Engagement Photoshoot

We love Maren and Michael from Applemoon Photography! Earlier this month, we met at our place to have some fun taking engagement photos around our house and at Baileyana Winery down the road. It was a little tough convincing Steve to do the photoshoot, but I swear, after a few beers and a couple loops around our property, he was lovin' it! I always call him my personal male model, and that day he really owned it!! I am so proud of him! Here are a couple of the photos, but you can check out Applemoon Blog or slide show for more! Plus, I'm going to turn them into a Save-the-Date card, and a guestbook for the wedding! Enjoy!

Lovely Ladies

A couple of weeks ago, my girls came to visit to partake in some wedding planning. We went cake tasting at Eclair Bakery in Arroyo Grande which turned out to be a BUST. I sent them a list of different cake and frosting flavors to try and they promised to have everything we wanted for the tasting. That morning, I got a call saying "as you know, there is no fresh fruit in season, so we couldn't make any cakes with fruit in them. We tried Trader Joes, but they didn't have any fruit. (WTF!?!?! There's ALWAYS fresh fruit in California) Oh and we ran out of lemoncello so we can't make the raspberry lemoncello that we offered. But, come on in and you can still taste some. But no one will be here to answer your questions, but have fun!" So we show up, and the cashier brings out three cupcakes - all chocolate cake, one with chocolate buttercream, one with vanilla buttercream, and one with raspberry buttercream. The cake was dense and dry and the frostings were yummy, but nothing special. Originally I had asked for ONE chocolate option as well as carrot cake, champagne cake, vanilla cake, a cream cheese frosting, some fresh fruit on some of them, etc..but we got jipped!!! It was the worst cake experience ever! And really, no one would ever expect cake tasting to go bad. DON'T USE ECLAIR BAKERY FOR YOUR WEDDING!!

Anyway, after that we went to look at See Canyon Fruit Ranch to show the girls the wedding location (even though I've just changed my mind and decided to have the wedding at Edna Valley Vineyard...that's another story). Then finally we got an ice cold bev at the Custom House in Avila Beach and relaxed!!

The girls tried on their bridesmaid's dresses and we added a lovely ivory sash to go with them, which really made the dresses shine. I am soo excited to see my girls all dolled up on my big day!! I tried on my dress for everyone with my J. Crew sash and it was a winner!! We are going to be BEAUTIFUL!

We went to Dell's Pizza for dinner and laughed over a bottle of wine, then ventured down to the Village to check out the wine bar. Cute place, but we missed the live music by 5 minutes!! :(

Sunday we went to the Bridal Faire and had a blast trying all of the food and cake samples (and champagne!!). I found a few florists I liked, and looks like we're going to go with Anacapa BBQ company for the caterer, and either Christine's Cakes or The Cakery. I am so glad my girls were able to come visit me and give me advice and make me feel special. Special thanks to my mom and Phil for breakfast at the Apple Farm!! Love you both!!!

P.S. We missed you Heather and Jillian!!

"Awe is what moves us forward"

Remember that post where I described my drive to work? Well, now I have pictures to prove it! I took these this morning from my camera phone. Look at that gorgeous blue sky and those luscious green vineyards! I am one lucky girl!

Slither

Saw the very first snake on our property over the weekend. We think its a King Snake about 2-3 feet long. It scared me half to death, but at the same time, the black and white design is so stylish don't ya think? After I shot this picture, it slithered into a tiny hole into the darkness. Eeekk! This is why I am scared to walk around after dusk!

New Hair!

Style Me Pretty

Oh my god, Rachel taught me the best trick ever!! Stylemepretty.com has the coolest tool for creating inspiration boards! I made my very own below :) I also used a color pallete tool on Colourlovers.com. I am obsessed with this stuff. Love, love, love it! Thanks, Rach!

In Brief

Here are some wild things happening in my life:

• A squirrel chewed through some important wires (and pooped!) in my engine and my poor car was M.I.A. for a few days until Steve miraculously repaired it and it's as good as new.
• I am a Cal Poly student again - taking thermodynamics as a pre-req for the Environmental Engineering Masters program, which I HOPE to be applying for at some point. (Which also means when someone asks my favorite question, "do you go to Poly?!" I have to say YES. S&FS^S*S*!)
• We recently bought a John Deer Tractor (actually it's technically a riding lawn mower, but tractor sounds so much cooler). It's big, green, and shiny and has a cup holder for an ice cold bev!!! Now, if we can just figure out how to turn it on...
• I also bought myself a brand new food processor so I can pretend to be Ina Garden (is that her real name?!) from Barefoot Contessa. I REALLY want to go to one of her dinner parties.
• Getting my hair cut and colored next week! Like this: