Finally

I finally ordered my dress!! Well, actually my mom ordered it.

I found it with my Mom and Daisha when I was home for the long weekend. I went on a rampage trying to find the perfect dress and I thought I found it three times. I never had the crying moment that everyone says they have. The moment I had was trying it on four times and saying, "I love this dress."

Also, it was a nice feeling when other customers and their 20 people at Wendy's Bridal complimented me over and over. That was an amazing feeling.

I have learned that you have to take pictures to see how the dress and yourself photograph. Some of the dresses that I thought looked good, made me look like a linebacker in photos. Having close friends and family involved make such a difference. I was super lucky to have Vicki (Future mom), Sarah Betts (Best Friend from Australia), Nina (Future Sister), Mom (Real Mom), Daisha (Best Friend), Amber and Abby (Sister-Best Friend and Niece) involved in the process. It's hard work and I was fading fast. I got a great deal on the dress and I love knowing I have a dress.

The Head Piece

I think this is a beautiful head piece!

Princesses don't need crowns

I need only to spend two minutes on Facebook to see that a lot of my friends, most distant, have gotten married or are planning to get married. We're contributing to the norm of people our age, I get that.

What I don't get are these girls who think wearing a crown or tiara with their wedding dresses is a good idea. It's not. I've been to Disneyland. That's where the princesses are. That's the only places where such head ornaments should be permitted. They shouldn't even be allowed in greater Anaheim.

Amanda, I'm all for the veil, the peacock feather, that cage looking thing, but you are NOT allowed to wear a crown or tiara. I love you. Bye.

I Live In A Frat

I have never lived on my own or had a roomie since living in the dorms of my conservative Christian college. We had curfews every school night until 12:30 a.m., but on the weekends it was 2 a.m. (if I remember correctly) and we could only go to the guys dorms on "open dorm night" and vice versa. I was such a dork in college and I went to sleep at 8:30 p.m. every night -- my excuse was because I played college softball. You know how people are dorks in high school then go to college and become cool, well I reversed that role.

Anyway, I am breaking all my college rules now. Mainly because I am living in a house with 3 boys (I've included Fabrizio!) and I stay up later than 2 a.m. on the weekends playing Rock Band.

It has been quite a whirlwind for me and I catch myself often saying, "I need to go back to college and experience the real College Life." I have threatened to move out and live in the dorms at one of the local universities, but everyone seems to shoot me down. I am pretty sure I will be starting school again within the year, so I am going to do my best to experience college at 28.

Living with 3 boys has its major down falls. ALL OF MY NICE TOWELS ARE BLEACHED. It makes me wish I had the opportunity to live on my own with my nice towels. Instead, I live in a frat.

Back from Indy, back in form

Amanda and I had a lovely, productive time in Indiana.

We decided on our wedding and reception venue: Salomon Farms. It's the right size, the right location, and it's something different -- just like us!



We THINK we've got our caterer: Hall's. Its menu looks right for the right price. We're going with an appetizer-style menu to keep the food simple. We're getting a keg and might bring in a couple bottles of wine for ourselves. Everyone can OD on soda, too.

We tried Hall's cakes but didn't fall in love with anything. We're leaning toward cupcakes and might find a better deal elsewhere. That's TBD.

Oh yes, and Amanda tried on a TON of dresses. Three outings in three days. I'd guess that she's probably tried on nearly 40 dresses by now and I'm sure she'll have a dress update here soon. I'm betting on white.

I'm off to the Men's Warehouse today to look at its suit rentals. I'd like to buy my suit but need to make sure the Men's Warehouse has something to match! I'd like to go with grey suits, but the catch is making that affordable for myself and the groomsmen (in case they'd need to buy, too). It's tough when you're not doing tuxes, but totally worth the style enhancement!

Off to Indy

I am in Minneapolis for work right now, but I'm meeting Amanda in Indiana for wedding planning this weekend.

We have some serious decisions to make, so expect some serious blog posts!

Fun date on the Ave.

Paolo's almost done with school this quarter at the UW. Usually I'm sad during his class days, but last week was great. I had most of the day off of work so I went to Seattle to spend time with Paolo before class.

We went to the U-District and got haircuts. He needed a haircut and I needed a trim, so we went to Rudy's. It was a little funny because Paolo's haircut was more expensive than mine, the reason it was more expensive was because he got a style that pushed him above and beyond.

Weird.

After haircuts we went to Thai Tom. It was so good with fast service and amazing food. The haircut and dinner was basically 45 minutes, so he was off to class.

I decided to see a movie in Wallingford after hitting Starbucks for dessert. I had a lowfat muffin with a coffee.

I saw 500 Days of Summer and it was great. After snacking on a large popcorn during the movie, I went back to The Ave. to wait for Paolo. While waiting I splurged on gelato.

The wedding diet begins now.

Camping we did

Paolo and I took vacation from work Friday so we could enjoy a weekend of camping.

It was not a weekend. It was a total of 12 hours.

We started off Thursday evening eating at The Hub in Tacoma (sister to the Harmon) and left for the Cascades super late. We packed the car and left at 7 p.m. We knew we were rushing it, but thought we would have plenty of time to set up camp.

Scott told us to go to this amazing campsite off a forest service road near Crystal Mountain and we decided to try it. That was the wrong decision, considering we were in my little Ford Focus. It was like driving on chunks of razor sharp rocks. We drove 1/2 hour up this road of chunks and turned around before we even reached the top. We were almost there, but Paolo was having heat flashes and practically hyperventilating.

So, it took us 1/2 hour to drive down. We had no camping spot, and it was dark.

I had an idea! We could drive to the camp site that was 1/2 mile down the road where we saw quite a few tents and RVs and pitch the tent using the headlights. Paolo refused and said, "There is a hotel up the road that we can stay at. It will be to hard to put the tent up in the dark."

We drove to Alta and they had no vacancies.

I asked the receptionist at Alta if the campsites down the road would allow us to stay without a park pass. She said we were supposed to have one, but the ticket fee was the same price as the park pass. We didn't really have a choice anyway.

We drove down the road where we thought Buck Creek Camping Resort was and we got lost. First we ended up at a Christian Camp and then we were next to an abandoned airstrip. We drove a little ways trying to get back on the highway, but no luck. It was pitch black. We saw a few campfires near the airstrip and decided to try and set up camp there.

We put the tent up in 5 minutes and got all of our stuff inside. I packed a beer for each of us to cheer and then we were off to sleep after minutes of hearing Paolo complain about how hard the ground was. Here we are inside the tent:


At 11:30 p.m. the neighing, bucking, and braying began. Paolo was exhausted and I was a little weirded out.

"Paolo, there are horses right outside our tent!" I said.

Paolo responded, "What?!"

No joke, we pitched our tent at a horse-people campground. The horses neighed and bucked all night and we slept from 1 a.m. - 5 a.m. I don't know what Paolo had to complain about. Here are our horse neighbors:


And here we are before packing up: