our weekend away & whatever else...

Last weekend Jake & I went away for the weekend with my family at the ranch in Harper, Texas. It was a great weekend mainly just full of relaxing, eating yummy food, watching good football, enjoying family time, and everything the ranch has to offer. It happened to be Jake's first trip to the ranch and first to shoot at clay pigeons, it was really fun to see him do that. But all in all it was quite a good weekend since all day before we left Friday we had been working so hard trying to get all the big stuff moved into our new apartment that Jake just moved into. We got back just in time on Sunday afternoon to get lots of work done at the new apartment, I am having so much fun arranging and starting to decorate the new place.





In other news, we both have been working SO much lately, which is great for the wallet, but have just been so tired and overworked, more Jake than me since his job is much much more stressful than mine. But we are having alot of fun right now putting our new place together, luckily we have most of all the stuff we need, except a few pieces of furniture. We still need a couch, nightstand, dresser, maybe a a couple chairs, and possibly a coffee table, but we have a good while to shop and buy the stuff we still need. We have been very fortunate to have been given stuff and to find such good deals on the things we have bought. My wonderful boss gave us their queen size bed, mattress, boxspring, headboard, & footboard which we love and I actually have alot of stuff we are going to use right now from my old apartment. We are also really excited about getting to paint our bedroom and bathroom/laundry room area, we are narrowing it down to our favorite colors so that we can start painting soon.


In other news, we recently mailed our save the date cards which was really exciting for me, I loved how they turned out! And I am almost officially done shopping for all my wedding stuff, I have the dress, undergarment thing, jewelry (which I LOVE), not wearing a veil so don't need to buy that, the only thing that is left to buy is my shoes which I will most likely be buying over the Thanksgiving holidays. I go for my first dress fitting very soon, probably the second weekend in November. I'm getting kinda nervous, but I haven't gained any weight since I have been on birth control so I have just been eating good and trying to walk on the treadmill while at work when Elizabeth is sleeping or walk on the track at night.


Thats pretty much it for now, Jake & I are just trying to avoid the flu and all the other nasty germs floating around everywhere. We had a pretty good scare, Jake thought he might have the flu, went to get tested and ended up being some sort of viral infection, and got a steroid shot and some antibiotics. I have been stuck with just an annoying cold ever since we got back from the ranch last weekend & I'm trying SO SO hard to make it go away! You will hear from me later this week, hope everyone has a great week, I know I will!! :)

I have so much to say

Warning! This may be a long post, but only because of how busy life has been lately I mean there really is just so much to say right now, hope you enjoy!


Ok, so usually I'm one to save the biggest & best news for last, but its gonna be first because I'm so excited about it! After so much apartment/house hunting for something that really was going to be good for Jake & I in our "newlywed" stage we have finally found the perfect little place and are so happy God worked it out the way He did. First of all Jake & I have been trying to decide when he should move out of his house with his mom and brother, it was either now or around the holidays. Naturally I was pushing for now because I felt it made the most sense financially and thankfully I was right :) It has kinda been a debate for Jake & I lately of how much we wanted to spend on a house or apartment because if we spend towards the higher end of our budget we have less room for fun stuff like furniture for the new place and just fun stuff in general. So I basically voted to spend less on a house and have more wiggle room for the fun stuff. Well last night out of the blue Jake finds out from his friend Chase that his small house is up for rent and since Chase & his wife are moving to Lubbock he wanted to know if we were interested in living there since they are newlyweds also (Chase & Jordan got married this summer). I mean talk about PERFECT timing it was almost to good to be true, but anyways I go over to the little house to take a look with Chase while he finishes moving their stuff out. Needless to say I was SO surprised at how super nice it was from the way the outside looks and just what the typical acu apartment/house looks like, I LOVE it!!! It feels so weird to know that we have a permanent residence after we are married, now on to the fun stuff like shopping for the perfect things for the house, oh so so exciting!!



So thats the big news, now on to everything else in life. I know it has been forever like always, but it wouldn't be me if I didn't wait FOREVER to update this thing. Well last weekend I went with Jake and his mom to Fort Worth for the weekend to just get away for the night and it was great to be somewhere besides Abilene, not to mention all the cute stuff I was able to purchase! We did a good amount of shopping, not anything like the amount of shopping I tend to do or what I'm used to, but some shopping or no shopping, I will definitely take what I am offered! I got alot of cute clothes, some adorable shoes to wear in Lindy's wedding, some much needed new jeans that actually don't have any huge holes in them haha, several cute tops to wear now and on our honeymoon, some fall stuff, and my much needed wedding day "suck in suit" as I like to call it haha. It was a fun weekend all around shopping spending time with Jake since we have both been working alot lately and not to mention we got to eat at PF Changs so amazing to my tummy, hands down the best Lo Mein I will ever eat I'm pretty sure!



Here are a few quick, recent pictures of my lovely job it's still as great as ever and sweet baby Elizabeth gets cuter everytime I see her which is basically everyday! Honestly I swear up and down that when the weekend rolls around if I don't see them all weekend come Monday morning she has already changed into an even cuter baby girl if thats even possible, I just love it thats all there is to it! She is doing alot better with sleeping less during the day and more at night, we are still working on it, small steps Elizabeth. She is hanging out awake more and just enjoying life therefore I have been able to get a few more good pictures of her awake with those pretty blue eyes. But she must love the camera because when I'm around she sees it most everyday. She is growing and growing already a month as of five days ago, SO crazy!! More sweet pics to come :)

sweet Elizabeth confused as to what I'm doing!

precious big sister Maggie holding baby E

Now some good juicy wedding/honeymoon news since I haven't talked about any of that in quite awhile it seems like. Well as some of you might know Jake & I originally had been planning a California honeymoon basically all up and down the coast including San Diego, Los Angeles, Orange County areas, and whatever else, but recently we decided that it was probably going to end up being much more expensive when it actually came down to it when you figure renting a car, gas driving to and from all those places, airfare to CA and back, spending money, food, hotels, etcc.....So we started discussing our other options we might be interested in, we looked into all inclusive resort type places, such as Sandals, Beaches in Mexico, Jamaica,& Carribean islands, but for what we wanted to spend on our honeymoon we couldn't have stayed for long at any of those kind of places. So we started talking about CRUISES and looking into that and found out it was basically right up our alley. We get to see all the cool islands we wanted to, get to go somewhere warm, sunny, and beachy, get to stay for awhile which is something we both wanted, so basically decided for the price and what is included the cruise was the absolute best option for us! So there you have it we have officially booked our honeymoon, we leave March 21, 2010 from the Port of Galveston on a Carnival Cruise line to Montego Bay, Jamaica, The Grand Cayman Islands, & Cozumel, Mexico with fun days at sea all in between for a full 7 nights, 8 days long and we CANNOT wait!!!! I have already purchased quite a few items that I bought with the full intention of wearing on the cruise and I love it, shopping for vacation clothing is so much fun especially such a big one like this!

On the wedding front, not too much going on right now, getting ready to address & mail our super cute save the date cards, be looking in the mail for your card very soon! I have decided on what I am doing for my bridesmaids for their jewelry on wedding day and am so pleased with my decision. I have not purchased my shoes or jewelry quite yet, I am being very indecisive and fickle when it comes to jewelry. Shoes on the other hand I really know which ones I want I just have not purchased them yet, they are so glamorous and I love them, they are silver, strap around the ankle, some beautiful peep toe detail, and are the perfect heighth, not to mention how incredibly comfortable they are! I finally officially decided not to wear a veil, I know for all you super traditional brides out there, its such a shock, but its just not me, it limits the way I can wear my hair SO much, I can't for the life of me find THE veil I want and like, most the ones I found hide and take away from all the gorgeous details of my dress, and ITS JUST NOT ME! But I have chosen the way I will be wearing my hair on the big day and I love it, just trying to get it as long and healthy as possibly before wedding time. The nerves finally set in a few weeks ago when I made the awful, dreaded trip to the gynocologist to get put on the birth control pill. It was not bad at all really, but am just TERRIFIED of gaining weight and not being able to fit into my perfect dress come November when it comes time for my first dress fitting. I am eating healthy for the most part, no junk food, candy, crappy snacks of any kind, no dessert, and am trying to walk/run on the treadmill at work when baby E is taking naps. Not sure exactly how long the birth control pill is supposed to actually take to kick in, but so far I have not noticed ANY difference or change in my body or anything. Hopefully it will come because I really don't want to have to switch pills and start all over again. And we are getting ready for our much anticipated engagement pictures which were supposed to be last Thursday but the stinkin' weather did not cooperate, it rained mostly all morning, the ground was then wet and muddy, so it was a no go. We ended up having to reschedule them and our new date is actually my birthday, October 22nd in case any of you have forgotten. So we are looking forward to finally having that done, I just LOVE LOVE photography so much. And lastly we finally registered and had so so much doing it, sorry no pictures to show for it, I didn't even think to take pictures until after we were all basically done. But just so everyone knows we are registered at Dillards, Bed, Bath, & Beyond, and Kohls. We loved the stuff we picked out and can't wait for all the fun to begin!

Until next time, love is all you need :)

lots of stuff

Lots of stuff to catch up on first our labor day weekend, pretty uneventful, but fun & relaxing. Saturday basically started off our holiday weekend by Josh (my future brother in law) birthday party and kinda a kickoff to the start of college football. Jake & all the guys had Josh a party consisting of basically eating tons of yummy football party food, drinking margaritas, playing video games, and watching football all day. Then sunday we went to an interesting church service that left me feeling a little confused and like I should study more up on the topic of the message, which was about Israel being the chosen nation/people. Then we went to a bday lunch at Lytle, Land, & Cattle for Josh with the family and a few friends. Monday pretty much consisted of Jake working, I ran a bunch of errands with my mom doing some wedding stuff, then doing dinner that night with Jake's dad. All in all it was a fun & relaxing weekend and good to have more than just one day of time off together!


This week has been pretty good, I have enjoyed my time with sweet Elizabeth during the day & actually have really really missed going to do stuff with the big girls- Maggie & Claire. Hopefully we will be able to go to the zoo one afternoon soon, I guess I just miss our time together we got to spend together all this summer! But Jake did get to come see Elizabeth for the first time, which was so sweet to watch him holding her, he was so surprised at how little she was though! This was Maggie & Claire's first week back to preschool and they are having so much fun, it's so cute to watch! Once I get their first day of school picture I will definitely share it because it is so so adorable.


But in other news he did find out this week that he needs to be out of his house by November, which officially means we get to start looking for our first place, I'm so so excited about it!! He will be moving out sometime in October or beginning of November and I will then move out in March when we get married. So if you are in Abilene and know of any nice apartments or houses for rent on either north or south side please let me know and that would be so so great!


But I guess it's already this weekend, we don't really have too much on our agenda, except working, we are both working friday & saturday, but not sunday, but I think we both know what we'll be doing in our spare time. Thanks to the GREATEST fiance we now have the amazing Guitar Hero 5 to play on PS3 haha the only game I will play on that game system & I LOVE it!!

But I think that is all for now, sorry this post has no pictures, I just haven't had my camera with me this week to take any cute pictures, more to come I promise! Anyways I hope everyone enjoys their weekend! Next post all wedding and honeymoon stuff, its going to be so exciting!!!

my new love

Well the sweetest little baby girl is finally here....Elizabeth Markham Trammell arrived last tuesday August 25th and I'm pretty sure she could not be more loved by everyone! I love my job more than I already did before, if that is even possible at all. In the last week I have really thought about how extremely lucky and blessed I am to have this job, really the only thing that would be better is to have my own little babies, but I will definitely settle for these adorable little girls for now, which will make Jake happy for sure haha! Its really weird how God knew just EXACTLY He was doing when he created babies in His own image because there is just something about a newborn baby that I (along with so so many others) just CANNOT resist....it really just melts my heart in two! And yes whoever is reading this I have loved babies like this since I was 6 years old and my cousin Alexandrah was born, I will never forget drawing and coloring all kinds of pictures for her while my aunt was still pregnant with her. She will always hold such a special place in my heart, I think I was probably the only 6 year old that honestly wanted to be responsible for a little baby, she was definitely my very first babysitting experiment!

But since then there have been oh so many more little babies I have had to the opportunity to babysit and love on and have never gotten tired of it. I have been keeping the Trammell girls for two years now and can really admit there has not been one day where I have dreaded going to work, NOT ONE, I never get tired of them, even when Claire's screams get too loud, or when Maggie is moody or whiney, I really just don't think there is a way for me to get tired of them! When Elizabeth was born I kept them for about 2-3 days straight, spent the night with them and everything and had so much fun with them, I think I loved it just as much as they did!

Well I really just cannot tell you how excited for this year I am now, I mean planning and wedding/getting married, and getting to keep the most precious little baby everyday I really just don't think life could get much better than this! Alright I know it can and will get better but for now I am so so happy and content that it might just kill me. I only wish that everyone could be this happy and satisfied with their life always. I really just thank God so much for blessing me like this because I don't deserve it, but Thank you so much anyways.

But for now that is all, I promise to try for all my posts not to be all about Elizabeth, just remember some will so don't be alarmed haha. Next post recent honeymoon plans and recent wedding stuff.

Love to all,

Jillie :)

life lately

There is nothing lately too terribly exciting to tell, no recent pictures or anything. We did have a really great weekend, we had my aunt monica, cousins hannah & rachel in town. Rachel was here moving into her new house for her junior year at ACU and we were all helping her get moved in and decorate her room, it all turned out ADORABLE! But it was so good to have some family in town for a few days, we had a great time talking about all our wedding plans, all the girls even tried on their bridesmaids dresses and loved it, despite some negative self image problems to say the least. But like I said the wedding is not until March 20 so everyone has plenty of time to look the way they want to, haha including me, which is a really good I have 7 months till the BIG day because I have ALOT of work to do till then!


Also this weekend my best friend, Lindy, who is also our florist for the wedding came to town this weekend and was able to come talk to us about our flowers, arrangements, reception table centerpieces, boutinners, and everything else. We are so happy she is getting to do our flowers for the big day, we have no doubt at all that she will do a FABULOUS job, and it will be great business for her career as a florist. It's just all so exciting when we get together because she is getting married in January 3rd and we are in March, we are just getting so pumped about moving & decorating our new places, all our showers, parties, and everything involved in wedding process! I just cannot explain how much I LOVE doing this, I have never had so much fun doing anything haha :)


But on another front, there is still no baby Elizabeth, she really has decided to take forever getting here. I think she will make her arrival this week or weekend at least thats what I am hoping for, I am so excited to meet her and I know her two sweet sisters can't wait! I am so excited for this fall to spend most everyday with that sweet little baby. Another exciting thing happening, Jake & I are about to start looking for a place to rent for him to move into in late September or October, then I will move in March. I'm so excited to find us our first place and decorate it, we both CANNOT wait! So hopefully we will be able to find something we love :)

But for now thats really about it, you should hear from me soon, until then enjoy your Wednesday!!

catching up on life

Yeah well once again its been awhile, and I know I need to get better at blogging on here more often or I guess its pretty pointless, so I'll try! But while I was away this sweet little Claire turned 2 years old...I cannot believe it!!! When I first started working for the Trammells in the fall of 2007, Claire was about 4 weeks old when I started keeping her, this picture below was taken around January of 2008. Needless to say I cannot believe how fast she has grown, it really is amazing. I feel so lucky to be a part of both her & Maggie's lives on a daily basis and am so excited to add another little baby girl to the mix!





The weekend after Claire's birthday my mom & I were able to go down to Houston one last time before school starts and everyone gets back into the rountine of everything. We left around lunch time on Friday after picking some really cute baby gifts for my cousin who is having twins in October, her baby shower was on Saturday afternoon. I just love buying baby gifts, I cannot wait to buy for the next little baby cousin (a.k.a tiny little daisy) and will be so excited when I finally get to buy for a future niece or nephew (jenna & matt?) haha, no rush I just LOVE babies! I loved what we ended up getting for the twin babies and can't wait to see what they look like! My mom, sister, and I had alot while we were down in Houston we got to eat breakfast with some other cousins, its always a treat to see little Ben, I'm pretty sure he could not be cuter if he tried! We also got to do a little bit of shopping mainly trying to look for some shoes for the wedding for me and for the bridesmaids. And I'm pretty sure I found THE SHOE I just have not found it at the price I want yet haha, they were so glamorous and beautiful not to mention comfortable, but lets just wait and see if they come down any from $80! I also loved getting to go to Escalante's Mexican restaurant in Houston, so so yummy! Then we got up early Sunday morning, went to church with my sister and brother in law at First Colony, then hit the road back to Abilene!


The last exciting thing I have to share about is Jake's BIG purchase this past weekend while I was gone in Houston! We have been talking about starting to buy furniture and other big essentials for our first home, which we have decided he is probably going to move into hopefully sometime in October. But the first BIG exciting thing for our house after we get married is the 42" LG Plasma HD tv, which we both LOVE! It kind of does add another thing to put on the buying list but I think its probably most definitely worth it, we will just have to buy something to put the tv on once we get into our own place, but I'm pretty sure we can handle that!

There is not alot of news on the wedding front, just kinda waiting around for time to pass, we will be sending out save the date cards sometime in September, be ready for those, they are SUPER CUTE, we love them so much haha! Right now we are working on getting everyones updated addresses and starting to get together all our pictures for the slide show so we won't be doing that last minute. But thats about it right now as far the wedding plans go...

And I'm still awaiting little baby Elizabeth Trammell to arrive, hopefully sometime this week or next, thats my prediction anyway! Maggie is so excited it is really all she has been talking about this last week or so, I myself cannot wait either another sweet baby girl to hold and love and add to the joy of my job! I will tell you this she is definitely going to have plenty of attention, but a little attention would never hurt anyone haha! Well thats it for now maybe next time I'll have so more exciting news...:)

its been awhile...

So I have decided I needed to better motivate myself to update this blog since I enjoy writing so much and reading others blogs, haha even though i'm not sure if anyone even reads this thing! Oh well I don't do it for other people, although I love to hear from everyone else out there!

Anyways the last few weeks have been pretty eventful for me, I enjoyed going down to celebrate with all my family in Beaumont/Houston for my nana's big 70th Birthday bash. We were able to go down a couple days before to stay and hang out with my sister and brother in law down in Houston so that was fun. My mom, sister, & I went bridesmaid dress shopping in Houston and got to try on my beloved wedding dress for my sister who had not seen it yet, which was really fun! We were also in charge of distracting nana on the day of her surprise bday party, and went to do more bridesmaid dress shopping but in Beaumont this time, still didn't find anything promising. But got to try on my wedding once again, but this time for my nana and thankfully she loved it! Then we came back to Abilene to bring my cousin, Alexandrah to her first year at Kadesh Life Camp at ACU. My sister actually ended up coming up to see us in Abilene this past week to help us with some graphics stuff on the computer for our save the dates cards and thank goodness she did! Actually with her coming up last week we got so much done, finished the CUTEST save the date cards ever, found & purchased THE bridesmaids dresses, worked on some music stuff, and really just had some really fun mom/sister time together! I'm so glad she got to come, thanks so much for spending a week up here helping me with wedding stuff Jenna, love you so much!

Other than that, Jake has been in Lubbock for almost two weeks and home for the weekend, but starts his fabulous new job this coming monday! I have missed him so much this week and last, neither one of us are used to being away from each other, so needless to say we will both be so excited when he comes home on Friday! While he has been gone I have been spending alot of time with my parents, working, and after much delay have started my beauty & health regime to fit into the dress in march haha! So far all I am doing to help myself along this healthy path is cut out all unhealthy sweets, (a.k.a. blue bell ice cream) cutting starches at dinner to a very small amount, trying my hardest to drink 6-8 glasses of water a day, eating as much fruit & veggies as I can, and have been walking nightly with my mom! Let me know of any advice towards this process any of you have out there, trust me I could use anything I can get, especially since I am about to get on birth control and have heard alot out there about significant weight gain while on the pill, which is really kinda starting to freak me out, but we'll see what it does to my body!

Now that summer is coming down to a fast end, not much else is going on with me, besides my little Claire is turning 2 in a few weeks, still awaiting on baby girl trammell #3 to come, and probably a few other wedding things to do before school starts for everyone but me here in a few weeks (haha). My mom and I will be going down to Houston for the last time of the summer for one of my cousin's baby showers, she is having twins (boy & girl) in later fall, and can't wait to see all of my family on my dad's side since we hardly ever get to see them!

Well this post has been long enough for now, hope to see you before too long! :)