The future Mrs. Faucker...

The people I work with are funny. Someone asked what my future last name will be... which surprisingly I haven't thought much about since I've been engaged. "Aucker" is a great last name... and if even it wasn't, it's what I get... so I'm saying it's great. That same someone said "that sounds like you're coughing..." And I said... "yeah I'm excited...." Then I made the mistake of coming up with all kinds of things Nate was called in high school... Awkward, Naucker, NatAuck, Faucker.... That's what got them... Faucker. They've been calling the Future Mrs. Faucker... the sad thing is, I'm not even close to offended...

We're Famous...

So occasionally my blog gets featured on a blog that highlights the lives of college students... recently, our engagement posts were added as a featured blog of the day... I think it's fun.

Pictures...

Here are the few pictures we took on Saturday... Nate kept telling me that his grandma needed more pictures of us... It was really just to document our engagement! :)

The beginning of our walk....



Here we are about 10 seconds before Nate popped the question...



Nate sneakily took a picture about 10 seconds after he asked...
I was still reeling...



Then we went to go see fireworks!

Big Weekend...

"I'm in love! I'm in love! And I don't care who knows it!" (buddy the elf)

Yesterday, the love of my life asked me to marry him. We are ecstatic! I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with him. He is my best friend and one of the most stand-up guys you could ever meet. I've never met anyone with such a big heart.

The Story... Last night, we went to a really nice dinner at a place in Clayton called Araka. Nate had been acting funny for a few days, so I was suspecting something... But nothing happened at dinner so my suspicions went away. As we were driving home, we passed my favorite park right next to my house. Nate asked if I wanted to go for a walk, I said yes, so we parked in some neighborhood and walked over to the park. He kept saying his grandma needed more pictures of us so we took a bunch of pictures with some horses and then headed down to a pavilion that went out over the water and had a fountain.... as my suspicions returned, all I could think was "how perfect would this be to get engaged!" After we took some pictures, Nate suggested we should go to one of the other pavilions... Disappointed, I started walking away, when Nate grabbed my arm, I turned around and he was on one knee! I've had to ask what he said several times, but I think I've finally got it. He said "I love you and I always will... will you marry me?" And I kept saying.... "what? what? what are you dooing??? what?" And then I finally caught up with reality and managed a "yes" between a bunch of other "Natey!"s and "What??!??" s I only know I said yes because as we walked back to the car I made sure... "Did I say yes?" (ashley) "um... yeah" (nate)... It was wonderful.

The big day... Right now we can only make specualtions, but we're thinking a small wedding at Table Rock Lake in Branson, MO could be a lot of fun. We're also hoping for June 13, 2009... my parents' 28th anniversary :)

I will post pictures soon!

Poor Mr. Fishy...

So a couple of weeks ago, one of my parents' fish died. Kinda sad, but we never really knew he was dead... He disappeared... I thought it was a miracle... My mom thought he just got sucked into the filter. My mom was right. This morning I went downstairs to find my shoes and found the poor thing stuck in a decorative bush in the tank... He didn't have any eyeballs and was missing parts of his tail (the crawdad has been eats all the stuff in the filter). My parents are out of town so I just left him there... I wasn't about to try and get it out since I was puking (that's right it was that disturbing)... so maybe some brave soul can get it out while I'm at work today... We'll see. Unfortunately, the image impressed on my brain is making my normally yummy smoothie taste like dead fish...

Second Saturday

Yesterday was the second saturday of the month. Every second saturday for my internship, we partner with New City Fellowship and work on a vast array of projects. Yesterday, we had a couple of groups go visit different widows and refugees, but the bulk of us went to NCF's (that's right... I'm all about the abrevs...) parking lot to build a garden. I did a lot of observing and writing name tags and introducing myself. Then I went "bopping" with one of my bosses, Carol. Bopping is a fancy term for "bopping" from site to site and making sure all of our volunteers are doing well. I met a woman with more vibrance than most... she also said she had healing powers. She is beautiful. Anyways... after a morning of hard work, we fed about 150 people with burgers and franks. I had to head out early for a wedding, but what from what I heard we pulled it off with flying colors. Here are some pictures...

Elf, long runs, and Derre-Air

I have the worst headache physically possible because today is my first day with out diet coke. My trainer asked me and my training friends to drink water.... and only water... So I've been weaning myself off, but still have a headache that could be fatal. So I made Natey come over and watch "Elf" with me... makes me happy.

This morning my dad pulled me out of bed to go for a surprise long run... I wasn't very nice, but cooperated. We ran from my house to Nate's house which is a good six miles (good meaning there were way too many hills) then got in my car (which nate took to his house last night) and drove home. Luckily I'm working hard because rumor has it, airlines are going to start charging for weight... These people are already on the ball... makes me sad.

Busy Day...

So today I found out just how absolutely Obsessive Compulsive I can be... It all started when I was trying to organize myself for my summer schedule. I needed to make a plain something or other to put in my binder (because I have ten others just like it). After getting frustrated with trying to do it on a computer, I decided to just use some markers. It started out with an innocent "oooh I should try again..." and went down hill from there.


1st try...



Second Try....





Third Try....


Oooh getting prettier?





No... I have ugly "R"s





How about some silver?



It's the stupid numbers that are difficult...


I just want a pretty Binder!!




Too many tries, way too much paper, and 43 minutes later, this is what I got....

Miss Bernice

Today was my very first Mercy Monday. Mercy Monday is when a bunch of people split into groups and head to different sites in the inner city. Some are with widows, some are with refugees, we also do a lot of work with Restore St. Louis. Today I went to visit Miss Bernice. She is a widow who looooves gardening. One of the big things we do in her neighborhood for her (as well as others) is build gardens. We helped plant flowers in her personal garden while the other half of our team mowed and weed-wacked her huge garden that she shares with the community. In this neighborhood, we find prostitutes, heroine addicts, alcoholics and all that good stuff. It is funny how much safer some good landscaping can make you feel. After I learned how to plant some impatiens (I even touched a few worms with my bare hands!), we met up with all the other Mercy Mondees and invited all the people we met (and more) to have a barbecue with us. It was so fun. The refugee kids are my favorite... One little boy in pink flip flops (they were from target for a little girl) kept wrapping himself around my legs... He didn't speak any english, but I hope he felt loved. I sure did...