Dream Come True?

Well, my fellow bloggies.. I've had some pretty interesting things go on this past week.

First up, I got an internship this past Wednesday with an event coordinator!! WOO! A LOOONG time ago I inquired about a photographer whose work I love, but she was out of my price range and somehow I got signed up for her monthly newsletter. Now normally I just delete the newsletter, but this time I decided to open the e-mail and actually read it. I happed to spot that an event coordinator was hiring for interns to work for her company. I e-mailed the owner and set up an interview with her for this past Wednesday. She was super duper sweet and it really wasn't even an interview, she just talked to me about the company and was asking me about my wedding. We talked for about an hour and at the end of it, she told me she would love to bring me on with her company as an intern! I said yes and she gave me a hug before we left. They are really flexible and will work around whatever I have going on, which is really nice considering what else I'm about to tell you next. I've ALWAYS, for as long as I can remember, have wanted to be a wedding planner.

Here is an example of their work:

I got home that Wednesday evening and was checking my facebook as always and I just happened to spot a post on my newsfeed from another wedding photographer that I can't afford, but love her work. She was hiring for lead photographers and assistant photographers to join her company. Now, you all pretty much know that I LOVE photography and even started my own little business, so I though.. what the heck, I'll e-mail her. I almost immediately got a reply back and she asked me if I wanted to be a lead or an assistant. I told her that as much as I would love to be lead someday, I really don't know enough about wedding photography right now to be a lead and would love to be an assistant to learn. So, what's going to happen is I'll be an assistant and have to sign a 2 year contract with her company. Basically, I'll get paid a certain amount now to be an assistant and it also allows me to use photographs for my own portfolio. The first year of my contract I will be an assistant and then after the first year, I'll become a lead and the owner will start offering my services to clients and I'll shoot their wedding on my own (or with an assistant). After my two years are up, I can either stay with their company as a lead or I can go off and do my own thing. Even under contract with them, I can still go out and book weddings on my own.

I'm so excited, my top two dreams were to be an event coordinator and/or wedding photographer and these two things that I just happened to luck upon are basically getting my foot in the door in a big way. I was really getting down and depressed on myself just the other week about life (I've been laid off from my job for about a year now) and now I have two very awesome things that just kinda landed in my lap.

So.. sometimes, dreams really do come true.

Oh yeah, I totally pulled out the ultra-corny Cinderella "dreams come true" picture. lol!

Do Me A Favor

Lets talk wedding favors.

After searching around on the bakerella website, I came across a GREAT choice for our wedding favors.. COOKIES IN A JAR!

{Source}

We're going to make them exactly like what is shown in the pictures, except imagine it with light blue instead of pink! We're going to get blue M&M's and blue and brown fabric (if I can find some that is similar to what it is in the pictures) It'll go great with our wedding colors since it'll be white, blue and brown when it's all finished. We're just going to put a sticker on it that says "Thank You Cookies" and stick another sticker on the back of it or on the lid with instructions. 

We're going to start making them in July or August (3 - 4 months before the wedding) because everywhere I read said that they have a 6 months shelf life without the pecans and a 3 month shelf life with the pecans (we're not adding in the pecans.)

It should be a relatively cheap project and I'll definitely post the result of how mine turn out!

We actually went out last night to Hobby Lobby to price the jars and to our surprise they were actually 50% off. So, we bought what they had there (which was 14 of them) and I texted my friend who lives almost 4 hours away and she ran to Hobby Lobby there and got some more for me (about 15). So, I'll just have to keep my eyes out for more when they are on sale again!

Engagement Inspiration

Derrick and I have our engagement session scheduled for April 10th with our photographer. I've been spending several weeks now trying to think of a location and a theme for the shoot and after SEVERAL google searches I have settled on one.

A carnival/fair them engagement shoot! I figured with the little touches of fun that we have included in the wedding (certain lights and my polka dot dress) having a carnival theme for the engagement session would mesh well.

Seriously, just look at these pictures:

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

{Source}

Aren't they awesome!? The only problem is, I'm not quite sure that there are any fairs or carnivals in the area in April, lol. My photographer is going to try to find something or at least something that will work and hopefully we can get ones similar to this.

*Crosses fingers*

Bridesmaids Gifts

I want to take a moment to talk about bridesmaids gifts. I'm very much so on a budget and wanted to give them stuff that would help them out price wise or that they may use again.

First off, I feel in love with hand painted wine glasses and decided to make my own. The wine glasses only cost me $1 each and each color of paint was only 97 cents! The brushes were about $3 and the ribbon was $2.50. I made one for myself in a script and my bridesmaids are in a funky letter. (There is one wine glass missing from the picture.. I added a bridesmaid later on and made her glass after these pictures were taken.)

4 out of 5 of the bridesmaids glasses:

My glass:

In addition to the glasses, I purchased brown Old Navy flip flops for them all when Old Navy was having their $1 sale. I figured this would be nice to give them as a gift so they can change into them at the reception if they would like. Not to mention, they can wear the flip flops after the wedding, too.

I also purchased the brooches to be attached to their dresses to help keep the costs down some on them:

I, just yesterday, purchased bath robes for them all, too. I'm not going to get them monogrammed or anything and really.. who doesn't love a normal bathrobes. Plus, I figured it would make for some great pictures of us all getting ready. These robes were normally $42 and I happened to catch them on sale for $10.49 and I got 15% off on top of that and then another 4% cash back through ebates. It ended up only costing me around $9 for each robe. The robes also come with matching slippers for the girls to wear, too! The only problem was, the color I wanted.. there were only 2 in stock and I have 5 bridesmaids. So, I found another robe from the same company that was just a little different and I decided to get all the same kind for the bridesmaids and then another kind for my maid of honor and matron of honor.

Here's the maid and matron of honors robe and matching slippers:

Here's the bridesmaids robes and matching slippers (slightly different blue, but I think it still works):

Then, I came across another robe for my little niece who is my flower girl. She'll be getting ready with us in the hotel room that morning, so I figured she needed a robe, too. I found a hello kitty one for only $5 but it's pink and doesn't really go.. but oh well, she LOVES Hello Kitty and I think it'll make her happy.

I plan on getting myself a robe to get ready in, too, but I haven't purchased it yet. I was thinking of getting a white one, but they get so dirty so easily.. so, I'm going to get a blue one with white polka dots. I haven't picked one out yet, but it'll look similar to these probably:

Lastly, I know you've all probably have seen the wire name hangers such as this:

But, instead of paying $20+ for each hanger, I decided to make a DIY project out of it. I purchased some cherry wooden hangers and some wire and I hope to finish them here within this next week. Mine with say "Mrs Weiler" and for my bridesmaids, I'm just going to make it their first names. It'll be cute to hang their dresses on.

I'm going to try to find a really cute tote back to put it all into to give to them. I'm so excited about their gifts and I hope they love them!

Top That!

Now that we've talked about the cake itself, lets talk about the cake topper.

Now, while we're going to be putting a "W" on top of our wedding cake, I couldn't help but fall in love with the clay figurines that I found through MudCards on Etsy. So what did I do? I ordered one, of course! It took about a month to get pictures of the final result.. but I finally got them yesterday. 

I sent her pictures of everything (including me and my fiance) and told her what I wanted  and she came through BIG TIME. I'm in love with it! Want to see?

Isn't it fabulous??! I can't wait to get it in the mail!

Anyways, you're probably wondering what i'm going to do with it if it's not going to be going on top of my cake. Well, I still plan on just putting it on the cake table (or guest book table) for decoration and then it'll make such a GREAT keepsake for after the wedding. I can't wait to put it on a little shelf in our new home (I also found a etsy shop that has cute little baby clay figurines that I can totally have made once we start having kids).

Cake Talk

I'm taking a break from house stuff (we're currently waiting on a quote from our contractor) and I decided to finally post about our cake tasting.

Now, I don't have pictures of the actual tasting because.. well, it would have been awkward, lol. Anyways, Derrick's great aunt does cakes professionally and has even worked with (it was a charity event) Buddy from the  Cake Boss (I won't tell you her real opinions on him.. lets just say, apparently he's not the nicest guy). She loves making wedding cakes esp for family and told us to contact her when we were ready to set up a tasting.

We did as she said one icy day (seriously.. we're talking INCHES of ice) and we drove 3 hours for a meeting with our caterer (more on that later) and a meeting with her. Now, lets get to the cake and the yumminess.

Here's the design we are going for (with some tweaks):

The differences will be that instead of the black ribbon, we will have dark brown with a thin band of crystrals going around each layer. We're also not having pink roses (at least I don't think so) and we're going to pick out the flowers and color of flowers we want (this is still up in the air.) It'll also have a W cake topper, as well. But other than that, this is the look of the cake we are going for.. We didn't want a super elegant cake since our wedding is going to be a little bit more funky.

Now, the tasting.. lets just say.. YUM! I have seriously NEVER tasted cake that tasted so good, I was amazed. It was so moist and so tasty and I seriously just wanted to plant my face into the cake and never leave. As for the flavors, we're having 4 tiers (like in the picture) and they are going to be pretty huge (we're talking the bottom layer is going to be 16 inches).. but we do have a guest list of around 250 right now. On the bottom layer, we're having regular white favor with a layer of filling.. but on half the cake there is going to be a thin line of Strawberry (I'm not a HUGE fan of strawberry, but when I tasted this.. I about died). The next layer up is chocolate with a fudge filling (YUM)! The next one is this new type of cake that she does that has been SUPER popular.. it's chocolate cake but has strawberry batter dropped into it so it almost tastes like a chocolate covered strawberry (a lot of people are excited about this!) and the top layer will be a marble cake. The whole cake will also be covered in buttercream icing (YUM! My fav).. I'm not a fondant person, AT ALL. lol.

But yeah, I'm super excited about this cake and now I seriously have dreams about awesome it tastes. 

Only 9 more months until we meet again, yummy cake.

Missing in Action?

I feel like I've been neglecting my poor blog lately. Don't get me wrong.. it's for a good reason!

In wedding related news.. last week we had tastings with a caterer and our cake baker (both of which we booked!). I'll post about those in the next couple days.

But, for now.. I'll fill you in on what I've been up to that has torn me away from my blog and wedding planning. Derrick and I are in the process of looking to build a house!! We were pre-approved for a loan and we have a house plan (blueprints) picked out and now we're just looking for land and builders to help.

Here's the house we are planning to build:

{Click to enlarge}

Isn't it beautiful!?

It's 3 bedrooms and 2 1/2 baths with a two car garage. We're also going to have a basement put in and I'm going to have a photography studio room put in down there (as well as a man cave for Derrick and a home theater). I'm so excited and I've been trying to keep quiet about it until things become more confirmed. But.. we're about 90% positive we're going to be able to do this. We're going to be doing a lot of the work ourselves, so I'm sure I'll be posting about it more and more as time goes on.

Right now, we've found land we really love that is about 25 miles from where we live right now. It has country and lake views and we can kind of pick and choose about how much land we want. We're hoping to set up an appointment to go look at it this weekend or early next week.

{Lake View}

I'll keep you all posted!! Keep your fingers crossed for us, please!

Fist Pump Mania!

I've hinted at my bachelorette party in a previous post, I figured it was finally time to blog about it. My BFF is throwing me a bachelorette party getaway (that I so kindly named "Fist Pump Mania") and we decided to go to:

ATLANTIC CITY, NJ!!!

And we're hoping to stay at the Caesars Hotel while there:

Pretty, right?

The theme of the weekend there is pink and zebra print and we wanted to have at least one night out on the town dressed in the theme. Want to see my outfit? I know you do.. 

First Up.. the dress. This is just an inspiration picture of the dress, I'm going to be getting it made in my specifications. It will have a black top with cap sleeves, the white tulle bottom and a zebra print sash tied around it. I'm planning on pairing it with some pink chunky jewelry.

As for the shoes.. I've shown them to you earlier in a previous post, but here they are again. My $10 zebra print pumps.

And to finish out the look.. this lovely clutch from ToonDesign on Etsy that is only $12.00!

We're planning on going the last weekend of September (about a month and a half before the wedding). I'm so excited, I can't wait.

What are you guys doing for your bachelorette parties?