Happy Halloween!

Mariachi band member- and yes, I have a mustache (the costume wouldnt be complete without it!)

Jake was a little weirded out about the stache....

Our friends Matt and Lindsey, who took the cake on the best costumes! She was a puppet and he was a puppeteer! So awesome.

Welcome Josh and Calley!

Jake's brother and his wife, Calley, just joined the blogging world! Welcome, guys!!

You can check out their blog HERE.

Vertical Reality!

This weekend, Jake and I went to Young Life's Sharp Top Cove with our high school small groups for Inside Out's weekend retreat, Vertical Reality!

It was AMAZING.

We had the best time with our groups and really enjoyed having so much time to spend with them and get to know them better! It has been really fun to see how the Lord has opened our hearts to serve these kids and guide them into a growing relationship with Christ. What an incredible blessing.

The picture above is me with some of my sweet, sweet girls (there were 4 girls who were not on the retreat). Words cannot express how much my heart aches for them- I just love them so much and want them to know God so deeply!!! They were fed some great truth this weekend and a lot of them really felt God move in their life. It was the most wonderful thing to be able to experience that with them and I feel so blessed to have been given that opportunity. God is SOO incredibly good. Please pray that all of the kids take what they learned this weekend and apply it to their everyday lives!

Check out more pictures from the weekend HERE.

Photography in progress

About a year ago, Jacob got a Canon SLR camera for work, and I LOVE the quality of pictures it takes. The problem: I only knew how to shoot in automatic mode. LAME.

So my friend, Lindsey, and I took a photography class a few weeks ago, and I've been dying to try out my new skills. Unfortunately, with all the rain we have been having, I haven't had much of an opportunity to just go outside and mess around with the camera. Thankfully, it was pretty nice the past few days and I got to head outside! Tucker was lucky enough to be my model for the day (Jacob was thankful it wasn't him)!

Here are a few shots that I really liked. None of these are really edited (the Photoshop learning experience is underway....), but dont forget that I am such a beginner so if you know anything about photography and think these are horrible, dont hate! :) But I cant wait to learn more- maybe I'll end up as good as this girl.

Pumpkin Bread

A bit of delicious holiday cheer....

Pumpkin Bread

What you need:

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1 cup pumpkin puree

1/2 cup olive oil

2 eggs, beaten

1/4 cup water

1/2 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp allspice

1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional) ***I used chocolate chips instead of walnuts, which is delicious!!!

What you do:

Sift together the flour, salt, sugar, and baking soda. Set aside. Mix the pumpkin, olive oil, eggs, water, and spices together, then combine with dry ingredients. Do not mix too thoroughly. Stir in the walnuts (or chocolate chips). Pour into a greased loaf pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes.

Photo and recipe found here.

Mr. and Mrs. Graff

This weekend, we made the trek to Columbia, South Carolina where Jacob's good friend, Jamie was married! It was such a fun weekend and we had a blast celebrating with the newlyweds! They had a fabulous outdoor wedding in front of a lake (kind of reminded me of our wedding!) and a super fun reception at a historic house! Congrats guys-we wish you nothing but happiness!

We rode up with Chase and Tiffany in this guy. Chase owns a video production company (Remedy Films) and was doing some video stuff at the rehearsal dinner and wedding. Thus the van to take up all of the equipment. The best part was that while Jacob and Chase were doing groomsmen stuff, Tiffany and I got to drive the van around. It was quite a sight.

Elizabeth, Jennifer (the bride!), Tiffany, and me at the rehearsal dinner

Classic "groomsmen holding the bride" picture

Wedded bliss (Photo by Courtney Dox Photography)

Sparklers!!

Herbs anyone?

Every Saturday, Suwanee Town Center Park has a great Farmers Market, where all of the local farmers come and sell their produce! It is awesome and they always have a great selection of fresh fruit, vegetables, flowers, herbs, etc. I recently got some herb plants that I potted and I cant wait to use them to cook with! Theres nothing like fresh herbs to make your food taste great...

Basil

Parsley

More rain?? Seriously...

Saturday, we made the trek to Athens for the UGA game. It ended up POURING rain almost the whole time, but we still had such a blast! UGA pulled out a win against Arizona State, so we were happy campers! Gooooo dawgs!!!

Soaking wet!!!

It ended up getting a little chilly PLUS we were soaked to the bone!

Our friends, Duran and Lindsey

Man, I feel old

My little sister turned 21 this weekend. Wow. I cant believe how grown up she is now! My Oma also had a birthday (they have birthdays one day apart!) so we had a great time celebrating!


We ate a fabulous Italian dinner at Sugo with the family and then, of course, being the awesome big sister that I am, I took Selena out on the town for the big debut of turning 21! We ended up at Aja in Atlanta where it turns out there was a private party for Sol Fusion. Now Im still not really sure what Sol Fusion is, but lets just say it was ghetto (we were the only white people there. Seriously.) But it was a lot of fun and we had a blast!!

The birthday girls at Sugo.

At Aja.

Yeah, we're crunk.

Liane and Matt even joined in on the fun!

Jacob wasnt too pumped about being there (he cant tap into the "ghetto-ness" like we can), but he still had a good time!

The next NotWedding...

I just heard some great news!

The next NotWedding is in the works! It will be held in February of 2010 and will be produced by Atlanta Occasions Magazine.

But that's not all...

I went to check out their website to see if they had written anything about it, and they have a picture of us and our wedding party on the NotWedding page! Pretty cool...

Anyway, cant wait to share more details about this awesome event! As always, you can check out the details and pictures from the previous NotWedding on the NotWedding website.