Thank God for Locals!!!

Today was a training meeting for the pregnancy center volunteers, which includes me.
It involved being at the pregnancy center in San Marcos from 9am-4pm. Miles was at his dads house being babysat by his Memaw (Vance's mom) and his sister, Dana.
He gets to go through it again tomorrow, and I get to go through training tomorrow as well. Again, 9am-4pm! Just 1 more day!!!
Trust me, I was anxious to get back to my little man after being away from him for sooooo long!
On the way home, Tess (a friend who is going through the training as well) and I stopped by the Goodwill in San Marcos. I found an outdoors baby swing (the kind you hang in the tree) and one of those red & yellow plastic cars that the kids push around Fred Flintstone style!
Tess bought them both for him as his birthday presents. We got home at 7pm so we didn't hang the swing up, but he loves his car! Lately Goodwill has been the place to buy his toys. I found a fisher-price rocking horse there as well as the other 2 items! The AWESOME thing is, Vance and I were going to buy all of those items for his birthday, but since they were purchased from Goodwill we now have money to spend on other items! Especially shoes, since he's walking now!


Anyway, onto the reason for the title of this blog. I was also excited to check my e-mail to read my responses from what I posted on craigslist.org's Corpus Christi's site. Since I have been having little luck planning the ceremony in Port Aransas, I posted asking for help from those that live in Corpus and Port A.
I have receive more messages than I expected. All quite helpful.
Here are a few things that I have discovered through help from the locals...

1. Since the beaches are public, you don't have to have a permit to get married on one! HOWEVER, you can drive on ALL areas of the beach, which means that I might have someone drive through our ceremony and there's no way to stop them! What a nightmare!!!

2. To have the J.O.P perform the ceremony costs $100 + a tip. Awesome!!! Other officiants are charging $275 and up.

I have received decorating ideas from a floral designer who has retired her company but has worked with weddings in the past and had great decorating ideas. A few in which I had already thought of, but great ideas none-the-less.
She also gave a great suggestion for wedding party gifts.
Now, I don't believe in favors when it comes to weddings, but I do COMPLETELY agree with thank you gifts for the wedding party, including our parents.

I have had a few places suggested as far as where we will be staying.
I am waiting to hear back from one place that we may possibly be able to rent the entire thing for the 5 days we will be staying there and all of our guests can stay together. It has a patio with an inground pool, bbq pit and a few other good things.
Hopefully when she gets back to me it won't be too expensive. I'm hoping, since I'm talking about renting the entire thing, she'll give me some kind of break on the price. *crosses fingers*

Here's a picture of the BM dresses that will hopefully end the search.
We will find out Tuesday!
The dress



In this color


I want the moms to wear champagne dresses.

A few decoration ideas that I like.


I know, I know... a picture from a movie. So cliche! I love the color scheme of the flowers, white and yellow!


I LOVED the look of the starfish around the cake, then thought of the fact that they're dead and, well, I started to feel sick.


I love the tropical flowers and color scheme (white cake, orange flowers)



A few "chuppah's"/arches that I like. I would prefer mainyl sheer aqua fabric with maybe some splashes or yellow or coral.



I like this idea, but I'm not too sure how great it would work out for a public beach.



Invitations that I like...



I like her hair, very simple yet pretty. I will continue looking though, this is just one idea.




I LOVE this cake!!! So simple, since the ceremony will be small and simple, yet still so beautiful!



More starfish...



I LOVE this ring pillow!


Possible wedding cake for the reception. I think it's GORGEOUS!




Well, I'm going to go now... need to go spend time with Miles.

Julia's Baby Shower

I have pictures!!!

It was awesome, at least I thought so. I even created a slideshow for her that had a picture of her as a baby, Jeffrey as a baby, Emma's sonogram pictures, quotes about babies/motherhood and then quotes from those that love her.
I even created a scrapbook that had the same contents so that she could look back on it.
It sucked... I couldn't find software that didn't suck when it came to burning the slideshow onto DVD. The scrapbook had a slot for the DVD, but in the end there wasn't a DVD!

Anyway, onto pictures.

Her Favors... yes, these were created by hand.










Now, onto the shower




































































Now, time for a few of my favorite little man!