Engagement Party 2.12.11

We were so excited to celebrate our engagement with many of our close friends!  My dear friends Natalie and Jessica threw us a fantastic party with lots of love and liquor!  Even my sister came down to celebrate.  Everything turned out perfect, even tough we had a hair disaster earlier that day.  My roots were getting pretty bad a couple weeks before so I went and bought this touch-up product that is supposed to help you last a few more weeks before getting it colored (by the way, it didn't really work, I still had roots).  Well, when Mandy came down she dyed my hair just like she always does and when we took it out, my roots were orange where I had used that product!! I was kind of freaking out, but I knew Amanda would fix it.  It looked like Ronald McDonald...it was bad!  So she ended up dying it two more times to get it to look right, but by the end it looked great!  Good thing we started early because we ended up working on it all day and barely had enough time to get ready.  

When we got to the party, Shabby told me, "Well, for having a hair crisis, it sure looks great!" so I must have looked good!  Everything at the party was so cute and just perfect!  It was Valentine's weekend so the theme was love.  There was red and pink decorations with craft beers and martinis to drink.  It was exactly what I would have wanted...lots of drinks and appetizers, good friends and laughs!  It really represented Chris and I as a couple.  Thank you so much Natalie and Jessica!! Love you both :)

xoxo,



Bride Abbi

Engagement Photo Session

The weekend of January 8th, Chris and I went up north for my sister's birthday.  We were so excited to celebrate with her and do some wine tasting in Livermore!  Mandy thought it was the perfect opportunity to have dad take some engagement pictures of Chris and I.  I wasn't sure about it because it was her birthday and I wanted to make sure we didn't take away from that, but she insisted and really wanted us to! 

It was cold so I couldn't wear a cute dress but I found a cute long sleeve shirt with gray pants and boots.  Chris wore a new shirt (that I made him buy) that was blue and purple plaid and jeans.  The first winery were we stopped at was beautiful and after our tasting we ventured onto the property.  Dad wanted to take some of us on the stairs with the building in the background so we started with that.  It was really weird kissing for my dad and having everyone watching us as he took our picture; we eventually got used to it though.  Then we went into the vineyards.  It was winter so they were pretty bare but still beautiful!  At one point, dad was taking pictures of us kissing in the vineyards and we were holding it for so long I started laughing and I kind of snotted on Chris' face!! Oops!  We both started laughing historically!  Then, Nick was signally Chris to grab my butt when we were kissing so he did it and I snotted on him again!  Ha ha! It was so funny!  Dad got a picture of him grabbing my butt and it is really funny! 

As we went to other wineries we found more beautiful backgrounds for pictures and we really started warming up....maybe the wine helped too!  We found a winery with old cars on the property that were really cool looking.  So Sara went in and asked if we could use take pictures in them and around them.  Of course they said yes to Sara, so we were able to get some great shots! 

We also found some vineyards that weren't pruned so it made for a different style.  They also had this cool building and windmill in the background that looked so cool.  This location was just perfect for us and for our engagement photo shoot because Chris proposed at a winery and we are probably going to get married at a winery.

We got some really great shots and had a lot of fun!    It was so nice to have my dad take photos of us and really capture our love in the pictures!  I am so glad Amanda pushed us to do it....Thanks Mandy!  I am so thankful to have this photos and will cherish them forever. 

xoxo,

Bride Abbi

Tumblr

Chris' friend Grant and his wife Sonya came over last week and Sonya and I got to chatting about the wedding...Grant and Chris were busy in the kitchen brewing beer.  Sonya and Grant were one of the million wedding we went to last year and I really liked their style.  She told me about this thing she used to keep all her inspiration in one spot; it's called Tumblr.  I had never heard of it,  but she showed it to me and got me signed up.  It is cool because you can add photos, links, text, anything really.  Then you can access it on any computer or on your phone.  It is like an electronic inspiration board. 

I started working on it and will be constantly updating it; it is super easy to use.  Check it out if you are interested in seeing my inspirations:

http://brideabbi.tumblr.com/


xoxo,
Bride Abbi

Always a bridsmaid, never a bide...

I have been compared to 27 Dresses more times than I can count!  Thank God my friends are not as mean as her's and all of the dresses were actually cute!  I’m sure there are many other girls who have been in my position and someone always says "Always a bridesmaid, never a bride."  (Mandy, you know what I'm talking about!)  Well, after the year we had with 9 weddings, I was about done with that saying.  Don't get me wrong I had a great time at all of the weddings we attended and we sure helped them hit their bar minimum, but I was tired of people asking me "So when are you and Chris getting married?"  I was in no rush to get engaged by any means, Chris and I have always done things on our own time; I wanted to tell people to shove it and stop mind their own business!  Trust me, Chris felt the same way...he was getting asked even more than me.  We started telling people that we wanted our own year (as 5 of his closest friends all got married in the same year and ended up clashing over dates and details).  Well, looks like we are going to get it!!  I figured Chris was wedding-ed out and wasn't going to propose until a few months in to 2011.  Much to my surprise and excitement, he popped the question on December 12, 2010! 

I am so excited to be engaged to such a wonderful person, who is my best friend!  Now we are planning our own wedding for 2012 and I have plenty of experiences to call on for what to do and what not to do.    

Unlike many girls, I have never dreamed of what my wedding would look like, or what kind of dress I would wear; I guess I just always wanted it to be a blend of me and my future husband.  Therefore, we have a lot of things to think about and decisions to make over the next year.  So far, Chris is excited about the wedding planning and has been very involved (which I really appreciate).  We are planning on having a long engagement to take our time planning our perfect wedding; that’s why I figured I would start a blog to share it with you!  Let me just go ahead and apologize now for all the spelling and grammatical errors (Jessica, you can chastise me for it later).  This will serve as an electronic journal for me also, so I can remember this special time in my life...many of you know, I have a terrible memory and can't remember what I ate for breakfast.  I hope you all enjoy my posts and for those of you that are far away, I hope this keeps you connected and involved. 

xoxo,

Bride Abbi