The story of how I won a free reception at Remington Park shall be told by dear friend and blog author Rhiannon Leach:
"on sunday i made a trip to okc to remington park for a bridal show. andrea had invited me to go and we had a lot of fun. we visited 60 vendors in about 3 hours. our feet were killing us! luckily i had stowed flats in my bag ... but i felt guilty putting them on since andy didn't have any. poor girl. she was walking so funny by the time we headed out to the car.
about 2/3 of the way through the show, we grabbed a glass of wine, and continued our trek to see the rest of the vendors. it was very important that we had our cards signed by every vendor so that we could be entered to win a $4000 reception at remington park. some vendors had left and we were worried that we had put in all of the effort for nothing. when we got to the room to hand in our cards, a very sweet woman signed the rest of our slots for us saying that she understood several of the vendors were gone. we relaxed on some very comfy couches for a few minutes nibbling some sweets before heading down to the winner's circle for the drawing.
you had to be present to win the drawing and while there were over 2,000 entrants, many had already left, improving our odds. we watched the funniest obstacle course race with 10 brides and their grooms competing for a honeymoon in the caribbean, and then the drawing for the reception.
andy won!!!
she was the first name they drew out of the hopper!!! she jumped up and down and started yelling! i was super excited for her. she's getting married in hawaii and wanted to have an at-home reception, but wasn't sure if she would be able to ... now she can! ryan {her fiance} couldn't believe it when she called to tell him the good news. after celebrating on the phone a little more, we headed out to the parking lot and decided to grab dinner.
we wanted p.f. chang's {i've been craving it} but we never made it because of a ton of construction. instead we stopped for on the border in edmond. i think we were both starving from the activities of the day. we enjoyed dinner and caught up a little more. then it was time for me to head back home.
andrea gave me the wedding presents she had purchased for me and travis saying that we had to open them on what would have been our wedding day. i told her that we wouldn't {because i love surprises and they're supposed to be for our wedding} ... but she insisted, so we shall see."
Friday, September 25, 2009
I found it.
On Saturday, September 12th I went to Bella Rose bridal boutique in Edmond with one of my college friends, Jana. We got there at 9am and I was immediately so excited because their racks of dresses were gorgeous!! I wanted to try them all on.
I picked about 7 or 8 and started trying them on. I fell in love with every single dress, I didn't want to take any of them off and each one was prettier than the next! I had no idea what to do. Jana took lots of pictures and we got it narrowed down to about 2 or 3. Then I went back to the main room and checked out the sale dresses.
I found an incredible Pronovias gown that was half off the original price, and just happened to be about my size! I tried it on...it was a little snug but the owner came in to my dressing room and fought with the zipper and it finally zipped up! When I came out of the dressing room we all knew. Everyone in the store was making comments about it, and I stood in front of the mirror just staring at it forever. I tried it on with a big white hair flower and a long cathedral length veil and I was so happy...I finally found "the dress!"
I paid for it the next week and they are going to store it at the boutique for me!
Friday, September 11, 2009
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
More Gowns
Jenny hasn't sent me the other pictures yet, but here are some of my favorites that I tried on from their bridal websites.
Dress Shopping
The hunt for my gown has become an OBSESSION! I'm having so much fun trying on dresses!!!
The first time I actually got to go look was right after our cruise, when I was in Dallas staying the weekend with Jenny for her birthday. The second time was this past weekend, when I visited two different boutiques who wouldn't let me take pictures. Mallory went with me to the 2nd boutiqe.
Here are the gowns, in no particular order....
Engagement Story Continued!
At this fabulous French pastry shop called Jean-Philippe! We ordered coffee and I had a mushroom, spinach, ham and cheese crepe, it was so yummy. We headed to the spa and checked in at the front. They led us down seperate hallways to the women's and the men's changing rooms and had us change into robes and leave our clothes in lockers. Then we met back up in a central room and our massage therapists came out to take us to our room. They left us to get onto our tables, which were kind of far apart. Then they came back in and we got Swedish massages for an hour. Mine was ok...they never press down hard enough but I never want to tell them that because I feel like they will get tired!
After the massage, we were led to a cool relaxing room with hardly any light. There was a waterfall on one of the walls and it smelled really good. We were supposed to meditate or something, but I just took some pictures and we left soon after that.
Back in the room, we had to shower and get ready for the day. Then we headed downstairs to gamble for a little while. We found a blackjack table and had some good luck. We made friends with the guys at the table, who were our age and really friendly. They actually started buying rounds of shots for everyone, and I ended up drinking way more than I should have! I guess I got hungry towards the later part of the evening, because I invited everyone at the table to come eat dinner at this Asian restaurant called Jasmine that was within walking distance from our table. Nobody wanted to go, and I got upset and went into the restaurant by myself. Somehow I ended up arguing with Ryan about it and our day was cut short...I'm really sad about it now, because the fight was completely due to the fact that I was drunk and being unreasonable.
The next day, we woke up and I apologized for the night before! Then Ryan ordered in room service....it was amazing! They brought up a table to our room and the food was great. Ryan went downstairs to walk around after breakfast, and I had a headache and was sick so I stayed and tried to sleep for awhile longer. I met up with him around lunch and we decided to buy tickets for a show that night. We wanted to go see the Bellagio's Cirque du Soleil Show, "O," but it was already sold out. In fact, the only show we could get tickets to was "Love" over at the Mirage- but that sounded great to me! We bought our tickets and then decided to go to the Paris hotel to eat. The original place we wanted to go ("Ah Sin") was closed, so we were walking past the elevators that go to the top of the Eiffel Tower part of the building. We saw the menu for the restaurant and Ryan asked me if I wanted to eat lunch there instead. Um....yes?!! I was giddy! Then immediately nervous again because I wondered if it was his plan all along, and if he had the ring with him.
Our table upstairs had the most magnificent view overlooking the strip. We were directly across from The Bellagio, and could see the water show and our suite. The food was pretty good...but we had to deal with this loud wedding part who had reserved the middle of the restaurant. It was a major 80s reception, with a giant frilly bride, a horrendous cake topper and the bright neon poufy bridesmaid dresses. Hilarity!
After lunch (and no proposal), we walked back to the hotel. I think we may have played a little blackjack before we got ready for dinner. Ryan had a limo reserved to take us to our favorite restaurant of all time, "Roy's." It's an Asian-fusion restaurant that my aunt and uncle introduced us to during one of our trips to Vegas. It was quite a drive to get there because we picked the wrong location, but the limo ride was romantic. I felt so spoiled.
Our table at the restaurant was in a cozy little booth tucked away in the corner. We ate until we were stuffed, kobe beef appetizer, filet mignon entree and molten chocolate cake for dessert. Afterwards, our limo driver was waiting to take us back to the strip and dropped us off at The Mirage for our show. I was already getting tired, but once we sat down I perked up because we had the BEST seats! Front and center (since the stage was round). The show itself was pretty good...loved the music of course. The dancing and stunts weren't as impressive as Mystere, which we had seen during our last trip out there.
After the show, we slowly walked back to The Bellagio in the heat. It was really late, about 11:30pm and there were so many people outside. We got back to the room and I was exhausted. We were just laying there on the bed talking about everything that we had done that weekend. I was so sad to be going home the next day. Ryan told me that he had had an amazing time too, and that he knew we would continue to have more amazing times....the rest of our lives.....
At that moment, I knew as soon as he said that. He got off the bed and pulled me off with him. He told me he was glad the trip hadn't been ruined by our fight the night before, and that he was glad I could be reasonable, and that he loved everything about me. I wish I could remember everything he said, but I was a little in shock. I seriously feel like I was outside of my body looking down when he finally got down on one knee. I think he asked me to marry him and then pulled the ring box out of his pocket. I knelt down with him and said, "YES!!" He opened the box, and my eyes were blurry so I couldn't tell right away which ring it was. The water show outside had just started, and we laughed because it was perfect. I put the ring on and realized it was THE ONE!! After that I was so happy that I was about to burst. I grabbed the camera and we took a few pictures of us kissing, us with the ring, me showing the ring...then we got ready for bed and spent the night with our little secret that nobody else knew about yet.
I loved my engagement weekend, it was perfect and I'm finally going to marry the man of my dreams!!! Mrs. Andrea Hurst!!!
After the massage, we were led to a cool relaxing room with hardly any light. There was a waterfall on one of the walls and it smelled really good. We were supposed to meditate or something, but I just took some pictures and we left soon after that.
Back in the room, we had to shower and get ready for the day. Then we headed downstairs to gamble for a little while. We found a blackjack table and had some good luck. We made friends with the guys at the table, who were our age and really friendly. They actually started buying rounds of shots for everyone, and I ended up drinking way more than I should have! I guess I got hungry towards the later part of the evening, because I invited everyone at the table to come eat dinner at this Asian restaurant called Jasmine that was within walking distance from our table. Nobody wanted to go, and I got upset and went into the restaurant by myself. Somehow I ended up arguing with Ryan about it and our day was cut short...I'm really sad about it now, because the fight was completely due to the fact that I was drunk and being unreasonable.
The next day, we woke up and I apologized for the night before! Then Ryan ordered in room service....it was amazing! They brought up a table to our room and the food was great. Ryan went downstairs to walk around after breakfast, and I had a headache and was sick so I stayed and tried to sleep for awhile longer. I met up with him around lunch and we decided to buy tickets for a show that night. We wanted to go see the Bellagio's Cirque du Soleil Show, "O," but it was already sold out. In fact, the only show we could get tickets to was "Love" over at the Mirage- but that sounded great to me! We bought our tickets and then decided to go to the Paris hotel to eat. The original place we wanted to go ("Ah Sin") was closed, so we were walking past the elevators that go to the top of the Eiffel Tower part of the building. We saw the menu for the restaurant and Ryan asked me if I wanted to eat lunch there instead. Um....yes?!! I was giddy! Then immediately nervous again because I wondered if it was his plan all along, and if he had the ring with him.
Our table upstairs had the most magnificent view overlooking the strip. We were directly across from The Bellagio, and could see the water show and our suite. The food was pretty good...but we had to deal with this loud wedding part who had reserved the middle of the restaurant. It was a major 80s reception, with a giant frilly bride, a horrendous cake topper and the bright neon poufy bridesmaid dresses. Hilarity!
After lunch (and no proposal), we walked back to the hotel. I think we may have played a little blackjack before we got ready for dinner. Ryan had a limo reserved to take us to our favorite restaurant of all time, "Roy's." It's an Asian-fusion restaurant that my aunt and uncle introduced us to during one of our trips to Vegas. It was quite a drive to get there because we picked the wrong location, but the limo ride was romantic. I felt so spoiled.
Our table at the restaurant was in a cozy little booth tucked away in the corner. We ate until we were stuffed, kobe beef appetizer, filet mignon entree and molten chocolate cake for dessert. Afterwards, our limo driver was waiting to take us back to the strip and dropped us off at The Mirage for our show. I was already getting tired, but once we sat down I perked up because we had the BEST seats! Front and center (since the stage was round). The show itself was pretty good...loved the music of course. The dancing and stunts weren't as impressive as Mystere, which we had seen during our last trip out there.
After the show, we slowly walked back to The Bellagio in the heat. It was really late, about 11:30pm and there were so many people outside. We got back to the room and I was exhausted. We were just laying there on the bed talking about everything that we had done that weekend. I was so sad to be going home the next day. Ryan told me that he had had an amazing time too, and that he knew we would continue to have more amazing times....the rest of our lives.....
At that moment, I knew as soon as he said that. He got off the bed and pulled me off with him. He told me he was glad the trip hadn't been ruined by our fight the night before, and that he was glad I could be reasonable, and that he loved everything about me. I wish I could remember everything he said, but I was a little in shock. I seriously feel like I was outside of my body looking down when he finally got down on one knee. I think he asked me to marry him and then pulled the ring box out of his pocket. I knelt down with him and said, "YES!!" He opened the box, and my eyes were blurry so I couldn't tell right away which ring it was. The water show outside had just started, and we laughed because it was perfect. I put the ring on and realized it was THE ONE!! After that I was so happy that I was about to burst. I grabbed the camera and we took a few pictures of us kissing, us with the ring, me showing the ring...then we got ready for bed and spent the night with our little secret that nobody else knew about yet.
I loved my engagement weekend, it was perfect and I'm finally going to marry the man of my dreams!!! Mrs. Andrea Hurst!!!
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