Hey, Thanks A Lot!

I just want to thank Liesl from Fabulous Fashions Sensible Style for this award and for all the sweet comments yesterday! Thanks woman!

And, here are a few ladies who brighten my day every day and deserve a little sunshine award too....

MY BB (duh) from Life, Love & Puppy Prints

JOJO from One Sassy Vixen & the Guy in Her Bed

MISS K from Love, Lipstick, and Pearls

DESIREE from Hitting My Stride

CHRISTIN from A Classy, Southern Bride

MS. EMILY ANN from My Heart Shaped Life

Wedding Wednesday!

So weird that I actually get to particpate in this now! How exciting! I will say that I highly doubt my wedding related posts will be limited to just Wednesdays but it's a rainy afternoon in Minneapolis and I have nothing else to write about.

I want to thank all of you for your words of wisdom regarding picking a date and engagement length. J and I are still tossing around a couple of ideas and will hopefully have something nailed down soon. Then, of course, we'll have to make sure our ceremony and reception venues are available those days, but I can feel us getting closer to actually having a wedding date! Woohoo! 

One thing I have always known about my wedding is that my colors will be black and white. Those who know me personally will not be the least bit shocked by this detail. When I say black and white I mean ALL black and white....no color. I want this wedding to be beautiful and timeless and classic but have a modern and metropolitan feel. I've been perusing the internet for inspiration and ideas and I thought for my first Wedding Wednesday I'd give you all a peek at what I've been looking at.

Thoughts?!

I'm Ready to Talk About It

After all the anticipation of the Gopher's first home game I am sure you were all devastated to not receive a play-by-play of my weekend in yesterday's post (sense my sarcasm?) Truth is I have been going through some extensive therapy these past few days and this weekend's memories are slowly coming back to me and I now feel strong enough to openly discuss what happened.

We lost.

We, a Division 1-A team lost to South Dakota, a Division 1-AA team. I will give SD props because they were a good team and played well but there is no excuse. We should have won by 30 and not even because we're a good team but because we're a frickin DIVISON 1-A team. The game was hard to watch. It was embarrassing. Shocking. Depressing. Aggravating. Disgusting. And, painful. The fans wearing maroon and gold last Saturday were speechless. We couldn't even be mad because we were all in complete shock. Immediately following the game a "Fire Brewster" (our head coach) chant was echoing through the halls of TCF Bank Stadium, a move that should have been made after his first year of failure. There is some hope in all of this...maybe this is the wake up call the University needs. Get Brewster the heck out of here!

Now let me share with you the great parts of that day. Saturday morning at 6:30am me, J and our two younger brothers set out for our tailgating spot. My dad is a season ticket holder and therefore has an awesome reserved tailgating lot that us kids always get to early to scope out a great spot. We realize it is completely ridiculous to stand in the middle of a parking lot and "tailgate" without a car, but we do what we have to do. Eventually, my dad rolls in with the mini van packed full of delicious food, ice cold adult beverages and any other ridiculous maroon and gold colored accessories we may need for the day. The weather on Saturday started out cloudy, extremely windy and colder than expected...but soon the clouds parted and the sun began to shine. The morning of our first tailgate was a beautiful one and here are some pictures documenting just that.

 Me with my baby brother and baby sister!

My Delta Chi boys doing their first ceremonial Shot Gun of the season.

Fiance, my dad, my future father-in-law and me :)

My future father-in-law. We've been buddies since I was born....he's one of the few people I let call me Krissy.

My aunt got us tickets to a suite....here's our view! 

 'M' shaped chex mix!!! 

Me and my fiance!!! 

I may be hurt, I may be disappointed but one thing I'm not is bandwagon. I will be back at that stadium next weekend and the weekends after that cheering just as loud as always and believing that a miracle can happen and that Gopher's can somehow win another game this season.

Now What?

It's been about a week and a half since we got engaged and I am comfortably settling in to my new role as fiance. As most of you diligent blog readers know, I love weddings. I love wedding shows, movies, blogs, books, pictures, magazines....all of it. I've been dreaming of my own wedding since I was little and now that I am actually engaged I have no idea what to do. I thought when this day came I would know just what to do and just what I wanted, turns out I was wrong.

I feel like planning a wedding is a little like "Which came first? The chicken or the egg?" You can't set a date without a venue but you can't get a venue without a date. You can't set a budget without a guestlist but you can't determine your guestlist without a budget....so where do you start? I need my lovely wedding planning professional blog friends to help me out here. What was the first thing you did? Date, Venue, Budget and Guestlist are numbers 1-4 on my to-do list, but which one did you start with? All of the internet sites list the following as the first to-dos of wedding planning: "Enjoy being engaged" DONE. Easy, I love it. "Start visualizing your wedding colors and themes" DONE, I've been doing that for 25 years. Then I'm stuck.

For some reason I am having a really hard time picking a date. I realize the date needs to be flexible due to available venues and vendors, but I'm just having a hard time with it in general. Initially, I thought Spring of 2012 would be perfect! Then I started thinking that's way too long. All the girlfriends that I have talked to had about 10-14 month engagements and said they were too long. I know I want a longer-ish engagement so I can enjoy this time in my life and plan this wedding without stressing out. I want to have fun planning, not morph into a scary Bridezilla version of myself. Plus, we own a coffee shop. A coffee shop that hasn't even been open a year, in fact it's only been open for 6 months. It's hard to say where the business will be in 1-2 years time and we need to be able to actually leave work to attend our own wedding. I got to thinking that fall of 2011 could be great! It gives us a little more than a year to plan but we don't have to wait forever and a day. Then I get nervous about the weather. Minnesota is cold and I hate the cold. If we got married in October/November it could be anywhere from 15-70 degrees, and do I really want to be outside posing for pictures in 15 degree weather? And, is next fall too soon for Coffee Buzz? I just don't know and it's driving me nuts! There's going to be positives and negatives to any date you choose and honestly weather in Minnesota is going to be a question mark no matter what month I settle on. So how do you weigh the options? Did anyone else have this much trouble with step 1?

I consulted the internet in hopes of finding some magical date-picking formula and here are some guidelines I found:

Consider the Seasons of Potential Wedding Dates  I know I don't want to get married in the winter, but I'd be fine with Spring, Summer or Fall. Which really doesn't narrow it down all that much. Although, I do know the wedding will be in 2011 or 2012.

Which Day of the Week? I know for absolute sure I want a Saturday wedding. So that actually narrows it down quite a bit, cutting out winter months and every day but Saturday in the years 2011 and 2012 leaves me with about 70 dates to choose from.

Marking Special Occasions with Your Wedding Date I know I don't want to do the wedding on a holiday or birthday. Our anniversary is in November, so it could be cool to do it then. J and I each also have lucky numbers that play a bigger role in our lives than they probably should, but it would be great to have an anniversary with one or both of our lucky numbers in it.

How Long Should Your Engagement Be? Clearly, this is where my biggest issue lies. I definitely want at least one year but don't really want to wait too much longer than that.

Prioritize Your Different Desires I am super lucky to have a fiance that is just excited to marry me. His desires are that I have the wedding that I want. He'll have input on certain things, but as far as a date he just wants to marry me and he wants to do it as soon as possible.

Make Sure You Avoid Certain Wedding Dates Like I said, I'll avoid all holidays. Then we have some weddings already on the calendar for next year and we have the Gopher football schedule to consult...I don't want my family and friends (or myself) mad that they're missing a big game.

Consult Key Participants Once we choose our 'key participants' we will definitely consult them and our families, but I think with planning a wedding a year out you avoid a lot of conflicts in regards to this.

Consult Your Favorite Wedding Locations and Vendors I'm starting to look at and research different ceremony and reception sites. I am hoping by planning in advance we won't run in to any issues getting what we want, but this will definitely be a key component in picking a date. 

Alright girls, help me out. How long have you or were you engaged? Was it too long? Too short? Anyone been married in Minnesota? What date did you choose, why? 

 

You Can Get with This or You Can Get with That

It's Friday morning and I'm tired. I stayed late and kept Coffee Buzz open late last night so that a local non-profit theater group could hold their auditions. Let's just say 15 hour shifts are annoying. Leave it at that. After I closed up shop I rushed over to our friend's Colin and Sharisse's for dinner and the Vikings game. Sharisse made the BEST cheese stuffed manicotti. I really wish I had some for breakfast, right now. Anyways, moral of the story is that between being extremely tired and fighting with my A.D.D. I couldn't think of anything that warranted a full blog post. But, no fear, I have about 80 million little thoughts going through my head which I will share with you now!

Who watched the NFL kick off last night? I did, of course, because Minnesota's beloved Vikings were playing, well, attempting to play. Yikes, what a gross game! But, the game is not what is upsetting me...it's Taylor Swift from the pregame show. Anyone else see her? She looked like a clown. Let me start by saying I LOVE HER! She is beautiful and talented and a class act. I love her music and adore her. But last night, her make up was the worst thing I've ever seen! It was theater make up, which is fine if you're performing a non-televised concert.  Not OK when you're performing on live TV and they're zooming in on your face AND especially not OK if you're performing in the era of high definition television. Her lipstick looked like that super cheap little girl play lipstick that is so thick and so bright and takes like four days to wash off...you girls know what I'm talking about? Then, her outfit....it was like a figure skating costume! It was short and silver and glittery and had this mesh high neckline thing. Worst part? She was wearing it with black cowboy boots! OH man! As of 6:57am Central Time there are no NFL Pregame Taylor Swift photos on the internet, but I will diligently continue to serf the net and when I find one you bet your bottom dollar it will be posted.

Where was the beautiful little Taylor we all know and love?

Tomorrow is the Gopher's first home game! HOLLER! We're playing South Dakota where my Uncle Todd (my dad's brother) went to school, so my uncle is flying in from Colorado for the game! It's going to be a blast and I cannot wait to see my Goph's stomp all over SD right on the spot where my man asked me to be his wife! Good stuff! 

Unleash this girl:

The Gopher game is at 11am and my darling fiance had the brilliant idea that afterward we should host a college football party. There are a couple of great games on that afternoon/evening so it only makes sense that after waking up at 6am drinking and eating all morning and going to my game we come home and host a bunch of people. But, it's all good. I'm going to pre-make as much food as possible so that I can come home, set everything up and then take a nap because let's be honest....I'd rather sleep then watch random teams I don't care about. I'm going to attempt Chili. I've never made Chili before. My thought is that I'll make it tonight, throw it in the fridge then heat it in a crock pot tomorrow. Is that a good plan? Awful plan? Do any of you have good chili recipes you'd like to send my way??? 

I need all the help I can get. 

I don't drink enough water. It's boring. I mean, it tastes great when I'm really thirsty but until I'm really thirsty I just don't want to drink it. I need to I know, but it's hard. I'd rather have a diet mountain dew or a powerade zero or an iced soy chai tea latte with two pumps of sugar free vanilla. I know (aside from the powerade) that non of these things will hydrate me or really do me any good at all but they taste so much better than water. And 64oz a day seems like an awful lot. 

Do you have tips for drinking more water? 

Ya know that little New Years resolution I made? The one where I wanted to walk/run 500 miles in the year 2010? Well, it's not going so hot. We're now a third of the way through September and I've gone 252 miles.....so I'm half way done. Whoops! I'm not giving up, I still think I can do and I sure am going to try. The days that I'll be able to walk the pooch outside are limited and then I'll be at the gym on the treadmill, which might actually be a good thing because I typically go at least 4 miles when I'm on the treadmill. So I did the math and there's 113 days left in 2010 and I have 248 miles left which means I need to go 2.19 miles a day or more realistically 15 miles a week. Doable, right?

Alright, that's all from me. I need to look up chili recipes and google Taylor Swift images. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!!