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troy and i actually accomplished something regarding the wedding: we ordered the invitations/response cards/reception cards. that's quite the undertaking for us. i'm really grateful that troy's dad is willing to help us out with that.

drove through some car dealerships last night, in search of the perfect car. i'm not sure that troy and i will agree on a car ...ever. he wants fast and sporty; i want 30+ mpg, 4 doors, under $18,000, less than 30,000 miles. he loves beamers and volvos. i'm thinking a mazda or honda. guess we'll have to figure that out eventually, but for now we are discussing what we want out of a vehicle. for now, all i know is that his truck gets 1/2 the gas mileage as my car, costs nearly what i pay for my apartment each month, and he loves it. this may be his choice, and this may be my choice.

aren't you glad i'm letting you see a glimpse of our relationship?

so now that i know my relatives and troy's relatives are all the anonymous commenters, i can smile. troy's going to have to tighten the straps on his boots and talk to all my family members on the phone one of these days. that may be the only way they get to meet him before the wedding. the wedding is going to be completely relational, and i love that.

any one in south dakota want to take troy out for his bachelor party? that's a dangerous request!

so i'm getting more and more excited about the wedding. each day i can see details coming together. last week some of troy's family bought their plane tickets for the event. yesterday, some of my friends bought their tickets, and i got some tickets for my parent's to join us for the reception at the lake here in georgia. today i got an email from a friend who thinks she may have found a photographer. now i need a cake person (sorry, troy, you don't have time to bake that cake - my family members and friends will have you tied up with projects the entire time you're in sodak.)

i'm really looking forward to troy's family getting to spend some time with my family. our dads are going to click, and so will our moms. that is a reassuring feeling to know that our families will all get along. i'm definitely marrying up - way up! (no offense to my family, but it's true!)

so i heard some news that derrick, my brother, has popped the question to his girlfriend, nikki. how exciting is that for my parents - both kiddos getting hitched the same year? (why not the same day - derrick, you in?) i'm just kidding - i would be up for it, but i'm thinking that nikki will need her own wedding. i like sharing - sharing costs and family. the more the merrier for me!

what other random stuff is going thru my mind this morning? it's friday and i'm ready for the weekend. troy and i have another session of pre-marital counseling tomorrow. looking forward to that. i've enjoyed the discussions which have come out of our first session. troy and i have talked about how much time is required for our relationship to thrive, some of the things we expect from each other, and how certain situations from our past affect who we are. one of our favorite discussions is how i went to africa in order to find troy, and how he went to brazil in order to find me. that's traveling the world to find the love of your life! it's a great story to be able to tell someone someday.

kelly is behaving very well these days. i think she simply needed a little surgery and now she has fully recovered.

for my family, thanks for accepting troy by his looks. he doesn't have any tattoos, he loves babies and long walks on the beach, is full of adventure and cares deeply for me. troy is so good for me. each day i see where he and i compliment each other more and more. like when my friends are offended by something i've done, he strongly encourages me to make restitution. he's trying to get me to eat better, but that's a challenge and a half.

something i learned about troy yesterday: he got a spanking for driving his hot wheel trike on his bed. thanks for sharing that story, steve! next time troy tries to drive the 4-wheeler (or 'fuller' as they say in the Messiah house) on the bed, i'll know how to deal with him!

oh man, i almost forgot to blog something really funny about troy which happened yesterday. (i told him i was going to blog this, so it's fair game!) as we were filling out the forms for the invitations, i asked troy the correct spelling of his middle name. get this: he had to get his license out of his wallet in order to know how to spell 'steven'. he has a 'v' and not a 'ph'. that's still really funny for me that he forgot how to spell his middle name. i love giving him a hard time about those silly mistakes, because he does the same for me! i wouldn't expect anything less from him!