Commissioning

Tonight William commissioned as an officer into the United States Army. He is officially a Second Lieutenant and I'm officially an Army wife. To be honest, this is probably more important to both of us than his graduation, although one cannot exist without the other! We both take very seriously "our" calling to the military. William made this decision when he was a freshman in college and even then we knew it would affect both of us for a good majority of our lives. I take seriously the honor of being a military wife and more specifically an officer's wife. I hope that my education and devotion to my "position" will help me help others who I meet during our time in the military. I love William and I am so proud of everything that he is today. He is a wonderful man and is willing to step in harm's way for our country. Here are a few pictures from the ceremony:

Finally a 2nd Lieutenant in the Army!

The Wedding

So William and I are married. I already have one form of ID that says Peyton Stephens. We got everything moved into our apartment and storage unit in Dallas. It's a little "cozy" as William calls it, but it will be great until we have more definitive plans for our future. So the wedding week was crazy. Tuesday we picked up my dress, Johanna flew in and we had the bachelorette party. Wednesday we picked up William's surprise cake, went to the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, and then went to Armadillo Palace to hang out with some friends. Thursday was more "low key". We had Thanksgiving dinner with my mom and grandparents and then went to hang out with William's family. We went to watch the Uptown tree lighting that night. Friday was a whirlwind. We started at 10am at Sensia and then everything went from there. Here are my favorite pictures!

New Blog Address

We have a new blog address.... I'm not sure how streamline the changing process is, but it is wandpstephens.blogspot.com. I hope everyone is getting excited about Christmas! I'm going to start updating everyone on our married lives. There are lots of exciting things happening right now! William is graduating on Saturday and commissioning into the Army on Friday. Hopefully soon we will hear about his training dates.  He is also still looking for a job and is finally starting to get some interest from some people! Anyways more updates soon!

Apologies

Sorry I've been an uninteresting blogger recently.

Life has apparently caught up with me. I will be sure to post pictures after the wedding events! Only 9 days!

Etsy :: Gift Guides

Etsy :: Gift Guides
It's almost the holiday season and many of you have started thinking about Christmas present and the like!

I love Etsy... obviously. So I wanted to share their holiday gift guide! It is amazing! It has something for everyone and your gift will be completely unique, not to mention handmade or vintage!

Check it out! Trust me it's worth the clicking!

Blessings

William applied for Tricare today. His coverage starts on December 1st, which is GREAT! This means he has affordable medical coverage... and when I marry him, so will I! It's going to cost us around $180.00 each month which is a steal if you know how much cobra might cost me (in the range of $600/month for me alone). It also has good prescription coverage which means I'll be able to continue taking Humira for my RA. This has been a HUGE stressor for me. So I'm glad everything is falling into place. I'm going to see a new rheumatologist this week that is on both my upcoming and current insurance plans. I'll keep you updated! Now all we need is some sort of income and we will be set for life!

Oyster Tales

My uncle got jealous of my grandparents media attention so he had to get in on the action this week!

This week they let the oysters go!

A link to the full story

Original picture

One can only drool!

English rose ruffle dress by Lirola on Etsy

I love etsy!

Wedding Rings

So it's official... William and I now both have wedding rings! I guess that means we could elope...... ;)

Performance Art = Awesome

This performance depicts the German invasion of Ukraine during WWII.

It is simply stunning.

I love it even more because my love for cello ensemble is showcased for all the world to hear.

Much of the music is by Apocalyptica a Finnish cello ensemble that covers Metallic songs. If you like the music also check out villalobos who composed cello ensemble music with a similar vibe!

Scrapblog

Scrapblog is an amazing tool that allows you to create digital scrap books. I don't know about you, but I've never been able to finish a real scrapbook that I've started. This I can do though! It's a lot of clicking and dragging but it's completely user friendly. You can also make cards and books that can be ordered through their website at very reasonable prices. For the most part the designing is free. You can make layouts without spending anything as long as you search for the "free" design elements, which isn't difficult at all. If you scroll down to the bottom of my blog you can see how they make it easy to imbed your scrapblog into a website or post the link for it anywhere.

I forsee myself using this a lot in the future!

Autism Epidemic?

Autism Speaks, Press Updates, Autism Speaks Responds to New Pediatrics Autism Study Putting Prevalence at 1 in 91 American Children, Including 1 in 58 Boys

In my Autism seminar today, we were alerted to this news.

Prevalence is now 1:91 in American children! What the heck! 1:58 in boys. Soon enough every other boy is going to be diagnosed with autism!

What do you think? Is Autism an epidemic? Why have numbers increased? I'm writing a paper on my views and I'll post it when I'm done!

Things to think about and research if you are interested:

Vaccination schedules

Testosterone exposure in utero

Genetic implications

Institutional autism

My grandparents are famous!

Galveston Bay residents 'plant' new crop of oysters | Houston & Texas News | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle

My grandfather and neighbor, Greg Tate hanging oyster bags!

SAN LEON — Below the choppy gray waters of a small peninsula jutting into Galveston Bay, 200 mesh bags dangle, filled with shucked oyster shells and a whole lot of hope.

Six families, who each have bay-front homes with long wooden-plank piers, stuffed the bags with oyster shells. They then tied the bags to the newly rebuilt fishing piers and dropped them into the water.

These families are experimenting with “oyster gardening” — using old shells to provide the hard surface upon which oyster larvae can attach and grow.

This is one of several creative projects, paid by federal and state grants, under way to restore a small portion of the 8,000 acres of oyster reefs killed when Hurricane Ike buried them in sediment a year ago. Oysters are important to the Texas economy as a food and are also efficient filters that remove contaminants from the water as they feed. A single oyster filters 50 gallons a day.

The San Leon project has promoted a kind of communal bonding, as these neighbors try to reclaim the life they knew before Ike submerged their peninsula under several feet of water.

When Edwina and Marvin Peyton learned about oyster gardening from a Texas Parks and Wildlife e-mail, they were thrilled. They were just about finished restoring their home and 100-foot pier, and now there might actually be something they could contribute to the bay's restoration.

“It's been very educational,” said Marvin Peyton, as he pulled a mesh bag onto his pier to examine it. “I've had to learn about the sex life of oysters. Something I hadn't taken into consideration before.”

Oysters, for instance, can change their sex during stressful times so that they can produce more eggs. The eggs are fertilized in the water and then the larvae swim around until they find a hard surface where they can plant their muscular foot and grow.

Marvin Peyton pointed to the inside lining of a shucked shell where a juvenile oyster had cemented itself. It had grown from a brownish spot the size of a match head to almost 2 inches in diameter.

“If you don't know what you're looking for, you might not see anything but dead old shells,” he said.

A busy nursery

But oysters are not the only things growing inside there. Numerous tiny crabs and shrimp the size of a thumbnail scurry from the bag laid on the pier. About every two weeks, San Leon residents must raise the bags, rinse them and leave them in the sun to get rid of predators that might eat the babies.

“We want to re-establish the oyster reefs that used to be near our shore years ago,” said Greg Tate, another home- owner participating in the $92,000 project, which began at the end of June. “We see the new reefs as a foundation so that future generations can enjoy the bay.”

On Friday, the mesh bags — now filled with thriving baby oysters — will be used to seed artificial oyster reefs formed from tons of river rock dumped around the piers.

These reefs are being formed within 200 feet of residential piers, which makes them off-limits to commercial fishing.

Another benefit of an oyster reef could be improved recreational fishing, said Bill Rodney, an oyster restoration biologist in charge of the San Leon project.

“There's a lot of creatures living on oyster reefs that attract fish from sea trout to red drum,” he said.

But most importantly, authorities say, the oysters are critical for cleaning the water. “You can't lose that much biofiltration and not have a decline in Galveston Bay's water quality,” said Lance Robinson, a regional director for Texas Parks and Wildlife.

Another oyster restoration project is a 20-acre artificial reef recently created from nine bargeloads of river rock poured into East Bay — the hardest-hit area, where 80 percent of the reefs were smothered. In addition, nearly $3 million has been set aside to pay commercial anglers in May to rake their dredges over the buried reefs in hopes of pulling oyster shell back to the surface while also adding some artificial reef material.

Optimistic forecast

The artificial reef in East Bay was completed a week ago by spreading 13,000 cubic yards of river rock over 20 acres in 9-foot-deep waters between Port Bolivar in Galveston County and Smith Point in Chambers County.

“We're letting it sit to see what happens. We've already started to see some spat (small larvae) adhering to buoys that we have out there,” said Jennie Rohrer, an oyster restoration biologist overseeing the $720,000 East Bay project.

The Peytons, meanwhile, talk about catching a 24-inch red fish off their pier recently, while noting flocks of pelicans and a pod of porpoises have seemed to find plenty of food out there.

“I believe we can get a good reef going in two years,” said Edwina Peyton.

The details... part 1

So i started this blog to account for my wedding planning process. But I haven't talked a ton about wedding stuff... so I'm going to start over from square one.

William and I are getting married November 27, 2009.

We are getting married here:

The Courtyard on St. James Place

We are expecting around 240ish guests and have rented the entire space for the evening!

Our rehearsal dinner is on Wednesday at Escalante's near Memorial and the Beltway.

It's obviously Fiesta themed. I did the invitations myself on the computer. I got the fonts from an amazing website and then had them printed as postcards from this site. Inexpensive is an extreme understatement!

Our wedding invitations are from Pretty Penny. In terms of Houston paper stores.... this one is top notch. They carry everything from Crane and Co. to DIY. Ours are amazing and I'll try and get a picture up here soon!

Okay I promise this is the first of many wedding detail blog posts....

Up next... Attire!

From magazines to blogs... How to get your wedding fix!

It is completely necessary to drool over beautiful weddings at least once a day. If not more. You think I'm joking? I'm not. I'm pretty sure that even when my wedding is over in 51 days that I will continue to travel back to these sites over and over to see beautiful pictures of weddings and what is going on in the wedding world.

Here is my top ten list (in no particular order... because that would require a statistical evaluation of my love for them):

Wedding Bee This is the most comprehensive multi-view point blog that exists!

DIY Bride

100 Layer Cake

Martha Stewart Weddings by Darcy Miller

Twigs and Honey Amazing accessories

Style Me Pretty Okay I'll confess... this is my FAVORITE

Always a Blogsmaid Great for etiquette questions

Utterly Engaged (Note: we used their honeymoon columnist Katie to plan ours... she helped us a ton)

Houston Wedding Blog (or do a google search Wedding Blog + {your city} for other local resources)

Etsy Wedding I can't stress how amazing Etsy is... this is just one way to find inspiration there... visit their site for all kinds of amazingness!

Also Bride Tide has an amazing list of blogs that is a wonderful way to find new reading material!

Elegant and Modern Bride Close Their Doors

Yesterday I heard the news that Elegant Bride and Modern Bride Magazines are closing their doors. As my mass communication professor would say "Welcome to media convergence". These magazines used to be a few of the only sources for wedding inspiration that existed for brides (other than going to your cousin's, friend's, sister's wedding). They then found competitors in the blog world. So, how incredibly ironic is it that I first found out this news on a wedding blog. I think both the blog world and the print world are equally saddened by the news though. Blogs take their inspiration from magazines. I mean blogs are basically digital magazines or, like in my case, journals. Obviously there are very large differences. Brides (or let's face it, anyone who loves weddings) will no longer be able to sit on an airplane and thumb through a magazine happily passing the flight time. Places without internet connectivity won't have access to these new online "magazines". Also, most girls know how exciting it is to open your mailbox and see a wonderful new shiny magazine there for you to read!

So to continue with the irony... here are a few bridal blogs that have blogged about the closing of these magazines. Can these blogs ever replace their former printed relatives? I sure hope they figure out how!

Bye, Bye Glossies at Back Stage

Around the Wedding Universe at Always a Blogsmaid

See my next blog for a bunch of blogs that may be able to fill a little bit of the void in your lives!

52

Today marked the start of midterms... this means that only a few more assignments stand between me and marriage. It's funny how I measure my relationship in school work. This has happened several times:

1. Couldn't be serious until we survived our first semester of college.

2. Couldn't get engaged until we were at least juniors.

3. Couldn't get married until we both had our degrees... or almost!

Anyways... I'm finally realizing that this semester is my second to last. I've been getting this feeling like the end is near. For instance, my extreme lack of caring about my tests must be evidence that I'm almost done. Also, I'm itching to look for a job. I could do this now, but I need to wait to figure out what William's going to do.

Anyways back to midterms... my tests went well I guess. I always hate the tests that you can't guess how you did. And of course they are always the hard tests that you studied more for (or in my case the only one I studied for at all). My other test was incredibly lame. I may have had record time in completing it. I know it's not a race... but it makes the test more fun. I will say that my brain is working slowly recently. I think it's because I'm day dreaming about the wedding all day.

It's starting to feel so real. About half of the guests have responded... so I know that at least 95 people will be there when I get married. My bridesmaids are all starting to get their dresses altered... which means they are actually considering the fact they will be wearing them soon!

I'm starting to feel calm about the life after wedding situation. God has really given me patience. And I realize that I really need to give William the space he needs now so that we can both be happy later. He may want to get a job some where other than the chemical engineering industry. I think I'm okay with that... but I really wish he would stop picking the dangerous professions.

I'm doing hearing screenings on Friday at a local elementary school. I may have to wear my hazmat suit to the school due to the number of flu cases in Dallas. 11 deaths in the DFW area since August. That is incredibly too many. So many have been young children, elementary and middle school aged. Normal flu seasons prey on the very young and very old. Now, it's going after healthy kids. I'd say there is a pretty high chance of us all getting it.

After school on Friday, William is coming to visit. I'm hoping we will have a fun weekend full of just us.

On the to do list:

1. Dog park

2. Dallas Arboretum

3. State Fair of Texas

4. Movies? or the Redbox at Tomb Thumb....

5. Good food

Zipcar + Iphone

An iPhone gets Zipcar drivers on their way - USATODAY.com

I love stuff like this. This is so freaking awesome!

"The iPhone can do many things. Now it can even lock and unlock a car and start the engine.

Cambridge, Mass.-based car-sharing serviceZipcar this week launched an app that lets you locate and reserve one of its vehicles, unlock it using the iPhone's touch-screen and drive it off the lot.

"The iPhone is a pipeline for almost one-third of our members," says Luke Schneider, Zipcar's chief technology officer. "This is something they have been asking for."

While there are many iPhone apps for autos, most are focused on directions, traffic, roadside assistance and games. Zipcar's app is the first to control the operation of a car, which is why David Cole, chairman of the Ann Arbor, Mich.- based Center for Auto Research, calls it a "breakthrough."

"Once you have this kind of electronic ability in a cellphone, there's no end to the type of technology you could bring to cars," he says.

How it works

Zipcar operates mostly in big urban areas, in 13 major cities and 120 university campuses. Members pay a $50 annual fee plus around $7 an hour to rent a car for a few hours, including gas and insurance.

To reserve a car, Zipcar offers telephone or Web-based tools. Now, a reservation can also begin from the iPhone. The transaction is completed with a map and directions to the nearest Zipcar parking lot.

Once there, Zipcar members find their car by using the iPhone to honk a virtual horn, which in turns triggers the real horn on the reserved Zipcar.

Next: Swipe the membership card over the dash to get access to the car keys, which are left in the car but are powerless without the authorization.

Once the member card has been swiped, Zipcar members can use the virtual iPhone to unlock the car doors and drive away for the duration of their trip.

"When you look at the app, it looks just like a car key," says Jim McDowell, vice president of BMW's Mini division, whose vehicles are used by Zipcar. "To give you the ability to get into a car with one touch on an iPhone is really cool."

Schneider made this work with basic cellular technology.

"The app uses the same wireless network that keeps the Zipcar fleet connected," he says.

A little black box Schneider calls the Zipcar M200 — the "brains" of the car — sits in all vehicles in a hidden location, controlling the use of the car. It prevents, for instance, the driving of the car — even with the keys — if a windshield is smashed by thieves.

Sharing a key, via iPhone

There are a lot of upper-end vehicles on the market that offer "keyless" ways to start an engine, using radio signals.

You get assigned a key and a fob for new models of the Mini, for instance. As long as it is in your pocket or purse, you can start the car by pressing the start button.

"If I'm going to the gym with a gym bag in one hand, and briefcase in the other, I really don't want to have to fumble for my keys," McDowell says.

Getting the average family to share a key is easy, he adds. "But in this case, it's thousands of people sharing a key, via the iPhone."

Now that Schneider has shown how to open and start a car with a cellphone, will manufacturers jump aboard?

It could happen in five to 10 years, says Tim Bajarin, an analyst at Creative Strategies. "I wouldn't be surprised if all the next-generation cars have electronic locks tied to smartphones."

Schneider first demonstrated the iPhone Zipcar app at a June gathering of Apple software developers, expecting it to be available over the summer.

It's taken longer than expected, mainly to test it on many vehicles.

Security was vital.

"We had to make sure the information was as secure as if we accessed it in the traditional way," Schneider says.

Meanwhile, while technology is great — it's not always foolproof.

What happens if your iPhone runs out of juice? (Better reach for your old-fashioned Zipcar membership card to start the car.)

Or worse: What if you lose the iPhone midway through the trip?

"Use a friend's cellphone and call us," Schneider says. "We'll take care of it.""

57

Today I did a stuttering assessment. Or I should say that I participated in a stuttering assessment. Let's just say it takes two to count syllables vs. syllables stuttered. It was like way too many syllables for any one person to count.

Here is my train of thought while counting syllables:

"there's one. there's one. and another one. another one. mark. mark. mark. oh wait he stuttered. syllable. syllable. oh crap he stuttered again. oh darn i missed a syllable. oh crap i should stop thinking about missing them. i'm missing more. darn it now he stuttered again. and now i'm 30 syllables behind. i'll just add an extra one for the other one i missed. wait. mark. mark. syllable. just kidding that was a stutter. oh maybe he just paused. syllable. syllable. ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.i sure hope shannon counts better than me."

When we were done the entire page I had was covered in little tick marks. I was like wow... I just made a ton of tick marks... that must mean something! I AM AWESOME. I am going to be a champion stutterer diagnoser. Wooo! Watch out SLPs... here I come. But then I hear something. What's that? Shannon's talking to the mother....

"Well Mrs. _____, I didn't see stuttering in his speech that indicated a stuttering problem. He seems to be having dysfluencies that are typical for a teenager. It is possible that he stutters. But it might be covertly, or only with people he is comfortable around. I'm going to need you to tape record him at home."

What? Are you kidding me? I just made nine million little marks on a piece of paper. He must be a stutterer. I mean see this dash here. And this one. Those are stutters. Seee..... Darn it! I'm a failure at stutterer diagnosing.

I guess I'll try again next week.

Haunted by my Cello

Twice in the past week I have cried when I heard cello music. A sign from God? Probably.

Today was Lovely

Five reasons why:

1) I woke up before my alarm at 6am. Granted it was very dark outside (due to the near 144 hours of rain we have had this week), and I was not ready to get up... but none the less, I was up! Thus I was early for practicum. And that's ALWAYS a good way to start the day.

2)My supervisor didn't abandon me with 5 small not-so-well-hearing children! She stayed in the session with us today and I feel like I learned a whole lot! Even better I feel like they got something out of it! We have the cutest little girl, E, and she really enjoyed acting like a train today. She ran around stomping her feet saying "sh, sh, sh". Her approximation of "ch" which is more than good enough for me!

3)At lunch I got to print all 240 program covers. AND 40 placecards! Whoo hoo! I had myself all set up. Lunch in one hand, blank programs in the other and I pushed the print button with my toe as I fed the papers in one by one! HA! I'm talented!

4)Despite the fact that it rained, at least it never got over 90!

5)Well.... umm.... Okay I lied there are only 4 reasons why today was lovely. And actually this entire post was sparked by item number 3. whoo hoo!

Fun Stuff

fredflare.com | at home

Look at all these fun gifts!

Wedding Etiquette Rant

Contrary to popular belief... the bride's family isn't an endless supply of money. When a bride writes on your invitation your name, and ONLY your name, that means you are the only one invited... unless something else is told to you from the bride or groom. Do not think to yourself "Oh, she meant I could bring a date when she wrote only my name on the invitation".... because that would be assuming... and we all know where that gets us!

Also, don't get all pouty about not being allowed a date... trust me if the bride's family could afford to pay for everyone to have a date... they would. But since they can't, they have to restrict date bringing to serious relationships only.

If you aren't sure if you are allowed to bring a date... ask... the bride would be much happier explaining her lack of wealth prior to getting your response card than after!

Any complaints should be filed with Emily Post... or whoever makes the rules... because I didn't amke them, but at this point in time... I LIKE them!

If you have already committed this transgression against a bride... don't worry... you are allowed one screw up... just don't be a repeat offender!

Here is a post from one of my favorite wedding pros... a planner in NYC. See what she has to say: A dated issue

The Q: This is pretty basic, but any help with tact would be great. Basically, my fiance and I hang out with a group of friends, most of whom are single. As a rule, we only invited people with “guests” if they were engaged or have been living together. However, now that my invitations have gone out, I’m SHOCKED to see several of our friends have RSVP’d with a date, even though I know that they aren’t in a relationship, per se. I don’t want to be a big you know what, but I don’t want all these strangers around either. Is there a tactful way for me to tell these guys that they can’t bring a date, or do I need to suck it up and have these strangers at the wedding?

The A: First of all, let’s just say that YOU are not the wrong one here. Somewhere along the way people have seemed to have lost the concept that the person whose name is on the envelope is the person who was invited. If it says & Guest, awesome. If not, hopefully you’ll get placed at a good table and meet someone new. In the old days (before weddings cost a gazillion dollars) if you were single you got invited with a date. These days, single guests- especially friend guests- shouldn’t be offended or think its weird or, frankly, assume that it’s ok to just invite someone along. I understand why someone wants to bring a date, but they need to respect some simple rules of etiquette…. (sorry, I got on my soap box for a second there).

Anyway, to get back to the practical, brass tacks solution to this issue: call each guest individually and give them some nice, straight talk and explain the deal. Let them know that they will have all of your other single friends to hang out with and you really wanted it to be a circle of people you know. It’s awkward, but not as awkward as you think, as long as you play the “I want to know everyone at my wedding and it will be a blast with all of our other friends there” card. If they really, really, really think that this date was Mr. or Miss Right and not Right Now, hear their case and then you two can decide. I remember one of my friends trying to bring a date to my reception, and I said it wasn’t a good idea, and, well, a year later we planned their wedding (eek!) Oh, well, he had a good time anyway and them being apart during my reception clearly didn’t hurt their relationship.

My Sweet Girl!

William and I have had Lucy for a little over a year now! I love her so much and I don't know what I would do with out her. She is amusing and loving. My grandfather calls her "dingo" dog. She has springs attached to her legs! She loves her daddy (more than me). Every time he is in town she crawls right in his lap. He will push her off... and she just goes right back. So here she is... her blog debut!