website

I started our wedding website:

http://www.theknot.com/ourwedding/AshleyDawson&NathanJohnson

I think this might become a wedding planning blog...:) I love wedding planning but I think all I am doing is coming up with more and more ideas but nothing that has been put into motion. Oh well. We have the location for the ceremony and reception (my parents cabin on the lake) and the officiant (a long time family friend who is an awesome Lutheran pastor in Minnesota) which I think are big things to cross of the list! Oh and a tentative amazing photographer if she can make it to the U.S.. But major things still hanging include: the other half of my bridesmaids (actually I have only asked one person...and I need 6...I know 2 others for sure, I hope they say yes!), the colors, the food, the favors (although I think we just settled on some truffles after my great Maid of Honor and best friend had some shipped to us from a pastry chef she knows), the layout of the tent, tables, chairs, the vows, the wedding bands, the groom's outfit, my dress, the bridesmaid's dresses, the groomsmens' dresses...yeah...just about everything. But I have a binder full of ideas and price quotes and a few more magazines to go through...so I think we're okay.

My mom is always calling with new ideas and we will be in Boise next week to discuss details with Nathan's mom and sister.

plan plan plan

The craziness has begun! Not even 3 days after our engagement all the questions started coming about flowers and colors and dresses and dates and locations and times and food and music and on and on and on! I wish we could be engaged a little longer so there would be time to just soak it all in. We have almost nine months exactly from our engagement date which isn't THAT bad but summers in Montana = wedding season and already one of the photographers I had considered as a back-up to my number one choice only has 3 dates left for the entire summer!

There are a few things I am not willing to scrimp on-namely an excellent photographer. If everything works out, we will have Mandy Mohler whose work and style I absolutely love. She took pictures of my brothers and me last year and just keeps getting better and better. I think the artsy wedding pictures she does are awesome. Beyond that we also will be having a lot of people (our guest list is at 220 right now) so we need good entertainment in the form of good food and good music. We might end up with just an iPod shuffle to save money but it will still be good! And food may not be gourmet but we will definitely be feeding our guests and showing them a good time-Montana style.

I just got back from a girl's weekend in San Francisco where I tried on a few dresses for fun. They were way out of our budget but I was more just trying to get an idea of what's out there. I want to wait until my mom can be a part of it all before I go crazy but I am getting more and more ideas. That process is kind of crazy in itself, a little bit emotional!

Beyond all the planning though I just feel SO happy. My cousin told me she just was "glowing" after getting engaged and I totally get it. I am still just up in the clouds and head over heels in love with my new fiance'. I can't seem to wipe the smile off my face and I get so excited to see him in the morning and come home to him at the end of the day. He's been a major part of my life for 23 years but now his role is changing and he has become such a huge part of my WORLD...I just love him so much.

One of the things I was most excited for after getting engaged was buying my first bridal magazines. It was something I refused to do until becoming engaged because I wanted to save the excitement. Now I have a few from which I rip pages of ideas and add to a binder. Right now it's just all fun, eventually I'll get serious about the planning.

August 7, 2010 is our date.

engaged!!!

Nathan proposed this weekend!! WE'RE ENGAGED!!!!!!!!

So...I kind of had an idea this was going to be happening soon, in fact I knew it would because we have both been so excited about it all that Nathan has not been good about keeping secrets. About 4 weeks ago he told me he bought a ring from a place we had once just casually looked before. Knowing the rings take about 4 weeks to custom make I had a feeling what his timeline would be. BUT I still didn't know for sure. He suggested we go to Victoria B.C. for the weekend of Halloween and booked us a really cute little hotel and tickets for the boat ride over.

Before we left he suggested we share a bag together to pack all of our stuff. At that point I started to think there was no way he had a ring because he could not hide it from me in the same bag. We ended up with separate bags anyway but there was still no sign of anything.

We were having an awesome time in Victoria, it is SO pretty and so fun to try good restaurants and shop and just walk around. There is this one hotel that has a big garden in the yard. Nathan suggested we go over there and walk through. As we walked out the door he started walking faster, getting sweatier and kept his hand in his pocket the whole time. We got there and walked through, just casually talking and walking. At one point I turned around to tell him something and looked to see him down on one knee with tears in his eyes. It was so cute! Of course I jumped up and down and we were just so excited we sat on a bench for like 30 minutes just giggling and hugging like little kids...it was good.

The whole week leading up to the trip he was extra sappy and extra cute with everything he said. I think it was all the things he would have said in a little speech to me if he wasn't so nervous. It's funny he was even nervous because we've known each other 23+ years but I'm sure it's different when you're holding a fancy ring and asking someone to be with you for 23+23+ more years. There's no question in my mind this is going to be great. We've known each other forever (our moms are best friends) and I had the BIGGEST crush on him when we were younger, I always dreamed of marrying him but it just a little girl fantasy that I never thought would come close to true. And it did!

We wanted to call everyone in our phone books right away to tell them but then realized we were in Canada and would be paying extremely high international rates! We called our parents and siblings and best friends but then just had to sit with the excitement until we got back to the states. It was great though, I still feel like I'm walking around on a cloud. I want to just enjoy it for a little while but I already feel the pressure to plan! We felt like we had to pick a date because we already have 4 other weddings to go to this summer/fall so we needed to fit our's in there. August 7 2010 at my parent's cabin on Ashley Lake is the plan. I want to have kind of a Seattle meets Montana style, maybe with more modern looking dresses and decorations but then a lot of just good old Montana charm. Most importantly we just want a big party with good friends, good food and good music.

symphony

One of my new friends invited me to see Ben Folds with the Seattle Symphony tomorrow night. I am so excited! I love hannging out with her and would love to see this combination of artists!

Nathan and I went to a first time homebuyer class last week. The class kind of made us feel like we're really far away from purchasing a home but then on a whim I called mortgage company, just to give us a better idea of where we stand. I just wanted some questions answered but the extremely nice loan officer insisted I let her pull our credit so she could see how things look right now but also could give it to her credit specialist who could tell us what we could work on to make our rate even better. She is still needing to finish everything but so far my credit report was good enough to get a loan. Of course Nathan's will make it better since he's the one with the income. We have a significant amount of debt with my terrible graduate school student loan (thank God I don't have anything from undergrad or there would be no hope), my car loan, Nathan's car loan, the rest of Nathan's old car and his student loan which is much much smaller than mine. And some credit cards. We haven't been so good with saving up a down payment so we're exploring what we can do about that. It sounds like the first time homebuyer credit will be extended which would be awesome. Right now it can be used as a down payment which would be so helpful for us. Unfortunately we're too late to take advantage of it so I'm just praying it will be extended.

The loan officer wanted to get everything started and ready to go so that if it was extended we could jump right on it and have all our paperwork finished. We don't qualify for any down payment assistance programs because our income is too high but there is still a lot to explore...and we could just work like crazy to reach the 3.5% we need for an FHA loan. So we'll see. I'm pretty excited this is much more attainable than we thought. I just wish we had started sooner but we were just so unsure and didn't want to pull credit again. Now it's time to get serious!

I drug myself to the gym today and am hoping this step will push me back into it. I go through spurts of doing really well and then just quit completely. Today I worked hard on the treadmill, did some weights and jump roped. I love jumping rope, I really need to do it more, it's great for getting my heart going. I did jump rope in junior high and loved it. Our school had a huge award winning team. I was a Skip-A-Beat which was not as good as the Skip Elites but it was still so fun! I tried to bring back my can-can and double unders and whatnot...I need to work on them:)

Suction

We desperately need a new vaccuum. I bought a Hoover Windtunnel in college and it just never seemed to suck as good as it should. Last year it wasn't a big deal because even though I had Scrappy, I borrowed my roommate's vacuum when mine wasn't doing its job. NOW we are in our own place with a dark brown rug and pillows downstairs, a black bedskirt and furniture upstairs and a dog who never ever stops shedding.

The last thing I want to spend money on is a new vacuum but we have to. Our's just isn't doing the trick anymore. I've been advised that the Dyson Animal is the way to go. Ranging from $300-$500 it is nearly a quarter of my monthly salary. The problem is, we can't afford to go cheap here. Scrappy isn't going anywhere and if we buy a bad or inexpensive vacuum, we'll just spend the money to replace it again in a year or two. I've been trying to research what would be best but it's just so hard to tell.

I kind of want an iRobot Roomba, the little round disc that cleans the floors while we're away at work. While this would be nice, I know there is a good chance Scrappy would attack anything that was gliding itself across our living room when we weren't there and I've heard they really don't last that long. I don't mind vacuuming, our house isn't that big. I just want something that works...and doesn't cost a small fortune.

What has life come to when my blogs about shopping no longer involve clothes and shoes but vacuums? Welcome to adulthood?

solo

I rented The Soloist last night off of OnDemand. It is SUCH a good movie I loved every second of it. It just futher reinforced how much I love working with the homeless population and how badly I can't wait until I'm able to do it all the time. It also made me really really want to open a soup kitchen (with showers, laundry, computers, clothing, etc) in my home town. There seem to be enough of those types of services here and I just don't really feel a tie or a strong enough desire to bring something like that here...but at home it's like a whole different world of opportunity. Of course that would be when/if we move back to Montana...it's okay that it's a ways away because I'd need to be a point in our lives that we were stable in our home, had lots of loans paid off and I could take the risk of starting a "business". Obviously it'd be a nonprofit so it'd require some patience and perserverence...and the ability to probaly go without pay for a little while. But oh what a wonderful place it would be. I would call it bread. Lowercase. Don't steal my idea internets, it's going to happen some day! And then my brother can come once a month and do free dental check ups and my other brother can make really awesome, touching videos about it all to help us raise money. And my dad could build me a beautiful kitchen to serve my meals and a desk to work at...awww...my mom would love it too. We both have this thing about people going hungry. It just breaks our hearts, it should never ever happen. So she could serve up all her greatest recipes in our big kitchen.

Ahhhh...I miss having that inspiration and love for my job. I don't hate mine right now but it definitely doesn't give me that feeling that serving in the soup kitchen and loving homeless people does. THAT feeling is why I am in social work and I need to be reminded of it every now and again.

I'm eating like I'm single this weekend with Nathan gone. There's just no reason to cook a big meal so my staples are brie and crackers, grapes, olives, humuus, Naan bread, bagels...just quick and easy yummy stuff. My cousin and I always used to eat cheese and bread 3-5 days of the week when it was just the two of us. We both loved it and didn't mind at all but no boy would probably ever be too fulfilled with that meal. Don't get me wrong, I will be very happy when Nathan is back to make his amazing food- you know me, I love to eat! But one of my favorite things to eat is snacky stuff so this is nearly as fulfilling.

4 day weekend

My Labor Day weekend has officially begun! Nathan is gone for a boy's weekend at The Gorge and Scrappy and I are here, just hanging out. I had every intention of making big plans for myself this weekend and then waited until the last minute and realized everyone was off doing their own thing. Oh well. I'm going to see some friends tomorrow night, maybe meet up with another for lunch Saturday, go to a new church Sunday...but otherwise I'm just going to relax, go to the library, organize the garage, take Scrappy to the new dog park, go use my IKEA gift card, go shop the Labor Day sales...It all sounds really great to me!

I need a break anyway. My job is non-stop busy (which is a huge difference from when I was hired 4 months ago and was stuck doing absolutely nothing in my old position) which I LOVE but it just starts to get old. Lately I've been dreaming about work. This is my absolute least favorite thing in the world. It feels like I never left! I think this is a clear sign I need a few days away. There are just so many details involved in this program (a government program-which explains why there are so many useless details) and I am NOT a details girl. I just do, take care of the little stuff later, you know whatever works...There's not really room for that. I also don't believe there is one method for helping everyone and this program does, which is so stupid for the goals we try to meet...but again, all these government programs seem to often be backwards in the way they play out. So I just suck it up and follow the handbook, fifty billion pages long as it is.

My parents will be here next weekend! We'll first meet them for a couple days at the vineyards in Walla Walla and then they're coming back here for a Seahawks game and a couple days in the big city. I'm so excited, we keep talking about all the places we want to take them. There is definitely not enough time! Guess they'll have to come back!