The Next Chapter Begins With "I Do"

Perfect.

Thats the only way to sum up the wedding. 

Everything was just like we wanted. Everything went smoothly and everyone had fun.

It was perfect!

And if there was some mishap no one told me about it ;)

Saturday morning I awoke early and showered. With my hair wrapped up in a towel I took my time as I went around making sure that I had everything and double checking that it was all packed in the bags by the door.

Most things had been taken up yesterday but there are always those few things that get forgotten about. Plus I had the bags with the Groomsmen and Bridesmaids gifts. 

The Groomsmen gifts were so cute, I thought! Marine got each guy a small bottle of Gentleman Jack and a cigar and then we placed those inside cigar boxes. Each box was a little different. And the guys loved them!

The bridesmaids gifts were a combination of things. First I purchased black tote bags from Oriental Trading and then in Photoshop I created a layout and printed it onto iron on transfer paper, ironed them on and WAHLA! Each bridesmaids bag was customized with their name and the meaning of their name. They were all the same layout but I also changed up the color trying to make the background each girl's favorite color.

They turned out so good! Inside each bag was a bottle of wine, a Bath & Body works purse size lotion and hand sanitizer, Mason Jars with Bath Salt that I fixed up and something for them to wear the day of the wedding. I saw these little rings on Etsy and loved them! I ordered them with black bands and ivory flowers.

I also made Alice and Red a bag and gave them a ring as well as their gifts for keeping the guest book and passing out programs.

Vixen and Blondie arrived at the house about 9 a.m. Chick-fil-a mini's in hand. The curling iron's and rollers were plugged in and we quickly got to work. 

By 11 we were leaving the house and I was texting everyone to tell them we were heading to the wedding location.

I stopped along the way and picked up Roomy-Wife so she could spend the day with us instead of the boys. Of course I had forgotten the wine to drink while we got ready, because of course you have to forget something on a day like this!

No worries though. Roomy-Wife and I picked up a chicken finger tray, a bottle of wine and stuff for mimosa's. Yep we were ready! lol

Once we arrived at the Cabin we the other girls were there already getting ready and scrambling around. Hollywood sat me down and started on my makeup. I was transformed formed from my previous plain Jane state. The make-up was subtle but really made my eyes pop. I have to admit, I'm not sure I had ever looked more beautiful. 

Then it was time for the dress. With help from Vixen, LC, Giggles and Nurse Betty I was able to step into the dress and then it was time to slide on my boots...

The day went so smoothly and we stayed on schedule all day! Which is pretty hard to believe! Pictures started at 1 p.m.




My Bridesmaids and I went first. We had quite a large wedding party...... On the bridesmaid side was Giggles (matron of honor), Vixen, Nurse Betty, Hollywood, LC, Blondie, Conscious, and Babbles.

They all looked beautiful! Instead of having them get identical dresses (which our way to expensive) I had told them to all just wear a knee length black dress. The affect was beautiful. 

After our pictures I was whisked back upstairs to wait while it was the guys turn to take pictures. 

Me & Giggles enjoying a Mimosa

The girls were all afraid I was going to spill something on my dress, because lets face it my Klutz track record is not so good, so they made me put the robe I had worn during hair and make up on over my dress.

I said it made me feel like a boxer! lol

Everything was done, now it was just time to wait. I of course paced a little, anxious to get the show on the road.

Not once though was I ever nervous. I was so calm and relaxed the entire day. I think it helped that everything was on schedule and I wasn't having to rush for anything. 

Also my dress was so comfortable it was easy to be relaxed.

At 3:45 I headed downstairs and outside to wear Miss B awaited.

She stood so patiently like she knew that today was different than every other day. It was special.

I swung up on her and Vixen arranged my dress before heading back inside to wait on her cue. 

I road Miss B down the road a short ways so that I would be out of site of the house and the guests. 

I was so anxious.

I'm not very good at waiting.

Miss B as if sensing turned around and touched her nose to my boot. She twitched her upper lip across the top of my boot while looking up at me. Her way of telling me "It's ok, we got this."

And with that lip twitch a wave of calm once again washed over me. 

I leaned down over her neck stroking her flowing mane. 

I couldn't believe this was all really happening. Her I was astride Miss B in a beautiful wedding dress about to marry the man of my dreams.

How did I get so lucky?

From where I sat I could hear the music playing telling me that my bridesmaids were now making their way from the cabin to the ceremony below. Then I could hear the laughter rise from the crowd. I smiled to myself as I pictured one of my ring bearers (Hollywood's son) heading down the aisle in his wolverine mask. 

And then I heard the music change and it was my song. 

"Ok Miss B, lets go." I tapped her sides slightly with my boot heel and guided her around the cabin and down into the grass. 

As we rode along a million things crossed my mind, the main one being 'please let me dismount without flashing anyone'.

Luckily I was able to do so and then handed Miss B off to a friend before proceeding to where Mom awaited me.

We held hands and proceeded down the aisle to wear she gave me away to Marine. 

The ceremony was short, sweet, and to the point - just the way we wanted it.

When the Preacher said "You May Kiss Your Bride" I expected a soft quick kiss..... boy was I wrong!

Marine grabbed me tightly and nearly swept me off my feet as he dipped me back and kissed me. We both came up laughing at the surprise.

We headed back down the aisle as Mr. and Mrs. Marine both just smiling from ear to ear.

Afterward we did some group pictures and a few quick shots of the two of us. Honestly we didn't spend that much time doing pictures because we didn't want to keep our guests waiting.

We had said the reception should start without us and boy did it ever!!

When we walked up the hill the drinks were already flowing and the food was nearly gone. We had prepared for a 100 guests when in reality we ended up having around 130. 

But it was ok. The DJ was in full swing and everyone seemed to be having a great time!

Upon our arrival the DJ asked us to come to the dance floor where he explained the story behind our First Dance song and how Marine had chosen it while he was in Afghanistan. The song was Josh Turner's Soulmate.

Marine and I danced and then the rest of the wedding party joined in.

Afterward the party really started! I danced so much my feet hurt.

Everyone kept telling us it was the best wedding they had ever been to.

Between dancing Marine and I tried to mingle and talk to everyone. Talk about exhausting!

Then Vixen called for a toast.

She got a little chocked up and nearly made me cry. As the tears welled up in my eyes I had to remind myself I wasn't sure if my face was waterproof!! I dabbed at my eyes trying hard not to let the tears fall.

Next up was Hollywood who gave a funny toast about my and Marine's first date.

Then Ford Guy took the microphone and with a deep breath started his toast of marriage advice for Marine. It was hilarious, I will have to see if I can get a copy of it from him.

After the toast we headed over to cut the cake.

Bridal Cake

Grooms Fishing Cake

I wish I could tell we I knew from personal taste testing that this cakes were delicious. Sadly this is not the case. Marine and I even forgot to feed each other cake!! WHOOPS! lol

Marine and I were so busy we didn't get a chance to eat any of the food or cake. But from what we were told it was all delicious. At least we had some cake left over so we could decide for ourselves ;)

We danced the night away. I had so much fun! And I love Marine's Marine friends. They are just the best group of guys. And 2 of them were definitely the life of the party, dancing the entire time and encouraging everyone else to dance.

Roomy Wife about my girls, "You have the best group of friends! They are all so nice."

They are the best and I am so lucky to have them!! They truly made our day wonderful!

At the end of the night on the way back home Marine and I realized we had not eaten all day and stopped at McDonald's Drive-Thru where we ordered 2 double cheeseburger combo's and large sweet tea's....

Marine, "Happy Wedding Dinner! Maybe we should have sprung for the supersize......" lol



More to come................

Lily: So that's what happened to the bouquet. Well, good for Victoria, that's an evil tradition.
Ted: So wait, you're not gonna have one at your wedding?
Lily: Hell, yeah, I'm gonna throw that flower grenade and yell "Crawl for it, Bitches!" 

Hurry, Hurry, Got To Get Done!

(Wrote Friday and Forgot to hit Publish --- Go figure!)

As I hurry to finish things for the wedding I thought I should perhaps share with you a little of what I've been working on and why I haven't been spending more time blogging!

When I say I have been playing Martha Stewart when it comes to all this wedding stuff, I'm not kidding!

Our favors are a actually thanks to a great little Martha Stewart project. I wanted to do something cute like pie in a jar.

But that was a little to time consuming and pricey.

Then I stumbled upon Martha's Seed Matchbook Favors.

Martha has a template on her site but they were not in the colors I needed so I took the design and modified to something that would work for our wedding.

I used white card stock paper, ordered the Glassine envelopes off Ebay about a year ago when I found this project, and Marine and I picked out a wildflower seed mix at Lowe's. We purchased to bags of seeds just to be safe. 

The final project:

Roughly a 100 Black and Red seed packets!

They turned out so cute! Plus they were simple and budget friendly. The bags of seed were about $6 each so this whole project cost less than $20. Not bad for 100-something favors ( I say something cause I don't really remember how many I made!).

Of course I also got a little creative with the programs....... 

When looking online for ideas I stumbled upon Intimate Weddings and there DIY on how to make a fan program puzzle. 

I thought this was a cute idea and work out perfect for our outside wedding!!!

Again I had to modify, because that's just how I roll. lol 

So I took their basic idea and expanded on changing the design so as best to fit us.

I did half of the programs with a crossword on the back and half with a mad lib.

Some tips though...... they do not sell golf pencils with a pre-drilled hole.

So I made do with a hot glue gun and think it turned out quite well!

Also Marine and I have made these hangers to go on the Mason Jars that will hang along the aisle. 

I have to hand it to Marine for stepping up and helping. I know that helping with wedding decorations is not the most manly thing to do and I know there was other stuff that he would have rather been doing but he still put everything aside to help get things done for the wedding.

Ok.... thats's my update! Now back to work!!

Crunch Time

Things at my house have been a little hectic this week....... we have been finishing up the last of the remodel in preparation for our first house guests who will arrive later today.

Plus I have been trying to finalize last minute wedding details.

Thanks though to Mom and Future-Mother-In-Law this has been much easier than expected!!!

The favors are done (which are super cute - pictures to come later), the center pieces and hanging jars are done, and the programs are one step from being done!

I go for the final fitting of my dress this afternoon.

Things are going smoothly....... except the location. But seriously I should have expected that when the guy was difficult to begin with.... but seriously you either want to have an event location or not. There is no middle ground, someone needs to inform him of that. Hopefully I won't be the one to when this is all said and done.

So plans were changed slightly. Marine and I were supposed to have the facility Friday and all day Saturday. The main plus of this place was that everyone would be able to get ready there........ well yesterday we were informed we cannot have access on Saturday till 11 a.m.

Which would normally be fine if Blondie wasn't doing everyone's hair and pictures didn't start at 1. 9 people's hair in 2 hours??? I don't think so.

I refuse to stress though so I fumed for a minute and then just told everybody to be at my house at 9 to start getting ready.

Poor Marine. I'm basically kicking him and our 3 house guests out. Telling him to go to his grandparents for breakfast or something.

It's a wedding. Something is bound to go wrong at some point during the day.... isn't that how it always goes? lol

In hindsight I'll be honest that I do regret booking this location. It is beautiful! But I should have known from the get-go that the owner was not going to be the easiest person to work with. And I admit I should have listened to my gut.

But it's to late for the coulda-woulda-shoulda's. The weather forecast is calling for sunshine, I have worked hard to make everything beautiful, and Marine and I will be saying I Do and spending the day with family and friends. So no matter what happens the day will be perfect.

When has your gut told you not to do it and you did it anyway?

You Go Girl, Work That Pole!

Saturday when I arrived at Vixen's house I still wasn't quite sure what to expect. I arrived with two bags as instructed. One consisting of work out clothes and high heals. The other with overnight clothes.

Per instruction I changed into my workout clothes and heels completely stumped on what it was we were going to be doing.

Giggles and Vixen were all smiles as the 3 of us loaded up into the car headed to destinations unknown.

I had been trying to come up with where we might be going and decided that maybe we were going to Sips n Strokes - a place where you drink wine and paint. Red and I had talked awhile back about wanting to attend one of their events so I thought maybe that's what we were doing and the girls were just trying to throw me off......

I could not have been more wrong.

The last minutes of the car ride I was blindfolded and threatened to not peak.

At last we came to stop and Vixen helps me out of the car laughing the entire time at the surprise she has in store for me.

Then all of a sudden the blindfold is dropped and there in front of me is Giggles, Alice, LC, and Will --- all grinning from ear to ear. And then I turn and gasp in shock.

OMG!!! There are poles everywhere!

"SURPRISE!" they laugh giddily.

"Here drink this," Giggles gives me a glass of wine.

"Did you really not figure it out?" Vixen questions.

"No, I would never have guessed this," I replied honestly.

We sat and drank wine and laughed while we waited on the instructor.

I was so glad Will was able to come! I haven't talked much about Will except to say he's the Will to my Grace. Expect he may be more of a Jack than a Will....... oh well anyway. We all grew up together and Will and I commuted to college even for several years. I love him to death and know that one day he will be a big shot news anchor and then you will have the chance to fall in love with him to.

Quote from Will, "Time to work the stripper pole! No seriously...I figure if this whole news reporting thing doesn't pan out I gotta have a back up! Let's do this!"


Seriously to funny.

Can you guess the shoe? I'm the red and black Zebra.... GRR ;)

The next two hours were spent twisting and turning and trying to look sexy (try being the key word on my part). 

We had a blast! It was so much fun and who knew that it could be such a workout!! Two days later I still feel the burn in my abs and arms. 

Also there are a few bruises on my knees that could be a little hard to explain......... lol I would show you a picture but the whiteness of my legs around the bruise would blind you. Seriously.

After the class we headed back to Vixen's where Conscious, Red, Babbles, Hollywood, Ford Wife and a few others waited with next surprise. 

I was greeted and this was thrown on head.

Why yes, it is a penis crown! lol

The next surprise being a Passion Party. Remember I attended one of these while Marine was deployed (post). It was a complete surprise and a lot of fun. There were even games. Yes, I did say games. She divided everyone into two teams and gave them a few materials and told them to make some kind of outfit. Giggles and I got to be the judges. Both teams did an excellent job, but in the end we had to give to Babbles team for creativity. 

Then it was time for cake..... now this was the part of the night that totally made me blush!!

Wondering what it was made of??? The privates were rice krispi treat!

Interesting to say the least!! lol

Overall it was a fun night with a lot of laughs.

Rachel: We did not know you wanted a stripper, so we went to the phone book and got the first name we could find.

Phoebe: How old's your phone book!?

~ Friends ~

The Royal Wedding & Bachelor / Bachelorette Party Weekend

Getting ready for bed......

E, "So you gonna get it up with me in the morning to watch the Royal Wedding?"
Marine, "Sure."
E setting the alarm.
Marine "What are you doing?"
E, "Setting the alarm so we can get up and watch the wedding."
Marine, "Oh you were serious?!"

Every little girl at some point or other pretends to be a princess. She dreams of growing up and marrying a Prince, and riding off in a horse drawn carriage to live her life happily ever after inside a magical castle.

Today Kate Middleton got to live that dream.

Images Take From MSN

Kate was stunningly beautiful. Her dress classic and timeless. 

I would like to tell you that I woke up and watched the wedding. In reality my alarm went off at 4:30, I turned on the TV and fell back asleep. But I had recorded it so when I was getting ready for work I watched a replay plus the live coverage still going on Good Morning America. 

Today Will and Kate got there fairytale wedding and it was lovely.

I wonder though if that was really the wedding they wanted? Or would they have rather had a small ceremony with just close friends and family out on an English hillside?

Interesting thought, huh?

Well my household is in full wedding swing! Marine leaves this afternoon for his bachelor party. They are taking their horses and going riding / camping. The campsite has been set up so that some of his friends who don't ride can still meet them and camp. 

We went grocery shopping last night for the trip and 2 cases of beer, a pack of steaks, and buggy full of  food later I was left to believe there may not be as much riding as there is drinking and eating! ;)

Tonight I plan on frantically finishing up favors, working on programs and on center-pieces........ and oh yeah trying to clean because our first wedding house guest arrives WEDNESDAY!!!!

Have a mentioned we are in the new place? Have I mentioned we still have boxes that have not been unpacked? Have I mentioned there IS STILL a pool table in the middle of our living room that needs to be moved? Yeah, still lots to do!

Then tomorrow is my bachelorette party...... and I have no clue what we are doing! Giggles and Vixen have kept it top secret and all I've been told is to pack 2 bags and to be at Vixen's at 1 p.m. One of the bags is supposed to be work out clothes and high heals........ what kind of combination is that?? I'm scared. I admit. lol

Monica: Who else do you want to invite?

Chandler: Uh, no no no. Just Ross and Joey is embarrassing enough.

Ross: Actually, sorry, I can't even make it. I'm seeing Mona again tonight.

Chandler: I understand. Who'd cancel an actual date just to go to a fake bachelor party?

Joey: (On the phone) I'm sorry, I've gotta cancel tonight, baby.

~ Friends ~

Smile! Post It Note Tuesday