Going Back, Going Back, Going Back to Nassau Hall...

OK, here begins a whole bunch of backlog posts... Sorry for the delay! It's definitely time to ease our way back into this blogging thing...

Two weekends ago was Princeton Reunions! That crazy, magical time of year where 18,000+ alumni and their families descend upon the campus and try to relive their glory years...

PEF has its own series of Reunions events, which is generally where we spend Reunions weekend -- we are, after all, guaranteed to see tons of old friends! And it's a hugely busy time for PEF staff, who cater and run all of the events... I think David and I are finally getting to the point where we're less stressed about making sure everything is running properly, and more focused on really getting to catch up with alumni friends and have great conversations. Less Martha, more Mary, if you will.

And it was so good to see so many old friends! Complete with the requisite crazy Reunions costumes. :)


'06 girls and John


Anna in the back, making Erin's famous punch


Gentlemen of the great class of 1984, in their 25th Reunion blazers


Jon and John, being... Jon and John


Little Elijah Saxton was a real chick magnet :)


Carissa and Luke, with their newlywed glow!!


Some of the luncheon on Saturday morning -- gotta love PEF salads!


Cutie-pie Timothy Rudd, in a Tigger costume


Look at that sea of black and orange!


Sallade kiddos at the kids' table


Our fearless leaders :)

Crazy busy though it may be, Reunions really is one of the best weekends of the year. We're so glad we could catch up with so many of you!

For more PEF Reunions photos, check out our dedicated Smugmug gallery.

A Whirlwind of End-of-Year Events

Oh, man. There are SO many blog posts we've been wanting to write these last few weeks. This blog generally serves as a record of all the special events and fun times with friends we have, and we've tried to stay on top of it all, but the last three or four weeks have just been too full. Too many dear friends, and good times, and reminders of how amazing our community here in Princeton really is... It's a good problem to have. :)

So I've been wanting to dedicate a whole post to each of several special events that we've taken part in over the last month. And I've started composing them in my head, deciding what pictures to post and what pithy captions I'd write... But right now, I'm sitting on a backlog of way too many potential posts. So I'm going to kill several birds with one stone, by creating a compilation post here, and directing you to our SmugMug galleries for more photos.

That's right, we've got a SmugMug site now -- we've mentioned it in passing in a few posts, and I recently created a button on our right sidebar that directs you to the galleries, but here's our first official announcement! :) We've uploaded high-resolution versions of all the photos we've taken in the last few years (slowly working our way backward; we've made it to spring 2007 so far). So this will be the repository of all the photos we take:

http://keddiebears.smugmug.com

We figured we'd stick with the Keddiebears "brand." :)

And here are some of the most recent galleries we've uploaded (reserving some of the events of this past weekend, because hey, I'm really going to try to write them up as separate posts!)...

Click on the photo to be taken to the gallery associated with the event. Hope you enjoy the photos!

PEF Talent Show! (4 May 2009)


PEF Spring Picnic! (7 May 2009)


Senior Testimonies! (7 and 14 May 2009)

Melissa and Jon are engaged!!

Last Friday night, at our final regular PEF meeting of the year, Alex Hwang '10 stood up during our normal sharing and prayer time. He started out by saying that he wanted to give thanks for two people that he really respected, and who had shaped his Princeton experience thus far. And then he launched into a really sweet tribute to his older brother, Jon, a graduating senior this year. Which totally brought tears to my eyes. And the second person Alex wanted to give thanks for was Melissa Plapp, also a graduating senior, and Jon's girlfriend. Which made me even more teary-eyed -- how much must Alex love his brother, to want to include his girlfriend in his end-of-year tribute to Jon?

Alex started wrapping things up, by saying what a blessing it had been to know Jon and Melissa as brother and sister in Christ. But that soon, he'll be able to call them brother and sister. Because as of that afternoon, they were engaged!

And the room literally exploded. I squealed in a register I don't think I'd ever quite hit -- and I wasn't the only one!

And, of course, we all rushed them at the end of the meeting, to congratulate them, and get the whole engagement story... And by "we all," I mean all the women in the room. :)

Side note: Anna, I know I promised I'd get all the details, but... there's social reporting, and then there's stealing someone else's thunder. So you're just going to have to ask Jon and Melissa for the proposal story!

Jon and Melissa are both such stalwart, strong believers, and a wonderful couple. We're so excited for them!

They asked me to take some engagement photos of them around campus this afternoon -- and since Jon has now debuted the photos in his own Facebook album, I've been given the green light to post a few here. :)

[Click to enlarge thumbnails.]

Congratulations again, Jon and Melissa! We love you!

Leave comments for the happy lovebirds on their Facebook album! :)