Warrior State of Mind

So this weekend it might be inevitable that I end up in the hospital. I'm pretty much the most accident prone person I know and embarking on a 5k run with 11 obstacles, also known as WARRIOR DASH well, may not be the smartest idea. Hell, who said you have to be smart all the time?!

So indeed, I shall do Warrior Dash tomorrow in the lovely (I think) town of Mountain City, GA. About 30 of our friends are heading up towards the area and renting a cabin on Lake Burton. Tomorrow we will adorn ourselves in silly costumes and prepare ourselves for um, "battle" as they call it. This said battle includes a 5k run (about 3.2 miles) and then the obstacles below:

*Knee High Hell (through tires)
*Leap Frog (from one platform to another in water)
*Muddy Mayhem (through mud under barb wire)
*Warrior Roast (leap over fire)
*Junkyard Jam (jump over car)
*Warrior Wall (climb wall)
*Breathless Bog (crawl over logs in water)
*Cliffhanger (rappel down side of wall)

*Black Forest (no freaking idea!)
*Tunnel of Terror (crawl through big black tunnels)
*Cargo Climb (climb up cargo net)

God Help Me! I really am only doing it because I feel like I was peer pressured into it and well, because I want the viking helmet you get after finishing! Should be a totally good time. Here's to hoping that I don't have to visit the hospital this weekend and if I do, I hope it's for one damn good reason!

Check Photography Off the List!

We're only really responsible for a few big pieces of our wedding. Thankfully, where we are getting married handles about 85% of our items (ie: cake, flowers, design, food and alcohol)...the rest (ie: photography, music, invitations) is about all that is left. Well put a check mark to the left of photography because we finally decided on one!

I had set up five appointments in the Atlanta area with photographers that I found via recommendation or website/blog. I met with four and then questioned meeting with the fifth just because well, I was tired of asking the same questions and getting similar answers. I felt like they were all the same and didn't' know how to choose. I sure am happy I decided to meet with the fifth photographer that I booked appointments with cause well, we choose them!

Mike and I agreed on Scobey Photography! A husband and wife couple (Graham and Ashley) will be capturing our day. Not only are they awesome photographers with a great storytelling style...they're pretty cool to boot. Their website and photos from previous shoots won Mike over and helped sealed the deal on our decision. I knew that getting along with the photographer was important and when I left the meeting, Graham said "Even if you don't book with us, we should all get pizza sometime, you sound like the kind of people we want to hang out with!" That might have won me over before I even showed Mike their website/blog.

So Graham and Ashley, if you're reading this....I think we'll take you up on that pizza deal and good news, you get to hang out with us ALL day/night on April 30, 2011! Prepare yourself!

Friday Favorites: Favorite Fried Green Tomatoes!

My Friday Favorite is a little early this week!

You know you're from the South when you CRAVE Fried Green Tomatoes (FGT)! I mean I've been craving these bad boys for at least a week now...and NO, I'm not pregnant! If I'm out at a restaurant and the menu claims they have FGT, you best bet I'm ordering them! I do have a favorite and I'm very partial to the ones at JCT Kitchen. This place is awesome without the FGT, but lets be honest...it is so much better because they have them...and on a sandwich to boot! If you're not a tomato lover, cause I'm not, you have to give these things a try! In fact, I might have to go find some for lunch today!

What's your favorite fried food?

Coming Together Nicely...With a Pretty White Bow and All!

Most girls dream about their wedding day for some time before it actually happens. I'm one of those girls. I've been in love with these colors, flowers, design, music and venue type since I can remember. Thankfully, my fiance is in agreement on almost all of this! Here's a little glimpse of what our big day will look like!

After visiting a few locations for our wedding, we have decided to get married at Flint Hill. It is a gorgeous antebellum home built in 1835 with southern charm. Flint Hill is located in historic Norcross, GA, just minutes from Atlanta. Our ceremony will take place under the gorgeous cherry tree and lights out on the back patio and we'll bring it on inside for a night of dancing and fun!

As far as our color palette goes, we're going with a modern yet classy look with a 'spiced wine and kiwi' combination with slate grey accents. I love the thought of darker colors with a bright pop so this color combo will work perfect with my, I mean our, vision! So far it's been fairly painless to find stuff to fit this color palette!

Our design and 'theme' if you will is Fleur de Lis. I've always been a fan of this emblem and Mike has a tie back to New Orleans so it seemed to fit us to have this as part of the design. It's kind of ironic that our color palette screams Mardi Gras and so does our design, yet um, that wasn't what we were going for!

For flowers and band, well, you'll have to check back. I've got a few things up my sleeve! If all sticks to the plan, it's going to be nothing short of amazing!

I said YES to the dress!

I didn't make the trip to Kleinfelds for the adorably hilarious and sometimes inspiring show "Say Yes to the Dress" but lemme tell you a little something...I said YES! to my dress right here in Atlanta and it is PERFECT!

I am a lucky girl in many ways. For this, I'm lucky to have a friend who happens to have a friend who has a nice connection to Anne Barge, a well known Atlanta bridal gown designer. I was able to have a private appointment at the Anne Barge wholesale location where I got to try on about 9-10 (more if I wanted) dresses and have my own version of the show. There to help was my Mom, Kerri, Danialle and Stephanie (all part of my wedding) and Stephanie's mom, Beth. It was by unanimous vote that the dress I chose was, "THE ONE!"

Clearly I can't show you pictures of what my dress looks like on here, but I can tell you that it is awesome and exactly what I wanted. Best part of the whole thing...I came in under budget. A whole $1.00 under budget and yes, my daddy (thank you mom and dad for my dress!) was very, very excited to hear the words "under budget" especially when it comes to a wedding dress.

So check that off the list of things to do! We're moving at rapid speed! Next April will be here before we know it and I can't wait!!

The Most Awesome Vacation Ever!

Our trip to Las Vegas this year will forever be in memory. It will be remembered as my last trip as a 'single' lady with a boyfriend as well as my first trip as an engaged lady with a fiance! Crazy how those two things can encompass one trip, but well, it did. So here's how it all went down!

My girlfriend, Kerri, and I hit up Jimmy Buffett with a few other friends Tuesday night to start the week off right. We sang, danced, drank and froze our little booties off! My alarm went off shortly after 5:30am on Wednesday (ouch!) and I finished packing up and made my way to the ATL airport where I would fly first class (yay) to Las Vegas. Three screwdrivers, a diet coke and about an hour nap later I arrived in Sin City. Mike wasn't due to get in til about 3pm that day so I hung out with his parents, who by the way rock, did a little shopping and took a nap. Mike finally arrived at the Marriott around 5pm with his rental car (mind you I thought we were taking his sisters car on our trip to Zion) but not just any rental car...a Lotus Elise! We took that bad boy for a spin up and down the strip and then headed to P.F. Changs for an early dinner.

Thursday we got up early and packed the Lotus (with what little trunk space it had) and headed on out to Zion National Park, about a 2 hour drive from Las Vegas. The drive was gorgeous and Mike was quieter than usual, none the less, a good drive and went by pretty quick. We arrived around 11am in Zion and stopped for lunch at SwitchBack Jacks Sports Bar. I knew something was up when Mike ordered a sandwich and only ate 2 bites because he said stomach was in knots and didn't feel well (little did he know that I was on to him)! We headed out to hike shortly after lunch. The hike to Angels Landing is about 5 miles (2.5 miles in and 2.5 miles out). The first 2 miles took us just shy of 45 minutes where we reached a landing before cruising on up to the main point of Angels Landing. I made it about another 100 yards before I had a panic attack and threw a hissy fit and wanted to get down. It was BEYOND scary. There are only chain link hand rails to hold on to at this point and another .5 miles of straight up and down hills...needless to say, I didn't make it! Lucky for me, Mike figured before we went that I wouldn't be able to do it (nice of him huh?!) so he planned to hike to the West Rim, about a .25 mile to the west of Angels Landing for the same view and "perfect spot". It was there that Mike got on one knee and told me something along the lines of "I love you and every day with you is amazing....will you marry me?" to which I don't even know if I actually said Yes, I just remember hugging and taking the ring and saying "it's beautiful!" Thankfully, a lady showed up and was able to capture a shot of us just after we got engaged...what's crazy is, we never saw her again (there is only one way in and one way out of this place...creepy huh?). We stayed up on West Rim for a few moments, captured a few pictures and enjoyed our first minutes of being engaged. We headed down through Walters Wiggle, Refrigerator Canyon and back out the trail where we checked into our room and ran off to make a few phone calls in town seeing as we didn't have cell phone service right in Zion National Park. Dinner that night was at Parallel 88 which was by far, the best food/dinner we have EVER had. It was a six course meal prepared just for us with delicious wine and an awesome chef to boot! It was a perfect ending to an amazingly perfect day. Mike went above and beyond to make our proposal so memorable and fantastic. I have truly lucked out with one amazing guy.

We headed back to Las Vegas on Friday morning where his family had a champagne happy hour for us and we got to enjoy being one whole Morris/Clarke clan. Later that night, Mike's sister, Melissa and her husband, Jack and the two of us went to dinner at Cabo Wabo (which by the way charges $8 for a freaking bottled beer and $4 for a soda) and then hit up Napoleon's dueling piano bar in Paris casino for a dang good time! The rest of the weekend was filled with some gambling, pool time, a great dinner at Mastro's Ocean Club and seeing PeepShow at Planet Hollywood starring Holly Madison (sidenote: Holly Madison is much less good looking in person and she will make you feel good about yourself after you see her!). Our awesome weekend came to an end on Sunday when we had to head back home to Atlanta for the wedding planning and back to reality time to begin.

So here's to the next 361 days of planning and fun and I think I can speak for both Mike and I that we can't wait for April 30, 2011 to get here!! You can read about us, our life and our wedding here: http://evansmorris.ourwedding.com/