Our First Years

After our honeymoon (and does it ever really end?), we made our first home in a lovely rental house in Elizabeth City, NC. We enjoyed setting up and moving in to this adorable little house on Maple Street. Even the address was perfect...1005 Maple Street!

Here are some pictures of our first home:

Our first home...we enjoyed planting flowers and working in our little yard best of all!

Eddie's beautiful rose bush. It's blooms graced our kitchen table and gave charm to many of our first family dinners.

Our first living room...of course, all of our furniture was handed down to us from our families.

Our first bedroom...I loved this beautiful bedding set that we got from a wedding shower!

For our very first 4th of July and only after being home from our honeymoon a week, we wanted to invite our families to come and see us so we hosted a little 4th of July barbeque. Eddie used some of our wedding gift money to buy himself a new grill so he was the man. We cooked hamburgers and hotdogs and his mother, Rowena; his mother's "friend" James; my parents, Harmon and Jackie; and my brother, Paul, and his wife, Jessica, all came. Paul and Jessica were on their way home to Winston-Salem from their yearly trip to Ocean Isle so they had a nice long drive up Highway 17 (Ocean Highway) to see us. This was one of the few times we could get everyone together at our house, but we hoped to host many more of these family get-togethers.

Eddie and I loved going to the Outer Banks a lot during our summers since we lived so close. The northern Outer Banks and the towns of Duck, Corolla, Southern Shores, Kitty Hawk, Nags Head, and Manteo are some of the most exclusive and beautiful beaches in the world. They are a favorite beach retreat for many northern vacationers, but due to the difficulty of reaching them are surprisingly less well-known and popular with people in this state. Every one should make the trip at least once. The wild horses of Corolla are also a special treat if you can catch a glimpse of one, and they probably won't be around for many more years.

Here are some pictures of our beautiful Outer Banks:


The ocean is so clean and blue here!

Eddie is enjoying a relaxing day on the beach! I hope he remembered his sunscreen!

Me & Jingles on the beach. One of the few times we let him go with us.  He is not a beachy or outdoor dog at all. He likes air conditioning! Can we say "spoiled"?

Our 1st Hurricane

As you may know, the southeastern United States is very familiar with hurricane season which usually begins in July or August and continues until October. Northeastern N.C. is usually lucky to be farther north and out of the path of most of these hurricanes, but in 2003, we were not so lucky. Hurricane Isabel (a category 3 hurricane) hit Cape Hatteras and the northern Outer Banks pretty hard and left a path of destruction on the inland areas of Bertie, Chowan, Perquimans, Pasquotank, Camden & Currituck Counties. The damage to the trees was the most severe as the high winds and large rainfall left the old trees vulnerable.

Here are some pictures from our adventures in the storm:


We prepared our little house to weather the storm!


Eddie surveys our flooded street. Our street flooded with even minor rainstorms so it was no surprise that it was flooded here!


Sherry & Jingles brave the storm!


Forester Eddie surveys the damage at one of the hardest hit areas along the Chowan River!

An aerial view from the helicopter shows the extent of the damage. 


Eddie's old Sidekick almost took a direct hit!


The tree damage was substantial.


Our 1st Christmas
Our first Christmas was also a very fun affair.  We enjoyed shopping for decorations for our first tree, and we chose to have a primarily silver tree until our tree becomes more of a collection of "family" and "traditional" ornaments. We started our tradition of buying an ornament for every year we are married and have continued that tradition to this day. We enjoyed spending Christmas with both of our families too.

Here is a collection of pictures from our first Christmas together:


Our Christmas Tree


Our house was the cutest decorated house on our street!


Eddie puts something special under the tree for his beautiful bride!


Sherry tries to determine what might be under the tree for her!


Eddie & Sherry with their Christmas tree


Eddie gets something special from his bride.


Eddie gives Sherry a beautiful new suit for her new profession!


A Christmas kiss!

Jingles, our first baby, graced our Christmas cards. 

We even got some Christmas snow!

Our 1st Anniversary

Our 1st Anniversary was an important milestone for us. We had been through a lot together in our first year, and despite the hardships, we had weathered the storms and come out loving each other even more. We reaffirmed our love and commitment and vowed to let God direct our life. We spent a wonderful evening together in our home and reminisced about all of our happy memories together.

Here are some special pictures that will always remind us of this special time:

Eddie & Sherry look at their wedding photographs and reminisce about that beautiful day only one year ago.

Eddie had a dozen red roses sent to Sherry at her work to show his love.

Sherry unwraps their wedding cake. At a year old, it was still delicious!

Eddie cuts the cake!