Student Teaching Semester

As most of you know, I will be graduating this December!  To complete my degree, I will spend this semester student teaching.  Due to a few hiccups right before school started, I was transfered from working at Goza Middle School in Arkadelphia to Cabe Middle School in Gurdon.  Gurdon is about 20 minutes away, so it's a commute, but it's not a horrible one.  My student teaching semester is split into two rotations.  My first rotation started last Wednesday and will go until October 16th.  I'll spend this time with Mrs. Jackson in a 7th grade English class.  My second rotation starts on October 20th and goes until December 11th.  I will hopefully spend that time at Arkadelphia High School with Ms. Slavens in 11th and 12th grade AP English classes.  This is a picture of my classroom at Cabe Middle School.  I have three classes total, and about 60 students in all!  I'm very excited about the semester and can already tell it is going to fly by! 

On another note, since I'm graduating in December, it's not the best time to get a teaching job.  Also, since I'm working in the dorm, I'm not allowed to have a full time job.  Fortunately, I already have a job lined up here on campus.  Once I graduate, I will become the Assistant Director of Campus Activities.  It will be so great to be able to live and work on campus while Tyler works in the middle school here.  We are blessed to have these opportunities, and are excited about the days, months, and years to come!

Birthday Dinner

My birthday was on the 19th, but Tyler and I were extrememly busy!  Since we were unable to take the time to celebrate then, we waited until beginning of the year things calmed down and were able to finally celebrate this weekend!  We both got dressed up and headed to Little Rock for dinner at Ya Ya's Euro Bistro.   

Tyler had been before, but I had not been yet and it was a definite 
pleaser.  We had the most wonderful time (and the most wonderful food) and I wouldn't be surprised if we found our way there again for another great meal.  

Tyler ordered the capicola pizza, and I had the salmon with shrimp ravioli.  They were both delicious!  To finish off the evening, we made our way home and watched Marley and Me (birthday girl's choice)!  

(Tyler and I at midnight on my birthday...rough)

It was a wonderful evening, and it was great to be able to spend the entire night with my husband.

Thanks Tyler, for a great birthday outing!

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Home Sweet Apartment

Happy Anniversary

Dear Tara,

I wish you "wood" have a wonderful anniversary...I'm sorry I've let you down with my absence of blogging...I hope this makes up for it!

Congrats on 5 years...hope Tyler and I make it!

Coming Soon

Tyler and I are about to order wedding pictures, and I'm so excited about getting them. Until we do, there isn't much to update on. Things are pretty quiet right now, but it will pick up soon. Bear with us while we sort through over 300 pictures! Until then, here's a little preview (thanks to our awesome photographer)!

We can't wait to share the rest!

Home Sweet Apartment

Tyler and I are very fortunate to be living on Ouachita's campus this year. We are proud to call Maddox Hall our little home, and love the way our apartment turned out! We are also fortunate to have gotten both a couch and a chair from the school. They are both brand new pieces of furniture, and even though they are fake leather, they look great in our living room. Along with the furniture, we were given new carpet. It is laid in squares, so if one of the carpet tiles is ruined they can replace that one without having to tear the whole floor up.

The wall with the collage of frames was inspired by my good friend Lynley, and I love the way it looks. We had way too many picture frames (Tyler's words, not mine) so this was a great way to get them all up!


One of my favorite things about the apartment is our island. Since Tyler and I love to cook, we knew we had to do something about the kitchen space. We bought this island, and even though it was more money than we wanted to spend, we are constantly reassured that it may be one of the best purchases. We use it all the time, and I can't imagine cooking in that kitchen without it!

This is a picture of our bedroom. I couldn't be more happy with the way it looks. I love the colors of the redish/orange, cream, and black all together, and I love how relaxing it feels when I'm in there.

This big window is also a favorite!

Our bathroom is pretty small, but everything fit perfectly. Like our bedroom, I also love the colors of this room!


Finally, the guestroom! That's right, even though we live in a tiny dorm apartment, we have an extra room for guests. The furniture is from my old bedroom, and it worked out wonderfully that we were able to take it for this room. We have already had a few guests stay with us, and we hope for many more!

This is our patio! It's small, but it is so convenient. It is nice to be able to get to our apartment from outside instead of having to always go through the lobby. Thanks to our parents, we have a lovely little plant. It makes it seem more like home. We keep our grill out here, and we're still trying to figure out what to do with that window frame. Our next task is to hang big bulb lights across the top to create a sort of canopy!

The place may be small, but it fits our simple life here in Arkansas. We love how warm and cozy it feels, and we can't wait to open our door to anyone who wants to come in!

I'm Officially an Ellis

Much to my husband's dismay, I thought I would start a blog for our little family so our friends and family can keep up with us. As much as we enjoy phone calls and emails, it just makes sense to also keep everyone updated via blog. This way (if you care) you can be informed about the little day to day things that are often left out of "catch-up" phone conversations. I hope to keep everyone up to date on the little things in our life, and I mostly hope to keep up to day pictures (because everyone knows blog posts are better when accompanied by pictures). Now, I'll try not to be a blog hog, so if there really isn't anything going on, I won't waste your time! I look forward to this new beginning as a wife, and can't wait to see what's in store! We love you all...our friends and family!