Wedding Weekend

This past weekend was my little sister's wedding at Toledo Bend Lake. It was absolutely gorgeous and we had a great time. It was a long week of preparation, but very well worth it in the end. She asked me to be her matron of honor..and her photographer! So it was quite a task. Don't worry, I didn't stand next to her in my bridesmaid's dress holding flowers in one hand and snapping photos with the other. I shot all the photos I wasn't in..and Matt and Leigh Ann shot everything else and the ceremony. And they did a great job!

We got to stay in a lake house on the water for a few days before the wedding and got to enjoy some time playing in the water and just relaxing. It was a great little getaway. I can't believe my baby sister is married! She looked so beautiful...just look at her! I'm giving you a sneak peek before all the photos are edited.

Mr. and Mrs. Chase Bell

Shell Bell and Me

Our New Family!

Matty and Me took a break from shooting and got a quick dance in

Cole hung out with Brody at the lake house this week. Here Brody is trying to comfort him. Apparently he does this a lot..Leigh Ann has a similar picture on her blog from a different incident with Brody trying to comfort Cole.

Matt caught a fish!

And here's our sweet boy just being himself!

When I edit the photos, I'll let you know so you can see how beautiful the entire ceremony was. It was a perfect day..perfect weather, beautiful setting and full of so much joy.

Congratulations Shell Bell and Chase. We love you!

*And in case you were wondering, this was a very casual wedding..so the groomsmen wore their shirts untucked and the dads wore khakis.

Check this Out!!

I'm not going to tell you what it is..you just have to go Check it out!

Aftermath

I'm late on my aftermath of Ike post. We've been dealing with, well, the aftermath of Ike. Bryan/College Station didn't really see much damage or affects from the storm, but those we love have really been through a lot. As you know, my parents are from the Beaumont area. God really had his hand on their home AGAIN...and they had no damage to their home. They had a tree fall in their backyard and demolish their fence, but that's it. However, houses next door and across the street weren't so lucky.

A long time family friend lives across the street from my parents. He and his family had evacuated and returned home to a treen through his house. My dad walked through the house with him for the first time when he got home. As they walked into their son's upstairs bedroom, my dad said it was a very "sobering" moment. The tree that had smashed their house had falled directly across their son's bed. If they wouldn't have evacuated, their son would be dead. The 3 men, including my dad, who walked in on this site were really shaken up by it. My dad said he will never stay through another storm again. Thank you Jesus for sparing the life of this young boy and for allowing his father to know they needed to leave town.

Brent and Leigh Ann came to Bryan and stayed here a couple of days. They have no power or water, but were able to go stay with some friends this week so Brent can work. They have no damage to their home either and should be able to get home as soon as the power and water are restored.

Other members of my family have some damage to their homes, but nothing devastating.
Thank you Lord for keeping our families safe through this. There are so many who have lost everything and have no homes to return home to. Our church is full of evacuees with heart wrenching stories and weary hearts. It has been such a blessing to see our church body in action as we work to provide shelter, food, ears to listen and shoulders to lean on for these courageous people.

Since we had a lot of time on our hands with a storm headed our way and family in town, we hung out at Matt's parents with Brent and Leigh Ann. Here are a few photos from the weekend.

Another Fun Weekend

I have a couple of things to post about that I completely forgot about until I looked through pictures on my camera.

First, a couple of weekends ago, we went to Matt's aunt's house on Lake Conroe for one last day on the boat before fall comes. (And doesn't it already feel like fall!! Thank you cold front!) We had a great time..but we really missed Brent, Leigh Ann and Cole. They couldn't make it this time and it just wasn't the same. We spent the day on the boat watching Grant tube and Matt and Jordan wakeboard. I would have got on the wakeboard, but the water was sooo choppy and I didn't feel like face planting into the water. I've done it plenty of times, and IT HURTS!!
Here's a slideshow of the lake day events.

The following day, we went to the Astros game with my Uncle Roger. He lives in Houston and we never get to see him so it was great to spend the evening with him.

(See how there was NO ONE at the game!)

And I just had to put this one in because my baby boy is too cute!

It's that Time...AGAIN!

This time it looks like Ike is going to have a major impact on Bryan/College Station. We're doing all we can to get ready without going overboard and being too paranoid. Can you be too paranoid when the forecasters are saying we are going to have strong winds, tons of rain, flooding and tornadoes? We have food, water, candles and flashlights. All of our patio furniture is in the garage. We will fill the bathtubs with water so we can flush our toilets and give our baby a sponge bath. We might not even sleep in our bedroom tonight since we have a huge sliding glass door in there. I just want to snuggle with my husband and baby so we can all stay safe.

It looks like Galveston is going to get hit HARD! Keep the residents in your prayers..hopefully most of them have evacuated. But pray they have homes to come back to.

My family in the Beaumont area decided not to evacuate this time. I think everyone has "hurricane fatigue." Plus, their county wasn't under mandatory evacuation this time. Please pray for their safety as they ride this one out.

Also, pray for our dear friends the Kramers. They have an amazing "grass-fed" farm that is up and coming. Like Lynsey said on their blog, what do you even do with a herd of cattle, a bunch of pigs, chickens and more! You can't just haul them into your bathroom with you while your hunkered down in the tub. (I am just picturing Jason doing this and it's cracking me up!)

Everyone stay safe!

Nobody Told Me

Brody is sick for the very first time. He has the yucky snot, the nasty cough and fluid behind one ear so he's always tugging at it.I'm so glad we made it 8 months without him having a cold. When he was a newborn, he had a lot of tummy issues, but never was sick.

However, I would like to know why nobody* told me how things would be when your baby gets sick for the first time.

Nobody told me that I would have to suck snot out of his nose with that sucker thing so much that he would start to hate me.

Nobody told me that his sweet little eyes would be all droopy and sad.

Nobody told me that he would be SO whiney and irritable that I would go insane if I don't cuddle and love on him all day.

Nobody told me that he wouldn't want to eat.

Nobody told me that he would want to sleep all day, yet not be able to sleep because he can't breathe out of his nose.

Nobody told me a lot of things about sick babies.

I don't like it. I want him to be all better and back to his happy little self. He's on medicine so hopefully it will be soon! How do moms survive and actually be productive around their home in these times? And this is just a cold! I can't even imagine when its a virus or something!

*I wanted to use "no one" instead of nobody..but I couldn't figure out how to type it. Is it 1 or 2 words?

A Fun Photo Shoot

I normally don't post about photo shoots on our family blog, but since most of the people that read this blog know this family, I wanted to share it with you. (that was the longest run on sentence ever!) Check it out!

What a Week!

A lot has gone on around here in the last week and I haven't had a chance to blog about it. So this is a hodge podge of all that has gone in the last week around our house.

First of all, I chopped my hair off. Now, if you know me at all you know that I did not go TOO short. I just don't have the face for it. However, it was way too long for the Texas heat and baby hands were constantly pulling at it. So its at my shoulders now. Here's a pic of it 2 days after it was cut.

This past Saturday was the first Aggie game! We were so excited, especially Matt. He's been waiting for this day since the last game last season. His parents got him season tickets for his college graduation gidt, so we'll be at every game this year. (I'm sure I'll gladly be giving up my ticket for his dad and brother to go sometime.) Here we are before the game, decked out in our Aggie gear.

Finally, as you saw in the previous post, my family came to escape Gustav. Fortunately, the storm missed them completely. However, Saturday through Tuesday, we didn't know that was going to happen so we had quite a housefull. My parents and brother slept here, my grandparents stayed with Matt's parents, and my aunt and her family slept at a hotel. However, during the day, everyone hung out at our house. It was fun..and crazy! Here are some pics from the weekend.

Brody playing with Nonnie

Nikki and Nanny (Tony's g-mother) playing a game

Hanging and grilling outside

Mom playing a game with the kiddos

We had a lot of fun this past week. Looks like there's another storm out in the Atlantic..maybe we'll have another evacuation party!