Wedding Highlights (yes, more.)

This day was perfect. I just wanted to share a few more pictures with everyone.

Our wedding photos

It’s only been some 5+ months since the wedding, but we’ve got our hands on our wedding photos now and are very happy to start printing and posting them. Here are a few, just for now. We’ll upload a link with everything, so you guys can download and print what you like. We bought the copyright from the photographer, so you don’t have to worry about that.

Yesterday

Yesterday was Cassandra’s funeral in Gallup, NM. It was an uplifting remembrance of Cassandra, with a traditional Navajo burial on her Uncle Edison’s ranch, in a stunningly beautiful clearing amongst the sage and oak alongside her brother, Cyrus. The ceremony, to me, was about Cassandra’s spirit being alive forever in each and every person with whom she ever made acquaintance. I know that all of her hard work and dedication to multiple passions and causes will be carried on by many who knew and loved her or were inspired by her very determination to simply make this world a better place. I can’t wait to see all of the good yet to come. We may no longer see Cassandra’s smiling face, but will recognize her lovely spirit in all of the world’s goodness and beautiful wonders.

As Sam and I headed to Phoenix after Cassandra’s service, we were heading into one of the most mesmerizing sunsets I have seen in a long while. Thanks, Cassandra.

Sam and I send all of our love to family and friends.

Cassandra & the kids

As many of you know, we tragically lost a dear member of our family this week, Jason’s wife, Cassandra. Since the kids are in the hospital in Denver, with Dad staying vigilant, things have been hectic, but the good news is that all three of the kids are stable and family and friends have been overwhelmingly supportive. We wanted you to know that we’ve set up a website which will serve as an informational page about Cassandra’s funeral, as well as a place to make donations to the family and to connect family and friends who wish to attend the funeral and would like to carpool. We also invite you to share photos and stories of the Cassandra we all know and love.

Visit the website at http://cassandrayazziehotchkiss.com/

Any words of love & encouragement for Jason, Noah, Amada, and Dante would be more than welcomed as they heal, also for Alicia and David who were thankfully uninvolved in the accident.

More photos from our trip!

So we are technically home from our trip–but boy are we totally wiped! Everything was so great, and such a whirlwind of activity, now it’s time to sleep. I plan to write up a good long blog about all of our adventures, but for now, I’m just going to post some photos so everyone can see.

NYC,Jersey & Greenwich SO FAR….

AHH, We’re still on vacation–and I don’t have time for stories–but I thought I’d upload some photos to see how the trip has been so far….I’ll write some stuff up later!! Love to everyone! Tomorrow we visit the Falls

B

Blues & Brews

Last weekend, Sam and Carol were nice enough to take Sam and I up to Telluride to visit the Blues & Brews Festival at which Taj Mahal and Bonnie Raitt were playing!! It was a great time–so thank you guys for the fun times! The drive up was beautiful, the trees between Dolores and Telluride are changing and all of the Aspens were bright yellow. It rained on the way up, and was a little cold, but overall, the weather made for an interesting addition to this exciting day.

Bonnie Raitt and Taj were AWESOME–I think anyone who was there that day would agree with me. At one point during the show, it hailed! I took some photos of the adventure and weather, enjoy below! I really wish my mom and uncle could have been there. They are true blue Blues fans and would have loved to hear all of the great music.

NYC, CT, Buffalo trip

Hi Everyone, Just in case you live in the area and don’t already know this, Sam and I are headed to NYC and Greenwich to visit folks and can’t wait to see everyone! Our schedule is sorta looking like this:

Oct. 2 we’ll arrive in NYC. We’ll stay overnight again on the 3rd.

Oct. 4 we’ll head to CT to visit and meet Granny and Grandfather and see Anne again (yay!). We’ll stay overnight the 4th and 5th.

Oct. 6 we’ll be back in the city. I think we’ll be there until at least the 8th. We’re going to see a Broadway show (West Side Story) thanks to me aunt, uncle and cousin–we can’t wait!

Sometime after that, we’ll be heading to Buffalo to visit where I was born and see the sights, visit the Falls and catch a Bills game.

We head home on the 12th, early.

We can’t wait to get some traveling in and see everyone!!!!!

It won’t be long, now!

B

We’re married!

First of all–a great big THANK YOU to everyone who came to our wedding–it would not have been the same without each and every one of you! Also, for those who were unable to make it– you were greatly missed and we hope to celebrate with you soon! Even though it poured rain not only on our rehearsal but our wedding, I don’t think either of us would have changed a thing. It was great to meet everyone, to put faces with all of the names I’ve been hearing over the last couple of years. We haven’t received any photos from the photographer yet, but we’ve been able to view them on his website. I’m just going to post a few photos taken by Ashley Eftink, Sam’s cousin (thanks Ashley!), a photo by Rachel (Sam’s sister–Thanks Rachel!), and some of the photos I took on the train ride to Silverton. It was a great time, and I’m really glad everyone was here. Enjoy the pictures, we’ll have more as soon as we get them from the photographer. We’ve been able to view them online, and there are a lot of great ones!

Hey Family

We sent out this letter- but we’re posting it here, too, in case you want to read it again!

Dear Friends and Family,

As the year draws to a close, we are sending you this very letter to let you know how things are going in Durango, Colorado. As you may or may not know, we are getting married this summer, on June 26th, in Silverton, Colorado. But lets not get ahead of ourselves, there’s a whole lot of ground to cover!

This year, Becky was promoted to the position of Managing Broker at Blue Ribbon Properties here in Durango! After months of studying and preparing, she passed the Colorado Managing Broker test in April, and has served in that capacity ever since. That means she gets to be the boss at work as well as at home! She was also put in charge of property management, which Blue Ribbon recently started offering. In other words, she’s very busy!

Sam has been working as an analyst for the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory’s corporate headquarters. He has built a system here that allows the company to remotely track the status of their 50+ year old chocolate manufacturing equipment. He’s now working on a system to track the movement of millions of pounds of chocolate through the company.

As the year winds down, we have our eyes to the future. In February or March, Sam will be transitioning into working full time as a technology consultant– building web sites and working with companies around the country on identifying and addressing their technology needs. Becky will be helping in the business as well, offering her great eye for design and photography, as well as handling the accounting. We hope that Becky will be working full time on our consulting business by the time the wedding comes around!

Speaking of the wedding, you’re probably curious about that! We will be holding the wedding in Silverton (about 50 miles north of Durango) on the morning of Friday, June 26th. This will be a semi-formal affair, so while the swim trunks might not cut it, you don’t need to go running to the Tux shop either! Thanks to the generosity of Sam’s Mom’s cousin, Al Harper, we will be holding the reception on the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, which he owns. You can find out more about the beautiful train at durangotrain.com. We sure hope that you’ll make it a few days early, too, as we have a lot of fun in the works for the week before, including whitewater river rafting (Sam and his brother Jason are both certified raft guides, so don’t worry, you’ll be safe!) mini-golf, bowling, and a family poker tournament the night before the wedding (if you don’t know how to play Texas Hold-em, you better start practicing!). As they’re available, we’ll have more details on SamAndBecky.net (your source for all the information about us!), as well as in the invitations which will be coming soon.

We share a beautiful home in Durango with our golden retriever, Barkley, and as we set up our Christmas tree and decorate our home, we’re reminded of the wonderful Christmases we’ve spent with you, our family, in years past. And remember that we always have a spare bed for you if your travels bring you to Durango.

We’re working on building our address book, too. So please, when you get a chance, get us your address, phone number and email address. Call, email, snail mail… however is easiest for you works for us!

And, of course, have a very merry Christmas!

Love,
Sam and Becky
2545 Main Avenue
Durango, Colorado 81301
970-764-4564