This is kringangel's Pink Wedding!

Last night all 5 of my bridesmaids and myself went shoe shopping. We really lucked up....well I guess it was not luck....Jec prayed we'd find shoes at the first stop....and we did! We actually found shoes everyone liked, and they had everyone's size! We were so excited.
It was alot of fun just getting together also. After we found the shoes we went to O'Charles. I think we were there 2 hours. We had the craziest waitress ever. It was a good night!



At Dinner

I posted this a few days ago....for some reason it disappeared. The whole post....so here are the dress pictures again.

I love them!

I chose to have a candy buffet for wedding favors. I have purchased glass containers in different sizes and shapes. And of course pink and white candy. I love this look. I also purchased gray chinese style boxes from Oriental Trading.

I'm having 5 bridesmaids in my wedding.

My maid of honor is my cousin Rachel. She is 2 months older than me and we have been friends our whole lifes. Growing up, when our families got together, we would start plotting how we could talk our moms into letting us spend the night together. She has been a good friend to me.

(Rach: Hope you don't mind me stealing a picture off your blog).


Then there is Jec. Actually her name is Jessica. We have been best friends since we began going to the same church when I was 12. We have a lot of great memories. I was in her wedding a couple of years ago and am excited about her being in mine.



Next would be Jen (Jennifer or aka Betty). We are also friends through church. She is Jec's big sister. I can only think of one fight that Jen and I have ever had and it was over room temperature. Ha! She's alot of fun.



Next is my sister Punky, or some people call her Tiffany. She'll be almost 17 at the time of the wedding.


Last, but not least, is my other sister Mikiah. She's 14 and will be a junior bridesmaid.

My dad works overseas. He has been in Kosovo for several years now. Since he has been there I have been privileged to visit twice and we have done quite a bit of traveling together. We have been to Greece, London, Paris, Switzerland, and Italy to name a few places. I always enjoy traveling with him and seeing different parts of the world. He's a great traveling partner but he does have one major traveling fault. Being born in the 60's he is a fanny pack wearer.

Of course I, being the caring daughter that I am, have had the conversation with him several times that being a fannyier is really bad for his imagine. I haven't convinced him of that yet.

Fast Forward to today..................

I received a package in the mail. Dad has been asking for a week if I've received any wedding presents yet. So I had a feeling this package was from him. I was so excited as I ripped the box open. I couldn't wait to see what our very first wedding present was going to be....imagine my astonishment when I found 2 fanny packs. One is black with the yellow letters MJ (Michael's initials) and the other one is yellow with black initials SJ (my soon to be initials).

He really thinks he's funny.

This has nothing to do with the wedding. I know that several friends and family members read this blog often so I thought I'd share!

I am officially finished with all the course work for my masters degree. Hooray!!!!!! My thesis has been mailed, and better yet graded.....I have an A.

So the next time you see me and think "Stephanie looks smarter" it's because I am!


P.S. If you need any information about early childhood brain development or kindergarten readiness--I'm your woman!

I saw an old friend tonight. She was asking about the wedding, asking the normal questions, then she asked "Wasn't it worth it to wait on the Lord?" I've had this thought on my heart all evening.
It has been worth waiting on the Lord. I have a peace in my heart that's unexplainable. I know without a shadow of doubt that I'm supposed to marry this man. That doesn't mean that every time I look at the countdown (74 days now) that it doesn't take my breath and I say how crazy it is. It just means that I have a perfect peace about it.

I prayed for years for God to send me the husband that he wanted me to have. I believed God was capable of that, but I don't know I fully trusted he would. Looking at myself, I knew I didn't deserve it, but I'm thankful God didn't send me my mate on the basis of what I deserved.
Michael and I live about 115 miles apart from one another. We have figured out that in years past we were at some of the places at the same times (church meetings, etc.), but we can't say we ever noticed each other or remembered one another. All credit has to go to God for bringing us together.

Michael is amazing. He has a wonderful reputation. Everyone that knows him speaks highly of him. He is talented. He is very skilled at his profession. He is kind. He is considerate. He is a christian. He is everything I have ever wanted.

Michael far exceeds all that I was praying for in a husband. He is my prince.

In all the rush of wedding preparations and life changes I don't want to lose sight of this. God brought us together, put us together, and will be the one to keep us together.

I read somewhere that the best marriages begin with both parties believing they are marrying better than they deserve. I know Michael far exceeds what I deserve! He is getting the short end of this deal.

Had I done things in my own way, and it my own timing, I would have messed up. God makes no mistakes. It was worth waiting on the Lord.


"Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.
Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass."
Psalm 37:4-5

Her dress is finally ordered. It will be this style, only tea length and in hot pink of course.

I saw the idea to make heart shaped crayons and coloring books for the kids at the reception. I think it is very cute but not too high on my to-do list.

I should have spent the last hour making the final edits on my thesis that I need to mail by Tuesday, but instead I have been browsing this website and working on a monogram.

AVASTDEVICE posted a link today with a tutorial about how to make your own Monogram (http://www.favorideas.com/video/monograms/monogram-ppt.html).

It was actually fun trying my hand at this. I've spent way to long on it, deciding what I like. I may use this on the front of our programs.
Click on the picture to make it larger.

I really like this program. I found a link to make it a diy project. I'm considering it.

I was so proud of my self. Friday night I was on a roll. I did several DIY projects for the wedding.
One included printing the invitations. All 150. I had big plans to assemble at least half of them. On about number 15 I just happened to look down and saw the date.....JULY 19! We are getting married on the 12th. I couldn't believe I did that. I even profread the invite and had my mom to. I cried for a good 30 minutes. All that is ruined is the vellum paper. But I bought it at Hobby Lobby when the bridal supplies were 50% off. I haven't seen them on sale since then. It won't be too expensive to replace but I'm really disappointed with myself.

Sometimes being a school teacher really pays off. Like this week, SPRING BREAK! I know that I should be working on my thesis to earn my Masters Degree, but I would much rather work on wedding stuff.

Last night I finished up the bouquets, 5 bridesmaids and my bridal. I still have to make one more to toss. I love how they turned out. I wish I could take good pictures. They are prettier in person.

I really want to have a nice wedding but at the same time I don't want to spend a ton on it. One way I thought I could save $ is by doing all the flowers myself. Also by using all artifical flowers. I was kind of nervous about this but I made all the boutonnieres last night.

There a total of fourteen:
a. Groom
b. Father of groom
c. Pastor
d. 4 grooms men
e. Ringbearer
f. Father of Bride
g. Stepfather of the Bride
h. (2) Grandfathers of bride
i. Photographer
j. Videographer

I was nervous making these because I had never done any before. I think they turned out ok. They are pretty simple, nothing fancy.

I feel good that I can check something off of my to-do list. Now I need to start on the coursages, I'm just afraid they will be harder.

These are the flower arrangements that I'm planning on using at the reception. These pictures aren't the best but it'll still give you an idea. My favorite is the one with the white vase. But to buy 20 white vases will be too costly so instead I'm using a clear glass vase with silver tissue hiding the foam stuff (that's techincal foralist language).

I'm not a huge fan of traditional caketoppers. I really like willow tree figures. So I ordered this online. I got it back a few weeks ago. I like it but don't think I'll use it on the actual cake. It is more brown than white and I'm afraid that it will look funny on the cake. Plus my mom said it looks like they are necking. So I think I'll just use it on the table by the cake.

I also got the guest book and photo album that matches.

I originally saw these on the wedding graffiti site and then stumbled across quotethewalls.com. I would like to get a monogram of our initials and put it on the church doors that are glass. I love love love this idea. However the price is kind of steep for something to look at once and then throw away.

I just order 144 tealight candle holders from candles4less.com. They are similar to this picture but only mine are made from frosted glass. I got them for $36.99 which I thought was a pretty good deal. I'm going to use tealights around the flower arrangements I'm making for the reception.

I guess the first thing I must admit to is that I didn't know the bridal slip was called a crinoline until I heard my future mother-in-law call it that. Then a couple days later I saw pictures of dyed crinolines on this site. I'm all about it now. I love the idea. I just have one question: Has anyone had any trouble with it showing through their dress?

I have been looking for the perfect shoes for a couple of weeks. I knew I wanted dressy heals. I also wanted closed toe. I looked several places and finally found this pair at payless. I'm excited about wearing them!

I knew I wanted to have a signature frame but I didn't want it to replace the guest book. So I decided I would have it at the reception.

So next I started shopping on line. There are a ton of different signature frames. Different sizes and different qualities. I finally decided on this one that I bought from a ebay store. Overall it is 22 1/2" x 26 1/2". I didn't quite realize just how big this is until it came last week. It has a 20" x 24" mat and holds an 8 x 10 photo.

I am really tickled with it. It also has our names and the wedding date engraved under the opening for the photo. I think the magnitude of the size will eventually grow on me also.

Two of my bridesmaids will be wearing this skirt and shirt combo. I think it's really pretty. They will be in hot pink of course. =)

Be sure to look at the back.

This is the dress that my two junior bridesmaids will be wearing (my sisters). The dress we ordered is actually hot pink with flamingo trim (at the waist and bottom). I'm just praying that they fit. =)

I have the perfect dress now only I can't post a picture because Michael occasionally looks on here. It's very modest which I wanted. After trying on dresses, everything is very very real!

Being the thrifty person that I am (aka: tightwad) I'm trying to do as many wedding projects as I can. Now every Sunday morning while getting ready for church, I have to pull up Hobby Lobby's sale paper to see what's half price for the week.

I'm contemplating buying stock.....

When we first started making wedding plans my mom wanted me to make my own invitations. I was totally against this idea. I was thinking for the price of making them I could buy inexpensive ones from a company and save myself the headache. But then I started looking at what invitation companies had to offer.....which is not much for a whole lot of money. It is really ridiculous. Most people will read the invite and then toss it in the trash. I can't stand the thoughts of paying hundreds of dollars for something to be thrown away. So I started pondering ways to make my own. Heres what I have come up with. It's not real fancy, but I'm not real fancy. I made it using textured gray cardstock, vellum, and pink ribbon. I've been watching sales prices and have calculated that I can make 150 for about $50.


Now if I could just get motivated to start........

This is not my exact ring but it's similar. I wish I could take a picture of my ring to post on here but I haven't been able to take a picture that does it justice. My ring has a marquise stone in the middle. Michael wanted me to pick out my ring but I knew that wouldn't be as special. So I let him know that I like the marquise stone but he did the rest himself.....and it's perfect just like him!

After a year and a half of a long distant relationship he finally popped the question.
It all started in August 2006. A few months earlier my stepdad had met Michael on a four wheeling trip. He came home and told me that he had met the man I was going to marry. I never expected to even meet him, let alone date him, fall in love, and become engaged. However, We did meet, we did date, we did fall in love, and we are engaged.
The first time I meet him was at my church. He had come about an hour and a half drive to meet me. We have spent about every Saturday since then together.
Since we live about 2 hours apart many times on weeknights we often meet at a park in Knoxville, to save time on his trip. This is where he proposed at. It was very special and I'll never forget it!
I am so very happy because I know God brought us together and its his will for us to get married. I can't wait to begin my new life with my husband.