Memphis Bridal Shower

The bridal shower was a lot of fun, Jan and Fia did a really great job! Here are some pictures from the afternoon.

The cake, roses Jeremy picked out, and the cute little favor boxes Fia made

The cake was gorgeous!

I just love this because Fia looks like she's about to sass someone

Fia and Jan

punch, munchies, egg rolls, pinwheels, quiches, and fruits and veggies-- yum!

slicing the cake with Meghan's help-- we were sad it didn't taste as good as it looked!

Ignore the flash in the door... from L to R

Ashley, Meghan, Me, Suzy, and Fia

All in all, a good afternoon! The alumnae tea at Rhodes was also fun, I got to meet a couple of girls I know through facebook but hadn't met since they graduated long before I got there, and I got to see some people I hadn't seen in years!

This week is Halloween, though I STILL don't know what we're going to be! I thought today we could be Michael and Fi from Burn Notice, but it'd be good to have something that the kids might understand for the contest on Wednesday. And that wouldn't involve me being cold. Any suggestions?

Eeexhausted

We're in Memphis, the drive up was nice and uneventful, and we found out that the other interested party at the Solarium dropped the date so we have a place for the reception now!!

The English Dept. isn't doing a reception tomorrow, so all I have is the AOII tea which should be fun since there are so many people who will be there that I haven't seen in forever! On the down side, the bridal shower we all rushed to throw together only has FOUR PEOPLE coming. I'm really upset. I set it this weekend because people said they'd be able to come and now everyone's saying they can't make it. GARGH.

I guess that's really about all. I just got bored and wanted to say something. Keep your fingers crossed that more people RSVP for this stinking shower so that we're not all just staring at each other. *sigh*

Henry Moore at the Atlanta Botanical Garden

and a Chiluly

It was a really excellent exhibit, the placement of the figures was very organic and fit so well-- I think henry Moore (who intended for his work to be displayed in open fields) would have been very interested to see how it all worked out. This last one is my favorite-- it was placed in a field that slopes down towards the city. As you can tell, it was a pretty foggy night. I'd like to go back before they close the exhibit and try to get a shot of the city clearly through the sculpture, but I don't know that's going to happen. Oh, well, I still love it! Though I do love anything having to do with the Atlanta skyline...

This week, we head to Memphis! Woohoo! Now to shake this cough and hope Jeremy can, too!

Brief tanget: We're watching Max Payne and just as I said that they had everyone in this movie LUDA shows up! Whaaaat!

And your Netflix wait list:

Eddie Izzard: Glorious

What Lies Beneath

Land of the Lost

Much shorter than usual!

Fooooooood is expensive

So I went to Whole Foods last week and found out they do sushi platters now! And they're reasonably priced, too! The only problem is that I keep adding more food and it keeps getting more and more expensive... my budget hasn't taken a complete nosedive yet since I only spent $100 on the dress (budgeted $300) and we'll get Jeremy's tux for free (budgeted $150) but still... Maybe I'll get lucky and find some of the veggies and stuff on sale that week. I'm also looking at doing breakfast for the wedding party on Sunday before everyone leaves, so we'll see.

I'm in Memphis for Rhodes' graduation tomorrow-- I can't believe Valisa and Caroline are graduating! It seems like just yesterday Caroline was a senior in high school! I'm really excited about the presents I got for them, and Caro will be able to take hers to France this fall when she goes to teach. All these people living abroad, what am I going to do?!

Last night, I got in and went to dinner with Sophia-- we went to Bosco's and split a few things and only spent about $15 each! (Bosco's, for those of you who aren't familiar, is frickin' expensive. You know, the type of place with $10 appetizers) Then, on our way out, we ran in to some people we knew from Rhodes and talked to them for a while, and then went and got a beer with Ashley and her friend Ryan. I came home later than I intended, but it was a really good night and once I finally got to sleep, I slept pretty well. I thought I was coming down with something, but so far it hasn't caught up with me so I'm hoping I caught it in time.

Tomorrow is graduation and whatever Caro and V want to do after their families head back to Jersey and Texas, and then probably hanging out with Brunner and Wayne tomorrow night. I don't really have much planned for Sunday, then driving back on Monday... I need to leave early as I forgot to put work shoes in the back of my car so I could just go straight in. Oh, wells.

Ciao for now!

Oh, right, the organizing...

Now I just have to organize all my stuff in the new house... we're trying to figure out the heat because it's doing some strange stuff. Mine and Casey's side of the house is always hot, but Mom and David's side is always cold, which explains the thermostat wars we've been having the last couple nights. We think we're going to get a digital (programmable, hopefully) thermostat to put in so we know exactly what the temperature is-- right now, it's one of those tap the lever just so kinds that you can't really get any accuracy on.

I'm in a little better mood going in to this next week, but still anxious. I feel like my days are an exercise in futility at work, I just don't make that much money. If I make enough to do something to my car and do gas down to Savannah and have an extra $15, I may go to the brandy tasting. I may go anyway since dad's going and it's a nice neutral place for us to spend time and not worry about anyone getting bent out of shape. It's also nice to spend time with Jill, my boss, who rocks my world-- for the vodka tasting we got a free glass of our Prosecco (my FAVORITE of our new wines) which totally made my night! Emily might also get to go, so that would be fun. I need at least one night a week out, but I also can't afford to spend the money. I'll do Savannah this weekend (and may have to miss the staff meeting-- I mean, how often do I get to go to Savannah? Hint: Last time, I was wearing a green Girl Scouts uniform!), then Daytona at the beginning of March, and I need to get to Memphis hopefully by the end of March or April, but definitely in May for graduation-- All my babies are graduating! I can't believe my last little sis and my grand little are seniors!

I don't have any major expenses for the wedding coming up in the near future, but I need to be careful about making sure I save since there's going to be about $2k paid out between October and December. We've kind of come to the conclusion that I'll put my money towards paying down my bills and paying for the wedding, Jan and Marc are giving us some money that we'll use partially to pay for postage (insanely expensive, I tell you what!) and then put the rest in a high-interest savings account for our Singapore/Thailand/Japan honeymoon! Jeremy's money in savings will go towards paying for moving and a deposit on where we live, and then we'll combine our debts and try to pay them all off in the first 8 months after school. This should be utterly feasible with the exception of the student loans which could be done with in two years. Ambitious goals, but we really don't want to end up in debt. It might mean we won't have the fanciest place to live and we'll have to hold on to our dinky old cars, but we want to make sure we can pay for prenatal care when we have kids, give them a good house and get safe cars to drive them around in.

As for the wedding itself, I know TJ's (Trader Joe's) will give me a good price on the wine (sorry kids, no Nobul at the reception!) and there's a great place my friend Julie hooked me up with that will give me a phenomenal price on the beer (since I want to do all local brews- whooo Sweetwater!!) and I've been to weddings without a champagne toast before so I'm not sure it's necessary, and it would save us a couple, maybe a few hundred. I'm doing all the gifts for bridesmaids, family, and groomsmen by hand, and the parts that aren't by hand are either inexpensive or I can get a deal on them with Jill's distributor contacts. I got a Martha Stewart Weddings last night and I'm not that big of a fan; I liked the bit on bows, gave me some cute decorating ideas, and I did find a cool candy site, but everything was so expensive! Come on, this is supposed to be Wal-Mart's chic DIY queen! I think I'm just going to take it back to CVS and see what the other magazines look like. I also found a bunch of silver ornaments that my mom has packed away that are really cute and simple, so I've already got decoration! Next up, white tulle! HEY, DILL! WHAT TIME IS IT?!

As of now, and this will hold if we're living in Georgia, Jeremy's going to bake the cake, and I'm going to make some of Paula Deen's sausage balls and get my bridal party to chop cheese like there's no tomorrow! I think between Costco and the Farmer's Market I can throw a darn good party!

Anyway, it's bedtime. I'm trying to get to bed by 2/230a at the latest. I would like to work my way down to 1a, then to midnight. I'm thinking about getting a second job part time and need to get myself on some kind of regular sleep schedule! Hopefully, I can keep myself busy catching up on my teevee on Hulu (they're running this season of Battlestar Galactica!! Geek alert!!), running through my queue on Netflix, and organizing all the boxes that need to be unpacked!!

Flash Flood Warning, much?

Last night was supposed to start a few days of rain, possibly heavy rain. Apparently I'm the only one who looks at the radar. The storm system stretches from Mexico to Canada and is hitting pretty hard; I took mom to work this morning to go shopping, but unless the rain lets up I may not go-- driving back from Emory was like driving through the rain that hit Memphis during Katrina! No, really! I told mom when I dropped her off that there was totally a chance there'd be a tornado today, and about a half hour after I got home, they issued a tornado watch which may become a warning if the lightning and wind keeps up like it is now. I'm wondering if anyone's told the construction crew next door, even if they did wake me up at 7am I'd rather they not get blown away.

I really love severe weather (I know, I know, I'm strange-- but it's totally fascinating!), but it's putting a cramp in my win style right now. Not thrilled about that. I was also going to pick up some new fake chucks at Target since my old ones are getting a little, well, old, and see what their wedding organizer looks like. I'm stuck between that one and the Real Simple one, but you have to go to Crate and Barrel to get the Real Simple one, which is highly inconvenient.

Rhodes Singers had their Christmas at St. Mary's last night; obviously I couldn't go but I love you all and I'm sure it was amazing!

That's about it for now. I'm going to attempt a 30 minute nap since Casey kept me up and then the construction woke me up-- I'm sure you can imagine better than I how large drills can permeate a dream where you've just finished building your own house. All I know is that it ended in destruction and we were pretty ticked off.