Wedding...10/10/10

So...SURPRISE!  Ryan and I became husband and wife (or wife and husband!) on Sunday, October 10th, 2010 in Galena, IL!  It was just the two of us, and we couldn't be happier with our decision to elope.  We got everything great about a wedding day and avoided everything not-so-great (i.e. stress!).

We arrived at The Goldmoor Inn on Friday afternoon around 4:00 after a stunning fall drive down Highway 52 from Rochester.  We entered our suite ("The Elizabeth") and fell instantly in love!  After a couple of hours, we decided to call down to attend dinner...late.  The staff found a table for us and the food was, as expected, amazing.  Right at sunset we were able to get a picture of the two of us overlooking the Mississippi River.

We woke up early on Saturday for what was to be a full day...and night!  We wanted to get in to downtown Galena for some shopping before meeting with our photographers at noon, but we failed to realize what an "additional 30,000 people" would do to traffic!  Galena was celebrating its "Country Fair" which brings in the masses from all over the region for craft shopping.  So, we decided to drive UP the hill and visit Grant's Home.  We got a few nice pictures and enjoyed a great tour of the home (Vinetta was our guide and she was GREAT!).  After our tour, we headed back to the Goldmoor to meet with Kris and Scott Kelly, the photographers that would take our pictures the next day.  They are so awesome!  After our meeting, we got called down to the Spa for our side-by-side couples massage!  IT. WAS. GLORIOUS!  As my masseur left the room, he reminded me to "enjoy the time the two of us have together, because our wedding day would NOT be about us as soon as guests start to arrive..."  I had to chuckle.  Our wedding day was going to be about US!  After our massages, we sat in the jacuzzi tub for a while before calling a cab to come take us downtown.  We didn't feel like fighting the traffic and finding a parking spot ourselves...so we didn't.  :)

Saturday night couldn't have worked out more perfectly if we had planned it!  We stopped in to the newly opened Galena Brewing Company, sampled some beer, ate some food, and took the tour.  The brewery is just great and the people are fantastic! We were able to get our picture back behind the bar on top of some of the brewing equipment.  After our awesome time at the brewery, we headed down Main Street and stumbled across a small acoustic band setting up at the Cornerstone.  It was still early, so we were the only ones in the bar.  Once people started trickling in, we had such a blast!  We were dancing and chatting with all the well-wishers once everyone learned we were getting married the next day.  The band played us a song (Comes a Time, Neil Young) so we could dance and everyone was just so nice!  We colored a dollar to hang up behind the bar and just had a wonderful "pre-wedding reception" with all the fun people in Galena! 

Sunday was the BIG DAY!  I'm not going to say that every couple should get married the way we did, but it was just perfect!  The bride (and groom!) woke up and maintained a stress-free, non-rushed demeanor all day!  We got to enjoy EACH OTHER on the day we became our own little family.  No one was pushing or pulling us to do anything.  It was complete bliss.  I started getting my hair and make-up done around 10:30 and the photographers (S.Kelly Photography!) showed up around 11:00.  I got to watch my terrible shows on Bravo for an hour (hair/make-up got done in our room!) while getting beautified.  Ryan got kicked out, so had to come back in (we had to coordinate our room exchange so he wouldn't see me!) to get himself ready.  After he got all ready, we did the room switch again so I could get in my dress and get this day going!  Ryan waited at the bottom of the staircase for me and he was stunned when I got half-way down the stairs and told him he could turn around.  There is something so special about that first time a groom sees his bride.  I, of course, started to cry.  After a few minutes of pictures, we went to the location Ryan and the pastor picked out for the ceremony.  It was a beautiful spot behind the dining room overlooking the river.  A rooster crowed a few times pre-ceremony...which was awesome!  Ryan and I walked in together and the short civil ceremony lasted about 10 minutes.  Pastor Dawn was so great and as Ryan and I spoke our vows to each other (we wrote our own!), we had both the pastor AND our photographer crying right along with us.  After the more formal vows and the signing of the marriage license, we were pronounced husband and wife and THAT was the happiest moment of my life to be sure.  After the ceremony, we had the rest of the day to travel around the area and take stunning pictures.  Which we did.  Kris joked that she wouldn't be able to share many of our pictures with other brides because they simply won't be able to get the shots we were able to get.  Again...another reason to just elope!  When we got to Grant's Home for some pictures, our tour guide from the day before came out to greet us and wish us luck on our marriage!  We went in to downtown Galena and received cheers from the crowd as Ryan spun me in the middle of the street.  We also visited the brewery again and received more cheers from the patrons as we posed for some pictures there.  After about 6 hours of pictures (yes, you can get 6 hours of pictures of just the two of you...have I mentioned how great eloping is!?) we had dinner in the Gazebo at the Goldmoor, had some wedding cake, soaked in the jacuzzi with some champagne, and fell asleep.  We were pooped.


Our wedding day was exactly as it should have been:  About US and our marriage.  I wouldn't change a thing about how we chose to get married.  Now...it's time to party!

Updates on Life

Work:  Is awesome!  I've been serving as our Assessment of Student Learning person since August and it's going great!  I've helped develop some campus-wide rubrics and just submitted a proposal to a major annual conference.  Some weeks are super busy and some are less so, but I'm starting to find some balance. 
School:  Is progressing.  I'm taking a statistics course (it actually might stick this time!) and an online educational psychology course.  Both classes are great, lots of work, but great.  I'm trying to read as much assessment and motivation literature as I can for my dissertation, but need to get cracking on that a bit more.  In general, I will be looking at whether course assessments can increase student motivation (with the assumption that more motivated students don't just perform better...they actually LEARN more than non-motivated students).  I've become a total assessment geek.  
Wedding: Is coming along.  That is all there is to say about that for now.  :)
Travel Plans:  Ryan and I are REALLY hoping to get to spend some time overseas this summer.  It's ludicrous that we have 3 months "off" over the summer and have yet to really go anywhere!  I'm over letting "life" get in the way of traveling!  No more excuses.  We're thinking Prague.

I will still shop at Target.

Poor Target.  As I learn to be more critical in my viewpoints, I wanted to do a little (VERY little!) research on the reasoning behind WHY so many people (mostly quite socially liberal, like myself) are boycotting Target.  Here is what I have deduced (hah...deuce). 

Target Corporation (yes everyone, Target is a large business in the business of making money!) donated a large sum of money (something like $150K) to MN Forward.  MN Forward is a bi-partisan organization committed to creating jobs and lowering taxes on businesses.  Target is a business and certainly would support an organization whose agenda includes making them (potentially) more money.  With me so far?

MN Forward endorses Tom Emmer for governor because he supports their agenda more than the DFL candidate, Mark Dayton.  The end. 


Target is NOT anti-equality!  Target is pro-lower business taxes!  Assuming that one issue is even remotely related to the other is erroneous.  It's unfortunate that the candidate supporting lower business taxes is also socially conservative, but that is all there is to say about that.

Target also provides millions of dollars in grant money to local non-profits and organizations promoting education and equality.  A few of the local and national organizations that receive money from Target are:
The Hispanic Scholarship Fund.
The American Red Cross
The United Negro College Fund
Local School Districts
The Minnesota Orchestra and Walker Art Center...

Anyway.  It is possible that I too am uninformed, but it seems to me that Target simply donated money to an organization.  Which they do a lot of.  Lay off Target. 

So excited!!!

Ryan is coming to Rochester!!! We signed the lease on a cute little house SUPER close to downtown and I can't wait for the awesome that this summer is going to bring!!! We have a huge backyard with a fire-pit within walking distance to the Honkers ballpark, Mayo Civic Center and the Riverside Concerts, recreation trails, and Downtown!! I'll have about a 4-minute drive to work and the house has a dishwasher! We are so excited to start making this little house our home.

Winter FUN and Winter FAIL!

Winter FUN:
Ryan and I spent a perfect long weekend over Valentine's day up at his family's cabin in Pequot Lakes, MN. It was so nice to just be away from everything with my Love and a little gin! :) We exchanged Valentine's gifts: Ryan really outdid himself when he presented me with a beautiful necklace from Tiffany's!! I've never had jewelry this nice and I can't wait to wear it every day! We spent some time in Nisswa for the Winter Jubilee (Pirate themed!!!), ice fished, watched movies, played PS3 and Monopoly, did some shopping, and stuffed our faces with Rafferty's. All in all it was awesome.

Winter FAIL:
I had to get back to Rochester on Tuesday for a Staff Development Day (I was presenting a session so it was doubly important that I got back...). We left the Cabin on Monday morning so I could get back to Worthington to pick up my car and then drive the 2.5 hours back to Rochester before it got dark. We were executing the plan perfectly when a "ground-blizzard" picked op and turned Interstate 90 into a sheet of ice! I was uncomfortably driving 40 MPH on the interstate allowing for everyone and their grannies to pass me, when I noticed one semi behind me creeping up awful fast and begin to lose his back-end. I steered onto the shoulder to avoid a catastrophe but decided that enough was enough. I found the closest hotel and got a room for the night. Longer story short: I made it back to Rochester for my presentation with both myself AND Stella in one piece. Moral of the story: Long term relationships are WAY easier in California. :)

Busy busy busy...

Just an update: I'm busy!

Teaching 15 face-to-face credits on top of TAKING 10 doctoral credits 1.5 hours away was a bad call. Not that I'm freaking out or anything because I'm totally not, but I need to make a mental note that I should be teaching as many credits as possible ONLINE! Although online teaching requires more "busy" work, I'm not required to hole-up on campus (aside from office hours of course...) for significant chunks of my day.

I'm hoping for some schedule changes for Spring 2010 - more online teaching. We'll see what my lowly standing in my department will yield me in terms of that. :)

New Toys, New Schedule, New Perspective

New Perspective Bit

I'll admit that I'm a spaz. I'm a stereotypical first-born child with Type-A Personality. I want what I want WHEN I want. Patience is not a virtue I endorse nor do I believe that delaying gratification makes you a "better" person. Delay until I'm dead? No thanks. That being said, I'm going to TRY (I might and likely will fail miserably...) to function better when things don't go my way. Not only do I have double-whammy threats to my future cardiovascular health (bad genes and the worst of all personality types), but I also really want to make sure that I don't make the upcoming school year worse on our long-distance relationship situation. He's got another year there and I'm here. That's the way it is. I won't get to see him when I want to. We're both super busy. That's it. That's the way it is. Summer was awesome and now it's not summer anymore. That's the way it is. Whining and worrying and catastrophizing and over-thinking isn't going to expedite the ideal situation. So...wish me luck on this new endeavor. I'm going to need it.

New Toys Bit

I got a new TV, new laptop, and a new phone!!!! The TV (32" LG) has been on my list for a long time and I am very happy to finally be a member of the 21st century. The iPhone was kind of on the list for a while. It has, thus far, been pretty nice having my work email and calendar updated in a portable fashion. Now (and maybe this isn't the best thing) I'll always know where I need to be and when I need to be there which will probably be a life-saver this fall... Also, my new laptop (a Sony Vaio...it's red) is pretty effing sweet. My old one was the victim of an unfortunate accident (the perpetrator will remain unnamed) and the power cable got ripped out of the motherboard. I called a few places for repair estimates and got laughed at a few times...so I took the money I would have spent to repair a two-year old laptop and put it toward the new one. Needless to say, but I really enjoyed spending my first "summer-class" paycheck. Now I return to reality and spend the other two paying off my credit cards! It will be an amazing feeling to have $0 in credit card debt.

New Schedule Bit

The new perspective I need to take will likely make my first semester/year as a full time instructor AND a full time doctoral student bearable. I simply can't let myself get stressed out over things that I have no control over...I'll have PLENTY of things I do have control over to stress out about. Here's my schedule this year: Monday I have class in Mankato. Tuesday I teach all day at RCTC. Wednesday I have class in Mankato. Thursday I teach all day AND have class in Mankato. Fridays I have "off", but I use that term loosely. I don't think I'll have much time to greet myself coming and going. I'll have all the usual work I have during the school year PLUS three classes worth of doctoral level work! Some would call me crazy and I'm starting to think they're right. However, I can't really say "no thanks" to a free doctorate degree. I love my job.