T-7 Days And Counting

Sooooo ONE WEEK UNTIL I GET MARRIED! For those of you who have been waiting for me to bust out with the gory details of wedding planning ad nauseam, I will do my best RIGHT NOW!

I am SO EXCITED to get married! Neil is awesome!!!! He is seriously the most amazing person I've ever met. Let me just say some things about him:

He is smart -- he is very intellectual and logical, and knows more about politics than anyone I know except my Uncle Dale (chair of the BYU-H Poli Sci dept.!)
He is creative -- he has SO MANY ideas for awesome design and architecture
He is kind
He is the most giving person I know
He is the most giving person most people who know him know
He is an Eagle Scout! Which is very impressive to me
He is Christlike in his actions
He is a great dancer -- he break dances like no white boy I know
He is super-fit, flexible and gymnastic -- I've seen him do flips, the splits 3 ways, walk on his hands, and various gymnastic moves incorporated into his break dancing. He's lifted weights every week for the past few years and he has an Excel spreadsheet to prove it, because
He is organized -- although his room resembles a disaster area, he cleans/organizes it nearly every day.
He always helps, supports and encourages me -- he gets excited about anything I'm interested in and he helps me to make my life easier: like getting me books and accessories to learn guitar, encouraging my desire to take ballet, getting me Shade shirts so I don't fret over what to wear, getting me bobby pins and hair ties because I can never find any, getting me Sterilite containers to organize my stuff in my house and car, encouraging and facilitating my travel to see friends with his flight benefits, getting me laundry bags because I had to use the laundromat, getting me a PDA phone because I wanted to be more organized, getting me foods I mentioned wanting to try, encouraging me to follow my career dreams, etc. etc. etc.!
He is a great yoga instructor!
He is a great masseuse
He is very good with money
He has great style
He is good at cutting, dyeing and doing hair
He is FUN!!!! He always plans fun things for the two of us to do, and he often orchestrates fun things for groups of us to do -- and he always tries to include and invite everyone
He is so sweet and romantic! From randomly giving me unique flowers, to box seats for two to a ballet at the Kennedy Center, to finishing a marathon with me, to last weekend helping me pack all my crap into a U-Haul and move to our new house, to the engagement-day trifecta: fly fishing lessons at dawn, a 4-hr. horseback ride through the mountains with lunch, and a hike to a peak overlooking the Shenandoah valley, where he proposed!
He is the most easygoing, happy-go-lucky person I've ever met
He is serious when he needs to be and is very practical
I could say so many more things -- this is what love does to people :)

The whole getting married thing sounds both crazy and pretty cool. The icing on the proverbial cake is that loads of people we love are coming out to celebrate! Neil's family is pouring in from Arizona, and his family here in VA will all be there. My grandparents from Utah are coming out, and -- treat of all treats -- my grandpa, a sealer, got permission from the First Presidency to perform our sealing in the Washington D.C. temple!!!! My aunt Linda and my cousin's wife, Stephanie, and her chubby little baby, Ambrose, are coming out from Hawaii!! My very good friends Cavan and Scott are coming from Iowa! One of my dearest friends, Linsi, is coming from Ohio! I am so excited to see all of these people!

We have been churning out batches and batches of announcements/invites. I have a very kind friend at the Arlington post office who has been hand-canceling ALL of our invites so they don't get torn up in the machines, and to give them a "personal touch." So, when you see that round date stamp over the postage stamp, you have Gary to thank.

I think the food is pretty much covered. My Dad has been filling up his freezer with gumbo he's made, which is quite a sacrifice, because between traveling the country and the world every week for business, I don't think my Dad has had spare time since the '70s. So I know it is a huge deal for him to MAKE the time to do this. Neil's family got together with us to make 300+ specially iced sugar cookies!! I hope you like green and orange :)

I have a dress I absolutely LOVE and am excited to wear! It is so pretty! As soon as the wedding is over, I will post pics of it. I am not letting Neil see it before the sealing. I am such a girl! Yes, that was a sexist comment. But really, there is something to be said about getting sucked into all of this wedding-day expectations/traditions propaganda, or, as Neil puts it, "it's not your fault -- you've been brainwashed for the past 27 years of your life to want the whole princess wedding-day thing." He's joking, but there is truth in jest.

I had my "bridal portraits" done by Neil's cousin, a professional photographer. I haven't seen them yet, but I'm sure they'll be good. She is also going to shoot the day-of, which should be exciting! Neil is quite averse to having his picture taken, but he is conceding to at least mostly candid ones. I have been advised that I do, or will, hold all the cards here and can make this man bend to my will, but I fail to either recognize my power or enforce it. But I will. Come on, a little manipulation never hurt anyone! ;)

Flowers are still up in the air. We need them for the open house. I am slightly concerned about these.

I am having a tea party!!! Neil's aunt planned it for me, and it should be fun. Especially because Neil and his "peeps" are going to go climb a rock wall. haha. That's not supposed to make any sense. But the tea party should be fun! It's an all-girl wedding celebration extravaganza. I hope I get to wear a giant bow on my head. In fact, I think I will arrive with a giant bow on my head. It just sounds ultra, over-the-top feminine and festive! The thing I love about all of this is, anything goes! I am the bride!! As Cartman said, "I do what I want!" Please keep that out of context.

We are going to Costa Rica!! We are going to a volcano, hot springs, jungle, zip wire, and the beach!! Mostly I care about the beach. A girl needs a tan!

Basically, the next week+ is going to be THE BOMB. I would even go as far to say that it will be a weeklong bombfest.

I hope Neil break dances at some point during these festivities. I have never seen him do a backflip. Many moons ago when I asked him to, he jokingly said he didn't want to lay all his cards on the table; he was saving the backflip for our honeymoon. I'll hold him to that.