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Are You a Real Alabamian?

Here’s 20 ways you can tell …

1. You can properly pronounce Arab, Cahaba, Opelika, Sylacauga, Oneonta, Eufaula, and Wedowee.
2. You think people who complain about the heat in their states are sissies.
3. A tornado warning siren is your signal to go out in the yard and look for a funnel.
4. You know that the true value of a parking space is not determined by the distance to the door, but by the availability of shade.
5. Stores don’t have bags or shopping carts, they have sacks and buggies.
6. You’ve seen people wear bib overalls at funerals.
7. You think everyone from a bigger city has an accent.
8. You measure distance in minutes. (It’s about 5 minutes down the road)
9. You go to the lake because you think it is like going to the ocean.
10. You listen to the weather forecast before picking out an outfit.
11. You know cowpies are not made of beef.
12. Someone you know has used a football schedule to plan their wedding date.
13. You have known someone who has a belt buckle bigger than your fist.
14. You aren’t surprised to find movie rental, ammunition, beer, and bait all in the same store.
15. A Mercedes Benz isn’t a status symbol. A Ford F-350 4×4 Extended Bed Crew Cab dually is.
16. You know everything goes better with Ranch Dressing, or Ketchup.
17. You learned how to shoot a gun before you learned how to multiply.
18. You actually get these jokes and are “fixin’” to send them to your friends.
19. You have used your heater and air-conditioner in the same day.

    Finally: You are 100% Alabamian if you have ever had this conversation:

20. “You wanna coke?” “Yeah.” “What kind?” “Dr Pepper.”

One of my coworkers sent me this. I’m guilty of a few of these … particularly #12.

Wedding vendor info, as promised

I admit, I am a bit later getting this out than I would have liked, but I think I’ve covered everything pretty well.

Vendors and Services We Used

Online Wedding Planner / Organizer: The Knot — The Knot offered a great online organizer service that allowed me to track and keep up with events associated to the wedding and the wedding planning process. They offer a ton of services, but what I found most useful was the adjustable checklist and portable guest/gift registry. I used the guest list to generate mailing labels for addressing the invitations, and the same for using the gift registry for generating mailing labels for thank you notes. I can honestly say that using The Knot’s services made my job a little easier. Wedding planning is hard work, but their website’s services helped me keep my chaos organized.

Wedding Dress: My Sister’s Closet — Someone on eBay referred me to her online store. My dress was new, never altered, and came at a very reasonable price. She shipped quickly and the dress was packaged very well.

Flower Girl Dress: Ducklings & Daffodils — Also a gem found on eBay, she shipped quickly and everything was packaged very well. Description was slightly inaccurate, but she was pretty quick to fix a mix-up, and overall I am pleased with the dress.

Wedding Location: The Birmingham Botanical Gardens — We were blessed with beautiful weather, and despite the drought all summer, the gardens were still as beautiful as ever. We paid a deposit of $100 for one hour in the Japanese Gardens. We also had the option of an hour rehearsal in the Japanese Gardens which would have had to been scheduled prior to the wedding (we ended up not needing it). The reservation also provided that we could setup as early as 30 minutes before the wedding. The gardens staff also allowed us to use their back gate so our guests would not have to walk from the visitor’s entrance at the main gate. (this has to be requested prior to the event!) All in all, we had a VERY lovely ceremony and I highly recommend the Birmingham Botanical Gardens to anyone who is looking for a wedding location.

Reception Location: Marriott Fairfield Inn & Suites — Unfortunately the reception room at the gardens was already booked for our date, so we held our ceremony here. This worked out in our favor for several reasons: 1. we needed a backup location in case of rain (the gardens’ rain shelter only holds 15-20 people); 2. we were able to start setting up the day before the wedding and did not have to rush; 3. we rented a suite in the hotel that was large enough for me, my entourage, and several others to get ready and do other wedding-related things the day before and day of the wedding; 4. the reception hall we rented was plenty large enough to hold everyone and several more, and was only right down the hall from our room so we could scurry back and forth getting things packed up during and after the reception. The Marriott staff were accommodating in every way possible and were a huge help in making our reception go as smoothly as possible. They went above and beyond when it came to customer service and we will definitely be using them again!

Miscellaneous Location / Meeting Room: Gardendale Civic Center — We used rooms at the Civic Center for several small and miscellaneous things related to the wedding. We met here with our pastor to cover the ceremony program as well as our consultation. We also used it to gather with friends and family to put together the wedding favors. The civic center staff have always been helpful and very accommodating. Their rooms are reasonably priced and book VERY quickly; so if you’re interested, give Linda Harris a call as soon as you have your event date/details!

Wedding Favors: Oriental Trading Company, The Paper Works Outlet, Elizabeth’s Treasures — My wedding favors comprised of large take-out boxes from Elizabeth’s Treasures; chopsticks, candy, magnets, and filler from Oriental Trading Company; wrapping materials by Paper Works Outlet. I had pleasant experiences with all three. The Paper Works Outlet is a local business (metro-area Birmingham), and was only a short drive from work or home. Their staff was very helpful in giving advice and ideas, as well as helping me look for anything I needed. I ordered online from both Oriental Trading Co. and Elizabeth’s Treasures; both shipped quickly and were quick to answer any questions I had.

Wedding Dress Alterations: Just Alterations (205-914-3081) — Located in the strip mall located beside the Gardendale Post Office, she was easy to work with and always very accommodating to my crazy schedule. She not only did a great job and worked quickly, she offered a lot of useful advice. I’m pleased to refer anyone I can to her, as I believe that no one else could’ve done a better job than she did with my dress!

Photography: His Hands Photography — I’ve never enjoyed having my picture taken until I met Samantha. She instantly put me at ease and I was able to enjoy the sessions and just have fun. Her husband used to work with my husband, and she was also referred by several people I know. She did both my bridal photos and wedding day photos. She’s also done a few sessions for my brother-in-law and his family as well as my mother-in-law. She does excellent work and works with you to meet any and all needs you may have. I highly recommend her services to anyone looking for a photographer for special events or for any photography needs in general!

DJ Services & MC: DJ Vez — Both my husband and I have worked with him in the past. Not only did he do a great job with the musical layout, he also helped keep the festivities rolling by making announcements and prompts when needed. We have enjoyed his company as well as his friendship and would recommend him to anyone in search of DJ’ing or music services.

Wedding Cake: Wal-mart — Yep, believe it or not, Wal-mart’s prices were very reasonable AND the cake was both lovely and delicious! The only thing they didn’t do that most everyone else did was deliver. That was no problem for us because the nearest Wal-mart was only a few minutes from the reception location. Wal-mart did a lovely job on decorating the cake and provided everything we needed to set it up as we desired. The price was the well within our budget and we even had filling added to the largest layer — our guests LOVED it!

Hair & Makeup: Merle Norman, Linda’s School of Beauty — Prior to the wedding, I had a makeover done at the local Merle Norman studio. Unfortunately they were not available to do my makeup early the morning of my wedding (they would not be open early enough for me to get it done), but they were very helpful in showing me how to do my makeup and what colors/tones to use to get the effect I wanted. Pretty much the same for my hair, Linda’s would not be open early enough for me to get mine done that day. However, I’d gained a lot of advice and tips previously and their staff (students) have always done a great job on my hair. I highly recommend both of these establishments to anyone looking for hair and/or makeup services!

Local Wedding Resources

These are various wedding-related resources that I ran across in the course of my research: Alabama Bridal Directories, Brides.com, Bama Bride, Alabama Bridal, Weddings Alabama, Alabama Wedding Magazine, Brides Club

Other

Eventective – This handy tool helped me refine my search for ceremony and reception sites. You can customize your searches based on location, need, size, etc. Not just for weddings either, you can use Eventective to look for event sites for just about any occasion. Using this site helped me narrow down my research to a select group of potential sites and provided just about all of the information I needed in order to evaluate whether or not I could use a particular company/site.

Also helpful: Frugal Bride, Cheap Wedding Ideas, Greater Birmingham Convention & Visitors Bureau, Shop for Weddings

Wedding pictures

These were taken at the ceremony by my brother, Jeremy, and his wife, Christy:

From what I understand, our photographer will be done with the pictures that she and her husband took in a couple of weeks.

This set has been provided by John and his lovely fiancée, Miranda. These were taken at the ceremony and reception (and even features evidence of *ahem* my car’s “defilement” ;P).

These are pictures of the “morning of” that Jim had taken:

These are honeymoon pictures I took with my Helio Ocean:

And here is the link to the honeymoon pics Jim took!

If anyone else has pictures, please feel free to hit me up so I can post and share! :grin:

The wedding, and all that preceeded and followed

I’ve got a lot to recount, but I’ll try to keep it semi-organized. I think the best place to start is the couple of days leading up to the wedding … (I will finish my vendors write-up later!)

The Preparation

Jessie, my mother, Jim’s mom, and I spent the Thursday afternoon before the “big day” putting the wedding favors together. Jessie helped me stuff white Chinese-style take-out boxes with a bit of candy and a magnet and cut a slip of ribbon for each. Once our mothers had shown up, they helped us close and wrap each box with the ribbon and seal each with a small sticker which matched our wedding invitations and other wedding-related paraphernalia.

In hind-sight, we should have taped the boxes shut, thus sealing the ribbon and helping the stickers “stick” better. (Because they did a real shitty job sticking, I’ll tell you that!)

The moms helped me load up the car with the wedding favor boxes and Jess and I headed back to the house to prepare for the coming day. I had enough sense about me to take off Friday — Lord knows I would have NOT been able to work if I hadn’t! (working Thursday was hard enough!)

Friday morning I packed up most of everything that we needed. I met Jim for lunch in Hoover and we hit a few stores afterwards for supplies. Then back to the house to load up the car and head to the hotel to check in. The room we rented for the night was great, we’re seriously thinking of staying there again … the staff was very accommodating and it made everything a LOT easier because it was right down the hall from the banquet hall where the reception was to be held.

Friday afternoon I began decorating for the reception. I was supposed to have some help, but the party backed out at the last minute. Luckily, my maid of honor, Teresa, came to my rescue and helped me setup everything that I needed. Jim and I met with T and Jim’s best man, Jeremy (a mutual friend that we have both known for years), for an informal rehearsal then we all went out for dinner.

Had a great time! And it was exactly what I needed … to get out and unwind!

After Teresa and Jeremy left, I tidied up a bit in the banquet hall then joined Jim in our room sometime after midnight. I’ve always had a hard time sleeping in strange places (such as hotel rooms), but luckily my migraine meds knocked me out about 45 minutes later, so I was able to get a few hours of sleep.

Pre-wedding Events

I think I got up around 5 and by 6 was back in the banquet hall obsessing over every little detail (again!).

Now, I had set a schedule for myself and had reminded Jim of this several times. Around 6:30 he tells me that he wants me to come help him get the wedding cake. :shock:

I seriously could have slugged his ass right then and there. :lol:

I think he picked up on my “hostility” because he mentioned on the way back that I didn’t “look too happy” with him. I didn’t say anything and he laughed and kept patting my knee telling me it would “be OK”. I looked over at him and said “You DO realize that this puts me behind schedule? I have a schedule to keep today and I’m already behind. I’ve got a LOT of shit to do today!!”

God love him, he put up with my bitching and ranting and crying and pitching fits and STILL married me! :grin:

So anyways, we get back to the hotel. My aunt and one of my cousins showed up shortly after with food and more decorations in tow. Next, Teresa and Jim’s mother showed up with Jessie. By this point, I was running WAY late and had to frantically wolf down a couple pieces of toast so I wouldn’t starve (you guys should KNOW by now how bitchy I get if I don’t eat!!!!), then started on my make-up and hair … then realized that I had forgotten to pack my hair brush!

Jim’s mom and Jessie ran by the house to fetch it for me while I finished my makeup and told Jim where they had gone. Luckily my sister-in-law had done Jessie’s hair (REALLY PRETTY!) and this saved me a lot of time and headache. Of course, by this time my parents are in the banquet hall talking to Jim, my aunt, and everyone else there. Teresa was taking pictures and my father suggests to Teresa that she should get my picture because I’m running around with my hair up in curls and barefoot in a tshirt and shorts.

I could have slugged him too! :evil:

So Jim’s mom and Jess get back with my hair stuff and I get my hair finished and squeezed into my dress. I ranted about “how fat my ass is” while Teresa and Jim’s mother and everyone assures me that I looked great and stop worrying. Jim rushes in and gets his suit on just in time for us to leave and head for the gardens … and were pretty much the last ones to get there!

Yeah, yeah, I know … the bride and groom CAN be late and the wedding CAN’T start without us, but I’m obsessive and being late didn’t fit on my ‘schedule’!

The Ceremony

With a quick word with Brother Carl, we pretty much got under way right then. I was able to scan the crowd around us partially and saw a few faces who came for the ceremony but didn’t attend the reception (thank you for coming!). The ceremony seemed to fly by and I’m proud to say that I didn’t cry until after it was all over and had started hugging guests.

Our photographers, Samantha of His Hands Photography and her husband Corey, were wonderful and took plenty of pictures. Hopefully they’ll be done pretty soon and we can get some posted to share with you guys. Until then, I *do* have this to share with y’all … this was taken by my brother, Jeremy, and his gorgeous wife, Christy:

You can’t see a whole lot of me, but doesn’t Jim look handsome?

After the photos were done, we all headed over to the hotel for the reception.

The Reception

We had a lot of food and fun. Our buddy, DJ Vez, worked the turntables and did a fabulous job keeping the mood light, making announcements, and keeping things moving along when needed. Jim’s best man, Jeremy, gave a very sweet toast. Before we knew it, it was after 2, and we needed to get packed, changed, and out of the hotel room — and not necessarily in that order!

The Departure

We hurried and luckily, our folks and Teresa chipped in and helped us get organized and loaded. Unfortunately our gamer buddies decided to “decorate” the car in shaving cream and toilet paper. Samantha, our photographer, cheerily told me, “I have photographic evidence. I’ll email you!” The hotel staff also had a good chuckle about it … apparently they all watched via the security cameras and were waiting for me to beat the tar out of each and every culprit.

I think I handled it pretty well … I ranted, fumed, and stormed back to the hotel room furiously slinging my dress and several curses (in 3 different languages!) in my wake.

Yes — for me, that is “taking it well”!

And yes, I am still mad at you assholes for covering my car in shaving cream! (Just you wait until I see you lot at the next LAN party!)

Moving right along … did you know that most car washes will not let you use their service if your car is covered in shaving cream? Neither did I. So we drove down the interstate with the car covered in … you get the idea. Around Alabaster, we pulled off to pick up a quick snack and to hose off the car at one of those “do it yourself” places. It was pretty much the only place that let us use their stuff.

We drove down to Jacksonville and pulled off at a Super-8 for the night. (I’ll spare you what I really thought of the place … this post is getting long enough and I still have a whole week to cover!) Sunday morning we checked out early and headed to see Jim’s Aunt Dorie. She was a really sweet lady and it was good to get to meet some more of Jim’s family and see where he spent his first few years (before they moved to New Orleans).

The Disney Experience

At this point, we had originally planned to drive to Orlando and stay at another hotel. Our reservations were with Disney’s Pop Century Resort, and we weren’t due to arrive until Monday. Because we had made great time, we decided to drop by to check everything out and see what our chances were of checking in early. It turns out that we had come at a good time, and were able to get the extension and even get the room that we had wanted.

I will say this: staying at a Disney resort is nice! You have shuttles that run to all the parks every 20 minutes from the time they open until well after closing (to ensure all visitors have been collected). There’s no “continental breakfast”, but the cafeteria in the resort was open before dawn and closed well after midnight.

The only gripe I have is that they did not have any sweet tea. :cry:

Other than that, it was FABULOUS! When we checked in, Jim mentioned that we were on our honeymoon and that it was Jessie’s first visit. Jim and I were given “Just Married” Disney buttons to wear, and Jess was given a “First Visit” Disney button and a ton of stickers. We were also encouraged to get the “bride and groom” Mickey ears (this was also suggested by a friend of ours). We eventually found these in Downtown Disney shops and saw them around the Magic Kingdom and MGM shops as well.

The bridal ears are white, with a long white veil attached. The groom ears set is actually a tophat with Mickey ears attached. They are ADORABLE! I hope to have pics of us wearing ours soon. :mrgreen:

We wore these practically everywhere and just about every Disney employee, from the resort workers to security and Disney police, to shop workers congratulated us everywhere we went. We even saw several other couples wearing the ears and would congratulate them in passing. I was totally loving it! :grin:

We spent most of Sunday and Monday shopping at Downtown Disney and playing around the hotel. Jessie instantly fell in love with their pool, and pretty much every day she would ask when we’d go swimming again. LOL! That girl loves the water, and they DID have a very cool pool!

Tuesday we spent in the Magic Kingdom, rode a few rides, and saw a lot of cool stuff. Wednesday was MGM Studios, and pretty much the same thing followed then. Thursday we took it easy — we went back to Downtown Disney for more shopping, then chilled out in the pool. Friday we checked out. Jessie did NOT want to leave, LOL!

We had originally planned to spend a couple of days more in Jacksonville and see more sights and come back Sunday, but we decided to cut it short because Jim and I knew that it would be best to have a couple of “recovery” days before heading back to work and school tomorrow.

And me getting sick Friday pretty much sealed that deal.

Luckily, I’m feeling MUCH better today, but may have to work from home tomorrow. I still have a low-grade fever, and besides, I’ll need to take some time to finish up a few wedding-related things that I still haven’t finished (paperwork — oh joy!).

Our wedding announcement was in the paper this weekend — I have half a mind to call our folks asking them to save copies of today’s paper for me.

In Closing

I had originally meant this post to be shorter, and I left out a LOT. You know me — once I get going, I can type on and on for hours! I hope to have pictures posted soon. I ended up forgetting my camera for most of the trip, but got some great shots on my Helio Ocean. Jim took his camera everywhere and took several hundred pics … hopefully I can sweet talk him into allowing me to share on here.

I would like to personally thank everyone who has contributed, attended the wedding ceremony and/or reception, called and emailed sending thanks and well wishes, and helped out in any way. Jim and I deeply appreciate it. Hopefully soon I can do a full write up of all the vendors and resources used in planning the wedding, reception, and honeymoon. We were lucky to have such a beautiful ceremony and I don’t think the reception and honeymoon could have been any more fun. To those who couldn’t make it: we missed you and hope to see you again soon.

Thank you for being there for us,

Nicki, Jim, and Jessie

Back to Normalcy

Just a quickie post to let everyone know that we’re back. Unfortunately I have spent the last 2 days of our honeymoon/vacation sick, so I won’t be posting the pending novella of the “wedding what’s and who’s” and other happenings as I had originally planned. BUT I do hope to do this within the next few days … just let me recover from my “vacation” (and this damned cold) first!

That said, I will leave you guys with this:

1. Driving around in Florida then coming back to Birmingham left me with a real appreciation of how nice their road systems really are — and re-enforced the notion that ours SUCK ASS!
2. It’s nice to have “normal” cable again — the channel selections in the Disney resort sucked some serious ass. That’s ok though, we were rarely in the room long enough to watch much of anything (but I seriously missed my football!).
3. If going from Alabama to Florida, don’t forget to fill up BEFORE crossing the state line — gas jumped up nearly $.50/gallon once we entered “the Sunshine State”! (I guess they have to pay for those nice roads SOMEHOW … ;P)
4. Apparently Floridians don’t like sweetened iced tea, or not enough visitors ask for it. Freakin’ NOBODY in Florida (that we visited anyways) had any sweet tea! I seriously had to stick to fruit juice (hardly anyone had anything other than orange — which I hate!!!) and water. I was SO happy to get out of there, as far as eating goes, just so I could find a place that actually *HAD* sweet iced tea!!! :evil:

The Big Day is almost here!

I’ve made and gone through I don’t know how many “to do” lists and checklists in preparation of this Saturday. But, this is a good thing … as I was telling my preacher last night, I haven’t pulled all of my hair out yet. :mrgreen:

Jim and I have finalized our vows (finally!) and are planning to each make a vow to Jessie as well. (Jim’s still working on that piece.) I’ve read over the foreword that Brother Carl has written up and I think it will be a great ceremony.

My aunt has stepped up and is taking care of most of the food and beverage details. The cakes have been ordered. My and Jessie’s dresses have been cleaned and are hanging up, ready to be worn. We each have our jewelry and associated paraphernalia, ready for the “Big Day”.

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!! I’m so excited! Part of me still can’t believe I’m about to get MARRIED!

I doubt I’ll be posting much more this week, and I seriously doubt I’ll post much (if at all) during the honeymoon. I’ll be sure to post when we have pictures and other goodies to share. :grin:

It’s almost countdown time!

Only 12 more days — and yet my “to do” list is still over 50 items long. *Yeeesh!* I’ve been making list after list of reminders, things to have done before this weekend, things to have done next week, things to have done the day before the wedding, things to have done the day OF the wedding, … it’s exhausting. ;p

Oh well, I have plenty of sweet tea and Axert … in the immortal words of Gloria Gaynor, I will survive!

I’m still nagging people for RSVPs, but I think we pretty much have our head count. I took my best guess for it, and I figure if more than that show up, oh well, we’ll run out of wedding favors – people should have responded to my emails, IMs, MySpace messages, and phone calls. (Tough nookie!)

Keeping all of this together and working and trying to keep things organized at home has been “difficult”. I’ve been pretty much LIVING on my wedding planner calendars and reminders and if something’s not scheduled on those, well it doesn’t get done. (like getting my car tag renewed in a timely fashion … oy vey!) Someone asked me today how I was, as if they expected me to be pulling my hair out (which I really AM inside!). When I answered, “Oh, I’m ok” they looked at me with this “I don’t believe you. I just KNOW you’re going to go Bridezilla-Bitch on us!” look.

LOL!

All in all I think I’ve held it together ok so far … but then again, I still have a little over a week and a half to freak out. :mrgreen:

If we were any geekier…

…this would so be me and Jim. :mrgreen:

2 weeks, 5 days …

It’s almost “Final Countdown” time! Less than 3 weeks away, there’s still so much to get finalized. I’ve been emailing (read: NAGGING) friends, family, loved ones, etc. who haven’t already to send in their RSVPs. We were supposed to order the cake this past weekend, but we wanted to be certain and make sure there’ll be enough for everyone at the reception.

If you received one of these nag messages/emails from me, please RSVP ASAFP! Thanks :mrgreen:

I had my bridal session this weekend. We’re using Samantha Ferguson of His Hands Photography. I can’t wait to see how the photos turn out. Saturday’s session was a LOT of fun, and I am usually not one to enjoy having my picture made! Samantha really made me feel at ease and comfortable with the whole process. She offered a lot of suggestions and advice. I really don’t think we could have picked a better photographer.

Here are a few sample shots:

These were taken at the Botanical Gardens. They were having some sort of event, so there were a LOT of people there, but for the most part everyone was polite and waited until we were done taking pictures before approaching. I think the reactions of children we passed were the funniest. Jim said he heard one little girl saying, “Look! A real princess!”

:lol: I don’t know about all that, but it *WAS* a lot of fun and I had a very good time (despite the humidity and heat … oh Lord, my hair! LOL!). We had a good time and I can’t wait for the wedding to hurry up and get here!

*anxious*

Do I love my Helio Ocean too much?

Someone asked me last night if I was engaged to Jim or my Helio Ocean? LOL! Such a silly question … preposterous! Though Jim would be in serious trouble if my Ocean could, say, take out the garbage, fix a leaky faucet, kill a creepy roach, bring me roses, find football scores — oh wait, it already does that!

Hint: Use Totally Scored and ZapTXT to output sports scores to your mobile device, IM or email. The great thing about ZapTXT is that you can turn it on and off … I turn off my SEC announcements until the weekends so I can get score updates when wedding-related events interfere with my football! :cool:

Seriously though, a big deal was made recently by a relative because I chose not to have a bride cake. However, I think if I were, I would want it to look like this:

Courtesy of Gizmodo and GeekSugar

No, I’m not obsessive. :mrgreen:

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