Our First Anniversary

We spent our anniversary in Chattanooga, TN.  We wanted to go somewhere, didn't want to go far, and didn't want to spend an arm and a leg. It was an incredible weekend full of wandering, hot chocolate, and sweet quality time. 

Saturday, we left Nashville and got to Chattanooga about 1pm. We went to get lunch with my sister, and then headed to downtown. We parked and set out, on foot, for ten miles. We spent a lot of time in the art district.

All in all, we walked 10 miles on Saturday, and we were feeling it on Sunday.  We woke up at 7:30 (6:30 our time ... on a Sunday ... ) and headed down to the lobby for breakfast! I love hotel breakfasts... and just hotels in general. After breakfast, we headed up Lookout Mountain to see everything we could see. We saw multi-million dollar homes, spectacular views, and then headed back down to board the Incline Railway.

When we came home on Sunday, after watching the Super Bowl, we got our thawed out wedding cake out of the fridge. It. Was. Delicious. No lie. Dad wrapped it in so much saran wrap and put it in a container that it was perfect. I'm still snacking on it today. 

I will never forget how perfect our first anniversary was.  I can't wait to see what awesome adventures our second year brings!! 

Happy Anniversary

Well, here we are one year later. Still married and still loving it.  We beat both Kim and Britney, so hey, there's that.    One year ago, we said our vows, we exchanged our rings, and we promised each other forever.  

  The last year of my life has been both the slowest year and the fastest year all at the same time.  It was full of learning and living, of arguing and grace, of growing pains and the bandaids that help them heal.  Some days have been impossible, some days have been so full of life that I wish they'd last forever.    I'm so blessed to have known Jackson almost half of my entire life, and to have loved him for just as long.  I am blessed to have a man who loves me unconditionally and with whom I can share every bit of life... the good, the bad, the ugly.  He is my past, my present, and my future. 

  I have learned that he does not eat mayonnaise and he hates sour cream.  He will eat all of the Oreos if you don't hide them, and can tell the difference in regular and off-brand Cheerios.  He loves new gadgets and loves being surprised with gifts, even as small as socks.  Speaking of, he can put a hole in the toe of a sock faster than anyone I know.  He works his tail off and still makes a point to conquer his honey do list at home.  He watches everything I do and loves my quirks. He picks up on the little things I say and usually comes through for my "I wish we could/had/did _____". I fall more in love with his crows feet and his laugh every day, and I even love his scruffy face.  He is my heart and soul and I'm so blessed to be his wife. 
Happy Anniversary, Jackson. I look forward to what this year has for us. I am loving being your wife, and I love sharing my life with you.   

Life Lately

I know, I know, I'm back to slacking.  I didn't have any more Christmas posts in mind, and life isn't containing a whole lot more than work, home, monogramming, and sleeping.  So here are little chunks of our lives lately....   Roomie Christmas was great on Friday, full of laughs and Jeni's ice cream!  

 

Jackson's brother and his wife will be here this evening from Hawaii! They're spending two weeks here before he goes back to deployment and she starts back medical school.   There are monograms galore in our home.  I've pretty much been running my own little business this Christmas, and it's really exciting.  

I am in need of a haircut, but can't figure out what I want. I don't want any of my length taken off, but I want layers and my swoopy bangs. To the depths of pinterest I go!    I got to spend time with my sweet Nana this week decorating her tree and helping her get ready for Christmas next week. 

  We got some of my bridal portraits back, and I'm so so excited to get the rest!     Also, I have been a college graduate for a whole year... and I miss it so so much. :(   I started my promotion on Monday. I'm now an HR Generalist.  It's pretty much what I've been doing, except now I'm getting paid to do it. Score for the home team!    We are so addicted to this game called "Trivia Crack".... It is like trivial pursuit! It's so much fun to play without having to get out a board.   There are piles of laundry, stray shoes, and a sink full of dishes waiting on me this evening.  Tis the season for being too busy to do housework!!  

Our Wedding: The Seven Things

While planning my wedding, people kept telling me that there are seven things that go wrong on your wedding day.  Whoever thought it was wise to tell a bride that was obviously ready to die. It was true, whether I wanted to deal with the reality or not.  Some of the things that went wrong, I didn't find out about until just recently, but sure enough, there were seven things that went wrong on my wedding day.   1. Ours started the day before our wedding.  For the rehearsal dinner, I had a beautiful Calvin Klein dress; it was white with a navy blue stripe on it.  My sister was putting on her face makeup and it shot out of the pump and onto my dress. I ended up wearing the same dress I wore for our bridal tea.    2. After the ceremony, most of my family left for the reception with everyone else.  We planned to take family pictures in the in-between time we had between the ceremony and reception.  Our minister forgot to announce that families should exit to the back of the auditorium, so we didn't get pictures with everyone in them.    3. The lighter wouldn't light for my unity candle.  I remember Dad coming back to the back of our auditorium and saying "the lighter wouldn't light".  I jokingly said "What'd you do? Did you take your cigarette lighter out of your pocket to light it?" He looked at me and said, "Well, yeah!"  Watching our wedding video, that was one of the most hilarious parts of our wedding.   

4. We forgot the boutonniere for the minister, and I kept Dad's with me. I didn't let anyone know that, so my poor father in law was shafted at first. haha. I felt so bad.   5. During the reception, the boys took my car to Jackson's parents house because we used the truck as a getaway car. Our marriage license was in the car, so our reception lasted much longer than it should have because we had to wait for them to go back and get it. 

6. One of my bridesmaids' dresses didn't fit at all. Apparently, there was a crisis a couple of nights before my wedding, she took it the day of my wedding to get it let out, and she took an ungodly amount of laxatives the day of my wedding.

7. Jackson ran out of time and budget to get his groomsmen gifts. Looking back, totally not okay.  Did they notice? Not one bit.  I love how simple boys are.    

Our Wedding: Redo's

After attending a wedding post-Hinners wedding, I have a bunch of things I'd do all over again for our wedding. 

1. Having a first look with Jackson and one with my daddy - I wouldn't give these moments up for anything. Looking back, they were two of my top five moments of the day. I was able to decompress and get rid of my jitters with Jackson and I was able to have a sweet moment, just me and my daddy before I was swept away as a bride.  
2. My dress - My dress was one of my favorite parts of my wedding. It took me two trips to David's Bridal and a breakdown with an awful consultant to find the dress. The second I put it on, I knew it was mine.
3. My venue - I loved having our wedding at our church. It was the church Jackson grew up in, the church both of us were baptized in, the church family that had poured into our relationship from the beginning, and the church that we will someday raise our own family. It just made sense.
   

    
4. My reception - Everything about our reception was a dream come true (minus the fact that we couldn't dance).  From the Christmas light, gossamer canopy to the dessert bar to the cake, everything was perfect.
5. The budget - I wasn't given a budget to begin with, I was just very conscious about how much we spent. Our wedding, total, was $7,000 (give or take a few dollars). We had everything we'd ever dreamed of, and that was simply enough. We didn't have to go to ridiculously measures to have the wedding of our dreams.
6. My maids and men - having each of these people in our wedding made our wedding what it was. Each of them brought something special to our day, and we wouldn't have had it any other way.
   
7. My bridal party attire - We used Men's Warehouse for our tuxes. They were a grey, Calvin Klein suit and pant, white shirt, navy vest and bowtie and pocket square. Jackson wore a grey vest with a white bowtie. They all had Happy Socks! :) Our girls wore Mori Lee style 181 in Navy. :) It was flattering on all of them!!
8. My flowers - I may have mentioned before that my flowers were artificial. I put together all of the bouquets and boutonnieres: groomsmen, fathers (I forgot our officiant.. oops), bridesmaids, mothers, grandmothers, and our Kroger florist where my mom works put together my bouquet... all ten pounds of it. :) We went to Joann's and spent $160 on flowers for 21 people (including my huge) bouquet. I bought every pink peony, white hydrangea, white rose, and baby's breath in Nashville. We also used artificial flowers in our centerpieces for our reception.
9.  Having Heath marry us - Our officiate is the associate minister at our church. He was the youth minister when I started attending church at Jackson Park, and for Jackson three years before that.  He has seen our ups and downs, breakups, fights, and our best moments.  I wouldn't have had anyone else marry us for the world.
10.  Hiring a videographer and photographer we knew well - It seems like it is a "duh" thing to hire both the videographer and a photographer, but it was even better having people we knew and trusted in these areas.  Our videographer is a member at our church and does videography for a living. Our photographer was a life-long family friend that I have known all my life. He has taken pictures of my sister and I growing up, so it made sense to hire him. Hiring people we knew also enabled us to use the money saved elsewhere. We only paid $200 for our videos (rehearsal, ceremony, and reception) and our photography was free.
11. My Groom (cheese alert) - I wouild not have traded marrying Jackson for any of the first ten things listed.  :) At the end of the day, we were married and thats what mattered. 



Our Wedding: The Dress

I had always grown up knowing I wanted to look like a princess on my wedding day. As I got older, though, and times changed, the "princess" look had a million different meanings to a million different people. For some, it was a sexy fitted dress, for others it was a ball gown. I got engaged on December 23, 2012 and first went shopping for dresses January 4, 2013. I went and tried on all kinds of dresses.... Mermaid, A-Line, Ball Gown, Tea Length. I didn't fall in love with any of them.   I made a list of requirements for the next time we would go dress shopping... Ball-Gown Blingy Belt Fluffy white (I was not a fan of ivory at all) Sweetheart neckline Zipper less than $500 (I had planned to pay for it all myself)   The next time I went to David's Bridal was with my mother.  We looked through, picked dresses we knew we wanted to try. I had been looking online and found this dress that I was convinced was it. My consultant pulled dresses too like this trumpet style dress, this sheath style dress, and another awful material dress that made me look pregnant.    I broke down in tears because I was scared I wasn't going to find the dress.  She asked me for my list of requirements, and I gave it to her. She looked at my mom and told her she had the perfect dress and asked my mom to follow her. I told my mom not to bring it back if it was over budget because I was not going to fall in love with a dress I couldn't afford (I watched enough SYTTD to know how that feels!)   She brought back this dress. I put it on and sobbed. It was the perfect dress.... my beautiful princess gown that I had always dreamed of. And it was my size - meant to be!!  

I looked at the price tag - $950?!???!?! I sat in the floor and cried. I couldn't believe this was my dress and it was too expensive. The girl came over and told us it was on sale for $800 that week. Wow... only $150 off?! Still too expensive. So My mother and I made the deal that I would pay half and she would pay half. so I left with my dress.   Fast forward to six weeks before the wedding. It had been hanging in the closet waiting to be pranced around in. Between the purchase of the dress and this pre-wedding mark, I had my gallbladder removed. I was unaware of the side effect of gaining weight in strange places (i.e. chest and ribs). I put my dress on and it was nowhere near zipping. I lost my mind. just lost it. How could this have happened??!   Luckily, my best friend had started working at a bridal store and knew a miracle-working seamstress. She let out every part of my dress, moved the beaded waist band, constructed a bow for the back, and viola! It fit! She worked a miracle two weeks before my wedding!! Plus it added a special one-of-a-kind flare to the dress!   You can see the back detail in these first-look pictures:

 

Wedding Wednesday: Bride-Guide to Bridesmaids

Happy Wedding Wednesday!   I come to you today with a bride-guide.   After I got engaged, so did my two best friends. They were my bridesmaids, and I am theirs (and MOH to one of them).  Before I got engaged, I was all wedding all the time. I wanted to be a wedding planner, open my own bridal salon, etc. After I got engaged, February 2, 2014 (the day after our wedding) could not come fast enough.   So today, I bring to you the things I learned as a bride that I wish I could tell all brides about bridesmaids.

1. Be smart about how much you're asking your bridesmaids to spend. My bridesmaid dresses were a little expensive ($140ish). We were in a time crunch because the ones I thought I loved I ended up hating, and they needed to have been ordered two weeks prior to my deciding on these. I offered to pay whatever needed to be paid for whoever needed it.  If you can't do that, think about other places you can cut costs. I told them to wear nude shoes they already had, didn't make them pay for hair or nails, makeup was free, I provided the jewelry. Because I knew they were spending so much, I was hesitant to ask them to pay any more. There's a fine line between having the wedding you want and making your bridesmaids stress. Odds are, they'll only remember what a financial burden your wedding was, not what a great time they had.
2. You're going to hurt feelings when picking your girls. I know, you don't want to, but you're going to. You can't possibly have twenty bridesmaids. Your best friend from elementary school probably still isn't interested in the pact you made years ago. Your cousins may feel like they're entitled to that position and get their feelings hurt when you don't ask. Sometimes it snowballs because you can't ask Jane and Jill without asking Judy, but if you ask Judy you'll have to ask JoAnn (and they're all Duggar sisters... just kidding). Your best friends from high school, the other roommates, the friends from church that you didn't ask may have hurt feelings. I had an old friend tweet and post passive facebook posts like "you never know what you mean to someone until you're not picked for bridesmaid." It's okay. Make your picks and don't be bullied.
3. Be mindful of body types. If you have bridesmaids of all sizes, don't pick a dress that will flatter only one body type. I'm in a wedding where most of the girls are tall and skinny, my co-MOH is petite and tiny, and I'm petite and "thicker" than they are. Some of the first dresses we tried on were only going to look good on the tall ones. The dresses we ended up with look great on everyone, but have to be hemmed because there wasn't a "petite" option. 
4. Not everyone is going to like everyone. I have two best friends. One can't stand the other, but it's because they're from two different worlds.  I met them in two different worlds, and our friendships are very different. I love them the same. After every party, shower, get together, etc. I would hear "gahh, I can't stand her!". Did I like it? No. Did I know I had to tolerate it through the end of my wedding? Yes, and that was okay.
5. Be gracious when you're making plans including your bridesmaids. This covers everything from what you're doing at your bachelorette party to what you're asking them to do the day of your wedding. If you have someone who you know has an issue with alcohol, it wouldn't be nice to demand they take part in drinking games. Know their comfort zones. If they're not comfortable doing a choreographed dance in front of everyone and their mamas, don't force it. They're already in dresses and shoes, all dolled up. Don't ask them to break it down while everyone stares at them.

  Looking back, these were things I was sure I did when it came to my bridesmaids.  I'm in weddings where not all of them are the case, and it makes life difficult.  These girls are your best girls and are standing by you in that video (and in your heart) forever.  

 

 

Our Wedding: Here Comes the Bride and Ceremony

Our wedding ceremony was perfect! From the song selection to the vows, everything was just as I've always imagined. We were married in the church Jackson grew up in, the church both of us were baptized in, and the church in which we plan to raise our family.  It was so meaningful to us! We were married by one of our best friends.  My daddy and I walked down the aisle to Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini from our favorite movie, Somewhere in Time. Listen and fall in love. 

 

Our unity candle was lit to the song "Then" by Brad Paisley.

(This is my favorite part on our wedding video because you can hear everything we're saying while we're lighting our candle.  I said things like "Why did we pick such a long song?" and "I can't wait to kiss you." and "I can't believe this is the day we've waited for our entire lives.")

...and our first kiss looked a little something like this: