premarital counseling

So tonight we are meeting with Pastor Craig for our first premarital counseling session. We have to take an assessment this evening to assess what we need to talk about in counseling and where our focus should be to improve our relationship together. I am actually interested in this, being the people person that I am (after all I did major in sociology.) I still can't believe we have to take a test though. Sometimes the whole going to vegas thing seems like the best idea ever! We have a pretty great relationship or we would NOT be getting married. We're getting married because we love each other...but I do think it will be interesting to see if there will be any challenges for us that come out of this. We definitely have our spats, but we almost never fight...i can't think of one "fight" in over 6 years together. However, B does drive me crazy b/c he can't seem to find a trash can or the dishwasher and I drive him crazy b/c I constantly remind him to put his stuff away and to not waste money, so I know those are issues for us to work on. Mainly communication I'd say. I am a communicator, he is not. If you know Brian, you know he doesn't say much...it annoys him when I tell him over and over again what I want him to do, but if he'd listen to me the first time around it wouldn't be an issue. Maybe that's not a good way to think as a wife, but we are partners and we do have to talk and listen to each other to make things work. I have a habit of letting things get to me until I can't take it anymore and then i get really mad about something stupid. But I will say that we have lived together for over a year and have been together for over 6 years, so if we haven't killed each other yet, we must be getting stronger!! But I am excited to see what comes of this. I am sure there will be a lot more to say down the road, but for now I'll leave it at that.

Almost all of the save the dates are out...thank God!

Registry...check!

So i'm done registering for things...basically. I am sure I will still look and add things, but all of my basics are there. I am registered for towels, dishes, glassware, flatware...all kinds of things. The only thing i'm lacking is sheets because we intend to get a King size bed eventually...probably after we buy a house, which is looking to be the day after never at this point.
I am stressing over getting our wedding bands a little. Brian agrees with me that we need to get them, and I believe i chose what i want, but as much as he agrees with me, getting him there is another story! Cody is supposed to be coming over this weekend, so that's not going to happen then, and I am supposed to work everyday next week I think...we have our first pre-marital counseling session next Tuesday night and so who knows when it will happen?!!
Other things to do...

• Flowers
• DJ
• Food
• Dress Alterations
• Groomsmen Fittings
• Bridesmaid jewelry/shoes
• Decorations
• Mail out Invitations

I'm sure there is more...but for now that's what is on the agenda! 3 months left today...

Completely forgot to add:

We are now registered at:
Pottery Barn, Dillard's and Target...B would like to register at Home Depot, but I'm leaving that up to him...so it will never happen!

WOW almost a month...

So its been over a month since i last update. Probably because I haven't done anything. I do have a job and a life to live outside of this wedding, though right now wedding stuff takes #2 priority, falling not far behind getting my butt finished with my teaching certificate. At present that doesn't take too much time, thankfully. So anyway, what's new with the wedding. Well...most of my girls have ordered their dresses and the others will soon. Jenna, Chris, Brian and I went and picked out the tuxes before we went to Hot Springs so that is done and now we just need all of the monkeys to go get measured. We have set the date for my bridal shower that Jenna is putting together, and I finally went and ordered my cake TODAY!!! They were so nonchalant, like I could have waited 2 more months and it would be have been fine. Its a damn expensive cake, but for what we're getting, they're well below the others I've seen. I'm sure it will be beautiful, but like my mom says, in the end its just cake and you eat it!
We have some things that need to be done and i'm still working on list after list after list...like i don't have enough to do. I have to make a list for EVERYTHING it seems. Tomorrow will consist of laundry, laundry and more laundry, and then finishing my drivers safety course and making lists of people for different wedding events. You're all jealous right?! Never a dull moment in my world.

So I also realized today that I have 3 months until this wedding and I'd still like to lose between 10-15 more lbs. I have successfully lost 30, so what's so hard about these vanity pounds? I have GOT to tighten up and I go back to working out hard again tomorrow! Lets hope its worth the effort come November 8th! I am hoping to schedule my first dress fitting for 2 weeks from now...so here I go!

I plan to be visiting here a lot more frequently soon, and will also have the details and pictures from our first wedding shower up soon.

The Fun Stuff

Probably one of the best parts of getting married is registering for gifts!! I'm not gonna lie, it makes the whole event much easier to deal with when i know there are boxes with pretty bows to cap it all off!!! So part of the wedding rite of passage is registering for gifts, which i suppose its time for us to get busy with. Most of my friends have warned me to save that for when i can't stand to do another wedding thing, but at this point I'm not too stressed except for that the summer is quickly passing and we'll be having showers soon and we still haven't even started a registry...ANYWHERE! So yesterday I started our first registry at Pottery Barn. Brian's opinion was that it is just a bunch of expensive crap that we don't need. WRONG-O buddy. Unless I can register for someone to put my dishes away and clean up after you, i need all of the stuff I can get! He seemed to think we needed to register for his and hers shot guns at Cabela's...

While it is not uncommon for couples to move in together before they get married and have some things established...we are not one of those couples. Yes we have lived together for over a year, but Brian's idea of fine dinner wear is the plastic plates I bought at Target. So I am having a blast registering for flat wear, serving dishes and platters, bar glasses, sheets, pillows, etc. I should probably be registered for a storage unit to keep things in, because there is no chance its fitting in our apartment now. It is all too much fun. So now i have to get him to go to Target with me. After registering for Julie's baby shower with her, i have an idea that this will take around 2-3 hours...I'm NOT tell him that though. So since there are varying opinions on registration etiquette (because I do not expect you to buy me a gift because we are friends, but i can't stop you if you want to...) I will say here that we will be registered at Target, Pottery Barn and maybe Home Depot (if B gets lucky!!)

Oh, and the new save the dates are here!

My mother insisted we have a save the date with a picture of us on it. So i made one! For about $13 including shipping, i got a beautiful personalized Save The Date postcard to send out to friends and family! So be looking for one of these to beautify your refrigerator soon!!

And today I did...NOTHING!

So I'm pretty much doing nothing at the moment. I thought i had someone I wanted to do the cake, but in the end i decided to go a different direction. That is the problem with getting married in a small town...the only wedding cake makers are women who make them out of their homes. I have found some closer to me in Plano, but they will charge over $200 just to deliver the dang thing...so now what to do?? The good news is I found a cake I like and just have to get it in my colors, so that is one thing down. Claire and Susan have now both ordered their dresses!! Its such a great dress...love it. I thought there was gonna be a death at David's Bridal but in the end its all okay!

I also found a whole sale online flower vendor that does calla lilies and roses in orange and cream, which would be beautiful for the bouquets, which we are planning on making ourselves. You can bet i won't be sleeping the night before this wedding with all i'll have to do. I probably won't sleep for a month! So I need to call mom and see what she thinks tonight but I wonder if I'll be able to find her since she's a free woman with Dad and Maggie in CS this week. Oh well, its worth a try!

I am looking around for jobs for the fall because i want to be in a school with a day job getting experience and hopefully well known around the school. Its either get an aide position or a sub position...doesn't matter much either way. Regardless, after the wedding I will more than likely not wait tables anymore because my school will be at night (IF i get in...cross your fingers for me!) B is taking his last course for the CPA this fall at U of H Victoria, as well as 2 other grad classes for his MBA, so hopefully we're on the right track here. I do not know how people stay sane, live their lives and try to plan a wedding...probably most just don't. I'm certainly headed toward Looneyville!!

CAKE. and FLOWERS. and TUXES. oh my!!

So I have a lot to do, and my much more organized and less procrastinating SIL to be is making sure I remember what I should be doing. So cake was on my agenda today...except that Brian decided he wanted to go to Hooters tonight and I forgot all about it. Guess I call Saturday or Monday. What a pain! We are having dinner with Brian's family this weekend and Jenna wants to see all of my wedding "stuff". Hmmmm...do I even know what i want and what i've been spending time scouring magazines and the internet for?? Next time, I'm hiring a wedding planner. (just kidding about the next time thing B).

Wedding Details

We will be getting married Saturday November 8, 2008 in Sherman, TX at Trinity Lutheran Church. The wedding will be held a 5:30pm and a reception will follow at Austin College in Sherman. So far I'm still working on the details but my colors are chocolate brown and a pumpkin orange (i guess that's the color). We are looking a calla lilies and planning a candy bar for our guests. I just got my dress and I'm working on ordering the bridesmaids gowns. So many details go into a wedding, but I'm feeling pretty fortunate that I have yet to turn into a "bridezilla". I use the word yet loosely though.

We are having a pretty decent sized wedding party. I want everyone to feel important and special especially our families!! Everyone is so important to this wedding and making it actually happen, especially my future sister-in-law Jenna...she's amazing. My three best friends from high school Katie, Susan and Claire will be playing bridesmaids, as well as my friends Julie and Ashley. My sister Maggie will be the maid of honor. Brian's niece Delaney will be our flower girl, which I pretty much decided the day she was born. On the groom's side things are still in the works. But Brian's brother Chris will be the best man, along with my brother John, and B's friends Ryan, John and Cody as groomsmen (the 6th groomsmen is still TBA). Hopefully we will have enough room for everyone in the church.

About Us

Brian and I met in the fall of 2001 when I was a high school senior. We had mutual friends and met when my girls started hanging out at his house after collecting canned goods for a food drive (sounds so charitable this way)! After about 6 months of hanging out, i had I developed a crush on Brian and he called me out of the blue at the beginning of 2002. We had always had a friendship but never a close friendship, so it struck me as odd! Well, after that we became more than friends and spent more time alone getting to know each other watching Mavs & Stars games, and hanging out with friends. I especially remember several trips to Taco Bueno....'nuff said.

So I would consider us to have begun dating around the beginning of 2002, though there was a little more than friendship there before it truly came to be. In April 2002 we made our relationship official. It was my 18th birthday; a day filled with tattoos and calamine lotion and biology tests. After we got out of Biology class I was surprised to learn he was at my house waiting for me, where we had cake and fun, and that was the day we became boyfriend and girlfriend. A lot happened over the next 6 years, but it included me starting and finishing college, Brian making 3 trips over seas, and a multitude of other obstacles. So fast forward to April 2008 when Brian finally decides to propose...

It was my 24th birthday and I had spent the day with my friend Ashley and my sister Maggie. Brian had class at UNT that day and was not supposed to be home from school until around 8 or 9pm. Maggie and Ashley left as a storm was getting ready to hit and not long after Brian came home with a mini raspberry white chocolate truffle cheesecake from Cheesecake Factory. It was great, except that it was frozen and we had about an hour and a half before we could eat it. So Brian come in the house and hands me the mail and i'm opening up an invitiation to a sorority sister's wedding. He goes into his room to put up his bag and take off his jacket. He comes out to the kitchen as i'm putting the response card on the fridge. He is standing there with this goofy grin on his face and his hands behind his back (oh crap, i know what's coming here)...so he looks at me and i look at him.
Finally I say, What are you doing??
He sticks his toungue out at me and says, I'm going to kiss you.
With your tongue?
That's how i usually do it (yeah go figure.)
OK...
(so we kiss here) and as i open my eyes he's standing there with the MOST beautiful ring he could have picked out all on his own!! I was really happy but not expecting it. I'm surprised i didn't cry but i didn't. I just looked at him waiting for him to propose...except he didn't say ANYTHING.
So after about 30 seconds i say, um what's that honey?
(silence)
Is that my birthday present??
(silence)
Wow thanks honey is beautiful.
So does that mean you'll marry me??
Of course it does...

And that was my magical proposal. Amazingly Brian, right?!

And now we are engaged to be married November 8, 2008...After knowing each other over 7 years and being a couple for 6 1/2. He's a keeper, and i'm pretty sure he must feel the same way about me!

wedding fun

we're getting married!