pictures, and then it would hit me again and I could nothing but sit down with my head between my legs counting to ten over and over trying not to think about how crappy I was feeling. I didn't think I would throw up, I wasn't feeling that bad, but it happened towards the end of the trip. And by then I was SO ready for it to be over as well.

You might ask why we didn't prep with any sea sickness medication like Dramamine... we were told not to. Ayden is fine out on the pontoon boat with waves and I was expecting to be fine. The captain and his wife both said that Dramamine would stave off sea sickness, but it would also knock you out and you'd be pretty useless the whole trip. I didn't even think of looking into other ways to keep the sickies at bay. They did have mints on board which were supposed to help when you sucked on them. And they did, but you can only eat so many mints before you get sick of them.

I did get some good pictures though, so it wasn't a complete waste! Had to get out the rabbit’s feet! We needed some good luck and bad! The fish were just not feeling us for the first few hours that we were on the boat!  Check out all of the lures! Some of them even glow in the dark! I thought it was SO cool! Our luxurious ride for the day! We didn’t go on top of the boat and I spent much of my time on a chair on the back of the boat hoping to feel better!I ‘whited out’ the phone number from the next few pictures… thus the white box you’ll be seeing. Not that anyone couldn’t google the name of the charter, just didn’t think they needed the phone number just out there like that. I was SO ready to get off the boat when we docked though. I hopped off and headed straight for the bathroom because boy did I have to go! They did have a bathroom on the boat, but I couldn't imagine going into the cabin, trying to use the bathroom, and heaving all over the floor. Not going to happen! I was good while I was moving on land, but when I stopped moving, I felt like I was still on the boat. I had a sandwich and after about a half hour I felt much better, but still had a bad headache.

We had some AMAZING supper at Hu Hot that night! SO YUMMY!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Pictures Galore!!!

Here are some pictures of my engagement ring. I know that I’ve shared some before, but I’ve recently become obsessed with ring pictures after googling wedding images so much for the weddings I took/am taking pictures for and so I’ve been trying new things with my ring to ‘prepare’ for the next one. Oh… who am I kidding, I just love taking them! Some lake pictures down by Jay’s grandparent’s house. I loved the clouds in the sky! And LOTS and LOTS of flower pictures because they are SO pretty! I’ve noticed a trend in my photography lately, putting everything off to one side or another, just a different perspective I guess… And some of the scenery around the flower gardens at Jay’s grandparent’s house. I can only hope to have a smidge of the green thumb that Jay’s grandma and mom both have! Or that Jay got a little bit of it… and by looking at the career he’s in right now, I’d say so! What a sour looking face!Family picture… Jay’s brother (Steven), Jay, myself, Jay’s dad (Gerald), Ayden, and Jay’s mom (Michele).And some flowers from around Jay’s parent’s house! I couldn’t get enough of the flower picture taking on Saturday, hehe!These are called Star Gazer (or Glazer?) lilies and they quite possibly have become my favorite flower. They are SO pretty!!! Hope you liked some of the pictures!

CIAO! LOVE ME!