Friday Favorites : Things to do in Atlanta on Friday Nights!

Fernbank : Martini and Imax Who says a museum needs to be quiet? Enjoy cool cocktails, stunning films, live music or a DJ, and creative cuisine beneath the world’s largest dinosaurs, Fridays (January through November) from 6:30 p.m. to 11 p.m. Tickets are pretty cheap and worth the price $12 for adults, $11 for students and seniors and $7 for members.

Starlight Six Drive-In : Who doesn't love a drive-in movie! What a great way to spend the night and you get 2 for the price of one! Get your lawn chair ready, pack a snack or picnic and a bottle of wine and enjoy! Movies of all genres and age levels. Starlight is open 7 nights per week, 364 days a year!General admission is $7 per person, children 3 to 9 years old are $1 each. 2 and under are free.

Atlanta Brewing Company : $8 for 8 beers and maybe more if you're lucky and they aren't taking tickets. You can chill, play corn hole, hang with your friends and even bring your pup. ABC is open from 5pm-8pm Wednesday - Friday and 2pm-5pm on Saturday. Great way to wind down a work with your friends and a perfect start to a fun night out!

9 Months to Go!

Today is exactly nine months til we say 'I Do'! OMG I could have a baby in that time.... Just playing, but no really, that's how long. about 40 more weeks til we're married, crazy huh?

I feel like things are under control. I don't think the word bridezilla has crossed mine or anyone I'm in the planning fun with so far. I've been much more even keeled than I or anyone else thought I'd be during this process...and yes...I realize there is still 274 days left for me to change, but I don't think I will.

I keep up with The Knot and as a good bride, keep up with my checklist of items to do! This month, well really 6-8 months out, there are 7 items to check off. I've got 1.5 of them done. According to them, I have until October 30 to complete these and I'm sure I will.

As you can see, that second one with the check mark is only 1/2 way done. Our engagement pictures came out good and we've picked our save the date (stay tuned for all that), we're just waiting for them to be printed so that we can go ahead and mail them out. Unlike a lot of brides and grooms, Mike and I are only sending these to family, out of town guests, bridal party and a few special friends that we feel would want/need them. Everyone else can check out our website for more information!

Next up, the check list below. We haven't even tackled one of these items yet and I feel like Mike's attire might be a challenge as we're not seeing eye to eye on this!

Let the games begin!

childhood haunts

Is there one thing that you always relate to a bad dream or bad time in your life? For me, they are thunderstorms.

When I was younger, a traumatic thing happened to my family. About this same time, I had gone off to Girl Scout camp (go ahead and laugh, you know you went too...). During one of my trips to camp, a tornado blew through our campsite and I found myself in a ditch, shaking, crying and fearing for my life. Up until recently, I associate bad storms with this memory and the rough time in my family's life.

So tonight, when I am home alone, as Mr. Mike is in Chicago on business, I think back to those moments and realize how much I've grown and matured. I used to sit in the corner and shake and cry when storms happened, now I can sit and watch them in awe, still not in love with them and wish someone was home with me, but at peace with what memories they bring and what they do for the ecosystem.

a day in the life of my office...

So my sole purpose at the office today was to shop. Yes, that's right...shop. Here was my shopping list:

-Beer
-Water

-Coke and Diet Coke

-Solo Cups

-Trash Bags

-Water Proof Cameras

-Super Soakers/Water toys

Here's what my cart looked like at Wal-Mart...I seriously got a cramp from pushing this cart and started sweating.
Post three trips to the store and lots of beer, water and water guns later, this is what the cart in my storage room looks like for our company event on Wednesday

Goodness gracious and God help the people working at Cool River Tubing come 11am...this could get outa hand!

Can't wait for our Engagement Party!!

The date is set, the theme has been picked, invitations sent and RSVP's are rolling in!

Our Engagement Party is something I've been looking forward to for quite some time now. As soon as we got engaged, okay probably before that even, I had picked out the theme and date that I thought would be perfect for our first 'hosted party' as an engaged couple. Graciously, my parents, brother & sister-in-law, Mike's parents and my sister-in-law's grandparents offered to host this event. It's being held on the final Saturday before the best time of year...FOOTBALL SEASON!
**A little back history here for you. Mike and I are football fanatics. We both LOVE college football and get very excited during the fall on Saturdays! Here's the breakdown of school love.

Melissa: University of Alabama

Mike: University of Georgia

My Parents: Florida State University

Mike's Parents: University of Florida

(are you sensing the hostility yet?)

My Brother and Sister-in-Law: University of Tennessee

Mike's Sister: University of Georgia
Mike's Brother-in-Law: Notre Dame

So needless to say, we're super excited about this party! It's going to be a fun, laid back kind of day. Kegs, food, good friends and family and even a pinata will be making an appearance. Can't wait to show off my koozies I ordered and the adorable other little favors we've picked up for the day!

So get your game face on, your favorite school colors (ROLL TIDE!) and head on over to celebrate the beginning of our wedding season!

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways...

When I got engaged, ok really when I started planning my wedding like 2 years before I was even engaged...I stumbled upon this AMAZING site, Etsy! This place is like Mecca for all things wanted/needed/desired. I mean they struck gold when they did this site.

There are so many talented vendors on here. I have purchased so many things already for our big day! Shout out to the vendors I've used so far for their awesome work and real quick turn around! I can share a few of the things I've purchased with you, but not others as they are gifts for my BM's!

**I got a great hair piece for the wedding, at first it wasn't the right color but I'm in love with the design and she's offered to make this for me in a darker ivory to match my dress...YAY! Jennypickle rocks!

(photo coutesy of etsy.com)

**I scored this AWESOME hanger from LilaFrances (still waiting on it to come in). I'll be using this to hang my wedding dress on (it'll say mrs. morris) for pictures and then put it in my shadow box I'm making!
(photo coutesy of etsy.com)

**We also ordered these great signs to be used at the wedding for photos and then later at our table (to sit on the back of our chairs). One side says "I Do / Me Too" the other says "Mr. / Mrs." OurHobbytoYourHome was able to make them in my Kiwi/Merlot colors! (photo coutesy of etsy.com)

**Instead of a wedding guest book, Mike and I will have a wishing tree! This great shop located in Colorado is going to be of help for us in this! Can't wait to see how it turns out!

(photo coutesy of etsy.com)

Now the next items are not off etsy.com but I'm SO excited about it I can't stand it. If you know me, you know I LOVE koozies! I think they are the best thing ever and I have so many of them I can't count! Of course when we got engaged, the first thing I did was look up koozies and how to get them! My mom wasn't so excited, but as you can see below, they turned out awesome! Can't wait to share them with everyone at the engagement party (which is only a mere month away..whoo!!!) Kustom Koozies is a great site if you're looking to get some made. They were so helpful and super quick with the order.

(photo courtesy of my blackberry)

Also, while checking out my GoogleReader today, I was checking out Bridal Bubbly and they had a great shot of the bridesmaids with the bride...and lookie here...these are the dresses we got for our wedding! It's so nice to see that my idea of all different dresses in the same color isn't THAT insane :) Can't wait to see my BM's in their dresses!

(photo courtesy of bridal bubbly)

Guest List Drama

If you were to ask my friends a few years ago what the size of my wedding and wedding party would be, they'd have said, "about 300 guests and probably 10 people on each side". My friends are crazy enough to even have started the "Melissa Evans best friends fan club" page on Facebook. My the times have changed.

My mom and I have been battling this 'Guest List' for weeks now. I keep saying I can't cut it anymore and she keeps saying that I have to add this person and that person. Mama Mia this is harder than I thought. While in fact, I do have a lot of friends, a good chunk of those will not be invited to our big day. I know that a few of them will be hurt and upset, but honestly, there isn't anything I can do. It's been the hardest part in the whole planning of the wedding. Our venue seats about 160 comfortably and right now our list is rounding out at 181. Now they say only plan for 70-80% of the people invited so that will give us about 128-145 people...big range huh!? With my luck, everyone will come and then we'll be wishing we'd have cut the list.

We're heading to our first of two appointments to look at wedding invitations today. I hope to not blow budget on these bad boys but I have some real unique and modern (yet traditional) ideas in mind. Here's to hoping I find something cool and we can get past this "Guest List" drama!

Happy Birthday, America!

One of my favorite holiday's of the year, 4th of July, just passed. I can't remember a 4th that I haven't been at the pool, lake or beach. This year I decided to switch it up and run the Peachtree Road Race AND hit up the lake.

I haven't been training for the Peachtree Road Race. A full 10k (6.2 miles) chock full of hills, tons of supporters, great music and lots of water stops. This race is the largest 10k in the world. Around 55,000 people run and another 3,000 volunteers make this race a great time and a 4th of July tradition in Atlanta. Still waiting for my "official" photos, but here is what it looks like at the start! My goal was to finish (remember, I haven't been running in months) in under 1.5 hours and well, I did that! I could have done better, but was pretty proud of myself.

We headed up to Lake Rabun (located in North GA) later that day to celebrate the 4th with good friends and family. The Campbell family welcomed all the crew up for the weekend, too bad we were only there Sunday and Monday! Here are some shots from the lake!

Mike and Todd on the Tube!
Watching Fireworks on the boat
Pretty Fireworks!
Jump, Mike, Jump!
Kyle, Kerri, Mike and I on the dock at the lake!

What did you do to celebrate?