May I?.. Can I brag a little? ok. I enclose an except from my "Professional Evaluation" written by my Psychopathology professor, and I quote...

"A friendly, confident, out-going graduate student, Ms. Boldt displays good abilityto analyze clinically presenting behavior and personality patters and arrive at sound conclusions regarding the nature and degree of dysfunctionality they may represent. She participates effectively in class discussion and relates well with other students. She is an academically capable student who has good ideas, a sense of humor and logical approach to psychopathology. Her capacity for continued graduate studies is excellent."

Out of all he said, I'm happiest that he acknowledged my sense of humor. But enough about me, then.

Crib Quest, 2002... After the carpet layer was finished Saturday morning, Mike and I went to Omaha in search of the perfect crib. We started at Nebraska Furniture Mart where we realized cribs aren't as cheap as you would think. The one I really, really loved was about $450 and we didn't want to spend over $200 if possible. We left and went to Toys R Us, where they had cheap ones, alright. Cheap in every sense of the word. It looked like those cribs may fall over if Sigmund the Cat were to rub up against them. Sears' cribs weren't bad, but I didn't want to settle. We stopped by a couple more places, but everything was either too expensive, or too cheap. We were at a point where Mike probably would have given in and paid for any crib I wanted, just to be done; but in a last-ditch effort, we stopped by Rod Kush. "Do you have cribs?" we asked the lady at the front desk, "Why yes," she replied as she pointed to the back of the store, "back in Kid's Stuff." With a little bit of hope we walked back to "Kid's Stuff." We hit the mother load. Once we found the one we wanted, we spoke to Frank, the Crib Connoisseur, who told us everything we will ever need to know about cribs, and more. "You won the trivia contest at your last company picnic, didn't you?" Mike asked him. It was funny. I guess you had to be there. Anyway, we found a beautiful crib and it is at this very moment placed in Macy's beautiful room, next to the beautiful changing table given to us by my grandma and aunts. On Sunday, we set up her dresser and put away all her clothes. The room is open for public inspection for anyone interested. We're ready.

snap, snap, snap... what you are hearing is my feeble attempt to "snap out of" my current unstable, hormonal condition. I think it started yesterday when a hamburger made me cry. Don't ask. Anyway, today seems to be going a little better, although it has been taking a lot of energy to keep my emotions in tact. As long as I can sit quietly and alone at my desk and concentrate on something fairly interesting, I'm fine. Personal interaction is iffy. It'll pass, it always does. In the meantime, send your support to poor Mike...

It's snowing and I'm not wearing any socks...

Uncreative weekend catch-up... Friday night my frient Mary and I went to My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It was a great movie and I laughed a lot. On Saturday, Mike and I painted Macy's room. The carpet-layers will come next Saturday for that final touch. It's exciting seeing the transformation. Even more exciting is the anticipation of crib shopping next weekend. That night we babysat the neighbor boys Kyle (8) and Drew (5). We took them to the new 3 in 1 McDonalds where we actually had to wait for a seat, then to Star Wars, Episode II. I loved this movie, too. I'm not exactly up on the Star Wars story line, but I could watch the special effects all day. Cool stuff.

On Sunday, Macy and I were properly coddled at a baby shower given by my aunts and cousins. My very first shower. I have to admit, it's a strange feeling being the center of attention, opening gifts and knowing your reactions are being watched by everyone, but it was so much fun having all my friends and family together in one room. We got a lot of cute little things, pink and purple outfits, toys, etc. The kind of things I probably shouldn't buy myself, but would have fun doing so. It was a nice girls' day. My sisters stopped by the house afterwards to check out the half-finished baby room. We sat around the table and talked babies, christmas, etc. while the three little nieces, Chelsie, Haylee and Emah, tormented Sigmund the Cat in the living room. Poor Siggy. He's not fond of children.

Yesterday (Monday) I had a severe case of the tireds, possible resulting from my Sunday night's poor sleep. It seems I'm having much more difficulty breathing these days, plus I can't seem to find a comfortable sleeping position. I want so badly to lay on my stomach, but can't. My due date is exactly 2 months away. I think the first thing I will do after she's born is sprawl out on my stomach; secondly, I will drink some wine....

Accomplishment... Took my Psychopathology final last night. It didn't seem very hard, so I wonder how bad I screwed up. Even so, I left feeling great. This was a true masters-level class. It was challenging and I feel like I learned not only the class content, but alot about myself; the strengths and weaknesses in my thinking. Most importantly though, I made it and it feels so good to have even this small step accomplished. As I handed in the test, the professor actually told me I did very well in the class.

So I happily walked to my car and drove to the mall to buy myself some new maternity clothes. I felt I deserved it, plus I have a baby shower on Sunday and wanted something new to wear. Of course, I spent way too much. I had to drive through Runza after that to fulfil a huge hamburger craving I was having. Much to my despair, there was quite a line at the drive-thru and I thought I would go die of deprivation waiting. That was a good burger... when I finally got it. After a quick trip to PetCo for dogtreats and catfood, and SuperSaver, I stopped by my little brother, Levi's, apartment to drop off some things. I hadn't seen his apartment yet, but I was quite impressed, as it was the epitomy of a bacherlor pad; appropriately messy, smelling of smoke with mis-matched furniture and some very nice girly pics adorning the living room walls. Little Levi is growing up. *sigh*

It was nice to finally get home last night. Mike arrived shortly after I did, returning from class. While I unwound in the bathtub, he sat with me in the bathroom and we had a great talk. This morning, I realize that I'm the happiest I've ever been in my whole life. A complete, unscared, confident happy. It's so nice.

Nerd... Started a brand new class term last night - Clinical Assessment. It's one of those classes that confirms the fact that I really, really want to be in this field of study. I left in a better mood than when I arrived, despite it being 10pm and I was tired. Anyway, the basic premis of this class is psychological testing. We will study what test are out there, where to find them and how to use them. I have been assigned to present a chapter to the class on personality and projection testing and am actually really excited about that. I've come a long way since my public-speaking-phobia days. We ended the class by taking the Strong Inventory and will have the results next week. I love this stuff! Yes, I'm a nerd.

kickboxer... I'm sitting here watching my belly move. I've heard of this phenomenon from other mommies, but the experience is amazing.

my pride saved... a little... Turns out I didn't completely mess up last week's assignment, instead getting a B-, along with some good comments scribbled in red amongst the bad ones. I was happy to have passed, but I did hand in an extra credit assignment that I completed Wednesday night when I thought the mess-up was greater. Teacher seemed pleased. It's Friday. Yes.

Home again.... Mike and I returned from our official honeymoon last night. We headed out last Friday morning with an unknown destination. We literally flipped a coin to see which direction we would head - North. It was his idea to do it this way, stating it is representative of marriage... it's not about the ultimate destination, but in the road one travels. This is one of the things I love so much about him - his insightful, meaningful ideas. We kept flipping until we got a general direction. We were drawn northwest. I will attempt to provide a quick summary below, as I have a lot to do today, including re-doing an assignment from last week that I completely fucked up somehow. It was a missed diagnosis, I was way off.... Oh well, I need these types of things to knock me on my feet once in awhile and keep me challenged. Anywho, the wonderful weekend more than made up for it....

Friday... Like I said, we headed north, breezing through small town after small town, happy to be free of any itinerary or schedule. For lunch we stopped and had hot beef sandwiches in a small town whose name I have already forgotten. Stepping into the little cafe, it seemed we had been sent back in time. The waitress bore the likeness of the 70's version of my very own mother. She had glasses, long stringy dark hair and a timeless outfit, worn only by the small-town. She seemed unhappy, the type of woman who goes home every night to an ungrateful husband and 4 screaming kids. After serving us, she sat at the counter-bar, and quietly ate a slice of pie, choosing not to take part in the animated conversation of the older waitress and patrons. Maybe she was interested more in the listing of local events being broadcast by the local radio station.

Our bellies full, we continued northwest, not stopping again until we reached Valentine, NE. I had never been there before and I'll admit I was expecting something a little more substantial. We parked on Main Street and stepped into a large western store, smelling of leather. We got at true taste of the people of this town, everyone seemed dressed very western in boots and hats, the women wearing those cowgirl jeans that have no pockets on the asses. Leaving town, we drove through a state park to get a view of the Niobrara. I must admit it was beautiful this time of year with the leaves changing. We were in awe that we were still in Nebraska.

We continued north towards Rapid City, SD. On our way, we drove through Pine Lake Indian Reservation and made a slight detour to drive through notorious Whiteclay, NE, a one-block town whose basic purpose is selling alcohol to the constant flow of Pine Lake residents who travel the 2-mile stretch for that sole purpose. My biggest memory is of a woman stumbling out of a bar and sitting down on the curb, obviously very drunk. She had an ironic little smile on her face and looked as if she did not even know who or where she was. All along the dirty little street, people were everywhere, leaning up against the buildings. It was a cultural experience and left us both feeling a bit sad. Obviously, there are many, many great and successful American Indians and, besides the invasion of the white people, they have such a beautiful culture and history. But we didn't see that along our route through Pine Ridge.

After another few hours, we reached Hot Springs, SD. It was getting dark so we decided to stay there for the night. After checking out the town, we decided upon Comfort Inn, where we were lucky enough to snatch up the Executive Suite, complete with a very nice hot tub and big screen TV. So after checking in we had a wonderful dinner at Red Rocks Cafe, a quaint little restaraunt. It reminded me of larger-scale Jack's Bistro (for all of you Three's Company fans). They even had a live guitarist. Oddly enough, the first song he sang was "Fields of Gold" by Sting. I always thought that would be a good wedding song.

Saturday... Off to Rapid City. On our way out of town, we took a detour through a state park whose name I also forgot. About a mile into it, we saw a lone buffalo grazing right along the highway. What a beautiful sight. I've seen them before in zoos and parks, but never out on the prairie, free as a bird. We later saw a very large herd of them and another lone one on our way out. We also noticed tons and tons of little hills out on the prairie, which were the homes of the Prairie Dogs we finally figured out. Cute little things, we stopped and fed them pistacios. After stopping again to pick up some neat rocks on the side of the road, we finally made it to Mt. Rushmore. I had never been there before and was amazed at the beautiful scenery as we drove up the mountain. It really was everything I expected and more. In fact, I was expecting a simple carved mountain and was unprepared for the beauty that surrounded it. We spent some time and bought some taffy in a nearby town, very touristy but nice little shops.

We then drove into Rapid City, bought some walking shoes and headed off toward Deadwood, taking a tour of Sturgis along the way. Deadwood was wonderful, with Germanfest going on. We gambled, ate brauts, and simply walked through the little town. I usually hate casinos, but the ones in Deadwood were great. They were small, the smoke was tolerable, and there were no tired-looking waitresses in short skirts, In fact, Mike's drink was brought to him by a middle-aged man wearing jeans.

It was about this time when we decided to begin heading south towards Colorado. As we drove away from Deadwood and entered Wyoming, I asked Mike if we should get some gas. He thought we could make it to the next town, looked on the map to be about 23 miles, so off we went. I'm not sure what happened to that town, but we literally drove about 100 miles seeing approximately 5 houses and 1 intersection. And it began to rain. I must say I was a bit nervous. Mike kept assuring me we'd make it to Lusk, and we did, but we rolled into town on fumes. If there was a worst part of this trip, that was it. First of all, I get a little uncomfortable being away from civilization for that long and second, the gas thing. So after we filled up the tank, I took the wheel for the first time. It started out ok, but I think my hormones got the best of me as it got windier and the traffic got worse. I became the irritated driver and snapped at Mike when he commented on it. A bit humorous looking back, but not at the time. We didn't speak much for about 30 miles, but all was well once we got to Wheatland, WY and talked it out. We checked into a Motel 6, which was the most basic hotel room I have ever stayed in, lacking even a box of Kleenex, but don't get me started on that. I slept horribly that night.

Sunday... I awoke bright and early to shave my legs in the tub. Then we stopped at a gas station to purchase more gas, coffee for Mike and Vanilla Espresso for me. I forget sometimes that Macy ultimately ingests what I do. She was a little hyped up on that espresso for awhile. It was a short drive to Estes Park from there. We were lucky enough to be a part of the Elk Festival they had going on. We listened to some Indian Stories and an Elk calling contest there, strolled through town, ate nachos at a restaraunt atop one of the buildings and eventually headed into the mountain. We were lucky enough to see many Elk, first a couple, later a group of about 12, and eventually a large group of 26 grazing on the mountainside. On our way out of the park, we stopped to look at about 3 of them grazing along the roadside. We looked up and on the side of the mountain, we could see many more coming down, including a big, gorgeous buck. The herd literally walked right around our car and ran off into the woods on the other side.

Another full day coming to a close, we headed east and stopped for the night in Greeley, CO. We checked into a Country Inn & Suites, again requested their hot tub room which we were given and headed across the street to dine at the Texas something-or-other. At this point I was beginning to feel like I was close to home. After another great meal, we spent another wonderful night in our suite.

Monday... Interstate 80 and home...

Happy... I'm officially a married woman! We tied the knot on Friday night in a perfect, beautiful little ceremony with our families and my belly. I just loved everything about the whole day. I woke up early and couldn't go back to sleep so I arose and made a couple omelettes for Mike and I. He was surprised when I woke him up with breakfast in bed. He left for some mysterious errands about 10 and I tidied up the house and tried on my dress to make sure it still fit. At 1 I had a hair appt. at Posh where Emily curled and upped my hair in record time (one hour). I then rushed to the mall where Christie applied my make up at the Lancome counter. The hard parts done, I returned home. The only thing I needed to do at that point was put on my red dress and my Grandma Boldt's gold and diamond choker. Mike suprised me with a beautiful tennis bracelet, the product of his earlier "errand". We then headed to Sterling, detouring only to stop by the cemetary where my dad is buried. I did not know Mike was going to take me there, but that just shows how thoughtful he is. We stood there looking at my dad's tombstone, both crying, but I felt better making him a part of that most important day. My best friend, Nicole, was waiting at the church and my sister, Beki, arrived a few minutes later to begin taking a number of pictures, more and more as our families arrived, before the little 10-minute ceremony. I will never forget the vows and how Mike looked as he spoke them to me. And I was both amazed and proud when I started out with strong voice and no tears. But towards the end of them I lost it as the tears and sobbing began. But it was what I expected all along. He kissed the bride and we were married.

After a few more pictures, we were off to The Family Pub in Burr, NE where my mom had reserved the back room for dinner. It was a sentimental place, as my mom and dad had their pre-nuptual dinner there 32 years ago. Dinner was nice and festive and I truly enjoyed myself. I felt truly happy.

We left the pub, the "just married" flag placed on the blazer by Mike's sister, Joan, waving. As we pulled into Lincoln, Mike took another unexpected detour, taking me to the top of a parking garage, a place where we have shared a number of beautiful moments, rolled down the windows, placed a brand new cd in the stereo and we danced to "Lady in Red" right there on top of Lincoln. So we did have a wedding dance after all.

Next stop, our suite at Embassy Suites... That's all you need to know about that.

Before our wedding day, I didn't think to send out invitations or any of that other stuff. I did think that we needed something to mark the occassion in our scrapbooks, thought. Mike and I wrote letters to our families and I think our words sum up not only the wonderful day, but all that has led up to it. What follows are those words...

Mollie Marie Boldt
and
Michael James Miriovsky
United Through Vows of Marriage
September 27, 2002
7:00 p.m.
By Pastor Doyle Karst
St. John Lutheran Church
Sterling, Nebraska
________________________________________________________

I could think of no better way to commemorate this day than through my words. Although written on this paper, they do little to convey the deep feelings of love and happiness that are truly in my heart and soul, but I will make my humble attempt.

As a girl growing up and even through my days as a woman, I have often dreamt of my wedding day. Those fantasies were mainly of my dress, my bridesmaids, the cake and the reception. Although I do still dream of these things, the events of the past months and all that has ultimately led up to this day has changed my perspective a bit.

Mike and I are here today to make a promise of love and commitment to each other. Knowing that I’m carrying a life inside me, a being made up of a bit of both of us, is what brought us to this day so quickly, but as the days, weeks and months have come and gone since Mike’s proposal on that beautiful day on the beach in May, I have come to realize that the only thing that really matters is that we are finally here. As an ending to a story you might not know, I’ve loved Mike for a very long time, first as a friend who took my heart and mind to places I never thought I could go, and now, ultimately and fatefully joined in this thing called marriage.

I need to thank you for being a part of this day. To my family, all that really matters is that you are here. I thank you for simply being you. You will never know how your presence has kept me looking up and moving forward. Thank you for your never-ending support and acceptance. You can finally rest assured I am happy.

And to my new family, I can’t thank you enough for accepting me, despite these unusual circumstances. You can be assured that I love Mike in the truest sense and the vows I speak tonight are not taken lightly.

Thank you for being with us tonight. I love you all. ~Mollie

******

I am sure that as parents you had many hopes and dreams for your children as they were growing up. I have to believe that finding their best friend, having a family, and living a long and happy life together was on the top of the list. Today, I realize that dream. I found my best friend, and begin my family.

There will never be enough time to thank my parents for all of their love and support. I also thank them for their patience and understanding over the past years. They have instilled the qualities that make me who I am today. Rest assured, that as I pledge my life-long commitment to my best friend Mollie, that I carry with me all of the valuable lessons that you have taught me since I was a child.

Mollie and I have chosen a road less traveled to get where we are today. These choices are a result of the love we share together. Though things have not occurred in the typical order, it does not diminish the unselfish love that I feel for her.

To Sandra and John I give you my thanks, and I give you my promise. My thanks for accepting me into your family and making me feel so welcome. I give you my promise that I will always treat your wonderful daughter with the love and respect that I would want for my own. I promise you that as Mollie’s father looks down from heaven, that his hopes and dreams for her will be fulfilled.

I thank all of you for being a part of this wonderful day. This is a day of celebration, a new beginning, a union of two people and the bonding of two great families.

Mike