5 more weeks!

FYI, I'm getting married 5 weeks from today! Woohoo....it's almost here!

They came, they went...

My invitations finally arrived Monday afternoon as promised by the ever-so-talented Amber. I hurried home after work and began hand-writing all 72 addresses and placing 2 stamps and a return address label on each envelope.

Meanwhile, I was able to get Scott's help in sealing them all. Because I forgot the glue stick at work, my suggestion was just to tape them. His suggestion you ask? Well lick them all of course. Clearly he has never done any mass mailing before.... Any Seinfeld fans out there? Remember the untimely demise of George's fiancee?

Needless to say, he used a wet cloth and a bowl of water and got the job done. Thankfully, all of the wedding invitations were in the mail on Tuesday morning except for 2. As of today, I am still missing only 1 address and I've already got my first RSVP card "yes" back. :)

Presents everywhere

So I didn't blog much about my bridal shower but it was very nice and I was overwhelmed with all the nice things I received. I couldn't have imagined getting all those great gifts with just one shower of about 20 people...but I did.

Not only that, but people are starting to send wedding gifts and my delivery address my office. I don't know how much I am really "allowed" to do that, but I figure it won't happen that often right? And the mail room has to bring the office mail anyway right? HA, I've been getting a wedding present that someone bought online everyday now for almost a week. It makes coming to work exciting. My boss said he doesn't care what gets me here as long as I keep showing up.

My only problem now is where to put them all. Currently they are in two piles (no reason) on either side of my tv in the living room. I even still have some in the trunk of my car that I need Scott's help carrying upstairs. I am so thankful for the gifts....just a little overwhelmed with the clutter right now. I guess it will motivate me to do some Spring cleaning before the wedding and reorganize the apartment.

Personalized thank-you cards

I think I've mentioned it in previous posts, but I've started going to a monthly stamping club taught by demonstrator, Bev Victory. The products are absolutely great and I love learning new stuff. Meanwhile, Bev has become much more than a demonstrator to me, she's become much more. Words can't describe how thrilled I am to have her in my life. I think God has truly placed her in my life just when I needed. Ok, enough gushing....

I wanted to share the cards that she made for me to send out as thank-you's after my bridal shower last Saturday.

This was from an example card in the 2008 Spring/Summer Stampin' Up catalog that she used and incorporated my favorite colors. I had hoped to recreate the example in the catalog but mine would not have turned out this nice. Aren't they pretty?

Thoughts on marriage prep

Well I've had about a week to mull over the things we discussed in our Marriage Prep seminar last weekend. My initial reaction is that they should come up with a t-shirt that says "I survived Marriage Prep and got married anyway". There were a lot of moments that I thought ya know, these are not fun questions to answer. And of course, if they aren't fun to answer, they will certainly not be much fun to deal with in real life. My favorite piece of information was that you potentially have the next 50 years of your life to work through, practice, and learn everything you can about each other, good and bad. I guess I thought that was comforting because no one is expecting or suggesting that we will get it right away. Everything comes with time....

Overall, I would highly recommend it to any couple. I can see some true benefits to taking this seminar either when you are dating, engaged, or even after you are married. Because if we took care of our personal relationships as much as we took care of everything else, would the divorce rate be so high?

My Wedding Invitations!!!

My dear, sweet, sweet friend Amber is hard at work on my wedding invitations all the way in Syracuse, New York. I am so in love with what she has done because they are exactly what I was imagining. I love them. I am so blessed and honored that she would do these for me that it makes them all the more special.

Here are a few pictures of what they look like so far:

This is the front, minus the Bible verse that will be stamped on the white part. I also told her for sanity and time's sake, she could leave off the make-shift bow with the accent.

This is the invitation opened up. The top is the rvsp card w/envelope and then the actual invitation with the directions/venue information behind it. I'm so excited to get them, I can't wait!!! They are so pretty and I love them because they are original!

Oxymoron = Marriage Prep

Tonight and tomorrow, Scott and I will be going to Second Baptist's Marriage Prep Seminar. As I was telling someone about it, I thought....marriage prep, what an oxymoron. I'm guessing that even though I've been in many relationships, NOTHING can "prepare" me for marriage. However, it is very possible that I will gain some much needed insight.

Below is the list of topics that are said to be covered:

• marital expectations
• communication
• differences and needs of a man/woman
• predicting a successful marriage
• love languages
• preventing an affair
• conflict resolution
• becoming soul mates
• the engagement covenant
• wedding vows
• finances
• blending families
• dealing with in-law issues and more....

I will keep you posted on what I thought about it all.

Update: Wedding

By now everyone has ordered their dresses and hopefully they will be here as scheduled...thank goodness, I was paranoid there for a while some of the bridesmaids might wait too long to order their dress. Oh well, crisis averted for the moment I think.



I'm going this Saturday with my mom to the florist in Conroe to meet with the wedding consultant. Hopefully it goes better than it did when we met with the owner of the flower shop. She wasn't very helpful and had no clue about weddings or flowers related to weddings...wish us better luck this go around.



I met with my friend Amber right before Thanksgiving since she was in town from New York. We talked a lot about the invitations, programs, etc. She said she was going to start working on them as soon as she got back home. The sample one she made was so pretty and very special since she's doing it all by hand. I just need to pick out some paper for the programs and some for the favors. For those of you that don't know, I'm making these sour cream containers for favors and I'm going to fill them with some kind of candy and a little thank you note. My Stampin Up Demonstrator, Bev, offered to have a little workshop at her house for all of us to make them together. I guess I do have a little bit of a crafty side...just as long as I have a goal in mind. :)



Other than that, not a whole lot of things going on right now with the wedding. Scott is going to be out of town for work most of February so I might try to schedule my bridal portraits then. We had decided to take engagement pictures sometime in January but I'm running out of weekends already.... The majority of the pictures will be outside so I can only hope that the weather cooperates for whatever day we pick. He's narrowed down the resort we are going to for our honeymoon. I'll let you know when it is all finalized. I don't want to jinx it by saying too much since I did that with the Sandals Resort in Antigua and we are NOT going there now unless we win the lotto. The place he found is very nice and looks soooo relaxing, it will be great!

Not as fun as I thought

This past weekend Scott and I decided to work on our registries since we are running out of free weekends for the next couple of months. Honestly, it was not as much fun as I thought it would be. Maybe I am guilty of over-thinking it, maybe it was just too overwhelming, but whatever it was it was not fun.

I thought long and hard about choosing a variety of items in varying price ranges, things I wanted versus things I needed, and most of all taking Scott's preference (or lack of) into account. We sailed through picking out china patterns, stemware and flatware with ease. Unfortunately it was the more fun items like sheets, oven thermometers, and toasters that proved too much for our patience. At any rate, we've finally finished the bulk of the decisions and our selections can be found online at Bed, Bath & Beyond and Macy's.

I think being engaged is fun, and I'll no doubt think getting some of these gifts will be fun, but I cannot wait to settle down into a comfortable routine of marriage! All the planning and the stress that comes with it is just annoying some days.

"THE" dress

Well much to my surprise, I have found THE wedding dress of my dreams. I'm convinced that it is perfect for me and is exactly what I had always imagined. It completely took me off guard that I had that feeling of "just knowing" when I saw myself in the mirror, but I did! It is a great feeling and I'm so hapy to have that behind me now. Of course the dress had to be ordered and won't be in for another 4 months but that's ok by me... The dress has actually been discontinued and as fate would have it, the warehouse listed 2 in stock. One of which was my exact size and color! Woohoo!!!

Side note on the size...the consultant ordered me a SMALLER size because she said the one I tried on was just too big. I almost kissed her... LOL, it's the little things!