Project: Do You #17

Today's Project: Do You post is going to be the last one. I don't know if I should be sad it's over or if I should be excited that everything's checked off!

Let's do a quick run down on how things went:

#1 - Read one book per month. Pretty darn self explanatory, right?

#2 - Work out on a regular basis. I was doing much better at this before my wisdom teeth surgery at the end of June, but since then I've stayed active at home rather than going to the YMCA 3-4 days a week.

#3 - Run a 5K. I ran/walked The Color Run on Sunday with 5 other teammates. We did incredibly well - seriously, I'm so impressed! - and I'm ready to sign up for another one already! It was so.much.fun!!

#4 - Add another 2K to the vacation fund. This one went out the window when a house came into the picture. It would be silly to put money in a fund that we won't use until late 2014 at the earliest, especially because more money that we can put towards a house, the less money we'll be in debt to our mortgage lender!

#5 - Plan a date night ahead of time for each month. This doesn't take a lot of explanation.

#6 - Enjoy a weekend away with Trevor. And it was a relaxing one at that!

#7 - Shape eyebrows. I finally was happy with the shape a few months back... and I've been pretty happy since then, too!

#8 - Finish our wedding scrapbook. I know it didn't say this on the list, but this was a summer goal. Now that summer's over for me, this is done and over with as well. It's not close to being done, but there's just simply much bigger and better fish to fry. I still have everything I need and I may have a scrapbooking weekend with my mom sometime in the future, but it's just not high priority right now.

#9 - Travel more. I had checked this off a while ago and I've since planned another trip to Chicago with Whitney in a couple weeks. I'm excited!

#10 - Learn to say no more often. I put this on the list because I felt that I was kind of getting walked all over at work. I'm still sticking to my guns and saying no when I don't want to pick up extra shifts at the drop of a hat.

#11 - Make more time for crafting. I finished a table, a bookcase, and a dresser within the past week and they look fantastic. I'm also in the middle of finding stuff for a gallery wall {leave links to your favorite free printables in the comments below!!} Crafting is a nice relaxer for me and I'm loving it in my life right now!

#12 - Get out of my comfort zone more often. Rule number one: Nothing about starting an accelerated nursing program with 29 strangers or buying a house is within your comfort zone.

#13 - Share our wedding on the blog. So glad I did this!!

#14 - Attend a concert. Checkity, check. And, Trevor and I are thinking about going to Chicago for another concert the first weekend of October!

#15 - See a Broadway show. BOM was amazing!

#16 - Get hearing tested again/look into surgery. It's good to know where my hearing stands and what my surgical options are. I'm not planning on going under the knife quite yet, but I'm glad I had the appointment.

#17 - Bake someone a birthday cake. I totally didn't skimp on this one! The chocolate cake I baked for Trevor was pretty yummy!

#18 - Go to the beach. What's summer without a little time with your toes in the sand?!

#19 - Forgive. I honestly feel like I've become a better person and that this comes a lot more naturally to me now.

So that's that! The list is done! Are you sad to see it go?

How are your goals coming along?

You can recap my journey by reading all of my Project: Do You posts here.

check this out!

Wedding Wednesday #5

This is it - the last day of wedding details from our big day over two years ago. And it's about time you get to read this, right?

You probably want to be caught up with my Wedding Wednesday posts before moving on, so here's the breakdown: read about our ceremony in the first edition of Wedding Wednesday, be overwhelmed with beautiful photos of our reception in the second edition, read all about the attire we chose in the third, and stare at photo after photo of the details on our wedding day in the fourth.

As promised, today I'm sharing my wedding dos and don'ts. From attire, to guests, to ceremony, to honeymoon - it's all below!

First, let's start with what I'd change:

- I'd find bridesmaid dresses somewhere other than David's Bridal. There are so many cute, wedding-perfect dresses out there in stores that aren't pegged as wedding stores. In fact, right now there's a dress at LOFT that I LOVE {yes, I own it} and would have been absolutely perfect for a bridesmaid dress. The fact that you can buy it on sale for $25 is just a huge, red cherry on top. I would have saved my girls money and they would have had a classy dress to wear again and again.

- Similarly, I'd have the guys buy suits rather than rent from Men's Warehouse. We chose some of the more expensive suits to rent and they could have gotten their own suits to OWN for about the same price. Plus, we could have gifted them the ties or shirts as part of their gifts to save even more money. Brides, do not think you have to rent suits or tuxes!

- Take a longer honeymoon. Need I say more?

- Buy a different dress!
- I would have hired a different wedding planner. The one we used was pretty darn unprofessional the day of our wedding and didn't follow through on what she said she'd do. Too bad, too, because I've warned so many of my recently-engaged family and friends to steer clear of her company!

Here's what I'd still do the same if we did it all over again:

- Get married at 11:30am. I loved the flow of the day and it allowed us to spend so much time with family. After the reception wrapped up, Trevor and I headed to our hotel, changed, ate a few bites of food, and headed back to my parent's house for a bonfire with our closest family and friends. It was the perfect way to wind down after the day's excitement.

- Spend a lot of money on a photographer. Enough said.

- Spend a lot of money on food.

- Not serve alcohol. Our guests didn't complain and it wasn't exactly expected for a garden lunch reception.

- Invite the same number of guests. We were so glad to be surrounded by our very close family and friends. They all played a part in our relationship and we genuinely wanted them there. Plus, we had time to talk to EVERYONE, to thank them for coming, and to enjoy their presence. It's my opinion that as the hosts of the party, you need to do this and when you have eleventy million guests, that just doesn't happen and it's rude.

- A first look.

Do you have any wedding regrets?

Photo courtesy of Laurie Marie Photography.

Project: Do You #14

Please note that this is a link up that focuses on individual self discovery goals. The goals you see below were set by me and for me only. If you choose to link up with us, please create your own goals to work toward and to update us on. If you are unfamiliar with Project: Do You, check out this post that introduces the project before proceeding.

#1 - Read one book per month. I finished another book last week, which was my September book. Only three books left to cross this off my Project list!

#2 - Work out on a regular basis. I haven't been able to workout in a week because of my oral surgery. I have been staying as active as I can manage, but it's no substitute for the YMCA! I've had some complications from the surgery so who knows how long it will be before I'm cleared for strenuous activity again.

#6 - Enjoy a weekend away with Trevor. We spent last weekend on the Mississippi River at my dad's house and next weekend we'll be visiting friends. I can definitely say we've spend weekends away, though none just the two of us.

#12 - Get out of my comfort zone more often. My wisdom teeth experience falls under this if nothing else! Sparing the details, it's been pretty weird for me to be the patient and not the nurse.

#13 - Share our wedding on the blog. Except for the last post hiccup, this is done and checked off. And I'm so glad about it, too! Our wedding day was special and beautiful and amazing and we'll never forget it. To share it with you was fun, and I'm glad so many of you also had dress dilemmas )

I am so happy to be seeing things getting crossed off my list! How are your goals coming along?

Wedding Wednesday #4

Every Wednesday this month, I am recapping our wedding as part of our two year anniversary celebration. Two weeks ago, I showed you photos from our ceremony and told you about our unity tree. You can catch up on that here if you missed it or need a little refresher. Last week, you were overloaded with photos from our reception, so don't miss that post either. Yesterday, I recapped the attire of our wedding party.

Today's post is a smorgasbord of detail photos from our wedding day. I won't narrate them too much, but I want you to absolutely feel free to leave a comment or question below if you want to know more about anything you see!

We did a first look and I regret nothing about it. We got a few moments to ourselves {and our photographer and videographer} before the wedding and it was incredibly special. It didn't change the feelings we felt as I was walking down the aisle towards Trevor - he still had an amazing reaction even though he had seen me already that morning. Plus, we got so many more photos taken and were able to get to our reception and be with our guests sooner!

I cried so much during picture taking. All tears of joy, but you can clearly tell where I get my teary-eyed tendencies from, right?

Photos of all of our grandparents on their wedding days.

Wedding Mad Libs and ribbon wands were both DIY projects. Both are featured in other photos in this mini-series and even this post!

Please leave any wedding related questions in the comments below and I will happily reply to you via email. You don't have to limit your questions to be about our wedding - I love helping brides no matter the size, feel, or location of their weddings!

And don't forget to check back next Wednesday for the last of our wedding recaps! I'll be discussing what I've learned, my regrets, and general dos/don'ts. It's bound to be full of information, so don't miss it!

All photos courtesy of Laurie Marie Photography.

Wedding Wednesday #3 - Anniversary Edition

Every Wednesday this month, I am recapping our wedding as part of our two year anniversary celebration. Today's our actual wedding anniversary, so you get an extra bonus post! Two weeks ago, I showed you photos from our ceremony and told you about our unity tree. You can catch up on that here if you missed it or need a little refresher. Last week, you were overloaded with photos from our reception, so don't miss that post either!

Today is all about our attire!

BRIDE:
First, let me tell you, my dress was a beast to find. Actually, it was one of the first dresses I tried on... but while it was love at first sight, I thought there would be something better out there so I kept looking. And looking. And looking.

My poor mother who sat through hundreds of dresses... sorry, Mom.

Finally, I realized that I was holding that dress so high that I'd be stupid not to buy it - no other dress was measuring up! So we went back to the local dress shop, put down my payment, got measured, and waited nine months for it to come in. The dress {Jasmine Couture T180, without the jacket} was made to my hollow-to-hem measurements and you bet your pretty face I called the dress shop every couple of weeks to check on my order!

The sample dress I tried on puckered a little around my thighs so the woman who measured me told me that it would be best to order up a size. After a bit more discussion, she suggested we order two sizes up so that the seamstresses would have more material to work with. They told me that it'd be easier to take in than let out due to the fact that the entire dress was lace.

Fast forward to when my dress arrived - after I had been working out with a personal trainer for months - and my dress literally fell off of me. The seamstresses pinned me up and took the dress for alterations. 

We repeated this over and over up until the Wednesday before the wedding - the day of my final fitting. I still wasn't happy with the way the dress fit. I stayed until closing time having them fix as many things as they could, but ultimately, I still left with a dress that didn't fit me the way it was meant to.

If I had to do it all over again, I would not choose the same dress again {heck, maybe not even the same silhouette!} but I really do think that I may be the most critical of the dress because I saw it through all of the stages.

Take a peek at our professional photos because they make the dress look better!

GROOM AND GROOMSMEN:
Simple, they rented tuxes from Men's Warehouse. In hindsight, it would have basically been the same cost had we asked the guys to BUY a grey suit with us gifting them ties and/or a shirt.

I never once thought we should have black tuxes. We had a lunchtime wedding, it wasn't a black tie event, and I loved the way grey looked with navy and pink! So, from the get-go I knew grey tuxes would be what the guys would wear. It just so happened they were basically the most expensive tux rental.

BRIDESMAIDS:
The three ladies that were my bridesmaids all had different body types and I wanted them to all be comfortable on our wedding day so I told them I wanted them to wear navy blue dresses and I wanted them to be short {not tea-length or long} dresses. Since one bridesmaid lives in Texas, the other two and I stopped at a David's Bridal closer to home and they both tried on a bunch of dresses and decided on a short, strapless, cotton dress. The third bridesmaid also liked the dress so we ordered the dresses that day.

The bridesmaids wore the navy version of the same shoe I wore {except mine were ivory}. Comfortable and pretty inexpensive!

I gifted a set of genuine pearls to each of my bridesmaids. The set was made of up a necklace, bracelet, and a pair of earrings. They wore their sets and I wore the exact same set for myself.

I know this is basically the longest post of all time, but I also want to leave a little note of my feelings for Trevor on today, our second anniversary. Feel free to skip over the rest of this as it's more for our memories than anything else.

Trev, you have been an amazing husband to me. I am so, so blessed to have you in my life and I am incredibly honored that God picked you to be my best friend, husband, and leader of our family. Our second year of marriage hasn't been easy but you never wavered - you and I are in this for the long haul, through thick or thin, and for better or for worse. You will make an amazing father someday, of this I am certain, and our family will be infinitely better because of you. Thank you for being the man that you are and for being the husband that I never dreamed I'd deserve. 

I said it two years ago, but I'll say it again and again until I die: I promise to fully share my life with you through days of happiness or sadness, abundance or want. I love you, always and forever.

Come back again tomorrow for a photo post of wedding details and next Wednesday for a wrap up complete with regrets and dos/don'ts!

Please leave any wedding related questions in the comments below and I will happily reply to you via email. You don't have to limit your questions to be about our wedding - I love helping brides no matter the size, feel, or location of their weddings!

With the exception of my horrible cell phone photos of my dress, all photos courtesy of Laurie Marie Photography.

Project: Do You #13

Please note that this is a link up that focuses on individual self discovery goals. The goals you see below were set by me and for me only. If you choose to link up with us, please create your own goals to work toward and to update us on. If you are unfamiliar with Project: Do You, check out this post that introduces the project before proceeding.

#1 - Read one book per month. I read another book in the past couple of weeks: Rose in a Storm by Jon Katz. It was decent, but not realistic which bothered me the whole book, but I powered through! Two more books read in June? I'll take it! 

#2 - Work out on a regular basis. Not much to say except this is still happening, so that's good!

#13 - Share our wedding on the blog. We're in the middle of our anniversary month and you've read two posts about our wedding. Tomorrow {our actual anniversary} is another one about our attire, Wednesday's another post, and next Wednesday is the final recap. I'm enjoying sharing photos with you and I hope you're liking them as well!

This week's P:DY recap is pretty short and sweet, but that's fine with me. I'm staying on the straight and narrow with my eyes on the prize, as they say, so I can't ask for more in terms of goal accomplishment. Hopefully there will be more checked off the list in the coming weeks!

How are your goals coming along?

Wedding Wednesday #2

Every Wednesday this month, I am recapping our wedding as part of our two year anniversary celebration. Last week, I showed you photos from our ceremony and told you about our unity tree. You can catch up on that here if you missed it or need a little refresher.

Today's all about the reception so prepare to be overloaded with pictures!

Our reception was held at my parent's home in a country subdivison. We rented a huge white tent, brought in chairs, decorated with lots and lots of flowers and a few DIY elements {like the ribbon hoops}, and everyone had an amazing time.

We received many complements on the decor and the feeling of our reception. Being that our ceremony was at 11:30am and our lunch was served a little before 1pm, we had a happy crowd.

The meal was catered in by a local Italian bistro. Our guests loved our food. They made pasta dishes, chicken dishes, and the most delicious salads. Our food was by far one of the hardest decisions we made while wedding planning because I didn't want a "traditional" meat and potatoes meal. We made the right choice and I would choose them again, a million times over.

People ate...

There were toasts...

And more toasts...

And we all had a great time.
Isn't my grandpa just the cutest?

Then we all dug into this beautiful cake with handpainted peonies - ugh, so good.

And danced the afternoon away!

But we knew people would need a break from dancing every once in awhile so we had lawn games set up for everyone to play. Who doesn't love a little bocce or croquet on a Saturday afternoon in June?

Come back next Tuesday for an anniversary recap and pictures of our attire!

Also coming in the weeks ahead: a post highlighting our decor and a post discussing my regrets and other wedding dos/don'ts.

Please leave any wedding related questions in the comments below and I will happily reply to you via email. You don't have to limit your questions to be about our wedding - I love helping brides no matter the size, feel, or location of their weddings!

All photos courtesy of Laurie Marie Photography.