Good morning! I am slurping down coffee like it is liquid crack–I had trouble falling asleep last night.  I probably got 6 hours of sleep, which I simply cannot function on.  I have a lot to do at work, so I hope the coffee kicks in NOW. How do people function without it??

I wanted something different for breakfast, so I made Continental Breakfast and pretended like I was in a hotel. 🙂

My breakfast included coffee (obviously), WW toast with egg & cheddar cheese, cantaloupe, and a sliced banana. I’m interested to see if the combination of protein + fats keeps me fuller, longer than an oatmeal breakfast… although today isn’t a very good test day as I had a HUGE dinner and no workout yesterday.

Warning: Mushy Alert Ahead

Several of you mentioned that you’d love to learn more about the wedding planning details.  As we get closer and closer to W-day, I will share more details with you, of course!

I am not the kind of girl who’s dreamed about her wedding day since she was young, and I’m certainly not a Bridezilla who screams at the florist over cascading bouquets vs. tightly bundled bouquets. However, in my experience, wedding planning has been a crazy, amazing ride, and I see why people get obessed with it!  Wedding planning has been very fun and only mildly stressful.  It’s only been slightly difficult because we have a tight budget to stick to.  Future Husband and I are paying for about 1/2 of the wedding and honeymoon, and our families (extended and parental) are paying for the other half. 

I suppose the first "Wedding Details" post should be about how it all started–the PROPOSAL!

(This is a "recreation" shot, of course!… Yes, I made him pose for a photograph so I could memorialize the moment forever!)

Last July, Future Husband mentioned to me that he had a "fun weekend planned" and I needed to take a half-day on a Friday.  He told me he was planning a relaxing weekend because I was having trouble adjusting to the move to Florida.  Several people at work mentioned that they thought he was going to propose, but I thought, "Naaaah! We don’t have any money for that!"

As instructed, I left work early and drove an hour and a half to Palm Coast, where I picked FH up from work.  He told me we were going to stay in St. Augustine for the weekend, which is my #1 favorite place in all of America.  It’s a 45 minutes drive from Palm Coast, and you take a scenic beach highway to get there.  St. Augustine is the oldest city in America and very romantic. Future Husband and I also had our first dinner date  (nearly 5 years ago) in St. Augustine!

He said he wanted to drive (which is unusual, as I typically do the driving), and about 10 minutes into the journey, he pulled over and said he wanted to take a break and walk on the beach.  I actually complained a little bit about how I didn’t want to go on the beach…. he suddenly looked kind of annoyed and said I HAD TO GO TO THE BEACH. Ah ha…. suddenly the gears started to turn!

When we got to the beach (which was deserted), he reminded me that our first "date" ever was on that very beach.  Then…  it was kind of like a movie… suddenly he was on one knee with a ring.  He said loads of beautiful things, but all I can remember is, "Will you marry me?". I JUMPED UP AND DOWN and SCREAMED "YES!"

The best part of the engagement story is that after I screamed YES, the first thing I said was, "Is that ring REAL?" It was just so pretty, and I didn’t know that Future Husband had been secretly squirreling away cash for over a year!

We drove to St. Augustine and checked into our bed and breakfast, which Future Husband and his mom had picked out the weekend before (everyone knew about the impeding engagement but my mom, because she wouldn’t be able to keep it a secret.  Future Husband asked my dad for permission before, too).

We stayed at the Casablanca Inn, which was incredible.  I highly recommend it to anyone thinking about visiting St. Augustine.  We thought it was ironic they had a British and American flag on the front:

We had a great weekend.  Future Husband made reservations at our first date restaurant (the Columbia) and told them we had just gotten engaged.  The manager made our dinner extra-special.  The next day, we had another romantic meal at the  95 Cordova at the Casa Monica Hotel . The food there was the BEST, and I’ll never forget that evening. 

On Sunday night, I laid in my bed and prayed that everyone in the world could experience at least one weekend in their life when they felt as purely happy as I did at that moment. It was truly the perfect weekend, and I’ll cherish the memory forever.

The Rings!

We bought our wedding bands a few months ago.  Purchasing the rings was (1) the most fun wedding errand we’ve done so far; and (2) the EASIEST.  It took us about half an hour to make a decision!

We bought our rings (and my engagement ring) at Zales Outlet, which we’ve had a great experience with and I would recommend to anyone.  They have an excellent warranty and lifetime cleaning and shining plan.

Here’s my wedding band (bottom) + engagement ring (top) together:

I’m currently not allowed to wear the wedding band.  In fact, I can only try it on if I’m sitting in bed. I have NO PATIENCE whatsoever and Future Husband knows I want to wear it all the time, so he made me promise I wouldn’t. 🙂 SIGH! He’s so responsible.

I hope you enjoyed hearing some of my wedding planning details! There will be many more updates soon. 

Have a fabulous morning, and I’ll see you for lunch.  Plus, I can’t wait to RUN after work!