Wedding Projects

So I haven’t been doing a lot of blogging lately but I have been getting some projects done that I thought you might enjoy!

Project #1 - Pearl hair pins.

My hairdresser for the wedding thought it would be nice to have flowers or something in my hair, since my dress has pearls on it I made my own designer hair pins! All I did was put a dab of hot glue on the hair pin and then set one or more pearls in place. to cool I grabbed the closest thing to me…. don’t laugh, it worked really well I thought! :)

Project #2 – Flower girl dress.

This is my Mom, a.k.a. Master Seamstress. As I’ve been playing with hot glue she has been working very hard on the flower girl dress and it is almost finished, I’ll have to post a picture of the final product.

Project #3 – Ring bearer pillow.

Believe it or not I didn’t use one drop of hot glue for this whole project! Aren’t you proud of me? My family was because I hand stitched the ribbons in place, Mom used the sewing machine for the edges, then I stuffed it and sewed up the rest. It was a lot of fun. By the way, that is not one of our real wedding bands tied to the pillow, just a cheap, silver band I had in the jewelry box.

Project #4 – Bird seed and Tulle Circles.

This is pretty self explanatory, The thin ribbon(1/8”) we cut about 7 inches long and the wider ribbon (1/2”) is around 9 inches long. When I told Kenny that I was putting these together he asked why we were supplying our guests with ammo! 

 

This last picture is (left to right) the Unity Candle, Program basket, Mrs. Spencer’s supply basket – she is the “Day-of-wedding-coordinator” and as such she needed some supplies…Final payments and thank you’s, tape, breath mints, band aids, Tylenol, handcuffs and brass knuckles for unruly guests, etc. :) and once again the ring bearer pillow. Can you tell I like polka-dots yet?

Thankful Thursday – Good Friends & Family

I know one of my first Thankful Thursday’s was about friends and I’ve done one on family before too, but I just couldn’t pass up telling you some more!

On Thursday evenings Kenny usually comes down after work to spend part of his weekend with me and sometimes we get together with Brittney and Stephany, two good friends of mine since grade school! This particular Thursday Stephy had to work late and I was going to be at Emmanuel with Kenny on Friday and Saturday for our Youth Lock-in and an Anniversary Party, so he didn’t come down. But Brittney still came over, poor girl, and I put her to work she volunteered to help address invitations.

I have truly been blessed by all the people who have pitched in to help with Kenny and my wedding!

Mom, Brittney and I sat at our Dining room table and watched “The Inheritance” while we addressed all 175 invitations – I actually don’t know the exact number we addressed but we ordered 175 to make sure we would have plenty.

Thank you Mom and Brittney for all your hard work!

DIY – Bath Soak & Sugar Foot Scrub

Ok as of right now none of my bridesmaids or ladies helping with the wedding can read this post! :) Just Kidding :)
I mentioned yesterday in my quick update on our lives that I had made gifts to give out at the wedding and these are two of them. First I show you my really cute jars and then give you the recipe’s for the Bath Soak and Sugar Scrub (so if your just here to get a really good, easy-peasy recipe’ you now know where to find it!)


First, I measured the jar lids and drew all the circles on the back of scrapbook paper then cut them out. – I told you this was going to be really simple! 




After that I hot glued just one edge of the label, recipe’ facing down, to the jar lid and hot glued a bow on top of that.

Ta-Da!!!! Ok, so this might not be exciting to anyone but me, but I had fun doing this and I hope the ladies receiving these will enjoy them. :)
Now for the Recipe’s
Best Bath Soak Ever! – I got this recipe’ from a good friend, who is actually going to be in the wedding, Amanda!
1 cup                Epsom Salt
1/3 cup             Sea Salt
1 TBS               Baby Oil
2-3 drops         Scented oil – I used vanilla, the original recipe’ called for Lavendar, you can use whatever you like and it should work just fine.
Mix together – When I’m making this for myself I dump all the ingredients into an old mayonnaise jar and shake it up until all the salts are blended with the oils.
To Use – sprinkle a couple tablespoons worth into warm bath water and enjoy :)
Sugar Scrub – I got this recipe’ from a blog I ran across called Maybe Matilda
3 cups                  White Sugar
1 cup & 2 TBS     Good quality oil – I used Baby oil since that’s what I had on hand for the bath soak but the lady I got this recipe’ from said she used olive oil.
*Mix these together in a bowl before adding Essential Oil.*
10 drops              Essential Oil per jar
I just did Vanilla for each of my jars to keep it simple but if you wanted to do a different scent for each jar you would just separate the mixture above into different containers before adding Essential Oil and mixing.
To Use – This is great if you give yourself a pedicure and want to gently scrub the “ruff parts” off, I’ve also used this on my hands to scrub paint off. Whatever you use it for it will make your skin nice and soft!

Enjoy!

I linked this project up to Handy Man, Crafty Woman

DIY - Flower Girl Basket

I am by no means an expert on DIYing but its a lot of fun and it has saved me some serious $$$ for our wedding (70 days away!) which is definitely a bonus! I recently made the necklaces for the bridesmaids and flower girl which you can read about here.

Now on to the main event! My sister made her own Flower Basket and after pricing them ($30 - $90) I decided to do the same!

Items needed:

• Wicker basket, spray painted white.    $ .25 at a yard sale
• Ribbon                                                $2.97 at Wal-Mart
• Black satin fabric                                 $1.65 at Wal-Mart
• Scissors
• Fabric measuring tape
• Straight pins
• Hot glue gun.

 

 I started out by measuring the inside of the basket ‘height x width x height’ I came up with 13 1/2” x 12” so when I cut my fabric I added  1 1/2 inches to both sides.

 

 

 

 

The next step was to role the edge of the fabric under and hot glue just a small section of each “flat side” to the basket.

I have other plans to make the rounded corners look nice :)

 I decided to pleat the corners using straight pins to get everything “just right” then I cut out the extra fabric off the back, hot glued it in place and removed the pins.

 

The next step was to make the bows for the sides (can you tell I LOVE polka-dots?) I cut 1 foot of ribbon, folded it and sewed it together… I’m kind of speeding through this part because I really didn’t know what I was doing, I claim the trial and error rule for my ribbons!

 

 

 Lastly I took a 1 1/2 of another ribbon to be the middle part of the bow. I sewed one end onto the bow then wrapped the ribbon around the bow, hot glued it in place and then hot glued it to the basket.

 

I went ahead, while I was making bows, and made one as a hair bow for the flower girl! (just hot glue it to a plain barrette or clip) Now just picture this with red petals inside and Valla!

This is something you can do to dress up a plain basket for everyday use too. I hope you got some tips and/or ideas for your next project and if you have any suggestions or comments (maybe some tips to help for the next time I do something like this) I’d love to hear them!

Just Because

I don’t really have anything important to write about today I just really like my new blog layout :s is that silly?

The temperature here in NC has been so nice lately I keep forgetting that its still February! I just hope that when it cools off this weekend it doesn’t completely kill all of the buds that have started coming out, I just want the pollen/allergy causing stuff to die.

Spring projects… that might get blogged about :)

• Cleaning out the flower beds, I’d like to get some of this done before the weeds come back in full force!
• Organizing the music files at the church. Kenny has done well with this already but still has a lot of music in tubs on the office floor, with that said anyone know where we could find an in-expensive filing cabinet? Book shelves would be another nice addition to his office.
• Yard sale-ing – I’m not going to have one of my own but I really enjoy going to look at them :) I claim the motto: “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.”
• Start packing things up to take to Kenny’s. I’ll be starting with decor (lamps and pictures and such), paper work, kitchen and living items that are currently in the attic and books. Once the warm weather is here to stay I might start working on the winter part of my closet :s Look out Kenny, here she comes!
• The wedding guest book. My cousin scrapbooked her own guest book, it was really cute. For mine I’m planning on having extra space where people can leave advice and comments with their names. I thought it would be more fun to look back at in the years to come.
• Flower girl basket and ring pillow
• Wedding veil, I’ve decided to make my own, how hard could it be? To be honest my sister is going to be aiding in this project since she is more crafty in the sewing arena.
• Address and mail invites… maybe I’ll invite a couple people over and have an invite addressing party! Anyone interested? (sarcasm)

Well I’ve made myself sound like a really crafty person with some of my upcoming projects, but don’t worry they’re really simple and as long as I don’t wait until the last to do them it should be a lot of fun too!

Does anyone else have a project list for this spring?

Wedding Jewelry

I thought it would be really neat to make the necklaces that my Bridesmaids will wear for the wedding. I love DIY type stuff but I’ve never made jewelry before so this is my first and I think it went rather well!

  This is the necklace that was my “inspiration” :) I had bought this a couple years ago and really enjoy wearing it. However, for the wedding I wanted a smaller pearl and a different ribbon. I went to the local bead store, (yes, in our small town we have our own specialty bead shop!) and not only purchased everything I needed, except the ribbon I already had that, but was given detailed instructions on how to put everything together. She really was very nice and VERY helpful. If your into making things with beads you should stop by “The Beaded Path” in Forest City.

This was my “work station,” A.K.A. the footstool from our rocking chair! :)

The finished product!!!!

I made 4 regular sized necklaces for the bridesmaids, and 1 small one for the flower girl. There were enough supplies left over (and I was having fun) to make 2 more regular sized necklaces to give as gifts and 1 small necklace for the flower girl’s sister, what little girl doesn’t like jewelry?

My 50th Blog Post

I just thought you all should know that I finally made it to 50 Posts! I am just going to be writing about random things today: Things I’m thankful for, favorite quotes, verses, and random thoughts. I hope you enjoy!

1. This is my Nephew Austin and my niece Mikaela.
2. The number one thing I am thankful for is my salvation but after that it is that I was able to grow up in a godly environment with Parents and Grandparents who encouraged me to serve the Lord with my life.
3. I have always wanted to work with teenagers in some way, I guess its a good thing that God brought me a Youth Pastor to marry.
4.  I dislike working in the church nursery, at the same time, my favorite age group for Sunday School is the 2~3 class. Some people think this is strange.
5.  If its going to be cold it should snow and if its not going to snow it should be 78~80 degrees, is that too much to ask?
6. My two best friends… pondering something important I’m sure!
7. Psalm 57:7 – My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed: I will sing and give praise.
8. I have developed road rage since dating Kenny. Let me explain, southern drivers do things like stopping at yield signs, or pulling into a parking space that is on the opposite side of the road. I never paid attention to these things until Kenny pointed them out. Now I find myself yelling through the windshield at the idiot in front of me!
9. Peach is the best flavor for a sucker or slushy.
10. When Kenny and I first met we didn’t like each other at all! I thought he was hot on himself and he says that I was a spoiled teenager.
11. My Grandparents along with my mom, on the left and my aunt, on the right. It was my Grandparents 60 something wedding anniversary! (I do know the exact amount of years they’ve been married, I just can’t post it because they just don’t want anyone to know how old they are!)
12. Pastor Camp did a series on Ruth several years ago, after he read Ruth 1:17~18 he made the statement that those two verses would make great marriage vows. Ever since then I’ve wanted to say them to the man I was going to marry in my vows to him.
13. Romans 8:39 – Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Jesus Christ our Lord.
14. I love my job as a barber. When Dad had his hot dog stand he would ask people if they could figure out what I did for a living, I don't think anyone ever guessed right.
15. In my job, I run into people from all over the place, Ireland, London, Cuba, New York, Pennsylvania, Florida. Its quite an education!
16. My brother Stephen, I think he’s adopted. 
17. Bowl cuts look cute on little boys but when your 27 with one its not cute anymore. At the same time, Mohawks and mullets never look good on anyone!
18. Why is it we drive on a Parkway and park on a Driveway?
19. I don’t have a favorite color, only favorite patterns – polka~dots and certain plaids.
20. The name of my blog, “Life in the Big City,” is just a sarcastic way of saying that I live in a small town that tries to do big things. Sometimes they succeed: Hot Nights and Cool Rides is one of the largest car shows in the Southeast; however, sometimes they fail: Dairy Goat Festival and Parade…. what is that?!?!?!?
21. Kenny and Austin playing “Twister.”
22. Vanilla scented candles and a rainy day go hand in hand.
23. Random facts, quotes, and corny jokes are the greatest!
24. Esther is my favorite book of the Bible. God’s name is never mentioned but you can see Him working throughout the story. That idea reminds me of unsaved people, they may not have God in their life yet but you can see Him working so don’t give up!
25. “God grant me the serenity to accept the people I can not change, the courage to change the one I can, and the wisdom to know its me.” ~Author unknown, variation of an excerpt from “The Serenity Prayer” by Reinhold Neibuhr

I hope you got some enjoyment out of my ramblings for today. Maybe I’ll have something exciting to post later this week.

Blogging

Ok so I’m defiantly one of those people who thinks half the fun of having a blog is decorating it! I kind of feel bad for Kenny because I have the same philosophy about a house! I love the change in seasons and holidays because it gives a good reason to re-decorate. Having said this I just remembered we need to take down the Christmas decor at Kenny’s… :)

I don’t really have anything major to blog about today just random happenings.

~Kenny and I picked out our invitations, wording, font, colors…. He was doing a really good job at pretending to be interested, I like that he is so involved in all of the planning because its not my wedding its ours :)

~Have any of you ever read some of the wording you can chose from for reply cards? I laughed so hard at this one:

Let's hear back from you
on or before MONTH DAY, YEAR
Name__________________________
___Shoot yes, we'll be there with spurs on!
___Dangnabbit, we can't make it!
I tried to talk Kenny into this wording but he just wasn’t going for it :) *just kidding*

~Saturday I went for my wedding dress fitting, a couple more minor adjustments and I think it will be just right!

~Pastor has started a series on marriage on Sunday nights. This past Sunday evening he picked on Kenny a lot! He asked this question of several people,“How’s your love life?” meaning how is your relationship with your spouse, or future spouse in our case. As he was doing this Kenny leaned over and asked me what to say when he asked him, I just laughed and said “Well I don’t know, how is your love life?” The point of the message was that your love life with people, namely those closest to you, will only be as good as your relationship or love life with God. It was a very good message, one that has caused me to ask myself several times “How is my love life with my Savior?”

~Tax season has just gone into full swing which means the Shahan family basically drops off the face of the earth for 3 months – don’t worry we’re not tax evaders who go into hiding! My mom, Sandy, owns a tax preparing business, and my two brothers and I help her out through the busy time. Pretty much, we all go to work and come home and occasionally show up at the grocery store or fast food restaurant but only when food is a necessity. :)

~I’ve been doing fairly well with getting things organized and de-cluttered. My only major issue is knowing that I’ll be moving in a couple months and will have to re-organize it all, this is a little discouraging but exciting at the same time because of the reason I’m moving.

I hope you don’t mind but everything in this post, except taxes, has had something to do with Kenny and/or marriage…is that normal?

Scary Moment :)

The first week of every new year I try to get organized for the whole year.

Buy a new planner…check; Make appointment for teeth cleaning…check;  Make Eye Exam appointment…check;  Call Joy’s for first dress fitting.

I bought my wedding dress from a small dress boutique here in town that recently purchased a larger building and was in the process of remodeling and moving into said building. When we purchased the dress my mom said “Wouldn’t it be something if they lost your dress in the move?”

This morning I called about having my first dress fitting, it needs some alterations and I want to get it taken care of well in advance. “Rebecca, We’ve just moved all our stock over to the new store, so, I’m going to find your dress and give you a call back in just a little bit.”

About 4 hours later… “Rebecca, We’ve lost….” My heart plummets, sick feeling in my stomach, I catch my breath as I’m thinking of what Mom had jokingly said! “We’ve lost your paperwork, can you come in a try your dress on again for the alterations?”

{[(Breathe!)]}

When I got there they explained that they usually put the receipt and the list of alterations in the pocket of the dress bag and some how it fell out or never made it to the bag. We had a good laugh and I’m just glad they didn’t lose my dress! :)

Kenny’s Tux Fitting!

Excuse me, Miss! Could you pull that a little tighter? I wanna see how many shades of blue he can turn. :)

 

Kenny… did you really wear your SLIPPERS to the mall? Just wondering :)

Engagement Pictures 2 – Vote for your favorite

Ok these are my favorites out of the 130 pictures Cindy took Sunday afternoon. Your more than welcome to comment on as many as you like but make sure to make it clear which one is your top pick. The one with the most votes will be the “Official Engagement Picture.”

Directions for voting:

• You can only choose ONE(1) favorite – Did you read that Mom?  Mrs. Godby? Only one! Just kidding :)
• Leave me a comment on this blog choosing your favorite
• You have until November 10th to vote – this is if you need to sleep on it before deciding :)

Here they are!

1. Funny story…. That’s not my engagement ring  I sent mine off to be sized on Friday, Cindy let me borrow hers for the pictures. Oops!

 

     2.  

    3.   I think this one looks like a magazine picture…just sayin

    4.

    5.   Doesn’t he just look dreamy in this picture? Alright I’m going to say it… Dreamboat!

   6.   Ok so I probably wouldn’t use this one for “the” engagement picture because its taken from far away… but it is one of my favorites

 

   7.  

    8.   Funny Fact: Kenny’s hand is covering up some other “lover’s initials” D+M -We should have put ours there and took a picture of that!

    9.   Maybe we can photo-shop those initials out :s

 

    10.

    11.   Once again, I probably wont use this one for the main picture but I thought it was really sweet. :)

 

    12.  

 

    13.  

  

Ok that’s all! Do you see now why I was having a hard time choosing my favorite? :) Please remember to vote for your favorite!

Engagement Pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!

We finally had some pictures taken! Cindy Haley, our Pastor’s wife, took them and did such a wonderful job I don’t know how I’m going to be able to choose my favorite. I think what I’ll do is take a poll :) Later this week I will post my top favorites and let every one choose one favorite out of the bunch. For today though I’ll just show a few of the funny ones!

I’m posing for the pictures and had no clue what he was doing! 

  Kenny was hiding Cindy’s Coffee behind his back

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Time to go!

Hope you enjoyed the “funny” pictures. I’ll hopefully have my favorites picked and posted soon!