We interrupt

your regularly scheduled blogging to bring you a discovery that has me tickled.

Not only did we love, love, love our engagement photo shoot with Alyssa Alig in Athens, but it seems the feeling was mutual!

We are now the engagement portfolio couple. How fun is that?

Check it out here.

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Such a Tease...

As I previously mentioned, the FH's sister - Maid Haley who threw me my awesome shower - took some photos of us at our Alma Mater, Great Bridge. At the shower, she gave me two discs chalk full of some awesome shots {like 300} and told me to pick out which ones we liked for her to edit.

We are currently catching up on the DVR and going through them...

BUT, in the spirit of generosity {or perhaps vanity}, I thought I would show you one of our faves...before edit:

 

Happy Sunday!

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Engagement Celebrations

I realized lately that I never posted about our engagement party back in November, and since we were lucky enough to have another engagement celebration in March, I figured I would go ahead and combo them up!

To start, our engagement party in November. My lovely FMIL hosted this gala at her home and decorated it beautifully - her theme was 'light' and I wish I had more pictures of the hundreds of candles and lanterns that made the party glow. The food, the friends, the...um...chocolate martinis, all were wonderful. ;)

Here we are with our appropriately decorated champagne glasses...

and the result of having drank the champagne, and maybe a few chocolate martinis...

{I swear the party was winding down and there were not too many people there to witness this sort of behavior ;) }

Next up was a youthful night of dinner and debauchery with our friends in Norfolk, courtesy of Best Man Corey!

He planned a lovely dinner at a restaurant in downtown Byrd and Baldwin Brothers Steakhouse. He even reserved the private dining room downstairs!

Here is the whole crowd around our table, courtesy of our server

{That's us! Waaay down at the head of the table}

Here we are!

{Excuse the pale face as I was just getting over being sick...in fact my fever didn't really break until later that night - but I still had a great time!}

The food and drinks were delicious...no joke it was probably the most melt in my mouth steak I have ever had. After we were all finished we headed upstairs where the hostess was kind enough to take this group shot!

We then hit the streets and headed out to some clubs on Granby Street! We swung through Guadalajara, Scotty Quixx and finally settled at a table at Baxter's where we closed the place down.

{Hey ladies! My fever broke! Time to celebrate!}

We had an awesome time at both celebrations and are so grateful that this preparation process gives us another excuse to hang out with our friends and have a great time!

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Preview!

The wonderful Alyssa Alig sent me an email today that was happily awaiting my arrival in Virginia.

She is 'ahead of schedule' and has our preview up on her blog {!!!!}

Alyssa, I love you. Truly, madly deeply. This just made my day!

Click here for the full preview.

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Engagement Photos

A while back the FH and I were discussing how fun that it would be to have engagement photos taken here in Athens. This town has been very important to us - it is the first place we learned that we could make it, just the two of us; it is the place where we got engaged; not to mention the place where we both have gone to school and made new friends.

At the time, we were considering going with a wedding photographer who included engagement photos, but we aren't anymore {more on that later}. And while our new photographer does engagement photos on the cheap for his couples, he suggested because of timing and scheduling that we have someone outside of Wisconsin do them for us. Smart man.

All in all this means that we get to have our photos taken in Athens! One of my maids, Lindsey, helped me scout out some possible photographers and after contacting a few, we have decided to go with Alyssa Alig Photography. They are great cost wise and release their photo rights, which means that I can use them for our guestbook idea, which is key, plus their images are beautiful.

This husband and wife team sounds so adorable and have been so great in all of our contact thus far. They even have a quote that I love on their website:

"Love is a canvas of many threads, embroidered by the imagination. Let us tell your story."

Here are some examples of their magnificent storytelling

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