Fall-Themed Engagement Party

I'm a little late on this post. Actually, a lot late. I was a little late when I started it and then blogger has been weird and won't let me upload pic. Anyone else having this issue? I digress... When we (me, C, his parents and grandmom) went to Colorado for Thanksgiving, my parents through us an engagement party. It was a fabulous party and a great opportunity for our Colorado friends to meet everyone.

Parents' front porch. Didn't get a picture, but she had pumpkins all over the flower bed as well.

We tried to emulate what the invitation looked like.

Mini bottles of sparkling cider as favors for people to take.

Dining room tablescape. My mom was so creative with those pumpkins, as you know that's how we got engaged.

Kitchen tablescape.

Individual pumpkin mousse. Delish!

My handsome, groom-to-be.

Sweet parents who threw this fab party. Can you tell the apple doesn't fall far from the tree? My love of entertaining definitely comes naturally!

Little bro (who'd unfortunately already changed out of his uniform)

My 2 besties, and fellow Delta Zetas

My friend Eric and his gf who is an amazing baker and cook.

Shawna, who is like my other half (besides C, obviously) she got engaged 1 motnh before me and her wedding is 6 months after ours. We've already figured we'll have kids at the same time.

2 dear friends, Heather and Mandi.

It was a great time and a fun Thanksgiving (which I promise to post on as well, LOTS to catch up on). 3 months from today, (the next Friday the 13th we'll have) I will be Mrs. Wilson and I absolutely cannot wait!

No Ordinary Party

WARNING: Nerd Alert!!!
In honor of Breaking Dawn, coming out I just had to have a party! (As if I've ever really needed an excuse.) It was an evening filled with cocktails, Taylor Lautner, food, Taylor Lautner, the movie and oh, did I mention Taylor Lautner? Bless his heart, he can't act but he can wash your shirt on his abs!

I lucked out and found all this Twilight themed supplies at Party City, marked down to .50 because it was from Eclipse. So I just bought the generic Twilight themed items.

I printed off these cute quotes and drink labels online and put them in frames I already had around the house.

My friend, Whitney, brought over lots of yummy snacks!

Team Jacob!

At the movie! PS: Everyone was our age or older, I think I saw maybe 1 or 2 teenagers. They said the average aged woman who attended was 37 1/2. Weird.

Happy Thanksgiving, Y'all!

Blogger issues and a busy schedule has caused me to be a slacker with the blog. Here's the link to a snippet of our engagement pictures. Kevin Barre is an amazing photographer!

http://kevinbarrephoto.blogspot.com/2011/11/jennifer-christopher-memphis-engagement.html

This one is my favorite:

Headed to Colorado tonight with the fiancee, future in-laws and soon to be grandmom-in-law for Thanksgiving. Lil bro will be home, too. It's going to be a fun weekend, culminating in an engagement party given by my parents. Really looking forward to hanging out with my brother. If you'll remember, here we are back in 2009's Thanksgiving festivities:

Have a blessed holiday and safe travels to everyone!

Thanks: Day 11

Yes, I admit I have been terrible at keeping up with this. Blogger has been acting weird lately and wouldn't let me add pictures, my mom was in town last weekend and work is crazy busy. I know, excuses, excuses. I will post later of all the things I'm thankful for from the past few days but today I want to focus on something I am extremely thankful for every day, but especially today I am thankful for our veterans.

I am so thankful that I live in this wonderful country, which is only wonderful because of the men and women who have been willing to fight for our freedoms in the past, currently and in the future. I've had so many in my life. My grandfather fought in the Battle of the Bulge in WWII, I've had many friends from high school who have served (including my friend, Eric who took me to the Miltary Inaugural Ball. Remember this?) I am most thankful for my younger brother, Kyle, who is serving in the Marines as we speak. While he is still in training at this point, his efforts are great and I know he will serve proudly no matter where he is stationed. Here is the post from his graduation from bootcamp.

Just remember: While you're enjoying the day off because of this holiday, or complaining that you don't get it off (as I was), these men and women don't get a day off.

God bless America!

Thanks: Day 4

I am so thankful for my sweet fiance Christopher. He has been such a blessing from day 1 and a true answer to a prayer. I cannot wait to start our new life together as husband and wife.

Thanks: Day 3

"May she who gave you birth be happy." Proverbs 23:25

Today I am thankful for my sweet mommy who is visiting me right now! We are going dress shopping on Saturday along with C's mom and I am soooooo excited!

Here I am with her when she visited this past spring.

Thanks: Day 2

Today I am thankful for my friendships. Yesterday I had dinner with an old friend. We go back to Girl Scout days as well as church. It was a great evening, that turned into a 2 hour dinner. I am thankful to get reacquainted with old friends. The following I think is appropriate especially considering we were Girl Scouts together:

Giving Thanks

As we enter November, Thanksgiving is on most of our minds. This year I am particularly excited because Christopher, his parents and his sweet Grandmom Betty are all coming home with me. My parents are throwing us an engagement party while we are home. It is so easy to get wrapped up in things that it's easy to forget the meaning behind this holiday as well as the next big one coming up. (Yes, I'm already thinking of Christmas. I do love it so!) So, I've decided each day to reflect on something I am truly thankful for each day in a post. They won't be in any specific order. Whether it be big, little important or might even sound insignificant let us never forget what we are thankful for and God's abundant blessings He continues to bestow upon us.

DAY 1:

I am thankful that I am healthy. Today marks day 2 of Adventure Bootcamp. Each morning after I'm done I remind myself how blessed I am that I am able to work-out. I know there are people that would love to just have the ability to walk. So, I have to remind myself I have no room to complain and every time I do I remind myself I AM ABLE.

This is my favorite Bible verse and it deems appropriate:

YES!!! (That's what she said)

Okay, so I meant to post this awhile ago but I've been so busy PLANNING MY WEDDING!!!!!!

That's right, I'M GETTING MARRIED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It happened 3 weeks ago today. This is how it all went down. Christopher asked me if I wanted to come over on Thursday and go for a walk, grab a bite to eat and watch Jersey Shore. None of this seemed weird to me, as we do that every Thursday. (Yes, we watch Jersey Shore every week. We are on the guido bandwagon.) Well, my friend Lana asked if I wanted to grab drinks Thursday after work. So, I told Christopher that I'd just meet him at his house later on. Well, he acted all disappointed and said he really looked forward to our walks. Ususally he doesn't care if I change our plans so when he acted disappointed I felt bad and cancelled drinks. So I got over to his house and we started our walk. We walked from his house over to Powell Road Park in Collierville. I noticed he was walking awfully fast and I asked him what his hurry was. He said that usually I get on him for not walking fast enough. (This is true, usually I'm telling him to speed up that we won't burn any calories if we just stroll.) Half way through, I asked him if we could just go back that I was hungry an just wanted to go eat. He'd promised me La Haceinda, our favorite Mexican restaurant. He said we're halfway through we might as well finish. Little did I know that all these things I was doing were making him a nervous wreck.

So (thanks to Kim's mad camera skills) here we are walking:

Now as we came back around to almost where we'd started. I saw these pumpkins lined up, but from the back. I told Christopher what a brilliant idea it was to carve your pumpkins in the park then you wouldn't have a mess to clean up at home and how we should do that. I saw people in the picnic pavillion and just assumed they had carved the pumpkins.

Little did I know, they had this carved into them...

So as we're almost to the end of the walking trail there are people running suicides on the path. So C says let's just cut through the grass. to which I say, "Why? They'll move." Again, something that probably freaked him out. Anyway, I follow him through the grass. He starts walking over to the pumpkins. Now, at this point I'm thinking: "Great, he's going to look at these pumpkins and chat with the people who carved them and I just want to go eat!"

So I walk over...

When I first looked at them, I thought they'd carved their names in them. Then, I realized what they said.

C says to me, "Oh, we don't want to mess up someone's proposal we should probably move." And I'm thinking yeah because all those people in the picnic pavillion are probably waiting for this couple and we're standing in the middle of it. So I start to walk away.

At this point, C says "Wait, these are for you." My reaction: "No freaking way!" (and at this point I still have no idea someone's taking pictures, or videotaping for that matter)

The BIG moment!

No, there was not a "NO" pumpkin.

So relieved all his plans went without a hitch!

So, so happy.

Our sweet friend, Kim who took all these fantastic pictures.

Our friend, John, Kim's husband who video recorded it all. I had no idea when we walked past those bushes he was standing right there.

We've already started planning. The date is set and the location is booked. We are super excited for all the fun planning and preparing we have over the next 6 months. I've also decided that this won't become an "all about our wedding blog."

Absence

Sorry for my absence. When I cancelled my cable, Comcast (2 weeks after the cable went away) decided I must've meant cancel everything! IDIOTS! So, I am without internet until Thursday (only9 days after I called them.)

The Couch to 5k

I am training for a 5k. Yes, you read that right. Y'all know I am not a runner. However, I want something to work towards and I need to work out. I have never been a gym rat. I have never been this girl:

But I would like to be. If I do run, I am on the treadmill running a max of 2 minutes. I need the treadmill physically forcing me to run. So, this will be a challenge. I found The Couch to 5k program on another blog, Pawley's Island Posh. Check it out, Julia has fabulous taste in clothing and decorating! I have done two days of the program and so far, so good. It starts out slow, and it's only 20 minutes. It's a 9 week program. I have chosen to participate in the Memphis Grizzlies' 5k. It's part of the St. Jude Marathon. Maybe I'll do that next year. Wait, let's not kid ourselves. I'm excited to have something to work towards and it's a great cause.

I can do this. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can...

From the halls of Montezuma...

My little (well not so much anymore!) is officially a US Marine. We all went to San Diego for his graduation. Painful, I know. Although it was a short trip spent mostly on base, we did get to go to the zoo, the beach and eat In N Out twice. Here are the highlights of the graduation:

I thought this was poignant, and pretty much summed up the whole trip.
Here is our first view of him after 3 months. Where'd all that hair go?
Here he is 4 years ago, a month after he graduated high school. Yeah, there's just a slight difference.

After we saw him (from afar) they did a 4 mile "motivational run." He said he can now run 3 miles in 14 minutes. I guess all that track and cross country in high school paid off:
Again, lots more hair back then!

The whole family, after he was finally turned over to us. (Just for the day, and we had to stay on base. PS The base has a department store where everything is super cheap and there's no sales tax. I wish I'd bought the Michael Kors bag, but I did get a Lacoste polo for Christopher. Orange, of course, for trips to Knoxville this fall. Oh! There was a Starbucks on base. God bless the Marines.)

His first Coca Cola in 3 months! (probably the #1 reason I couldn't be a Marine ha!)

Proud big sis! Confession: Everyone made bets on whether our mother would cry or not. We all lost, she didn't. Not that we could tell. They should have bet on me.

End of visitor's day. Kind of a tease, we had to give him back until the next day.

The graduate! (2nd from the back)

Proud family

Of course, I wanted an "An Officer and a Gentleman" picture!

Put the dress blues on just for me, since I wouldn't be flying back to Colorado with the rest of the family. Looks sharp!