With This Ring....

Sooooo.... been gone for a while, almost a year to be exact. But i'm happy to come back with pictures from the happiest days of my life thus far, Our weddingmoon! Now the definition of a "weddingmoon" is a wedding and honeymoon in one, and that's what we did ( a little backwards, the honeymoon was the first 6 days then the wedding was on day 7) but we finally did it! After 7 years of up's, down's, and growth I'm so very happy to be Mrs. Darreal Paul Gay! Not really thrilled about the last name, but it'll grow on me, love you honey!

Anyway it's taken me so long to post these because I have soooooooo many pictures that the thought of blogging them was overwhelming. So at the idea of my lovely husband ( i have to get used to saying that) I'm going to show some of my favorites that have not already been posted on facebook, and then my favorites from wedding day!

First time EVER snorkeling, exciting, but a little scary....

first time ever snorkeling AND with the sharks AND without a cage to keep the sharks from eating us alive... exhilarating but REALLY scary!

My girls! (jen, i wish i could photoshop you in)

Groom's ready!

Okay, I'm READY!

Ceremony Area

Anxiously waiting.... Poor man, spends half his life waiting on me!

With this ring, i give you my world

The kiss that brought me to tears.... 7 years finally sealed with a kiss

What a wonderful day... what a wonderful WEEK! Ciobhon, JD, Jen, Brady, Glenda-boo, and Cindy; THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU! I hope each of you know how much we love you, and how much we appreciate your love and support! For those of you who couldn't make it, thank you for your well wishes. Lastly, for those of you who have been with us from day one we never could've gotten here without you so perhaps the biggest thank you goes to you!

The Beginning of a New Decade

I can't believe it's been a decade! I remember when it was 1999 and everyone thought as soon as the clocks struck twelve the whole world was gonna come to an end! People were at the stores buying canned goods and water and all but saying their last goodbyes, but look where we are now, we've made it through 10 years and looking back on them they sure have been 10 crazy ones. Life has changed so much! So this year, to celebrate making it to not just another fabulous year but starting hopefully 10 more great ones, we rung in the new year at the aLoft hotel on the National Harbor with another fabulously fun couple Mike & Monique... I unfortunately didn't take as many pictures i wanted but let me say this night never held a dull moment!

One of my many self portraits of the night

The ladies of the night (Monique & I)

My first kiss of the new year! Happy New Year!

This is most definitely my favorite picture of the night! Mike said i had the "beyonce" hair hump going on

Us ladies all snazzy in our black & gray dresses!

the cutest couple ever! probably the funniest too! This isn't the best picture of them but its the only one I had! They're still hot!

These four were the cake toppers for the night... They were TRYING to bust a move! It was all very frightening to watch... I wouldn't exactly call it dancing it really just looked like their bodies were moving without them knowing it... All i could do is shake my head, well and take a picture!

The next day we literally watched football ALL day long, but that night when we took a walk on the harbor to attempt to find some dinner (we were unsuccessful, the wait at every restaurant was way longer than my starving belly wanted to wait!) I came across this mural of the DC, MD, VA area. Its pretty cool although this isn't a really good picture of it, the wind blowing off of the water was way to cold so i couldn't stand there any longer and try to get a good picture!

Darreal wanted pictures of our room b/c he said it looks like it came out of an IKEA Magazine

View of some of the cute little shops on the harbor

You can see the Potomac river and the Woodrow Wilson Bridge in the background

Darreal in all his glory, Ohio State won the rose bowl so he wore his scarlet and gray (mostly scarlet) all day long the next day!

There you have it, we made it through our first Holiday season not in Ohio with our families. It was hard (i cried a couple times) but we did it together, and if i must say so myself we had a pretty good time! I wish everyone a blessed and prosperous new year, may you reach all your personal goals and have a great time getting there!

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

This year being my first year in DC for Christmas, I of course had to do all the traditional DC Christmas stuff! This mission placed me outside in the cold for 2 hours as i ventured into the city to see the National Tree, all the state trees, and any other Christmas decorations the district had to offer, BUT who better to do it with than my girls!

Jessie and I in front of the National Christmas Tree (aka the White House Christmas Tree)

The house and train set that went around the tree

Not a great picture but that is the back side of the white house right there, and one of the state trees on the right

the MASSIVE national tree! it really is beautiful if you get to see it in person

Washington Monument in the background

This firepit SAVED MY LIFE!!! i was trying to warm every part of my body from the heat was emitting. Pretty effective if i must say so myself, and i love fire so it was cool to watch it burn too!

These dedicated river dancers were out there gettin it in the cold! These kids (mostly girls) were all ages, from about 5 - 15 and they were so good! Bravo to them for braving the cold in their cute little dresses and tights and tap shoes.

More city decorations, you can see the capital in the background

To warm up we went to the Poste to get some much needed drinks and truffle fries (yummmm!) Unfortunately we never got that warm because we were sitting right next to the back entrance/exit and everytime the door opened we got a bitter breeze of 20 degrees air!

Glenda-boo joined us!! The trio of trouble right here :)

victoria & glenda; victoria had a few alcoholic beverages and was gettin a little rosey in the cheeks!

The former Alexandria Kimpton Sales team back together again!

After dinner and drinks of course we turn in to silly girls!

Victoria & I disturbing the presents under the Monaco DC's christmas tree

Oh Jess, yes i talked her into taking a picture with the fake cheeseburger doggie chew toy.

THIS is how hotel christmas tree's should look! It's so gorgeous!

Great times, with great friends! Kisses, thanks ladies!

Back to the E.L.

So the weekend before Thanksgiving we found ourselves back in East Lansing for the MSU vs Penn State game. As much as that game turned out to be not so much of a game, I could careless because I for the first time in YEARS got to do three things 1) be back in east lansing 2) be in spartan stadium and 3) see one of my best and greatest friends in the whole world and my most favorite couple in the whole world Jen & Brady!! After driving 10+ hours from D.C. to E.L. I was determined to have a great time, and that's exactly what we did!

Two and a half years later we finally get to be back together again!

SPARTY!!!

Opening Kick Off

The first touchdown of the game!! Unfortunately that was 1 of only 2 touchdowns we scored in the whole game, which would be fine if penn state didn't score 3 times as many as we did!

Oh how I love the drumline :)

The true state fans that stayed to the very bitter end!

The girls! Me, Dana, and Jen all at B-Dubs for some much needed catch up time!

The guys! Brady, Darreal, and John, back together again

Such a great weekend! I miss everyone so much, hopefully it won't be so long until we see each other again!