big praise and budget?

[yk] praise God that gordon and i have finally booked a venue and date for our wedding! thanks for all the helpful advice and prayers! keep your eyes open for a save-the-date!

throughout the wedding planning, gordon and i have sometimes slipped into the "you only get married once" mentality when booking the venue, choosing a photographer, choosing a dress, etc. OR "better go now before we have children" or "i'll regret not dishing out that few extra hundred dollars" when choosing a destination for our honeymoon. we want to go to a far exotic beachy place before we have kids, when we're the most in shape, and have the means to go. we can save europe for when we're old and wrinkly, but anywhere where a bathing suit is the main article of clothing, i want to go now before the predicted post-marital and pregnancy weight gain! ok maybe i just need to be more secure with my own body image...no matter what stage of life i'm in...

obviously this wishiwashiness about how much to spend means we're not very good about embracing our budget and sticking to it. ok, mostly i'm not very good about it...because i've never had to really live by a budget. i feel like God has blessed me financially so that i can give and spend freely. if you know me, you know that i'm not an extravagant spender by any means and that i enjoy treating people out to eat, but i've never had to be limited by a budget. i also know that it's never bad to budget...even when you aren't struggling with finances. i also know that i should always find joy in giving...no matter if i'm financially comfortable or not. i'm just afraid i'll regret forgoing something that i really want...

Merry Christmas!!

Yvonne and I just wanted to wish you all a

Merry Christmas!!

Thank you for all your prayers for us. Please let us know how we can be praying for you!!

where does the time go?

[yk] these days, i find myself spending/wasting hours and hours of time online reading about other people's weddings online (at theknot.com), looking at hundreds of wedding and bridesmaids dresses, looking at hundreds and hundreds of wedding photos from other people's weddings (at photography vendor sites), and reading about honeymoon packages with beach bungalows and swimming with dolphins. and before i know it, hours have flown by...

someone, please give me those hours back...

new news

So I have added another site to my daily visits. . . This site, the knot, is great to get started, but you'll soon figure out that people who advertise on theknot are $$$$. Lots of advertising. Good job on a business plan of keeping the company going.

I recently found another one: Austin Wedding Mall. They do a good job as well. They're coolest feature is that you set up a profile and they mass email the photographers, DJ, florists, etc and they contact you!

News: we potentially have a date set. But we still have to go visit the ceremony/reception site to make sure we really like it. But it's available, timing is okay, and seems like it might work! Stay tuned. . .

wedding planning woes...

[yk] lately, i've been getting REALLY frustrated with wedding planning...usually to the point of tears. i know there's no need to be so dramatic and stressed out...but hey, i'm a girl and this is the day that most girls dream of so naturally, i want everything to be perfect.

i think my frustration stems from not knowing what i really want and the things that i know i want, i can't have. so once again, i'm asking for your help...help me figure out all of things i need to consider and prioritize:

1) a ceremony and reception that glorifies God and testifies to others of His goodness to us (duh, this is #1)
2) how i look (determines how much i spend on the dress, makeup, hair, etc)
3) nice photographic memories (determines whether or not to hire a professional photographer, how much to spend on photography, the venue)
4) having a beautiful venue (determines where the wedding is)
5) saving money for the future (determines how much we spend on the wedding)
6) making parents and their friends happy (determines how many people we invite and how many receptions to have)
7) making my friends happy (determines how many people we invite and how many receptions to have, whether or not we have alcohol)
8) decorations (sort of related to nice photographic memories and venue)
9) good food (determines where to have the reception, what food to choose, etc)

oh yeah, the other source of frustration is my lack of working out ever since i started travelling and all the weight i've gained...wish i got married a year ago when i was in the best shape i've ever been in and wasn't so lazy...

don't worry, gordon is doing his fair share of the planning and being very loving, supportive, and patient.

top 10 sys adm truths

WARNING: This one isn't pertaining to wedding stuff.

So on Slashdot I read this interesting article about a sys admins top 10 truths. These are mine.

1) Tell me the truth. Did you really reboot? Or are you imagining that computer turned off by itself?

2) Try it yourself. Usually, if you try the help pages and try searching for yourself and find the answer. You will be happier that you figured it out than asking me.

3) Google is your best friend. Trust me, most of the errors have already been encountered.

4) No you don't need it. No, you don't need a 80gig, 2 gig RAM, P4. Do you just type papers, check email, do some surfing? Save some money, you don't need the latest and greatest.

5) I can't see what you see. Okay, so you're describing me the problem. Please tell me exactly what you see on the screen. I don't have a magic program to see what's on your computer. At least, I don't have access to see what's on your screen.

6) Security, security, security. Yes, set up a WEP key, at the very least, on your wireless. Cause I can probably get into your computer. Especially when you have a blank password as your admin account.

7) Backup, backup, backup. Daily, Weekly, Monthly. You just never know. And don't you want to ever look back on your high school papers? :)

8) I'm not Keanu from the Matrix. Umm, no, I cannot make the Internet go "faster." Be happy that you have internet. (Although, I can troubleshoot why it's so slow.)

9) Time to REINSTALL. I know you don't like to do this. But your hours online you have gotten popups, adware, etc. No program can do enough cleaning to ever get rid of that stuff. Get ready to backup your files (see #7) and just start fresh.

10) I'm nice. Yep, I can answer any question you have to the best of my ability. Just don't lie to me about what you did. Don't look sad when I tell you the truth that you probably lost your files. Smile, and just ask, "Gordon, can you help me with something?" I don't respond well to, "I hate this computer, please fix it." Cause honestly, you did something to it. Computers don't fight back, they just take our abuse.

want to elope?

Want to elope? I find myself asking Yvonne this every so often when we come to a decision impasse. I like being a quick decision maker, but trying to please everyone is nearly impossible.

My mom and I visited a reception site today. You look at a restaurant with new eyes when you're planning a reception. How many people/tables? Where's the wedding party going to sit? Will everyone be able to see us for the toasts? Then you go into the tailspin of possibly reserving the space. Lunch or dinner? parking? Are you available? What time to start? What extra decorations are needed? Are linens covered? Centerpieces? wow. . .

We have to keep reminding ourselves that this is a celebration and for us to share a piece of ourselves and our love to our family and friends. This makes all this work a little bit more meaningful.

I finished a good book just on my flight back from Houston, Velvet Elvis. It's highly honest and continues the conversation of who we are as Christians. Makes me dream . . .

Time to sleep now and get ready for my training run tomorrow. gn.

decisions decisions...

[yk] I'm usually pretty indecisive to begin with...or I take forever to deliberate about something because I try to exhaust all options and explore all possibilities before coming up with a decision. If I were to apply this method of decision-making to wedding planning, Gordon and I won't be married for another few years because it would take me THAT long to make decisions about the wedding. But everyone advises me to not spend too much time on details...just keep focusing on what's important...glorifying God and honoring our friends and family. So instead of spending a ton of time trying to make up my mind, I'm going to enlist your help in making these decisions. Current decisions I'm trying to make:

- where/when to have wedding (don't need more advice on this...have gotten tons...thanks!)
- what style/color bridesmaid dress (all different styles? different colors? let the bridesmaids choose?)

I'll be going wedding dress shopping this weekend, but if i don't find anything that I love and is reasonably priced, I think I already know which dress I am going to get.

In other news, it's snowing here in Ft. Worth!! In the entire office, only 3 people were left this afternoon because everyone went home early or couldn't make it to work.

more wedding . . .

Okay, okay, more wedding planning. . .
so we've decided to focus our search for a small wedding/reception site in Austin and then host a larger reception in Houston the day after. I put my mom to work in looking for a Houston reception site. :) go mom. We're specifically looking at:
May 5-7,
May 12-14,
June 9-11, and
June 30-July 2nd weekends.

Start clearing your calendars, but clear warning we might not even settle on those dates.
And for friends of Yvonne, you can email her to ask her specifically why we chose those dates. The reason is pretty hilarious if you ask me.

Now for another poll . . . For those of you who are married, which books have you read that you would recommend in preparing for marriage?

AIDS Stats

At Liquid, we just had a Blindspot on Aids Awareness. I was interested to know what the statistics were on AIDS in China.

Adult (15-49) HIV prevalence rate	0.1% (range: 0.1%-0.2%)
Adults (15-49) living with HIV	830 000 (range: 430 000-1 400 000)
Adults and children (0-49) living with HIV	840 000 (range: 430 000-1 500 000)
Women (15-49) living with HIV	190 000 (range: 95 000-320 000)
AIDS deaths (adults and children) in 2003	44 000 (range: 21 000-75 000)

Source: 2004 Report on the global AIDS epidemic

boo. ..

So while I'm stuck at work taking care of virus issues, Yvonne is out dress shopping. . . oye.


Latest virus to hit our company. W32.Sober.X@mm What a stinker, all those Paris Hilton emails are filling up our email server. DELETE. Just a reminder for everyone to update virus definitions. Should be done once/month if not automatically done by your antivirus program.

taking it easy . . .

So we decided to slow things down and just gather information first before making any decisions. Taking everyone's advice and going to just enjoy our engagement period together. Continue to pray for us though. Hard to plan for a wedding long distance, and when both of us aren't in Houston to look at sites there either.

In other news, Liquid is gearing up for a Blindspot event: Aids Awareness. Should be an eye opening time.

I'm also shopping for a new cell phone carrier. After eight years of being with Sprint, I'm looking into other carriers. Mainly cause Yvonne and I would like to be on the same plan. We're in luck too cause both of our contracts are ending. Does everyone like the Razor? You make $50.01 from buy.com