Hair Problems

So I was (I thought) 100% convinced of how I wanted to wear my hair on my wedding day. You see, I'm all about looking like myself on my wedding day. I wanted to buy a dress that was "me," that was comfortable, and that I could see myself wearing on any other day (if it wasn't white and a wedding dress...). So when it came to hair, I wanted to follow the same principles. And I basically have one "favorite" way of wearing my hair.

Personal photos.

Basically curly and pinned half back. I have a lot of heavy hair, so having it hang in my face drives me crazy! Easy enough, right? I looked up pictures and found tons of inspiration for long curly hair with a birdcage veil.

Photo credit one, two, and three.

I bought my dress (online, without trying it on, remember?). It came, fit perfectly, and I loved it! I had the dress and hairstyle I wanted—all good.

Well...

I hated my hair down with it. Because my dress isn't strapless, my long hair covered the straps and just made it look... weird. Even though I wanted to channel this bride or this one, it was not to be. So it was back to the drawing board. As soon as I pulled my hair back (into a simple messy bun), the dress worked. I felt like a bride!

Now the question is, how should I wear my hair? I still am not on board with an elaborate up-do. I'd like to keep something closer to my style, while still having my hair at least somewhat up...

Flashback Friday: Trip to the East

To be honest, this post is going to be more like a dump of pictures from the trip I took with my family a year and a half ago to the East Coast—but that's ok! I want to document the time we had and relive some of those awesome memories. I'd love to go back someday and spend even more time there!

Two days after my college graduation, we left Greenville and headed up to Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. Harpers Ferry is a small historic town best known for battles during the Civil War.

You can see the old buildings and walkways in the two pictures on the left! There's also a train that goes out of Harpers Ferry across this amazing trestle bridge into Washington, DC. Apparently there's a lot of people that do the daily commute, because the parking lot was still completely packed in early evening. Harpers Ferry is also a huge tourist town. The Main Street of the town is a row of shops and reenactments catered to visitors looking to get their history fix. We were there in early May in the evening, so nothing was open—but we still took the opportunity to look in some of the windows and pose in front of a General Store.

From there we headed to Gettysburg, where we spent the morning. Somehow I don't have any pictures of this! I do remember that the museum was incredible—it was huge, and all new. We headed out around lunch time and arrived in Lancaster, Pennsylvania before two.

This is the house I lived in until I was three years old! My parents bought this tiny, tiny house (less than 500 square feet?) before I was born and fixed it up, including adding more space. Our next door neighbors Bill and Sandy took care of Emily and I and were close friends with our parents. Obviously I don't remember them, but it was good to see them again! They were still living in the same house next door—and thrilled to see us. Just the sweetest couple!

Next step on the whirlwind tour was Baltimore, Maryland. We made it to the Inner Harbor by around 5:00—we wanted to visit Fort McHenry, but by the time we got there they were closed. So instead we walked around the Inner Harbor and ate dinner at a Noodles & Co. right on the water. We checked out a HUGE Barnes & Noble and some other neat buildings in the area and then got cheesecake to split from The Cheesecake Factory—you can't go wrong with that.

From there it was on to Washington, DC.

So many museums! This is the Air & Space Museum—we walked through several museums, but our time schedule (if you can't tell already, we pretty much tried to see everything in three and a half days) didn't really allow much more than that.

We headed out through the downtown area and took a tour of the Capitol—by then the air conditioning was very welcome. It was hot for early May!

Later in the evening we also walked past the White House, and my mom struck up a conversation with one of the security guards which included her asking him how many snipers were on the White House roof and the officer replying that he couldn't divulge that information, but that if she pulled out a gun there would be dozens of Secret Service agents on her within minutes. Well done!

My parents decided that we had to wait in line for an hour to go inside the National Archives—not a popular decision. Especially since once we got inside and stood in line for another half hour, we found out that the Declaration of Independence is so yellow it's barely readable. It was cool, but I didn't feel like it was worth the time when we were short on time already!

The last few stops of the day were the Lincoln Memorial, the Vietnam Memorial, the World War II Memorial, and the Washington Monument. This was a really neat area. It was getting dark and parts were quite crowded—so unfortunately we didn't get to spend the kind of time there I would have liked to. But seeing the memorials reminded me of the incredible dedication and sacrifice of so many men and women—something we should never forget.

Likewise, the next morning spent at Arlington Cemetery was sobering and reflective.

We stayed for the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Solider—it sent chills up my spine—and visited the Marine Corps Memorial before my dad had to make it to Dulles International Airport for a flight to Africa.

All in all, a crazy whirlwind trip, but SO many good memories! And the longest Flashback Friday ever—sorry I'm not sorry!

All personal pictures.

Catering Update

Last time we talked about catering, I mentioned my dilemma regarding my idea of a true "brunch" reception—including both breakfast and lunch items. Reaction to this was mixed! Some people said they thought it was a great idea and others said it was weird and I should stick to one or the other. Ultimately they encouraged me that it's my wedding and I should do whatever I want—quirky or not (probably more quirky than not...)!

I don't always subscribe to the "do whatever you want, it's your wedding" doctrine. I think input is important and you shouldn't always do something just because it's what you selfishly want! That being said, I don't think the items you put on the menu fall under this category. In designing the menu I was focusing on a variety of items where everyone would have something to eat (including the health-conscious and vegetarians). All that to say—I decided to move ahead with my plan to essentially split the menu.

I did take a few things into consideration. First of all, I want the menu to stay portable and casual. This means no pancakes or steaks!

Photo credit.

Don't they look delicious? I'm a french toast person myself, but I knew that I wasn't going to be including pancakes, french toast or waffles on the menu. Delicious as they are, they don't really fit a buffet reception, especially when we want to encourage people to mingle and walk around. I'm one of those "don't let my food touch" people—so if I eat a pancake, it's sitting down with nothing else on my plate. This applies to all kinds of "syrupy" or more involved foods that I was trying to avoid. Did I spend enough time over-analyzing pancakes yet? Thought so.

Photo credit.

Alright, so steaks. First of all, I actually hate my steak rare. I like it well done, and my favorite part is the charred edges. Total side note! But here's my real point with steaks—and actually all foods in the typical "formal" reception menu—it doesn't fit with the rest of the ceremony and reception. We're in a casual room with a simple reception. Not really steak material—or crab cakes, or salmon, or... you get the picture.

So now for the inspiration picture. Still a work in progress!

Cinnamon rolls, muffins, mini quiches, fruit, chicken salad croissants, pasta salad, and cheese & crackers.

Here we have a mix of three "breakfast" foods (the cinnamon rolls and muffins are a pastry mix) and three "lunch" foods. All of them, though, are fairly casual and all except the pasta salad could be semi-finger foods. For some reason I'm just stuck on the pasta salad!

*spoiler alert* We did our tasting with the venue and tried two different kinds of pasta salad. We chose a pasta salad that had a good flavor without being bland or overly distinctive. I'm super excited about it and hope that other people like it too!

I'll talk more about the tasting next time, but for now I think we have a decent idea of where we want to head with this! I can't wait!

Pretty Pretty Pictures

This post title inspiration brought to you by Pretty Pretty Princess.

*ahem*

... moving on to the actual theme of the post. I was going to write about something else today BUT we got our engagement pictures back! Meaning that clearly I was going to have to overload you with lovely photos.

Here we go with a few of my favorites—all pictures from Niki Marie Photography.

Looking back on my favorite pictures of the photo shoot, I'm pretty sure I'm laughing in over half of them. It's real laughter—I promise!

Outside the Fox Theatre in downtown Detroit—I love the reflection in the glass.

My absolute favorite shot. Bored yet? Let's mix it up a little...

Not all (none?) of our pictures made us look like models—and if they did it was all thanks to Niki! But there were some not-so-perfect pictures too which I loved.

And one more to finish out this photo heavy post. Love him!

Tangent Tuesday: Long Distance

I'm just going to warn you up front—this is going to be a depressing post. I'll keep it short though. Nathan is officially done with undergrad—which is AWESOME! I'm so proud of him. Unfortunately, I still have a semester of school left in South Carolina. Which leads me to the depressing part...

Photo credit.

According to Google Maps, it is 680 miles and 10 hours and 11 minutes from Michigan to South Carolina, and Google Maps does not lie. Unless you're going 80 the whole way. Then it only takes 9 hours and 30 minutes. *cough*

So Nathan and I will be long distance for the remainder of our engagement. I'm not too concerned about the wedding planning part of it—we can do almost everything on the phone and on the internet and he'll come down when he can. And let's just be honest, Nathan wasn't enthused about cutting and folding tissue paper anyway!

The hard part is just being apart. I read about how important the engagement is for preparing for marriage or how this is a time when you work things out as a couple—but I know that can still be true. We'll just have to text a lot more (if that's even possible) and maybe I can even convince Nathan to call me a few times (he's not much for talking on the phone). And hopefully the four months after New Years—since we're spending the holidays together—will fly by!

Projects in Progress

This weekend I was in very much a wedding planning mood. I felt less like blogging and documenting and more like actually accomplishing projects—that's a good thing! But now I need to step back and think about the projects I started, all the crazy ideas I have, and what I have left to do. I don't want to go all list crazy on you, but here's what I have so far...

• Crossword Puzzles—almost done, just have to do the final proofread and print! Oh and for these I also bought 120 pencils... unsharpened. That was fun.
• I Spy—these were done but then I had the idea that I wanted to do several different versions to (hopefully) get a wider variety of pictures, so it's still in progress.
• Coloring pages—this is a new one! I started thinking about giving the kids something else to do (since clearly they'll be too young to do a crossword puzzle). I bought ten packs of crayons for less than a dollar each and am working on coming up with some wedding related coloring pages. I'll write a post about this when I'm done!
• Tissue paper poms—I finally came up with my flower inspiration! This isn't something I've touched on before, but from the beginning I was interested in making my own flowers and floral decorations, since flowers really aren't in the budget. A post on this is coming up this week for sure.
• Scrabble letters—I scoured eBay (ahem, clearly I have an eBay obsession) and found 300 tiles that should be arriving in the next two days! Can't wait to start working with these.
• My wedding binder—ok, so this one isn't actually a wedding craft. But this weekend I did get all of my wedding stuff organized in one place. And I had to make it pretty of course! I cut apart some old bridal magazines and made some themed pages. Maybe I'll have to take some pictures later! I might be a little too excited about this.

As you can see, there will be a lot of craft posts coming up! I also need to do an updated catering post and talk about registering for items. So here we go!

Wedding Dress Decisions

(Much better than Wedding Dress Nightmares)

From the very beginning, I had a dress preference from the six I originally liked. But first let's look at the ones I didn't choose.

The Bettina was beautiful, but not exactly what I was looking for in a wedding dress, mainly because I couldn't see myself walking down the aisle with any jewelry or a veil in it. The neckline doesn't lend itself to a necklace, and I feel like in a veil I would just be completely covered from toe to forehead. So that one was out.

Nathan was actually the one to veto the Sararose and Sinclair dresses. Which was fine with me! I was glad he had input, and neither of these dresses really stood out to me.

I also should note that I'm not the typical look for "the dress" and cry when you find it bride. In some ways I wish I were! It all seems so romantic and classic. But to be honest, I have yet to feel that at all in my planning process, and I don't know if I will. For me the planning is purely logical—not to say that I don't enjoy it!

I guess in the end it just came down to availability, price, and what I could actually see myself wearing on my wedding day. I went to a local J. CREW store (not a J. CREW bridal—the nearest one is Atlanta) and tried on a few dresses to size myself. I'm consistently the same J. CREW size, so I felt fairly safe ordering online without trying on the actual dress.

So here we go. The J. CREW Sophia. My number one choice from the beginning for several reasons—the simplicity of the dress, the way it fits with my style, and being able to feel comfortable and like myself on my wedding day. I also like that I can make this dress my own! I haven't decided how yet. I'm considering a chunky necklace for the reception, maybe fancy drop earrings, a sash, flowers in my hair/on the sash—or really anything that I want. Because of the simplicity of the dress, I can do whatever I want with my accessories!

A few things. As you can tell from the link—the Sophia is no longer sold on the J. CREW website. Which is fine, since I knew I would be able to find the dress cheaper elsewhere anyway! I found it on RecycledBride—not my size. Again, here it is on PreOwnedWeddingDresses—this one is my size but sold obviously. These are just a few of the sites I checked! There are plenty of places to buy gently used or even new with tags wedding dresses that aren't full price.

These pictures and dresses are also all showing the dress in silk tricotine. J. CREW originally made the dress in both silk chiffon and silk tricotine. After looking at pictures of both online, I decided I wanted the dress in silk chiffon. It seems like most women buy silk tricotine, but since I was looking to have a casual ceremony and reception, I felt like silk chiffon would be a better fit.

I typed "J. CREW Sophia Silk Chiffon" into the search bar on eBay and came up with these results. (Well, not these results exactly since the dresses listed are always changing!) Eventually I found a great deal on an ivory size zero silk chiffon J. CREW Sophia new with tags. And bought it! Just like that.

So yes I did buy my wedding dress on, *ahem* eBay, without ever trying it on, and without ever having seen it. And I love it!

I keep looking for pictures of brides wearing this dress but there aren't very many out there in my style and size. I took a few horrible pictures of me the first time I tried it on—but you're going to have to wait until I can take some slightly less embarrassing shots! And since this post is long enough already, we'll talk about the details of my dress the next time around.

Flashback Friday: Graduation

About two months after we started dating, I graduated from undergrad! The next week my family and I went on a week long trip to Pennsylvania, Baltimore, and Washington, DC. A few pics to recap...

Me with my parents and siblings after graduation!

Nathan and I at graduation. I feel like we look so young and different here!

A few pictures from my graduation party! Side note: I love my bangs in these pictures. I think it's time to get a haircut.

All photos personal.

I was going to recap our trip to the East as well, but I just realized there are a TON of pictures from that trip, so I'll have to make it a post of its own.

Instead, I'll give a huge shoutout to Nathan for officially finishing undergrad yesterday!

The Unabridged Short Stories & Books... of Nathan & Laura's Wedding

Nathan and I paid a visit to the largest used bookstore in Greenville—Mr. K's Used Books—to fill our vision of a book themed wedding. We knew we were looking for classics and books we had read and loved, such as Jane Austen's Pride & Prejudice and Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. Ok maybe that was just me; Nathan was looking at Mark Twain and Charles Dickens.

We bought each of the following books for about five dollars each—not bad for hardbound classics!

• Pride & Prejudice
• O Pioneers
• Doctor Zhivago
• Selected Stories and Poems of Edgar Allen Poe
• Uncle Tom's Cabin
• The Scarlet Pimpernel
• Wuthering Heights
• Mutiny on the Bounty

Here's Nathan modeling our books...

Personal photo.

Nice. But really, see how all the books are different sizes, shapes, and colors, yet have a cohesive theme? Perfect! Now I just need forty more or so...

Bridal Party Introductions!

I realized I haven't done a post on my bridal party yet! Making a decision on who to include in our bridal party wasn't difficult after we thought about what we really want. Nathan has two brothers and I have two sisters, so we knew at the very minimum we wanted to include those two on both sides. At the same time, however, we wanted to keep our bridal parties small—at most three each. Somehow the choice suddenly became tricky. Would I ask my roommate of the last two years? One of my two closest friends from school? One of Nathan's two sisters (my future sisters-in-law!)? The same applied for Nathan.

The answer is none of the above. We chose to have only two stand up with us on each side—my sisters and his brothers, respectively. The alternative would have been to include his two sisters and my brother for four bridesmaids and three groomsmen. The big obstacle with this is that my brother is only 15 and actually didn't want to stand up in our wedding, so I think our final choice ended up being the best overall! We'll be blessed to have some of our siblings stand up with us and others directly involved in the wedding.

But now for introductions! These are directly from our wedding website.

Bridesmaid Emily

Emily is the second oldest Dickinson girl and a junior nursing major. This picture shows exactly who she is—a free spirit. A soon-to-be two-time beast of a marathon runner, Emily is the strongest & fastest, and also by far the most outgoing!









Bridesmaid Abigail

Abigail is the youngest Dickinson girl—and the tallest, which means she is often asked "Who's older?" Also a marathoner, Abigail's running style reflects her personality: steady and consistent. You can call her "Abi," but make sure you spell it with an i.









Groomsman Brandon

Brandon is the third oldest Miller and the first to get married! Brandon & Brittany were married in a ranch-style wedding on July 21, 2012, and currently live in Utah. Brandon also might be playing the cello—as long as he's willing to play Pachelbel's Canon in D.









Groomsman Jeremie

Jeremie is the baby of the Miller family and probably the quietest—it took him a year & a half to say more than three words together to Laura! Let's just be honest, Jer prefers slide tackling on the soccer field to holding a conversation. He also has a tendency to spill things on himself...








So maybe I had a little too much fun with the introductions and poking fun at my siblings and future siblings—lots of inside jokes. But I really am so excited to have these four standing up with us! You'll see a lot more of them in future posts when we start talking more about attire, wedding day timelines, and pictures.

Tangent Tuesday: One Epic Run

Today's post is just going to be a quick recap of a trail run Nathan and I participated in this weekend! To give a little background, there are very crazy people out there—and they're called ultramarathoners. You thought running a 26.2 miles for a marathon was bad? Imagine running four marathons, back-to-back, without stopping—and all of this on rough trails and up and down mountains.

Nathan and I happen to know a few of these crazy ultramarathoners from our church in North Carolina. They came down to the Greenville area last Saturday for the ultramarathon One Epic Run. One Epic Run is not your typical race. First of all, it is a 24-hour run. This means that some of the participants started at 9am on Saturday morning and were still running at 9am on Sunday morning. The goal is generally to amass as much mileage as possible. Second, it is a 3.16 mile loop on trails through the woods—trails that include steep hills, mud, a log crossing over a creek, and a long climb back to the starting point.

So on Saturday we headed down to Croft State Park where the 24-hour race was being held to support our friends and to run a few laps with them.

Personal photo. Nathan and I with two of our ultramarathon friends—clearly the shirtless guys.

Both of the guys in this picture have completed a 100 mile race, and the one on the right has completed two, both in less than 24 hours! Here's a picture of what the log crossing looked like, taken from the One Epic Run Facebook page.

These runners are crazy. If you didn't believe me, check out this picture...

For all of their craziness, they're great guys, and we had a fun time hanging out with them and even running almost ten miles ourselves! The race organizer set up a really amazing spread of food—if you're running 24 hours straight, you're eating 24 hours straight!

The top male runner completed just over 107 miles in 24 hours and the top female runner completed just under 73! The people we knew running completed anywhere from 22 to 101 miles.

If that doesn't make you want to get into ultramarathons,  I don't know what will...

Choosing a Caterer (and a menu!)

Before we decided on a venue, I looked around at caterers in the area and got majorly discouraged. Either the prices were way too high for our budget—or the sites were hard to navigate and uninformative. I didn't know if I could find anything to fit our vision, which has slowly evolved into...

A casual morning wedding and brunch reception celebrating family and love.

Then we finally found our venue. *cue sigh of relief*

Along with the venue came the options to use the venue's caterer, do our own catering (although we would have to pay for the use of the kitchen), or bring in an outside caterer. Here's where I need to make a confession: food is not a big deal to me. I like simple food. I eat cereal for breakfast, rice for lunch, and pasta for dinner—with extra veggies. But at the same time, I want to provide our guests with plenty of healthy (ish), good-tasting food.

I finally got in contact with our caterer (a mix-up that was partly my fault and partly our venue's fault) about three weeks after first touring our venue. I talked to her on the phone and walked away from our conversation feeling SO good about it! She was a sweet older lady with a southern accent and a willingness to do whatever—but she also had her own ideas and direction, which was great since I still don't know exactly what I want.

Best part of it all: her prices are totally reasonable and scaleable. We'd be paying her per item, so we can choose how much we want to spend per person by choosing how many items we want to have out. I think we've struck a good balance between being money-conscious and providing a good meal. We have a tasting with her soon and as long as her food is edible (just kidding—it has to be at least semi-delicious too!), we're definitely booking her for the reception.

Enough words—let's look at some inspiration pictures. Well... about that. It's overwhelming. I typed "brunch reception" into Google images, thinking I'd get a few cute pictures I could draw from. Instead, I got this:

Umm, it's overwhelming. Where to even start? Also, apparently brunch doesn't mean breakfast + lunch—it just means breakfast at lunch time. My original thought had been to include both breakfast and lunch foods in the same meal. A true "breakfast + lunch." Now I feel like that is too weird...

What do you think? Is it ok to do half breakfast items and half lunch items? What would you want to see in a "brunch" menu?

Flashback Friday: "Official"

I'm going to drag this series out as long as I possibly can because I love it. Well maybe not as long as I possibly can—I don't hate you that much! But really, these were really great days, and I think back on them with a huge smile. Granted, I have no interest in going back to these days now! I am more than happy to be in a comfortable long-term relationship—no more of the questioning and second-guessing.

Nathan and I continued to hang out and see each other a few times a week, and of course text each other. A lot. Maybe the title of this post should have been Flashback Friday: We Love to Text. To be honest, that's still true today! Even when we're on the same campus, whenever we're not together my phone is essentially an extension of my hand. Neither of us are big on talking on the phone, but sending 15,000 text messages a month? Piece of cake.

In my family, my dad has a rule that before anyone can date one of his daughters (he has three), the guy has to call him and ask permission. No big deal right? Ahem. Apparently (at least according to Nathan and my sister's boyfriend) this is TERRIFYING. As in, my dad is the Scariest. Man. In. The. World. Really, he's just a nice guy who enjoys the outdoors and is lovingly protective of his family.

Personal photo. This is a great spot for a picture of my family. From left to right: my dad, my mom, my youngest sister Abigail, my next sister Emily, Emily's boyfriend Dillon, me, Nathan, and my brother David (the baby of the family). We love hiking!

Back to the story, though—Nathan finally mustered up the courage to call my dad and chat with him, which he did for about twenty minutes or so. After he hung up the phone, however, he realized he hadn't actually asked him if we could start dating, leading to the following conversation...

Me: "How did the conversation with my dad go?"
Nathan: "Good, except..."
Me: "Yes?"
Nathan: "I kinda didn't actually ask him if we could date..."
Me: "Are you serious?"
Nathan: "Can you just call him, and, you know, ask him if I have to call him again?"

Good news: everything was all fine and Nathan and I started "officially" dating the next Monday, after exactly five weeks of casually talking and going out on dates. And now—almost two years later—we're still together and planning our wedding! But I'll leave more on that for future posts.

Original Inspiration

I know I'm already several weeks (months?) into planning, but I wanted to share my "original" inspiration—we won't say when I started looking at pictures and coming up with ideas. I could do an inspiration board for where I am now, but I feel like the pictures would too closely relate to reality, and I want to be able to reflect on the entire planning progress at the end. So here we go!

Floating flowers, I Spy, music paper flowers, ivory dress, mismatched bridesmaid dresses, engagement ring, wedding cupcakes, guy wedding ring, cake table, color inspiration.

Even I know a few of these pictures already don't match up (doing several cakes, not cupcakes!), it's neat to look back at my original vision and see elements I still love and am including. Sometime soon I want to compare this to my current inspiration!

Engagement Pictures Preview

If you remember from a previous post, we chose to go with Niki Marie Photography for our engagement pictures. Niki helped us decide on outfits and locations and two weeks ago we drove to downtown Detroit for our engagement shoot.

A few days later she posted this sneak peek!

Photo credit.

A few things:

1. I LOVE this picture! I look just like I feel—relaxed and happy—and Nathan is actually smiling for real! Of course, after all of my dilemma about what to wear and not wearing black... I'm wearing black. In my defense, I had a colored shirt on, but it was getting chilly by the end of the day.

2. The whole photo shoot was SO much fun. Nathan & I relaxed and interacted easily while Niki snapped pictures. She would put us in a basic location and pose and then let us laugh and talk while she took pictures. Occasionally she would give us some direction like  "Laura, look at Nathan" or "Nathan, make Laura laugh!"

3. There is a hilarious story behind this picture. We were actually done with the photo shoot—it was 5:00 and we were driving away from downtown Detroit towards I-75. All of a sudden Niki goes "pull down one of these streets, the sun is perfect!" Nathan pulls an illegal u-turn in an intersection on a red light (good thing there were no cars around) and heads down a street with ZERO parking spots. So we keep going and going, and the sun keeps getting lower and lower! Finally he parks in a no parking zone, we hop out of the car, and we all run back two blocks to get the sun at the perfect angle. We stand in the middle of the street as Niki snaps away and I say "These pictures better be good for all of this!" And they were.

I can't wait to see the rest! We've also decided to book Niki for our wedding pictures. I'm thrilled! Not only are we getting great pictures at a great price, I also feel completely comfortable with her. I did not feel rushed or unnatural during the engagement shoot—and I'm sure working with her on our wedding day will be the same way.

Countdown: Five Months

Now that we're five months out from the wedding (crazy!), it's time to take stock of where we are now and what goals we have for the next month! From the very beginning I discarded the checklists on The Knot—umm research lighting? book a calligrapher? buy wedding insurance? According to this check list I am way behind.

Good news. It doesn't have to be like that. With a little help from A Practical Wedding—great blog, book, & resource!—I came to realize that this is my wedding, and I don't have to finish all of the 179 uncompleted tasks on The Knot. 

So let's recap.

Things that are completed:

Venue: Pleasant Ridge Camp & Retreat Center

Photo credit.

Caterer: Sammie Daigle from the Pleasant Ridge Camp & Retreat Center

Photographer: Niki Marie Photography

Dress: Can't tell you yet! Coming up... check out the wedding dress post to make a guess.

Programs: Crossword puzzles & I Spy in progress!

Personal photo.

Things I'd like to start on this month:

Invitations: We need to finalize our guest list, begin collecting addresses, & come up with a rough mock-up of our invitations.

Flowers & Decorations: I need to start making flowers, continue looking for books, and work on Scrabble letters.

Caterer: Hopefully having a tasting this month and deciding on our menu & cakes!

Registry: Decide where to register & start scanning.

Hmm... anything I'm forgetting??

Tangent Tuesday: Meeting My Goals

The week of the 5k started out just as badly as it possibly could—with me sick and unable to talk or breathe well. I forced myself to lower my expectations and kept telling myself "just do your best!" Inside, I always wanted to hit my three goals, but I began to realize they were less and less likely. Add a stressful semester and limited time to train to a massive head cold, and that's hardly a recipe for a personal best run.

But I still woke up that morning, ate my best "running" breakfast, dressed in my favorite outfit, and headed out to the starting line ready to race. I stood next to my sister and her friend—who talked about running a sub 20:00 race and starting out at 6:30 pace. Not happening! I knew I had to let them go out and start conservatively.

Personal photo. Me with my two sisters after the race.

Conservatively for me turned out to be a 7:18 first mile, which was perfect for this race under these conditions. At this point I estimate that there were about ten girls in front of me. The second mile contained the largest hill—but I powered through it with a second mile time of 6:58 and passed four or five girls, including my sister's friend. I yelled encouragement at her and started the third mile.

Ouch. This one hurt. I rounded the corner to last big stretch and my grandpa shouted "You're in fourth!" Knowing I was so close to my "A" Goal, I tried to push it. However, there were winds gusting up to 25mph and a full half mile of the section was directly into the wind. Finally, with less than a half mile to go, I passed the third place girl and settled in about ten yards behind the second place girl.

I tried to kick, but it just wasn't there. Finally I could see the clock ticking closer and closer to 22:00 and finished strong, just ten steps behind the second place girl for a time of 21:53! I was absolutely thrilled. I had no regrets in this race—I ran the best race I could, met all my goals, and set myself up for success in the future!

Personal photo. First, second, and third place girls overall. My sister took first!

So what do you do when you run your best possible race and meet all your goals? Set new goals of course!

Wedding Dress Nightmares

Alternative title: How to Get Out of Going Dress Shopping.

Most brides look forward to dress shopping, right? Ehh. Me not so much. In fact, the idea of going shopping with a group of females and trying on dresses which will most likely not be flattering OR in my price range is pretty terrifying. Which is why I immediately turned to buying my dress online.

One of the first places I looked was J. CREW, for two reasons.

1. J. CREW has the kind of simple understated elegance I was looking for in a wedding dress.
2. The prices weren't more than my entire budget combined.

Here are some of my favorites:

Clockwise from top left: Bettina, Sararose, Sophia, Sinclair, Lyden, & Larissa.

You'll probably notice a theme in the dresses above: straight, simple, not strapless, and under $1000. In fact, I probably would wear any of the dresses above. I had a preference from the beginning (and Nathan vetoed some of them), but I started looking around online to see if I could find any of them cheaper.

I did in fact buy one of the dresses above online (not from the J. CREW website though). Which one do you think it was?