Caden's First Year!

Today, I celebrated a very special day with the Melby family-Caden Luke's first birthday. Unfortunately, Al was in Chicago for the Bears game...

Note the many layers necessary for this December game!

...so I attended this Cookie-Monster themed event solo.

I always look forward to parties thrown by Jeff and Holly, as there is always such consideration for the guests involved. Case in point: the fantastic cookie arrangement Holly put out downstairs with about 10 different kinds of the delectable treat! Of course, it's always just nice to be around these two and their two cuties, as you can sense such a strong bond of familial love between the four of them, which they openly share with others. It makes me so excited for the days (soon) when Al and I will begin a family of our own!

Caden's entrance into the world a year ago was full of joy. He is the first boy to be born to any of Al's siblings, thus making him my soon-to-be very first nephew-YAY! I was in love with him from the very first moment I held him...

And now, "Baby Caden" seems to no longer be a tiny baby, but instead has grown into a very sweet little boy. I really enjoyed getting to spend this special day with Caden and fam...and the cookies didn't hurt either!

Happy birthday baby little boy Caden!

Christmas Spirit

I have been notorious over the past few years for being somewhat resistant (not on purpose) to the Christmas spirit. Somehow, with wrapping up the semester, administering and grading finals, and getting caught up on everything else at school, things just always seem to pass by without me noticing.

However, this year, I have made a conscious effort to improve my Christmas-y-ness. (I'm an English teacher, so I'm allowed to make up words.) :)

December 4th provided the perfect opportunity to get Christmasfied! First, it snowed a TON the night before, so I woke up to a glorious winter wonderland. Then, my friend, Coco invited me over to make cookies with Kim and Baby Andrew. Though I was worried about passing my flu virus on and just watched the cookie-making, I was still getting filled with cheer. Mostly because of this little baker...

More sprinkles, ladies!

Then, I headed over to Krannert to meet up with Holly, and her friend and neighbor, Sara to see The Nutcracker. Naturally, I was excited to see this, as I've never been to a ballet before, let alone a classic. 

It was a fantastic day, filled with some of my favorite people and a truly lovely atmosphere of Christmas spirit. Go me! Thanks for the help, ladies! :) 

Sickness...

Al and I reached an entirely new level of romance (Holly's beautiful way of looking at my unfortunate situation) when I became sick on Wednesday. I actually threw up for the first time in front of my fiance, which would have been traumatic, if I didn't have the best fiance in the entire world. He was so sweet and took wonderful care of me, jumping to fulfill each of my saucy demands. Prime examples are as follows:

1. "Can you pick up some applesauce? ...the natural kind though, I don't think I can eat anything else."
2. "While you're up, can you get me some lotion? I think I'm dehydrated, and it's hurting my skin. Can you get my face lotion, too?" [followed by an interesting back and forth over which one was the 'face lotion']

I think it's safe to say that I lucked out with Mr. Nuku... :)

Oh, Christmas Tree...

Due to an unpleasant tree experience last year (see me for details), Al and I were quite glad to have a stress-free tree outing this year!

We decided not to cut the tree down ourselves (good decision #1) for the first time in our relationship, and went to a lot in Champaign instead. We found a beautiful tree with short needles, which are easily vacuumed (good decision #2). Finally, we made tree decorating into a fabulously Christmas-y event which took place the FOLLOWING night, seeing as we were both feeling exhausted (good decision #3)!

On that glorious Monday night of tree decorating, Al and I started with some fancy seasonal eggnog.

Al and I then turned on Scrooged (an uplifting Christmas classic), and began our lovely decorating adventure!

The tree turned out so pretty...and the perfect dog-admiring-Christmas-tree pose is not too shabby either!

We finally did it!

For the past two years, Al and I have gone pumpkin-pickin' and never actually carved them. This year was a first!

Kim's Engagement ParTAY

Tonight was the night we celebrated Kim and Ryan's engagement! I am so excited for these two. They have such a special bond, and I feel very lucky to be involved in their life together!

The evening started out with some tasty food and drinks. We all sat around and chatted, but were anxiously awaiting what we had all come there to find out...Kim and Ryan's wedding date! However, we patiently enjoyed our dinners and continued visiting with one another. It was really nice to get to spend some time with Kim and Ryan's family members and closest friends. Both of them are very lucky to have supportive families who love them and are so excited for the wedding!

Such was evidenced by Kim's dad, Tim's sweet announcement of congratulations after dinner. He recalled a family bowling night during which the Ludwigs first met Ryan, and his beautiful daughter, Sam, and it was so clear how much of a bond this family has already formed.

Directly afterwards, Kim and Ryan made the big announcement! They are getting married on June 18, 2011 in Urbana! YAY! This, of course, is the weekend before the Al and I get married, so this will be a very busy and fun-filled couple of weeks. I'm looking forward to it!

We all relaxed and visited with one another before Kim and Ryan made their second big announcement: who the bridal party and groomsmen would be. Kim asked her bridesmaids to be involved with very sweet, personalized photo cards and Ryan asked his groomsmen by awarding them a medal! What a fun way to tell everyone!

I know Kim and I are now both counting down to our wedding days, and are running around super busy trying to get everything done, but I feel so lucky to have one of my best friends going through this with me at the same time. It's nice to be able to share our joy with each other over this huge event, and admittedly, many of our frustrations as well. I'm so glad to have such wonderful friends!

Kimmy d. finds THE dress!

Tonight, I accompanied one of my very best friends, and bridesmaids, Kim Ludwig to her champagne appointment at Michelle's Bridal to look for her wedding dress. Kim had already tried on a few dresses elsewhere, but was really excited to see what Michelle's had in store for her.

Kim told her giant group of fans ahead of time what she thought she would be interested in, and we all searched for dresses that fit the bill, while sipping champagne/grape juice and snacking on hors d'ouvres. I can't share pics of any of the dresses, for obvious reasons, but everything looked amazing on her! We all had fun playing dress-up with our little Kimmy doll!

Afterwards, the ladies of the bridal party searched for our bridesmaid dresses in Kim's chosen color, pool. It's a very pretty light blue that I think will be gorgeous on everyone on the big day.

After taking care of all of the important stuff, Colleen, Kim, and I snuck off to M2, the section of the store devoted to outfitting girls for special occasions like dances. They were having a big sale and Coco found the perfect gown!

This was a wonderful night filled with lots of wedding excitement. Thank you to Kim for including me in all of the important decisions leading up to your big day!