70 days

As you can see, there are a lot of huge upcoming events in my life! While the graduation ceremony itself is not the exciting part, it is the idea of actually being done with school for the rest of my life, if I so choose. I've started my internship, and although I wasn't placed in the exact unit I had requested, I am still enjoying my time there, learning a lot, and it is reaffirming my decision to leave grad school and start a new career.

Also, you may have noticed a new event on my countdown - my move to Colorado! A mere five days after the wedding, my dad, step-mom, and I will embark on the cross country trip to coincide with M's first weekend off of school. Hopefully that will give him some time to help me get settled before he gets back to class. I know it will be stressful for awhile, especially if I don't have a job yet, but things will work out and it will be sooooo great to finally be together again!

On to more relevant wedding topics...

a) Our engagement pictures are almost ready!! Jerrod has put them up on Pictage but they are not released yet, so M and I are impatiently waiting to look at them! I cannot wait to see them.

b) Invitations - they are addressed, stamped, and ready to roll!! Well, it can't be that nice, can it? I actually still have one to address, and about twenty more to stamp. By the way, I highly suggest that you get your invitations measured and weighed a few different times before buying stamps. When I got them weighed in Mobile, I was told they would be $.58, while at home, they told me it would be $.42, and I made sure she double, triple checked and asked her co-worker to verify. That will save me some money, which will be wonderful. Besides that, the guest list came in just above our goal of 150, which was pretty darn hard to do with the huge families we have!

c) Shower - My shower is on the 22nd! I am so grateful to my mom's old friends for reaching out and throwing me this shower. I am really looking forward to seeing everyone again, and I am thanking God that I didn't have any work conflicts or anything!

d) Bridal portraits - Scheduled for July 16th. It's a little odd to me to get an entire shooting session of pictures of me, but, whatever - I also have my hair and makeup trial schedule for that morning. It should be an interesting, incredibly HOT day.

e) Alterations - I had my first fitting on Thursday, with Heidi Elnora, a former Project Runway contestant (anyone remember her? I do! I thought she had potential). Anyway, she makes custom couture gowns here in town and my planner, Ashley, happens to be good friends with her, so she set me up with her to have my alterations done. Thankfully (or not?) my bust doesn't need to be taken in. That's either due to the different bra, or I've gained a few in that area. I wouldn't be surprised if it's the second! I'll have the hem altered and an American bustle put in. We also talked about bustling my veil so I can wear it during the reception as well (it is that awesome).

I think that's a pretty good update for now. Here's a picture of my shower invitation, and my wedding invitations. This is what $30 can get you!





return address is on the back flap


This is how it looks when you take it out of the envelope. I will probably turn them so they are all aligned the same way, but it's a bit of a tight fit. Those are directions to the ceremony on top. At the ceremony, we will have the directions to the reception on the program.


RSVP card



Voila! Inexpensive, elegant (in my opinion), invitations.

Hopefully I'll have some engagement pictures in the next day or so!