The DIY in Me

This is basically a bragging post on myself. hehe. (Get ready for photo overload.)

One of the major headaches of a wedding, I think, is choosing the perfect wedding invitation. I really struggled trying to find perfect stationary at the right price. And because "perfect" is hard to come by and everything I loved was way out of my price range (go figure), I took it upon myself to design our own wedding invitations. (Side note: A lot of my decision stemmed from my invitation-envy I got when I received my girlfriend Sheena's invite a year before... she did an amazing job on hers!) I must have designed 5 different invites before I was completely satisfied. I started with striped, evolved to bubbles, and ended up with swirls as my vision for our wedding slowly transformed into a whimsical, romantic wedding theme. Figured I'd share the finished product now that our wedding is over and the invitees have already received them...

I also found some pieces of the bubble invites I did. I was initially inspired by this photo...

Which led me to these invites...

Pretty cute, huh?

Then after the invitations were shipped I got a little carried away with DIYing. And I ended up creating our own guestbook, table number cards, escort wine bottles, seating cards, stickers for our cookie boxes and a sign for the cookie table! Ha! ... I think that's all?

Luckily the photographer was able to capture most of that stuff!

I went with a unique idea for a guestbook... along with our engraved photo frame, we did Madlibs! And I got some pretty interesting submissions! LOL

I made the table numbers match all of the stationary.

My wine bottle idea was a pretty big hit! I used magnum wine bottles instead of individual escort cards. They were placed on a round table so guests just walked around until they found their name and table. A few guests left with their bottles as keepsakes.

When they got to their table inside, this is what their place card looked like.

Of course my family understood why there was a cookie table at our wedding, but majority of our guests didn't so I have a little sign that explain the significance to our ode to Pittsburgh.

And I couldn't find a close-up of the cookie box stickers but they said "Sweet Dreams, Love, Danielle and Michael" on them! :)

I've always had a passion for event planning but finally getting to plan one and be involved in the details of a wedding really helped me turn my dreams/ideas into reality! I've been researching into getting certified in event planning... and hoping some of my friends get hitched soon so I can design their wedding invitations!!

I love a good live singer...

I dragged Michael up to Orlando with me on Tuesday for the Sara Bareilles concert at the House of Blues. I saw her in Atlanta last year with some of my girls and all of us were blown away at how amazing she is live. The girl can sing! I was a fan before but after that concert I kind of grew into super fan. Not to mention her stage presence and personality made me wanna be her new BFF. You know those celebrities you see on television doing interviews and you say to yourself, "I could totally be friends with them..." yeah, she's one of those people.

One of my most favoritist songs of her's (and I think everyone elses too) is "Gravity" and my fav part of the song towards the end when she just belts out the most amazing note ever is goosebump worthy. It gives you the chills. Hearing this live is just amazing. It never get's old. My video isn't the clearest but you can kinda get what I'm saying.

Here's a few more pictures too:

Poor Michael, I made him stand in line for over an hour before the concert with me so we could get a good spot because it was general admission and no seats. Thanks for being a good sport babe!

Opening song

♥

Being her rad self.

Highlight of the night was during the encore when she sang "Kaleidoscope Heart"

If you ever have the opportunity to see her in concert, it's worth every penny. Pinky promise.

P.S. As I blog this I'm listening to her music... and I just heard MB quietly singing along in the kitchen. Even he's a fan. But don't tell.

Meet Brinks

Everyone meet Brinks and witness in my pathetic attempt to convince Michael that I NEED a big dog. I love my little chi-chis but I can't rough-house with them. And they tire after we walk one block. And I'm home alone a lot during the day. And, And, And... With Brinks by my side we'd have no worries now would we.

Shame. I've already named my imaginary rottie.

I don't even really want a rottie. I'd much rather get a bernese mountain dog or a great dane but Michael loves rottweilers so I'm trying to meet in the middle.

We'll see where my begging and pleading gets me. In the meantime our best friends are out of the country until January so we get to foster their rottie on and off for awhile. Sigh...

☮ Out

Farewell Bobby

This was my first year being a Braves fan and who knows if I'll be one next year or not... no, I'm not fair-weather I just follow a friend who plays in the ML. But I have to say, rookie fan or not, I got pretty emotional during Bobby Cox's press conference after the game.

He's a pretty cute old man I think! That's just my personal opinion. And I loved to see him get all fired up on a bad call. Old men are notorious for being grumpy so every time I saw him get on an umpire it kind of reminded me of my Papa D'Itri. There are some strange similarities there so maybe that's another reason he warmed up to me pretty quick this year!

Anyways, congrats on a wonderful career Mr. Cox. Apparently you've been a pretty big deal. Mad respect.

My apologies...

I know it seems as though I'm a horrible blogger because I seldomly update but you have to excuse me. I promise I've had good reasons. I managed to plan a wedding, house hunt in Florida, move to Florida and get married (in Georgia) all within a way too short period of time. AND didn't loose my cool, pull my hair out or bite my nails off!

So now seeing as I'm a married woman now living with my hubby in Dade City, FL a long way from the fantastic distractions of the Atlanta lifestyle I think it's going to be a lot easier to blog.

As I said, we did move. Left the countryside of Newnan and traded it for the countryside of Dade City. I must say, it was a pretty good trade. Although I miss all of our land, being able to see MB ride on the tracks just through the living room window and all the privacy... being on a super nice golf course in a smaller more manageable home isn't to shabby!

Goodbye Newnan...

Hello Dade City...

More pics to come! And if anyone's interested the Newnan house it is still for sale!! We're going to miss that house so much. It was pretty badass.