It's a....

BOY!!!!

I think it is safe to say that those wives' tales were definitely wrong! We are most definitely having a boy, no question about it. Our little guy is measuring as expected and we could not be more excited.

Happy New Year!

Happy 2013 Everyone!

I hope everyone had a great time enjoying the holidays!
Tyler and I were able to spend a large chunk of time at home and I couldn't be more grateful. It's so nice being able to spend time with your family especially around the holidays.

As some of you may know,
Tyler and I will be getting married on May 11th, 2013!
Seriously though... that's just about 4 months away. I cannot even believe it! 

And with that being said, I will be graduating college just a week before Tyler and I are getting married. I could not be more excited for 2013!
It is truly going to be a wonderful year.

Since time is sort of wrapping up on our engagement (4 months is going to FLY by) we have started finishing up more stuff for our wedding.

One major check of the list that we did just this week was
we ordered our bridal party's flowers! (YAY/*sigh of relief)

I also surprised Tyler on Christmas and ordered him his wedding band! He picked it out a couple months ago, not knowing that I was going to surprise him on Christmas! :)

We also ordered our cake topper and

other small items that I cannot wait to see.

For the most part, we only have smaller things left to do

which is nice since I'll most likely be bogged down with school these next 4 months.

Last but definitely not least, WE FINISHED OUR INVITATIONS.
Ah, I'm so excited to check that off the list.
Now we just have to get them all printed out and sent on their way.

I hope you all are enjoying 2013 so far!

PS: One thing that we are having trouble with STILL is our honeymoon. So wish us luck while we make that decision hopefully within the month! :)

The Proposal

It wasn't too long ago that I proposed to Michelle and saw the tremendous amount of happiness in her eyes, but time is flying quick (already 7 months until the wedding)!

Anyways, for those of you that haven't heard how it all went down, this is the post to read:

Michelle and I had a camping trip planned at Huntington Lake, nothing out of the ordinary, just another regular camping trip we wanted to take like all of the others we love so much. I figured that that weekend would be the perfect opportunity to pop the question; us being in the mountains and surrounded by trees, it's everything we love. 

So I decided that I would place the ring on top of the frosting on a cupcake since baking is her biggest passion (it's what she's basing her life around anyways!) But that wasn't easy, I had to sneak over to buy the cupcakes without her noticing or finding them in the fridge since I had bought them the night before. The next day came around and I was glad she hadn't found them yet, but now I had to sneak them into the car with all of our camping stuff and hope she wouldn't see them again, and thankfully it worked out... again.

As the night rolled on and we were all settled in at the campsite after a fun day, I got more and more nervous to get the cupcakes out, set the ring on top, and bring it out to her in a cute and romantic way. Eventually when the time was right, I walked over to the car and opened up the cupcake box and opened I up... they were both melted to the point of looking like hot fudge splattered all over the inside of the box. My heart was racing and I had NO CLUE what I was going to do now. The night was coming to an end and we sat inside the tent talking before bed like we usually do, but my mind was so pre-occupied I couldn't really concentrate and felt like she could see something was wrong. 

The next day, after a lot of thought, I figured that I would just take her for a drive and see if I could find a cute, secluded and elevated area to pop the question. We drove around and eventually came to the Huntington Lake dam and decided we should walk down and just relax by the water. We found an area just past the damn with a secluded shoreline where we could just sit right by the water and hang out. I finally realized that this would be the perfect area to propose, but there was only one problem. The ring was still hidden in the car (from me thinking there would be nothing special by the dam). I needed a reason to go back to the car to get the ring, so I made up an excuse to head back to our camp a mile or two back to get my swimsuit, which I really didn't have and needed. After we got back to the dam I made sure to stuff the ring in my shoes in our tote bag. 

The view from the dam

We hung out by the water for 30 mins or so and ate some snacks and tried to catch minnows with Ziploc bags (for Michelle, I swear she insisted we catch one). I eventually noticed that to the right of where we were sitting the shoreline stuck out a bit (to where you couldn't see what was around it) and then back again. So I tucked the ring box into my waist band of my swimsuit and walked across the rocky shoreline to the alcove (while almost dropping the ring in the water) and saw a perfect tiny log to place the ring on. So I set it down on top of it and tried calling Michelle over to me to sit where I was and hoped that as she came around the bend she would notice it and I would ask her those four words. But she didn't want to come over at the moment, so I walked back to her and sat for a few more minutes. 

Proposal right around the corner!

Eventually I said we should go to where I was because there was shade and we didn't have sunscreen. She finally gave in and began walking over while I walked right behind her. She got about halfway over (right to the point where you could see around the bend) and stopped. I could tell she noticed something weird. 

Turns out she was just pointing out some trees along the water that looked like they grew cotton on them... great, she didn't even notice the ring! A few second later after admiring the trees she asked me what the heck was over there and I told her I have no idea what you're talking about. She said, "Ty, I think there's a ring over there, OH MY GOD I think somebody was going to propose here!"

She had no idea!!!

Just as I came up right behind her to pretend to see what she was talking about, she turned around and saw me on one knee. I told her how much I loved her and asked if she would marry me, and I was only able to make it about halfway through before the tears started flowing (and she almost got me going too!).

And I don't know why so much nervousness had built up inside me all weekend from just the thought of me asking her, because of course she told me yes, albeit in the midst of her crying.

I swear we spent the rest of that weekend camping just looking at the new ring on her finger with huge smiles on both of our faces; we couldn't stop talking about it! But I guess that's what happens when you decide to spend the rest of your life with your best friend and the most amazing girl in the world. 

I hope you're hungry!

So as Michelle has recently started her senior year at college it felt like the wedding planning would start to slow down quite a bit, but we're still making a bit of progress! We recently finalized the menu for the reception... 

and it's BBQ!

Look at those baby pies!

I mean, seriously.... how amazing does all that look? We're drooling.. 

It took us a while to come up with what type of food we even wanted to begin with since we eventually decided against our first idea. And we know BBQ is typically a messy type of food so we're keeping the finger-foods to a minimum (because we don't want it to look like the end of a wing-eating competition by the end of the night).

As of right now here is what our menu looks like:

• Tri-tip (as a sandwich or by itself)
• Pulled pork (as a sandwich or by itself)
• Mixed-greens salad
• Corn on the cob
• Baked beans
• Potato salad

I'm sure we might add some more to the menu if we come up with anything, it's just so hard finding what works best for the occasion. If anybody has any ideas of something we could add to the menu, let us know in the comments.

Work, work, work!

This week has been insane... from planning a wedding, to saying goodbye to loved ones (only temporarily), to moving & unpacking, to starting up school (YAY! LAST YEAR!). It feels like there hasn't been any chance to catch a breath these past couple weeks but now we're relaxing and just finished up a shopping trip at WalMart (because we're classy).

For those of you who would like an EXACT date of when our wedding will take place... get those calendars out and mark off

MAY 11TH 2013 

and "save our date". We are incredibly excited to keep this wedding planning going and believe it or not, we have accomplished SO MUCH... here's a list so we can see all the progress we've made.

X Found an AMAZING venue (Thanks Kathy & Charlie) 

X Figured out our colors/theme 

X BOOKED OUR PHOTOGRAPHER! 

X Booked the Port-O-Johns :)

X Booked the chair/table rental 

X Made parts of our amazing centerpieces

X Made our backdrop

X Decided on the food..... 

X Set up a wedding registry for one of the two places

X OH AND WE (Michelle) SAID YES.... TO THE DRESS!!!

X ...other things that cannot come to mind. :P 

Here are some pictures of the things mentioned above. Enjoy!! :) 

Where we will be saying our "I do's" 

Really want this chair for the wedding... 

Had to say goodbye to this precious little girl for the next 8 months... :( 

...And an early Happy Birthday :)

Finally getting started

After much delay and thought going in to exactly what we want to have for everybody to feast their eyes on at the wedding, we finally got down and dirty and put our hands to work!

We started off our crafting binge last night with the process of cutting down some fabric to the proper size. It seemed like such a simple process for what we were planning to make (and it was really), but man, using a pair of scissors for any extended period of time starts to take it's toll on your hands! After much hand crampage (for lack of a better term), we finally had the finished product on our hands; some amazing mason jar votives (there will eventually be candles in these)!

I'd say these turned out great!

Tonight we hesitantly got started with DIY project #2, while still feeling the effects of those scissors from the night before. This was another very simple decoration, just somewhat time consuming getting all of the fabric ripped down to the strips that we needed. After lots of sweating while sitting out in the front yard getting everything cut down to size, we were both happy to get back in under the air conditioning to start putting everything together finally.

The backdrop

Wedding planning?!

As the realization of my new addition to my finger starts to set in, so do my wedding fears. I have been thinking about this moment in my life for years, and now that it is here I don't know where to start! How typical.

As of this moment, Tyler and I are hoping for a May wedding, and as most of you know, I'll also be graduating early May as well. Not to mention that I'll be doing all this planning while living in Riverside. AHH!

I'm not going to lie, I am honestly really excited to start the whole process and I'm going to enjoy every minute of it (as much as I can). If anyone knows any good photographers that are not extremely overpriced then I would love to hear from you! Actually, any suggestions for anything will be greatly appreciated. 

All in all, I'm just happy to be looking at my ring knowing that it's not a dream.
Cheesiness. Yay.

This picture was one of our first pictures taken together. I think I knew that we were perfect for each other by our weirdness and our inability to stop laughing. 

He fell asleep on Christmas. CHRISTMAS!