I had a ton of fabric leftover from my turkey place mats and was really in the mood to use my sewing machine some more, so I decided to make Thanksgiving postcards for some friends. Well it went from making 1 to mass producing 8 of them… but I think everyone really enjoyed them… who doesn’t love getting mail?!
It had been a while since I’d used my sewing machine…. it was actually covered with dust… and I saw this really cute tutorial for Thanksgiving Placemats so I decided to give it a try. Unfortunately my printer was not working so I couldn’t trace the pattern, SO… I winged it. Luckily turkeys are made up of pretty easy shapes to draw and cut. Here is what I came up with. He’s kind of cute.
After getting all of my wedding pictures back and falling even more in love with aqua, I decided to paint the guestroom that color too. It’s just such a bright and cheery color and I can’t get enough of it. I found this cute quilted bedding for super cheap at Home Goods, so the next project was to bring out some of the other colors from the quilt to even out the blue a bit.
First I got this lamp from Salvation Army for $4.00. Loved the shape.. it just needed a little lime green spray paint love.
Still need some pictures for those small frames 
Next I took some old canvases that have been sitting in the garage for a good 5 years. These little gems were from “art night” that I used to participate in with a group of friends. Spray painted over them and added some vinyl.
It’s not much but it definitely livened up the room. No more boring white walls. Still looking for an old door to make a headboard for the bed and something cute to put on the wall above the bed. Maybe some cute white shelves??
just your favorite Kindergarten teachers… dressed up in ridiculous Halloween costumes.
I finally made my first Halloween time trip to Disneyland with Ben, and our friends Dan and Kera. The park was incredible with all of its fall colors, Halloween decorations, and the characters dressed in Halloween attire. We had a really great time and I can’t wait to go back again soon.
Doesn’t that look so relaxing!! The honeymoon was great…. we spent most of our time just relaxing by the pool and beach, soaking up the sun and playing some Scrabble (nerd alert, I know!) When we did get our lazy butts in gear, we also enjoyed some fun day activities like snorkeling many of the beaches of Maui, couples massages at the Hyatt Resort, and some window shopping down by the pier.
One of the days while we were down walking by the pier I saw a sign for a Deep Sea Fishing Excursion. Somewhat joking, I insisted that we go look at the booth and see what it was all about. When we got to the booth, the boat was just pulling back in for the day from one of the excursions, and were unloading HUGE fish….the biggest fishies I have EVER seen. I was amazed… and I wanted one… BADLY! It took some convincing to get Ben onboard, but of course he was into it, and we signed up to go the next morning. In order to be at the right place at the right time, our trip had to begin at 3:00am. Six of us boarded the boat at 2:45, when it was still pitch black outside, and everyone was a little groggy… like we might still be sleeping, and this might be a dream nightmare. As we pulled out of our slip and 100 yards away, just past the breaking wall of the marina, our boat starts to tip to one side. The captain begins to yell at his deckhand to check some things down below, and as he pulls up the basement compartment of the boat, water floods onto the deck. What the heck?! Yes… the entire bottom portion of our boat was flooded and the water was rising QUICKLY. Within minutes, the water was already up to our ankles and the Captain is yelling at us “RUN TO THE RIGHT! RUN TO THE LEFT!” to even out the water so we don’t tip over. The water is now up to our calfs and the Captain is booking it back to the slip as fast as he can. When we finally get close enough to get off the boat… me and the one other lady on the boat get off, and all the men grab 5 gallon buckets and begin to bail the water, as it continues to rise, now up to their waists. They bail for 45 minutes straight and it doesn’t seem to be making a difference at all. Finally the water gets high enough that it is spilling over the edges of the boat… the cooler has popped open and our drinks and sandwiches have floated off to sea. The live bait cooler pops open and our bait swims off… lucky fish!! The Captain finally gives up and orders everyone to get off of the ship… and it sinks! To the bottom! Of the Marina!
Seriously. The creepiest part is… the day before when they brought in all those huge fish they gutted them and cleaned them out right there on the boat and then tossed everything right into the water, and there were 5 big sharks circling the boat right there in the Marina. So, if heaven forbid we would have gone another 100 yards when we discovered the water coming onto the boat… we wouldn’t have made it back to the dock and we would have been bobbing there in the water, in the complete darkness of the early morning, with live bait and fish guts surrounding us… and sharks. In the end we decided that this was a freak accident and there was NO WAY we could sink 2 boats in a weekend, so we decided to go back out and give it another try the next day. We had so much fun and Ben caught a nice big Tuna.
Tonight we were invited to the Tim McGraw concert by the Arizona Gold Star Family Group. One of the ladies in the group is friends with Tim McGraw and asked him to put aside 50 tickets for the gold star families of Arizona, which he did- and one step further, invited us to attend his pre-show party. He puts on a really great show… and let’s be honest… he’s a pretty good lookin’ cowboy.
oh yeah… and I finished the night with a ride on the electronic bull. HA!
Tim McGraw: If You’re Reading This
[If you're reading this
My momma is sitting there
Looks like I only got a one way ticket over here
I sure wish I could give you one more kiss
War was just a game we played when we were kids
Well I'm laying down my gun
I'm hanging up my boots
I'm up here with God
And we're both watching over you
So lay me down
In that open field out on the edge of town
And know my soul
Is where my momma always prayed where it would go.
If you're reading this, I'm already home. ]
So after months and months of preparation it finally came… and went by so fast! The day was perfect and everyone seemed to appreciate all my hard work put into the wedding.
These were just large mason jars that I had picked up for a quarter a piece at the thrift store. I hot glued blue ribbon around the rim and a loop of blue ribbon to hang one from every aisle chair for the ceremony. The night before the wedding I stopped and picked up a bunch of wild flowers to put a few in each of the jars. 
This was my favorite idea, and although it was a little pricey, I’m so glad that I was able to do it for the wedding. I ordered custom orange cream Jones Soda bottles from their website with a picture of me and Ben and a little thank you note about coming to the wedding. The orange and blue card that is tied around the top of the bottle with twine is a place card with the guests name and table number… there is one bottle per family so some bottles may have 2 or 3 place cards. I was really hoping to get these chilled before the wedding… I thought it would be so nice for our guests to enjoy a refreshing drink while waiting for us to get our pictures taken… but I guess they were just too cool to drink because almost every guest wanted to save it.
Here is what it looked like under the tent… I love love love the aqua linens with the white chair. The tent was also covered in twinkle lights so it looked really pretty when the sun went down. 
For centerpieces, I picked up these little jewelry stands at Marshalls for only $3.00 a piece. I spray painted them all white and then made the table number at the top with my Cricut. Each table has pictures of me and Ben at that age scrapbooked right onto the stand. So here is table 5, with pictures of us at 5 years old. It was a great way to get people up and moving around so that they could see the pictures at every table. The jars were for the candy buffet, and the little notecard is instructions for the jars, telling them to visit the candy buffet on their way out and one jar per family (worded a little nicer of course)
Here is the candy buffet… it was gorgeous! I had 6 different big apacathary jars filled with blue candies, and they each had little heart scoops in the top. I wish I had a picture from the front because it looked so stinking cute…. but you get the idea. 
The cake was simple and elegant… and it tasted amazing. We actually ended up with the entire bottom tier to take home that night, as well as the top for our 1 year.
My beautiful bridesmaids: Ashley, Veronica, Brittany, and Monica. We made our own bouquets the night before the wedding. We went to 4 different Safeway stores and bought out all of their orange tulips and a few randoms for my bouquet then sat down and arranged them. I actually can’t take too much credit for this… turns out that floral arranging is not really my department. 
These were the gifts for my bridesmaids. They are locket necklaces that have a charm inside with their initial and their husbands initial. We tied them around the bouquets for the ceremony, then at the reception the girls wore them. 
And here we are! Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Still sane and still in love after all the crazy wedding planning.
… and we lived happily ever after
So this is it… my last girls night out as a ‘single lady’. We got all dolled up and headed out for a night on the town
