Hello my few blog readers. (Blah Blah Blah -- you can skip to the last few paragraphs if you want...)

I feel like I should have done more updating when we went through all of the wedding planning but it's not like I had a lot of time to do so in between running from business to business trying to get everything squared away.

Our invitations were a pain in the butt. We went to a paper store (a la Dunder Mifflin without the desks and Steve Carrell) and found an invitation that we liked in the sample book from their printer. We found out what paper it was printed on and went to go find it in their store. They didn't have enough of it, so they called their Salt Lake store and reserved enough packages of it to be sent down for us. When they finally came in, we went in, paid for them, and got them out to the car before realizing they were the wrong thing. These were place cards that all had a crease down the middle to fold them in half and we ordered index card style. I knew it was too easy. So we went back in and they called the Salt Lake store to see if they had the right cards for us. We drove up to pick them up because we didn't want to wait another 3 days for yet another shipment to come in. The Salt Lake store is much bigger than the Orem store, and the people were much more knowledgeable. They took back our wrong cards and paid us the difference between those and the cards we actually wanted. Fairly easy.

Okay, so the next step was to take them to the printer and get our invitations printed. Bryce tried to get us a good deal from the place he works at but the guy that works in the print shop was pretty lame and didn't get back to us with any information until about a week later, at which point he told us that he couldn't print on the cards that we bought. Okay. Plan B. We took them to the printer that printed the sample one we saw. They promised us they could do it. We had to revise our design because they couldn't print in color and do the raised text unless we wanted to pay about $500. Sad day. So we simplified our design and got them a CD of it. They took all of our information and told us they would have a proof for us on Monday. Monday rolls around, no proof. So we go in to find that they neglected to take down our phone number and so had no way of getting in contact with us. They can't print on the cards that we bought. They're too small. So they offer us paper that comes in sheets that they have in stock in Salt Lake. It would take about a day to get them to their store in Provo, and then they would print them. Meanwhile, we had to return all of the paper we bought from the crappy Dunder Mifflin imitation store. That was a pain because we didn't have our receipt after shuffling the paper around to two different printers. They eventually found our order and refunded our money. Yay. And with that, we got our invitations printed. Neither of us were thrilled with the finished product, but it probably had something to do with the fact that it was such a pain in the butt to get them printed. The text was also remarkably small, so we're afraid some of our guests might need a magnifying glass just to figure out who's getting married.

BUT! They got sent... eventually.

Once we picked up our invitations, we went to pick up our pictures from the camera store we brought them to. They promised us 4x6 prints and 5x7 envelopes for 17 cents each - one envelope and one picture. This sounded like a pretty good deal so we went in and showed them what we wanted. They told us they could print a proof if we'd wait about an hour. So we waited for an hour, came back and approved the proof, and were told that our pictures would be ready to pick up by Wednesday (or some equivalent time frame. I can't remember exactly what the days were). We call on Wednesday, having not heard anything from them, and they said they were waiting for us to come in and approve a proof. Urgh. We told them we'd already done that, so they promised they'd have our prints by Friday. I go in to pick up the prints on Friday, but they don't have our envelopes ready. They're waiting on a shipment. It should be in by Monday or Tuesday. We call on Tuesday. They still don't have our envelopes. They should be in by the weekend. By now it is Memorial Day weekend. We began this whole invitations process right after I got back from tour on April 27th. It has been a month now and we still don't have our stuff. Needless to say, we were fed up with everything and everyone related to our invitations. I went in and picked up the pictures, asked them to forget about the envelopes, we'd buy them somewhere else. I bought some 6x8 envelopes to put our 5x7 invitations in. Yes, quite overkill, but they were the only envelopes Staples, Office Max and Office Depot had, and I needed invitations so I could send them out on Saturday so they could get in the mail before Memorial Day. On Saturday morning I returned the envelopes I didn't use, and bought the right size envelopes from the original paper store. I know, I know. I had every intention of boycotting their store, but for once, they did have exactly what I needed and for cheaper than it would have been to buy something close to what I needed. *sigh*

So, I finally got some invitations sent, in big ugly envelopes. Sorry if you received one of those - I wanted you to get it before it got too close to the wedding. Oh well. And I still have some more to send out. Sorry if you haven't gotten yours yet. It will arrive shortly.

I also looked for shoes for the longest time, and today I finally found some at Walker's Bridal Emporium on Center Street in Provo. THEY WERE TEN BUCKS! I was so proud. Okay, okay, but the best part of the story is not that.

We drove up to Walkers, and parked on Center Street, just across from the store. There was an ice cream truck parked on the sidewalk out in front of the NuSkin building directly across from Walkers. I frantically searched through my purse, but couldn't scrounge up enough cash, even after raiding Chad's wallet and ash tray. :o( So I decided to just go look to see what they had. As we were walking up, a few workers from the NuSkin building came out, got ice cream and walked back in. I was going to turn around and walk away, disappointed that the ice cream was only for the NuSkin people. A guy, ice cream in hand, walking back in the building, turned around and said "Free ice cream! Have some!" I looked at him like he was crazy. "Go ahead!" NO WAY!!! The guy in the ice cream truck lured me in to. "Yeah! Free ice cream! What can I get for you?!" NO WAY!!! Not only was there an ice cream truck with it's music of happiness playing and it's flashing light drawing attention to its goodness, but it was GIVING OUT FREE ICE CREAM!!! It was seriously my lucky day. If you know me at all, you know how much I love ice cream trucks. I've been known to chase one down the street just to tell them to wait while I ran in and got money. And this one didn't even require money! So I chose the big cookie ice cream sandwich - Chips Galore. And joy of all joys, he reached in the back, grabbed one, and handed one to me! Chad asked for a fudge pop, and the guy says "Do you want two?! Here! Have two!" It was like a dream. But I know it was real because I have pictures to prove it!


(Free) Ice cream truck!!! There it is! Off in the distance! A very rare specimen of its kind, captured on camera for the very first time today.

Free delicious ice cream from the ice cream truck.

One of Chad's two free fudge pops from the ice cream truck!

So. It was a good day.

Only two more weeks until the wedding! We're both wicked excited. Hard to believe I will forever leave the world of single people.

"Attention ladies and gentlemen, please make sure your seat backs and tray tables are in their upright and locked position as we begin our initial descent into marriage where the local time is eternity. Thanks for flying with us today, we hope you don't have to choose us again in the future. Thanks again and have a nice life." AH!