10-day Forecast: Plenty of Sunshine

"Plenty of sunshine" headed my way ;)

So I know I'm not alone when I say this, but hitting the 10-day mark IS A BIG DEAL. It means that Mr. Groom sent me first thing this morning the accuweather forecast for #October27 (yes, we have a hashtag, please use it if you tweet from the wedding).

There happen to be nearly a million reasons I love October, and the weather is just one of them. I'm not trying to jinx anything, but the weather is just perfect this month. Here in South Mississippi, our Halloween weather ranges from needing a long-sleeve t-shirt to being able to wear shorts, so I know that no matter what, it. will. be. perfect.

Things are coming together quite well. All of my last minute etsy and online orders have been shipped and are on their way to my eager hands.

In case my wedding wasn't enough of a big deal in my life, I've also been planning (at work) the christening of our biggest ship yet at the shipyard. It's a pretty big deal and I'm living off of protein and coffee these days. Check it out here, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter and Tumblr for Navy/shipbuilding/patriotic related posts. You MIGHT know the girl who writes some of that stuff. ;)

Anyway - I have to keep posts short right now since I have eleventy billion things to do right now - currently taking a break from choosing my bridal portrait, sending my MOH the pics for rehearsal dinner slideshow, and writing thank you notes - BUT I do plan on updating a few more times before the wedding.

Did I mention I'm madly in love with the groom and seriously cried last night while we were at the church and the organist played the Bridal Chorus? Yep. It happened. 

Love to you all. XOXO.

Dance Dance Dance

Okay friends, I'm pretty sure I've already asked you this, in fact, I know I have... Way back then, yes, I did. But that was a long time ago and not very many of you gave me your input so I'm putting it out there again:

What music choices do you think are MUST plays or DON'T YOU DARE plays?

Comment on this blog post and tell me what you would like to hear for both slow dances and fun fast dances. I really want to know what it'll take to get you, yeah you, the one reading this blog, to get up and dance with me. Because that's all I really want! :)

Annnnnd GO!

Power of Social Media: Praise for David's Bridal

If it's not obvious to you by now, then let me just say it: I am all over social media. I Tweet, I pin, I'm a tumblr, I Facebook, I'm LinkedIn, I try to Google +, I love YouTube and you know I love my Blogger. I track my every move on Foursquare and I photograph every move I make on Instagram. Oh and did I mention I do most of those for work, too? Sheesh. I started playing with social media back in the days of Xanga, LiveJournal and MySpace, oh and I was all over AIMing back in the days of dial-up internet.

So it should come as no surprise that turning to social media to solve (some of) life's problems is kind of second nature to me. Anyone remember this post, you know, the one where I said a few unfavorable things about David's Bridal. I had a terrible experience with their Hattiesburg store and didn't hold back telling you, my faithful followers, all the gory details. I had better experiences at the Mobile store; hence, that's why I got my bridesmaids' dresses from that location.

Okay, that was way back months ago. Fast forward to 6 weeks out from the wedding and my bff/bridesmaid Jean, who's just announced her pregnancy, comes to the revelation that her bridesmaid dress may not fit on October 27. No judging, y'all, she's got lots of changes happening to her body while she plays host to another human life. Anticipating drama at David's Bridal, I sent one little tweet to @DavidsBridal... I could have never imagined the response I received. Feast your eyes, my friends:

 

Needless to say, I was amazed at the quick response of their Corporate Social Media person. I understand that it's impossible to get to every tweet to a large corporation's Twitter account, so I was pretty excited that I got some attention from them. Not to mention the fact that Jean was treated like a  VIP when she arrived, they rolled out the red carpet, gave her a fake belly bump to try on and everything. True CUSTOMER satisfaction.

So I'm here to say this: I owe David's Bridal a big grown-up-I-mean-it-for-real apology. As far as I'm concerned, they've righted the wrong I experienced at the Hattiesburg store. They helped one of my bridesmaids glide with ease through an experience that could have been stressful, keeping her happy and thus, keeping me happy because I'm not worried about if she's going to be comfortable in her dress.They truly used social media to represent their company's value of customer service and considering I'm a social media practitioner myself, I'd call that a success any day of the week.

So for the naysayers who see Social Media as nothing more than a waste of time - (which I doubt any of them are reading this blog, otherwise they'd be hypocrites, right? WHAT ARE YOU DOING READING MY BLOG?) - one little half-joking tweet sent by me on my lunch break saved my pal Jean and I both a bunch of headaches. So there. :P

Have any of you had pleasant experiences with a company as a result of reaching out to them via social media?

Licensed... To Kill ;)

Votin' and marryin'. God Bless America.

One very sweet Mr. Groom and I paid a visit to the Jackson County Circuit Clerk's office today to sign away our lives as we know it and become legally able to marry each other. :)

We'd intended to do this on the 1 month mark, yesterday, but well, you know how that goes...

The office was bustling with youngsters registering to vote, other happily engaged couples applying for marriage licenses and the booming voice of the Circuit Clerk himself, Mr. Joe Martin. Good Lord, that man has a loud voice. We could barely hear our clerk over his loud ass voice telling someone all the business that was going on in the office during lunch today. That's when I realized, he was talking to a Mississippi Public Broadcasting reporter. It's a shame Mr. Groom was in a hurry to make it back to work in our scheduled lunch break time, otherwise I was trying to make us stars by getting interviewed by MPB. Well, until I realized she was doing a story on voter registration.

Other than the fact that we first went to the wrong office (ironically enough, the office where you file for divorce), I think our marriage license application process went super smooth. We're definitely thankful that the blood test requirement was lifted beginning July 1 as a result of last year's amendment.

One note, I think I made the joke about being glad to now be, "Licensed to kill," a few too many times...

Did any of you have any funny stories from your experience applying for your marriage license? Please share, if so!

Enjoy the pics, y'all!

Little Kev signing his life away! To me! :)

Success! Licensed and ready!

Almost official, all we need now is the priest's signature on October 27!

Well, at least one of us is excited!
I think he's really bothered by my, "License to Kill," jokes. :)

What a ONEderful World

Where has the time gone?! I can't believe we're only 30 days from THE big day. So much has happened since this wonderful journey of engagement and wedding/marriage planning began 7 months ago. I've moved, Mr. Groom has moved, he's changed jobs, and we're adjusting to life actually having each other in it every day.

As previously indicated, we're so busy our heads are spinning and as I type this I'm meddling through things in my head and trying to decide on what shoes I'll wear for my friend Meg's wedding NEXT WEEKEND.

One month out and yes, most of the big items are taken care of... I'm still going crazy with details though, since I'm a top notch procrastinator and have yet to complete tasks that could have been done months ago.

I'm pretty pleased with how RSVPs are rolling in and I really hope I don't have to call and harass those people who I know are coming but find it impossible to stick a prepaid envelope in their mailbox. Don't make me throw my Emily Post book at you, really... Don't.

I plan/hope/really want to post some more in depth posts as the countdown continues. Don't worry though - once the wedding itself happens and I'm settling into wifedom, I definitely plan to post LOTS of recaps, especially on a few secret projects I have for the wedding. :)

Picture of us, the almost-weds, last week

Blogger Dodger

So as it turns out, I’m probably the worst blogger in the world. Either that or I’m still mastering my ever-on-the-resume-as-a-weakness time management skills. Now that I’m burning the candle at both ends with wedding planning, parties, showers, and work events, I’ve little time left to actually sit down and reflect on it and how exciting all of it is. And so it happens, that I have even less time to sit down and blog about these events. So in a few following posts I’ll try and catch y’all up. Try.

Here's an overview, but I PROMISE to devote an entire post to each shower individually.

In the past few weeks I’ve had so much excitement! The last weekend of August (8/26), I was given a shower by my aunts on my mom’s side of the family, Aunt Debbie and Aunt Sharon. The week following that we had an unexpected WEEK off of work due to Hurricane Isaac. 

That first weekend of September (9/1-3, following Isaac) Mr. Groom and I went to St. Louis for Labor Day weekend. We attended his pledge brother’s wedding. The bride, Ashley, is a crafting queen, and her wedding looked like my favorite blogs, magazines, and Pinterest all got together and had a big, beautiful baby. She and I have a lot of the same styles and ideas, so I loved it. There was another engaged-and-soon-to-be-married lady sitting at our table and we gushed over how inadequate we were feeling while checking out all of Ashley’s well thought out details and pined over how we wished we had the time to put it all together!

Sunday afternoon, I was given a shower by my ALMOST mother and sister-in-law, Shelley and Nicolette Kowalewski. It was especially sweet for me to meet a lot of the women for the first time that day, as they were bringing us nice gifts without ever having met me!

The next weekend (9/8-9) Mr. Groom headed out of town for another friend's wedding in Kansas City, MO. I had planned to go, but since my invitations were shipped late (and messed up with Isaac), I I had to sit that one out and spent all weekend hand-addressing each invitation. I did recruit some help for the stuffing, stamping and sealing stages of assembly. I may or may not have bribed my helpers with pizza and buffalo chicken dip. :)

The next weekend (9/15-16), I was given my third and final shower, by my Aunt Suzy and cousin/bridesmaid Amy Gibson and very special friend of the family, Mrs. Anne Blair. The bridal shower brunch was attended by almost all of my bridesmaids and it flowed right on into my BACHELORETTE PARTY! My Matron of Honor, Laura did an awesome job coordinating it and I never had any stress about it at all! We had an awesome time on Bourbon Street and I'll leave it at that. ;)

The following week (feeling all bloaty and regretting the weekend's diet splurges)on Wednesday (9/19) I took my bridal portraits with the super amazing Lisa Tilley-Newman. The worst part of that experience is waiting to see them! The very next day I helped my family pull off a surprise party for my Grandpa's 80th birthday!

The weekend following those two exciting events (9/22-23), I traveled down to Fort Walton Beach for my bridesmaid/friend/fellow bride Meg's bachelorette party. I'm in her wedding just 11 days and she'll be in mine 3 weeks later. 

I don't need to attach a screen shot of my calendar to tell you I've been absolutely bonkers. The hardest part for me is actually letting myself ENJOY these things I'm going through, and not just merely looking at the tasks and events as check-offs on my task-list.

Dinner Blogger Fail

So I've got some lovely drafts of posts I'd started for our first week on Emeals. Posts that you may have noticed never made it past Day 2... It went great, but I'm remembering why I decided to devote the blog to just wedding stuff until after the big day: it sucks up all of my time! Mr. Groom and I are having an awesome time "playing house" as I go over to our little "Love Shack" every afternoon, we cook dinner together, eat, then I leave to come home and do wedding work and he's left to clean up the dinner mess. :) I could get used to this!

This did not happen to me, but thought the pic was funny.

Now here I am having to do something I rarely do and that's confess my failure and defeat by not even completing one week of showing my devoted followers what we cooked each night! I know, I can hear the sobs you're bellowing from here. ;)

I'll fully recommend Emeals as it's working out great for us and a couple friends who joined at the same time as us, but I won't be blogging about it until after #October27.