Paul and Emily dot com

Its 2:15pm and 4 years ago, right now, I was scrambling around my house getting tuxedo stuff together. Four years ago today, there were a bunch of guys at my house swapping tuxedo pants, shoes, and shirts trying to figure out who was wearing who’s clothing. Four years ago today, there was a beautiful woman fitting into a white gown, smelling some purple and white flowers. Four years ago today, there were 150 of our closest friends and family gathering in a church.

Four years ago today, I married my college sweetheart, Emily. Talk about making smart decisions in life 🙂 Since that day, we have lived in two houses (plus a surrogate third floor dwelling of the Taliaferro house), been on two Caribbean Cruises, traveled to Seattle, New York, New Orleans, and St. Louis. We’ve watched her brother Brian get married, and helped Philip learn to drive. We’ve been on vacations with family, including my brother Sean, watched my sister graduate from college and then her double masters program.  And now, we are planning for our first child!
When you get into a long term relationship with someone, you may often wonder “Do I know what I’m getting myself into?”. (It was actually a question oft asked by Emily when I was going to meet her family for the first time. And yes, Phil, Love is a many splendored thing). But do I yet know what I am getting myself into? No, you never really know. Things can go completely wrong, can be boring, or as I have found, can be really exciting and enjoyable when you find the right person.

4 years … and while I may reminisce, I will never look back. Happy Anniversary Emily! I love you!

 

 

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Getting restless with the website. Its been online in this format since at least December 2005. Those that know me well, know that I get restless after 2 or 3 years of the same old same old 🙂 Maybe that explains my car “habit” (time for a change about now isn’t it?). I guess it goes back to my military childhood of moving every two to three years.
Anyway, I’m thinking its about time for a theme change on the old blog. Of course I haven’t mentioned it to Emily yet 🙂 This all came about after doing some work on Heather and Ashley‘s blogs. I think I am still using an older version of the blog software, so it would have to be upgraded to the 2.x version to work with many new formats and layouts. So keep your eyes peeled, there may be some new changes afoot.
On an unrelated note, my Dad is doing really well. His recent trip to the oncologist brought back some very positive feedback on his treatment. At 42% reduction in the tumor size and a significant reduction in the [stuff] they measure for cancer in the blood. As Mom says, he is a poster boy for his current treatment plan 🙂 Their website is listed on the links to the right of the website.
Emily and I will be going to New York for the first weekend in August. We’ll be visiting her dad and stepmom and spending some time at Diana’s cabin. Maybe I can finally watch a movie in the home theater room that I designed and installed? (and never got to have fun with!)
My brother is taking the Motorcycle Safety Course up in Seattle this weekend. I think everyone should take this class.  Heck, even if you don’t plan on getting your two wheel note on your ID, I encourage anyone to take it. Could save the lives of many of us on two wheels. Plus you will learn the thrill of riding a motorcycle. Its truly a freeing feeling.
Guess I should go to bed now as work draws near.

-pc

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Paul’s been doing all the posting lately, but that’s mostly because I’ve been saving up for mine. As you can tell from the picture below (or because we’ve already told you), we’re pregnant!! We are 8 weeks along; due March 5, 2008. We found out on June 23, and have kept it a secret until now. It was the hardest secret we’ve ever had to keep.

We had our first ultrasound on July 9 at 5 weeks, 5 days. The baby was 2.6mm. My doctor was a little concerned though because the heartbeat was in the low-normal range. I had to go for a 2nd ultrasound this morning, and everything checked out perfect. The baby has grown to 15.4mm and the heartbeat was 163bpm. Everything was perfect and it had grown by leaps and bounds, so we decided it was time to tell everyone. We of course called parents, and siblings and are in the process of telling people at our work and our friends. We figure that within a week most will know either from us or from reading this 🙂

I’ve been pretty sick the last 1.5 weeks. I get really nauseous if I don’t eat every hour and a half. Food is very unappetizing to me, but I have to keep eating anyhow. Paul has really stepped up (thanks for raising a great one Lary & Narni!) with cooking, shopping, housework, and pet care. I couldn’t ask for a better husband, especially when I feel so yucky.

Check out the picture below, and click on it to see the rest of them. We’ll keep updating as time goes on!

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My big brother Brian got married to Ashley this past weekend! Congratulations!

It was an absolutely beautiful ceremony. We had a great time this weekend spending time with friends and family, but it was a busy one.

The weekend started off with a bridesmaids’ dinner on Thursday night at Triple Crown Country Club. It was a very nice gesture, and a time when the bridesmaids, Ashley and ‘the mom’s’ could get together, share stories (which made us all cry), and relax a bit before the big events started. It was a great start to the weekend!

Friday was the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. The rehearsal dinner was at The Waterfront restaurant. It was beautiful as well.

All the girls spent time at The Hilton getting ready, doing our hair, sharing laughs and eating lunch. While we were getting ready, Brian showed his romantic side. Ashley kept getting deliveries of two roses tied together with a red ribbon, along with a card every 1/2 hour. Each card had 1-2 sentences telling “their story” written by Brian. It was so romantic and sweet, we were all in tears each time one arrived at the door!

The girls went to Covington along the river to take pictures before the ceremony, and actually ended up running into the guys’ limo! Luckily they saw us before Brian did and ducked him down so he wouldn’t see us or Ashley! A close call! We found it really funny, that of all places to go in Northern KY for pictures, we all chose the same place!

The ceremony was just gorgeous. We were all trying to hold it together, but one look at Brian’s face made all the girls start bawling. You could tell that we was so ready to see his bride!! The funniest part of the whole night was right when after all the bridal party walked down the aisle, and they closed the doors in the back of the church so Ash and her dad could get ready to come down the aisle. Right after they closed the doors, Brian walked down the steps from the altar and starting heading down the aisle. Everyone in the church (including the bridal party) had the resounding reaction of “what is he doing?! Is he leaving? Is he going to get her? What is he doing?!” He walked all the way down the aisle to the very back row, picked up a box, opened it, and slowly and carefully, starting sprinkling pink and red rose petals on the aisle runner for his bride. He sprinkled them all the way up the aisle to the steps of the altar, put the box down, then got back into his place. Let me tell you, there wasn’t a dry eye in the place! It was the most romantic and sweet gesture that any of us had ever seen. After that, Ash and her dad walked down the aisle, and the night began.

Who knew my brother was such a romantic. 🙂

I have a link to some pictures that Heather (one of the bridesmaids) and her husband took throughout the weekend. Sarah (Ashley’s step-mom) has some too, but I’m waiting on the link from her.

Check out the pictures below; we’re so glad we have some now so we don’t have to wait for the photographer!

Heather’s pictures

-ec

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This weekend was Brian’s bachelor party.  We started the day off with lunch at Frisch’s and then went to a local golf course.  This was my first time golfing, and I really enjoyed it!  We got lucky and had a 76 degree day, no humidity, and mostly sunny.  My driving was pretty much worthless, but heck, aside from a few practice swings while visiting Jason up in Cleveland, I’d never even touched a golf club (well, except the putt putt courses!).

I played with Brian, Kirk (Brian’s future brother-in-law), Cary (Brian’s best friend and best man),  as a foursome, but Adam (Brian’s other brother-in-law to be), Curry (Brian’s future father-in-law), Phil and Phillip (Brian’s brother and step father) followed us in another foursome.  It was nice playing with that many people, as I got to try out a number of different clubs and got a lot of good advice from Cary and Kirk.

I may have to start shopping Craigslist, classifieds, and Play it Again Sports for some decent, cheap, used clubs.  There is a driving range right down the street from my office…how convenient.  🙂 Emily played a year or two ago with her friend, Mary, and she had a good time, too.  May have found a new hobby!

-pc

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Mirth, Musings, & More: Pass The Band Aids

As read on the above blog, OJ Simpson was in Louisville this past weekend for the Kentucky Derby. He and friends went to dinner at a Jeff Ruby’s restaurant. Jeff approached the table and told OJ that the restaurant would not serve him and asked him to leave, which they did.

As a side note, we had our rehearsal dinner at Mr. Ruby’s Waterfront South Beach Grill and Phil is his lawyer. Best steak and seafood you will ever have, and the service is great as well.
I found some more info on Cincinnati.com:
http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070510/NEWS01/705100412
http://cin.planetdiscover.com/sp?keywords=Ruby&aff=100

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I hosted a wedding shower for Ashley today. The weather was rainy and dreary, but we had a lot of fun and laughter inside. We played a few really fun games, enjoyed the chocolate fountain (we’re women, did you expect anything different?), and opened a mountain of wonderful gifts. Thanks to all those who came, it was a great time!

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Congratulations to Stephen and Allie, and to Jason and Cindy! Both recently got engaged last week. We’re happy for all of you!

–pc

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Sorry to all our avid readers *smirk* that we haven’t posted in awhile.  We’ve both been really busy with work, Dliberation work, friends and family.  I was thinking back to this time last year, when we were buying our house, living at my mom’s, I was preparing for my black belt test, Emmaus was going on, we were having all sorts of car trouble, etc.  Whew, what a stressful few months!

Now, a year later, it’s happening again…not so many big things going on, but this time of year seems to be a tough one for us to get through.  We’re both swamped at work, there’s another black belt test coming up (thankfully this time I just get to watch everyone else), we have 3 mock trials coming up in the next month with Dliberation Resources, plus we are squeezing in a visit to St. Louis, and a couple of on-call weekends for me, and of course, Brian and Ashley’s upcoming wedding.

Luckily though, we’ve got Lost, Survivor, and The Amazing Race starting back up again (which we love), a great cruise to the Caribbean (YAY!), and April, which in general is our “ahhhhh, it’s all over” month.  Hopefully we’ll get back to posting soon, just wanted to keep everyone updated.

-ec

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Last night we all had dinner at Brian and Ashley’s.   Curry and Sarah (Ashley’s parents) brought over a game for all of us to play; Mille Bournes.  Mille Bournes is a car racing card game, getting points for collecting “miles” cards, and trying to stay on “roulez (go)” and avoid getting stopped by various predicaments like flat tires, accidents and speed limits. 

Brian and I used to play this game in our 8th grade french classes.  I remember the game being a big hit then (everyone was fighting for turns during free time), and it was again a huge hit last night. Even Paul who hates playing games had fun playing!

I definitly recommend getting this game if you are into faster-paced fun card games. 

-ec

 

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