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.    

Wedding Wednesday: Bloominous

After getting married in February, I know how easy it is to get carried away with a budget.  I spent hours looking for places we could make cuts so that we could spend the money elsewhere.  One place I was able to cut a lot of our money was our flowers! I went to every Joann's in Nashville and bought every light pink Peony, rose, and white garnish they had in stock to make seven bridesmaids' bouquets, my bouquet, mothers' and grandmothers' bouquets, and eleven boutonnieres.   My favorite part: I got to arrange them how I wanted and I saved a ton of money My least favorite part: they were artificial.    Could anyone tell? No. Could I tell? Yes.    Did you know there is a typical 300% markup on flowers when you use a florist? Did you also know that the flowers are often frozen and thawed when they come to you?   I stumbled upon an amazing company that I wish I had known about in February.  Insert Bloominous!

  This awesome company has a variety of flowers for every bride.  They send cut-to-order flowers to you along with everything you need to assemble them. The DIY kits also come with an arrangement guide in case you don't know anything about flower arrangement!!  

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  My personal favorite is their Party Pop Collection! These would have fit our wedding beautifully!!

  By cutting out that middle man (without cutting out the florist experience), you save oodles and kaboodles!! You pay $5 for boutonnieres, and $40 for bridesmaids' bouquets!   Brides! Take the guesswork out of the floral side of your plans. Visit Bloominous and explore their options!! They're bound to have something that fits your wedding style and saves you money! Who wouldn't want a little change to spend on their honeymoon!?      

Friday!

Happy Friday!! I am on the struggle bus as always! This has been a long, busy week.   1. We spent all week at Vacation Bible School.  Jackson acted, I taught, we had a blast. 

 

  2. My best friend got her wedding photos back. I love so many of them! I will do a photo dump next week, but here are a handful of my favorites! (Credit: Emily Lester Photography)

 

 

 

 

 (please note her daddy in the window ^^)

 (totally my idea ^^!)

   3. I have finally framed and laid out my gallery wall!! I will definitely be hanging it sometime next week!

    4. Good news, we found out what's wrong with my car. Bad news, it's not good. I have a cracked head in my engine. Now we are weighing our options: Fix it and wait for something else to come up, or buy a new car. I feel like we can't win, either way, it's money we don't have.  sigh.   5.  Jackson has been my rock through all of the car nonsense, sneaky spending whatnot, and through the 10000 times I've been sick since February (like now!) My sweet man keeps life fun, Godly, and light.  I'm so thankful for that during stressful, hard times! For example:

My Best Friend's Wedding Weekend!!

This weekend, on Friday, my best best friend got married! 

We all spent Thursday night in a hotel together after I ran us to Walmart and got pulled over for having a headlight out. sigh. 

We woke up on Friday to celebrate Taylor!! We went to Dunkin Donuts where Alex (my co-matron of honor) and I treated everyone to coffee and donuts. We then went to Houston Station where we got our hair and makeup done!

After getting ready, the bride and groom's first look, the bride and her daddy's first look, and pictures, I handed my best friend over to the man of her dreams. 

Enjoy the photo dump. 

Maybe I'm biased, but she was one of the most beautiful brides I've ever seen! 

We spent most of the night dancing our feet and butts off, but I will share pictures when her photographer shares them! 

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. 



Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

Happy Friday, all, and hopefully happy long weekend for everyone, too! I hope you've had a great week. This week has seemed to fly compared to last week!   1. This week I've been an eBay selling machine! I sold the bridesmaid dress I wore in Brittney's wedding last Saturday for $5 less than I paid for it, I sold my Chacos that were way too small, and I sold two pairs of random brand heels for which I paid $2 each.     2. I found our favorite coffee in VUE cups for our Keurig on Amazon!! Finally! We've been out for a while, but the only places they sell VUE cups are BedBath&Beyond and Amazon.

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  3.  After I had a not so good experience curling my hair for Brittney's wedding, so after a week of debating, I finally settled on an updo for Taylor's wedding in June! 

4. I broke down and went for my first pedicure since we got married. ew, I know. It was so great, though. Yay for pretty piggies for the pool that opens today!! 5. Tomorrow, we will be venturing to Arrington, Tennessee to go to the Renaissance Festival. I haven't been since I was eleven, but from what I remember, it's the bomb dot com. It's jousting weekend, so this should be awesome.

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Fridays and Weddings!

This week has been exceptional. Busy, overwhelming, but exceptional.   1. I scored this adorable skirt and this awesome tripod for our new camera on Groopdealz.

 

 

2.

Jackson was able to sell his toolbox!! Mind you, the guy pretty much stole it from him, but hey, we needed it gone and he needed a toolbox. Now we can pay off two whole debts and focus only on his huge tool bill and school debt!! Yay for making grown up decisions!!

 

 

 3.

 My best friend from high school came over to our apartment on Monday night for dinner. She just graduated from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and was home for Mother's Day weekend. I am so glad that we have stayed friends for almost ten years!

(2004//2014)

 

 4.

I found the perfect planner for our lives right now on Etsy. It's got seven sections so you can plan for you, hubs, kids, chores, outfits, dinners, etc. They have great student planners that break things down by class instead of by family member. There are also teacher planning books. Awesome shop, in my opinion.

 

 

 5.  Tonight, we're celebrating the marriage of my best friend, Brittney. She is getting married tomorrow, and tonight is her rehearsal. I'm so excited for she and Jared!!

     

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.