owd - operation wedding dress

so a lot of my friends have already heard me talk about owd, and some of you have not. operation wedding dress (owd for short) was contrived one evening when i realized that there were just not enough hours in the day to get everything done that needed to be done, including working out in order to fit into a gorgeous white dress that will make everyone ooo and ahh.

and since i'm living at home until we get married, it's hard to work around everyone's schedule to be able to walk on our treadmill which was at the time housed upstairs above my sister's room. every saturday morning i would walk around 9 am, and, man, i would hear about it when she finally woke up about 2 pm about how i woke her up... now trying to be the peacemaker in the household (i'm sure mom and sara will laugh at that) i decided to beg, plead, cry, negotiate, and manipulate (just kidding to 3 out of 5 of those) to get them to let me move the treadmill downstairs to our den. in the den, i was pretty sure that i would disturb no one while walking at any hour of the day. once they gave in, and my dad and i hoisted the humongous thing down the stairs and in the den - operation wedding dress was born!

i've decided to get up every morning (ok, maybe not EVERY morning) at 5 am, walk for an hour (while watching previously taped programming since nothing but saved by the bell episodes that i've honestly seen about 200 times each is on - thank you, dvr), cool off for a few minutes, take a shower and get ready for work, and then carpool my happy little butt to work. i LOVE the fact that when i get home in the evenings, i dont' have to worry about walking another mile or feeling bad for not doing anything because i have!

some days i have a hard time getting myself up in the morning, but with the help of my fabulous fiancee (who i call EVERYDAY at 5 am in order to wake him up for work), he helps to motivate me out of the bed that early. i'm still working on making it a daily habit, but i'm going to try as hard as i can between now and march (when i am finally going to allow myself to be able to browse and try on wedding dresses)

cute ideas?

so i've got a couple of ideas i'm pondering...

one, i found this thing on uncommongoods.com (or actually fm the catalog that i received in the mail) called a wishing wall. it's a framed-type cardboard thing that people write their wishes on little colored pieces of paper, roll them up, and then put them in little sections throughout this 'wall'. i wouldn't really want to do this in lieu of a guestbook like some of the reviews suggested that they've done, but in addition to, i guess... here's what it looks like.

i think it's a cool idea, and it's something that we can keep for forever - or at least until our house gets flooded and the cardboard is ruined! ha! someone even suggested covering the frame in a fabric that you like to make it even more awesome...

next, is that instead of a dj/band that we will spend a ton of money on that we cannot really afford - and i'm not even sure that our guests will utilize (our friends - yes, our families - who knows) - i think we're going to rent a digital jukebox that we can choose up to 70 songs (including the first dance, father/daughter dance, etc) of our choice and then there will be 100 or so others. it's actually really affordable, it comes with speakers, will sit on a tabletop, and is touchscreen! so all of our friends/families can pick the songs that they want to hear/dance to! :)

i've got plenty other crazy ideas running around in this head of mine, and hopefully eventually will have time to get them down. so we'll soon see...

we're almost to the one year mark!! :)

step uno - place/date

ok, first big step?
well, minus the whole getting engaged thing…
CHECK!

i sent off our deposit for the wedding/reception site today!
shocked? me too!!

we’re going to be having it at montgomery bell state park - group camp on:

October 9, 2010.

exact time to be determined later.

mark it down or just remember to figure it out later when the calendars for 2010 actually come out!

many more details to come later!!

where to begin.

hello, fellow internet users:

i have no idea where to begin this thing... i knew that i wanted to put a lot of my thoughts down somewhere, so where else...a BLOG! yeah yeah, i know. it's the cliche thing to do these days, but it's so much faster to type than to write all of these things out.

so, here i am, engaged and feeling underage. i feel like i've been spending all my life looking for 'the one' along with every other girl alive. now that i've found him, it's strange to think that i'll become a wife in a little over a year. VERY strange! i know nothing about planning a wedding, cooking, ironing, or any other 'wifely' duties that most (ok, maybe not most) know going into a marriage. i know that there are many out there like me, but still feel alone sometimes when i hear about my friends constantly cooking dinner for their husbands or taking care of children. am i really cut out for this? as long as tom understands that i'm not perfect and life will not be like that, then we're good, right? let's hope so... what matters is he loves me!

so join me on my journey - as i travel through engagement and beyond...