Blogged!

I'm excited to announce that our engagement was features on the blog Wedding Thingz.   It includes a brief description of our proposal and our engagement pictures.  The link is below:

http://www.weddingthingz.com/ashley--dave.html

I just wanted to give a big thanks to Wedding Things for including our engagement story on their site.  If you have time check out the blog.  It's full of some great ideas, helpful reviews and some awesome giveaways.  :)

Dress Shopping

I forgot to mention yesterday that I have plans for dress shopping!  I am going while I am home in Maryland for the engagement party.  Oh, I also forgot to mention that all of my bridesmaids are going to be able to make it to the party - I couldn't be happier!   The best part is, that since I will be at home in Maryland, my mom and grandmother will also be there.  I was so worried about having to go dress shopping alone, but it looks like it all worked out.

Anyways, in order to prepare myself for dress shopping, I have been stocking up on bridal magazines and obsessing over Pinterest.

After looking at literally hundreds of dresses, I noticed that pretty much all of the dresses that I picked out looked very similar.  From what I've read, it seems that I want a strapless ballgown with pick-ups.  I also like some beading, but nothing over the top.   Who knows if any of this is what I'll actually want once I get to the salons and start trying things on.  Anyways, I have to start printing/cutting out pictures to bring to my appointments, so that I have somewhere to start.

Busy, Busy, Busy

So, I haven't posted in quite a while.  As I said, I've started my new job, so I've been super busy.  We basically haven't done anything wedding related since the engagement pictures (OOPS!).  However, I was just on my "Team Bridesmaids" site today and saw my countdown for my engagement party - only 12 days away!  WOW!  Time does fly.  My fiancée and I realized that we've almost been engaged for 3 months, where did the time go?

As many people, I am using theknot.com as one of my go-to wedding planning sites.  According to my checklist on there, we have a few things to start working on:

• sign our wedding reception/ceremony venue contract
• start deciding on our reception menu
• find an officiant for the ceremony
• finalize our guest list
• search for a DJ or band
• visit florists
• start planning out save the dates and invitations
• start dress shopping 
• work on our registry

What a list!!   Fortunately, we already have some of that planned out.  We will be signing the contracts in November when we are back in the New York area for Thanksgiving.    We have also decided where we are registering and have started the process, but need to get it all finalized.  So, I guess we've got a good start on things.  Not to mention, we have the next 3 months to work on the list.  Time to get back into wedding planning I guess!  

Knock,Knock

Who's there?  My fiancé and I....time for some more engagement photos.

These were taken at my colleges brownstones.  The others with balloons were just around outside.

Vacation Mode

So after lots of delayed flights and waiting for shuttles to our car, I finally got back to my apartment and in my bed around 4AM last night.  That left my plenty of time for a refreshing 2 hour nap before I had to go in for the Welcome Back breakfast for the school year.  (Not so great to get up at 6AM after only 2 hours of sleep, especially when you're still in vacation mode.)

I don't know if I've mentioned it yet, but I graduated with Masters in Teaching back in 2011.  I spent last school year subbing and ended with a long-term sub position at a school where I was offered a job for this school year.  I officially accepted my very first teaching position and today was the first day of work.  No students this week, just us teachers getting ready for the start of the year.  It's going to be a VERY busy week!

That said, I have pictures of my vacation to Tampa (a.k.a. pictures of my trip to Disney world - for the first time!)  I will be posting them soon.  Unfortunately, like I said this will be a busy week, so I probably won't post until the weekend.  Maybe later depending on our plans for the long (4 day!) weekend ahead.

Vacation

I will be in Tampa, Florida for some much needed vacation time.  I won't be back until next Sunday!  That means no wedding planning for a while, just 9 awesome days of "us time" for me and my fiancé!

Engagement Pictures

So my dad (i..e my engagement pic photographer) has been slowing sending me the pictures.  He took over 5,000, so he is going through them and editing the good ones.  Below are a few that I've got so far.