Bridal Shower with the Herman and Lafone side of the family!

The adorable tables and favors for all of the guests

The wonderful gifts!

Papaw decided to tough it out with all the women to stay for some food and to play with baby Mackenzie, who also got into the food ;)

The lovely spread!
Malachi and I, after he ate about 15 funfetti cupcakes
We played the classic make-a-dres-out-of-toilet-paper game...Emily's dress looks great!
Sandra Herman made me the cutest corsage out of a sponge, mixing spoons, and a wine opener. She knows me so well! :)

The Herman and Lafone women did such a good job- we had so much fun playing games and eating all of the wonderful food. I cannot wait to be a part of this awesome family!

HOUSE: Updates!

Nick and I have had a very special experience with finding a house for us to live in. We knew that we didn't want to buy new construction, but rather find a foreclosed home in good shape for a much lower price. Our three-year plan is to cosmetically fix up a house, and sell it in three years for much more than we paid for it. Well....this process took much longer then we thought. We made 7 offers on houses, and got out-bid on all of them. This is something we expected, because finding a foreclosed house for the price we wanted to pay puts us in competition with investors, who are often willing to jack up an offer on a house. Well patience paid off for us, because the eighth house we made an offer on we got! Thank God for our realtor Sandra, because she earned every penny. We must have walked through 25-30 different houses, not counting the dozens of other we just drove by and deemed unacceptable.

The house we have under contract is a 3 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath house with 2,200 square feet. It's in a cute little neighborhood with a pool and great trees :) The value of the house is 50% more than what we paid for it, so we're so excited about this investment opportunity, and well as a place to live! The house needs almost no fixing-up...just some new carpet in places and a new refrigerator (can we say new stainless steel? My favorite!)

We are definitely very excited about the house...so depending on how well the appraisal goes, we should be closing on it from the middle to the end of August- talk about cutting it close! I was beginning to think that we would come back from the honeymoon to have nowhere to live....but my parents house. Not happening!

The financial burden of a mortgage is now apon us, and I couldn't be more excited :)

Tea Party Bridal Shower!

I'm so very bad at updating this thing when it should be updated, but I figured I'd catch up on the past month or two. In June, Jocqueline Propst, Madolyn Helms, Phylia Smith, and Terri O'Bryan threw me a wonderful tea party themed bridal shower. We had so much fun! They did such a good job with the food and the cupcakes (thanks Mad!) and the games. I had such a good time! Here's a few pictures from the day:

Adorable candy they had made!
The Hermans :)
Crock pot! My favorite :)
Mariah playing with the tissue paper


My Mom!
My mom has saved these tea cups over the years, and most are passed down from her mom and grandmother
Adorable "S" cupcakes, made by Madolyn
The delicious food!

Honeymoon!

Today, Nick and I FINALLY booked our honeymoon...we now have a trip to look forward to together! We had talked about Jamaica for the longest time, so last night, Nick said that we should just go and book one. So we did! We are going to Riu Ocho Rios in Ocho Rios, Jamaica, for seven days and six nights in an oceanfront room. I can't wait! Here's the website:

http://www.clubhotelriuochorios.com/


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Engagement Photos

Nicholas and I had the luck of finding a fantastic photographer, Jeff Cooke for our wedding. We met this weekend in Freedom Park to take some engagement pictures, and here they are!

I FOUND THE DRESS!

I found my dress! My mom and I went shopping at a bridal boutique in Matthews because we heard they were going to have a sale on Saturday. We just wanted to scope out the store to see if we saw anything that we liked, and if we did, we would go back the day of the sale. We walked in to the store, saw the dress at the same time, and grabbed it. I tried it on...and I knew! The dress was on the sale rack (it was a mistake) and we got it at a great price, which my mom loved. It's fabulous, and I can't wait to wear it! I'm so picky, I thought I would never find it. You'll just have to wait until September 5th to see :)

Update- New Web Page!

I've updated my Knot.com website to include more information about the ceremony and reception, including directions and other goodies :) Please sign the guestbook to let me know you visited!

the website is:
http://weddings.theknot.com/pwp/pwp2/view/MemberPage.aspx?coupleId=7868687558807864

Enjoy :)