For better and for worse...

Even though we have 18 months until the wedding and our marriage officially starts, Joel and I got in our first major marriage based argument. Lets just say it involved a bachelor party, several strip clubs and a huge chunk of change. But after explaining my reasoning to Joel and making him realize that from now on all decisions have to be made with our marriage as the top priority, we reached an agreement. He gets to attend the bachelor party, NO strips clubs and a decent amount of spending money. I'd say we handle this first big blow pretty well. It really give me hope that we will be able to conquer anything life throws at us. Here are some pictures of Joel and I over the past 2 years.

This is the first time Joel and I hung out outside of class.

His fraternity won scandals that night

This is the day Joel asked me to be his girlfriend :)

We were at the arts festival in OKC

This is Joel's 21st birthday.

We were dancing to our song

I have no clue where this is but it is a cute picture

This is Joel and I celebrating our first Christmas

This picture was taken in Chicago when we went to visit his mom.

It was our first big trip together...15 hours in the car

This is me waking into the restaurant when he proposed

I was so awkward

This is Joel proposing :)

This is our most recent picture taken at a family reunion in Enid

Is it bad to still sleep with your baby blanket when you are 21?

Until recently I did not realize my need for comfort items. My biggest most important item is by far my blanket. I have had it since I was born and absolutely refuse to part with it. I even had to warn Joel that if I ever had to choose between him and my blanket...He would be out of luck. I remember when I was little and I would go to school when it was stormy outside, I would test my mom. I would ask her what the one thing she was supposed to grab if there were ever a tornado and I was not there. My blanket of course! I even had a designated spot for my blanket when I was gone so she would know exactly where to grab it.

Lately I have found myself being very clingy to my mom. For some reason I feel like if I surround myself with her I will feel better. I have a huge portrait of my family hanging in my bedroom (joel thinks it is creepy), I have a picture of my mom next to my bed, in my planner and LARGELY posted as my screen saver on my computer. Why that makes me feel better..I have no idea. I think part of me just wants to feel close to her. Sometimes I find myself wishing it was the week she died just so I could be surrounded by her things and people talking about her. I think I am scared that the further I get from the last day I saw her, the more I am going to forget her.

One thing that is really important to me is a necklace she made for me. When my sisters I were cleaning out her apartment we came across these 3 handmade necklaces. We had no idea what they were but then my aunt told us that my mom had mentioned that she was making necklaces for us. I am so glad we found them because it is a piece of her that I can have with me all the time.

As I plan the wedding I find myself trying to find as many ways as possible to include my mom. I have come up with several ways to do this. Silent night was my moms favorite Christmas song. Since I am getting married at Christmas I decided to include the song in our ceremony. Another thing I am including are these beautiful white ornaments that my dad gave to my mom every year for Christmas. Since there will be a Christmas tree in the sanctuary I am going to hang them on the tree. And last, I inherited my mom's 25 years worth of Southern Living cookbooks. There are several Christmas editions and as I was going through them I found several sticky notes marking her favorite ideas that I hope to incorporate in the wedding. I am hoping that with all these little details I will really be able to feel like she is there with me.

December 18, 2010

Wedding planning is definitely coming along. I still have a LONG time until the wedding but we will need it with all the projects I am doing myself with the help of ANYONE willing. I have booked the church (First Presbyterian Enid) and set up premarital counseling. Since it is going to be the week before Christmas I have also already booked the caterer (Angel Delight) and the reception venue (Cherokee Strip Convention Center).

I am so excited to have a Christmas theme and I am TOTALLY playing it up. There will be tons of candles, white lights and several Christmas Trees. I have always LOVED Christmas time. Everything about it is romantic to me. I almost get teary eyed when I hear my favorite Christmas songs. As smooth as things are going right now there are a couple things I still need to figure out.

I have 4 ring bearers and ZERO flower girls

I really want to have someone sing at my wedding but I have no idea who

The thought of creating a my guest list completely overwhelms me

Here is a picture of one thing I am TOTALLY excited about

These are two of my colors. The third color is just traditional white. I LOVE this color for bridesmaid dresses and this bouquet is just amazing.If you look closely you can see that at the bottom supporting the roses are poinsettia petals. My bridesmaids will carry this and I will carry a larger version.

One other thing I am really excited about are all 25 years worth of southern living cookbooks I inherited from my mom. There are several Christ,as editions and as I was looking through them there were several decoration ideas my mom had marked. I am going to try and incorporate some of these things into the wedding. I hope it will make me feel like my mom was involved.

My sister is going to be so proud of me!

My sister has said that blogging is like therapy. The past 6 months have been crazy! They have been filled with 2 of the most life changing events I will experience. At the end of it all I will have successfully planned one wedding and one funeral.

On April 3 I became engaged to the most wonderful person. It was definitely one of the happiest days of my life.

On May 21 I found out that my mom had died. It was definitely one of the most heartbreaking days of my life.

Those two days are polar opposites but they are so intertwined with each other that I find myself more confused and hot and cold than I ever have been. After both of those moments I found myself being asked the same question for both. " Were you surprised?" My answer was the same for both. " I knew it was coming but did not expect to be as surprised as I was."

I started this blog to create an outlet for all of the mixed emotions I have been feeling lately. I am SO excited about planning my wedding but it is really hard to do when all you want is your mom. Ever since I got engaged I had mixed feelings about my mom being too involved in my wedding. She was very unstable at this point and I was honestly scared for my wedding. Now I wish she could be a part of it more than anything. I am so lucky to have two sisters, a handful of aunts and tons of friends to help fill the void of not having my mom around and as much as it helps, I would do anything to have my mom be a part of my wedding.

I hope I am as good of a "blogger" as my sister Amy but no promises. So to hear all about my wedding planning and healing process...

Please come again!