Nerves

So planning a wedding is always a little nuts, right? I think so. Even the most calm brides have moments with their mother, fiance, friends, bridesmaids, or something or someone isn't just perfect and its irritating or makes you fret. I am slowly excepting that fact, and I insist on not letting those little things ruin the big day.

Moving on and fast forwarding past the big day, my nerves are heading towards the actual marriage. It is not that I doubt future hubs, but it is more about doubting myself. I have days where I sit and wonder, am I ready for this? Am I going to be a good wife? How is it going to be living in the same city, let alone the same house as a man that I have been apart from for nearly two years...Am I going to be able to do all the wifey things that I think I need to do, am I going to have a cute house, am I going to make him happy, is my non-existent career ever going to appear among all of these things? In a nutshell, can I handle this?

The truth of the matter is that, I have no idea how all those things are going to pan out. I do not have a clue what the future holds for us, and I am treading water with my career or even what our new home will look like.

I think that the peace that comes from all these nerves is in something far bigger than my mind can actually conceive,because it is found in God. I think throughout this process, I have hit the highs and lows. I will say that the wedding planning is nuts, yes. But the planning for the marriage is even more crazy, because the fact is, as much as we try, life only goes so far in our plans, and the rest is up to the big man upstairs.

Everything happens for a reason. Why? I do not know. But I am slowly learning to rely on God and trusting that the paths and doorways that have opened and are opening for our soon to be family are the ones we are supposed to be taking.

Proverbs 3:5

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;

Wedding Thoughts

Hi All-

So after the reality of being slapped with floral costs..is addition to all the other costs that you grin and bear it through for a wedding, I began to think about weddings and the process of planning and paying for these weddings.

I then came to the conclusion, that the reception (of course, as we all know) is a giant party, in which we celebrate with those who are near and dear to us, and eat, drink, and be married. I love the thought of all of that, just not the cost. Especially for the girl, who 7 months ago or more, said to my own mother, I do not want to spend money on things like florals that do not last a long time, and then die 3 days later and we reap no long term benefit from it. Makes sense, right? It seems practical and rational and a good budget making decision. But after making seemingly budget conscious decisions throughout this process, getting the proposal from the florist knocked me off my feet. I only wanted a few pew markers, flowers at the alter, and then flowers as centerpieces...but oh how it adds up.

And I realized that I want these things, because 1. these flowers and centerpiece ideas that I have spent a lot of time on, I see as a reflection of me and my style, 2. I want to have a fabulous party, that is beautiful and that people will outwardly acknowledge is beautiful, 3. I only get to do this once, right? But the flowers have NOTHING, nada, zip, zlich, zero, goose egg to do with my future marriage. It is amazing how vain we all become or how materialistic in this whole process...

Which brings me to my real point, the point of the wedding ceremony is to be in communion with God and future hubs, and with the support of a community of believers around you, who are also vowing to make this long, hard journey called marriage a successful one for myself and future hubs. I love, desperately needing to cling on to that thought, kind of love the simplicity and pure beauty in all of that. So why, why do I find myself so drawn to wanting to spend thousands on flowers?! For the party of course, for all those silly reasons that I listed above. But while I do not know how the flower thing is going to work out, I need the gentle reminder, that this is NOT ABOUT FLOWERS, or cake, or matching tablecloths, or even gifts.

It is about love. So though I still don't have the answers to the questions in my head, I do need sometimes to have that gentle reminder that it is not all about the things in life.
I am looking forward to June 29th, 2013, with or without those mason jar florals. It will be the most beautiful day in my life to date. I am marrying a man who would do just about anything for me, my parents are paying for this fabulous event, and we have been able to invite many of our family members and good friends to witness this marriage, and also celebrate in a party.

Count you blessings, and know that its not about the wedding, its about the marriage.
<3

Baking!

Hi All!

Exciting news of the day... well I found out the other day really, but we got a GREEN kitchenaid mixer off our registry! YES! I am so excited... 1. It's green, 2. My mixer is on its way out... the noises it makes are seriously some of the weirdest things ever... my roommate I think is legitimately afraid of it, and I laugh so hard every time I use it, because she will back away.. every. time., 3. This new gift will fuel my new weekly baking addiction!

Tonight we decided to celebrate our Irish a little early, and bake a GREEN (see the common theme here?) cake... a Key Lime flavored cake!

The recipe can be found here:
http://heidibakes.blogspot.com/2012/02/trisha-yearwoods-key-lime-cake.html?m=1

It is currently in the oven, but smelling delicious! I can't wait to see how it turns out!

On that note, I do think anyone reads this blog, which is ok... but if for some reason I start getting readers, I may decide to post more recipes, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Well, because we have had some that turned out beautiful and tasty, those that were just nasty, and then those that were totally fine in taste, but err how should I say it.. lacked in beauty or finesse of baker... aka the ugly!

I am really excited about the things that I have now baked from scratch and I am pretty sure future hubs is pumped about this too! All his hard work loosing weight and working out might be ruined when we finally are living in the same town again, let alone under the same roof!

So here is to baking and enjoying all those calories!

:)

Traveling, FINALLY

Hi All-

Here is the weekend update!

I got to FINALLY see the future hubs this weekend, it had been 7 WEEKS, or 49 days since the last time I saw him! WHEW... when you love someone that much it seems like an eternity! But alas, we made it! And in his typical sweet and thoughtful fashion he gently reminded me as I pouted and cried on Thursday of last week when my flight was canceled and rescheduled for the following day (hence boo hooing because of tacking on one more day to the whole time apart thing...) that this was one of the last times we will have to do this before we are married! I think that we have 2 more visits scheduled between NOW and when we are MARRIED!! What? WHAT?!

That brightened my mood in an instant, and also made me more anxious for this time to be over. But patience is a virtue, and it is a lesson that I have become much better at learning over these past two years. The crazy "Winter Storm Q" through a loophole in our plans last week, and Kansas got almost a foot of snow and backed up the tiny airport. No worries, I got there on Friday like I said, though I was supposed to be there Thursday! As luck would have it, though I ended up getting an extra day out of the deal due to all the weather and so many changes in flights, so I was with future hubs for 4 solid days! WIN!

It really is the little things in life that count! We just enjoyed being together, seeing friends, cooking, a date night, a redbox rental, and threw a little premarital counseling in there, and it was magnificent!

:: Side note- if you are not getting married in a church (we are!) and there is no one requiring you to get premarital counseling, you should do it anyways. It it hard sometimes and nerve wracking, but it is SO SO helpful in figuring things out, putting important things into perspective, and for us centering our marriage on God. I really think its a great idea for everyone, and I can already see how it brings future hubs and I closer when we are there. End side note! ::

Since we are on the topic of perspective, I ran across an article today and it was GREAT for brides and putting things into perspective. Here it is:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/anne-almasy/resolution_1_b_2761883.html

Check it out!

That is all for now! Oh, that and I get to see him again is only a mere 21 days! How lucky am I?! And to top it all off we are having our first shower/party to kick off our wedding season! Hip hip hooray!

xoxo

There is a first time for everything!

So here it goes!

Ladies and gents, this is my first EVER blog post. I am not sure who will read this or why anyone would, since in all honesty I don't lead a very exciting life. But my thoughts were that I can at least document the important things, emotions, exciting events, trials, and all the things that mean something to me throughout this journey.

This so called journey, despite me having said that I don't lead a very exciting life, is actually been one of the most emotionally stressful and most uncertain times in my life. I am currently finishing up my Masters of Public Health, and graduating from K-State on May 17th, 2013. HOW CRAZY IS THAT, RIGHT? Especially since I never envisioned myself as a master's student. I always thought that I would be that girl working with cows in coveralls, happy as a clam, covered in manure, helping with a dystocia, or at least well on my way to being that girl right now. But as of now, I am not quite well on my way... I have applied to vet school twice, and not accepted both times. I have started to view this as not a "your not good enough" reason, because I can't stand for myself or anyone else to believe that they aren't good enough for their dreams, but instead I am choosing the view this a God's timing reason.

Everything has a place and time, and perhaps this isn't the time to start veterinary school, or perhaps it is not what I mean't to do with my life at all. Perhaps I am made for something bigger or different at least. All of these things, like having a master's in a program that I never really saw myself in, or not getting into vet school, and not knowing what type of jobs to take now, all of these equal some serious and stressful uncertainty.

But there is one thing I do know and that I am very certain about... I am getting married, yes MARRIED. June 29th, 2013 to be exact! Funny enough, I always considered myself Ms. I-N-D-E-P-E-N-D-E-N-T. I am that girl who likes to just be me, and I didn't ever feel like in order to be me I needed to have a boyfriend or someone that I depended on. But as God would have it, he taught me another swift lesson about what I think I know about myself and the world, and this boy rocked my world. I moved to Kansas in August of 2011, and moved very far away from my long time college boyfriend. I quickly learned that since I decided to head to Kansas, I was seriously missing someone who I thought seemingly I did need to rely on. As it turns out, relying on someone, like your future spouse, does not in fact make a weak person, or a weak women which is something us slight feminists would NEVER want to be perceived as. I have actually found that needing him and relying on him, though extremely tough at times since we are 1,000+ miles apart, makes me quite the opposite of weak. I feel stronger knowing that we can do this, if we can make it through my alligator tears on Skype, the canceled flights, the endless weeks apart, than we can handle just about anything if we are in it together. I have also found that this boy makes me stronger by being my number one, my rock, and encouragement. Without him, I would not be as self-confident of a woman that I am now. And silly me, even as we talked about getting engaged almost a year ago, I was hesitant  even though in my head I knew all these things about our relationship to be good and true..but I was so concerned with future plans, and vet school, and work, and converging two lives that I seemingly wanted to keep physically part through all my other crazy plans I was making in my head.

BAM! Wake up call, I did not need all those crazy plans, because as it turns out, those crazy plans were MY plans, not God's and now in hindsight (Why is it always 20/20?! GAH!) I see that by having a husband, a Godly man to rely on, that I have all I need right in this moment. He treats me as an equal, he allows me to pursue my dreams.. all the way to Kansas, he pushes me to better, and he helps me realize the person I need to be and want to become. As cliche as that sounds, I am convinced that real love, Godly love, and lasting marriages are birthed from people who have a relationship with these qualities. In no way are we perfect as individuals or as a couple, but it is a solid foundation to start our "forever" on.

So needless to say, between the uncertainty of work, school, future life plans, moving, graduating, and getting married, I am a slight basketcase a times... only fueled by my type A personality and excessive worrying tendencies. But when times like this arise, I just realize that I need to put a little more faith in God, and a little less time planning on out me and my life, because as evidenced, I have NO idea what is going on!

So my day in and day out  might not be the most exciting blog ever written, but I do want to bottle up and remember all these thoughts and feelings and be able to look back on this journey and laugh a little about how ridiculous it all was, but also count my blessings.

Dad is already fondly referring to this time as the "Kansas Years", for my eventual book he thinks I am going to write! HA!

To the Kansas years, and all that follow!

Cheers!
xoxo