Meet Me At The Altar

Wedding! Wedding! Wedding!!  It has been a very productive past week and weekend! One day this week, mom and I took off looking for fabric and different ideas to throw around for some things for the reception! We had a lot of fun and really enjoyed each other. We found some different fabrics and bought pieces of them to see what magic mom can work up. We also found some candles to use at the reception!

On Sunday, mom and I headed to Louisville for a Bridal Show, "Meet Me At The Altar". It was my first bridal show as a bride so I was really excited! I didn't know really what all to expect!! We arrived at the show around 2 pm. At Registration, we learned of a "cake dive" that was going to be happening around 4:30. I wasn't sure what all that entailed, but the girl told me she did it last year as a bride and that it was totally worth it. So mom and I began our journey through all the vendors at the bridal show. We gathered a lot of good ideas and saw things that solidified ideas that we wanted to stray away from and ideas that we had thought about that looked gorgeous! There aren't a huge variety of photographers, etc being from a small town, so it was good to see other photographers, florists, etc to be able to compare them to the ones here. Still haven't made a final decision on a photographer, but think we will end up going with a local one! 

      In order to be a part of the cake dive, each bride had a green sheet of paper that they must have signed by each vendor! So I was frantically going around to each vendor so I could register for the cake dive. Mom just thought the cake dive was such a wonderful idea.....which she ends up getting more of then what she expected! Around 3, they had a runway of lots of beautiful wedding gowns and bridesmaids dresses. I absolutely fell in love with one dress and look forward to going to the shop that sponsored the runway to try it on! Hopefully, that will be in the next couple of weeks! At 4, they drew 20 brides names out of the registration to get the chance to participate in the cake dive! And all I remember hearing...from LONDON KY.....Jennifer Felts! AHHH my mom was cheering and I was having mixed thoughts....I kept thinking, oh wow, I hope I win something great, but I really dont want to do this! haha

To make a long story short...20 girls including myself lined up along a very long sheet cake. Each of us had a number that we stood in front of and the cake was marked off in sections on the table. Each of us was responsible for our section of the cake. We were CAKE DIVING, FACE ONLY, NO HANDS to find a token! Each token had a number on it that determined what you won! After taking all my jewelry off and pulling my hair back, I was ready for the dive! Let me tell you, brides will do ANYTHING to win something for their wedding! Guess I am considered to belong to that group now?! :)

Ready to begin the cake dive! So excited and nervous!

We all were going at it and I thought my strategy would work great! I decided I was going to use my chin to dig in the cake so cake wouldn't go up my nose! This worked for some time, but then failed! Cake was all up my nose and I couldn't breathe! All I could hear was my mom cracking up and pictures being taken of all of us! 

Taking a break from my face in the cake to see if I could see the token!

Cake was in my hair, nose, all ALL over my face! But such a fun time!

After about 5 minutes, about 15 girls of the 20 still could not find their token! So.......either a fiance or MOB (Mother of the Brides) were allowed to join in! Yes, my mother dove straight in! haha It was great. It didn't take 2 minutes and she had found the token! (only because I had went through the whole cake except for one corner:)). 

My beautiful and fun mother who was such a great sport to help out!

It was so much fun and ABSOLUTELY WORTH IT! In the end, I won an amazing price totaling $900!!! It was so exciting!

Mom and I after cleaning up a little with our token! #14!!

Needless to say, I do not want to see, smell, or eat birthday cake for a long time! haha I'm looking forward to another bridal show!!

On another note, Tracy will be in Kentucky in 4 days and I absolutely can't wait!  I'm so excited for us to blog about our time together in Kentucky! We have some fun things planned and will hopefully get some relaxation time together as well!

Everyone take care until we post again!

SAVE THE DATE!

No better time than now for everyone to SAVE THE DATE- July 21, 2012 is THE DAY! It's going to be the best day ever! The wedding is going to be in Jenn's hometown of London, Ky! We are very excited and really hope that our friends and families in NC, AL...etc,etc.. will be able to make the trip and share the wonderful weekend with us!! So make plans now:) So, for those that know me...for the last couple of years I (Jenn) have said that I would never have a wedding! HA Look what I'm planning on now! Also, those that know me well know that I am horrible at making decisions! Therefore, every idea that people are throwing out at me I think is good! So far the wedding planning process has been slow but  I'm hoping to pick it up within the next month to take pressure off of doing things during the hardest months of my rotations! Even though I think I'm not that excited about all the planning with the wedding because I stress so easily..I find myself getting giddy when I do find things that we are going to use! So...I'm guilty! I'M EXCITED! For example, I now have found our cake server and knife, guest book and pen, and a beautiful picture frame that all matches the fine china that we are soon to be registered for!:) I've been throwing around color ideas and I think its going to come together great! Tracy has been good listening to me get excited about little things like dishes and all! What can I say, he is a man and doesn't say much, but when he does have an opinion..he definitely lets me know:). One thing is for sure, we are very blessed to have 2 wonderful mothers that are jumping right in to help out with the wedding details! My mother can work some magic so I'm excited to see what ideas she has in store to share with me!

                 Me with the bags with our cake server, etc!

Tracy and I have not been together for about 1 month and 2 weeks so we are both VERY EXCITED for his upcoming trip to KY in the beginning of July! I know that I can't wait! He doesn't get much opportunity to visit KY since he always visits in AL, so I love showing him around my hometown and state! I may be in many places, but home is always home! It's definitely difficult to fit in everything that we want when Tracy visits KY. It's like he is a star! Everyone here wants some of his time and always ask.."When is Tracy coming?!" What can I say, you have to love him;)

This wasn't much to read, but hopefully in the next week or so we will have much more to share!! Hope all of you are doing GREAT!!

THE ENGAGEMENT!!!

         So our engagement happened on April Fools Day (April 1^st 2011). I really wanted to surprise Jenn with the engagement especially since she didn’t think it was possible to do. The April fools day idea was mine and I wanted it to be unbelievable and for her family and friends to guess if it was true! I was just wanting to add some fun to it! Also, it was important to me to incorporate the use of our computer or our phones since that is a major component in our relationship. So, I took off Friday at noon and headed toward Al-a-Bama to work my surprise. If you know Jenn, it wasn’t easy to be on the road for 9 hours and Jenn not know what was going on, so I had to do some convincing and maybe a little stretching of the truth! ;) I arrived at Jenn’s apartment around 8:30 pm to totally surprise her and that I did! By the way, all week she had been saying how bad she would love to see me in Bama and little did she know I had already been planning this. When I walked up to her door, I asked her to go to her door and open it and to please not ask any questions (she actually did it without any questions ;) ).  She thought I was just arriving home to skype her. She was so so surprised! I waited about 15 minutes after I arrived to ask her to check out a song that I liked and wanted to share with her. I usually do that randomly so at this point she really didn't think much of it...she was still just so excited for me to be there. She along with me, started the song and listened to it and at the end of the song I got down on one knee and asked her if she wanted to be in my wedding and will you marry me……all you have to do is “Say Yes”!!!Of course, she said YES!! The song was Say Yes, by Dusty Drake. Check it out! I've added the link but if it doesn't work look it up!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv7Lj4YMrNs
    To add on to Tracy's bit of the engagement, the rest of the weekend was perfect! We shared the excitement with our families and friends that night and the next day my sister was the first to see the BLING!

We had a wonderful weekend of tennis, walks on the trails in Birmingham, and a great engagement dinner night, recreating our first date in Birmingham at Carrabbas then onto the Vulcan to look out over Birmingham in the night! So wonderful! 

                                                  Before going to dinner for our Engagement in Birmingham

                                                                       So very excited! The Dutton's to be!