A Look Into My Life

This has been the worst semester so far. It's been assignment after assignment and my anxiety has been through the roof. Needless to say, I cannot wait until break. These next two weeks are probably going to be the longest weeks of my life. As excited as I am for break, I might be even more excited about all the wedding things I get to do within the next two months. We are trying out food from a local caterer the Monday after break starts and I am getting all my bridesmaids together to shop for their bridesmaids' dresses after Thanksgiving. I am so excited.  I already have a dress picked out for them, but I want them to try it on and try on others to make sure they feel confident in the dress they buy. I'm not dead set on the one I picked out, but I wouldn't be mad if they all like it. It should be so much fun. The day we are shopping is exactly six months from the wedding day. It's unreal how fast it's coming up.  Not only am I excited to pick out the bridesmai...

I am probably the most indecisive person I know. I have the worst time making decisions and that has been one of the hardest parts of wedding planning. I double think every single thing and can never make solid decisions. Because of this, I am very glad I'm getting married in June and not sometime in 2022.  I have almost changed my mind four times on color schemes and have double thought my wedding dress. It always takes me a second, but I know I made the right decisions, and everything will come together on the day. Even though I know my decisions are the right ones, I work at a wedding venue and I always see new things that I love, and it makes me rethink everything. This year I am an intern for Crimson Lane Venue. I attend at least one wedding or styled shoot per month and see new ideas every time. Everything Crimson Lane does is very modern and different than what you see everywhere else. That is my style and it is not a good combination.  Anthony keeps me in check and let...

 I'm sure you all have noticed, one of the most important details of your wedding day is having a videographer to capture all the details of the day. I feel like having your wedding recorded is a new trend. It's a great trend but weddings are already expensive enough, why did we have to add another expensive thing.  Don't let me fool you, I do love the trend of videographers and I probably would have had one even if it wasn't a trend. But I can say, it is not cheap. This is probably why I've pushed it off for so long.  I tried to plan as much as possible before I came to school. I knew this semester would be busy and I didn't want to have to plan the whole thing while in my senior year of college. I was pretty successful, to be honest, but I couldn't find catering and videography in the short amount of time. It has been very hard to find them now because I am so busy now, but luckily, I think I found the right person to record our wedding.  Bethany, one of m...

I'll stop with the depressing blogs now and bring it back to the wedding planning. This past weekend I asked three more girls to be in my wedding party and it makes me even more excited to start on the fun wedding plans. Friday night I had dinner with an old friend from back home, her name is Bethany. Bethany and I have been friends for as long as I can remember. We used to hang out at our city pool together and tumble the whole time, then we ended up cheering together and I transferred to her high school, so we graduated together. Bethany has been one of the only people that have stayed in touch and makes time to hang out when I'm home. She is such a blessing to have as a friend and I'm so happy she said yes to be my bridesmaid. (She actually started crying when I asked her.) Then Sunday rolls around and I'm hanging out at Anthony's house with his family. What a perfect time to ask his sisters. His two sisters Averi, 16 and Lea, 20 both said yes to be my bridesmaid...

 I'm going to take a week to talk about something outside of the wedding planning. I want to talk about this semester and how draining it has been.  Coming into this semester I didn't think it would be much different than any other semester besides started early and ending early. Boy was I wrong. This semester has the worst semester I've had so far. It has been so mentally and physically draining. One assignment or exam after another and no breaks to take a day to breathe.  Although the semester is almost over, it still feels like the end is too far away. Our Christmas break is nearly two months this year and it is greatly needed. I will need this break to regroup and work to make some money for spring semester.  ONU just recently decided to cancel our spring break next semester and give us three days off throughout the semester. These three days won’t be enough I can assure that, but it will help a little bit compared to this semester. I wish COVID-19 was never a th...

 This week has been weird. I've been trying to get all the Save the Dates sent out like I blogged about a few weeks ago and this week was the week I was determined to do it. Well, that didn’t happen and I’ll tell you why. We all know men are the best at doing what you ask them to the first time. For example, I’ve asked Anthony for the addresses for his side of the guest list for at least a month now, and we just got them, yesterday. For those of you that may not know, Anthony is in pharmacy school and it’s nearly impossible to find a time to work on these things because he’s constantly studying. Which isn’t a bad thing, it’s just difficult.  The way his schooling is set up right now, he has one class for two or five weeks and has an exam once a week. Typically these exams are on Thursday, but this week it was on Tuesday. Because his exam was at the beginning of the week, he studied from Friday through Tuesday morning. The weekend would have been perfect to get it all taken car...

This past weekend was a fun one for me. I met my two best friends for dinner and walked out with my maid and matron of honor.  My mom always told me she wanted me to join a sorority in college because so many of the brides she worked with at her bridal store had their sorority sisters in their wedding. Well I joined a sorority, and majority of my bridal party are my sisters. Even more specifically, the two girls that will be standing next to me when I say I do, Emma and Ireland.  I met Ireland and Emma my sophomore year when I transferred to ONU. We cheer/cheered together, and we are a part of ZTA. I have searched my whole life for friends like Ireland and Emma and I couldn't be happier to have them in my life. I live with Emma now and Ireland graduated last spring and moved to Columbus, so I get to see her way more than when she lived in Defiance. We love to travel together and are known for our last-minute dinner and drinks to catch up. This is exactly what we did this weeke...

So far wedding planning has gone pretty smooth. We chose our venue just a couple weeks after we got engaged, we set up engagement pictures right away and I even met with the florist before we came back to school, but no one tells you how hard it is to make the guest list.  We have been sitting on a guest list for a while now and it just never seems right. Not to mention, we know too many people and are having a hard time keeping the number under 300. We don't know if inviting distant family members over college friends is better or visa versa. We don't know if we should send out just over 300 invitations because the odds of every single person coming is slim to none. There are so many questions and uncertainties when it comes to making this guest list. We want to make sure we are surrounded by people that love and support our relationship and each other and I never guessed it would be this hard.  We have truly been blessed with the most amazing people in our lives. Sometimes ...

Our first photo together I have been blogging about my upcoming wedding but I realize I never explained how Anthony and I met and how we got to where we are today. I want to take this week to explain our love story.  Anthony and I met when we were in high school; Anthony was a sophomore and I was a freshman. We didn't go to the same high school, but our schools were in the same league. I went to watch my brother play basketball at Anthony's school one night and I noticed a cute boy wearing number three playing against my brother. I asked my friend from his school who he was and she told me his name was Anthony McFadden. Naturally I tell my mom about this cute boy named Anthony and somehow she knows his aunt. So being the nosey mother she is, my mom tells his aunt I think he's cute. His aunt tells his mom and his mom tells him. A couple days later on Super Bowl Sunday, I saw a direct message on Instagram from Anthony. I guess you could say the rest is history.  I still have ...

As I talked about in my last blog, I went dress shopping this past weekend; well, kind of went dress shopping. I modeled for House of Wu and was hoping I would find my dress while I was working. My wish came true and I found the perfect dress! Because this was a pop-up type buying show, set up in a hotel conference room, there were no mirrors. I barely had a room to change in. When I would try on dresses for buyers I couldn't see what I looked like in them, but I still knew the moment I put on this dress it would be my wedding dress. I didn't have to look in a mirror to have the bridal feeling, but when I did, the feeling was amazing.  My best friend Emma ended up going to Columbus with me and helped me throughout the day. She saw me in the dresses before anyone else did. The moment she saw me in my dress, she started crying. I started laughing because I hadn't even seen the dress myself and she was already crying. Then I walked out to show everyone and the sales rep, who i...

As some of you may know, my mom has owned a dress store since I was nine-years-old. I've grown up looking at dresses and I've seen almost every dress ever created on this planet. It becomes VERY overwhelming when it's time for you to shop for yourself. I always compare it to someone asking you where you want to go eat, but telling you you can choose anywhere in the United States. I also have always felt I have to have the perfect dress because if I didn't, no one would want to shop at my mom's store.  Recently my mom sold her store but I still help run it for the new owner. My mom and I also still have good relationships with our sales reps. Because of these relationships, I get to continue modeling for House of Wu this upcoming weekend and it's doubling as shopping for my wedding dress. I really hope I can find my wedding dress with House of Wu, but if I don't find it this weekend, I will be flying down to Atlanta to shop with another designer.  I feel like...

As I talked about in my last blog, I got engaged this summer. I have the majority of it planned and ready to go, but I have to tell you, my favorite part has been bringing Anthony's world and mine together. If you've ever met Anthony and me, you know we are complete opposites. Anthony is a BIG country boy. He grew up in a small village called Bainbridge and it is in the middle of nowhere. This village is so small and country-like, hunting in the morning is an excuse to show up late to school. Me, on the other hand, I graduated from a city school and traveled to big cities with my mom to buy dresses for her bridal stores. Anthony is very quiet and I am not at all. I think, in our case, opposites attract though. We will be together for seven years come February and I couldn't have picked a better guy for me.  The venue we chose gives off some barn and woods vibes, but has fancy chandeliers and rock pillars that really make it more fancy. This gives it a good mix of our person...

  This summer was one I will remember forever.  Every year my boyfriend's family goes on a beach vacation around mid-July to Oak Island, NC. This year was like any other year; until Tuesday July 14th. We spend the week playing games, soaking up sun and eating homemade meals. It is such a nice break from the real world and it's my week to destress.  Then Tuesday night rolls around. Anthony's sister, Lea, asked me if I wanted to go to dinner with her and her friend. Of course, I say yes, and we head to the town over for dinner. While we're at dinner, we decide we are going to go to the new pier to take pictures during sunset. This whole time I thought we were just having a fun girl's night, but to my surprise it was actually a life changing night for Anthony and me.  We walk out under the pier for pictures and there is no sign of Anthony or his family. As we walk further towards the water, Anthony walks out from behind a pillar, under the pier. I was so surprised, but...