Peace out, 2010! Hello 2011!

Well, 2010 has been a great year! Interesting, but great! In February, Jim proposed to me in front of a huge auditorium filled with people at his graduation (and I said yes!). Later in the spring, I got rid of 2 more of my 4 debts in collections, now I'm down to 1! Something also happened to Jim that was in his favor, but we fear that if I gloat, we will be jinxed, but those of you that know us well know what I'm talking about. That was a huge sigh of relief and a big help for us. In August, Alyssa started kindergarten (the BIG school, as she calls it).  In October, we bought our first home, along with our beautiful dining set that I'm madly in love with. I also gained another cat during that time. In November, I bought a different car (not completely thrilled over it, but it's an improvement over my damaged Jetta :( ). Later on, we find out the Kyle (who just started violin a couple months back) is being drafted into the advanced class. Also in November, I was offered a promotion at work. :) 


Some of the bummer things are: my back is still all jacked up from my accident, and I have developed constant tinnitus, which drives me INSANE! My parents are getting divorced, which is a good thing, but a bummer thing as well. I think it's harder dealing with it as an adult, but what do I know..?! Jim hasn't been able to find another job, but we're lucky we have jobs, and the one he's currently at isn't bad, it's just that he could have a nursing job right now instead, had there been any to apply for. His job pays well for what he does and he's lucky to have it (and he's good at what he does). My computer went suicidal and I lost all my pictures and all of the wedding stuff we'd worked so hard on. Yeah, that was a MAJOR bummer. 


I'd say it's been a good year. :) Much better than the couple of years before (aside from my graduating and us meeting). 2011 should be good, considering we're getting married in the middle of it! :)
 

Santa came!

Yes, Santa brings the animals presents too! 

That fat dude ate a ton of cookies! 

Christmas Cookies for Santa!

Look at how stiff this stuff is! 

The mixer was about to start smoking! 

I think Santa will like them. They're too cream cheesy for me, but they're pretty! 

The BLING!

Well....I've obviously had my ring for a while...and I have this posted in my planning bio, but I figured I might as well post in on here too. Hey, a girl's gotta show off her ice, right? :) 
I absolutely LOVE my ring! I had a little part in picking it out...I had picked out a couple that I liked and Jim got the one he said, "Made me glow." hehe It's a Princess Plus, and they are no longer available. They are really one-of-a-kind, no two are exactly alike. It has a diamond inside on the left side, to be placed on "the vein that leads straight to your heart." It is always sparkly and brilliant, even when it's not it's cleanest. This was my first attempt at working on getting a crisp, clear picture with my camera (which is smarter than I am). Of course, the pictures do not do this ring justice....it shines CONSTANTLY. <3

Holy 5 MONTHS, Batman!

Unbelievable! Time is going by WAY too fast! I did FINALLY get the guestbook done today...well...it's been done for a few days now, but I had to find a frame for the sign, and after printing it FIVE times, it finally fits without cutting off any words. All I need to find are some cute pens! I love how it turned out! :) 

Showing how a card will fit inside when a guests places it there. :)

The Fiskars blades are committing suicide!

Well, between all the cutting for the invitations and the guestbook...I've went through 3 blades...2 brand spankin' new! ARGH! They're not the cheapest thing in the world, and for some reason, Wal-Mart no longer carries them! At least not the one I just went to....so I guess I'll have to wait until I can get to Michael's to get more, but here's what I've got so far. 120 RSVPS are done...not sure on the rest...I had to toss a couple of the smallest ones as I cut words off by mistake. OOPS! I will need more paper, but I'm not even sure how many invitations to make right now. SIGH So tired of cutting....anyone else think that the Fiskars paper cutter cuts at a slight angle?! 

My Vista Print cherry has been popped!

Okay okay, so I didn't care for what they had to offer, and I didn't care if things were free and all I had to pay was shipping...until I saw that I could get a stamp and save myself from writing our return address ten THOUSAND times! ha ha I Also got Alyssa a cute tote that says Flower Girl with her name and date (she's a bag lady already anyway!), a hat for Owen, our Ring Bearer, although I'm certain it will be WAY too big...lol, and a t-shirt for me to wear after the wedding, that say's Mrs. Jacobs est. 5.21.11. <3!!!

I'm a little surprised I didn't see this box of goodies on our porch last night before I left for work. SOOOO thankful we live in a good 'hood now....it would have been long gone if we were back in our old neighborhood! I wonder how long it was out there for. ha ha 

Oh, and never put a rubber stamp together after coming off a night shift...dingbat here put it on upside down. ha At least it was free. It's nighty night time for me! 

Guest book is ALMOST done...

Apologies for the crappy pic...I couldn't turn the light on any brighter and all I had was my wonderful POS Blackberry for a camera. So, when Jim and I went to Archiver's the other day, I had 2 coupons for other cardstock as well as the kind for the invitations, which I wasn't going to use. It was buy 5, get 5 free...but it was the cheap cardstock. Then I thought, I can use that for the guestbook cards! We found a vanilla creme color we liked, and figured 20 would make enough! The first few I cut were too small for the envelopes..I didn't like how they set in them, so I increased the size just a hair. My poor fiscars is SO tired....I've went through 2 blades just on this! Eek! 

Productive weekend...somewhat...

So...I got 4 different coupons for Archiver's that expired this week, so I ran out there and bought some more cardstock for the invitations...though I'm positive I'll need way more, and I also got a bunch of cardstock to make the cards for the guestbook. We went to Wal-Mart and got more black cardstock, page protectors, and double-sided tape as well. Hopefully I'll get that book done this weekend, but I'm not sure how I will have it set up for people to use. 


We also made a payment on my wedding band, and Jim reminded me that I need to take my e-ring in for inspection this month. WHEW! What would I do without him?! 


We attempted to ballroom dance in our living room with my beautiful wedges on, however, I couldn't tolerate the twirling. eek! Not sure what we're gonna do now! I'm starting to panic about the whole dancing thing...the most dancing I've done is show choir. haha Can't I just whip out my clarinet or something? Ugh! 


Oh, and we got the styrofoam that can be formed for the wine love letter box....hopefully we can get back to that thing here soon and finish it...we're not even close! Haven't even touched it since we began looking at houses last summer! eek!
 

The dress is in!

However, I will not be trying it on very soon.... Hopefully I will be able to go check it out next month. I keep reading this horror stories, and since it takes so long to order these damn things, I NEED to go see! AAAHHHHHH

Shedding For the Wedding! lol

Jim asked me to make him a black forest cake for his birthday. Well...after working all night, coming home and sleeping for three hours, then making this cake for about 5 hours....it is complete. I apologize for the cheezy smiley face on it...I went to toss the LITTLE BIT of extra frosting, and Jim's chin began to quiver, so I used it all up instead. It was actually really freaking good! Messy as hell, but good! 

It's all over my hands! 

Showing off the 3 layers of chocolate cake, cherries, and frosting. mmm

Ladies and Gents...my motivation is back!

So...since the whole house-buying process began back in, what, September...?...I've completely stopped planning altogether. I tried to get back into it a few weeks ago, and we did book our transportation, find my wedding band, and find a purse for me, but that's NOTHING compared to what I have left to do! So when 6 months hit the other day, I thought...OH MY GOD...now I have LESS than 6 months! **** :) So I'm back to looking online for things to order, pricing items everywhere I go. I did manage to find some beautiful necklaces for my girls (with the exception of my jr. and flower girl...they will have something different). I looked online and found some nice ones at Kohl's...well wouldn't ya know..I just opened an account with them (ugh) and had a coupon, plus I still had $10 in Kohl's cash to spend by today...so Jim and I went and were looking. I was torn between two, and this lady that was shopping came up behind me and said she works in jewelry and offered her help. She suggested I get these, and I agreed I liked them better. Of course, they only had 2, so I had to go to another location to get the other 2. I wasn't about to wait until AFTER Black Friday. haha The pic isn't the greatest..I was in the basement with poor lighting. 

My purse for the reception...SUPER CUTE! :D

I held it up against my swatch, and it's pretty darn close! Should be perfect to keep lipgloss, kleenex, and Tylenol in, so I don't have to search for whoever has my stuff. :) 

What a week!

Last week was CRAZY! We had to finish (most) of the rest of the house for our housewarming/football/birthday party starting on Sunday, which finally got finished on Friday, my birthday was Thursday, so we went shopping AND GOT MY WEDDING BAND , and then out to dinner with the kids before going to scouts, all the while Jim was incredibly sick (just like last year!), Friday night was our night to go out for my birthday (their mom took them for us), and Saturday was spent cooking, cleaning, and entertaining from 9am until about 1am. SIGH! Oh, and sometime during that week (not sure what day), we FINALLY booked transportation. I just mailed the check! YIPPEE!  

Happy Halloween!

       Pretty sure I'm amazing at doing her makeup. Just not my own! 

A co-worker and friend of mine does a haunted house in their garage every year. This is her boyfriend with the kids. :) 

I'm sorry, but I'm in LOVE with our living room!

And I'm head over heels for our new dining set! :) 

And we're BACK in the game!

Well, it has certainly been a long time since I've posted, or even touched my wedding craft box....So in a nutshell, we bought house, we paint house, we move in house. Ta da! Sounds easy right?! NOT! I don't think I had a stright 36 hrs in that five weeks when I dcidn't get a phonecall from the broker, realtor, or insurance agent flipping out, and if I didn't get this signed in blood and that signed by Obama, we were NOT getting this house...blah blah blah. Needless to say, I have a little bit of acne going on, and my weight is a little lower than usual. BUT, it all ended well, we just didn't know until the DAY OF if we were closing on that day or not. I don't think I will EVER buy another house again! haha
Anyway, in that time, my hard drive on my NEW computer decided to go suicidal and I lost EVERYTHING! From pictures to wedding stuff, you name it, it's gone. I suppose it's my own fault for not having it backed up, but it was the best computer out of 4 in our house, so I never got around to it. At least most everything we've created has been printed once for a mock-up, so we can re-create it...it just sucks, especially considering all of the long nights I spent on it. I'm more upset about losing all my pictures and videos, but we do have a few on my old computer, so I guess not all is lost. So anyway, I haven't really had time to breathe, let alone think about our wedding. We do have a few more things to do around the house, but since I have a new hard drive in my computer, I thought I'd go ahead and give an update. Oh, and the night my computer died, I found out TWO of my bridesmaids are pregnant. :) Suddenly, I started having pregnancy dreams myself. The Nebraska Furniture Mart deliveryman handed my newborn son over to me on the front porch of our new house. WTF? lol

CLOSING DAY!

It's gonna be a LONG month, but it's a GOOD thing! :D

Well, it seems the seller accepted our counteroffer (FINALLY!) We were SO CLOSE to losing this house...they countered our original offer, and we found out about it just a few hours before they were showing the house to someone else! Luckily, they accepted our counteroffer...but we didn't find out until the next day! UGH! It was SOO stressful! Anyway, so now the fun begins. I have to go in on Tuesday to sign some paperwork and get the inspection underway. Yippee (not!) Hopefully that will get done before Friday. So far, it's looking as though our closing date will be October 8th. Kind of messes up plans for wedding planning, as well as Kyle's 10th birthday party, but we will figure something out. This kind of house won't be found at this price and in this condition ever again...we were very lucky (hopefully I'm not jinxing us!). I've got our current house somewhat packed, but it is SUCH a disaster zone...I hate living like this! Would be nice if we closed sooner so we could start painting and finishing the fence and moving stuff in sooner, but I suppose that's just a dream. :) Here is the front of the house. We face a field and the development is right by a (small) lake. Somewhat reminds me of home. The other pic is the back, which isn't fully fenced yet, but you get the idea. :) FINGERS CROSSED!

STDs

That's SAVE THE DATES, you freaks! ha! These have been done for a while, but I'm just now getting around to posting it on the blog. I know, I suck. :( 


These were my first DIY project, and I am so happy with them! I didn’t want to send just a plain old postcard or something that people would toss in the garbage. I have always liked the magnet idea, but not the price! I looked into making my own. I researched different STD magnets to get an idea of what I wanted. I spent probably around 10-15 man hours working on my own template, which was a HUGE PITA!  I found a seller on eBay selling business card-sized peel and stick magnets. I got 300 of them for $28 and free shipping! They are heavy, thick, and hold really well on the fridge! I made my template business card size and bought printable business card paper at Wal-Mart. Jim fixed the layout so they would print on the paper correctly and printed them out for me. I then punched them out and stuck them onto the magnets. I found out very quickly that I had to really watch how I placed them on there. Once they’re on, they are NOT moving! I wanted to place the magnets on something so that they wouldn’t be flopping around in the envelopes. I found really pretty cardstock, trimmed it down to fit in the envelope and used a single gluedot with each magnet. I’ve received so many compliments about these cute little things…my mom of course bragged that I made them, but many people say they can’t tell! J I had to pat myself on the back..being my non-crafty self, I think my first DIY project went pretty darn well! Sadly, I sealed them already, so I do not have any cardstock to show how I had these set up, but here is the magnet itself! 

9 months and counting!

It's hard to believe we only have 9 months to go! Our planning and craft-making has taken a hard turn....we started looking at houses again, only this time to buy! I think the snakes in the house was the final straw. We can't stay in this house anymore...not to mention the price to heat this thing during the winter, and running out of oil is never any fun during a Nebraska winter! I finally got some of my major medical bills taken care of, so now the bank likes me (so they say!).  SOOO....it looks like we may not be taking a honeymoon right away...but we will be living in a (hopefully) better home instead. Seems like now is the time to buy...and I figured vacations will always be there, but not this buyer's market. Guess it's a good thing we weren't able to get our passports earlier as we wanted. Maybe there is a reason for everything. :)

Oh no!

So I just totally realized that we have to redo the coloring books...well...just part of them. But still! We had a change in the wedding party so it's incorrect! Ah well...I think we will wait until we're closer to the wedding date before we fix them. Ugh, untying those knots in the ribbons is gonna SUCK! :(

 

Cake is booked!

Well, we finally called today to tell the lady that her cakes were AWESOME! We are officially booked! Yay! So we will meet with her around the beginning of the year to discuss exactly what we want. I'm SO happy!

Invitations!

Ok, so they're not TOTALLY done, but I'm not about to print and cut and tape until we're closer to the date, JUST IN CASE something changes. BUT....for the most part, they are complete. Check it out in my bio! I could NOT have done it without Jim! He's a lifesaver! I think we should go into the wedding business! :)

Price breakdown of the pocketfolds and how we made them. :)

The only thing that we did not make are the envelopes...and the ribbon. :) We figured the entire thing including the mailing envelope (except postage) is around $1 a piece.
 
I bought black 12X12 cardstock from Michaels, creme delux text weight paper from Archiver's, the ribbon from Hobby Lobby, the rhinestones from JoAnn's, the RSVP envelopes from Cards and Pockets, and the (ugly) mailing envelope from eBay. I used rubber cement, double-sided tape, a fiskers cutter, a boning tool, and lots of Excedrin. :) Jim (being the wonderful man that he is) helped me make all the pocketfolds! He actually made his own template by looking at what I'd found online and messing around with it himself. He did it perfectly the first time and they're exactly what I wanted! So, once he showed me how to score and cut the paper, I took on that job and he did the angle-cutting (which he did by hand!). The I did the gluing (I used rubber cement, and I curse it everytime I see the bottle!) and boning, cut the ribbon (which was wired, so I often had to trim the wire if it poked out)  and used double-sided tape to secure it every so often. Then I used the tape again to secure the 2x2 I made on the front. To make these, I just printed and cut them and glued a small iron-on crystal (which were on clearance) and had to push REALLY hard with my finger or thumb (which became a PITA, but I love them!) I used the double-sided tape to secure the invitation down and placed all the inserts and the RSVP envelope in the pocket. 

Voila! I realize the outer envelope doesn't match, but they did not look that color on eBay, but I can't beat the price anyway, so I'll deal with it. I'm not printing all of them until we are closer to our date, just to be safe so we don't waste anything. I CANNOT believe we MADE these...from SCRATCH! Seriously! If I can do it, ANYONE can do it!

Calluses!

Ugh, I feel like I'm playing guitar again! But I LOVE how these are turning out! I am about halfway done (ran out of cardstock, as usual). To get these cute little jewels to stick (they're actually iron-ons, but they are were on clearance, so I snatched them up!), I have to use a TINY glue pen, then let the jewel sit for a few minutes. Then press REALLY hard, which dents my finger or thumb. Sometimes they fall off anyway or stick to me, so I have to redo it. After about 80, I hurt. I managed to lose only 1 jewel, though. I think they're super cute and make the J look awesome!

TGF-Facebook!

I was messing around and comparing prices for envelopes for my RSVPs and for my guest book. I've been ordering samples when possible (to prevent another NEON pink catastrophe!).  I decided to add Cards and Pockets to my Facebook page and see what they had on their site. WELL...it just so happens that the sample that I bought for the RSVPs last week are on sale! .12 a piece! I bought 160. The clencher was the shipping, which was like $9 or so, but hey! They're PERFECT! Can't wait til they come in! teeheehee 

Sugar and spice!

Well...I should get "Nicest Fiance of the Year"....Jim has been out of town camping with Kyle, so I've been stuck alone with all of the animals and working every night...needless I say I drove REALLY fast a couple of nights to make it on time. Anyway, the lady that MIGHT be doing our cake dropped off a couple of samples for us to try yesterday. Well, I didn't want to eat any without Jim, so I put them in the fridge and had to WAIT! First thing I did when he got back (after hugs and kisses, of course), was run downstairs and grab the cakes and forks. I am torn between Oreo-filled and Creme de Menthe-filled. We both agreed the Chocolate Raspberry-filled was a no. He likes the CDM...I can't decide! I should have taken pictures of them, sorry! :( They are HUGE...like the top tier of a cake themselves! I gained a few pounds...must have been the cake! haha Hopefully she's not too terribly expensive. I suppose we should call her tomorrow once we wake up.

Got cardstock....and something else, of course!

Busy day! After waking up and having a dr. appt, I ran to Michaels and found they had more black cardstock and NEVER called me! (I had a raincheck and basically got 3 for the price of 2 or so). PLUS I found this cute basket on clearance that I think I'll use for programs. It was the only one of it's kind and did not have a tag on it, plus the baskets section was outside on clearance but the sign was missing. All together I think I paid $14. Can't beat that! I'd also found a coupon online for Archiver's so I ran there (clear across town) and bought out the luxe cream paper for the invitations. I still need a lot more, but this is a start anyway. Then pay house rent, and tomorrow another dr. appt and grocery shopping. Buh bye paycheck! Good thing I'm working tons of overtime!

They're coming along...

I was going to TRY to save a little money (and time) and not do a belly band, but it was WAY too plain and boring. My mom bought a roll of this sheer pink and I slapped that on there. Oh my god...LOVE it! Even Jim likes it better like that! Problem is, I first used rubber cement, but that made it look "wet" and the black bled through the ribbon. So double-sided tape, it is! Tedious work, but so worth it (so far, anyway! I've only made 8 total!) Of course, the ribbon is wired, so I have to trim some of them if it pokes out, but they're looking SOOO good (in my opinion!) Need more cardstock, need more cardstock! I should buy STOCK, in cardstock!