Anniversary

Three years ago today I was your typical college sorority girl who couldn’t believe that she met the man she was going to marry just a month and a half ago at a concert in Cincinnati. Three years ago today I remember exactly what I was doing when Chris and I had “the talk.” Three years ago today he asked me to be his girlfriend.

A year ago today I was sitting in my apartment unengaged and researching florists for the wedding I knew we would be having at some point in the fall of 2008. There was a knock at the door, a “trick-or-treater”. And then there was a blur of excitement, a ring on my finger, and a bottle of champagne being popped. A year ago today, Chris asked my Daddy for permission to marry me and crafted the perfect, surprise, proposal. A year ago today we became engaged.

And here I sit, looking back on those three years that have flown by. I think about how fate brought us together at that concert and how different, and more wonderful, my life has been since I shook his hand and introduced myself. I think about all the laughs and tears we have shared, places we have been, and memories we have made. I think about how he has always been there for me {and Mommy}, especially over the last few horribly difficult months. I think about how lucky I am. Happy three year anniversary, I love you Chris.

And to my readers, Happy Halloween! Today's pretty picture is one of my favorite aisles, ever. Very fall-ish and appropriate for Halloween, don't you think!? Picture found here.p.s. if you're new to my little blog you can read how we met & how he proposed by clicking on the links below.
how we met

the proposal

The Wait is Almost Over

Mommy called me out last night. She said that lately my blog posts have been lame since I guest blogged one day and gave reasons why I liked a picture the next day.
Friends, Mommy is right. I have been a bad blogger ever since the wedding. Truth is that I have been feeling a little un-inspired lately. It’s hard looking at images from weddings that I come across on photographer’s blogs because it makes me want to rewind back to our wedding day and snap those same shots, which is now clearly impossible. And there are a lot of you out there currently planning your own wedding and as much stress as it was to plan ours, I miss the planning and the blogging that went along with it.

The good news is that this weekend we will get our wedding pictures from Nicole ! To be honest, I haven’t really had the desire to sit down and look through all of them on the proofing site yet. Maybe it’s because there are SO many pictures to look through or maybe because it’s still just a little hard to believe that it’s all over. Regardless, the re-capping shall begin next week. For each re-cap there will be an accompanying post, “Lessons Learned”. Lessons learned from each re-cap areas will feature tips/advice, provide cost break-down (if applicable), vendor references, and other info that I don’t want to have get in the way of the pretty pictures.
So for the rest of today’s post, I’ll play along with some games of tag.
Melissa of Melissa's Greetings tagged me to share 6 quirks about myself.
1. I loathe melted cheese. Cubed cheese is fine, for some reason.
2. I never open up a can of pop/coke all the way. I prefer the little tab to only be about halfway down into the can. No idea why.
3. I would love to open up some sort of http://etsy.com/ shop selling untraditional calligraphy services for wedding invitations (i.e. funky/pretty envelope addressing) and/or wedding website design.
4. I still haven’t been able to get into the “flat” shoe craze. I prefer my heels to be at least 3 inches thankyouverymuch.
5. I got my ears pierced and flew on an airplane for the first time at the ripe age of 21.
6. I have a sliiiiiiiight obsession with sharpie (thin) permanent markers, opi nailpolish, the target version of ugg boots, and turkey sandwiches.

Adrienne at For the Love of Weddings tagged me to list 6 things I value and 6 things I don’t
Value:
1. Family and friends
2. Memories
3. Target/Von Maur/Nordstroms/Forever 21/Gap Outlet
4. Diet coke/diet mt. dew and the occasional (read: almost everyday) glass of wine
5. Sweatshirts/fleeces/scarves/comfy blankets

Don’t Value:
1. Being 100+ miles away from family and friends
2. Life going by too fast
3. Melted cheese
4. Politics/high gas prices
5. Fake people. Being snobby is fine, but fake? Not so much.

I'll tag... Nicole of East Coast Wedding, Stephanie of Gossip.Style.Wed, Danielle from Danielle Nicole Downing, Laura from LauraAnn822, and Landon of 255 and Counting ....to play along with either or both of these tags.

And now, for the pretty picture picked to accompany this post:
Flowers from my sorority sister, and blog reader, Siobhan's wedding. Aren't they gorgeous!? They complimented her green & blue color scheme perfectly. Indianapolis and central Indiana brides, contact me if you would like the florists info!

Adorable

I am absolutely smitten by this picture....

...for the following reasons:

• The dreamy gown
• The groom not wearing black
• The brides 'casually glamorous' hair
• The darling bouquet
• The massive bling on her finger
• The hand-holding

And just when I thought that my love could only be contained the one photo above, I found more of this couple's wedding here. If the pictures are too small for you to see, just know that they are amazing.

I will never tire of a green + white + tweed wedding. Bonus points if it's an outdoor wedding/reception.

Thank you, random couple, for having a spectacular wedding that I was able to drool and lust over just a little bit today. xo jessica lynn

Being a Guest

Hi friends!
The lovely Molly from These Little Moments asked me to guest post on her pretty little blog while she is away on her mini-moon. Stop by and see some of my favorite bling!

As all of you know, I like to put a pretty little picture with every post. So in the spirit of my guest post, here's another one of my favorite ring shots.

photo via: bobbi + mike

p.s. hiiii to all of Molly's readers that have clicked over! i tied the knot exactly a month ago today and will be posting all about it next week, when we have our professional pictures. i'd love it if you would stick around! xo

Fingers Crossed

My fingers are crossed for Molly of these little moments because she is getting married today!! I hope that the leaves are the perfect fall foliage color, that your day is flawless, and you get a dreamy picture like this one:
photo via: m three studio

p.s. in a week we will have our wedding photos!!

Tying the Knot: Our Honeymoon {The Husband's Recap}

If you are thinking about honeymooning at the sandals st. lucian grande , and want an even more detailed review of our honeymoon than what I posted, you can read Chris' detailed review of our trip here, on trip advisor .

And because every post should have a pretty picture, here's another little gem from our honeymoon:

Tying the Knot: Our Candy Bar

Here it is, friends. The candy bar recap. As you recall from this post I wasn't too sure if I wanted to do the whole candy bar deal at t-minus 20 days until the wedding. At t-minus about 10 days til the wedding I bit the bullet and ordered the candy. Am I glad I did it? Not sure.

Before I go any further I should note:
1. I don't have any pro photos of the candy bar since it was set up later into the reception, after Nicole left.
2. I borrowed all the jars/bowls from my great friend Kristen and was therefore able to reduce the cost of the candy bar by at least $100. If you want the really sweet looking apothecary jars, you can buy them here for a pretty great price (plus shipping). I only used 1 apothecary jar. The rest were just cool looking vases/jars/bowls. Moral of the story: you don't have to spend $200 in apothecary jars to have a sweet looking candy bar.

I went with an all-white candy bar. In part because plum/purple and/or raspberry candy was impossible to find and also because I looooove the look of an all white candy bar. That being said, the candy bar in the picture below is not mine, but a pretty picture (by clary pfeiffer) for this post.

Below is the make-up of our candy bar:

from bulk foods we bought:
72 white swizzle sticks
white nonpareil chocolate drops 5 pounds
hershey's kisses 5 pounds
white jordan almonds 5 pounds

from candy direct we bought:
white (pineapple) gummi bears 5 pounds

I searched high and low on-line and in stores for affordable white chocolate covered pretzels. I ended up buying some in bulk from meijer and the rest were Flipz pretzels bought from random places.

Results/advice:

• Skip the jordan almonds. They weren't what I thought they were and NO one ate them.
• The white chocolate covered pretzels (and the nonpareils) were a hit. Note: yogurt covered pretzels and white chocolate covered pretzels are not the same thing.
• With Bulk Foods you can get free shipping on all orders over $75. The website is hard to navigate, so just be patient.
• I didn't want a HUGE candy buffet. With the 5 variations of candy, ordering 5 pounds of each was plenty. If you are going to have a wider variation of candy, you might want to consider ordering fewer pounds of each kind.
• Guests did appreciate the candy bar. I got a lot of compliments on it. You have to remember that even though you may hear about candy bars all the time through blogs and wedding magazines, the majority of people at your wedding will probably have never seen one before and it will be "new" to them.
• Make sure you know what you are getting into with a candy bar. I cannot stress enough that they are NOT cheap. Most will probably run you over $150 for just the candy alone. Add in the vases/jars and the paper and ribbon if you decide to label each jar with its contents and you could be looking at $350 easily.

Dockside

I just had to share these pictures with you, of a beautiful dockside wedding. After all, as much as I love fall, there are times when one longs for the days of summer back.

My favorite part of this wedding? The mantle in front of which the couple tied the knot. Check it out. Two starfish nestled in beautiful flowers on a mantle of stone and slate. Beautiful.

Who wouldn't want to tie the knot in this venue!? The bride choose the perfect colors to compliment the beachy rustic-ness of the space. Besides the mantle, I love the white benches!

Pink, white and perfectly beachy.

Looks like a perfect ending to a beautiful wedding.

Pictures from this wedding by Marie Labbancz

Tying the Knot: Our Honeymoon

{I received an e-mail from a reader, Erica, about our honeymoon, so I thought that I would share our experience with all of you.}

When it came time to determine where to honeymoon we knew we wanted to be on the beach, be somewhere somewhat exotic, not have to worry about a thing, and go "almost" all out. Thus, Sandals St. Lucian Grande was the place for us. Here's the breakdown.
The flight/shuttle:
We made it to the St. Lucia airport around 2pm. It took us an hour and a half on the shuttle from the airport to the resort. It was bearable, but just be prepared.
The room:
We were able to use Chris' frequent flier miles to cover his airfare. With the money that we saved we upgraded to the Penthouse beachfront honeymoon suite. The penthouse comes with a concierge, in-room refrigerator, and 24/7 room service. The room wasn't THAT much bigger than the average hotel room, but the extra huge king bed, bathroom with double sink, and a view to die for was worth it. Here was the view from our room.

Not too shabby. The fridge was stocked with water, pop, mixers, and beer. The beer was the local beer, piton (kind of like a heavier bud light), and Heineken. Rooms below the concierge level don't come with an in-room bar/fridge. The concierge service provided a VIP quick check-in (with champagne), booked tours/excursions for you so you didn't have to do it at the tours desk yourself, and gave you access to 2-3 concierge hosted parties (we didn't go to any of them). Definitely not a necessity, but a nice small luxury.
The Pool/Ocean
There are multiple pools on the property, but we stuck to the pool bar. Angela was our favorite pool bar bartender. We recommend the "dirty banana" and the "no pressure no problems" drinks. The chairs around the pool don't fill up too fast, but grab 2 with an umbrella so that you can hang up your pool bag under the umbrella in case of rain. The ocean was beautiful. There were a couple of locals attempting to sell necklaces, but just smile and politely tell them "no thanks" and they will leave you alone. The ocean cabanas do fill up quick everyday so get up early to nab one.
The Food:
Sandals St. Lucia has 3 resorts on the island of St. Lucia. There is a shuttle that runs between the 3 of them. The Regency has the best restaurants and food. The food at the Grande was nothing fabulous, but it was do-able. You normally don't go on a honeymoon for the food, right? There are a few restaurants (La Toc, a Japanese steakhouse and some others) between the 3 resorts that require reservations. Make them the SECOND that you get to the hotel or else you won't get to eat at any of them.

Excursions:
We did 2 excursions: zip lining and Simon Says. The Zip Line excursion was from 10am-3pm. There was about an hour and a half ride to the zip line course, 30 minutes to prep for the zip line, 30 minutes on the actual zip lines, 20 minutes to re group, and then a two hour ride back to the resort (with stops on the way to see different sites). Total cost was about $200 and we think it was worth it. It was something that we will never get to do again and the views of the rainforest from the zip line were amazing.
The Simon Says tour was not thru the actual resort. We heard about this tour from Trip Advisor. For $100 each, Simon will pick you up at the resort and show you around St. Lucia. The caravan stopped at a banana plantation, snorkeling between the Pitons, the islands' dormant volcano, and a waterfall/mineral bath (which was a joke). We did this excursion on Thursday and by then we were sick of being on shuttles and just wanted to relax (the zip line was the day before) so I don't think that we enjoyed the excursion as much as we could have. Our morsel of advice, just do 1 excursion and relax around the pool the rest of the time.
Misc.
We hiked to the top of Ft. Rodney for $5 a piece, so worth it. Rented jet skis. Attempted to go on a booze cruise for $60 each on one of the ships from the Pirates of the Caribbean. It's called the Sea Spray and goes out on Monday and Friday nights. Ask the front desk for the # of the Sea Spray so you can call to reserve. If you want to call home, phone cards don't work at the resort. You just have to call long distance and your room will be charged. At the resort, sunscreen is $25, bring plenty of your own. It's an all-inclusive resort so at dinner order 2 dinners and eat half of each of them.

General honeymoon advice
1. pack extra clothes in your carry-on in case you miss your connecting flight home, like we did.
2. if you can, don't leave for your honeymoon the day after your wedding. wait another day.
3. use a travel agent. most agents get paid thru the resort they help you book at. so they do all the work and you don't have to pay them a dime.
4. GET TO KNOW OTHER COUPLES. Your honeymoon experience will be increased ten fold if you befriend other couples. We met other couples at the pool and even went to dinner with some of them. Our honeymoon experience was much more memorable because of the times we spent laughing with other couples, swapping honeymoon experiences and advice, and making new friends.

5. always ask for an upgrade.

Ringy

Love love love ring shots.

Nicole got some aaaamazing shots of our rings. But, before I share those professional pictures with you, I wanted to show you some other favorites of mine that have come across my Google Reader in recent months as well as a few that we took of our rings on our honeymoon. Enjoy!

photo credits: M Three Studio, Hy Stuido, Natalie Moser, Christine Farah

photos via: Jennifer Skog. My wedding day shoes were fabulous, but not THAT fabulous!

Here are some shots we took of our rings while eating lunch at the resort on our honeymoon. Love them.

Don't forget to have your photographer take a couple pictures of your rings, you won't regret it! I'll be sharing our professional ring shots in the next few weeks!

{One of} My Best Friends Wedding{s}

I remember standing in my chapter house on bid day looking around at all of my new "sisters". Some I recognized, one was my roommate, and others I had never seen before. Jenn was one of those girls that I had seen before. Tall, blonde, and gorgeous I never thought she would want to be friends with little ole me! But over the years we developed the same circle of friends and became two of the five seniors that lived in the sorority house together. When I first started dating Chris, Jenn and Stephen (her then boyfriend) were one of the first people I introduced him to. They bonded over their love of the Cincinnati Bengals (back when they could win more than 1 game in a season) at our Baller Bash party and it was all downhill from there. The four of us then hung out all the time and haven't stopped since. From the late night hilarity in broadripple in our college days to spending three days with my Mom and I in the days after my Daddy passed away in June, Jenn has been a true friend in every way. Chris and I were honored to stand next to Stephen and Jenn this past June as they tied the knot in Cincinnati.
What a beautiful day it was and what a beautiful bride!
Our bridesmaids bouquets were a-mazing! Hot pink roses with black feathers. The stems were wrapped with black satin and completed the look.
So after the ceremony the bridal party (and dates) hopped in THE most phenomenal party bus of all time and went down to "Millionaires Row" to snap a couple pictures. The classy ride wouldn't be complete without six cases of beer, two giant champagne bottles, and $1 sunglasses with our choice of hot pink, neon green, or flashing orange accents. Since they were so fantastic, we had to get a picture with them. We're on the far left.

Just a few of our sorority sisters.
To be honest, I don't think that I had any of the cake, I was more about the open bar that night. But I'm sure the cake was as delicious as it looked.

Congrats Stephen and Jenn! And thanks for letting me snatch these pictures from your facebook albums in order to feature them here.

Pearls

Hi friends!
The fiance and I have decided to purchase the digital negatives from our wedding from Nicole and we should have them in our grubby little paws around Halloween. So don't you worry, the official recaps will be coming soon!
Several of you have commented about my lack of blogging over the recent weeks since we returned from our honeymoon. To be honest, I don't really have a reason for NOT blogging. Ever since the wedding I just haven't had the desire to blog, look at our wedding photos (maybe because there are SO many of them!) or look at my google reader. Sad, I know. It's just that knowing that the wedding is OVER and done and there is no more planning to do is just an eerie feeling that I just haven't yet gotten over.
But, I do have a lot of pictures saved in my "To Blog About" folder so I hope to be back to blogging on a regular basis now. So here we go!
I constantly drool over the images by megan w photography. Back when I was trying to decide what necklaces/jewelry my bridesmaids would wear, I saw this photo and immediately loved the pearls. Black dress+white pears+white & green simple (gorgeous) flowers = beautiful bridesmaids.



In the end, we went with no necklaces, and I was ok with that. But I loooove the classic elegance of pearls (especially if the bride wears them too!).
photos via: megan w photography the wedding of matt & katie on august 9, 2008.

Tying the Knot: Lifesaver

I was the type of bride-to-be that swore off a DOC. I thought that I had it all under control. I never thought I could relinquish ANY detail to someone else. And I certainly didn't want to fork over the big bucks to someone whom I didn't even know to be our DOC.

And then in came Stephanie . Well, kinda. One day I peered over the cubical walls and saw a staffer from the St. Louis office checking out my blog. I walked over and tapped her on the shoulder, introduced myself, and cautiously asked how she heard about MY blog. Out came "ohmygawd i love your blog blah blah blah." We could have talked for hours. And so our little friendship began. We could have talked all day about Jessica Claire, fab wedding dresses, and color paletts....but we're auditors and it was busy season, so we went back to our cubes.

Stephanie volunteered to come all the way from St. Louis to be our DOC...for free. How can one say no? When she showed up at the rehearsal, it was like a breath of fresh air came thru the church. There is no way that I can ever repay Stephanie for everything that she did for us to allow our wedding day to run smoothly. There is NO way that we would have ever gotten thru the day without her. Do yourself a favor, hire a DOC or a close close close friend, that isn't in your bridal party, to be your DOC.
Here are some of the things that Stephanie handled.

{Kept the church coordinator calm and away from me, kept us on time during the big day, pinned on boutonnieres, assisted with first look, ensured reception hall set up correctly, made sure lunch was delivered to church, got everyone up and down the aisle, cleaned up the rooms in the church we used, collected gifts & took them up to our room, distributed remaining payments to vendors, kept reception flowing smoothly, fixed every little problem that came up, assisted with the tear-down of the reception, and everything inbetween}

Stephanie, I cannot tell you how blessed we were to have you there on our big day. You smile, your kindness, and your easy-breezy beautifulness has touched us all. You know how I love to post a pretty picture with each post, right? Well I was going to steal a picture from your facebook profile. ha. Instead, I'll share one of our favorite Jessica Claire photos from one of her weddings that we both drooled over:
Check out Stephanie's blog and if you are in the St. Louis or surrounding area, do yourself a favor and have her as your DOC...you can thank me later.

Tying the Knot: A Preview

Hi bloggity friends!
We're back from the land of sparkly new wedding bands, frozen drinks (without umbrellas, sadly), and our penthouse suite overlooking the Caribbean sea.

A lot has happened since we came back from our honeymoon! Tuesday morning was bittersweet...I left my friends in Indianapolis to move down to Cincinnati with Chris. As of today, Chris' house is now pending and scheduled to close on 10/24. Thus I haven't even unpacked and and my personal belongings are stored in cardboard boxes and scattered throughout his house and garage. Ohhh and did I mention that I start at my new office in Cincinnati tomorrow?! Just a wee bit hectic.

Needless to say, I haven't even had time to look through our wedding pictures and I need just a couple more days to get life in order before I get back to blogging. I hope you understand. Until I return, hopefully on Monday, I leave you with one of our favorite pictures Nicole has posted of us on her blog. If you want to see more of our pictures, before I get a chance to take you through our day, you can see a post from Nicole right here.

photo via Nicole Green