More on Lute... he's BIG!

Coinciding with our move to bump up his breakfast and dinner to two scoops of food a few weeks ago, Lute has exploded into a mess of adorable teenage puppy awkwardness.

As you can see from the pictures, he is mostly legs now-- we're beginning to wonder how much dog we're gotten ourselves into...

A picture commemorating the last time Elizabeth will be able to pick him up

An additional side bonus is that the older he gets, the more unique he is appearing. The Portland Humane Society listed him as 'Australian Shepherd', but I think that was a pure branding play (my marketing knowledge suggests that "other?" doesn't sound too good on adoption papers). We're thinking of sending off for a DNA testing kit. Perhaps we'll have a door prize at the reception for the person who guesses his lineage the closest-- I think he's mainly harbor seal.

Making progress...

This past Saturday, Ian and I ordered our wedding invitation suite. I felt like we were prepared; we had already picked out the invitations that we wanted, we had finalized the wording, and we had the experience of ordering the Save the Dates behind us, so I figured we would be in and out of the stationary store in no time. Boy was I wrong! The processes ended up taking about 2 ½ hours. Just like the rest of the wedding planning, creating our invitations was all about pulling different ideas and details together to make a cohesive and, hopefully, beautiful product. From choosing the fonts, to the font size, to the colors, to the type of paper, to the wording, to the envelope liners, to other details I won’t even bother to mention, the process was surprisingly complex and time consuming. The sales associate helping us was wonderful, very patient and professional, and I can’t imagine what the process would have been like without her. Despite the fact that we were mentally exhausted by the end of it, I think we both enjoyed the experience. In planning the wedding thus far, we have made a lot of decisions, but for the most part we won’t see any of those decisions come together as a whole until the Big Day. The invitations were fun because they are something tangible. Although we won’t actually get the invitations for several more weeks, the fact that they exists in some capacity and have our names on them helps to make it real that we really are getting married, and soon!

Wrapping Up 2009 and Welcome to 2010

Ian and I would like to wish everyone an embarrassingly late Happy Holidays. We had a great holiday season starting with Thanksgiving in LA with the Parkman family. It was nice getting to experience some warmth and sunshine in late November, a special treat coming from Oregon and getting to spend time with Amy and Allen and Andrew and Whitney is always fun. Ian and I celebrated Hanukah with some friends here in Eugene (I know all the words to the Dradle song now). And we had a traditional Christmas morning with my mom and Larry and brother, where Ian received his first stocking from Santa. The day after Christmas we headed up to Portland to celebrate the holiday with my dad's family at my grandparents house who host an amazing dinner every year.

The New Year's holiday found us back in LA to watch the PAC 10 Champions compete in the Rose Bowl. We drove down with a couple of buddies and Andrew and Whitney graciously let us all stay with them in their downtown loft. We had a fun New Year's Eve out in LA, but we were ready bright and early the next morning to head to Pasadena. Unfortunately, the Ducks lost, but was still a great experience and we were glad we were there.

Christmas morning

At the Rose Bowl. Go Ducks!

Now that New Year's has come and gone and it is now 2010, Ian and I are realizing how soon the wedding will be upon us. The next six months are sure to be busy for us as we continue to prepare for the wedding and make plans for our move to Baltimore, where Ian has accepted an assistant professor position in marketing at Loyola University Maryland. Ian also has to deal with the small matter of finishing his dissertation . Although we are busy, we are keeping in mind that our time here in Eugene is coming to a close and we want to make the most of it and appreciate our life here while we can. We know that the next six months will be a unique and exciting time in our lives and we are looking forward to enjoying it.

Lute

While we're posting, we'd like to introduce everyone to our new'ish puppy, Lute.

He came to us from the Oregon Humane Society up in Portland and is an Australian Shepherd (among other things probably).

Tentative Schedule

Hi everyone,

It still feels like we're a long way from the wedding weekend-- but time is flying by and I know some of you are beginning to make plans, so we wanted to give you a sense of the schedule we're planning and some broad hotel/ travel information.

Firstly, we have a block of rooms at the Residence Inn Eugene:
541-342-7171
http://www.marriott.com/hotels/travel/eugri-residence-inn-eugene-springfield/

and the La Quinta Inn
541-344-8335
http://www.lq.com/lq/properties/propertyProfile.do?ident=LQ433&propId=433

Each are ~2 minutes from our condo and very close to the Pre jogging trails, Alton Baker Park, Oakway Shopping Center and the UO campus/downtown Eugene. When making your reservation ask for the the LaDu/Parkman block for a discount.

Tentative Schedule of Events:

• Thursday (6/17) evening we're planning a casual meet-greet at the famous The Cooler Restaurant (http://www.thecoolerbar.com/)

• Friday morning (6/18) the USA is playing Slovenia in the World Cup. Traditionally, a group of our Eugene buddies have gotten together to watch the US games at The Cooler

• Friday evening (6/18) we will have an informal rehearsal BBQ for everyone at Alton Baker Park (hopefully)

• Saturday (6/19) will be the big event out in Marcola (buses will shuttle guests to-from the hotels)

• Sunday morning (6/20) breakfast

Of course, all of these plans are bound to evolve as we get closer to June-- please check back to our blog for updates and feel free to send either of us an email (ian.david.parkman@gmail.com or elizabeth.ladu@gmail.com) if you have any questions or if there is any other specific information we can provide.

We can't wait to see everyone in Eugene!

Welcome to Our Wedding Blog

Hello friends and family! We have decided to create a wedding blog to keep everyone updated on our plans, and to provide useful information for our guests. We look forward to celebrating with all of you in June, and hope you enjoy our postings.