Father's Day: 2011

On this Father's Day - what is more fitting than to call out what makes my dad so special?  He is definitely one of a kind and the most amazing person, teacher and dad I could ever ask for.  Literally.  He is always so helpful...with pretty much anything.  Whether it is house projects (to no end), carrying things or really just anything you ask him to do...

And he's a pretty amazing dad to my sister and I.  Pretty freaking amazing.  What a wonderful example of a man to have in our life.  I would say that I followed the mold of marrying someone like my dad (Jimmy and him are a TON a like!)...because pretty much, I couldn't imagine a better man.

He really likes to hang out and watch games or just with the boys...

And is one of the few people I know that goes to a restaurant, orders a virgin strawberry daiquiri with whipped cream on top and eats it with a fork : )  And loves every minute of it!

So to my dad, I hope he had the best Father's Day ever and his foot is feeling better :)  We got him this cordless drill that he has been wanting for a long time and I think he really liked it :)

But I cannot forget the other wonderful dad's that I'm so blessed to have in my life.  Including my father -in-law, seen below at our wedding with his wonderful grandchildren!!  Will was in his mom's stomach in this picture :) And my 3 older brother in laws that are wonderful dad's....glad they are a great example of what a father looks like for Jimmy!!

And then you have my grandpa's that I am blessed both are still alive and I have been able to have in my life for so long.  First off, my dad's dad...Orin.  He is a farmer from Iowa and is one of the best guys I have ever known.  Always has great life lessons and words of wisdom.  He is just a phone call away and is always so excited when we call him :)  This was when we went to visit them after our wedding!!

And finally, my mom's dad, who is just as wonderful!  He is a Methodist minister in Kansas City and is a wonderful example of a man that has lived a Christian life cycle and raised a family of 4 with lots of grandkids and great-grandkids.  We are lucky they are close and get to see them regularly!

So a shout out to all you dad's out there - it's a hard job (especially dealing with the mom-side of things....because I can only imagine how much Jimmy will have to put up with me even more when we are parents someday)!!!  

And a final shout out to the Wassinger's :)  It was one year ago today that they tied the knot after a long engagement and now they are in Omaha, where I actually visited them last weekend (promise, that blog post is next...) and had a great time!!  Wishing them a VERY happy anniversary!!! PS How cute is this picture of them a year ago??!

FINALLY: Mr and Mrs Wassinger!

So it happened. Two weeks ago- Erica got married!!! As you saw from a previous post, 561 days had passed since her engagement and I know they were both READY to pull the trigger aka tie the knot :) Jimmy and I headed to the airport early Friday morning

and we were off to Dallas to start the celebration! When we arrived we met some of the groomsmen and then went off to eat....duh. We love to eat.

Then it was off to get our nails did :)

THEN it was time for the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. Which was FUN! THE food was amazing (Mexican- yum!) and the company was even better. Thanks to Ruth and Dick for a fantastic party celebrating Erica and Andrew!! Had so much fun with all these girls, as always. And of course my fabulous husband enjoyed himself a lot. With a trip to the Gingerman afterwords and meeting the rest of the wedding guests there (and our friends!), we were ready to get to bed!

Next day = wedding day. Up early for a breakfast with all the girls and then time to get pretty. We all got our hair done and did our make up in Erica's suite and had a fun time munching on snacks, etc. You know, chatting like usual and having a good trip watching the bride get pretty.

Twins. And classy cats. AKA I'm a Heather wanna be.

The bride- with her gorgeous hair!!!

Then it was off to Arlington Hall. After a few beers- we got the dress on and we were ready to go. Let's walk down the aisle!!!!

Pictures were first though---group shot!

The bride--ready to go :)

After a nice ceremony performed by Pastor Luke, it was time for cocktail hour and then the PARTY.

The cake....

The husband (well my husband, not Erica's obviously!)...

Me with the groom....

Me with the bride....

Vanessa and I's maid of honor speech!! We let Andrew and Erica know what their lucky numbers were and exactly why they were---even bought them a lottery ticket. Don't think they won :( Bummer!!

Giving our speech!

Pi Phi for life. No more words needed.

Bride having a blast on the party bus!!!

Watch out Dallas- they are about to hit the town :)

After that, they were headed off with Della to their new cabin that they now own as a married couple! Long Pine Nebraska/Hidden Paradise didn't know what hit them with this new family!! Congrats you two!!

Check out THIS video to see the awesome karaoke we did at the wedding too!!

Preview: A Party in the USA: E's wedding

And now presenting....a preview to Miss Erica's incredibly talented bridesmaid and the bride herself in their own version of "Party in the USA" by Miley Cyrus.

Whomever said on facebook those microphones were not on...you were unfortunately mistaken. Let's just say while we had a good time, it is a good thing we all have day jobs :) More to come with pics from that day.....but wanted to try out this new online video stuff too because Blogger takes forever to load my videos!!

And here you have it....

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

561

What does that number symbolize? I don't think you'll ever guess it. So I will just tell you.

It has been 561 days (or 1 year, 6 months, and 14 days) exactly since my friend Erica and her soon to be husband, Andrew, got engaged. Can you believe it? I remember the day that got engaged like it was yesterday! I can't believe it has been that long! It was December 6, 2008. The night before, Vanessa called me to tell me "OMG Erica is getting engaged tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!!!", which then followed with a session of OMG's and so exciting and can't wait to see how excited she is. Heather spilled the beans to Vanessa because Andrew had to get Heather (then Erica's roommate) out of the house. Us girls, don't tell us anything, we can't keep our mouths shut. But I mean, who can when something that big is happening??!?!

The next day (aka E-day aka Erica's Engagement day) my dad, Jimmy and I were volunteering with our church at a local women's shelter. I was VERY thankful that I knew what was happening in Dallas that morning because I was able to keep my phone in my back pocket, awaiting her phone call to tell me the good news. Otherwise, I would have just left it in my purse. So good call on spilling the beans, Heather :) Well the phone call finally came and she couldn't believe it and was so excited, as was I! While he was still going to be in Ohio for awhile, she was very excited and anxious to get wedding plans started. Here are few pictures of the couple, newly engaged!!



And if you know Erica, it won't surprise you if I tell you that her wedding was essentially planned in like 3 months. Because by the time March rolled around, she had all the big stuff nailed down and had her vision. While I was so excited for her, since I wasn't in "bride" mode at all, it was hard for me to completely grasp all the things she was doing, planning, sending me to look at as one of the MOH's. Well when the other MOH (Vanessa) got engaged in March, she was able to share in wedding excitement also...and then we got engaged in April....well you couldn't stop this threesome of bride friends. It was all we could talk about and Erica was there to guide me along the way and answer my questions about what she did with this, this and this. Very nice!

So now that she has probably attended 10+ weddings as an engaged bride-to-be...I'm very happy to announce that as of this Saturday, she will no longer be a bride-to-be, but she will be THE bride and then a wife!! It will be a wonderful weekend in Dallas celebrating two fabulous people. She has wonderful things planned at a gorgeous venue that everyone will drool over (trust me, when I saw it I did). She has had time to think of all these wonderful details that will pull the whole day together. And best of all----she has been patient for 561 days of her engagement, that she can celebrate her little heart out during the biggest party she has ever planned with the people closest to her and Andrew celebrating with them!!!!! Wahoo!!! I know she can't wait and neither can we!

So get ready to "cheers" to Erica and Andrew on Saturday---lucky number 561? :) Love you both!

Here is one of their amazing engagement pictures- can't wait to see wedding pics!

New Orleans...here we come :)

As we speak (or you read), I am landing in New Orleans for the bachelorette party weekend for Ms Erica Snyder. VERY excited for all the fun festivities to come this weekend, which include:

• Lingerie shower
• Hopefully some pool/sun time if the rain holds off
• Dinner and drinks with good friends
• Some fun games
• Loving the bachlorette
• Out on Bourbon street!
• FUN, FUN, FUN

Hopefully there will be some of this...

And this is just a cute picture.

Here we come....watch out NOLA

Posts that I missed #2: Erica's shower!

Ok, so the weekend after we got back from our honeymoon....we flew to Dallas (all the bridesmaids) to host a wedding shower for Miss Erica Snyder...the bride to be on June 19--so soon!!

As always, Dallas was an amazing time. Vanessa met Emily and I at the airport where Heather was nice enough to pick us up and then we were off to dinner with all the DFU and Carol Snyder, who was in town for the festivities!! It was a very delicious meal and I actually saw one of Jimmy's cousins while we were sitting at the table- small world. Then it was off to an SMU bar, full of very rich and very fancy people. Haha.



Me and Payson and Rachel- part of the DFU :)


The other side of the table!


Matron of Honor #1- doing her thing and getting the bride to be drunk


Matron of Honor #2- getting it DONE

PS- all the pictures are stolen from Vanessa's facebook album---as I didn't take any Friday night and just a few on Saturday! Thanks V :)

The next morning Vanessa and I tried to get up and head to CostCo early, but that didn't work because they weren't open. Haha. The host and her mom made us a delicious breakfast of a fruit and yogurt parfait and then we were off to the bridesmaid bootcamp the Erica was hosting us at with her trainer at Cooper Aerobics. And then there was a surprise visitor- Andrew's sister, Kristine, made the trek all the way to Texas from Nebraska!!! Yeah :) I'm so glad she could make it and hang out with all of us- it was so great to have her there.

Pretty much April, Erica's trainer at Cooper, kicked our butts---after a little warm up, we did some intense intervals at different stations with our partners. It was pretty fun and make me realize how much I missed bridal bootcamp and the structured work outs :) We ended the work out with a nice walk around the Cooper complex, with Erica as our tour guide. It was really beautiful and full of lots of healthy people working out- of course. Check out the blog that Erica helps manage as their PR Manager- she's a stud with her own office!!

After that we were off to a delicious lunch at Central Market- a VERY upscale grocery store with a little restaurant in it. It was delicious....and for the record Erica, nothing like Hy-Vee--haha!

Finally, we were off to do what our main goal was there, to get supplies for the shower that started at 6PM. With our trusty CostCo cards in hard, we headed a way away from Dallas to get all the supplies we need for the wine and cheese themed shower. Of course, it had everything we needed at a great price and even some beautiful flowers! But as we left, we realized we forgot the most important part---6 bottles of wine to gift to Erica as part of our present. We then drove around for an hour by Erica's house looking for a liquor store---turns out she lives in a dry county but luckily we found some trashy place that only sold beer and wine, but we were good to go and luckily all the other bridesmaids were already showered and ready so they could set up and we could get ready :)

And ladies and gentlemen....I present to you, our final product! Complete with recommended wine and cheese pairings! I have to say....the bride to be LOVED it! We all knew that she would, but were very happy she was excited!!

There were a great group of girls to help her celebrate and lots of awesome presents!!! I think overall, she had a great time and so did all of us!!!


The table set up- Vanessa's wonderful handwriting!


The set up on the island---and you can see Erica's sweet new countertops!! And Heather being creepy...what's new?


Um, I think she likes it :)


All the shower attendees working on their game!


She LOVED this present!


The bride and all her bridesmaids :) Getting excited for New Orleans and June 19!

Then we were off to Uptown for the night- and things got a little crazy on the dance floor.


Everyone prior to the dancing fools...


The bride has some moves we have never seen...


Heather and I dancing, luckily I wasn't sweating :)

And after a fun and tiring weekend, we were off to the airport bright and early and back home. But never fear our Dallas friends, we will see you all again in only a few short weeks in New Orleans and then again in Dallas at the Wassinger/Snyder wedding shin-dig! Yeah for fun, friends, and good times....