A party, a concert and a rehearsal.

Ahhhhhh.......  The weekend is over.  Wow.  What a wonderful (and busy!) few months we have had leading up to this weekend.  

The wedding turned out perfect.  We cried.  We laughed.  We danced.  We drank champagne from the bottle.  It couldn't have been better.  But it deserves its own post.  

I want to back up and share a few things that I haven't had time to share before I get to the wedding. 

A couple of weeks ago me and a few of my friends hosted a couples shower party for Sarah and CJ at my house.  We wanted to do something that would involve CJ a little more than you average "wedding shower".  Our theme was "Brats, Beer and Months of the Year".  I assigned each couple a month and they were to bring a gift that correlated.  My thought was that people would be able to get gifts geared more towards CJ with that theme than just something off their registry that, let's all be honest, most men don't really care that much about.

Sarah and CJ

We cooked a few different types of brats and had lots of toppings for them.  I made sauerkraut and we had a few other side items (potato salad, baked beans, etc).  You know, manly food!  Ha!  We had a few tubs of different types of beer (always a hit) and I made some cider.  It was a great time and the gifts were so cute!  Lonnie and I had April so we got them a picnic basket and filled it with wine, personalized wine glasses and a water proof picnic blanket.  

Katie and Tommy

This theme was perfect for a "non-traditional" shower.  They got things like a turkey fryer for November, a heavy duty ice chest for July, tailgating stuff for September and champagne flutes for January.  I think my favorite gifts were a jar full of money for March and the August gift my friend Jenny put together.  She looked up all of the days in August that were "national" days.  For example, she got them stuff to make s'mores for Natio.nal S'mor.es Day, a picture of all of us for Nati.onal Frie.ndship Day, matching socks for wiggle your toes day and her favorite board game for Nat.ional Just Bec.ause Day.  There more more but how cute and original is that?   

Jenny and Matt

Then we played a version of the newlywed game and, as you can imagine, it was pretty hilarious!  

Mark and Casey

It was a great night celebrating a great couple.  I actually think we should do this more often!  Although Lonnie may kill me if I plan any more parties at our house in the near future...Ha!  And would you believe I didn't get a picture of the two of us.  Sigh....

All the girls...

Moving on.  A few days after the party some of us girls went to see Mr. Timberlake in concert.

The concert was in Memphis (about 3ish hours away) and since he is from there they declared it Nation.al JT day.  

We dressed up and even made our own little bow ties!  The concert was great and he put on a great show for his hometown.  

This past Friday night we had the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner.  

Lonnie was on call and ended up having a TERRIBLE day Friday so he couldn't make it to the actual rehearsal but was going to meet us at dinner.  It was just me and B.  Let me just set the scene for you.  It is dinner time and she's starving.  We are outside and it is cold.  The wedding was on a ridge (also known as a cliff...) and it was dark out.  I was wearing 5 inch heels.  So here we go practicing our entrance.  The plan was for me to walk down some steps (about 15) with Blakely and Kyndal holding my hand.  Then when we got to the bottom I would walk down the aisle and they would follow me.  So we start walking down the steps.  B immediately screams NO HELP!  NO HELP MOMMY!  She wants to do it herself.  Then when we finally make it to the "altar" (it seemed like an hour) she bolts right to the cliff.  I am running around chasing her in soft grass with heels on while she screams ME SWING NOW (there was a swing set)!  I mean.  It was stressful.  I told Sarah there was no way the girls could walk down the stairs so we made another plan.  That plan was much better.  But you can imagine my stress about the ACTUAL wedding when Blakely was such a tornado at the rehearsal.

But, honestly, these two could scream the whole time and still be adorable, right?!

All about Miami

I agreed to this trip when B was just weeks old.  I remember thinking "Oh, she'll be 13 months old.  I won't be be stressed to leave her!"  Yeah, right.  I told Lonnie multiple times while I was packing that I changed my mind and wasn't going...which wasn't not even an option since we had paid for everything already.  

We went on a lunch date before I left.  She was excited if you can't tell!

We left on Saturday morning when B went down for her nap.  She stayed at our house with my mom and my aunt Saturday and Sunday.  Then Monday and Tuesday she stayed here with my mom and my MIL.  I was not worried about B...I knew she was going to have the BEST time.  She absolutely LOVES her Gran Di, her Jenni, and her NanaBob.  I was more worried about how much I was going to miss her! 

We got to Miami Saturday evening and went to dinner with our friends, Justin and Allison.  We ate awesome sushi and I had my first ever sake bomb...fun times.  Then we decided to go to a super fun Miami nightclub called LIV.  What a time that was!  Let's just say I had on way too many clothes for this club ;) 

only one crappy cell phone shot of that night... 

I really wanted to sleep in while we were there but that just didn't happen.  We didn't go to bed until 4 am so I was running on little sleep Sunday.  I definitely feel too old for the Miami club scene but it was a super fun experience.  I think I can do that about once a year.  

On Sunday we had brunch and then napped in the afternoon.  That night we went to an Italian restaurant that had amazing food and amazing wine.  But the company was even better.   

We spent the whole day Monday relaxing on the beach.  Which is exactly what you want to do when you have just gained 10 pounds from weaning AND started your period the day before.  Not cool at all but whatever.  I sucked it up (or in) and got into that bikini (!!) and planted my white, squishy, bloated booty on the beach.  The mojitos helped a lot with this...

Monday night was the Madonna concert.  The concert was the whole reason we planned to meet them in Miami.  

Lonnie and I have seen Madonna twice.  I know that sounds weird!  We went to NYC for our first anniversary and as I was planning the trip I looked to see if there was anything fun happening at Madi.son S.quare Gar.den.  It turned out that Madonna was playing while we were there.  We had to go...I mean it was Madonna.  It was one of those things that you had to do if the opportunity presents itself, kind of like Elvis or The Beatles.  So we went and it was amazing!  We both had such an amazing time and she put on an awesome show.  Neither of us were super fans of hers or anything but the concert left us very impressed.  We ended up seeing her in LA a few months after that.  Lonnie told me not to tell anyone how much he liked it and I was sworn to secrecy about the 2nd show.  Sorry honey!  I'm telling the internets now ;)

Anyway, her show in Miami was great again.  The only problem is that she NEVER starts her show on time.  She was 3 1/2 hours late so that was pretty frustrating.  We were pumped up for the show and then we had to wait so long that I was getting tired!  We went to a latin/salsa bar before the show and it was so much fun.  They had people singing and dancing all over the place...VERY entertaining.  At one point Lonnie ordered us all tequila shots.  I mean...I haven't had a tequila shot since college!  And I won't be having one for a very long time!  

This is what we looked like when we got to the concert...

and this was 2 hours later..

We flew home Tuesday and that was the hardest part of the trip.  I COULD NOT get home to my sweet girl fast enough.  She missed us for sure but not nearly as much as we missed her!  She was playing outside when we drove up.  I scooped her up and didn't want to let her go.  I gave her to Lonnie and she started whining!  She wanted meeeee!  That actually made me a *little* happy..only because she is always excited to see Lonnie.  I am with her everyday so she never really misses me.  She always wants to go to him..but this time...she wanted her MOMMY!  

we did lots of snuggling...

and playing...

I am so glad that we went.  It was great to hang out with our friends that we don't get to see very often.  Lonnie and I needed some time together.  We love to travel and we can't always take our B.  I know she was well taken care of it didn't scar her for life!  I even gave her super messy spaghetti that night just in case she was mad.  

 and she liked it..

 and then she didn't.... 

Happy Tuesday!  Tuesdays are always great here because my house gets clean!!!  

Excuse me??

So, like I said before, my husband's birthday was Tuesday.  He says thank you for all the birthday wishes by the way ;)  I really wanted to get him something great for a couple of reasons.  

1.  He is awesome....

2.  He pretty much hates the holidays and, since his birthday is so close to them, it gets hated by association.  

3.  He gets super down, depressed, sad, blue, agitated, irritable (and any other synonym) during the winter.  Something to do with the cold and gray days....

4.  He is awesome...did I already mention that?

I set out to find the perfect surprise for him.  I thought about taking him on a little trip.  Had to throw that one out the window because I can't leave our child over night and I don't see me getting over that anytime soon.  I thought about buying him something great.  That was thrown out because he doesn't really like things...

As I was pondering this, a wonderful song came on the radio.  That song was Margaritaville.  It hit me!!!!  I could take him to see Jimmy Buffett!!!  He LOVES Buffett and has mentioned multiple times that he wanted to go see him.  I remembered hearing that he was touring so I went online to look and see where.

Enter sad face.....He wasn't coming anywhere close to here and I'm sooo not ready to leave Blakely and fly to Florida to see JB.  :(((((

BUT, while on Ticket.master I saw that the Zac Brown Band WAS coming somewhere close to here!!!  He LOVES them too.  So I bought us tickets to go see Zac Brown Band on March 10.  I am so excited and he was very excited too.  He told me it was the perfect birthday present.  I thought so too because now he will have something to look forward to during these dreary months.

Then this morning the most amazing thing happened....

Jimmy Buffett announced a few more concert dates and one of them is just an hour away from us!!!!!!!

Are you kidding me???  How crazy is that??  SOOOOO we will most definitely be buying tickets for that one when they go on sale next week.  I'm thinking that can be his present to me since my birthday is in March...my 30th birthday by the way! 

Didn't that all work out so well?

2012 rocks so far :)

Now, if only I can get Blakely to take a damn bottle by then....what is up with this girl???