Merry Christmas

img via {fine little day}

I hope all your holidays are wonderful. Ev and I will be hunkered down enjoying the snow, home cooked meals for two, secret gift wrapping, midnight candlelit services, christmas brunches, yummy drinks, reruns of the all time favorite christmas movies, and doing absolutely nothing wrapped up together on the couch for as long as we want to stay there. See you in 2010 my dear friends!

Rock Climbing I Do's

I think I might have just found the coolest wedding ever.

A little background story- Evan and I are both climbers. We both got into the sport while working on an adventure tour up in Alaska together {where we met - awwww}. Later we kept it up in various gyms and any climbing spots we could get to throughout the lower 48. Those gyms during a cold Portland winter would become the scene of the crime, where after being seperated for a year the boy would shamelessly try to flirt with me to win me back {as if he had to try}. I in turn did my best to act uninterested while trying desperately not to go flinging off the wall, dumping my ungraceful body onto the crash pad 10 feet below. It's hard for a woman to keep her dignity sometimes.

Needless to say, while this wedding is almost too much {a zipper through her dress for the belay loop?!} I have to give it to them for doing whatever the hell they wanted to do. And not worrying about it.

Go cute rock climbing couple. Can we be friends?

all images via {Grazier Photography}

It's wintery white, and we're very snowed in.

Western North Carolina is having major issues with this winter storm and huge masses of power outages. While the snow fell heavily on the streets outside and the sky turned dark, we were wrapped up cozily inside with warm soup and down blankets. Luckily, we were some of the few that got our power back yesterday afternoon while thousands still wait until Monday. Sometimes I wish we had a house big enough to fit everyone without heat inside and give them fresh baked cookies and mugs of hot chocolate. But for us? After a day of unsuccessfully trekking through the Asheville streets looking for open coffee shops and trying to get the truck out of the drive way, we decided to hunker down and wait it out. The plus side? It's pretty romantic, and gorgeous outside.

But in not too long the pub theater WILL be calling my name, and I'll be outside with a shovel desperately trying to dig out to answer it.

Ohlala! Cosabella Lingerie Contest

A.Moutain.Bride is hosting an awesome give away from Cosabella, featuring their most popular lingerie pieces, the Ever-babydoll- a $118 value! Yay for us girlies!

Go now, enter enter enter!

Santa Claus Woman Bride

It's snowing outside. Like really dumping snow, sticking to the ground, covering the car snowing. That is SO cool.
You know there's a website called tackyweddings.com? Not only that, but there was a Santa Claus wedding. Oh no? Ohhh yes. I'm really just in awe of that train. And their cake.... although I have no understanding of what it was supposed to be.

via {tackyweddings}

Don't get me wrong, I'm not making fun... I just really can't believe it. I hope they laugh about it now, years later looking back at their crazy festive wedding style. I hope they do.

The Garter Girl: Featuring my Garter!

Julianne Smith over at Garter Girl Blog just posted the nicest, sweetest, most down to earth feature about my wedding garter. That woman is the best, I had all sorts of warm fuzzies inside while reading this. To check it out and see a couple little never seen before pictures, go visit her blog and admire all the hand created gartery goodness.

Wrap it up.

Did I tell you my computer broke? First, my previous pup tripped on the cord and it fell off the only place I could steal the neighbors internet (the back of the couch) and onto the floor. Twice. Then it fell off the arm of the couch about a year later. Three times. When the display finally broke it was a day to be thankful for. I love you dear sweet insurance company, thank you for the money to buy a beautiful new mac book. Unfortunately, moving means I have to be patient and wait until we're settled to use your money. So until then, I have to be nice and share the only other computer we have, which didn't happen yesterday when E had to take it to work.

I'm a happy girl this morning with an amazingly good caramel latte to sip on and this jewel of a computer sitting on my  lap. God, I sound so lame.

Today I'm going to do a Christmas craft. How many days until Christmas and I still have to get it in the mail in time? Please tell me I'm not the only one that procrastinates these things. Anyway, if it's successful you might see an etsy store in the making. If it's not... well, you probably wont hear about it. Ever.

By the way, you know how wrapping paper is so damn expensive? I don't use it {usually}. My sister gave me a present one year wrapped in old maps, I probably gave her one using a brown paper bag. Regardless, I'm sure you can guess which one I use now. Plus, it makes whatever you're giving look way more impressive, which can be a very good thing. Of course there's also just fabric or a boat load of ribbon over parchment paper.

images found {here, here, and here}

Then again, if you guys are any better about this than I am, your presents are probably already wrapped and under the tree. Which means --- I've really got to get busy now.

The Coolest Studio Ever

My portraits as a child? Well, remembering that they were taken in the 80's, they were usually filled with puffy sleeves and lace on colorful flower print dresses and poses that included leaning against the studio prop with my chin resting on my hand, smiling sweetly with my curled bangs and crazy crimped hair. These kiddie portraits -- totally awesome. How I would love three simple things: a Canon DSLR with all necessary lenses and equipment, an amazing downtown studio space, and time to create these awesome props for all my rad clients and their attractive looking offspring. A girl can dream, right?

By the way, this photographer is really amazing. I stumbled across her page while searching for what's in a photographers gear bag, and got hooked on her work immediately! To see more of this Alice + Tigerlily shot you can head over to Nicole Hill Gerulat's blog: A Little Sussy.

Confessions of a Blogger

Sorry I was MIA yesterday. For some reason I've had trouble putting posts together lately. It's exciting to be in a new city and getting ready to move into a new home, but it's also been surprisingly hard.

I've always been the type of person who was constantly on the move since high school. Since the early spring when I graduated I've moved about every 6 months consistently. That's a lot of moving in the past years, but I've always looked forward to it. Sure, it was often lonely and definitely a challenge to save any money at all, but I was having adventures. This move for some reason, although I'm so happily married and have what I was moving away from or back to for so long, has been one of the hardest so far. Maybe it's because I've done it so much already, maybe it's because I haven't found a job to replace the one I left in Tucson, maybe it's because I'm alone all day and a little {I'll admit} semi-jealous of the new amazing job opportunity my E. is able to have a huge part in. Maybe it's because I need to find my own, and since I can't pursue the things I really want right now I feel overwhelmed and discouraged by that.

Asheville is an amazing place and it's been so good to be with our friends we love and have missed so much. But I also unfortunately have the bad habit of getting swallowed up by the negative and letting its sticky claws drag me down into a dark place, which of course inevitably reflects on the words I write and the passion behind them. So if it's been a little dry lately, those are the reasons why.

It's so much better to focus on the positive --which in times that are hard {i.e. wedding planning, long distance relationships, family drama, financial stress, or in my case: moving} is a choice everyone has to make or not. When you're feeling weak it's harder, but so much more important to make the effort.

So, the lovely things in my life I'm blessed with:

Having a wonderful amazing caring, supportive, and very attractive husband.
Being young, in love, and newly married.
Being in a new artsy, eco friendly, outdoorsy, beautiful new place.
Getting to move into an awesome little home soon with space around it to breathe.
Having an amazing family, even if they're far away.
Having enough money to pay the bills and food to eat.
Having wonderful friends who want to share their home and are always there for us.
The fact that my little car, Jetta Jr., has not broken down in the last 6 months.
The support and community of our extended family and amazing friends spread all over the states and various countries.
That after years of struggle, I finally know that I can be healthy and feel good, and what I have to do to get there.
That I have my camera and this computer to create art.
That I have this blog and amazing people who read my words and enjoy sharing inspiration and encouragement with one another.

Now onto enjoying things, enough about this! Soon to come: what I come up with to fill all of my insane amounts of free time.

You're all the best :)

Mountain Details of a Real Wedding

This wedding celebration was captured by the awesome couple behind Tinywater Photography. Julie and Alexis had eloped to Big Sur previously {following the tradition since both their parents had eloped} and threw this party for their family and friends afterward. It took place in Cornerstone Gardens in Sonoma, and was of course eco-friendly, outdoorsy, and totally laid back.

For all of you mountain brides, look! Wood boxes, moss, saplings, flowers mixed with herbs, mason jars, rocks for seating cards, and loads of simplicity. Everything we love, and it looks amazing, doesn't it?

find more of this pretty party {here and here}

*oops! go figure I'd feature this just a couple days after green wedding shoes. but you can check out her great post about it here!

Etsy Love: Salty and Sweet

I know, I know... two in a row. I promise I'll be posting some very pretty wedding stuff soon, but I had to share this new etsy find. This seller is clever, and I like what they do. Enough to probably go buy myself a house warming present. Ranging from politics, pinups, to pretty little animals, go check it out at the Etsy store {Salty and Sweet}.

Etsy Love: Woodroots

I don't care what anybody says, I love these. I'd wear them in a heartbeat.

And I'd put this on my wall, especially if it was green.

via {woodroots}

The Day After: Brides on Horses

Oh goodness. Let me introduce to you this incredible day after session of Kate and Matt, taken in New Zealand by the talented artist Tracy Turpen. These are probably some of my favorite photographs {and elements included in the photographs} that I've come across so far. And did I  mention Tracy is from South Carolina? Oh yes, I have a ton of talented photographer neighbors out here in the East.

This session made me wonder though, instead of a day after session why can't someone do a year-after or even a few-years-after session? Okay, I admit trying to squeeze into your wedding dress 10 years down the road to recreate photos could be a little desperate or weird, but why not a year or two? Seriously, I'm asking. Or maybe I'm just wanting to wear my dress again and lay on a horse.

Has anyone ever postponed their day-after shoot to a longer period of time?  If not, would you do it?

See more here, here, and here.

Snow Day

And so winter begins, with the first flakes falling from the early morning sky..

{leslie*thompson}