D-O-N-E!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am very, very, very, very, very, very excited and pleased to tell you guys that, we are DONE with our to-do list for the wedding. Finished! Completed! I can't think of any other synonyms for the word done, but we are done!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think this calls for a celebration. I am dancing here at home because of how excited I am. Trust me, you don't want to see it, haha!

Now, if I could just get over this stupid cold that I have had for the last week, everything would be fantastic. Any suggestions for a cold remedy?

Also, I am still looking for some people to do guest posts. If you are at all interested, email me with the contact info on the left hand side of the page.

Thanks everyone for all of your kind words, ideas, support, and encouragement throughout these past months of wedding planning. I have loved all of it and you guys have helped keep me sane at times. I am so excited that this special day is almost here. I can't wait to be able to share all of the details with you guys. Aghhhh! I'm so excited. Thanks again everyone!

Exactly One Week From Today

Exactly one week from today, I will be getting up around 7 am so that I can be ready to start my hair and make up at 8 am.

Exactly one week from today, I will be watching my family and bridesmaids getting themselves ready for our wedding.

Exactly one week from today, I will be heading to the church.

Exactly one week from today, I will be stepping into my dress and getting ready to take pictures with all of my girls.

Exactly one week from today, I will be walking down the aisle toward my Groom.

Exactly one week from today, I will be saying "I Do"

Exactly one week from today, we will be partying it up with our guests.

Exactly one week from today, I will officially be a Wife.

It is weird typing the word "Wife". It is still really hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that we only have a week until the wedding. One week. Seven days. It is just crazy!!!!

With just a week to go, I thought I would give an update on how our list of to-do's is doing.

Ceremony Programs(Waiting on our Ceremony Music and then we will get started on these)

Wishing Tree Sign(Just need to print it on the paper and put it in a frame)

Final touches on Favor Boxes

Affixing signs to candy jars

Buy all the candy(We only need to find two more types)

Table #'s (These are designed, we just need to pick pictures out for them and print them)

Get a hold of the last 6 or 7 that haven't RSVP'd

Seating chart

Place cards(Aran's Mom has the list and will be working on these this week)

Ceremony music(Just waiting on our musicians to finalize this)

Make my garter(I tried making it, but I don't really like it, so this may go out the window)

Finish Gift for Flower Girls(Almost done with this, but I need an iron. Who doesn't have an iron? Oh yeah, us,haha!)

Buy gift for Ring Bearer

Buy Groomsmen Gifts(Going today to do this)

Get my Brother and Step Dad to get fitted(I may have to drag them there, but it will be done this week)

Final Count to Caterers(Emailing them on Monday with the final count)

Final Count to Florist for Corsages, Bouquets, Boutonniere's, and Table Arrangements

Get our Marriage License(We are doing this at the end of this week)

Get all of our final paperwork to the church by this weekend

Take my rings in to get put together and cleaned

Final meeting with DJ's(This was supposed to happen last week, but we have had to reschedule twice, oops!)

Need to get ribbon to our cake person

Cut down the sleeves on the flower girl dresses(they are way too long, good thing they are made of tulle)

Pick up dress the week of the wedding

Pick up Veronica from the Airport(Can't do this til Thursday! Hurry up Thursday!)

And lastly, find some time to relax and breathe(I went and had a massage today, more on that later!)

Our list is definitely getting shorter. I am hoping to have most of this done by the end of this weekend, especially with us having Monday off. 

What was your to-do list looking like with a week to go?

A Year Ago Today...

A year ago today was without a doubt one of the hardest days of my life so far. A year ago today, my Dad, my cousin and I were racing to Kansas in a blizzard to go see my Grandmother one last time. Unfortunately on our way there, we got a phone call from my Uncle saying that Grandma was gone.

My Grandma when she was younger.
I love her dress in this picture.

I can remember everything about those few minutes. I remember looking down at the screen on my phone and seeing that it was my Uncle calling and I just knew. I didn't even want to answer the phone. I remember answering and hearing the tears in his voice when he told me she was gone. I was standing in a gas station at this point and I turned to my cousin and I told him that she was gone. I then went outside and I didn't even have a chance to tell my Dad what had happened because he could see it all over my face. He looked at me and said, "She's gone isn't she?" I didn't even have to answer, he already knew.

Even though we didn't make it to see her one last time before she left us to go to Heaven, we still raced out there so that we could say our goodbyes. A drive that should have taken us six hours at the most ended up taking us almost 12 because of the weather. I was really surprised with how well I was handling everything that was going on. But now looking back on it, I think it was because I didn't think it was real. The next day, it definitely became more real.

My Grandma is the one in the middle with the crown.
She was an amazing bowler.

The morning after we got there, we headed over to go say our goodbyes. I had been on the phone with my Mom a few times that morning and kept telling her that I wasn't sure if I wanted to see Grandma like that. I wanted to remember her in the way that I knew her, always happy and full of life. I finally decided to go in and see her and I am glad that I did. I was able to say my goodbye's and I think that if I hadn't it would have been an even harder process for me.

I believe this is the day that her and my Grandpa Dave
got married. She is the one in white.

Later that day we were back at my Aunt's house when the Pastor that was going to be conducting my Grandma's services came over. She wanted to hear more about my Grandma so that she could be prepared for the service. I think we sat around sharing our stories and our favorite memories about Grandma for two or three hours. And the nice thing about it was that this whole time, none of us were even crying. We were all laughing so hard that we couldn't even think about crying. I know that this is how Grandma would have wanted it to be though. She wouldn't have wanted us sitting around and moping. She would have wanted us to remember all the good times and the fun that we shared with her. And that is exactly what we did.

Me and Grandma the day I
graduated from College and sadly
the last time I ever saw her

My Grandma was so many things. She was a Mom, a Wife, a Sister, a Daughter, an Aunt, a Grandma(of course), an avid Bingo player and many more things. She was always our biggest cheerleader in the stands for whatever sporting activity we were playing. She was always there to talk whenever you needed her. She would do anything for you, even if you didn't ask her to. I could go on and on about all of the amazing things that she would do, but this post would be ridiculously long. She was an amazing women to say the least.

Grandma holding my niece Kelsi for the first time.
And yes, she has a black eye because she was a bad ass, haha!

It is always hard losing someone that you love, especially around the Holidays, but for me this is an even harder loss. With my wedding being only a week away, it is really hard for me to not get upset when I think about how she won't be there to see me get ready and to walk down the aisle. She was supposed to be there. She was so excited for me when I called and told her that I was engaged, and it never occurred to me that she wouldn't be here for this special day.

I know she will be watching over us from Heaven with my Grandpa and my other Grandma by her side. Even knowing that it is still hard knowing she won't be there. Grandma, if you are listening up there in Heaven, know that not a day goes by that we don't think about you and miss you. We miss you and love you so much and we hope that you are proud of us and what we are doing. I love you and miss you more than words could ever express, but I take comfort knowing that you are in a better place and that we now have another angel watching over us.

She is in the black dress. She was so beautiful.

This is probably one of the hardest posts I have ever done. I am not going to lie, I had to step away from it at least twice because I would just start crying when I would start thinking about everything. But at the same time it feels good to be able to share with people how much I love and miss her. RIP Grandma, you will be forever loved and missed.

The Great Ring Debacle of 2011

!WARNING! This post is a little long, sorry! But I just have so much to say about this topic!

With a little under two weeks to go until the wedding, the Fiance' and I decided it was time to take my rings in to be sautered together. When we bought our bands in October, we decided not to have my band sized yet because it just seemed easier to have it sized when it was sent off to be put together with my engagement ring. We did however have Aran's ordered in the right size.

So the afternoon before we headed over to Helzberg, I told Aran that I wanted him to try his ring back on and make sure that it still fit. For most guys this wouldn't have been an issue, except that my Fiance', Aran, decided that he was going to go on this thing called the Abs Diet before our wedding and has since lost almost 20 lbs. 20 lbs!! I didn't even think that he had 20 lbs to lose. He is already really tall and a skinny minny, but apparently there was 20 lbs in there to lose. And shouldn't it be me worrying about losing weight before our wedding? You would think, but definitely not the case. I figured that I ordered the dress in the size that I was at the time and losing weight would just cost more money when alterations came around, so I didn't even bother.

Anywho, when we went to Helzberg, the guy that was helping us informed us that the ring that we had originally picked out for Aran couldn't be sized because of the type of design that was in it. So the only option was to order a new one in his size. The only problem with this option was that we weren't guaranteed to have the ring back in time for the wedding. Apparently you have to send the old one back to get the new one. I was about to lose it at this point. The guy helping us then told us that what we should do is keep the ring we have and place a ring guard on it and then after the wedding come back in and order Aran a new one in the right size.

Aran's Wedding Band that we picked
out in October
Source

Well, again I was about to absolutely lose it because this just didn't seem right to me. It didn't seem right that we would get married and take our vows with this ring and then turn around and get him a different one. I want us to have the rings that we will be wearing for the rest of our lives on our wedding day. And to not have that ring would be really upsetting to me. Hence why I was about to lose it.

Luckily, Jeanelle, the lady that helped us pick out my engagement ring and our bands, who I absolutely LOVE, came back from her lunch at this point. I think she sensed that something was wrong and she came over and pretty much told the guy to get lost and that she was now going to be taking care of us. Thank you Jeanelle!! We told her what was going on and she said that we should at least try to get the new one here on time and keep the old one at the same time so that if the new one didn't get here on time, we would still have something. I still wasn't real pleased about this, but it was a better option than not having one at all.

Well she was working on putting everything in the computer for mine to be sent off and then she was working on getting Aran's new one ordered when she was having issue's finding the correct SKU for his. This was starting to worry me. She was telling us that it almost seemed like it had been discontinued or something. Great! So she said that she would put in a call to the designer tomorrow and get everything figured out. Well at this point I was more than a little worried and I wanted to have a back up plan. So I asked Jeanelle if we could pick out another ring for Aran just in case that one was discontinued. She was very much okay with this. She wanted to help us in anyway possible, so I think she thought this was a great idea.

So we walked over to the case with the bands and in the case were some new bands that we had never seen. Something that I need to explain is that Aran has long slender fingers. A lot of people refer to them as surgeon fingers or pianist fingers because they are so long and slender. So when we were picking out his band in October we were looking for bands that weren't so big and bulky because they just look ridiculous on his finger. So when we saw these bands, I pointed them out to him because they were thinner than his ring he already had. He put one of them on and he looked at me and said, "I like this ring a lot better than the one that we originally picked out." Jeanelle looked at us and told us that if we liked this one more, that this was a ring that could be sized and she could have it back to us the same time that mine came back which is the 30th!

We discussed it and Aran decided that he liked the second ring much better, so we went ahead and exchanged the rings and we will now have both of our rings cleaned, sized, put together and ready to go for our wedding day. I was actually very surprised that he picked out the first ring that he did in October. The one he picked out yesterday was way more what I thought he would have picked out and I am glad that he is happy with it.

The New Ring that Aran picked out
Source

So the Great Ring Debacle of 2011 as it turns out, worked out very well for us. I guess that other ring just wasn't meant to be.

Did you have any issue with sizing rings? How early did you take your rings in to be sized and cleaned?

Calling All Guest Posters!

Happy Tuesday everyone! I hope that everyone had an amazing Christmas and enjoyed some time off of work and your usual everyday activities!

With our wedding being less than two weeks away, I figured I should start putting some guest posts together. So, if you would be at all interested in guest posting for me for the week of the wedding and the week after the wedding, please leave me a comment letting me know if you are interested along with a way to contact you or email me at mdvervaecke@gmail dot com. I would love to have enough guest posts to cover both weeks, but if not, then I will just spread them out over the two weeks.

Even though we are not going on our honeymoon the week after the wedding, we are taking it off to just relax and re coup and maybe spend some time with our family and friends that are still in town, so I have no idea how much I will be around a computer. So again, I would really like to have some posts set up for that week too.

Thanks in advance to everyone who is going to help. Hope you are having a great day so far!

Licensed to Wed

I have been horrible about posting things on the same day or day after they have happened, but there is just so much going on that I just haven't had the time. Sorry guys! So today I am going to tell you about what took place last Thursday(I know! An entire week ago, haha!)

Last Thursday the Fiance' and I took the afternoon off to go run a few errands. The biggest errand on that list? Getting our Marriage License! I was pretty excited about this. I thought it would be fun and start making this whole wedding thing more official. We went to one of the three or four locations in our town where you can buy a Marriage License. We walked in and there was no wait at all. The lady at the front door handed us a number and as soon as we walked in, our number was called. So we sat down at the counter, gave them our $30 and our information and within ten minutes we had a Marriage License.

It is exciting that we finally have this taken care of, but it definitely was not as thrilling or exciting as I was hoping it was going to be, haha! But I did manage to get the "We just got our Marriage License" picture. We took a few once we got out into the car. The Fiance' was not very happy with me because I kept making us retake it because I didn't like how it looked, haha! Typical girl right? This was the best that I could get, so it will have to do.

So there you have it, we are officially licensed to wed in the state of Colorado! I am so excited that everything is finally starting to fall into place. I can't wait until the 7th when we can officially be married!

Did you take the "We just got our Marriage License" picture? Were you excited to go do this part?

Merry Christmas!

I know it is a day late but Merry Christmas everyone! I hope that  everyone had an amazing Christmas with your family and friends. Christmas isn't quite over for us yet, we still have one more stop to make to deliver some presents to my nieces. I can't wait to see them open their gifts. I hope that they love them!

Now that Christmas is almost over, things are really going to start shifting gears. I mean we have a wedding in less than two weeks! And our list of things to do is slowly getting checked off, but it doesn't feel like it is getting checked off quickly enough. I kind of just wish that they would do themselves at this point. But of course they won't so I still have some work to do. It isn't a lot and I think that within the next week we could have everything finished.

Last week this was my list of things to do;

• Ceremony Programs
• Wishing Tree Sign(Have it in Word, just need to print it on the paper and get a frame for it.)
• Final touches on Favor Boxes
• Affixing signs to candy jars
• Buy all the candy(We got a Sam's Club Membership for Christmas so that will come in handy for this!)
• Table #'s (These are designed, we just need to pick pictures out for them and print them)
• Get a hold of the last 6 or 7 that haven't RSVP'd
• Seating chart
• Place cards
• Ceremony music
• Make my garter
• Finish Gift for Flower Girls(Almost done with this, but I need an iron. Who doesn't have an iron? Oh yeah, us,haha!)
• Buy gift for Ring Bearer
• Buy Groomsmen Gifts
• Get my Brother and Step Dad to get fitted(I may have to drag them there, but it will be done this week)
• Final Count to Caterers
• Final Count to Florist for Corsages, Bouquets, Boutonniere's, and Table Arrangements,
• Get our Marriage License(We are doing this at the end of this week)
• Get all of our final paperwork to the church by this weekend
• Take my rings in to get put together and cleaned(Doing this today!!)
• Final meeting with DJ's(This was supposed to happen last week, but we have had to reschedule twice, oops!)
• Need to get ribbon to our cake person
• Cut down the sleeves on the flower girl dresses(they are way too long, good thing they are made of tulle)
• Pick up dress the week of the wedding
• Pick up Veronica from the Airport(I am way excited about this one!!)
• Need to get my nails done
• And lastly, find some time to relax and breathe

Like, I said the list is getting shorter. I know that there are a few other things that need to be done, but I just can't think of them at this time. 

Well, I think that is all that I have for today. I need to get myself up and out of bed and ready to go. We have a few other things that we need to do today so I should probably get my butt in gear. It is nice having a day off of work, but with all the stuff that we have to do it doesn't really feel like I have the day off. Bummer! But, I guess it will all be worth it in the end! Merry Christmas again everyone!

Did you guys have a great Christmas? What was your favorite gift?