2010 has been an amazing year for us and it seems surreal that it's already almost coming to a close. We have been extremely blessed with all of the events of this year and I am so happy to have spent 8 out of 12 months married to my best friend. As our Christmas letter said (which most or all of my faithful readers received), this has been a year of doing. Planning a wedding, getting married, moving into our first apartment, moving to Colorado, getting a new job, traveling to CA for Thanksgiving, leaving for TX tomorrow to spend some time for Christmas with the Rabons, spending Christmas Day & having dinner with the Athertons and going to wrap it up with New Years (celebrating 4 years together!).
Here are some highlights from the last year:
January
We rang in the New Year with some of our best friends, progressive rummy, and The Truth.
February
We spent quite a few weekends traveling to North Lake Tahoe to arrange wedding plans with various vendors. The more time we spent there, the more we knew it would be perfect for our big day.
March
Our nephew Slade turned two years old in March and the family celebrated at a nice park in Manteca. He is such a cute and smart boy!
On March 28 my amazing bridesmaids threw me the best bridal shower of all time. It was such a huge blessing to be surrounded by family and friends and to be blessed with A LOT of awesome gifts. The company, food and games were all great.
April
We had the only beautiful weekend weather-wise in April to spend with family and friends dedicating our lives to each other. It was such an amazing day and every time I look at pictures I remember just how perfect it was. We were blessed to have our parents pray over our marriage as part of the ceremony.
We had the best wedding party ever. I just love our friends and how well they all mesh and how it was so natural to have them all together in one place. It was incredible.
We spent some time down by the lake with our amazing photographers, Charlotte Geary and Mike Pritchard (and baby Pritchard, come to find out later...). We have such epic wedding photos thanks to them and God's beautiful handiwork.
We danced the night away...and I'm not even big on dancing. A true to testament to the fun-ness of our friends and family and the musical prowess of our awesome DJ, Derek.
Then, a week later we went on our honeymoon to BEAUTIFUL Kauai, thanks to the generosity of Aunt Lori and Uncle Bill allowing us to use a week of their timeshares.
The gardens were beautiful.
So were the beaches :)
The company was amazing!
We hiked around in Waimea Canyon
And drove some beautiful backroads.
May
In May we really settled into our first apartment together. Stephen traveled to Colorado for Dan and Matt's graduations from college and high school, respectively.
June
In early June we were able to attend an A's Fireworks game with a group of friends including the Adys, Nikki, Vannah and the (now) Rogers. It was a great night with a great theme: Hair Bands!
With the help of a great many people, we were able to throw Mom a 50th birthday bash! People came from near and far (Nana and Papa, CD, Ash & Slade and Holly) to celebrate one of the best people in the world on her birthday. It's safe to say she was shocked!
For Stephen's birthday we went to another A's game and got to watch the A's defeat the Pirates in a most unusual way... the last out was the runner being hit by the ball.
July
July was a month of firsts and lasts. It was common knowledge at this point that we were going to be moving and we wanted to make a few last stops at special places. We also had some very special firsts.
Stephen and I went to the Redwoods for his first time and most likely the last time either of us will go for a while.
Sandi invited me to take part in Jack's first trip to the beach. Stinson + beach picnic + family = amazing.
We were also able to celebrate with our best friends as they purchased their first house together and started a new chapter of their lives.
August
We arrived at our new home in Colorado on August 2. With the help of Mom, Dad and Holly we were able to unload all of our stuff, get some rooms set up and begin getting settled into our new life.
Sandi came out to visit me at the end of August while Stephen was in Vegas and we had a great time talking about everything in life, seeing Garden of the Gods, adventuring and ending up at a Dueling Piano bar.
September
In September, I spent some time getting the house decorated for Fall. Home Goods provided me with some great decor and I enjoyed dressing our home up for the season.
Also in this month, we added a grill to our family and had fun learning to use it. I also got my job in September working at Parker Montessori with some great coworkers and adorable kids.
October
In October I spent some time exploring the area around our house and taking in the fall colors.
We also went to the mountains for the first time since we moved out here. We went for a nice hike at the Maroon Bells and the drive was also lovely.
I also started by Photo A Day project with this photo, taken on the drive home:
This project will essentially be a photo journal of a year of my life. It's on my Facebook though I am thinking of making it a blog for continuity sake as well. I should probably do that soon before I get too many more and won't want to transfer my little write ups.
November
In November I did some more exploring of our area, this time going out of the Metro area a bit.
We also got our first snow in November.
This one was from the morning after.
Chris came to visit us mid-month and the boys went to the Broncos vs. Chiefs game. Lucky for them the Broncos played really well and won. This was Chris' first Bronco game.
We flew back to California for Thanksgiving and got to enjoy time with family and friends whom we have missed a lot.
The whole family on our Thanksgiving :)
I couldn't believe how big our nephew had gotten in just a few months! He's talking up a storm and even gave me some kisses :)
We put up our first Christmas tree the day we came home from California. It was great to start off the holiday season right away with my favorite person.
December
My company Christmas party was on December 3 and was a great time of bonding with the lovely ladies at PMEI. It's really a great group and I'm blessed to be a part of it.
Mike and Marcie sent me the most beautiful roses for my birthday with a card that says "You are ours now!" What a great feeling it was to read that card :) And Stephen wrapped my gift in the official Rabon wrapping paper (shiny, green paper that has been in the family for forever from a department store that went out of business). We went to Hacienda for dinner with Dan and Brandon. It was nice to have great food with the guys and watch some football. Very low key birthday.
Stephen, aka best husband ever, knowing my great loves for the zoo and Christmas lights arranged for us to go to Zoo Lights at the Denver Zoo. It was awesome!!
It was very romantic to walk around the zoo hand-in-hand enjoying the lights and the night. We had hot chocolate and a churro and spent the evening enjoying each other's company and looking forward to doing the same with our kids someday.
What a year it has been! And we still have almost two weeks to enjoy with family and friends before 2011 comes around. Obviously there was so much more that happened this year than I have written about (wedding planning madness, leaving VCS, Young Guns softball games, MNF at Brandon's house, etc.) but I wanted to put some photos up to represent a busy and amazing year.
Looking forward to an equally, if not more amazing 2011 :)
