My defining moment (part one)

 Part One: I was eighteen and a freshman in college when I was diagnosed with melanoma. That was my defining moment. I suddenly went from worrying about mid-terms and how I would spend my first spring break,to worrying about how much time I had left to live. This moment shaped who I have become and who I will be. The repercussions were immense. During my scariest moments, I started to write about the things I wanted to accomplish in my life. In such a saddening time, I was fighting for my future and below are the things I couldn't imagine leaving this world without experiencing.  The words below I wrote 6 years ago....

• " I want to explore all the beautiful places I have never seen. I want to travel the world and experience other cultures. I want to love the feeling of coming back to Oklahoma and knowing that no matter how far I go it will always be home.
•  I want to graduate from college a teacher with the attitude that making a living is not making a life. I want to have my own classroom where children come in feeling safe and appreciated for being indivuals with their own view of the world. I want to make a difference in someone's life.
• I want to fall in love with a man who becomes my best friend and lover. I want to find the man who feels like my favorite blanket, whose arms make me feel safe, whose intelligence challenges me to new thoughts, and who most importantly loves God more than he loves me. I want to build a life with him,take his last name, and be proud to call ourselves husband and wife. I want to dance barefoot in the kitchen with him.I want to fall asleep to the sound of his hearbeat and wake up to his voice. I want to kiss him in the middle of an arguement with the intention of making it impossible for either one of us to stay angry.I want passionate, intimate moments that allow us to truly feel alive. I want to experience the world as a part of someone else, not just an individual. I want to buy a home on acres of green land with a blue front door and a front porch with a swing. A place to call ours that together, we make a home.
• I want to be a mom. I want to have a huge baby belly, spend way too much money on nursery decorations and precious little clothes. I want to feel a life growing inside me and know that I am being given the greatest blessing. I want to fall in love with my husband all over again when I first see our child in his arms. I want the sleepless nights of rocking my baby to sleep in my arms while quietly humming the lullabies that were sang to me as a child.I want to have tonka trucks and barbies dolls scattered through my living room floor. I want to watch my children grow to be people who love their God,who know they are loved unconditionally, and who know that without their prescence in my life, I would have lived feeeling incomplete."

Part Two coming soon...

Choosing me...

I had my first cross fit type workout last night.... All I have to say is bless my heart and thunder thighs. My legs are so sore and if we're being honest, I may or may not have thrown up. The old me might have given up, might have made an excuse, and then decided  I was too busy to never go back, but here's the thing about giving up. I just can't. I had a sweet friend who reminded me that I can do anything for an hour and she is so right. I've faced harder and scarier things. This is nothing.

I want to live a healthy life not just for myself, but for this handsome face....

I have been overweight since the day he met me. From DAY ONE. What consistently amazes me is that he loves me just like this. He didn't meet me  during high school and college when I felt skinnier and confident.  He didn't meet the girl who felt care free, who had never felt heartache, who danced on tables and on occasion, forgot that I had responsibilities. Clay met me during a time when I love myself the least. Yet, he loves me, he loves my heart and he chose me to be his wife because he thinks I'm beautiful. Now, it is my turn to choose me.  So here it goes. I owe this to myself. No excuses, puking or not, sore or not, tired or not, I'm going to learn to love me.

27 dresses later...

 

Our love story started long before I met Clay.

 

If you really think about it, most love stories start that way. Every dark day, every lonely night, defines the way we appreciate the moments of happiness. Trust me, I had a lot of dark days and enough Mr. Wrong's to know realize when I found Mr. Right. When I met Clay it was that moment people say you wait for. The moment when you suddenly know that he is what you had been waiting for. I had heard about him before, his best friend was dating mine, but we had never been face to face until our friends got married. I was the maid of honor, he was the best man, and literally walking down the aisle together was the beginning of us. I spent my evening shamelessly flirting and maybe even doing a little bit of staring. He is seriously handsome. It was that night that led to the start of a friendship and a first date.

Our first date consisted of going nowhere we had planned to instead spend hours in parking lot playing twenty questions and learning about one another. There are so many things I will never forget about that night, but the most important of those is that I knew. I knew he was mine. He was the man God had intended for my heart to love.

Three years later, Clay proposed. He did everything right. He asked my Daddy for permission, he custom designed my ring, and he dropped to one knee in the middle of twinkle light covered trees on New Year’s Eve. He said that, “he wanted to spend forever with me and didn’t want to wait another day for our forever to start.”  Of course, I said yes.  Our wedding is set for 12-31-13 and this is bound to be the best day ever.

Is our relationship perfect? No. In fact, it never will be. Clay is a firefighter and I am a teacher and with our careers come a lot of sacrifices all of which are worth dealing with to be together. I am in love with a man who makes me laugh uncontrollably, who loves me unconditionally, and whose flaws never outweigh the parts of his character that make him a genuinely good person. God knew even before I did, that when he put Clay in my life, he would be there to stay. I wouldn’t trade this perfectly imperfect love of ours for anything.

This is happening!

Welcome to my new blog! I am so excited about this and you should be too! Thanks to Hubby Jack and his awesome blog design, I now have a space to share with you. Not only will I share my personal stories, but this will be the blog for Chelsea Cormack Photography!

My favorite part of being a photographer is that by taking a picture the emotions in that image are left perfectly captured and we are able to relive those moments time and again. The time where I have captured natural moments of pure happiness, loving embraces, and sweet, unexpected smiles are the reasons I love this job! The truth is, I belive that pictures make the world much prettier which makes me excited to be about to share my world with you!

 I'm also excited for the opprtunity to let you inside my crazy life and learn more about who I am away from the camera! All the things that make me who I am, I want you to know about! There will be more on that in the next blog!


Love, Chelsea