Crazy times...

The last week+ has been crazy busy for us... on October 2nd, we flew to Phoenix for my cousin Neil and Rekha's wedding. We met up with Oliver's parents who also came in for the wedding.

The wedding was great and I got a chance to take some more fun pictures. It helped that the bride was stunning...

The boys greeting my cousin Neil...

While in AZ, we ventured out of Scottsdale and headed to Sedona. Everything that I've heard about Sedona made it sound magical, but unfortunately for us, it rained so it wasn't that great. We did enjoy hanging out with the family.

Sunday morning, Oliver's dad treated us to our first ever hot air balloon ride - it was a really fantastic experience.

We flew back to Atlanta on the 5th, but Oliver's parents stayed in AZ until Thursday, 10/9, when they flew to Atlanta to spend about a week with us. Friday afternoon, we met up with my parents and went to Oktoberfest thrown by the German cultural institute of Atlanta. It was actually a lot of fun - Oktoberfest in Atlanta at a French restaurant...

sunday, we went to the new world of Coke. It made me feel guilty for my newfound love of mountain dew. i LOVE coke - and i think it's time to get back to my roots. no more green bottles, just red - what was i thinking?

I thought this was a cool reflection picture of the Bank of America building...

the week with oliver's parents ended with another family celebration for our 2 year wedding anniversary. we went to nava (my favorite restaurant) and had a really nice evening. it's hard to believe that it's already been two years, but at the same time, it's hard to believe that it's only been two years. i have a hard time remembering when oliver wasn't around. that may also have to do with the brain tumor that is eating up my memory...

anyway, happy anniversary husband - in case i forget that the last 2 years have been great, i'm writing it down... :)

New Boyfriend...

move over Oliver, hello Sanjay Gupta...

last night at a benefit for CARE, we met Sanjay Gupta. Now, I will admit that I originally just wanted to meet him to tell him about my friends Brett and Kajal (mainly Brett), but after talking to him for a bit, I've discovered that he's a little bit dreamy.

He is nice, humble, gracious, friendly, super cute, my size, and has a pretty good sense of humor. And he autographed a pic of my favorite girl, Dilan, for her dad... All in all, the perfect boyfriend.

Oliver witnessed the stalking (he also took the above picture) and didn't seem to mind, so I think it's ok... :)

Sad to see you go...

Thursday night we had dinner with our friends Kelly and Adrian and their sweet son Tyler. Saturday they get in their car and drive up north to start the next chapter of their life in chicago. i'm excited because now i have friends in chicago, but i'm so sad because now i won't get to see them regularly.

i met kelly in october of 1998 when she interviewed me for my first job at E&Y. I then worked with her on my first project and we've been friends ever since. A lot of friends have moved and all have been sad for me, but this seems a little different. Kelly really has been one of the biggest influences, if not the biggest influence, in my career and my adult life.

Oldies but Goodies..

i have a lot of other good pics that i haven't posted... here are a few.

we went to Jen and Ben's wedding back in August. Jen was a beautiful bride - here are a couple of good ones from then BGC (before good camera)...


and Kajal and Anne came over and brought Dilan and Cora to play. Cora's another super cute baby - and super chill... she just hung out while Dilan tried to eat her head a few times! a really fun personality.
I'm still having trouble with indoor pictures - I need to play around more with that - these were using the natural lighting from outside. I probably needed more light.

Got some other good ones of Dilan. Yup, I'm obsessed with this girl! Can you blame me???

Torture...

i hate running. there aren't many things that i hate more. but i've signed up to a 5k. i know, i know. you're saying "that's only 3 miles. what's wrong with you? i run a 5k everyday to start off my morning". well, if you keep up that attitude, i'm going to group you in the same category as running. my 5k is november 8th. the last 5k i ran was probably around the same time last year.

on top of that, my crazy husband is training for a half marathon. why??? i don't understand it. don't you get bored when you run that much? i mean, i'm planning on bringing rihanna and chris with me when i run, but they can only do so much. and i can't really dance while running - or at least i haven't tried yet.

which brings me to my last point. today i was turning over a new leaf and was going to run in the morning. it's now the afternoon, i've taken a shower, and no running has happened. this evening i'll say "well, it's too hot, and i'm already clean, and we have plans" essentially procrastinating the run.

my girlfriend just ran a half-marathon and is rewarding herself with some really fancy boots. i think i should reward myself with more than just nice boots, because she LIKES to run and i don't. so clearly my 3 miles is harder for me than her 13 miles were for her, right?
so, i'm looking for some incentives people... all suggestions are welcome...

calling all women...

last week while watching the today show (my main news source), i found out about the Army of Women. what is it, you ask? well, it's a partnership between the Dr. Susan Love Research Foundation and the Avon Foundation (both leaders in the fight to cure breast cancer) which has 2 initiatives:

• To recruit one million healthy women of every age and ethnicity, including breast cancer survivors and women at high-risk for the disease, to partner with breast cancer researchers and directly participate in the research that will eradicate breast cancer once and for all.
• To challenge the scientific community to expand its current focus to include breast cancer prevention research conducted on healthy women.

One of the things that was said on the today show is that one reason that a cure has not been found is because there are not enough volunteers to help with the research...

So, on this site you first register as a volunteer, and then you start receiving emails announcing new reserach studies - including research project and who and what the researchers need. If you fit the criteria and wantto participate, you can reply to the email. If you don't think it's the right fit, right time, right project, you don't have to reply. Pretty simple. There's a FAQ that's pretty good - the question of interest to me was "What might a study require?"

"There are many different types of studies. Some might require you to complete a questionnaire, while others might need a sample of blood, urine, saliva, breast fluid, or breast tissue. Some studies might be clinical trials testing a new detection marker or drug. You decide which studies you want to take part in."

Anyway, it's a great cause and by now we all know someone who has been affected by cancer so it's an easy way to make a difference... I registered and I think you should too (or get your wife/girlfriend to)!

Field Trip

So, last weekend (the Sunday morning after the UGA game - ugh...) our photography class had a field trip to the Oakland Cemetary. It's a pretty cool site - really historic.

Anyway, here are a few pics...

This was my attempt to capture the water falling off of the umbrella in the fountain...

In these pictures, I was playing with white balance. The second one is correct, but the first one still looks cool...

Athens...

i've been avoiding blogging about last saturday. it was a total letdown. my first game of the season in athens, where i actually go to the game, and the Dawgs lose. BADLY. so let's not talk about it. instead, let's talk about tailgating. oliver, myles and i got to athens around 10ish and spent the entire day with a bunch of friends. oliver was skeptical about tailgating for that long (10-7pm) but he ended up having a pretty good time. some pics from the day...

No idea what Drew was doing here...

This was pretty funny - Erin, Tui, and I were taking a picture when Ryan decided to throw the football at Erin. She's apparently 'wishing away' the football or trying to teleport somewhere else...

Please don't stop the music...

so, i've been a little slack about writing lately...it's probably because i can't stop dancing. i'm not sure when this started, but it feels like it's been a couple of months now. for those of you who know me, you know that i can't help but sing along to a good tune when i hear one, but dance??? that's not me. i have friends (ok, one friend) who would turn on mtv and dance along to naughty girl, just to learn the new beyonce moves - she can actually dance - but me on the other hand - trust me people, it's not pretty.

oliver mainly just laughs at me, but i really don't care - i guess we're at the point in our marriage where i'm perfectly ok making a complete ass of myself at any point in front of him - is this normal?

anyway, the dancing. i'm not even sure that's what you would call it - i essentially just jump around to a beat - i look like a combination of a headbanger and a 5 year old. i will say that it's a euphoric feeling, so maybe it just a method of relaxation for me - but whatever it is, i plan to continue it, so i'll go ahead and apologize in advance to those of you who come visit - if Rihanna's Disturbia come on, i can't control myself...