The First Look....

Taylor and I opted to do the "first look" prior to our wedding so that we wouldn't have a TON of pictures to take afterwards. This allowed us to get the reception started faster and definitely made the actual wedding much more laid back and we were able to control our nerves! What's funny is Taylor was way more nervous than I was, his palms were so sweaty! Taylor was of course ready and very excited to marry me, he was just a little uneasy about being in front of all our wedding guests! Here's my faves :)
And here is our amazing wedding party, these guys and gals mean so much to Taylor and I and we're so glad to have them as our family/friends!

This picture cracks me up every time I see it! Spencer is one my dearest friends and he served as one of our ushers. Our photographer called him up and instead of standing next to Taylor like everyone else did, he wraps his arms around Taylor. This picture makes me laugh because if anyone who didn't know these two saw this picture they would think they are in love and are having a commitment ceremony!

Here is my AMAZING family!And here is Taylor's amazing family as well! They were so much fun to be around and even traveled to little ol' Lubbock from all over the U.S. just to be with us!
Speaking of which, we had friends and family travel from California, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Florida, New York and North Carolina. Taylor and I are very, very lucky to have people in our lives that love us enough to travel this far!

Next up.....the ceremony!

The Big Day (Part 1)

Ok, so that I don't bombard my page with a humongo (yes I just used the word humongo!) entry about my wedding day, I decided that I'll break it up into several mini posts. The first? Getting ready!

I am so lucky to have the wonderful Lorrie Caballero hair stylist extraordinaire as my friend. She is a miracle worker I tell ya! We met quite randomly 3 years ago and she's been amazing to me ever since. Here she is rolling my hair into humongo (haha that's twice now!) curls. And that froyo I'm eating? That's the only thing I could eat that day because of nerves! Many thanks to Lins and Christi for fetching it for me :)

Flashback to 2001! Suleika used to be my personal stylist/groomer back in the day and I literally had a case of deja vu on my wedding day when Suleika found a few strays that needed plucking!

Not only did Lorrie do my hair but she also did my make-up for the day. I love this picture because you can see Christi in the background on my phone which was ringing non-stop the day of the wedding. I got tired of answering, so Christi became the designated phone answerer that day. We also had a running joke (that we still use today haha!) about how Christi's job was the same as Anne Hathaway's maid of honor in Bride Wars. Her main job was to tell me about my bridal beauty!

Here's Lori taming my mane!

This moment is pretty bittersweet. Here's Lins putting on a brooch (part of my something old) that belonged to my step-grandmother. She and I were kindred spirits, loving all things vintage and even jewelry making. Back in October I had a bridal shower and my Mom brought Cleo with her. She spent the entire shower making conversation with everyone and was never without a smile on her face. Sadly the very next day she passed away quite suddenly. Here she is sitting next to me playing the bridal bingo game.

My something borrowed was something from Taylor's Mom. We pinned this little mustard seed pin underneath my cummerbund. The pin belonged to Dana's grandmother and is something very special to her.

And here is the finished hair with my cage veil and brooch fascinator. Seriously ladies, Lorrie is a miracle worker, I looooved my hair that day! I had originally planned to make my veil myself with some veiling I bought on Etsy. Well the way the veiling was cut, it didn't quite work the way I wanted it to, so TWO days before the wedding we went to David's Bridal and bought the veil for $20 bucks! I did however make my brooch fascinator with a vintage brooch that was a gift from Taylor for our first engaged Christmas.

Meanwhile as things were all abuzz in the ladies area, here's what the boys were doing haha!

Yup, drinking and playing the Wii haha! I had our photographer take a gift to Taylor from me and I swear it's the gift that keeps on giving......Call of Duty Black Ops. He seriously plays this game almost daily. Well there you have it my friends.......part ONE is done! :)

Roooooooad Triiiip!

I'm deviating from the wedding posts because today Taylor and I leave for our honeymoon! We wanted to take our honeymoon sometime AFTER our wedding because we were already going to be doing a lot of traveling because of the Christmas holidays. We were originally planning on going somewhere at the end of May......well that was the plan! One of my co-workers informed me in January that I could be gone Spring Break because he was wanting to be gone in May. We decided to go ahead an opt for Spring Break since Taylor wouldn't have any classes.

This left us with little time to make plans/reservations/save money so we opted for a road trip! We rented a car and are driving to Shreveport, New Orleans and Orange Beach , Alabama. Taylor has pretty much made all the plans and even typed out a handy dandy itinerary for us. Among the plans....a little of this....well I won't be feeding them!And a little of THIS!

And lastly a little of thisI'm super excited to be gone, BUT i'm super bummed that I have to wait a week to meet little Miss Presley, Erica's new baby girl that is due ANY MINUTE now! Hope all of you have a wonderful Spring Break! :)

Rehearsal!

So on December 3, mine and Taylor's families arrived in Lubbock along with 4 members of the bridal party that flew in. We had people flying in from Dallas, Charlotte, L.A. Des Moines, Orlando and Kansas City! Luckily for me, Christi arrived a week early to be my (in her words mind you!) my wedding slave!

We had our rehearsal at The Legacy and afterwards we all gathered at the Lakeridge Country Club for dinner. We had some delicious Italian food and some delicious wine! Here are our good friends Todd and Kayla who joined us from Ft. Worth and then there's Jeralyn and Tim whose daughters Raegan and Sydney were our guest book attendants!

Here are the two most influential women in my life, my Mom and my Memaw! With a special guest appearance by a framed Jenn and Taylor :)
Half of the bridal party...Adam, Graham, Court and Logan looking through their goodie bags full of gifts from me and Feeeedler!
The other half of the bridal party, Spencer, Jenny, Jer Bear, Suleika...with a special appearance by Christi's back!
My matron of honor, my beee-utiful seeeester Lindsey! It looks like she's accepting an award haha!
Mi Familia! My uncle Tony, Lins, Step-Dad Steve, my Mom, and my sweet Memaw and Papaw! With a sneak attack from Baby Feeedler in the back!
Taylor's family flew in from all over the country, starting at the top, Taylor's Grandad and Uncle from Florida, Taylor's brother Jacob who flew in from Norman (yes he goes to OU but we love him anyway!) Taylor's Aunt Janey from Iowa, cousins Andy and Jess from Minnesota, Grammy from Iowa and Feeeedler's parents who flew in from Kansas City!

On a very WEIRD side note, Taylor's cousin by marriage Andy used to play semi-pro hockey and was a member of the Lubbock Cotton Kings which I happened to go to many games during undergrad. What's even more weird is that we both lived in the same apartment complex at the same time! And now almost 10 years later we meet and become cousins!

Taylor and his Aunt Julie from IowaBrian, Taylor's childhood friend, Baby Feeedler, Dana (Taylor's Mom) feeling groovy haha and Graham, Taylor's best friend in High School. We had a great time hanging out and getting to know each other (this was the first time our extended families met) and afterwards the bridal party came over to our house for an impromptu pre-wedding, last night as single party! Next up.....Pre-wedding! :)

Sending the Bachelorette out in STYLE!

Ok so yeah my bachelorette party happened 7 months ago, but since I've been a blog slacker, I wanted to chronicle everything that occurred before my big day! This will be the first of several in the next coming week ending with the wedding.

August 4-7, myself and 3 of my lovely bridesmaids (Lins, Christi and Court) boarded a plane and headed for VEGAS! I had never been and boy did we have a great time! Here's Court and I enjoying a frosty beverage on the flight to Vegas!

The first night we got there we got dressed up, and as you can see they gave me the bachelorette treatment by making me don a red feather boa that matched perfectly with my dress! My sister got us tickets to Thunder from Down Under and we had a blast! Contrary to popular belief, the men do NOT get naked.......Phew! Aaaaaand luckily for me, I did not get called up on stage :)


The second night we were there, we ate at a restaurant in the Bellagio run by world renown chef Todd English called Olives. A fellow colleague at Tech recommended it and we absolutely LOVED it! We were able to grab a table on the patio and had a front row seat to the fountain show at the Bellagio. Here we are on the patio!

After dinner we of course stopped to pose for pictures before heading to our next stop. That was the beauty of the trip, we kind of just went wherever we wanted to!

Our next stop was Gilley's bar located inside Treasure Island. Gilley's was pretty much our home away from home, they played country music.....which we felt much obliged to show everyone how to REALLY dance, none of that line dancing bull crap haha! The bar had saddles for bar stools, a mechanical bull riding contest (which we did NOT participate in haha) but we had ONE major complaint, the bar was called Gilley's, after the legendary Gilley's John Travolta made famous in the late 70's. Now one would think this Gilley's would remember its roots and honor the legend of the original Gilley's by having Urban Cowboy playing continuously on a loop, but alas they did not. Now don't you worry though, I took it upon myself to tell the manager how Urban Cowboy on a loop could make his bar just that much better if he took care of that one minor detail. Now normally I wouldn't take it upon myself to tell a manager how to run his bar, but I'm pretty sure the margaritas we enjoyed had a hand in helping ;)

After Gilley's we started heading back to our room at the Monte Carlo and walked back through the Bellagio. We ended up getting sidetracked and found ourselves in Jay Z's club called The Bank. While there we met some super nice folks who live in Vegas and invited us to their VIP lounge area. Aaaand just to show how small a world we live in, one of our new friends was born in Amarillo!

After the bank we finally headed back for our hotel and of course stopped for picture ops along the way..."Did the real Caesar stay here?" haha

The last day we there, the boys joined us for a day of fun. Here are some fun pics taken at Aria, pretty much one of the coolest casinos we saw on the trip. There is a HIGH END mall located inside and when I say HIGH end I mean HIGH end. Stores I had never even heard of and waaaaaay out of our budget were located here. Yup that's a Dior located just behind me!

That night our whole group went to dinner at a restaurant called Stack located inside The Mirage. The food was delicious and we all had a great time! Afterwards we went out to a couple of bars as a group and then us girls went back to our room since we were flying out the next morning while the boys stayed for a couple more nights.

We absolutely had a BLAST in Vegas and I can't wait to go back. Taylor and I have discussed going back together and going to some shows and doing things that we weren't able to do the first time around. HOPEFULLY this will be something we'll be able to do this year!

Next up.....the rehearsal dinner!

I'm Baaaaack :)

That my friends is an understatement! I've been a major slacker and have neglected my poor little blog for almost exactly ONE year. Yowsa! So what's happened in that year? SO much! For starters I'm now a Mrs. not a Ms. as Taylor and I married on December 4th. I don't have a real good answer for why I've neglected my blog other than planning a wedding deemed more time consuming aaaaand Taylor and I began a new endeavor together....we started a photography business. Taylor has always been a really great photographer and always just did it for fun, but during March of last year, we decided to turn it into a business in order to help pay for our wedding.

Business has been good! We've done lots of shoots for families, senior sessions a quinceanera and a couple of weddings. We also have several things lined up the next couple of months and we are so glad that these opportunities have come our way! If you haven't already, you can check out our website here

I WILL be better about updating and I look forward to getting back in touch with some of you that I used to follow so avidly! In closing here is a picture from our Christmas in Kansas City with Taylor's parents, I'll post more about our wedding and Christmas later!

Yay March!

I can honestly say that I've NEVER wanted a month to be over as much as I wanted February to be GONE! True to form though, February wanted to get just ONE last dig in and I was sick all weekend. Just a cold though, but it did cause me to miss work yesterday. You won the battle February, but you will not win the war! :)

On a tangent, I know I've mentioned before how much I love vintage jewelry. For Christmas, Taylor bought me a few pieces that I plan on making into jewelry for my wedding day. Another piece that he bought for me, I made into a necklace that I can't wait to pair with a cute dress once the weather gets warmer. Hopefully this will be REAL soon because I'm tired of the cold weather. I'm so ready for a flip flop weather and I'm equally pumped about getting a pedicure to show off my toesies!

And now for your viewing enjoyment, here's a picture of the brooch turned necklace. This picture does not do it justice though, it's much prettier in person :)