>Vows

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Below, I am posting mine and B's wedding vows. We wrote them ourselves and I really want to share them with you, reader. Thank you, for taking the time to see how much B and I love each other. We hope to forever live up to these words we promised each other 51 days ago. If you are getting married soon and feel a writers block when sitting down to write your vows, please just ask if you want to borrow or use our vows. Thanks.

B's vows to me:

Peace is a word rarely used nowadays in terms of already having attained, but Sarah, you give me peace. You give me peace of mind. Peace of stability. Peace in direction. I promise to give you the same. I promise to work with you for a life without regret. I promise to work with you for a life of peace, happiness, and success. Because as we become wedded, we must work together for everything we want. Love to me means that I will always be there for you. I will be there in sickness and in health. Good times and bad. And whenever you need a back massage before bed. I loved you immediately after meeting you. I love you even more now. And, S, I will love you forever.

My vows to B:

When e. e. cummings said "We are for each other", he had you and me in mind. I have waited for no one but you. After the first time you kissed me, I knew that you were going to be more than another boyfriend. You are my best friend, my soul mate, my life partner, and now... my husband. With you by my side, I stopped worrying about finding the right man, and instead focused on becoming the right woman. My life only gets better every time you say you love me, every time you hold my hand, every time you look at me, and every time you smile. Together we will share simple moments and remarkable ones, tears and laughter, pain and growth. We will have intimate negotiations, rather than arguments, and heartfelt listening, rather than stubbornness. My ultimate goal as you wife is to love unconditionally and remain united. We are a team ad we will be extraordinary together. I will love and support you always. I am a better person near you, and near you I will be all my life.

>the first family delima

>i am perfectly aware of family drama. i have watched my parents banter over what to do for thanksgiving and christmas and whose turn it is to see us (as in the grandparents). This year is the first year that a set of grandparents will not be pulling arms and convincing us to come "out" for the holiday. no, this year, it is with a new family on my end, being married and all.



my original point in writing this was to talk about something that happened this past weekend. however, i see it is already becoming bigger than the one isolated incident. it started several weeks ago when my mom mentioned a "family get together" with her dad and stepmom down in denver. i told her i don't work sundays and it should not be a problem and when i mentioned to to brendan, he said he didn't know if he would have to work. last week when i reminded brendan about the family event, he claimed i never mentioned it to him and that now he was committed to playing softball with his work league. i support him playing softball 100% and it was hard for me to be the middle man. i was not really excited to go see the family, but it would be the first time since the wedding that we all saw one another. brendan was holding strong and was really hating the idea of not supporting his team.

first, i e-mailed my parents to tell them that brendan had a game that he was not willing to miss and it was very important to him to play and that if we go down, it would just be me. well, my mom calls me back the next day and gives me a huge guilt trip about telling brendan how important it is for us to see our family and blah blah blah. i had told him that. he is not stupid. but here i am, monkey in the middle. i wanted to side with my husband, but i didn't want to hear about it for the next month about how we should have gone down.

brendan and i mulled it over for a good day and he finally decided to go with me and that we would stay with his mom and spend the next day with her. he missed his softball game. wanna know what he missed it for? an hour long photo slide show of my grandparents trip to alaska. it was so fun i almost woke up. yes, that bad.

we both know this will be one of many moments where we will have to decide between family obligations and personal commitments. it just sucks. we are married now. aren't we supposed to be able to make our own decisions now without the guilt of our parents? grrr...

back to how i began this whole thing. this will be the first year that my dad's parents aren't here for the really important holidays: thanksgiving and christmas. now that i work in a retirement community, i have been missing my grandmother more and more. in november it will have been one year since she passed. it was hard enough not having her next to my dad at my wedding. brendan's grandfather also passed in may. these moments of wanting lost time really show me how easy deciding whether or not to go to a family get together or play a softball game should be.

but we don't always do what we should.

>easy bliss

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i laughed so hard tonight that i cried. my abs got a great work out and brendan fell in love with me again all because i was blowing raspberries on his neck. so funny!

>a good cry

>i cried last night.

it was the first time in i don't know how many years that it was out of pure exhaustion. i have been working so much and hours that don't give me more than 6-7 hours of sleep at night that i just cracked all over brendan. i tried holding it back and thinking, nah...i don't need to cry. but at the same time, i almost wanted to cry. and then i did. brendan was just explaining something that was supposed to be funny and i fell apart.

it was one of the best cries i have had in a long time. i was sad because i missed brendan. i was sad because i don't get enough sleep. i was sad because i didn't want to watch dr. horrible. i was sad because i missed my mom. i was sad because i didn't know why i got another babysitting job. i collapsed.

and it felt great.

>butte and tulo

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I am proud to introduce our children: Butte and Tulo.

Butte is a 2 year old Aussie shep mix and totally the big sister. She picks on Tulo and tells us when he has done something wrong.

Tulo is a 1 year old Greyhound. He thinks he is the cat's meow and sometimes is dumb as a rock. Other times, be surprises us and is so smart we don't know what to do with him. There will be many BULO stories to come. Silly dogs. Here they are watching Brendan play softball. While it looks like they are behaving, they were really quite terrible. I had to take them home.

>36 days

>we have been married for 36 days now and it feels like 36 months. i think when that feeling of comfort and permanence is finally real, time stretches at the seams. this whole married thing is quite fitting for both of us. unlike myself, brendan has been living on his own for several years. i did the on-my-own-thing and found it is much cheaper to eat out of my parents fridge. it is a different feeling when you have to fill your own fridge. brendan was never good at that when he was by himself. he got by on cans of soup and frozen pizzas. now that he has a women in the house, his has graduated to home-made pizzas and mmm mmm good spaghetti. i, however, digressed into the current food rut from having a home-cooked meal nearly every night. needless to say, it sucks not having the money to buy the food to make gourmet stuff that i can brag about at work. not yet.

i do laundry twice a week. and not just one load, two and sometimes three if i do towels and sheets. i just can't stand the hamper overflowing. i let it top off and then into the wash it goes. brendan, on the other hand, would wear every garment once, maybe twice before considering doing the laundry. getting it done is not the hard part--putting it all away is. i already feel like i accomplished something when the hamper is empty, but quickly remember that only half the job is done. i am sure everyone feels this way, i am just getting used to doing it for two people. with my job, i don't even wear normal clothes everyday and the laundry is still full three days in because brendan might wear two outfits in one day (work-play). i used to be able to go two weeks before doing laundry for myself and only having one load of darks and one load of whites. when we have children, i know it will get three times as bad as it is now. and i did not say having children is bad--i want one, or two.

we have to share the remote. this does not seem to be too bad, especially on the days when i work all day and brendan works at night and he can watch ESPN while i am gone. then i have time for gossip girl and the hills and brendan's arguing ground hardly exists. i don't mind watching the rockies, except this time last year was way more fun. i also don't mind south park and the simpsons. but anything i like (gossip girl, the hills, AMNTM, reality tv anything...) he whines and whimpers for me to change the channel. sometimes i do, sometimes i don't. i love you, by the way. don't worry.

the best part about being married, so far anyway, is knowing that i have somewhere and someone to go home to. i know when i will be sleeping, sometimes what i might eat, who will greet me (along with butte and tulo), and what i will do the moment i get home (take a shower! make love! watch oprah! take the dogs to the dog park!) whatever it might be, it is home. brendan is my home. we are amazing together. i think i will post our vows we wrote next time. we are both very proud of our knack for words, especially in a moment like our wedding.

love easy.

>Three Trees

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Incredible Beauty.

>Two Trees

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As cliche as it sounds, I hope that Brendan are old trees. Trees with scars of memories, tears, beginnings, endings, friends gained and some lost. I was not thinking that when I took the picture that dons this page (yes, I took the picture for real). But now that I have a life partner, I can reflect on the the symbolism. These trees rest on the shores of Lake Erie in Cleveland, OH in a family-friendly park.

It is hard to believe that this trip ended over a year ago and to think I already knew that Brendan would become part of my roots. Good thing I found you, love.

>A Lapse in Judgement

>I never give out my personal information. Never, being the operative word. For one short second, possibly while on drugs, I broke my own rule. I can see the look on my father's face, shaking his head at me and scoffing at my inability to pay attention to red flags. When I go shopping and clerks ask me for my e-mail or zip code or phone number, I quickly ask if it is necessary (it is NEVER necessary) and kindly decline passing my information onto the technology drone that might steal my identity or send me outragous mail. This practice is not enough anymore as those drones are becoming more creative and persuasive in their skeeming ways. I contradict myself: I guard my heart with new people, but I give out my personal info to a stranger...??? I know what you are thinking and you have every right. Now, let me explain this rather embarrassing and almost life-shattering lapse.

I actually have no idea how life-shattering this could have turned out, but I am going to just assume the worst becase we already know I'm an ass.

"I need tutor for my son of seven in English language..." blah blah blah. I skim over this ad on the now tainted craigslist and quickly resond, desperate for some part-time something. I suppose that is the bottom line--I was desperate. And I digress...within 24 hours I received an e-mail stating in great detail how a "father" in Denmark needs a tutor for his "son" that he is sending to the states for a month. He said he would pay $50/hr and to send him what I think the total would be for a month. Skiping all the boreing details, I was FedXed a check two days ago for $3500 and was to wire or money gram the remaining $2900 to Marva McGibbon in Florida. My husband and I quickly got over our excitement when we took the check to the bank and had them verify that yes, it was in fact a fraudulent check. Of course, before I had received the check I had a few e-mail conversations with the "father" that seemed convincing enough and so much so that I had given him too much information--until I found an identical ad for someone's son in Austrailia the night I received the check. Wow. I was scammed. And here I was thinking all along that I was doing the right thing in withholding my information out in the public. For one minor second, I forgot that the internet is as pubilc as it gets.

At the very least, my husband and I learned a VERY big lesson within the first month of our marriage. I know this is happening to people all over the world as I write and hope that those under the sound of my typing can learn something as well before the pigs get dirty and start enjoying it.

(please, eat my cliches and enjoy it)