The Griffins

a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week

2010-01-06T05:31:00.000-08:00

I think Shel Silvertien said it best in his beloved poem called "A terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day" where a little boy has everything go wrong for him in one day. For me, it's lasted an entire week. It really all started New Years Eve. Matt and I had tickets to see the Avett Brothers in Asheville for the night (excellent show btw) and on the way to drop Amelia off at Grandma's house I witnessed two cars wrecks. Strike one. So that shook me up a little, but I calmed down. The evening was fabulous, the band was great, but by morning Matt's naggy headache turned into a migraine. Strike two.

Here's where it gets crazy. I was a bridesmaid in a wedding on New Years Day (a rare and fun opportunity for yours truly) and since Matt had the migraine, I had to take Amelia to the wedding. My mom was out of town and all my other babysitters and grandparents were going to be at the wedding. Anyway, the evening went great with many people to help with Amelia and she was a perfect little angel. However, things turned quickly south when at the reception the bar tender asked, "OH HOW MANY WEEKS ARE YOU?!" I could have died right there! I looked at her in utter disgust and said, "I HAD A BABY 11 WEEKS AGO, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!". Need I say more?? Strike three.
So now that you're getting the point if you've read this far, here is the list of the other things that went crazy wrong.

1. Our heat downstairs has been out since last Wednesday and the part to fix it is ordered, but not here.
2. My car window was smashed tonight at the gym and my purse was stolen. They totally missed the $150 pair of sunglasses in the seat and the $5 bill in the cup holder. Go figure.
3 The one thing they did get that breaks my heart is my engagement ring. I'm super sad about this. Big tears over this one have been shed.
4. Oh and tonight when I got home our dishwasher decided to crap out on us so now it doesn't work.

Don't get me wrong, I know things could be worse and I am very grateful my family is healthy and happy. However, for the past week I believe it has just been my turn to have everything go crazy wrong. I always think that maybe I should be more personal on here, well I guess this is definitely in that direction. I suspect I won't be this way all the time, but you know how when crap happens you just want to blurt it out and then you feel much better? I guess this was my chance to have the violins playing.

Now, so as not to end this post as being an overall downer, I'd like to some recent pics of my sweet little baby girl whom I love and adore with all my heart. Her daddy ain't bad either. I really do have the best husband a girl can find.

At the End...

2009-10-10T11:43:00.001-07:00

Well, here we are...at the end. Thank God! Matt and I go to the hospital monday night to be induced and I just cannot wait. I'm so ready to meet her and I know my family and friends feel the same way. Let's get on with the show, for real.

I believe I'm crazy to be posting these images. I am so huge! When I uploaded them, I litereally laughed out loud at the size of my stomach. What can you do though? In the first shot I had asked Matt to go stand in the spot I wanted my picture taken so I could get the correct camera settings for him. He thought it would be cute to pretend to be pregnant. As if he had any clue. Poor fella...or lucky fella rather.

Last night we had our last date night as a childless couple. Unfortunately, by 9pm I was ready to go to bed. I'm just so tired right now and I'm sure it's about to get that much worse. Oh boy!

I would like to take a moment and truly thank everyone for your prayers throughout this pregnancy. It has not been easy, but it has been a true blessing. I sincerely apologize to everyone that has had to deal with my over emotional rantings and super freaked out new mommy concerns. I always said I would never be that way, but there I go. God has taught me many lessons in this pregnancy, but He has also shown me that those that truely love Matt and I are always there to love us and accept us no matter what. Our heart's desire is to put Christ first, then our marriage, and then our baby. It's an incredible journey and we will fail many times, but at least there is wonderful Grace. :)

Love to all...

37 weeks

2009-09-30T07:04:00.000-07:00

Well, I believe it's definitely time for an update. We had our last ultrasound on Monday and she is looking great. She's measuring 6.12lbs, which is perfect and the doc said the ultrasound is usually over by close to a lb so most likely she'll be right around 7lbs at birth...possibly. This is great news since my specialist wanted me to have a smaller baby due to my fibroid.

Anyway, we also found out the plan for her birth. The doc wants to have a controlled labor because of the fibroid. That being said, we're scheduled to be induced on Oct 13th in the morning. If I have not dilated any by 2 or 3 in the afternoon, they will do a C-section. The doc believes it's fine to try for a natural birth so I'm willing to go for it even if it is only for a short time. :) We're very excited to have a plan in place. Of course she could come early, but that is doubtful because the doc doesn't think I can go into labor on my own.

Right now, all I can think about is meeting her and squeezing her and kissing her. I'll be honest in the fact that I didn't feel a true attachment to her until about the third trimester. Some women may scoff at this revelation, but for me it was somewhat of a defense I believe. I was too scared to bond with her because the fibroid scared me so much and I thought if I let myself go to that place in my heart and mind that I would be hurt so deeply if we lost her. These days I feel much more confident b/c she is holding so strong and I feel her constantly. She's a very active baby! Regardless, every mother has a different experience in pregnancy and that is why I am able to share mine. :)

So that you know, we'll be delivering at St Francis Women's Hospital at the eastside campus and on the 4th floor. Everything is about to change and for the better. :)

Here are some ultrasound pics from sept 8th when I believe I was 34 weeks. You can definitely see some detail on these. I just think she is darling. :) The darkness over her eyes in the bottom 2 images is the shadow from her hand.

32 weeks

2009-08-27T06:13:00.001-07:00

Ok, I realize these images are creepy looking...at least that is what I think when I see other people's 3D baby images. However, when it's your own child you have a different feeling about it. To me she totally looks like Matt and has his nose and mouth, but that could all change once I finally see her. :) Let me know what you all think? These images were actually taken at my 27 week visit, but I had lost the CD temporarily.

So now that I'm definitely in the third trimester things are way different. First, and most of you know this, I did test positive for whooping cough from my aug 6th nose swab at the doc's office. It's a surreal and scary situation for the health dept to call you just a few hours before your first baby shower and tell you were positive for whooping cough. I freaked out because I thought I would be contagious still. However, the health dept and my doc office assured me that since I took the correct vaccine only a couple weeks into the cough that I was not contagious and that it would not spread to the baby. Thank goodness. I must have asked both places 3 times to repeat everything and to promise I wasn't contagious. Unfortunately there is absolutely nothing you can do for the cough. No medicine or anything will help it. It just has to run it's course. Anyway, this nasty disease caused us to leave our july vacation 2 days early and it has been one of the most miserable experiences of my life. And I have a mild case!! I can't even explain to you the coughing fits and how when you're pregnant it makes you vomit and pee your pants more than you would have if you weren't. It is not fun and I would tell everyone having a baby or who works with children to get vaccinated. I actually believe I'm either half way through with it or nearing the end of it. I'm just praying it's gone by the time the baby arrives. So whooping cough was my introduction into the third trimester. YAY for me! HA!

On to some good news, I do not have gestational diabetes. I had to take the second test, which was totally weird and annoying to sit for 3 hours while they call you in the room to draw blood once every hour. Matt never thought I had it, but I do know my sugar is the first thing to go when I'm hungry. I really didn't fit the profile for it though. It doesn't run in my family and I was not over weight previous to pregnancy.

Some more good news is that Amelia is growing and healthy and as text book average as you can get for her measurements. As far as we know as least. she is a mover and a shaker in my belly. they keep telling me her movement will slow down because she'll run out of room, but I haven't had that yet.

As for me getting around these days...it's a challenge for sure. I'm carrying her super low and she is sooooo heavy. My friend Carrie bought me one of those belts to lift you up and it has helped a lot. Thanks Carrie! Bending over is just about out of the question at this point and I seriously think through going up and down the stairs at home. My hips get major cramps in them every night and I wake up and have to use a heating pad just to get relief. Tylenol is a joke for this kind of pain. The hot tub in our backyard is my new bff. Don't worry, I keep the temp at like 94 degrees. Poor Matt is ready for her to be here I'm sure. He's been great though and he's taken great care of me. He's the best baby daddy ever.

Anyway, I'm sorry this is so long, but there were lots of updates to do. I have another appt this coming monday so I'll try to do another post right after. Oh and if you've ready this far then you deserve to see pics of Amelia's nursery on my photography blog.

Love to all and thanks so much for your prayers. :)

Cajun Shrimp

2009-07-22T09:49:00.001-07:00

For Katie and Lyndsay.

27 weeks

2009-07-19T16:14:00.000-07:00

It's Official, I'm now in my third trimester. YAY! Things are going well and Amelia is practicing her fancy foot work in my belly on a moment by moment basis. :) No complaints though, I love feeling her in there.

Matt and I went on a date last night and it was great to get out. Before we went I set up the tripod in the backyard and we took these pics. I had to beg Matt to not make silly faces. He's such a goober. My girlfriend, Brooke, sent me this cute top. I just love it. She had her sweet little girl this past December.

I do have a Dr appointment this week so I'll be blogging with updates on that. For now, this is mostly a pic post.

25 weeks

2009-07-06T09:12:00.000-07:00

This week begins my 25th week of pregnancy. Wahoo!! Last week, I had my 24 week checkup with the OB and the specialist for my fibroid. Below, I have some really cute ultrasound pics to show you. The update on the fibroid was a good one. It hasn't grown any and I'm not having any real discomfort from it. I know the warning signs to look for so I feel as prepared as I can be if something happens. While the fibroid has stabilized for the time being, my heart is beginning to be an issue. I actually have an appointment to get an EKG done today. It started last week at the gym. I've been working out the whole time and doing aerobics and feeling great about myself. However, on Monday while at the gym my heart started racing so I came out of the class and sat down. It got worse and my vision and hearing went and I broke into a cold sweat. I've never been so scared and not for me, but for the baby. I called over a trainer who took my pulse and it was 190!! Way too high. They called EMS and so the drama began. I finally came out of it and was able to relax. I called the OB and told them what happened. The nurse asked me if Amelia was kicking regularly. I said she was and she also asked if I had any bleeding or cramps and since I didn't she felt I was fine, but that I couldn't do ANYTHING the rest of the day and had to go to bed.

So after telling all this to my specialist, he has referred me to a cardiologist to have my heart checked. They think it could be an arrhythmia. He didn't sound terribly worried so we're not worrying. From what I read, these can be common in pregnancy and something relatively easy to take care of so we'll see what they say.

As for the rest of the pregnancy. Amelia is right on target and weighs 1lb and a 1/2. She is a very active little thing and is constantly kicking. I don't think she sleeps much. :) I'm also going right on target for the pregnancy. So far I've gained 13lbs. I've been trying super hard not to over eat now that I don't want to puke everything.

The nursery is looking fabulous and moving along. Matt and my dad installed the beedboard and mom painted it and the walls. she also refinished some antique furniture that looks way to cute. I'm so excited. Everyone has helped so much and I'm so grateful. Thanks!!! I will have before and after pics very soon so stay tuned.

Matt is cuter than he's ever been and I think I love him more every day. He now introduces Amelia when we meet people. He points to my belly and says, "oh, and here is Amelia". I love it. He has felt her kick a lot and he loves to say, "hey baby, it's daddy". You'd have to hear him. It's real funny. Ok, hugs to all. Liv

22 weeks

2009-06-12T08:13:00.000-07:00

Sorry it's been a while since I've posted. The wedding season is almost over and I can feel the excitement of july 4th being my first Saturday off since march 28th!! I really can't even begin to explain the business of this past spring and early summer. It's honestly insane. I like to compare my career to that of a CPA. They bust butt until April 15th and then get to have a life again. I kinda feel that way too.

Now for an update on the pregnancy. If you read my last post, then you know about the fibroid I have that has given us a huge scare of pre-term labor. Well, Matt and I went to see a specialist and he was so amazing. I loved his bedside manner and confidence with which he spoke. I really thank God for people like this. During the meeting my 50% chance of per-term went to like 5%!!! Praise God!! I could have kissed the doctor right there, but that would have been a little weird. Anyway, I am back to enjoying my pregnancy -minus the occasional nausea brought on by the iron pills I have to take for anemia. Apparently the fibroid or "big nasty", which is what I call it, likes to suck the iron out of me on top of what Amelia takes for herself. The doctors are going to keep a close "eye" on me and I have another ultrasound coming up the last week of June. Please continue to pray for us during the pregnancy and that the doctors would have wisdom and that Matt and I would know the questions to ask.

I am now starting to feel Amelia kick on a regular basis. She is an active little thing. I feel kinda bad for her though, I believe she has chronic hiccups. I feel them all the time and it makes me worry about her. Does that even hurt her? I can't stand to have the hiccups and it makes me think of that poor girl that was on the Today show this past year who had the hiccups for months. I just hope she can relax in there. Do any mothers reading this know what I'm talking about and if it's ok?

Finally, here are some pics to enjoy. There is one of Matt and I holding the onesie from the night we found out it was a girl. The other two are from just yesterday. I had a family shoot at furman and I had the dad take these shots of me at the end of the shoot. :)

The Big Reveal

2009-06-03T04:24:00.001-07:00

That's right we've got little pig tails on the way. :) I can honestly say that I knew it all along. I wish I could say how I knew, but I can't. Last night we had my mom, dad, Matt's parents, Abby and Nate and Allison and Chad over for the big reveal. Matt and I had the doc put in envelopes what we were having and then everyone came over and opened up the envelopes last night to tell us what our little one was. The funny part about the whole experience was that my mom and Matt's mom had presents wrapped that would tell us what we were having afte they had all looked. One present had a blue onesie in it and the other had a pink. After opening the envelopes Matt and I were handed the appropriate present not knowing what color was in the present. We opened our present and it was a blue onesie!! What?! I was like, "I was so sure I was having a girl". Then Matt's mom said, "oh no the girl at the store wrapped them wrong". So then we figured out that we're actually having a girl. :) I am so glad to know, but I really want to smack that woman at the store for not paying attention. Good grief! Anyway, it was still fabulous and I'm so glad everyone got to share the news with us.

Now there is another part to this story and it has to do with our doc visit yesterday. During the ultrasound we learned the baby is doing fabulous and is very healthy. She looks great and has all 10 fingers and toes. We are thrilled. The other part of the visit was not as fun. Many of you know that I have 2 fibroids. They were found at my 12 week ultrasound. The doc I met with then said they would be monitored closely and that she was not worried at that point. Apparently I have one that is 8cm in diameter and is below my bladder and next to my cervix. Now that I've had the 20 week ultrasound things are a little different. The doc we saw this time seems more concerned. I have 2 risks here: one is pre-term labor and the other is a c-section. In all honesty, I could care less about a c-section if it's needed. I just want the baby to be ok. However, pre-term labor has me concerned. Right now the doc is telling me there is a 30% to 50% chance of pre-term labor. When I was told this I burst into tears and just became a puddle right there in the office. The reason for risk of pre-term labor is because with the fibroid being near the cervix it can cause the cervix to contract early b/c of pressure. I've been told to watch for any bleeding and for 6 menstrual like cramps within an hour.

The good news is that I think the doc saw how upset I was and so she said she would set me up with this amazing specialist ASAP who could give us a better assessment of the risk of my particular fibroids. I have the appointment this friday at 10am. Matt and I are very much looking forward to the appointment just to get some answers. I know that healthy babies are born all the time to women with fibriods and that most pregnancies are fine with them. Mine seem to be little more in the "scare zone" so we would really covet your prayers.

Matt has been absolutely wonderful through this whole experience. He has comforted and encouraged me and has continued to point me to Christ. I honestly can't imagine a better husband. He prayed for the 3 of us last night as went to bed and I've never felt more comforted and secure in my life. I don't know what will happen, but I trust that my God does and for whatever reason we are meant to have this experience to bring glory to Him, for that alone, I am grateful. :) Please continue to pray for us as we will need lots of strength and wisdom to make it through.

So if you've read this far, then you deserve to know what we're naming our little girl. Her name will be Amelia Ruth. The first name is one Matt and I just loved and Ruth is for my dear sweet grandmother who I miss everyday. :)

pics are coming soon...

Little Feet

2009-05-19T05:33:00.000-07:00

For Mother's Day my mom made me these cute little booties for the baby to wear home from the hospital. I just think they are the most adorable thing I've ever seen. What a great gift! It's hard to believe the baby's feet will be this small and cute. I can't wait to kiss them. :) I think she's also going to make a little jacket to go with them and we're going to change out the color for pink or blue once we find out what we're having. YAY! Speaking of that, our doc appointment is for June 2nd to find out the sex and we are so excited. We're having all the parents over for dinner and giving them envelopes and together they will open them and tell us what we're having. I am beyond excited to know. Matt keeps saying things like, "I'm ready to give this baby a name". I couldn't agree more. :)

17 weeks

2009-05-11T12:35:00.000-07:00

Since my last belly update I have certainly grown. LOL I'm starting to really like my bump. It's so fun. I had a conversation with my friend Brooke the other day (she has a 5 month old) about the things people say to you when you're pregnant. So far I've gotten "are you sure there aren't two in there?", "with this fast paced world I think mothers shouldn't find out what they are having" (said after I said I couldn't wait to find out) "you're huge", "you are showing a lot", "I didn't get sick at all". Anyway, I just had to get these out there. Mainly because it's funny. If I didn't have a husband that told me how beautiful I am while pregnant these comments would probably get to me, but most of the time I feel cute and I think that is good enough. :)

My morning sickness has started to subside. Praise the Lord!! I seriously wanted to die. I still take some zofran only when necessary. I'm also starting to get that second trimester boost of energy, which feels great and helps me get a lot done with the photography. Sleeping has gotten better as well. I bought this pillow called a "snoogle" from target and I love it. It's this cylindrical pillow shaped like the letter "c". In fact, Matt calls it the "letter c". He's not such a fan b/c we can't snuggle when I'm wrapped up in it. LOL poor fella. Last night we both got a chuckle because I said, "I'm sorry baby, but I have to sleep with letter c tonight". I guess you had to be there. :)

Last week we went to the doc for a check up and regular testing. I am proud to say that so far I've only gained 5lbs! I'm very happy about that. :) We also got to hear the heart beat and it was 155bpm. I absolutely loved that sound and started to cry when we heard it. Matt just held my hand with a big grin on his face. love him.

So finally here are some pics taken this past sunday on Mother's Day at my in-laws house. I got so annoyed with matt because he wouldn't make a normal face at the camera so this is the best one. what a turd. I also wish i still had on the pink dress i wore to church that morning, but this will have to do. :)

love you all...

Baby Bump Revealed

2009-04-21T07:36:00.000-07:00

Ok so here are my first baby bumb pics. Let me warn you they are not glamorous, which is very sad considering my career. This is straight up after a walk with kenah no makeup and no shower. HA!

I've always said that when we got pregnant I would document my growing belly and here I am waiting until 14 weeks to do it. How sad. So far pregnancy has already changed everything for me. I'm sure that is strange for some moms, but for me it's true. I've been really sick in my first trimester and now all I have to say is "thank goodness for zofran". This cancer drug has made life possible for me. I really tried my hardest to go without drugs and after puking for almost two months with no relief I couldn't stand it any longer. Pregnancy has also changed my view of Matt and our marriage. This is such a sweet time for us and I honestly can't get enough of him. I want him around all the time and every time I look at him I think about what features he has that our little one will have. Desiring to have him around all the time is new to me. I'm not a very clingy wife and like to do things on my own a lot and I've always been fine when Matt is out of town, but now it's like I'm sad all the time when he's not here. I also just love to hear his voice. It's like the best sound in the world. :) One last way pregnancy has changed things for me is of course my body. Duh!! It's so weird to think of a life growing in you and how protective you become automatically. Also, just watching my shape change and my skin look different has been interesting as well. Over all the experience has been wonderful, scary, sweet, and fun.

I promise to post more belly pics as things progress. Please pray for G and that he/she will be health and happy. :)

Liv

Sugar Cookies

2008-12-14T19:04:00.000-08:00

As you can see I've been doing a little baking. :) Matt and I had two Christmas parties to go to Saturday night and I really wanted to bring something fun so I got Matt's mom's sugar cookie receipe and whipped these up on saturday. My mom was up for a visit so she was actually with me the whole time and helped greatly in making these little beauties.

This first image is of the huge cookie we made for just Matt. These are his favortie holiday treat and he's been eating them his whole life so mom actually made the suggestion to make a really huge one for him (mainly to keep his paws off the ones for the party) and give it to him when he got back from his bike ride. It was really cute. I told him to close his eyes and then when he opened them the cookie was right there. I think the cookie was about 6in in diameter. LOL

The Cosby Show

2008-11-11T08:53:00.000-08:00

Why is it that I love this show so much? I couldn't really tell you except that I watch it everyday during my lunch break and I'm asking for the DVD box set for Christmas. :) It probably wouldn't be the same if the show was still airing. Their problems would be so different and depressing. I'm sure Claire and Cliff would get a divorce or something. Maybe that's why I like it. It stays true to commitments. It can also bring you to tears in laughter.

So I couldn't figure out how to post the actual video so I just did a link to it in YouTube. I'm blogger retarded. This is one of my favorites where Rudy has a slumber party. You HAVE to watch to the end to see Peter, the little (or big) kid from across the street. He this one that puts you to stitches. I love it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VB88RdqEZc8

Life Update

2008-10-30T04:23:00.000-07:00

I realize this is a "no picture" post, but I really wanted to write something today and I have no pictures to post. I believe that is a first for me. :) Honestly, I've been photographing so much lately that my fingers hurt and my back. That camera is heavy to carry around every Saturday for like 8 to 10 hours nonstop. Plus the 2 sessions a week I'm averaging these days. Don't get me wrong, this is not me complaining though it's hard to tell. I'm just saying that by the time I get home the last thing I want to do is take pictures of Matt and I or really anything.

It's been very interesting working from home. I'm really proud of myself for consistantly getting up at 6:30 every morning. So many people tell me they would sleep in. I would probably have a problem with getting up so early if it weren't for the fact that matt makes so much noise in the kitchen when he cooks breakfast. It's really funny. My alarm clock is clanging pots and coffee grinders every morning. I guess there are worse things to wake up to. :) So, yeah, working from home is really cool. I get a lot done and I've found a new favorite website to help me along as I work. Check out http://www.pandora.com/. Basically this is a free radio website. You just type in a song or artist you like and it builds a radio station around your choice. Too cool. So you like every song you hear. I think it's better than satelite radio. It's also nice to have Kenah here with me for company. I stop frequently and give her pets. I've also been running with my neighbor in addition to my regular monday night soccer games. So hopefully I'll be a rock soon!

Ok I've got to jet. I have a bride coming by at 9am and need a shower. :)

This Morning

2008-10-02T05:30:00.001-07:00

This morning I was siting on the couch watching the Today Show and editing away on the laptop. This is my usual morning routine. I know, you're jealous. Anyway, like I said, I was editing away and I here Kenah outside give me her "let me in bark". This is REAL annoying. Being the patient person I am, I waited 5 seconds before letting her in. I then decided this would be a great opportunity to share with everyone what she is like when I get the "let me in bark". While I snapped a few of her, I figured this was the perfect time to share the shots of the gallery wraps I had made and had promised in my previous post. Matt LOVED the one of the William Aiken House in Charleston. This is in our foyer. I was so excited that it went so nicely with the fun blue vases I bought at this cute shop in downtown G-Vegas last year. :) The sunflower was placed in the living room next to the back doors. We've been in the house for over a year and these are the first photographs I've had printed for the house.

I'm planning to open up a "Fine Art" gallery on my website, but I really want to compile some images from the fall on the parkway. Hopefully Matt and I can take a drive soon up there. There is a shot I've got in mind and I'm dying to get it.

Behind the Sun

2008-09-14T20:24:00.000-07:00

As you can see I have this lovely sunflower theme going on and I'm sure you're wondering why I posted this photo. Well, a few months back I entered it in an online photo contest and I'm proud to say that it got "editor's pick". How cool! So now, I've ordered this huge gallery wrap of it for our living room. I think it will look really great in there. I'll take a picture of it on the wall to show you, which I'm sure won't do it justice.

The one you see above was also taken in this series I did. My little story is that I was at publix one day and they had sunflowers on sale and I thought "oh cool, these would look good in the foyer", but I really didn't like them there when I got home so I put them in the bedroom in the window and turned off the light and they just really popped with color. Of course, I ran and got the camera. All of them were shot in natural light and in this one I'm like pinned against the window zoomed in on the flower with the lights off and that's how I got the black background. Anyway, I thought it was cool. :)

Stars and Stripes

2008-09-10T21:13:00.000-07:00

A couple of weekends ago Matt and I headed to downtown G-Vegas to watch the National Championship in Cycling. This is huge guys! I don't think Greenville really understood how big this race was. It's like the Superbowl of cycling. Anyway, Matt and I took our bikes and basically rode all over downtown and followed the race at as many spots that we could get to. It was really cool to watch the peloton. You get this big rush of wind when they come by. It's amazing. Tyler Hamilton ended up winning by two hundredith of a second. He used to ride with Lance during the tour.

Greenville did get the contract to have the race again next year, but they're on a type of probation and basically if the city doesn't do more marketing and advertising to build up the race and get more participation, the race is moving to another city. Boooo. So I hope you can come because it's really fun. :)

A Mattisim

2008-09-05T12:46:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I can't tell if what is funny to me is funny to everyone else, but really who cares so I'm going to give this a shot. Let me first lay the scene for you. So I'm doing my makeup and it's 6:30am and Matt keeps walking back and forth in front of the bathroom and I realize that he's looking for pants (as he does every morning) even though I tell him where they are every time. Too cute. That's not part of the story (the pants part), but it's still funny to me. :) Ok, so yeah I'm putting on makeup and one time that he's walking by he in passes says "Hey Olivia, you ever thought about how funny the word "partypooper" is? Role that around on your tongue a few times". At first I didn't think about what he had actually said and then moments later I thought about how irresistibly cute he is and how much I just love the little things he does (most of the time). Oh, and I busted out laughing. He keeps it young for sure.

One of his other favorite things to do is to sing the Star Spangled Banner in the morning while we're getting ready. Oh for any of you to be a fly on the wall!! LOL

Charleston

2008-08-24T15:16:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know it's been FOREVER since I've done a post. I got a little distracted with the photography blog, but I really do want to keep this one going. That being said, here are some fun shots from our two trips to charleston recently. The first trip was back at the end of July and the second one was in August. On the first one, we hung out with Tyler and Natlie but I need to find that shot of the 4 of us together. Booo. The second trip was with Abby and Nate. We had such a blast both times and it was great to just get away and not worry or thing about anything.

So, keep checking often because we'll be updating! :)

To the Mountains We Go

2007-11-06T19:00:00.001-08:00

Matt and I decided on Sunday that we would enjoy the Lord's day by spending time in His creation. So we went to our favorite place, Pisgah National Forest of course. The sky was probably the bluest it's been all year. Unfortunately because of the drought, the leaves are not much to look at. The yellows all have a brown pigment in them, but you get the idea. So with this first shot of looking glass from the park way, I was very disappointed only because just 2 minutes before the Sun was shinning on the valley and on the red leaves in the foreground and it was on fire! It was beautiful. Since I didn't get there in time (b/c we had to turn the car around) I will always feel this shot will not live up to what was there just moments before. I'll have to wait another year for this shot. The leaves will be gone next weekend to try for it. :( I guess this is in a way one of the things I love so much about photography. It's the story behind catching the shot that makes it mean so much.

matt and I have decided to call this shot our Family Portrait. I think it's quite fitting and unique.

Isn't our darling Kenah Bear regal!

Meet Chef Matt

2007-09-05T18:43:00.000-07:00

Typically I'm not one to take pictures of food. I personally hate going to restaurants where they have pictures of food on the menu. GROSS! Anyway, those of you that have eaten with Matt or spent significant time with him have picked up on the fact that he loves food and I don't mean just any food. The man has a sophisticated pallet and is not afraid to talk about it. This is of course intimidating to me so he mostly does the cooking. Don't get me wrong, he's not one of those husbands that turns their nose up. I just know he'd rather have it his way and that is fine by me. Ok, where I'm going with this is that I came home from church tonight (Matt couldn't go b/c he had to work late) and he was just sitting down to dinner. I figured he'd cook something for himself since I ate at church and when I got in the kitchen I saw this lovely plate of food he had prepared for himself. I thought it was the funniest, cutest thing. I really thought he only did the whole preparation thing for me when I was there. I guess not. Look at how the cherry tomatoes and the basil leaves make a berry/flower display and are placed on top of the couscous inside the bell pepper. Needless to say I immediately grabbed the camera once I realized I was staring at a master piece and of course the fact that it was just dang funny. So here's the shot I took to enjoy. Now you should all come visit and have some of Chef Matt's cooking. :)

Charles/Anders Wedding 08.24.07

2007-08-29T19:33:00.001-07:00

This past weekend I had a wedding on Friday night, which I especially like. Friday weddings are so romantic to me for some reason. This wedding in particular was very sweet. It was a very small wedding of about 15 guests and that made it so itimate and special to everyone there. The bride is of course stunning. Everyone was fun to work with and as you can see the camera loved them all. Thanks Jennifer and Jonathan for sharing your special day with me. I had a blast.

Golden Bear

2007-08-20T16:11:00.000-07:00

Today, I had a few moments after work to throw the ball with kenah and here are the results...

Her favorite toy...

Many things I could say here so if you've ever met or live with my dog then you know what I mean. :)

I hate 4th of July. God bless our country, but Kenah is scared of fireworks and this was the damage she did on our new house. :(

A classic Kenah moment when she really wants to go inside with you. LOL I love it!

2007-08-19T12:53:00.000-07:00

Ok, I explain in the post after this one what these shots are all about. I just didn't have room. I know you all just couldn't wait to see shots of me! Just kidding! Matt really liked these and wanted me to post them. He's such a sweety. I can't imagine anything more great than your husband letting you know how beautiful he thinks you are. God has truly blessed me with him. :)

Beach Trip

2007-08-19T12:23:00.000-07:00

Back in July I went to Sunset Beach NC with Abby (sister in-law) and Laurie (mother in-law) and we stayed at a really awesome big house one block from the beach. The best part was of course the outdoor shower I got to use. It was of course closed in for privacy. :)

Anyway, we really didn't do much, but lay around. So usually I'm the one taking pictures, but Matt's cousin, Sarah (who is also into photography), thought it would be fun to have some shots for Matt. Matt really liked them and wanted me to post them. I feel kind of vain posting them, but he liked them so much I figured, why not. I did get some cute shots of Parker. She's 7 and it was so funny watching Sarah tell her not be so sassy in the pictures. So I guess 7 is when little girls start realizing what they got! Oh, how scary for moms.

Finally, I got up early for a sunrise! I've posted some of the results. I'm not real impressed because I know exactly what is wrong with these shots, but anyway it was fun. I'm trying new stuff in photoshop and this was basically my first go at Bracketting. Hope you like...

Another Work Day Quote

2007-08-09T07:01:00.000-07:00

Due to recent events at work, a quote that my old boss (whom I adore) used to say to me came to mind. Whenever things would change at work he would say...

"Well, we need to rearrange the deck furniture on this titanic"

Anyone in a sales position for a big corporation can appreciate this. :)

Cecil is No More

2007-07-24T08:25:00.000-07:00

Ladies and Gentlemen Cecil has finally stepped out of this world and into the next. I always thought her passing would be different than it actually was (I'll explain in a moment), but nonetheless she passed. She served me through the ladder part of high school and I believe her best years were in college. So many people enjoyed her company and great gas milage to many concerts and beach trips. Kenah also had many long rides in the back seat to Columbia. You know, she never left me stranded and was always dependable. My dad has been driving her the last four years and I'm so impressed that she made it this far, but alas she is gone and she definitely went out with a bang (almost literally)

So the story goes that my dad go up last Wednesday morning and notice a smoke smell in the air. He goes outside to find one of the garages on fire and Cecil in flames! Apparently, lightening had struck the garage the day before during a storm and we didn't know it. Fire had gained momentum all during the night and by the morning it had consumed Cecil and the garage to the unsalvagable point. :( Anyway, I'm glad my dad is ok and the house wasn't caught in the fire as well. He did loose a lot of memories in the garage so that is very sad. Needless to say, Cecil is gone and I honestly didn't think this would be her demise, but it does make for a good story. My she RIP.

Unpacking Can Be Fun

2007-07-10T18:51:00.000-07:00

So yeah there are ways to make unpacking your stuff in a new house fun. I totally got lost in picture world tonight and since Laura's recent visit I had her in mind for most of these. First of all, ladies please take notice of the four of us at Brooke's going away to Africa party! We are so tan and YOUNG?! Jackie is the only one missing in the shot. :( I'll show love to her with another post though. Of course for the next two pics we have Kenah and I at Looking Glass. I miss my curls so much. Also I had to post this one of Kenah since Laura informed me that she is actually eight. :( I still have not gotten over this. I take her face in my hands and tell her how much I love her every night. Imgine when we have kids. Finally, I've got this last pic that Laura was asking about on her visit. She mentioned the day we bought boiled peanuts and how funny it was that we caught a shot of these two beautiful feamullets (I believe they are both female). Anyway, you get the idea. I honestly can't believe I found this shot and I wish you all could have seen the glee and excitment in my face at that moment. I almost called Allison to tell her! LOL Ok, will post again soon.

Favorite Business Quote

2007-05-09T12:50:00.000-07:00

So, for all my peeps out there who have jobs that deal with the general public or have client based interaction...here is my favorite quote I recently discovered that goes out to you. This was supplied to me by a co-worker today.

"I never had an appointment where I wanted the other person to show up."
-George Costanza

Clemson Down Hill Racing

2007-05-01T04:34:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago Matt had a downhill race in Clemson. It's so funny to see what a big kid my husband is once he gets on, near, or around a bicycle. Allison and Chad joined in the festivities. It was so nice to have them there and it meant so much to Matt, I know.

Going to these races really gets me in the mood to ride my own bike. So, the next day we went back out to the course and I thought "oh I'll just roll over these technical areas". Boy was I wrong, I don't know how they do it. One of the drops was like 25 ft and that wall ride you see here was really intense. We saw one guy crash here in the picture where you see Matt jumping a gap and Allison, Chad, and I all thought he was dead. I thought to myself...well now I've witnessed my first fatality, but he just popped right back up and was on his bike again and going on down the path in now time at all. They wear so much armor and padding that it's actually pretty safe and way less injuries than you see in road biking believe it or not. So anyway, I thought you all might like another race story to log. :)

Our New Home

2007-04-12T07:19:00.000-07:00

We hope everyone will come visit soon. We close May 31st! It's in Pelham Falls and the neighborhood has 2 pools, walking trail, swim team, river for tubing, and much more. Lots of young families live here and it's a great place to raise children and in a great school district also.

Anyway, just wanted to share and let everyone know since it's been so long since we've posted. We've been so busy and trying to get everything in order for the move.

Love you all, Matt and Olive

John Rock

2007-02-19T11:10:00.000-08:00

All you Mountain Lovers out there will enjoy this!! This past Sunday Matt and I decided on a whim to go up to the mountains after church. It was so much fun and Kenah thoroughly enjoyed herself of course. It was in the 30s and I know this is nothing to Laura, but for us this is pretty cold. The wind was crazy and that made it even colder. The hike was only about an hour long and we got to the top at about 5pm or so. When we got to the top the wind was so fierce. I was so scared to walk out onto the rock. For those of you who have done Looking Glass it's kinda like that on top. I couldn't even stand up because of the wind and not to mention that ice had frozen all over the rock. I did manage to get myself out there enough to snap this shot of Looking Glass from a distance. I love it and I need you guys to tell me if you like the b&w better or the color. And of course here is one of my darling Kenah who was so terrified of the wind and looked so pitiful being so wind-blown. It was hilarious! LOL

Our House is For Sale!

2007-02-19T10:05:00.000-08:00

Yep that's right! We're trying to move. Eventhough we love our little house we feel it's time to move across town to be closer to friends and family. So if you guys know of anyone who wants a really cute house let me know!

Mom's Paintings

2007-01-20T15:29:00.000-08:00

My mom painted these two water colors when I was about 5 or so. Some of my earliest memories are of her sitting in the living room with all her art supplies spread about and just painting away. JM and I have been encouraging her to pick up a brush again so I can put more up in the house. I had these two framed recently that she gave to me about a year ago. They look so great in our bedroom. Anyway, I wanted to share with everyone just how talented Vonda really is! :)

Christmas Fun

2007-01-15T16:43:00.000-08:00

Ok so I know Christmas is a distant memory, but I really wanted to share with everyone because it was so fun this year. JM came to visit and here he is stylin in the front yard of our house washing is new "vain prospect" as I call it. J/K, this is his first big purchase as a new lawyer and he just couldn't wait to wash it after the long drive up from New Orleans.

Most of you know that Matt does the cooking in our house, so here he is making Chrismas Eve dinner. He's so hot when he's cooking!

Mom wouldn't let me get a pic of her opening presents so this is the best I got of her the whole time. Mom, I thought you were cute as a bug.

So my mom got JM and Matt these towel things that velcro (did I spell that right?) so you don't have to worry about it coming off after a shower. I thought it was a hilariously funny gift...totally original! She was going to have their names put on them, but I told her that was taking it too far.

I got a "chest" jewelry box for Christmas that I absolutely love. Mom even bought me some jewlry and I found it later in the chest. How cool. Over all it was a fantastic Christmas.

Favorites

2006-12-14T16:41:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd share with you guys a couple favorite shots I've take this year of random places, things, and events. :)

A New Blogger Joins!

2006-12-14T06:07:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone, Checkout my friend Katie's two new blogs. I have them as links. One is "the Pig Smarts" and this is only because her last name is Hambright and I just think it's funny. :) Her father actually came up with it so I can't take credit. The other one is "Katie the Knitting Ninja". She recently knitted this totally cool sweater. It looked like something out of Jcrew. Anyway, yall check them out when you get a moment.

More Christmas Party Fun

2006-12-10T15:28:00.000-08:00

I forgot you have to post in reverse to get your story in the right order on blogger, unless I'm just overthinking it. Anyway, here is a fun one of Abby (sister-in-law) and me. How do you like my Zoolander face??

Pictures never turn out good when you hold the camera out in front of yourself, but I actually like this one of Matt and me. Maybe it's because he has extremely long arms. Go Gumby Go!

HMMM what can I say...Jackie and my husband are two peas in a pod! :)

Christmas Party

2006-12-10T15:19:00.000-08:00

Here are some fun pics from our Christmas Party this past Friday night. Here's Allison and me together, as if we didn't have enough together. I was sooooo glad she made since work kept her for a longer night. She looked fabulous with her new "black" shirt and silver belt. I only comment on the clothes because 4 of us all wore blacks tops and jeans with heels. It was too cute!

Here is a group shot of the hostesses. From right to left it's Lyndsay, Carrie, Katie, and me. I go to church with these girls and we got together and planned a Christmas party at Katie's house. It was totally fun and there were lots of good eats.

This picture is just a classic!

What Can Brown Do For You?

2006-11-08T18:54:00.000-08:00

Yep, so I went back to my natural color. I decided it was time for a change and boy does highlighting get expense. So far I feel more sophisticated. Comments are welcome of course. :)

Sue gets Hit!!

2006-11-04T05:18:00.000-08:00

So I've been trying for the longest time to think of a name for my car. I had one for the Celica I drove all through college, which was a wonderful car and my dad still actually drives the thing. Well last weekend took the taco and I realized that "Sue" would be my car's new name. My main reason is that my car is very simple. It's a 5speed and everything is manual on it and since Sue is such a basic name, I thought it fit. The best feature is that it's a Honda and it's got a CD player. Don't get me wrong I do love the car and it has been faithful, but last week someone decided to give Sue something she hasn't had yet and that was a big dent in the rear bumper. So that was the other reason for naming her because I felt if we're going to go through this together she at least deserved a name wouldn't you say?

When I first came out to my car after spending 8 hours or so photographing a wedding I saw the dent and just began to cry instantly. After having my fit and acting like a child and throwing a pitty party for myself I decided enough was enough and decided to just go home. Well, when I got to the door I saw a wonderful glorious note had been left for me on my windshield by the people who hit my car. It had wonderful news like their name, phone number, and insurance information. Anyway, they are paying for the whole thing and I just have to take Sue to get fixed. I guess there are some honest people left in this world. What a blessing God gave me, not to mention His mercy was also involved. :)

Abbster in Detail

2006-10-26T15:54:00.000-07:00

Hey Everybody this is my beautiful Sister-in-law Abby, who has become one of my most favorite subjects to photograph. She was gracious enough to go to the park with me a couple of weeks ago and let me practice. These were some of my favorites. Abby, I hope you don't mind me sharing and I've got a CD for you the next time I see you.

Anniversary

2006-10-23T17:54:00.000-07:00

Matt and I went to the Biltmore on Sunday to celebrate our second anniversary. This is my favorite time of year so I was in heaven with all the fall leaves. It was beautiful.

I thought this pic was too cute with Kenah looking as if she was about to launch at the camera. Of course she always has more fun than anyone else no matter what we're doing.

The lighting ended up being so beautiful towards the end of the day and it gave great light. Plus I'm having so much fun using my new lens. It makes the colors pop so great!

Household

2006-10-09T09:13:00.000-07:00

Here is a typical day in the "Griffin Household"

Allison and Chad

2006-10-09T09:03:00.000-07:00

Ok Guys I'm so sorry it's taken me this long to say something about Allison and Chad's wedding. It was so beautiful. If you haven't noticed already, I have all the pictures I took uploaded to my website. Please take a gander at them. The Password is "Nicholson".

Group Shots from the Trip Two

2006-08-12T12:54:00.000-07:00

The Trip Two! :)

2006-08-12T12:15:00.000-07:00

So upon arrival to Murrells Inlet, the boys decided the best way to unwind after our travels was to pick up the instruments. There is just something about a man playing music that drives women wild. It was a perfect way to get settled into the house. :)

Here are a couple of shots from around the house that I thought were especially nice.

Before going on the trip I got a little sneaky and thought it would be a good idea to throw Allison a secret lingerie show since Brooke and Laura live far away and hate that they can't be there for Allison's showers. However, from the pictures I think it's pretty obvious that Haley had the most fun helping Allison open her gifts. She was a great little helper. Ana gave it an honest try, but soon got too tired. Anyway, Allison got some nice things, so watch out Chad! Va Va Voom!!

Newborn

2006-07-10T18:57:00.000-07:00

A co-worker (Archie) had a baby this past weekend and he asked if I'd come to the hospital and take some shots of them with the new baby. Isn't she a cutie. They haven't decided on a name yet though. Either Hannah Morgan (my favorite) or Hannah Grace. Anyway, I thought all you mothers out there would love these. :)

2006-06-29T09:57:00.001-07:00

Hello Everyone,

Matt Here,

I just finished my first summer session at Clemson and I'm just now decompressing! As promised, I thought I'd give you all a little update on my racing season so far. Unfortunately, due to school, I haven't been able to attend as many events as I would like to, but I'll just have to chalk it up as differred gratification.

VA State Championships, Massanutten Ski Area, Harrisonburg VA, May 7-8:
This was my first official race of the season, and its alway a favourite. 2 years ago, I won the VA state championship here, and the course is just a little over 3 minutes of fun, top to bottom. From the start, there is a high speed boulder garden, the middle section is tight, rooty singletrack with fast, sweeping bermed turns, and the final section is a super high speed rock garden, filled with loose "baby head" rocks. All day longduring practice, I was feeling solidly fast on my brand new Specialized Demo 8 race bike. I was having a great race run, and I knew it. I think I got a little bit too comfortable right through the last rock garden, within sight of the finish when I got knocked off line, over the handlebars, and into the woods down below. I clamoured back up the hill, back onto my bike to salvage the remains of my race when I realized that my stem had twisted and my handlebars were now sideways, rendering my bike all but unrideable. I limped my poor crashed up bike across the finish line, and brooded. I left with mixed emotions. Yes I crashed, but when the final results were posted, I ended up being only 11 seconds off the win. So. All I had to do was stay on the bike and cruise on into the finish for a win, but I crashed. Sure the fastest racer stays on his bike, but I knew I had what it took. (And I had a ton of fun!!)

US Open, Vernon New Jersey, May 27:
This event has been growing exponetially for the last 4 years. It's held at the mountain creek ski resort in the little town of Vernon NJ. I have always heard what a great venue this is, with an awesome course, well organized promotion, and an atmosphere to match. It was a 13 hour drive from sunny South Carolina to Dirty Jersey, but it was worth every mile.
I raced the pro class for the first time, which meant that I was lining up with the same guys that I watch in the videos and read about in the magazines. Its pretty intimidating when you hear one of those freight trains come clattering down the trail behind you! This course was the real deal. The whole top half was a crazy rock garden, with a collection of some of the biggest, greasiest, and steepest rock lines that I've ever ridden. The last half was a little bit tamer, but really high speed as you went through what reminded me of a luge track in the olymics, except made out of dirt. It was really fun! I went into the event not expecting much out of myself, due to the quality of my competion, so needless to say, I don't even know what place I got. The resort is entirely dedicated to downhill mountain biking throughout the summer, so after the race, we rode all kinds of different downhill trails all day long until our arms fell off.

NORBA National #2, Sugar Mountain North Carolina, June 10:
I've always thought of Sugar Mountain as being my "home course". I've grown up racing the annual "Showdown at Sugar" race, so it was really a surprise to find out that Sugar Mountain had been added as a venue in the most elite series in the US, the NORBA National Championship Series. Everyone wondered whether or not old Sugar Mountain would be able to pull it off on the national stage, but I think everyone agreed that they made a great first impression! Anyway, the course was superb, with all kind of features from top to bottom. It had tight twisty stuff, fast open stuff, really steep stuff, roots, rocks, mud, jumps, mud, big drops, and mud. This being my "home course", I was surprised by what a hard time I was having during practice. I was crashing everywhere! Come race time, I knew I had to get myself together. As soon as I left the start gate, and made it through the first rock section, I knew I had something to work with. I kept building my momentum, rode smart and clean, and when I crossed the line, they announced over the PA that I was the new leader! My time held and I ended up winning! It felt great to beat people from all over the country, PA, CA, VA, on my old home track!

Next weekend, I'll be going to Wilkesboro NC for a fun little local race at a place called Dark Mountain. It sound really imposing, like some place in Lord of the Rings, but its actually a really tame course with a refreshing lake right at the finish line! I've almost got Olivia talked into racing the course just for kicks, so you guys should tell her she better not disappoint! After that I have one more at Snowshoe West Virginia that I'd like to go to.

Blast From the Past

2006-06-11T19:37:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I'm really hoping all yall remember Allison taking this once in a lifetime shot on our way to a Clemson game. So I was sitting here tonight going through old college pictures and Matt suggested I do a post. I wasn't particularlly in the mood, but then I came across this picture and knew I had to share it with you guys. Matt and I had an excellent chuckle over it! Allison, do you remember us trying to send it in to David Letterman? I can't remember if we actually sent it or not though? What I love most about the picture is that the focus is exactly where it should be. :) Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this as much as I have all these years.

katie's portrait

2006-05-27T15:16:00.000-07:00

So I finally got to do my first bridal portrait. My friend, Katie, from church was gracious enough to my be my first trail run. I kinda goofed in the beginning because I failed to realize that the sun is much harsher in the summer time. I thought meeting at 9:45am would be great lighting, but boy was I wrong. I should have said 7 or 8am for the summer. Anyway, I had to let the creativity flow for this one and it ended up being great. Katie is fantastically easy to take pictures of. It's so hard to mess her up in a picture.

We took all the pictures on our church grounds and some from the inside of our little chapel. This was a great learning experience for me and hopefully many more to follow. I'll soon have her gallery posted on my website and the password will be "hambright" which will be her new last name.

Katie, thanks for being such a great sport!

Red Dress Ball

2006-05-20T07:46:00.000-07:00

The Haeart Association has a charity event every year where you wear a red dress to it. The bank bought a table, so I got to go. Matt unfortunately could not go so another co-worker decided to go. We had a great time and you all know how I love to dress up. Take notice of the dress I'm wearing. Does it look familar? Hey Laura, does Charlotte's dress look familiar? She wore my dress from your wedding. I got a kick out of that.

Mother's Day

2006-05-20T07:19:00.000-07:00

Everyone came to our house for Mother's Day and we had cababs. Matt has really become an excellent cook. It was a beautiful day. It supposed to rain, but we didn't see any of it. After lunch I decided to get out the camera, which Matt's mom hates because she hates having her picture taken , even though she is beautiful. :) This could be said for my mom too, especially the beauitful part. Anyway, here are some of the pics and the flowers are from my brother. They were a complete surprise for my mom.

Magazine Cover

2006-05-04T19:14:00.000-07:00

So Matt and I had the coolest opportunity the other day, we got pictures taken of us for the cover of an outdoor magazine called "Go Magazine" here in Greenville. I believe this picture of my very cool husband will be on the cover. Yall remember last summer when I took a photography class? Well, I became friends with the teacher, Richard Bernabe and we keep in touch pretty regularly. Anyway, he recently got asked to take pics for June's issue. We got together with him earlier this week at Paris Mountain, which has great trails now! The coolest part was that Richard showed me how to do this with my camera, so I can't wait to try it out soon. Hope you all like the pic...

Kid shots in the Spring

2006-04-13T12:44:00.000-07:00

I thought I would share with you guys two really cute kids. Malachi is Jenny's little boy and the little girl is Harper, who is a co-worker's daughter. Malachi and Harper have been my recent photography business. I never realized just how hard it is to make a kid smile if they don't know you. They just look at you like you're the craziest lady alive. I found a little trick is that if the mom laughs at what you're doing, usually the kid follows suite. Interesting huh?

Backyard Fun

2006-04-08T10:28:00.000-07:00

For those of you who didn't know already, we have a bike track in the backyard. It's really cool actually and Matt rides it practically everyday. Well, the other day we got home from work about the same time and I decided to go out there and catch him in action. Notice that Kenah is an excellent spectator.

Us at the Biltmore

2006-03-26T16:00:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone,
I thought I'd share a photo from my birthday trip to the Biltmore House from last weekend. Matt took me there as a surprise for my birthday, since I had never been there. Some of you have already seen the shots from that day on my website, but this one of us together is not on there. We ended up buying season passes because it was only a little more to do so and then you have a free vacation whenever you want it. We thought that while Matt is in school over the next year or so this would be a great way to get away and not be expensive. I'm so excited about being able to go anytime. :)

Laura's Belly

2006-03-24T15:21:00.000-08:00

Well, I fugured it was time again. Honestly I've been so busy setting up the photography stuff that I just haven't had time. Also, Matt has been using the computer so much to help him prepare for grad school. Blah, blah I'm back and now I must share with everyone especially Laura's sister inlaw, Ashley, the belly shots I got about a month ago from my brief visit with her and Hay hay. Hope you all enjoy!

Extras from the Bike Race

2006-02-20T07:18:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone,
Here are some more of the pictures we took from the race. Please read the next post below for Matt's detailed narrative of our experience. Hope everyone is doing well.

I have more pictures posted on my gallery and some from a recent bridal shower I photographed. Hope you enjoy!

First Bike Race of the Season

2006-02-07T12:13:00.000-08:00

Hello Everyone,

This is Matt. As many of our loyal readers know, one of my passions in life is racing and riding downhill mountain bikes. This will be my 11th season of racing and I thought that since we like to post blog reports, what better thing to do than to give everyone a little window into my life as a bike racer. I'd like to let everyone know that I will be posting a race report after each mountain bike competition or otherwise noteworthy cycling event that I attend this coming season.

A couple weekends ago, Olivia and I braved the elements for the first race of the season which is held at the Fontana Village Resort in North Carolina. This is the 6th year running that I have competed in the Fontana "IceCycle" event, and it certainly lived up to its name this time! This is a unique event, not only because it takes place during what most people consider the off-season, but also because the downhill event that I specialize in takes place after dark! I had hopes of it being unseasonably warm and dry but to our dismay, it rained and snowed all day and the temperature had dipped below 20 degrees by the time I was lining up for my race. Olivia, Kenah, and I arrived at Fontana at about 2:30 in the afternoon, checked into our cabin, and slouched around for an hour or so. Usually when I come to a race, I can't get changed into my race gear and get myself out on the course for practice quick enough, but not this time. Finally, after much painstaking deliberation, I mustered up enough motivation to sluggishly pull out all my gear, layer up and make my way outside and into the snow to take a few muddy practice runs. Not to my suprise, there were only a scant few people out on the course. I did chance to run into one of my teamates, so we got together and sessioned the course 3-4 times together. It was nasty. I'd bought a $5.00 rain suite at walmart that I had hoped would keep the mud off of me so that I'd have a fresh Jersey and shorts before the start of the race, but that suit didn't make it through the shuttle ride back up the mountain the first time before it had torn from heel to crotch.
The course at Fontana is for the most part made up of narrow fire road or wide open single track. From the top, it is super fast- at its fastest, your propably pulling 35+ mph. It has several sweeping turns and big sections of roots that you can bunny hop at speed. Towards the second half, it levels out, with several short up hill sections and long, flat straightaways. These always presents a real mental challenge after the exhileration of the speedy top half of the course. I really have to stay on myself to keep pedalling hard throught the flat stuff. The thick winter mud even further intensifies the pain of the last part. At the very end, it goes into some really tight.twisty, and super slippery singletrack. Fitness is the name of the game on this course. I knew that the temperature was only dropping and that things were really going to be interesting by race time!

After a few practice runs on the course, I realized that I had totally forgotten about the burrito dinner that started at 4:00. Of course Olivia had to come down to find me, and then I had to sprint my bike back to our little cabin, take off all my muddy layers outside, and then throw on some clean duds. We met all our buds and enjoyed some pre-race burritos, and watched the snow continue to fall. We took way to long eating our burritos and when I realized this, I had to rush back to the cabin to get all my stuff ready again.
When I got back to the cabin, I realized that I had left all of my gear outside in the snow after my practice runs, so now I had the to face the misery of changing back into my muddy, frozen, wet race gear. I was absolutely frozen stiff. Once I had gotten all my gear on, I had to rally up the last bit of dexerity out of my fingers so that I could mount my lighting system onto my bike. Finally I was ready to go, so Olivia and I drove my truck on down to the bottom of the hill, where she got to spend the remainder of the race, with the option of staying in my warmed truck or basking beside the glow of an inviting communal fire can, with holes punched in the bottom that served to warm the toes of its guests. I, on the other hand, had to go climb into the back of the smelly shuttle truck that would take me to the start of the race. I must have looked like a jewish POW on the way to some unknown terror.
At the top, I tried to get into my normal pre-race ritual of warming up by sprinting around but all I really wanted to do was stand there and shiver. I did however realize that my gears were completely frozen and I had absolutely not shifting whatsoever. It didn't take me long to figure out that I wasn't the only one beleaguered with shifting woes, as it seemed to be a widespread problem. I really had no excuse to suck, so just got in line and made up my mind to try to pin it during my race run. I rolled up to the start gate, turned on my lights, put on my goggles, and thought about the course while the timing official counted down.5..4...3..2....1...CRANK!!! I got a pretty good start out of the gate, but with the course being so steep and my not being able to shift, I quickly spun out my gears, so all I could really do was to try get down low and coast and try to pump as much speed out of the course as I could. As I came into the second, flat part of the course, I mashed on my pedals and tried to sprint as hard as I could but I ran out of gas in that thick mud! By the time I had reached the flats, It was all I could do to even turn the the gears that I had been spinning up top. I nailed the twisty rooty stuff at the bottom and crossed the line to finish up in 8th place. Kenah and Olive were there to meet me at the bottom and I understand that my doggie was very concerned about me while I was at the top of the hill. I hear that every time a rider crossed the finish line, she thought it was me and she becI was suprised at how well my lighting system worked! After the first few seconds of getting used to riding in the dark, you really forget that there is anything different! Not my best, but hey, look at the circumstances. I guess its good to get a good kick in the rear at the beginning of the season so you can see where you are weakest. I know I need to get my fitness back on track before the meat of the season gets here!
After the race, I went straight back to the cabin to go take a nice hot shower and change into some warm clothes. As soon as that hot water hit my frozen toes, I almost cried! I had to sit down in the shower because my toes hurt so bad! Anyway, the promoters threw a pretty fun party with a band and a few kegs of Highland Oatmeal Porter, one of my all time favorites. I got to hang out with a lot of my good friends that I haven't seen all winter, and despite the bone-numbing cold, I always have a great time at this event and I think I feel just a little bit more hard core everytime I come home after the wintertime night race at Fontana!

Fun time with Kenah

2006-02-03T14:30:00.000-08:00

So I got home from work earily today and came home to this...

I couldn't resist so then it turned into all this...(please take note of the two tennis balls in Kenah's mouth...yes 2)

Rebekah's Wedding

2006-01-31T15:54:00.000-08:00

This past Saturday Matt and I went to a wedding at our church. The pastor's daughter got married. I just love weddings. Anyway, of course I took my camera to get some practice. Here are a couple of shots from the day. I have more posted on my gallery so check those out from the link on the left and let me know what you think. :) I have my first real wedding job on March 11th so pray that everything goes well for that.

U2 Photojournal Finally Comlete!!

2006-01-24T06:23:00.000-08:00

Much to the Chagrin of my hard-working grade school teachers, I am still turning in my assignments a dollar short and a day (or two) late. As many of you readers may recall, Olivia and I were finally able to attend U2 show during December. Everyone asks me how it went and all I can really tell them is, "Oh it was great!". I really don't feel that I have been able to express just what a great time we had and why, so I wanted to post a detailed account, complete with colour photos, here on our blog. Since I started the draft several weeks ago and didn't get around to finishing and posting it until last night, you'll have to scroll through 2-3 previous blog entries to find it. I'll warn you all that I did get a bit long-winded with it, and I cannot say with any confidence that you'll come away feeling as though you spent your time wisely in the reading of it, so consider yourselves warned.

New Orleans Pictures

2006-01-16T07:58:00.000-08:00

New Orleans

2006-01-16T06:26:00.000-08:00

In may of last year I went to New Orleans to see my brother graduate from Law School at Tulane University. I didn't have the new digital camera then, but I used my film one. Up until now, with the purchase of our new computer, I haven't been able to scan those pictures and put them on the internet. Anyway, I thought it would be cool to share New Orleans with everyone the way I remember it. During the time of these shots it was a beautiful thriving city, unlike now. It's amazing to think that just 3 months after these pictures were taken Katrina hit with full force and sent the entire nation into panic.

Unfortunately my scanner is not the best quality so I'm sorry if some the images look low quality. I was a little disappointed in that. Oh well, live and learn. I should have paid the extra $60 to upgrade the printer.

Christmas Cheer

2006-01-08T15:49:00.000-08:00

Well I can't post anything new until I at least post some pics from Christmas. The best part of Christmas was of course getting to see JM. I love this moment with him and Kenah

Here is another fun scene of my studious husband, who in this picture is reading a book I gave him for his birthday "The Man Called Cash", which is an excellent book. I recomment to everyone. It's way better than the movie. It actually tells what really happened in his life and God was more to him than just going to church on Sunday.
It's still safe to say that Kenah had the most fun at Christmas. Here she is ripping through some tissue paper from a present. It seemed the more we laughed at her the more vigorously she tore through the paper. What a great dog!!

Basically we made the rounds for Christmas. JM came and stayed with us a night in G-vegas and then we went down to Cola-town and stayed with dad and then went to Newberry and stayed with mom. Matt's parents gave us a gas grill, which was much needed. We had been using a charcoal and while that tastes better, it takes way too much time. Both of my parents gave us money and that went to our new computer from Dell, which should be arriving any day now. Anyway, I hope everyone had a great Christmas and I can't wait to see so many of you this summer!

With or Without U2

2005-12-30T20:30:00.000-08:00

On Saturday November 19 of 2005, one of my biggest dreams was about to come true. It was about 12:00 in the afternoon and we had just taken our spots in line outside of the Phillips Arena in downtown Atlanta Georgia. After weeks of scavenging on internet fansites and classified ads, I finally scored 2 general admission floor tickets to see my favorite band, U2, come and play Atlanta on the third leg of their "Vertigo" world tour.
My dream started much earlier during a very formative summer vacation between my eighth and ninth grade years in high school. That's when I was introduced to some of the music that would see me through as I established my own identity and would help me to reminisce about those times in the years that would follow. I remember that particular summer very well because that was the time that my parents began to loosen the reigns as I was feeling out my independence and trying to figure out who exactly Matthew John Griffin was. I owe a lot to my youth leader at that time because he helped me to carve out an identity for myself and helped to foster a relationship with friends that I remain close with even today.
I also remember that he had enlisted the help of a summer youth intern who would take small groups of us out on weekend getaways to the mountians near Brevard North Carolina, which is still one of my favorite places in my known world. We looked up to him as the arch-typical cool dude. Had three things going for him that we hoped to have going for us someday- He was in college, he had a pretty girl friend, and he had a car. He'd used to call up three or four of us boys, our moms would drop us off at the church, and as soon as we pulled out of the parking lot, he'd reach under his seat and pull out the most voluminous CD collection I may have ever seen, to date.
I can remember him always slipping one particular disk into his CD player as he pulled out a little rusty old harmonica from the ash try beside him. I remember he'd skip though about 6 or 7 tracks on the CD until a song popped up that started with a driving bass drum beat and led into the wailing of a harmonica, with which he would play along with, albeit in a different key. That song was "Trip Through Your Wires" on the Joshua tree album by U2. He'd always go on and on about what a great band U2 was and what a great show they put on. We'd spin that and other essential U2 albums over and over the whole way though the mountains.
I can still smell the vibrant scent of freedom in the lush summer woodlands of western North Carolina when I hear the U2 favorite, "Where the Streets Have No Names". I must have gone out and bought that album shortly after that summer ended and I still call the Joshua Tree my favorite album. In the years following that summer, U2 toured the area two more times with the "Pop" tour, which my parents forbade me from attending, and the "Elevation" tour, which unfortunately made its rounds while I was in college trying to make ten dollar bills stretch out for two weeks at a time.
In late 2004, U2 finally anounced the dates for its next tour, entitled "Vertigo". Being unencumbered by parental directives, and somewhat more financially stable, I was determined to get tickets. The online scalping industry snapped up most of the tickets before you could blink but I was determined that I could find the tickets I wanted with enough dilligence. Sure enough, I found my tickets, and there we were in Atlanta, about to see the show.
Most of my readers already know the story of our trip to Atlanta to see U2. I believe Olivia wrote about the experience in a previous blog. In summary, we waited in line all day outside if the Phillips Arena, only to be told when we finally got to the front door that we had tickets for the previous night's show. We were sent to the other side of the arena where we waited in line at the box office for another 3 hours, hoping in vain for one more chance to get a pair of tickets there happened to be a last minute ticket drop. I have to say that as heartbroken as we were, it was a positive experience for me. If nothing else, it happened to be a "Beautiful Day" outside that day and I enjoyed spending good quality time with my wife. We got to meet some really cool individuals and I had a thoroughly good time waiting in line with all those other people with whom I had something in common.
Needless to say, it was a long somber ride home that evening. All I remember saying was "Olivia, we are going to see U2 before the end of this tour." The good news was that U2 was scheduled to play in Charlotte on December 12. The bad news was that it took me 6 months of solid searching to find the tickets that I did for Atlanta, and we now had less than one month to find tickets for the Charlotte show. One week before the show, I found a pair of tickets way up in the upper stratosphere of the Charlotte arena. Dejected, but undetered, I purchased these tickets and continued my search for a pair of General Admission tickets that would give us the chance to be on the front row. I was about to call off my search when one ad caught my eye: "2 General Admission tickets, face value, Seeking buyer in Greenville SC". Olivia can attest that I almost knocked the ceiling out and went right throught the roof. We got the tickets and we were on our way to Charlotte!
So, with the dream resumed, there we were again, outside of a downtown arena, waiting to see my favorite band, U2. The only difference was that instead of a "Beautiful Day", it became a "Dirty Day", with temperatures hovering around 45 degrees and clouds rolling in. By the time night had fallen, a driving rain had overtaken us. I must say that our trials definately enhanced the experience.
The doors ahead of us finally opened at around 5:30 and the line started inching forward. My heart was rushing as we approached the ticket scanner. Although we had thoroughly checked our tickets this time, there was an air of anxious uncertainty that made my whole body tense as noise of the scanner beeping grew more audible as the line drew closer. When he finally had my ticket in his hand as he scanned it, the world stopped....beep beep beep...."Go ahead"....WHEW!!! We made it in! Olivia and I were in a state of absolute elation just to have made it past the threshhold of the door to the Charlotte Arena! As we made our way to into the arena, I remember just wanting to stand there and take it all in but we literally had to rush into the arena, down stairs, and across the arena floor in order to secure an optimal viewing location- which we did.
We situated ourselves right up against the small security gate that divides the stage from the crowd. We were slightly to the left of center stage. The stage set up was unique. On one end of the arena sits U2's main stage. A large eliptical "track" runs around the stage and encircles about 1/3 of the arena. The band members are known to spend alot of time performing and sprinting around the whole track so that they can be as close to as many of the fans as they can be. Once in the arena, we had to stay put, so as not to risk loosing our prime viewing location. We had to wait for another 2 hours before the opening band was due to start. The people around us were cool. There was a very large man beside me who had seen U2 in Ireland, the group beside us were all from greenville, and the lady's behind us were very drunk and insisting that they belonged in front of us (they fought for our coveted positions all night and recieved more that a few harsh elbow nudges in the side for their efforts).
The opening band was called Institute. I'll just say that U2 did not have a terribly hard act to follow. Institute was led by Gavin Rosdale, the former lead singer of the popular mid-90's rock group, "Bush". They didn't do a bad job and it was cool to see Gavin, as he really is a good performer, but I wasn't terribly inspired. Once they finished up, we waited for another hour while U2's stage crew set everthing up. I thought it was particularly interesting to watch the technicians tune the guitars. As the familiar house music was playing on the PA, a song began to play that I was not familiar with. This song was called "Wake Up" by the band "Arcade Fire". When this song began to play over the PA, the crowd erupted. I found out that this is the song played just before U2 comes on stage.

As the song drew to a close, the lights went dim, and a voice came over the PA, announceing "everyone........everyone...........
EVERYONE!!!................EVERYONE!!!" I remember that. At that point, out of the shadows on the main stage, I saw the sillouettes of Adam Clayton on bass, Larry Mullen on the drum kit, and of course, Edge on lead guitar. Edge was picking out a nebulous tune on his guitar that he eventually molded into the introduction to the song "City of Blinding Lights" as Bono appeared directly in front of us! The light show began as confetti rained down on the crowd.
I could go on and wax eloquent for long time and talk about each song, and every emotion, but I'll suffice it to say that it exceeded my highest expectations in every way. They ended the show with the song "40", which is derived from Psalm 40 in the bible: "You lifted me up out of the pit, out of the miry clay. You set my feet upon a rock and made my foot steps firm."

It was an absolutely inspiring show, I bought a T-shirt for myself and Olivia and we drove on back to greenville after enjoying a wonderful meal at the Waffle House in Gastonia. and I can't wait for them to release their next album, as I already have my bells on for the next show. Thank you for spending your hard earned time reading this post. I really don't expect that many people have made it this far, but it would have been hard for me to do justice to all of my exitement about this event with anything much shorter.
If you have made it this far, I really appreciate your time. I wanted to give this piece of photojournalism as detailed an account as I could because its so easy to simply say, "Oh the U2 show? It was great!". Even though we really mean it when we say we had a great time, this was a great way for me to flesh those words out and express all the things I wanted to, so that if you really care, you can take the time to find out just how "great" it was!

Thanks!
Matt.

My Brother's thoughts

2005-12-13T14:12:00.000-08:00

Hey you guys, check out JM's blog. His most recent post is hysterical! Oh and we made it to U2 last night. We will be posting all about that soon. Matt has already claimed his place to do that post. He's so funny. :)

Matt's Bird House

2005-12-10T19:17:00.000-08:00

Hello,
This is Matt. I am responsible for shooting this very pastoral photograph of a birdhouse in a field not far Brevard North Carolina, one of my very favorite places in the world. Although she is a very accomplished and discerning photographer in her own right, my wife Olivia has decided that this photograph is not blog-worthy. I am rather proud of my picture of this humble birdhouse so I decided to sneak into the computer room late one night and post this picture on my own. I hope all of you out there on the world wide web enjoy my work.

Thank you for viewing!

Country Roads

2005-12-10T18:59:00.000-08:00

Brooke, I know you will appreciate these pictures since the mountains are not out your backdoor anymore. Matt and I were in Brevard the other day and I of course had my camera and was dying to find some good shots. Well, we were just driving along and couldn't find a view without those stupid powerlines and then Matt just took this random turn. (he's good at stuff like that) Anyway, around the bend from this turn was this beautiful field with these gorgeous mountains in the background. The sky was magnificant. I hope yall enjoy. Let me know what you think.

Christmas Family Shoot

2005-12-10T18:08:00.000-08:00

Gosh it feels like I haven't blogged in forever. We've been so busy lately. So this weekend I've just been relaxing; if mopping the floor, stubbing the bathroom, vaccuming, and doing laundry is considered relaxing. Oh well, it's all finished now. Anyway, last weekend I did a photo shoot with this couple that I work with and his kids. They are so cute. Let me know what yall think.

John Mark's blog

2005-12-01T19:28:00.000-08:00

So if any of you understand my brother's sense of humor, then you will enjoy his blog. I personally couldn't stop laughing. I'm sure he will appreciate any of your comments. :) I put a link to his blog to the left. JM, I enjoyed to talking to you tonight. I miss you terribly and can't wait to see you for Christmas. Love you!

Photo Shoot

2005-11-30T15:18:00.000-08:00

I finally had my first photo shoot! It was so fun. This is Katie and Joe and I'm actually in their wedding. They are friend's of mine and Matt's from church. They made it very easy to take pics of because they're such a good looking couple anyway. These are some of my favorites from the shoot. They're not sure which one they're going to use for the engagement picture at the wedding. I'm also doing her portrait. Oh and I finally have my first wedding booked for March 4th. I'm so excited! This is such a dream for me. Boring banker by day and creative photographer by night. Let me know what yall think. I have some more of my favorites posted on my gallery.

Turkey Day Extravaganza!

2005-11-24T16:26:00.000-08:00

So I decided that this year Matt and I would offer to have Thanksgiving at our house since we always have it at his mother's house and this year Grandma (her mother) is really sick. I wanted this to be an unstressful time for my mother inlaw and her sister (Aunt Bonnie) since they always do the cooking. Anyway, I was sure that I was somehow going to make a disaster out of it, but God was with us and everything turned out wonderful. My little casa held up just fine and everyone had a blast. This of course could not have been completed without the cooking expertise of my wonderful Mother, who came up the night before just to asist in my very first turkey cooking.

Here are some pics from our fun filled day with the fam. Most of these pics are of Matt's family. Since mine is so spread out, it was just my mom who came up. The little one is the newest addition to the family. His name is Asher. He was a wonderful baby and hardly made a peep for how much he got tossed around. Hope you all enjoyed Turkey Day as much as we did. Sara and Melissa, if you want to comment on anything you can email me at o_luv@hotmail.com since you don't have a blog yet. Love you all and talk with you soon!! Oh and check out Liv's Gallery to see more pics from today.

A Sad Sad Story

2005-11-20T04:33:00.000-08:00

So Matt and I recently have been spending a lot of time looking for U2 tickets for the Atlanta show. I saw them back in 01 with Laura and some other kids, Matt has never seen them and they're his favorite band. He has every album/CD and we listen to them all the time. Anyway, we found a sweet lady that sold hers to us for face value, which is unheard of. We couldn't find any that were less than $200 and we only paid $50 for ours and they were on the floor.

So Saturday morning we got up early and headed down to Atlanta to get in line to be one of the first people to get on the floor and get a spot. We got there at noon and someone was there marking everyone's hand with a number for your place in line. I was 231 and Matt was 230. We were all set. We waited all day and met really cool fans and Matt and I had the best time.

Finally it was time to get in line. We were sooooo excited. You could just feel the crowd's excitment. Everyone loved this band as much as we do, if not more. So we finally get up to the line and they scan our tickets to go in and the scanner made a funny sound. The lady looked at our ticket and said, "these are for last night's show, you'll have to leave." I immediately threw my face in my hands and began to sob. We were so humiliated and shocked. In our excitment we had never checked the date!! We tried desparately to find tickets from the radio stations set up out side. Finally we waited in line for another ticket release, as U2 does at every show. In that line we were numbers 20 and 21, but when the tickets came available some scalpers at the front of the line bought most of them and were selling them for a least $250 a piece.

So we came home with our tails between our legs. We are determined to find tickets for Charlotte in December. The good thing is we're not out any money because Bank of America paid me $100 to drive to Columbia for a meeting, so we have our money back. By the way, please DO NOT PICK ON US about this one. We're so sad it would really hurt our feelings. Oh and I did do this back in college for a Phish show I went to with Allison. I bought tickets for the wrong night, but we were still able to go in. Not for a sold out U2 show though. I'm sure we'll look back and laugh one day, but it's just so hard to get tickets for a show.

Anyway, that is my sad story. :(

Before the Game

2005-11-07T19:39:00.000-08:00

Before the Clemson game we all went to see Allison's brother and his wife and their two little girls. Of course I couldn't resist. Here are a few shots from that fun time. Isabella is the older one and Elissa is the younger. Leah, if I spelled their names wrong let me know. I'm not the best at that.

More Home Coming Pics

2005-11-07T19:23:00.000-08:00

Home Coming

2005-11-07T18:05:00.000-08:00

This past Saturday Allison, Chad, Matt and I went to the Clemson/Duke game together. It was so awesome and very sad that is was the only game Matt and I have gone to and will go to all season. I still say my blood is orange. Honestly, it wasn't the same without Laura and Brooke there to bring on the extra fun, but we still had a blast!

Throughout the day I had constant reminicsings of our many walks from the gheto house to the stadium and of the many game days I had to work at the bagel shop and then come meet you guys on the hill. I love my life now and wouldn't change it for anything, but I do miss being with everyone at Clemson. If anyone wants to share any fun stories in the comments, I would love to hear them.

These pics should take you back. I hope you guys enjoy!! Blogger is being bad so is these couple of pics post then I'll do some more. I've tried three times tonight already.

the lazy girl

2005-11-01T15:06:00.000-08:00

Not too much going on right now, but I got this fun shot of Kenah being herself. Don't let her fool you, the first smell of food or trick or treaters and she is back to life. Actually this pic was taken after our little visitors so I imagine she's either worn out or being lazy. Well, Matt is trying to sell his downhill bike from this past season. Any takers?? It's only $2700... This shot with Kenah and the bike was taken after a long session of Matt's maticulousness trying to get every possible angle of that danged bike for the internet postings. He had me in all kinds of positions making sure to get every angle. Boys are so funny with their toys.

beautiful bride

2005-10-31T16:21:00.000-08:00

Well, my dear friend Katie Spears from church is getting married. Her husband to be is Joe and he is awesome! Let me add that her ring is quit beautiful. Well, Katie asked me to be in her wedding and I am so excited. Anyone that knows me understands that all I need is an excuse to get dressed up and I'm there. Sometimes I can be such a girl, but honestly Katie is going to be so amazing on her day and I'm just honored she thought of me to share it with her. These pics are from our adventure to David's Bridal where we had way too much fun. These are some of the dresses she tried on and I was there with the camera of course. I believe it's an extension of my body now. Anyway, hope you all enjoy. Oh, and now I will have 3 friends with a June anniversary. Katie will be June 16th and joining Laura for June 25th and Carrie for June 12th. Cool stuff!

Trip to the Fair

2005-10-30T12:43:00.000-08:00

Recently, Matt and I went to the Anderson County Fair with Allison and her new man Chad, who is quite wonderful I might add. The Carnies frecked Matt out a tad. I don't think he's ever experienced a fair the way Allison and I did growing up going to the State Fair in Columbia. Anyway, we had a great time with Chad and Allison. It's great to have another couple to do fun stuff with. Here are some pics from that adventure.

2005-10-29T07:09:00.000-07:00

Ok, I'm not sure what happened, but I believe this blog thing is working now. Here's a recent pic of Matt and I on our anniversary trip to Savannah. If this works then I'll do much more.

Savannah Trip

2005-10-29T07:06:00.000-07:00

Well, we've celebrated our first anniversary. Honestly, it feels like Matt has just always been here. Very comforting. I love being married. Anyway, here are some fun pics from our trip. We also went out to Tybee Island, which I highly recommend. Matt and I got to do some seakyaking for free. There were some training would be instructors who needed some people to be their fake students. Since it was my first time in the water EVER, you can imagine my demise. Anyway, I was a trooper and if you don't believe me just ask Matt. Ok, will blog again soon. :)