The Bachelor and The Bachelorette Venture to Miami and Chicago

If you are in Miami or Chicago this weekend – WATCH OUT!!! The Bachelor and The Bachelorette will be out and about this weekend, and neither will be handing out red roses! As of Thursday, there will be a smokin’ hot bachelor runnin’ loose in Miami and a fabulous bachelorette hoopin’ it up in Chicago! Who am I talking about?! Me and Tres of course! This weekend is the party of all parties before we tie the knot:
The Bachelor and The Bachelorette Party!!!

Our friends have been planning this little retreat for us for several months now, so the excitement has been built up until I can’t stand it anymore! I can’t believe the time has finally come! And it came at the most perfect time… because this gal needs a break! And I know the future hubby does too, and what better way to get one than a weekend out with our best girls and boys!
Here’s a random itinerary for each party:

Who: The Gals
City: Chicago, IL
Hotel: Marriott Magnificent Mile
Goal: To be tourists, drink a lot of wine and champagne, eat as many amazing meals as possible, pretend we live in the 80’s, and be even more fabulous than we already are!Haha – that is only the gist of what we have planned for this trip… I can’t wait to see what else comes of it!

Marriott Mag Mile - Chicago!
Here’s the breakdown: On the days we are there, the cameras will be out and the flat sandals will be on our feet as we take on Chi-Town as tourists! We plan on doing everything from Sears Tower to Navy Pier, drinking much wine and champagne in between! On Saturday, we have brunch reservations at this fabulous wine tasting restaurant called Bin 36. They have flights of wine galore and what looks to me like a really scrumptious menu. Matron of Honor, Ginger, picked this place out. My girls aren’t dense… they know, hand me a glass of red, white, or sparkly, and a smile will come across my face!
As far as night time… get ready to hear about night #1! On Friday night, we are having official MADONNA NIGHT! Yes, you heard me right… Madonna Night! There is an 80’s concert going on at Navy Pier, where a band called Sixteen Candles is playing, and SEVEN different Madonna videos are showing up – that would be me and my six friends! We are each dressing as a different Madonna video. I will be Vogue, complete with the cones, and my girls will be everything from Material Girl to Papa Don’t Preach and everything in between! We will be listening to Madonna songs as we get ready in the hotel suite and then we will be rockin’ to the 80’s at Navy Pier– this should be a huge riot!!! Night #2, Saturday, will be our glam night. We will be going to dinner at the infamous, fancy Joe’s Stone Crab, and then we will head to a top hotspot: Enclave for bottle service, dancing, and pure fun!

Our Suite!!!

One of the best parts about this trip will be where we are staying! We will not only be at the awesome Marriott Magnificent Mile, but thanks to my wonderful friend, Lori, working her magic, we will be in one of the best suites in the hotel: The Governor’s Suite! I have only seen the 360 degree images of this room, but I do believe we are going to be more than pleased!

Who: The Guys
City: Miami, FL
Hotel: Loews Miami Beach Hotel
Goal: Golf, pool, beach, awesome clubs, and just be guys? Heck, I don’t know what all they are going to do! :)

Loew's - Miami As far as I know, Tres and the boys have everything planned from a game of golf one morning to drinks by the pool and on the beach during the day. And at night, I’m sure they will do nice dinners and go club hopping. Whatever they do, it will be loads of fun because Tres will have his very best friends there. I think there are around 10 of them going, so it should be a really fun crew! Tres’ friends like to really go all out and “do it up,” so I can only imagine the fun they will have in that great city!

So… to wrap up my blog post for the week, I have to bring this up. I get theknot.com updates sent to my email and one of the most recent ones was titled something along the lines of “His Bachelor Party.” I, of course, opened it because it was so timely for what was going on in our wedding planning process. In the post, this gal had written something on the message boards along the line of “worrying” about her fiancé’s bachelor party. Some of the responses to her question were good ones, but others made me cringe – women wonder why some men don’t want to get married, or when they do, they despise their wives nagging them.

HAHAHA!!!! Sooooo funny! Here are my thoughts: NO it’s not ok to question him having a bachelor party, NO it’s not ok to ask a million questions and nag him about it, and NO it’s not ok to worry yourself sick over it. 1) If you are worried, you probably shouldn’t be getting married to him in the first place 2) No one likes a nag… its grounds for divorce so stop now while you’re ahead. And 3) Guys like to have fun too… especially with their guy friends, and if you’re not going to let him have it now, what are you going to do when you get married?! Ok… I am done with my judgment for the day. :) Maybe I deal with the easier because Tres city hops for work/with his friends all the time, as do I at times, and we have never had to question it. I mean, if I had a problem with this, as much as Tres travels, I would be in big trouble. Maybe it’s because that’s how it’s been since we started dating, but maybe too it’s because we respect each other and want each other to have a good time – with OR without each other. Lesson of the Day: Let your boyfriend/fiancé/husband do what he pleases, and have a smile on your face when he tells you he is doing so! I promise, you will get one back from him when you want to do the same thing! Moral of the story: HAPPY BACHELOR AND BACHELORETTE PARTY TO TRES AND ANDREA!!!!! And here’s to more fun than imaginable in two of the greatest cities in the country: MIAMI AND CHICAGO!!!!!

Bad Blogger

There’s no other title for this blog but what you see above. Things have been crazy lately… between wedding planning, family in town, and Tres and I traveling, I’ve hardly had time to stop in and drop a line. Ok, so where did I leave off? Engagement pictures! The latest update on that is WE GOT THEM ALL BACK, and I am beyond excited about all of them. We could not be more pleased, and choosing which ones to print is going to be the most difficult part! The good thing about Armosa is they are giving us a disc with all of them on there – how fabulous is that!? So we can print any ones we want any time we want! Yay!

If you liked the sneak peak from a few weeks ago and want to see ALL of them, visit the link below. I plan on blogging about my favorite ones in the next several weeks, but until then, here they all are:
http://www.pictage.com/client/event.do?event=873299&emailFlag=true

Since then, we have also been on a wedding planning roll. We have been knocking our wedding to-do list out Tyson style! Two weekends ago, we made a final trip to New Orleans – the last time to visit the city until the big week, and it couldn’t have went better. Here’s what we have gotten done:

- Florist – I have not met with the florist in person yet and probably won’t ever. But I am not a bit worried because her work is exquisite! Each of my girls will be carrying a single magnolia tied at the bottom with a long gold ribbon. My bouquet will be two dozen Sweetheart Roses –
fully opened, some ivory and some very light pink, with Gardenias scattered. Gardenias look like small magnolias to me, so it should work perfectly with my girl’s bouquets. Each parent and grandparent will wear a sweetheart rose corsage/boutonniere. And like I have mentioned before, the groom and groomsmen will wear cotton blossoms. Ah, aren’t we just as southern as they come? Below are examples of what I want my bouquet to look like… just think of a mixture of these two:

- Cake – The cake baker is booked! We took care of this on our trip to New Orleans. After two tastings and a sugar headache mixed in with nausea (if you like cake, you will be fed well at a cake tasting), we went with what we ultimately thought we would go with in the first place: Gambinos. Tres calls this cake place the “Cake Boss” of New Orleans. Anyone and everyone we knew from New Orleans did not skip a beat when we asked them where to get our cake. Gambinos is a local favorite! Clearly, the cake will taste amazing, but what will it look like? We are doing three tiers, separated from each other, with an ivory color on the cake, and a large sugar faint-pink Magnolia on each layer. The look will be a mixture of these cakes:

- Rehearsal Dinner Site – We officially booked this while in New Orleans! For months, we searched near and far for a cool, casual, New Orleans style place for the rehearsal dinner, and I’m telling you, being from out of town booking a destination wedding is very difficult! All I have to say is thank goodness for the internet and email. Finally, we narrowed our website and email choices down to two, and after tours of both, made the final decision! Our Rehearsal Dinner will be at Oceana! It is located right on the corner of Bourbon Street , and our private dining room will have balcony access, never ending cocktails, and the best part… FABULOUS food! Seriously, if you ever go to New Orleans, I suggest you dine here. The food is New Orleans style, and it melts in your mouth. We did a tasting here, and we were SOLD! The dining room is also beautiful with a custom built wooden bar and wine rack on the far wall, Cajun décor, and like I said before – balcony access – just what we wanted! Since the wedding is so formal, our goal for the rehearsal dinner was casual, fun, and CAJUN! I think we nailed it here!

Here's the place!

- Rings – This was fun and easy… well for the most part it was. Tres’ was easy… he picked a beautiful white gold design out that we both loved. It was fun seeing him put on that eternal love symbol :)! As for me, my bands had to be custom made because of the shape of my ring. So, I have officially been without my engagement ring for two weeks now. I sure do miss it, but the fact that I am getting to check “rings” off my to-do list makes it all worth it!

Miss it :(

- Dress fitting – Did it! I got pulled, squeezed, and pinned a few weeks ago, and am due for my first fitting this weekend. I will be out of town again for work though, so looks like there will be a delay on it. I have to say, I am seriously excited to see my dress because not only did they alter and hem it, but they made a little change to the top of it! I won’t say what because I’d hate to give anything away, but I am crossing my fingers that it looks fabulous!

- Makeup and Hair – I finally got the courage to send in a deposit and mark this off my list. This has been an on-going process for way longer than necessary. I just have a real problem trusting people with my hair and makeup… it makes me nervous! So finally after in depth-research, reviews, and getting my bridesmaids opinions 100 times over, I have chosen Get Polished for mine and my bridesmaid’s hair and makeup!

- LASIK - Is.....Scheduled! But after hearing I have large pupils, I am TERRIFIED, so this could change at any moment. Apparently, my pupils aren't large enough to be rejected from getting the surgery, but I have the potential to acquire starburts and halos after the surgery, which means at night, streetlights, road signs, and anything with light can possibly put off a huge, glaring light that makes it difficult to see. This apparently only last a short time, but if I'm really unlucky, it could last forever. I think they were just giving me the precautions, but it scared the living daylights out of me! Please, friends, if you or anyone you know has had LASIK done.... Talk me into it. I am scheduled to get it done in exactly 2 weeks and need to make a final decision! I watched the Nick and Jessica Newlyweds Episode today where she gets Lasik... OMG - that show used to kill me! Sometimes I think I may just go ahead and buy the DVD collection, I loved it so much! If you have never seen this episode, watch below. I promise... it's so worth the laughs!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVcXdOix988&feature=related

Well, I think that covers it all! A final trip to New Orleans down and many phone calls and emails to the other vendors, and I think we have it all under control. I have learned that planning a wedding is similar to running a business, only we are not making any money from this…. We are in fact losing money. Haha!

Engagement Pictures. AMAZING!

We all have the ability to tell a story – not all of us will have a best selling book or award winning magazine article published – but God gave us all the ability to have our voice heard, and we all have our own special way of doing it. Some tell a story better through word of mouth, others are better at physically demonstrating or acting out a story, and some even use sign language to tell their stories. Some of us tell a story best through writing while others draw, paint, and sketch their stories out. No matter what your special talent or skill is, it will always gear back to storytelling.

As for me, you don’t even have to know me personally to be able to tell what category I fall into; just look at my blog and it tells all. I am no doubt a “writing storyteller.” I express words best down on paper, and I love to share it with people. As a writer, I have never posted a "wordless" entry since I started writing this blog. Don’t get me wrong, I ADORE all of you guys’ "Wordless Wednesdays" and "Silent Saturdays" posts – after a long day of reading and writing it’s just what I need, and sometimes a gal just wants to look at beautiful pictures! But for me, I usually express myself in words.

My wedding photographers on the other hand… they fall into the “art storyteller” category. And can I just say the very gifted “art storyteller” category! I know it's difficult to believe, but thanks to the work of Armosa Studios, I may just be silent on this post. As you have seen in the past, I usually feel the need to tell a LONG story or write something that could be compared in length to a chapter in a book (what can I say, I love to write!), but today I am going to post in silence because these pictures speak for themselves. Thank you Tera and Wes from Armosa Studios who have such a knack and true talent for “art storytelling” and such a gift for bringing couples and their love for each other alive - all through photographs!

For more pictures from our shoot visit http://armosastudios.com/blog!

115 days to go… THE COUNTDOWN BEGINS!

I do my best to only post wedding planning to my blog. There are many weeks when I want to veer off to a different subject, but right now, I am using my blog as mine and Tres’ wedding page for guests, our wedding journal for friends and family to read, and a place to thoroughly capture our wedding planning journey together. Once we have leaped into marriage, the blog will take a different focus. It will center on our ever-growing relationship, our life together as a married couple, and my take on successful relationships and how we keep ours on the right track. I plan to look at this blog one day, 50 years from now, and reminisce all the planning, good times, and life lessons Tres and I have experienced together.

As for now, with 115 days until our wedding, it’s all about PLANNING! To be honest, we don’t have much left, but my thoughts have been scattered and I haven’t really gone through with what we have left. Here’s a little nit-picky list of what we are currently working on in “wedding planning world.”

· Wedding Invites – I know I have mentioned it once before, but I work very closely with one of the most fabulous graphic designers, and guess what… she also does wedding invites on the side! Since she always comes up with magnificent artwork for the articles I write on Varsity.com, I of course, put my wedding invitations in her hands, and what did she give me back? A MASTERPIECE! Our invites are beautiful, custom made, one-of-a-kind, and truly bring our theme to life. When thinking about the design for our invites, it was most important to me that when our guests received them in the mail, they would know exactly the wedding they were coming to, and thanks to Lindsey, they will! Now I just have to order the pocketfolds and get the designs printed. Since we are having a destination wedding, we are breaking the rule timeline on when to send them out. Ours will go out close to three months early.

· Makeup and Hair – Wow… has this been quite the task! You would think I was looking to audition to be the next covergirl of MAC or Hairstyles magazine with the work I have put into trying to find the best makeup and hair artists in New Orleans. Having an out of town wedding immediately puts brides at a disadvantage though. Why? Because we go into everything blind. We don’t live in the city we’re getting married in, so we don’t know “the best” of anything. We just have to read reviews, ask around, and go with our gut. Now, I have had bad makeup and hair done, and I’ve had good makeup and hair done. The last thing I want is for my wedding day experience to fall under the “bad” category, so this is really important to me… like REALLY important! As of now, I have narrowed it down to two: Get Polished and Flawless Bride! Feel free to give your opinion on which you think is better!

· Rings – The sweet fiancé is taking care of this one. He has contacted our jeweler for an appointment, and we should be set for next week. This should be one of those easy tasks – one that will have me crossing it off the To Do List with glee shooting through my ears!!!


· Eye Doctor – Why in the world is “eye doctor” on the to-do list? Well, friends, I plan to get LASIK eye surgery before the wedding. I have never worn contacts in my life, and I am so tired of putting on my beat-down, scratched-up glasses when I need to drive or watch TV that I could scream! My vision has, in my opinion, never been bad enough for contacts (not to mention I refuse to touch my eyeballs to put them in), but it’s bad enough to where the leaves on the trees are not distinct, when I go to a sporting event the athletes look like little blurs when they run by, and driving at night is like being a border-line possum. To make a long story short, if I want to see my groom when I’m walking down the aisle, I need to get LASIK!

· A “Last Visit” to NOLA – To finalize everything, Tres and I are going on our last New Orleans trip before the big day next weekend. We have yet to pick out our cake, so one of the days will be reserved for tasting and booking our cake baker. While the flower order has been put in and extensive phone and email convos have been had with the florist, we have not met or spoke in person, so that will also be a priority. We will also visit the hotel that everyone will be staying in (Tres has stayed there, but I have never seen it). We also need to book transportation – we are doing limos – for our wedding party, so that may come into play as well. And finally... our last meeting with our wonderful venue, Southern Oaks Plantation!

· Fix these Feet – Many of you may not know, but I had foot surgery in November to remove bunions on both feet. Being a dedicated lover to high heels, it was one of the most miserable experiences of my life, as I couldn’t wear my beloved heels for 4 months. Well, I am currently back in heels, but I am still not healed up enough to be in THE HEELS! Tres bought me the most beautiful Christian Louboutin’s I have ever seen in my life for my “wedding day shoes” (READ THE FULL STORY HERE)! Well, the shoes are close to 5 inches high (yes, you heard me right… FIVE inches), and even after seven months, my feet still hurt terribly to put them on. Literally, I can’t even take a step in these shoes it hurts so horribly, so I went back to my foot doctor this week. My foot doctor who, might I add, refers to me as “the heel girl.” Before I ever agreed to surgery, I made him promise me I would be in heels no less than 4 months after I got it done. I also emphasized my love for shoes so much that he thinks I am some sort of heel freak, and always cuts some joke about how unnecessarily high my shoes are. Well, when I went back to him this week, I told him I he had four months to get me in the most fabulous pair of shoes I have ever laid eyes on, so he shot me up with a cord ozone shot and promised me that I would be catwalking on those beautiful blue, red-bottomed stilts with no problem come October 17! All I have to say is, start praying now because whether I am limping down the aisle, crying in pain down the aisle, or having my father carry me down the aisle because I can’t put one foot in front of the other – nothing will keep me from wearing those shoes on wedding day!

Ok, so most of this weeding “to-do” is all stuff I have to do. Tres has his own list and is successfully on top of it! He’s such a wonderful groom! The countdown is on… can’t wait until October 17!!!

* Photos: Cards and Pockets, Modern Cosmetics, weddingrings.net, torontolasiksurgery.com, virtualtourist.com

Couples Shower – New Orleans Style

With only four months left until we make things official, this weekend was time for our very first shower! Tres and I traveled to his hometown and where a lot of Tres’ family and our close friends live, Knoxville, TN. Our wonderful friends threw us the most amazing wedding shower I have ever been to. Set at Getteysview Country Club, the vibe was classy and fun, the food was melt in your mouth amazing, the drinks were free flowing, and the company was more than we could ever ask for!

We had friends travel from Memphis and Atlanta to be there, and my family came all the way from Mississippi while Tres’ mom came all the way from Florida! One thing about being engaged and having people celebrate you is realizing how many people really love you and would do anything in the world for you. It’s easy to forget and to take it for granted, but once you see every person who loves you in the same room together, it becomes so clear, and it makes you never want to take it for granted ever again.

While we had approximately 50 of the people who love us most there, I couldn’t help but imagine how many more would be there at our wedding and how loved we will feel on that day four months from now. Loved… excited… and overwhelmed. Can I just say that feeling a lot of love is sometimes very stressful! I got a little dose of what wedding day would be like at this shower: the stress of getting hair and makeup done – pretty and on time, running around talking to everyone in the room at the party, hoping everyone is having a good time and is well-entertained, NOT EATING, and the most heartbreaking part of all… how it all goes by so quickly. This shower was 3 hours – same as our wedding reception will be – and it FLEW by. It felt like a mere hour from the time we walked in the shower until my parents were packing up our gifts and heading out the door.

I have to say, this was the perfect practice for what the wedding is going to be like and I learned five things:
1) I need to calm down... and do it on my own – not by downing two glasses of wine in under 30 minutes.
2) If people want to talk to me, they will come talk to me. I don’t have to run up to every person in the room I make eye contact with. They have friends there and don’t need me to entertain them.
3) EAT! Everyone knows food is always my #1 priority, well when you are too busy talking and running around, it’s true – you don’t eat. I cannot let this happen at the wedding!
4) Stop for a minute alone, look at everyone in the room, enjoy the setting, and take it all in – realize how blessed I am to be getting married to someone so wonderful and to be celebrating with so many wonderful people.
5) Have Tres beside me all night. With two people trying to talk to so many people, it’s easy to split up – Tres and I didn’t see each other for the first half of the shower. We can’t do this at the wedding!

With a few lessons learned, a mountain of wonderful gifts to take home, and speeches and toasts that will remain in my mind for a lifetime, I feel so blessed to have the family and friends we had at our shower Saturday night. It means the world to me that my parents and grandparents would make the trip to meet everyone and experience the shower with me. It was a true blessing to have Tres mom come from so far away and enjoy it with us. It was so wonderful to have Tres’ Knoxville family there are well. And as for Tres’ friends… he is so blessed with the group of friends he has – it’s truly a unique and uncommon group – there are so many of them, and they all love him so much. I have never seen anything like it with a group of guys – they are truly his second family, and I am so grateful to say that they are now mine!

Thanks to Lori and Elise for all the décor – it was straight from “The Big Easy” and perfect! Thanks to the guys involved in throwing the shower: Trevor, JG, Mike, Cole, Boog. And thank you to Tres’ mom, Carol, and Tres’ sister, Renee for completing the New Orleans theme by getting authentic cakes and desserts delivered straight from New Orleans all the way to Knoxville. You guys are ALL THE BEST! We loved everything!

FAMILY
Grandmother, Me, Momma
Family and Soon-to-be Family
FRIENDS
The girls After hours... Martini Bar
Me and the HOSTesses with the MOSTesses! The Guys
Hip, Hip, Horray! Hip Hip Horray... FOR TRES!
CHAMPAGNE TOASTS
Mike's speech Us laughing at one of our friend's toasts! GIFTS
Can you tell how much we love wine?
Adore our china!

Engagements - Armosa Studios is THE BEST!

This may be the shortest blog post I have ever written because to be quite frank, I am SPEACHLESS! As you know, Tres and I had our engagement photos taken this weekend. I knew going into it, we had found a gem when we found Armosa Studios. I knew this because I wanted the best photography we could possibly get for our wedding. I knew this because I searched near and far for the best photography out there. I knew this because when I first saw their work, I almost fell out of my chair. I knew this because photography was my #1 priority above everything else in this wedding, and I was so willing to get the best photographers, I didn’t care where we found them. Well, we found them in Florence, Alabama, and while I knew we had found a gem, I had no idea we had found a treasure!

Tera and her husband, Wes, came all the way from Florence to Memphis for our engagement pictures. And if that wasn’t enough, they listened to all the crazy, over-the-top ideas I had for the pictures and not to mention, let Tres and I drag them all over the city of Memphis to take the photos! They are not only amazing photographers but also a good, wholesome couple who are just so much fun to be around! I could go on forever on how great they made “engagement picture day” for Tres and me, but instead of writing another 10 paragraph blog post, I will leave you with this picture - proof of how talented they really are. They gave us a little “sneak peak” this week on Facebook, and thank goodness they did because I could not wait another second to see at least ONE of the pictures!

When I first saw this picture, I was completely blown away and if it wasn’t already confirmed that I felt we had picked the best photogs, it most definitely was after I saw this picture. And I just have to throw this in there but… this photo was snapped during the shoot with Wes’ iPhone… HIS IPHONE! Can you even imagine what the pictures from the real camera are going to look like?! Wow… I cannot express enough how pleased we are with them – already – before even seeing them all! We should have the others to post in a few weeks when they are done editing them. Until then… here’s our sneak peak!
To see more of their work click here!