Wedding Week

Better late than never right?! Truth is, the camera card that held these pictures was left in Florida after we came back from our honeymoon, and I didn't get it back until about a month ago. Saturday marks 8 months since I married that handsome hunk of mine. (I know, 8 months already?!!) Time is flyyyying. And I am loving every minute of this awesome gift, that is marriage. :)

Here's some random pictures from the week of the wedding... 

For weeks, I was walking around my house in my wedding shoes trying to break them in. How awful would it be to get blisters on your wedding day from unworn shoes?! Yikes! 

 The girls had their bridesmaid shoes sent to my house, so when they arrived we put on our shoes and walked around for a while. ;)

The amazing, Anna Beasley. I tell her all the time that without her, my wedding would have been crazy! Not only did she make 8, oooh so delicious, cheesecakes for the rehearsal dinner, She also single handily made almost all of the bridesmaids dresses. I don't know much about sewing, but pretty much, I gave Anna a dress that I had found at J Crew online, and she recreated it, with no pattern. I don't think that's very easy to do. :) You cannot tell the difference what-so-ever between the J crew dress and the Anna dress. Their incredible. Not to mention she also created her own pattern for the adorable flower girl dresses as well.

Anyways, on with my bragging about Anna-- She also sewed a last minute vest and tie for our ring bearer a few days before the wedding, made a runner for the unity candle table the night before the wedding, did the bridesmaids hair, and did my hair for the wedding (which was also a completely last minute decision, I'm talking like 3 days before the wedding!) Seriously, I have no clue what I would have done without this girl! 

 oooooh my mouth is watering just looking at this picture! Yummy! 

My soon-to-be (now) sisters, who also helped with the cheesecakes. :)

"Many hands make light work" So true! I am so thankful for the help of these awesome people who helped with the cutting, tying and assembling of our programs! 

 Friday Morning, we had the bridesmaid luncheon at the Country Club of Orlando. (Reception site)

 Bridesmaids

Cute little bridal cookies! :) 

 The Mother's 

 Bridal Party

 Then Friday night, the Rehearsal and rehearsal diner!

 These are those incredible cheesecakes I was talking about! 

 My handsome man. And his last night as my fiance. :)

 We played the shoe game. And got a little spending money for our honeymoon for every question we answered correct. :)

 Prayer time

 My cousin, and Matron of Honor, Katie. :)

 My favorite boys.. My cousin, Daniel, Andrew, and brother Bryce. :)

 China Buddies! :)

 My Family. ;)

I'm hoping to blog some photos of our home, and life since this wonderful week soon...So stay tuned. :)

"The LORD has done great things for us, And we are glad."

Psalm 126:3

Old Threshers

It's become a tradition for me to spend labor day weekend at old threshers reunion in Iowa. Andrew's family has been going for years, but this was only my 3rd year. It's a fun filled weekend, full of old time farming machines and engines, antique tractors, horses, crafts, homemade goodies, and the list goes on... Basically, anything old timey or antique, they have it! 

 They bring in several groups for entertainment, one of which happened to be my favorite singing family, with the hottest banjo player around. ;)

We loved spending time with Andrew's grandparents, who always make it down for the reunion. Grandma brings along lots of yummy goodies... ":)

 Andrew and I's 6 month anniversary fell over the weekend. So on that day, we decided to reenact our wedding toast with Sarsaparilla's [root beer, for those like me, who have never heard of such a thing]

 Antique John Deere Tractor

 We rode in the engine of an old train that ran off of hot coals. It was amazing to see how it worked. And it felt good to be up there on a chilly day! ;) 

 We also took a turn riding in the caboose. 

The weekend ended with the horse pull. I'd never been to one before, and I'll say, I was incredibly impressed. Watching the horses as they tried to pull thousands of pounds was amazing. Not gonna lie, I did not like watching the one's who didn't work together, and struggled to pull the sled. But, when both horses worked together, they were able to pull the sled without struggle. It was such a neat expeirence! 

6 months ago today...

...this purrrrty ring found it's way to my little ring finger...

...and we said 'I do'....

And life could not be better. People say that marriage is great, but I never knew it could be THIS wonderful, and amazing, and fantastic, and incredible and magical, and well you get the point!

:) 

A little bit tropical in Nebraska...

Fact: Before I was married, I rarely ever cooked. I can remember 3 times off the top of my head that I made a meal, by myself, for my family. And one of those times I was forced to by a school project. So, needless to say, my poor, love-struck, newly wed husband was pretty much doomed when we got married, as far as good cooking and good food goes. Hey love conquers all, right?! :)

Anyways, for their 25th wedding anniversary, my parents went to Hawaii. They had lots of good food over there, but when they came back, my dad raved about one meal in particular. He then recreated it for us. And I helped...cut up the pineapple. ;) 

Since Andrew and I have been married, I've made it several times. It's one of our favorites, and it is super healthy, fresh and delicious! And easy to make, too! 

 You start with your fish. I personally like it best with Mahi Mahi. It's my favorite kind of fish because it doesn't taste very fishy, and it's just flat out good. That is how my dad originally made it and how he had it in Hawaii. But Nebraska hasn't caught on to the amazing-ness of mahi mahi yet, because I can't find it anywhere. So, I've been using frozen Tilapia. Honestly, you can made it with whatever kind of fish you want. My dad has even done it with salmon before. So whatever fish you prefer will probably taste good with it, but if you have access to Mahi, USE IT! it's the best. :)

 Next, you chop up your pineapple. I get the fresh pineapple they have already cut up in the produce section. It's much easier than buying an entire pineapple and it's still fresh. It needs to be the fresh stuff. Canned pineapple just doesn't taste the same. The amount of pineapple you use is pretty much to your liking.

 Next comes the Salsa. Fresh, all natural Salsa from the produce section. It must be fresh. Again, the stuff in the jars just won't taste right. Oh my goodness, I seriously could drink this stuff! It is my absolute favorite salsa in the world. Think, I'm exaggerating? I'm not. Ask my husband. I down this stuff!
I usually use about half the container for the two of us. {Partly because I want to eat the rest with chips.} ;) It all depends on how many you're serving and how much you want. Don't ya'll just love my measurements?! lol

The end product. Yummy, amazing, goodness.

My asparagus recipe is super complicated. ;) You wash and break off the dry ends, spread them on a heavy baking sheet, drizzle a little olive oil over them {and then toss them a bit to get them covered} sprinkle them with salt and cracked black pepper, and stick them in the oven! So hard, right?! I baked these at 400 degrees for just under 10 minutes. Bigger stalks will go for 10-15 minutes. You just want them to be tender. It's delicious. 

Lastly I cook my fish. Just drizzled a little olive oil, {you could use butter, too, if you prefer that} in the pan to keep them from sticking. Even though it's a non-stick pan, fish will still stick if you don't put something in the pan. Crazy little critters. You cook them till they're white all the way through  {2-3 minutes on each side for tilapia, other fish will vary depending on size and thickness}

And wahhhla! A perfectly healthy, amazingly good meal! I also cook up some brown rice, according to the package, and serve it with the fish and pineapple salsa on top. It brings that refreshing taste of the islands right to our little apartment in Nebraska. Enjoy. :)

Florida

Wow! We are overwhelmed by the responses to our last post! We had no idea so many people view our blog... and from all over the world!! So cool! {If you haven't commented on our last post... pleeeease go do it! It's so neat to "meet" everyone who reads our blog!} 

As promised I will try to blog more often. But probably not this week... haha :) Andrew and I have been in Florida since last wednesday. Andrew left last night to head back to Nebraska {sad day}, but I am here for another week. It's been so wonderful spending time with my family and friends. I was in a wedding Friday night of a friend that I used to work with, and it was super fun getting to catch up with all my coworkers, and introduce Andrew to them. 

After the wedding we went straight over to New Smyrna Beach for the rest of the weekend. {more pictures to come later} We were on the 11th floor, and had the most incredible view. It was awesome.

"Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad, let the sea resound, 

and all that is in it; let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them. 

Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy; 

they will sing before the Lord." 

Psalm 96:11-13

Attention Readers...

...It is time for you to identify yourselves! Whether you are a regular visitor, have commented before, just happened to find our blog, or are one of those lurkers who never comment, or leave anonymous comments-- now is your time to SPEAK UP! We'd love to know who you are! We get lots of comments from people asking us to blog more... and my cousin Kelley has been asking me to blog something for the past 3 days.. so here is my blog. {There will be more where this came from if you will participate in my fun little activity. :)}

If you'd be so kind... leave us a comment telling us... 

::Who you are::

::Where you are in the world::

::How you found our little corner of the web::

and just for fun...

::Something you enjoy doing::

Please?? :) 

Example--

My name is Kori

I am from Orlando, Florida... but I married this handsome guy {Pictured above :)} and moved to Seward, Nebraska.

I write this blog.

I love swimming, and traveling, taking pictures, anything that has to do with sports, and spending time with my amazing husband. 

Got it?! Okay... ready?? GO! 

Our Honeymoon

After our fairy tale wedding day, we set off on our first adventure together, to the beautiful island of St. Lucia for a wonderful week in the sun! I cannot say enough amazing things about our honeymoon, it was the most beautiful place I have ever been--pictures just don't do it justice. 

We had to leave leave our hotel at 4:30 am to drive down to Miami to catch our flight. We were so excited to leave, so the early morning didn't seem to phase us. :)

Hello, crystal blue water! :)

The main pool at our Hotel. You can walk right in from the pavillion restaurant if you'd like. The Pavillion was kind of the main restaurant, they had a buffet at each meal time.

The beach

Our First day, there was a mini market around the pool. Vendors from the island brought handmade items in to sell. It was really neat.

 

There were several fun beach activities we could do, sailing included.

Each night they had something going on in a little court yard by the pool. The first night was just a little cocktail party before dinner began at all the restaurants.

Catching the Sunset...and a kiss before dinner. :)

One day we took a boat around the island and went snorkling. Andrew had never been before so it was fun to teach him. We had SO much fun and the water was absolutely beautiful! We saw lots of tropical fish and got a really bad sun burn! 

Chillin' on the boat.

The resort had lots of daily activities and games for guests to participate in. Andrew really hit it off with this guy, named Ricky. He was the events coordinator at the resort and he liked to rope Andrew into doing everything, on the talent show night he wanted Andrew to go up on stage and do push-ups for his talent! And one day he got BOTH of us haggled into a couples pool relay. He was a funny guy.

Andrew's favorite thing he got pulled into was the 100 yard dash on the beach--which he won by a long shot. :)

We did lots of swimming, and lots of laying by the pool and lots of EATING! I could seriously do an entire post on the amazing food! Our resort was all inclusive, so we could go eat anytime we wanted as many times as we wanted--and believe me, we took full advantage of that! There was always food somewhere to eat at one of the restaurants and it was all SO good! 

 As part of the breakfast buffet they had an omelet and pancakes station.--This is Kirton. He made our breakfast every morning. He got to know us pretty well because Andrew would visit him several times at breakfast and he always ordered a HUGE omelet. And several pancakes. We were very entertained by him, and I think he was pretty entertained by us, too! lol

One of Andrew's breakfast plates. On average he had two 4 egg omelets, 7 to 8 pancakes, a couple pieces of bacon, 2 fruit smoothies, 2 yogurt cups and several glasses of some kind of juice.

They had a open flame pizza kitchen that had pizza all day long. So if we ever wanted a little snack, we could always go grab some pizza! 

Each night we got to dress up and go out to dinner. It was fun after a day on the beach to get to dress up nice and go out to a nice dinner with my new hubby. :)

Before Eating dinner at Neptunes-- as Restaurant that was open air and right on the beach. Talk about incredible! 

The resort had so 7 different restaurants that were open for dinner at night, and as a bonus we could take a shuttle to one of the 2 other Sandals Resorts on the Island and enjoy one of there restaurants! Which, we only did once, because the restaurants at our resort were so good! They had places that served food from many different cultures, French, Japanese, Irish, Italian, and Mediterranean. Every place was unique and incredible delicious. It was so fun to be able to go into a restaurant and order a 4 course meal and walk out without having to worry about the price. {I'm weird and took pictures of all of our meals because they were so incredible! And pretty! I won't bore you with too many} :)

Neptunes-- Mahi Mahi with fruit salsa. SO good! 

 Our "blackanese" chef at the Japanese restaurant, Kimono's--Japanese food with some island twists, like grilled pineapple. It was SO good! 

As if the crystal blue water wasn't beautiful enough, watching the sunsets were even more beautiful! Our room had a great view and we loved watching the sunset each night. Sunsets are one of God's greatest creations! 

We made some amazing memories on our honeymoon, and look forward to making more as we start our new life together! Anyone looking for a great honeymoon spot or vacation, I highly recommend St. Lucia! :)