sunday school sunbeam

if you don't know who paige patterson is, then i have to say congrats. thankfully you must not be one of the freaky fundementalists that follow him (or someone like me who has to hear about his crazy rants). he runs what was, not too long ago, a fabulous seminary.

i just read this article entitled "baptist seminary launching homemaking program" in the dallas morning news. my stomach hurts, seriously.

he has come up with another (insert sarcasm here) plan to make the seminary wives (aren't there seminary husbands, too?!?) perfect betty homemakers. since when do christian women need to go to seminary to know how to love their children and family? i don't know of a more godly woman and spectacular mother than my mom (and she did not attend these seminary classes arranged by paige patterson, i can promise you that). i am so thankful that she raised me to have an open mind and to think for myself. lavon will not be happy about this latest development.

and as my mom always said: when mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.

i wonder if they teach that in their classes... ; )

finally settled

we closed on selling the house in fort worth yesterday, so we are both officially dallas-ites again! today was the first day back in the full swing of things, and let me tell you, it was great! i loved my first day at inwood and really feel like this is going to be a great fit for me. it was weird being "katy pritchard" everywhere, but something i can get used to, especially since i'm married to jay now and also keeping the "link" in my name!

also, the official pics are up of the entire wedding...and i love them!

http://www.inphotography.net, click on client galleries and put in your email and the password "link". we had such a good time, the setting was beautiful, and i feel like the pictures are a wonderful reflection of the moment. thanks to all of our true and dear friends for making the trip to celebrate with us!

welcome my new niece, lily

well, maybe not my actual niece, because we will probably be more like sisters, doing crazy things behind her mother's back. lily is precious and i can't wait to meet her!

hilarious pic with dad. already a crazy girl!

congrats, mollie and kevin! she is gorgeous!

new honeymoon update

a few more pics...we are having the time of our lives!!!!

our last day at the broadmoor

on the plaza in santa fe

our suite at ten thousand waves spa...wonderful!

at the peak of our favorite hike in santa fe ('kenz rode in her backpack)

today is our last full day in santa fe, and we have had so much fun. we have had excellent dinners at the pink adobe, the compound, and geronimo. we have shopped the galleries all over town, hiked, and had some excellent spa treatments at ten thousand waves. today we are heading out for another hike, then back to do a little time poolside, and then off to make our selected artwork purchase and on to a relaxing evening on the porch at the cowgirl hall of fame! tomorrow it's back to dallas...monday we close on the house and tuesday i start my new job. woo-hoo!

catch up

the kids helped me get ready

the girls and me

caroline and me...i think she was as happy as we were!

a sweet moment

my big brother jarrod

my big brother josh and caroline

jay and his baby girl

jay and i are officially hitched! the wedding week and day were absolutely perfect. most of our crew got into town early and we all were able to hike, white water raft, and enjoy each other in the bridal party house.

the wedding day held for us perfect weather, lots and lots of wonderful friends, and went off without a hitch. i couldn't have imagined it would be as wonderful as it was and jay and i had the best time. neither of us ever really got nervous, we both just enjoyed every moment. a few of the pics are up on our photographer's website. you can go to our set and put in the password, which is link. they are great!

the honeymoon has been a blast thus far. we spent the first night just outside of breck in a friends vacation home, then went to evergreen and stayed in a little bed and breakfast called highland haven. we were just a few miles from red rocks, where we attended the snow patrol concert last night. it was beautiful and so romantic!

bed and breakfast

red rocks

today we headed south to colorado springs and are staying at the broadmoor, which is freaking AMAZING! i mean this place knows how to treat a new couple. we hiked around colorado springs this morning and spent the afternoon by the infinity pool here on the property. after getting back to our room we were greeted with a complimentary bottle of champagne that we are currently enjoying on our balcony. yum!

pool party!

our balcony at the broadmoor...a toast to mr. and mrs. pritchard!!!!

everything has been perfect thus far. tomorrow we head to santa fe. more pics to come!!

denver

jay and i are in denver and officially in countdown mode for the big day...sunday! we are so excited to have the whole crew up here to celebrate with us and we are heading to breck tomorrow to meet the rest of them.

right now we are at the brown palace hotel, relaxing and tying up loose ends for the wedding. i am so excited! if i get a chance, i'll post some of our pics up here soon, otherwise, i'll update the blog as soon as i can!

interesting reads

this is so true for girlfriends! five friends every girl should have...

http://www.cnn.com/2007/LIVING/personal/07/23/5.friends/index.html

and this couple has quite a story!!!

very few

in my estimation, very few people think i am as crazy as i actually am. as i sit here, sitting in my first home (purchase), staring at blank walls, i reflect on the last year. i believe it was about this time of year that i was complaining to everyone i know that things were "boring" and i was craving "change." well, WHAM! like a mack truck, i have had constant change for the last year. and let me tell you, i am realizing how truly nuts i was to ask for all of this...

august, 2006 - jay asks me to marry him
fall, 2006 - jay is offered his dream job in fort worth, i am offered a "great job" to go to fort worth, we purchase a beautiful home in a wonderful neighborhood and immediately start dreaming of moving back to dallas
winter2006/spring 2007 - wedding planning, showers, all fun, but completely busy every single weekend. literally.
summer 2007 - wedding plans in full swing, jay gets raise, i get a new job and the "summer of katy" begins...if you read the blog, you know the deets

last night was the last day of the option period on the house, so today i signed off on it and signed a lease on a great place in dallas. we are excited to go back to the life of renters for a bit. ah, the bliss of non-home-ownership. we did try to find a house, but were not able to find the dream spot yet, so we chose a favorite spot in the uptown area and will have a blast as newlyweds there. i will miss my little place here in the fort, but going back to big D is like going home. it will be as if i have been on a long vacation and i am back to the place i want to be. it's still strange looking at the blank walls i have begun packing, but in a week we leave for our wedding...two weeks of fun and happiness, then back to start our new life together in our new place back in dallas. we are both thrilled and can't wait to get moved and leave for our beautiful wedding!!!!

entourage

if you don't watch entourage, you should. it's worth the few bucks to add hbo by itself. vince and the boys are living the dream and with every episode you feel like you are a part of their crew. it is one of my favorite shows ever and i am curious to see if anyone knows the story about the ending tonight. is there really going to be an actual movie?? (right now in the show they have been making a movie about pablo escobar called "medellin" and showed a trailer for it tonight as if it may be an actual movie to be released).

http://www.medellinthefilm.com

would you rather...

be the tallest or the shortest person on earth?!?!


click here to read the story behind the meeting of the world's tallest and world's smallest!

new chair, new pics...

jay and i went to visit my brother and his family in tulsa this weekend for the 4th. we had such a good time in their pool and eating at coney-islander with the kiddos. josh and joy have bought some new furniture and passed on a chair from my great-grandmother (that i have always loved b/c it is so unique) to us. let's just say that it has had some big attention from the kids. (cute pics below)

it's been a while

an update:

we sold the house in fort worth in THREE days. our realtor did a great job and it looks like we will close on the 10th of august. we are desperately searching for houses in dallas, most likely the m-streets. if it doesn't work out that we find exactly what we want, we will be renting for six months and looking during that time.

we are so excited and can't wait to get back to our old stomping grounds and all of our old buddies. we have missed you all!!!

in other big news...jay made senior associate last week with his job and got a big, fat raise! we are so excited and feel very blessed that all of his hard work has paid off in such a big way! he has a meeting this week in d.c. with j.c. watts (http://www.jcwatts.com/jcwatts.htm), which he is ecstatic about, and we are all awaiting the autographs, of course (especially our OU-obsessed dads!).

i start my new job on august 7th. i'll still be doing lending, but with inwood national bank in dallas. i am very excited and i have put a lot of thought into this decision. i had several different offers, but this is where my heart was leading me. this is what i feel will work best with my personality and the clients i work with, so i am going with my gut and am very excited about this bank and this job. i'll be at the office on inwood and lovers, so come by and visit me or we can meet for lunch!

as far as wedding plans go, we are almost wrapped up. three weeks from today jay and i will be dancing at our reception, celebrating ourselves as the new married couple!!! i can't believe it and i am SO freaking excited!!!!!!

breck or BUST!

trust

this verse has given me so much strength this morning...it's my anthem during this crazy time of life.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to
prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
-Jeremiah 29:11 (NIV)

with the wedding, the new job, possibly selling the house, moving, buying a house...i'll stop there and just say, i have a lot on my plate right now. i'm very excited and patiently praying and waiting to watch God's plan for us unfold. i was talking to mollie this morning and told her that i am so open to God's plan right now, i swear i feel like i'm about to be asked to build an ark (have you seen 'evan almighty'? so great)! anyway, the verse was a great encouragement to me so i thought i would share!

it's official!

we are selling the house and moving back to big D! i landed a sweet job in dallas that i am very excited about, and today is the first day of "showing" the house. as i was sweeping the hardwood floors and straightening up the house, i thought of that scene in "american beauty" when carolyn (who is a realtor) is going through that empty house frantically cleaning and telling herself, "i will sell this house today, i will sell this house today, i will sell this house today!" so funny. let's hope my realtor does!!!!

more details to come...so happy to be heading back to dallas soon!

something old...

i spent some time with my mom today and she presented me with a small pink gift bag and a card. it was a little something she has saved for me for a while...like, oh, since birth.

tears...

the magic hanky

i'm just a little hanky
as square as square can be.
but with a stitch or two
they made a bonnet out of me.
i'll be worn from the hospital
or on the christening day.
then i'll be carefully pressed
and neatly packed away.

for her wedding day,
so we've been told,
every well dressed bride must have
that something old.
so what could be more fitting
than to find little me.
a few stitches snipped,
and a wedding hanky i'll be.

dads and their boys

i have the best brothers on earth. this is a fact, so there really isn't any point in arguing with me on the topic. this weekend, they (the bro's and their wives, joy and shannon) pulled off one of their greatest stunts yet and i am pretty proud of them.

my dad loves convertibles. always has, always will. after a terribly frustrating 'car year' (i'll spare you the long story), my brothers' families decided to play santa and get him the car he has always wanted, but as a minister, not felt like he should really purchase.

yesterday our entire family drove to the halfway point between dallas and tulsa (where my brother, josh lives with his family) to surprise my dad. jay and i were tasked with riding with dad and coming up with conversation to try and distract him from whatever the "good news" that josh wanted to "tell him in person" was..."are they moving? new job? what is it?!?!" it was very hard to keep a straight face.

as my brothers drove up...my dad was saying, "what's going on here?"

i'm not sure if he's bowing down to my brothers or the car!

cutie patooties

we followed them the entire way home, and i swear that grin never came off his face!

a star is born

my mom has a little shop called 'the antique garden,' which is located in the brownstone village in arlington. they host neat little marketing events and are doing a cancer fundraiser next month. they had a contest to choose a mascot for the event and they chose my mom's yorkie, sadie!!!

Madtv - Apple I-rack

wedding reception

the link family

since jay and i are getting married in colorado, some of my parents' best friends decided to throw us a reception-style party here in texas this last weekend. i must say, it was a bit overwhelming. we had a swarm of over 400 friends and family show up to celebrate with us and humble us with waaaaaay too many gifts (not that i'm complaining!).

it was a fun warm-up for the real-deal wedding day, and it was great to spend time with some of the folks that will not be able to make the trek up to breck, as well as some that will...never too much time with good friends! thanks to you all!!!

the bach party

what a fun time we had in wacky waco! mollie did a great job organizing and it made for a fun night. i'm not sure of the final number, there was somewhere around 20 of us (the greatest girlfriends on earth) and we tore up the town. we started off at george's, a favorite of ours in college, went back to the hotel for the lingerie shower (thank you again, girls!) and then headed to dinner at ninfa's, a tex-mex restaurant that we frequented (to say the least) in college.

it was a perfect party and i had a blast. definitely a fitting end to my singledom.

george's in our favorite corner booth

big o's are yummy

ninfa's

uh-oh. just kidding, we just thought the cops were cute

the late night crew at (and in) the fountain