e-shoot

Well, Melissa is even more amazing then I thought! She got our engagement shoot pictures up on her website SO fast! She texted me to tell me that our feature was up yesterday and I just about jumped out of my seat and ran to the computer. And for good reason... check them out here: http://www.melissabarrickphotography.com/?p=1090 ! I don't mean to brag, but I think they are pretty awesome.

As far as wedding stuff goes... the invitations are officially out of my house and in their respective mailboxes! Hooray! I'm still working on registering for stuff since expert advice tells me that I haven't registered for enough (even though I feel like I've registered for all of the 3 stores we picked). And then next week I'll be in MD dog/house/sister sitting for my parents while they go close on their gorgeous new house in NC (featured below). And I will get to meet with our wonderful and oh so sweet new florist, Jessica from Hocus Crocus! I can't wait! I'm super excited about our new choices for the flowers.

Now I've just gotta get legal stuff ready, paperwork to change my name, and get a military ID, and switch car and health insurance... fun fun fun! We've still got to get someone to sign off on our marriage certificate and make us legal... It shouldn't be a problem. I'm not worried at all...

Anyways, here's my parents new house! Isn't it so pretty?! I can't wait to live there when Pat deploys again! Haha just kidding, of course I don't want him to leave :) But the house is nice, right?!

happy birthday to you!

Just wanted to wish my big sister (and maid of honor) Kelly a happy birthday today!
This picture of us dates back a few years... about 7 to be exact (don't worry Kel that makes me feel old too)! It was just after the Severna Park Field Hockey team won the state championship in 2003. Kelly played for SP too, and we even had the same coach!

Now she's off being superwoman, running marathons and raising 7 babies. She's awesome. Love you Kel, can't wait to visit soon!

i'm obsessed

Before I get into all that... I will start off with the fact that this weekend was a huge success. We got everything accomplished that we had set out to do (well almost).

Dress fitting - perfect, got to take the dress home
Meeting w/ caterer - great, finalized everything and had a nice lunch at his restaurant
Hair trial - awesome, loved that the stylist took my ideas and improvised and it turned out great (and bonus - it stays in well and is easy to take out at the end of the night) plus it's really cool and different

We paid for our wedding bands that are already in production (and will be shipped to us in 2 short weeks!).

We didn't get a chance to make our ring bearer pillows like we had planned, but that's ok it'll be easy and my mom is a master seamstress :) We also didn't get to meet with our florist, but she was very busy with another wedding and it turns out we didn't really have time to meet either, we were busier then we thought (sleeping in will do that to you). But, I did see the pictures from that wedding and the flowers are stunning and it makes me so excited for mine!

Now on to the good stuff... We had our engagement shoot yesterday with Melissa (she's amazing, I highly highly recommend!) and we had so much fun! She is so good she already has our "sneak peek" up on her website! Check it out here ! I am in love with the 2 pictures she has posted and I am on the edge of my seat waiting to see what else she has for us!

All in all a fabulous weekend. Long, but fabulous... On today's agenda - finally getting my invites sent out! Hooray!!! 75 days and counting...

one hundred and one posts

To celebrate my 101st post ( I didn't even realize until after I posted my 100th) I am asking a favor of all my lovely (Stef - I did it again... spelled it lovley first) blog readers.

Although I can't imagine there's anyone out there reading this who hasn't seen on facebook, or gotten an email from me... here goes:

Patrick and I are finalists in a giveaway for $10,000! We submitted our best 'recessionista tips' for a wedding on a budget and we were 1 of 40 couples picked! The top 4 couples with votes will win the $10k prize. So here's what I'm asking you to do, if you haven't already (if you have THANK YOU!!!!) please go to this link: http://wildfireapp.com/website/6/contests/28230/voteable_entries/3872925

and vote for us! It's very user-friendly, just a couple of clicks! We would really REALLY appreciate it, and so would our parents. They are dropping lots to make this day so special for us and it would be absolutely amazing if we could help them out in some small way.

That's all... thanks guys! And you can only vote once so tell everyone you know!

Now it's off to MD for our wedding planning weekend - palooza!

wedding planning extravaganza round 2

So next weekend Patrick and I are headed to MD for the 2nd weekend in a row, this time for wedding planning. And lots of it! Luckily, Pat has duty on Thursday so he gets his duty day off on Friday and we can leave as soon as I get off work at 11 to get up there ASAP.

Our schedule is as follows:

Friday:
- Pick up a 'prop' for our e-shoot in VA on the way home (Pat doesn't know about this yet...)
- Arrive in MD before dark (hopefully)

Saturday:
- 10 am dress fitting (please oh please need to be taken in again)
- 11 am meeting with caterer
- 3:30 pm hair trial appt (soooo excited!)

Sunday:
- 4 pm Engagement shoot with Melissa! (I need to start making a list now of everything we'll need so I don't forget anything)
- Drive back to NC after shoot is over... and try to stay awake for the whole 6 hours (and then get up for work at 5 am the next day)

Somewhere in there we are supposed to be purchasing the wedding bands we designed a few weeks ago (which are already in production - yet another thing I can not wait for!).

We also may be meeting with our new florist. Yep, that's right... NEW florist. And here I thought I was done picking my vendors! Hah! Well there were some concerns we had with the florist we had previously chosen, and so now we've found a new one at the suggestion of our photographer (thanks again Melissa!) She is very busy with another wedding though so the meeting might just have to wait for another weekend. That's ok, we'll be up in MD plenty over the next 81 days!

And my poor videographer that we've booked but haven't booked yet... He's been trying to get me to call him so we can put together a contract and I keep forgetting or getting tied up with something else and I haven't called yet. So he's going to wing it and send me something and we'll go from there.

honeysuckle

I've recently discovered a patch of honeysuckle that must be growing behind our fence in the backyard because every time I go outside it smells wonderful! It's blooming all over our neighborhood as I found out when we took the pups on a quick run the other day. Pat and Winston sprinted along as Jack and I stopped every so often to smell the flowers... literally.

Ok... well Jack stopped to smell... something... more then every so often. And I yelled at him to keep going, but I did get to enjoy the honeysuckle as we ran by! I absolutely love honeysuckle. If I never smelled anything other then honeysuckle for the rest of my life I would be a very happy girl.Poor, poor Winnie though, the next day his little paws were raw and he kept limping and licking them. I took them home to MD to spend Mother's Day with my family and they were so bad at that point we had to bandage them....
And on the ride home he was trying to curl up without putting pressure on the bottom of his feets...Don't worry, I didn't forget about my snuggly boy Jacko...They both had a great time with all their 'cousins' and running around in the yard. And, napping, of course :)

just a quick note

Not much to report today... Still waiting on invites... But there is a fun contest I've entered... Check it out here: http://chicncheapliving.blogspot.com/2010/05/chic-n-cheap-living-contest-birdcage.html
Isn't it gorgeous?! Now that my winning hairpiece from an etsy shop will not be coming to me since the shop has completely disappeared and the girl making the piece fell off the face of the Earth (sad face)... I hope I win this one! We'll see if I can get so lucky!

Only 85 days to go!

i got sunshine on a cloudy day....

I feel I've been neglecting my wonderful puppies on my blog recently. So I wanted to dedicate a post to them, because they light up my life! They truly are my sunshine on a cloudy day. Yesterday here in Newbie it was rainy and dark outside. So... since I didn't want to play with them outside and turn our backyard into a mudpit, I decided to move all the furniture out of the family room and we had play time in the big open space. It tuckered them out! Check out Winnie... And snuggly Jacko... And Patrick got a picture of us all napping together...
And yes, this is how I sleep, always. Winston on my head, and Jack at my side. I manage to rest somehow... in between when Win steps on my face. But I still love them all the more :)

On the wedding front - I bought our ADORABLE postage today and have finished stamping alllll the invites and RSVP envelopes. Hopefully the extra ones will come today so I can finish addressing and stamping and mail them out tomorrow! Hooray!