Inspiration {ways to ask your maid of honor}

Yay!  The newest issue of Brides magazine is out and ready for me to rip out pages for future reference!  Looking at bridal magazines is definitely one of my newest and favorite hobbies, ever.  I love being so visually inspired and can't wait to combine my envisions to create the perfect wedding day for Matt and me.

And I have to give a BIG thank you to Matt's step-mom, Laura, for sharing her wedding planning bible with me.  Inside are several professional contacts, family addresses (yay!), gift ideas and tons of inspiration! I'll be busy looking through this for hours....

So like I mentioned in a previous post to Cloud9Dallas, I've been thinking about who I want to stand beside me on my wedding day (besides my amazing fiancé).  I obviously want my sweet little sister next to me, so I wasted no time asking her to be my matron of honor.  If you don't already know, Haley and her husband are moving to Denver this June.  Yes, I'm so sad/devastated/in denial about this; but I'm excited for their new adventures.  In honor of her moving and all the traveling she will be doing (to be with me during my planning and partying, duh!), I bought and personalized a luggage i.d. badge.  I met her at Taco Diner last week for dinner.  I presented the "going away gift" and when she turned it over to look at the back of the badge, she smiled so big!  I'm so happy that she's so happy to be my matron of honor :)

Since I am the bride, I can pretty much do whatever I want, right?  Right.  In that case, I'm having a co matron of honor - my bestie, Lindsay!  We're pretty much sisters anyways, since after May 4, 2013, we'll both have the same last name ;)  Cheers to almost being a Williams! I met her at our go to place, Southpaws, Tuesday for lunch.  We're also obsessed with Tu-Lu's Gluten Free Bakery, so I had to incorporate a cute little cupcake in my asking!

Along with all my magazines, Pinterest and notebooks, Haley and Linsday are also inspirations to me, in more ways than one.  They both had really great weddings last year.... I hope I can keep up!

Stay tuned to meet my other lovely ladies!  Can't wait to ask them and can't wait to spend the year celebrating with the best!

My New Job

Yup, I'm now a full time wedding planner.  I am trying to create boundaries tho, because I know my sweet fiancé doesn't want to get off work to come work on wedding plans.  So suggested by my momma, I'm going to try to turn off the wedding planning mode/job as soon as Matt walks in the door because I learned (the hard way) that Matt really isn't as excited as I am about the details of the wedding.  Matt was really only interested in finding the venue and I quickly realized he has no interest in scanning 100s of photographs by local photographers or watching several other random couple's wedding videos for inspiration.  (Confession:  I cry during almost every one of those videos.  Is that normal?)

So now that we have our venue and our date selected, what's next on my planning agenda?  I've been narrowing down my bridesmaids.  I think I'm making this decision a lot harder than it should be; but that's what I do with everything.  While I've been thinking about my girls, I've also been thinking of a cute and original way to ask them to be a part of my day.  I can't wait to ask them and then post it to Cloud9Dallas!  If I say so myself, it's way too cute!  I've also been busy researching photographers and videographers.  Did you know that these professionals are so expensive?  Goodness.  Photos and videos are very important to me tho - they'll last forever!  And I want all the details (because I'm so detail oriented) to be documented so I can always look back and remember how beautiful everything about our day was (though Matt could probably care less). ;) Oh well.  So here's a few of the professionals I'm researching, interviewing and comparing:

Photographers
June Bug Photography
Jami Saunders Photography
Double Knot Photography

Videographers
Spinning Leaf Films
Marc Roberts Photography
When It Clicks

It's amazing how important a company's website is!  During my intense research, I'd click a link to a photographer's website, and within seconds I would know if I was interested or not. A webpage should be just a creative as their work.  If I didn't like their site, I closed it out before even looking at their portfolio and crossed it off the list with no hesitation.  And if it was difficult to view their photos, I would get annoyed and again, close the screen and cross them off the list.  

Anyway, I'm taking all suggestions/recommendations so feel free to contact me with your favorite professional photo/videographer or let me know what you think about the ones listed above.

Today I'm working on a DIY project  Never really been into the whole craft thing, but this is different, this is for my girls to be!  Love 'em and can't wait to ask each one of them to be a part of our celebration!

Sweet message at my grandparent's barn

The Date

Last night I spent the evening with a sweet friend of mine (and Matt's), miss Katie.  She asked to get together to celebrate my engagement and to hear all about how Matt proposed; so we went over to The Common Table for some good wine.  Before I knew it, we had been there for three hours just talking, sipping and munching.  Having such sweet friends is a huge blessing and I'm so thankful to get to share this special time with the people that mean the most to me.  Love you Katie!  

  

After much discussion between Matt and me and our families, we finally decided on a date, whew!  I've been stressing out about the perfect date and I really don't think there's a better day for us!  (Although, if you ask Matt, the perfect date for us would be next week.)  This morning after Matt and I finalized our decision, I emailed our venue that we've confirmed our date and commitment.  She emailed the contract over to me and I forwarded it to Matt.  It's sitting on the kitchen counter right now, waiting for our initials :)  It's official, (well, almost...we have to mail in our deposit) we're getting married May 4, 2013.  Yippee!   

Venue Shopping

Before we started going to view wedding venues, I knew that I would just know when we found the perfect place for Matt and me to get married.  I knew I would get that feeling that would completely overwhelm me with love, joy and excitement!  We started our venue shopping Saturday evening (after our visit with my family) at the Dallas Petroleum Club downtown.  Nice place but just not what we were looking for and definitely not big enough.  We wished we could take their wedding consultant with us though, he was fantastic.  We continued our shopping on Monday afternoon.  Mom was able to come down to join us, so we started with a pre-game lunch at Gloria's.  Our first appointment was with The Crescent.  We valet parked, (which would be an added/unwanted expense on our wedding day) walked in and commented on some strange extra large doll dresses hanging from the ceiling.  The wedding consultant greeted us and immediately began our tour.  It was nice, but didn't knock our socks off, I didn't get that feeling.  Plus, it was too small and the rooms were all spread out - we want one large room! At least we were able to cross The Crescent off our list of venues.

Next we drove over to the new Omni hotel.  Nice building, not so nice area.  I'm not even going to go into detail of our experience there...

I could already feel myself becoming a little frustrated 1) because I had high expectations for these two venues and 2) no one from the AT&T Performance Center would return my call or email me back.  I decided that I'd cross off the performance center just for that reason - Bridezilla at her best...

Our final stop that day was the Dallas Museum of Art.  We walked up to the door to find that it was closed Mondays.  Wonderful.  I was pretty frustrated by then so I didn't want to venue shop for the rest of the day.  Matt dropped mom and me off at my apartment and we spent about an hour looking at wedding dresses, flowers and venues (online).

Today we went to view the most beautiful wedding venue.  Breathtaking!  Beautiful! Perfect!  I think we've found our venue!  (We have it on hold for 24 hours, though I'm planning on emailing her in a few minutes ;))  I have been waiting for that feeling, and today, I felt it.  There isn't a more perfect place for Matt and me.  On the way back home I'm expressing how absolutely perfect it is on the phone with my mom, I'm hearing my Aunt Bobbie squealing in the background and I'm tearing up next to my fiancé... that's when you know.

I can't wait to marry my best friend in such a magical place.

Also, we're still discussing our date.  It's now between April 6 and May 4, 2013.

"I love her still"

Matt and I drove to Howe today to see my grandparents and then to see my dad and step-mom.  We had to wait a whole week until we could show them the ring!  I absolutely love how happy my Mammaw and Pappaw are to see me when I walk into their home.  They were especially happy for our visit today so they could hear our side of our engagement story. After Matt and I took turns telling our story, Mammaw and Pappaw told us theirs, and then went on to tell us how they spent $9.99 on silver plated flatware from JCPenny instead of an engagement ring and even more stories and "bumps along the way".  My Pappaw was looking at my Mammaw as they bragged about being together for 57 years, then looked at me and choked up as he said the sweetest thing in the world:  "I love her still."  

What an inspiration they are.  I can't wait to sit and tell our grandchildren how much I love their grandfather, still.

Dad and Shawna, my step-mom, were also thrilled to see us and so excited to hear how Matt proposed.  I don't ever get tired of telling people about that special day.  We spent a couple hours at my dad's property fishing, shooting guns and playing with his new cows.  ...Can't take the country outta the girl ;) (Those of you that know me, my accent is the only thing that makes me country.)  Then dad and Shawna took us to dinner to celebrate our engagement.  

Above:  Me trying too hard to make fishing an athletic sport.

 

Cinco de Mayo, 2012

May 5, 2012

I am engaged to the most wonderful man on earth.  I can't wait to blog our engagement and record every little detail during this magical time of our lives.  This kind of love and happiness happens once in a lifetime and I thank God everyday.  God's timing is perfect, though sometimes you don't realize it.  I am so thankful God put Matt back into my life when He did.  It's wonderful and so comforting when you, the one you love and God are on the same page.  Good, really good, things happen...