Hello my name is Heather and I am a DIY bride and my self proclaimed theme is rustic shabby chic! I only share some of my pages (because of the FI's prying eyes!) so if you would like to see more and you are an active PW member just add me as a friend!

XOXO

It all started when I started hanging out with my best friend Ryan when home from breaks from college. We would go out to parties together and be inseparable every minute I had when I was home, which was easy since she was my next door neighbor. After a half a year or so of partying and meeting new people, I was shoping around for a new boy friend after being in such a recent horrible relationship. Meeting people was never hard with all of our social gatherings at bars, but no one really seemed like something long term so I kept on moving along, thinking maybe this is what I need to do for myself. I was after all recently leaving another long term relationship that had followed a 4 year relationship in high school, so this was my first single time in about 8 years!

The following winter in 2010 Ryan and I were out and about when I was visiting home from college, like usual, and we met two guys later in the night but we had to leave so I didnt remember much about them. Thanks to the wonders of the internet and facebook, that next morning I found two friend requests in my inbox, the boys! Anthony and Hunter were their names. Hunter casually left a message on my wall saying did I get home alright and we should go out again some time, me being used to the guys Ive  been meeting lately didnt think much of it at the time and that was the end of that.

Fast forward a month or so and I was talking to Ryan about coming home next weekend to celebrate my birthday and she mentions she has a new boy toy that keeps calling her, it was Anthony. I wont go into their story but to make it short they are dating and it all started while I was at school. Next thing I knew I was coming up home every weekend to see Ryan and her new boyfriend Anthony. They slowly started suggesting guys for me and I refused, I was used to being single and I liked it at the time. Then they got around to Hunter, always mentioning him and asking him to come out to see me and saying "hes perfect for you Heather! Your like the same person!". Eventually we saw each other on a weekend I was home and then the next week I got a private face book message asking for my phone number and what time I would be back in town. That friday we were going to a friends bon fire and I was going to follow Hunter on the way there. I started driving there and whos right in front of me, Hunter! I started texting him (bad idea while driving) to see if it was him and he stopped so I almost rear ended him! We stopped at the next gas station and then we were off to the bon fire.

After that night things were a natural progression. We started texting everyday when I was at school, living for the weekends where we could see each other but I still didnt really want a relationship so I never let him have any idea I liked him. Then school was over in May, I graduated and moved back home. We started hanging out with the group of friends a little more and one night we were talking about relationships, I said I want nothing to do with a relationship right now and then a little later Hunter decided to go home and we went out to the bar. Next thing we knew Anthony was getting a call from Hunter that he was pulled over. Naturally caring I asked is he ok whats wrong!? And then it hit me, there was no hiding it, I like him, a lot. Then next thing we new we were together every day after he finished work. Only a week after I had moved back from school to home he asked me to be his girl friend. Quickly that like turned into an "I love you"  that was on the tip of our tounges, but we both waited to start with that four letter word untill we were further in the relationship. The next thing I knew we were planning for the future together, and I knew he was the one I wanted to be with forever. Now that we have been riding buddies, video game components, camping partners, wheeling pilot and co pilot, music junkies, drinking allies, and best friends for over a year and a half, I couldnt be happier that we are engaged! He is everything to me and I cant wait to start my life with him!

Hunter and I got Engaged on my family vacation to the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. Its not much of a story but we were alone on the deck when the sun was setting and he asked me to come talk to him. I was confused and just said ok, we went outside and I was taking pictures of the view, oblivious to what was about to happen.

Funny thing is that I had just bought champagne with my mom at the grocery not even knowing what was about to happen! Then he asked me as we were talking, said how much he loved me, and the first thing I said was, "Are you serious?" ha. I always had a feeling it was coming, I just didnt know when or this soon! He replied yes, and I answered yes!

The Ring

I love it! Its a princess cluster of four diamonds  with diamonds surrounding it and on the sides. Its perfect because I didnt want anything too gaudy or flashy, im not much of a jewlery person. He had been planing to get it and was gone a few extra Saturdays before to pick it up, his sister looked for rings at Macy's in Chicago and this is the one he picked! Everyone that sees it asks if its an antique, which it isnt! I love the sides! Very different! I might have to go to get a specialty band so it wont cover it up, still undecided.

Here come the....

BRIDESMAIDS!

Maid of Honor:

Jill

                 and I met when I lived in southern Illinois near St.Louis about in 3rd grade and have been good friends ever since. We got even closer through the distance when I moved in Highschool but when I went back to college only a half an hour away from her we got to see eachother more! I can call her whenever I need and when we meet up after months its like we never left eachother, shes truley my best friend!

Bridesmaids:

Ryan

                     and I new eachother in Highschool but we never really hung out much, we were in two different crowds. She and I lived right accross the street from eachother so we knew eachother simply as neighboors. Then when I came back from school one summer we started to hit it off and hang out more, before long we were inseperable! She's the girl who introduced me to my FI!! Love her to death! Another best friend!

Brittani

                                is here with her hubby Dean, which is my FI's best man! Brittani and I met a little before I started dating Hunter through mutual friends when we were going to his dirt bike race. We have been on trips camping and canoeing many times as well as grilling and drinking on Friday or Saturday nights! We have become great friends and I love them both so much, shes another one of my great friends!

Megan

                          is Ryans older sister, so the same story sort of applies here as well. I didnt hang out in the same crowds so I knew Megan but never really hung out with her. Shes actually the person that got me drunk for the first time before I left for college (parents insisted i knew before I left, long story lol) but before then I was actually afraid of her! Now we are great friends and she has two beautiful daughters Taylor(3) and Leah(1).

Emily

                           with her husband Chris. Emily is my cousin and we have always been close but in the recent years we have become closer! Shes one of my favortie cousins and I always have a blast with her! She will be the life of the party for sure. She has a son Melachi, and two daughters Rory (2) and Quin (newborn).

Ring Bearer and Flower Girls:

(not pictured for saftey reasons)

Ring Bearer:

Melachi

                                      is my Bridesmaid Emilys son! He is very polite and an all around nice kid. Enjoys riding dirt bikes and plays tackle football! He is very fond of my brother and Hunter my FI as well!

Flower Girl:

Rory

                             is my bridesmaid Emily's daughter. She is so cute and has red hair, like me, which I like for the flower girl. Since she will be only 3 by the time of the wedding, she will walk down the isle with her brother Melachi. This little girl has a lot of spunk which I love!

Bridesmaid Fitting Gifts!!

Since most of my bridesmaids are coming from somewhere or getting off work next Saturday to see my dress and pick out their bridemaid dresses, I thought it would be nice of me to get them a little gift for their time!

The theme is So sweet of you to come! and Ill have a candle, anti-bacterial, and a ring pop in a little bag with green, brown, or orange ribbon with a little leaf and the saying.

Here are some pics!!

Bags were from Party City, matches my fall theme and colors! Filling was from dollar tree and I plan on getting some nicer ribbon (couldnt find any) from hobby lobby!

Cost : $3.00

 All of these items were from Bath and Body Works. I got 3 for $5 candles in Homade cookies scent which is delicious! Then I got 5 for $5 anti-bacterial gel in Island Nectar which I thought was a good scent! I also got the holders that were each $.50 in a matching color to the bottles!

      Cost : $18.00

Ring pops for something sweet to eat and for the engagement!

                                                                                                                        &nb sp;      Cost : $4.00

I also need ribbons in either bright green, orange, or chocolate brown!

UPDATE! Got the ribbon, they were 50% off at hobby lobby! 

 Cost : $3.00

I hope they'll turn out cute with the ribbons and saying!!

UPDATE! Finished them up just in time for my fitting this weekend! Here's the finished product all for around 30 bucks!

 The tags ended up just saying thank you!

Cant wait for them to get their goodies! I also made one for my mother in law, sister in law, and my attendant at Davids!

Total : $28.00

So I originally wanted to do colors that went with fall. I wanted orange and dark brown, with splashes of bright green but the more I saw it and looked at it, I didnt like it. So I decided to go with something brighter! Im going to be staying with the dark brown color with off white and nudes to accent it. I think this will look more simplistic and less busy than my original colors. So here are some ideas of the shades I will be working with!!

So I had an appointment on Saturday at 10 a.m. at David's Bridal. I ignored what some other brides had told me about bad service, seeing that I had an awesome attendent the last time I was in. This trip, not so much. My attendent dealing with my wedding was out on medical leave so I got another, first when we came in she had none of the dresses I already picked at the previous visit (in their computers) out and ready which didn't affect me much untill she was taking 20 mins at a time to locate them. I had an hour appointment with my maids app. following an hour later, so we were late to start their appointments. Again which was fine with me untill she tells us we were running out of time to find their dresses.

Fast forward to their fitting, I gave some ideas I liked for them to try, saying in the begining I wanted brown or in their color called "truffle". We tried some on and the girls weren't liking any of the fits so we started trying on some other styles which seemed to make her upset that I was straying away from the ones I picked which was because they weren't liked by my bridesmaids. Again I brushed it off it doesn't take a little thing like that to make me upset. Then we all found a dress that was perfect, it was around 11:30 at that time so we had 30 mins to spare. But since we found it on the clerance rack there wasn't a guarentee it was going to be in all the maids sizes. We wanted to investigate more where we could get these dresses but she kept on saying to us, "it would take her a lot of time to try and call the ones it listed on the computer" which I'm sure it would but didn't we want them? Since it seemed to me she was too lazy to try and help her customers we tried some more dresses, this is when she made me come with and bring the dresses to our bridemaids, I'm all about helping but she seemed like she didn't want to do any work for us. Earlier she was complaining about how the hangers were hurting her arms because of the way she was holding them which I think is the reason she made me take them. She was also very short with my mother, mother in law and sister in law who came not even listening to what they had to say or suggest, interupting what they were saying often.

But the last straw came later. I already determined by the end of this visit I wanted to wait to purchase my dress with a different attendent because I didn't want her to get the comission. We all found a dress everyone loved, that was flattering and fit my rustic theme (its hard to find a dress that goes with boots!) And we were finished! Everyone was satisfied and she took all our sizes down and even gave me a brown swatch to take home of the color we would be getting and we left thinking we had found it! About an hour or so after we arrived home (3 hours after we left with travel and lunch) we get a call. I didn't want to answer so I left it for the answering machine. It was our attendent, the dress we picked and loved didn't come in any shade close to brown! All of our time was wasted and my MOH bought a plane ticket to be there for nothing! I was so dissapointed! Now I'm back to square one! If you ever go to David's bride beware! YOU need to check all the bits of info yourself so this doesn't happen to you, I'm so upset we have to do this again and it looks bad on me that I have to get my maids all together again.

From another bride to be, make sure you are careful!

So, I picked up my dress on Sunday!! Im so excited to wear it on my wedding day! I love it, its just perfect... And puts a smile on my face!

I also signed and put the first deposit on the venue!! Here are some picture of the place we chose!

Inside the barn:

Ceremony spot:

Outside of Barn:

And we are staying in the houses that are there after the reception! They are gorgeous! Because I wanted to get married in the grass not in the gazebo that they have (too traditional for me) we had to rent the house next to it which can be divided into halves so I can get ready on one side and the FI and his best men can get ready on the other with a pool table and bar in the basement (lucky!).

I dont have any pictures of those but im sure there will be pro pics taken in there while getting ready as well as friends and family. Im so excited and we are getting so close!! 10 more months! I have a feeling its going to fly by!

Heather

XOX

Here are my inspiration for the flower girl dress, yes tutus!! I love them, they look very fairie-esque and I love it! also reminds me of my dress a tad! Here are some pics and where I could get them, etsy is a great spot but its a bit pricey! I wonder if this could be a DIY project for me?!

http://allabouttots.com/

http://www.etsy.com/shop/BellaBeanCouture

So cute!!!!! Any one make this themselves?? I think I might be more excited about this dress now than my own haha!

XOX

Heather

What is a Haul?

So a Haul is when you share things you buy on a recent trip to the store. I did these a lot when I had my make up youtube channel, you just press record and talk about the goodies you got or sales you encountered! Its fun! So I thought I would share my love and knowledge of hauling with the PW world! I thought we could use this a lot since I know I am always picking up things to be used!!

So my mom and I went to talk to the caterer to make sure our date would be available next year and he said that since my venue gives him about 90% of his wedding customers he automatically writes those in the book and we have first priority! AWESOME! So since he was busy with the holidays coming up we agreed to meet again sometime in the beginning of next year so that part it partially done, but I cant officially check it off my list!

Then we decided to go to lunch, I wanted salad so we thought of Olive Garden, mmmm! :) We have been there 2 other times for salad and soup after wedding adventures (it might be becoming a tradition!). Then we decided to look at Michaels before we walked in they had fake fall flower arangements for 90% off!! So I grabbed some to play with to decide what I want to have for the wedding! We also got some stamps on sale for 40% off which was awesome! I got a mason jar one which I LOVE I think I might use it for the STDs which need to get done ASAP. We also got a stamp for the candy bar bags! Here are some pictures!!

This is my collection started in the dinning room! Picture frames I got from Walmart (packs of 6 for $5 on clearance!) for centerpieces throughout and the pales were from Target in the dollar section! I took all the silver ones the had when I saw them haha Flowers were the ones from Michaels, some were just $0.19!!

Budget Bride Tip!

Go to resale shops like Goodwill, Salvation Army, or any Thrift store to look for glassware, baskets, or any other extras for your wedding. You will be surprised what you find, and you will LOVE the price!!

Then talking about the candy bar we went into Goodwill and looked for some glass containers for the candy. I found 4 of them and they were are $1.99!!! Awesome deal!!

This one I dont have a use for (yet!) but I couldnt leave with out it! Even more so because of the price! I love the cow detail on the front of the bottle! It says Absolutely Pure Milk and made in Italy on the bottom, so cool!

So theres my first haul! Hope you enjoyed!!!

XOX

Heather

Here is my design I came up with for the save the dates (sorry not a fan of the acronym lol). I got the mason jar stamp at Michaels then stamped and scanned it into my computer then I added text in paint! This is what it turned out as:

Then since the letters were a little bolder than the stamp I decided to take the file into picnik and edit it. I made it softened and then also changed the color with the sepia effect. Here they are finished!

Im going to get them printed on cardstock at a printing store and have 4 on a page. Then cut them all out and put some string or twine on them. If that ends up being cheaper than expected I might get some magnet stickers to put on the back of them and they can turn into magnets! I thought they turned out pretty good so far! I got the inspiration from different ideas online then took my own ideas and moved from there! More pictures to come!

XOX

Heather

So here are the dresses we got for my bridesmaids, if you ever read my other post about my whole ordeal at Davids they didn't make it easy to get these let alone a bridesmaid dress in general! So this is what we have as a matching base to work with for all of the girls. Cost 63$ each with shipping and tax!!

It is in this color as well. So with the dresses done and purchased my idea to make them all a little different because I hate the matchy matchy look (too traditional, and DONE for me) so I'm going to have them wear cardigans in any style or color they want! Any color excluding pink, blue, and bright green that is since it wont go with the fall colors. I am also going to have them wear boots, ankle boots, or wedges in different styles too. What ever they are comfortable walking in on the grass. So I'm hoping it will all come together and look something like these pictures.

And then the boys are wearing "suits" and when I say "suits" I mean they aren't wearing suits haha. They will be wearing khakis or any brown color pants they have, a off white button down and brown suspenders with white converse. My fi hasn't decided if he wants ties or bow ties, but he knows he wants newsboys caps for sure! Here are some pics of that too!

Fi will wear a vest, he already has one from a previous wedding he was standing in.Then for the reception and more pictures the boys will have tuxedo t shirts, something my fi always joked about getting married in but I think it will work for the reception!!

I'm so excited!! I hope the two look nice together. I know the two photograph well but I haven't seen it exactly like I want it yet in pictures!!

Heather

xox

Valentine's Mailbox!

Leave me a valentine in my mailbox!! Happy Valentine's day!!

X0X  Heather