"and i don't know how it gets better than this..."

Wow!  Hi folks!  Hi friends!! 

I've been alone a lot lately.  Naturally this leads to me feeling depressed and sad and generally just overall melancholy.  But then I thought, "Hey - I could BLOG!  Then I'd get to see all my old blog friends and I'd probably start to feel better about myself." 

HENCE: this blog post.  I feel better already!!!!!  I thought I'd give you a pretty huge update about everything in my life.  And then hopefully (since I'm alone a lot) we can become regular friends again. 

Let's jump right in?  Let's!  There will be a lot of photo evidence in this section.  Not because I think you won't believe me, but just because I want you to feel like you haven't missed out on anything.


I GOT MARRIED!

I know!  I got married!  I still can't believe it either.  And we were just so excited about it that we had not one, but TWO weddings!  Even crazier. 

FIRST WEDDING:

 

That's the only picture of me and Ben together on our wedding day!  haha.  And this was before we were actually married.  Oh well.  

Me and Kara!  

Ben's mom made me this beautiful coral dress!  It was absolutely perfect.  We were married on an airfield in Greenland, NH.  It was the place where Ben officially became my boyfriend about one year earlier.  I know, ONE YEAR!  What can I say.... when you know, you know.  Every day since we met has been better than the day before. 

So, we had two weddings.  The first wedding was quite small and only included immediate family.  The second wedding was bigger and included lots and lots of our beautiful, amazing friends and also all our family.  Oh, it was spectacular.  

Let me tell you about it.

We got married (again) here:

 

It's the Artist's Bridge in Newry, Maine.  Cool, right?!  Yeah!  We wanted to get married on a covered bridge and then found this perfect one.  It's such a beautiful spot.  

We had our reception here:

WOW!  Right???  How pretty!  It's The Bethel Inn, in Bethel, Maine.  (When you're in that back room with the giant wall of window, you totally feel like you're on the Titanic.  Trust me.)  

It was the most beautiful place!  The reception was in that round room at the end.  The dining rooms were so beautiful that we didn't really have to do any decorating, which was exactly what we wanted.  

We did have gorgeous centerpieces:

 

And there were lights wrapped around the grapevine wreathes:

 

Cool, right?!?!!?  The wedding was navigation themed!  We came up with the idea of globe bowls a while back, but didn't think it would happen multiple times because..... have you ever bought a globe before?!?!!?!?  THEY ARE SO DAMN EXPENSIVE IT'S CRAY!!!!!!!  We LITERALLY found the cheapest globes available to humans.  Found them at Toys R Us.  Amazing.  And we were totally stealth about it too, because the deal was you got free shipping on your orders over $50, but there was a limit of four globes per order.  And we needed five!  So we placed TWO orders and got free shipping on both of them!  #WHAMBAM  #brillz  Ben split them in two to make bowls and we spent $100 on the apples and oranges that we filled them with.  It actually came out perfect.  Oranges and mint leaves and apples and cinnamon.  And we PICKED the apples with MARIA two days before the wedding.  

Oh, that wedding.  It was actually one of the most fun times ever.  I wish Future Julie would have gone and told Super Stressed Out Julie that because I was seriously thinking the whole event would crumble to the ground and we'd be making our guests help and pick up the pieces to try and make it a fun time.  BUT, that didn't happen.  Amazingly enough, everything went super smoothly.  

We picked the flowers for our bouquets:

They were absolutely gorgeous.  There is this farm in Bethel that has a pick-your-own flower garden!  So me, Kara and Maria trudged through the grass and spiders and picked out these gems.  

And they made perfect bouquets:

 

Kara, Me, Alana (my sister in law!), Maria (BFF!)  BRIDESMAIDS!!!!!!!!  

DRESS SELFIE:

 

That wasn't the wedding day, but the day I got the dress in the mail!!!!  Ordered it from ModCloth.  Amazing.  It was pretty much the perfect dress, obvi.  

 

Evans family!!!  Look how handsome we are!!!  

Newest member of the Evans family!!!  (Meaning Ben.)

 

Newest member of the Carling family!!  (That's me!!)  We've got:  Zach, Lauren, Johanna, Ben, Julie, Ben's mom, Ben's dad, and Alana.  Wonderful, beautiful people.  I am so lucky to have them all!!  

 

Luckiest of all.

 

Wanna talk about having cold feet on your wedding day??  Let me tell you.  It was cold and rainy allllll day long.  But I was determined to get photos of us with the bridge in the background.  Our photographer Chet was a great guy.  A TROOPER.  He climbed down there with us.  Friends, that ground was not dry.  That rock was definitely slippery.  Great photos, though!

 

 Great!  I love it!

Oh, what a great time.  Got to see all my friends which was so amazing.  

Joe, Elizabeth, Aliya and Kerianne were ALL THERE!!!!!!  

 

Girls Dinner Night ladies... Kara, Jen and Meg.

So many people came from so many parts of the country to celebrate with us.  I felt so loved, I thought my heart might explode.

 

love love love.  

Then!  We had our honeymoon.  We went to the Dominican Republic:

Because, duh.  I needed a big, straw hat OBVI.  And big designer sunglasses.  Check.  

The one thing that I did not realize about the DR was how many stray cats there are.  In case you don't know this: there are stray cats everywhere.  

Let me explain this photo to you:  IT IS A BUNDLE OF KITTENS SLEEPING TOGETHER ON A CHAIR.  

Kittens sleeping under the trees.

 Little kitten on the steps!

KITTEN NURSING.  This was our view from our room.  A mom cat nursing a little kitten.  This little kitten was running around making teeny tiny meows over and over and over.  Suddenly, mama cat came running up to it, she gave the little one a few kisses and then started nursing him!!!  Literally this happened in real life.  I seriously BURST into sobbing tears when I saw this.  Like, could not contain myself.  It was SO CUTE and I missed Ruby Tuesday SO MUCH.  Oh man, too much to take in.

This was the closest we came to getting all the resort cats in one photo.  I think there were seven total.  I think in the future Ben and I will write a children's book about a family of cats that lives at a tropical resort.  And all the friendly people they meet on their adventures. 

So, those are pretty much all our honeymoon photos! Haha.  We pretty much spent the whole time taking pictures of cats.  

And also amazing selfies with my new shades:

Yep.  

Loved it!  Such a great wedding, such a great honeymoon.  

GENERAL LIFE:

I married Ben.  He's in the Navy:

He's so handsome!  I figured of all the life updates, the part where I married a sailor is the most unbelievable.  Right?  Pretty much.

But it's true.  Also unbelievable is the outfit that Ben is wearing is actually BLUE.  Not black.  I know... it doesn't make any sense.  Craziest thing you'll read all day.

I still work with Planned Parenthood! 

Me in my Planned Parenthood sunglasses!!! 

Friday gang at work!  Amazingly, we all had the same mustache this day.  Fridays are usually slow...

WE LIVE IN VERMONT!  We live there because that's where Ben is stationed.  It's pretty incredible... I'm living in basically the same area I lived when I worked at Hannah House.  So, we moved here and I already knew the area and I already had friends here.  And literally the day he told me that's where we were moving, a job opened up at the Planned Parenthood up there.  (I was already working for Planned Parenthood in Maine.)  I pretty much just transferred over there and it's been pretty amazing.  

This is our house:

All decked out for Halloween!  Amazingly enough, our pumpkins didn't get smashed!  Even though I had a nightmare about it!!!  We definitely have the most beautiful house in the world.  There is much more of the house, but you get the idea.  It was the first schoolhouse in the town.  And that's, PRETTY COOL.  

We've made some pretty amazing friends up here.  Ben's hosting a trivia night at the restaurant across the street, which is super fun.  

I GOT REAL GLASSES:

Ya know, whatevs.  All that practice wearing fake glasses FINALLY paid off!!!!  But seriously, I needed glasses.  I still need them.  I actually have to make an appointment at my eye doctor for an eye exam because I fear my eyes are getting even worse!  I mean, can you blame my eyes?  They've seen some pretty amazing things in their days... they're just like, "c'mon, we're getting tired."

Ruby Tuesday is still the cutest and best cat on the whole planet.  But, no surprises there.

 Adorbs.

We had lots of great times with Kara this summer!  She came to visit a lot which was so wonderful:

We had a campfire in our yard one night.  And we made smores with peanut butter cups instead of regular chocolate.  Prepare yourself, because it will blow your mind.

Kara on my shoulder, hahaha.  So silly.  Good times at the Hartland Dam. 

Oh yeah.  We have lots of fun.  

 I decided to include this last photo from the campfire night because of two reasons:

1.  The creepy look on Kara's face

2.  The amazing article of clothing that Kara is wearing

So, for Kara's birthday we went to the Harpoon Brewery BBQ Championship Festival... (it was called something like that..)

That's all of us at the BBQ fest.  Ben, Julie, Mom, Kara, Carl and Jen.  So there's this radio station there and they have an entire table full of Taylor Swift merch.  Immediately we are drawn to the table.  There's some game that you can play and if you win, you get to pick out some Swift Gear.  So naturally it's Kara's birthday, so we all play the game to try and win her something.  Nobody wins, but my mom convinces the radio guys to give her some Swift Stuff anyways because it's her birthday.  So, she picks out this sweatshirt that says, "LIKE EVER" on it.  At first we didn't get it...... But then it hit us!  "We are never, ever, ever getting back together!  Like, ever!"  Yeah, it's amazing.  And when she pulls it out of the bag, it's not a sweatshirt but like, the softest sweater you'll ever touch.  It's like a fine cashmere Taylor Swift sweater.  So amazing.

Speaking of Taylor Swift.....

Welcome to New York.  Currently OBSESSED with this song.  Off her new record, 1989.  I'm sure you've heard all about it.  Kara and I are going to try to go see her in Foxborough, MA when she comes in July.  Last time was pretty epic....

 

Yes, we made t-shirts that said, 'Speak Now,' which was the name of the current record she had out.  And they definitely said, 'SWIFT' on the back.  I recently found those black sunglasses.  I still like them. 

I remember when I bought those Taylor Swift concert tickets, I had barely listened to any of her songs.  I was very hesitant to agree to go with her.  From that time, up until the concert, I spent hours, days even, listening to all the Taylor Swift records and songs.  The 'Taylor Swift literature,' as Ben would say.  I quickly realized that I could relate to all her songs.  It felt like she was writing all those lyrics for me specifically.  Sometimes I still feel like that.  In a good way.  

In case you haven't seen this recent SNL gem, please take a look.   You're welcome.

HMMMMMM are there any other updates I should talk about?  That might be everything?  Everything major, anyways.  

You guys think I should keep updating the blog?  You think anyone will read it?  Do I still have interesting/not-interesting things to say??  Eh, we'll see I guess.  In the traditional blog fashion, it's taken me a total of about three hours over two different days to complete this blog post.  

Oh, also.. I'm trying to get back into Twitter.  Just FYI.  Anyone else still on Twitter?  Amazingly, it seems like people still use it.  I kinda thought it was going out of style.  I signed up like five years ago.  

Something that's crazy... I'm starting to realize how much time is going by.  Like, I think as you get older/become a real adult, you realize that time goes by in years.  I mean, yes, that's how time works.  It just all of a sudden it becomes more apparent.  

Like, my TEN YEAR high school reunion is in a few weeks.  For some reason, that doesn't seem nearly as crazy as the fact that I graduated from college SIX YEARS AGO.  It's like, I knew I went to high school a long time ago.  But I still feel like a 'recent graduate' of college.  But, I'm not.  Not at all.  

I mean, I've done a lot in six years...... I guess?????  Maybe not!  Not as much as other people.  Feels like I'm still searching for something meaningful.  

"Meaning is not in things, but in between them."

I guess you could say that.  But, still.  Sometimes it feels really weird to be back in the Upper Valley.  Like, living here again.  I think because when I lived here the first time, I was pretty much by myself.  It's a very isolating place and I was happy to leave.  But, now I'm back here.  I'm married up here.  Ruby is back here.  Ruby hates I-89 more than any of us.  It's just so strange.  It's such a strange area to live in, then leave, then live in again.  Part of me keeps thinking that there's something I'm missing... Or something about this place that's right in front of my face and I can't see it.  

Part of me still feels like Belle in the field...  Part of me feels like I always will.

Alright, friends.  I think that's all for now.  Let me know if anyone reads this?  OK great!

Everybody have a great rest to your weekend.  And a fulfilling week ahead.  I will try also.  

this is the part when i break free

cause i can't resist it no more,

Captain Julie

(yes, i chose to close this entry with Ariana Grande lyrics.  #ballin  #girlcansing)