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!