There Are No Wigs in the Sunsphere!

Last night some of our good friends Sam Crass and Brooke got married! Yay! The wedding went off without a hitch and the happy couple is on their way to the Dominican Republic for their honeymoon!
The wedding ceremony took place at the World's Fair Park on the lawn in front of the fountains and the reception was held in the Sunsphere! I had never been inside the Sunsphere, but contrary to The Simpson's episode, there are no wigs in the Sunsphere! It had a GREAT view of Knoxville!
Brooke arrived in a horse-drawn carriage, which made great pictures, and the groomsmen, and the bridesmaids all came in a white limo - snazzy!
Brooke did most of the planning by herself! I can't believe that she was so calm and collected the entire day because there is inevitably something that doesn't go according to plan when it comes to weddings. I co-coordinated the wedding with Brooke's aunt. This was my first time coordinating/directing a wedding, but I guess since I've had my own, be in some and be to some, that makes me qualified -HA! I was so nervous that I would mess something up!
It was an incredibly hot day for an outdoor wedding. I wore a casual dress during the day while helping out and quickly sweat completely through it! Right before the wedding I had to duck into a bathroom and take a 'bath' with Shower to Shower towelettes in a nice Island Fresh with Citrus scent which did help some, but not enough for me to really hug on anyone at the reception, and then I had to change into my other dress, which was black!
Side note: The dress I was originally going to wear ended up not fitting very well. The cut at the top was just all wrong and Adam said I looked like I was trying to stuff myself into the top of the dress, when actually the fit was great, just the cut was wrong. So we drove around Knoxville an hour before we were supposed to be at the wedding/reception site to find another dress and had absolutely NO luck, so I wore a black dress in 92 degree heat!
We did manage to take a few pictures from the reception, but none from the ceremony because Adam was a groomsman and I was directing.

So I guess I can add coordinator/director to my repertoire of wedding know-how!

Bridal consultant at bridal boutique - check
Make up artist - check
Cake decorator extraordinaire - check (well not quite to the "extraordinaire " status)
Coordinator/Director - check

So all I need is to learn photography, catering, floristry, and ordained ministry, and I could be almost a completely self-sufficient wedding venue - A one-stop wedding shop!

Here are a few pictures of the reception!

The Cake!

First Dance as Husband and Wife!

Adam took this picture, so sorry for the head shot up front!
Sam was about to cut the top tier, so I yelled at him - Director duty calls!

Us!

Bouquet Toss

Garter Time!

Garter Action Shot!

Poison Ivy

Sadly, this blog is not in reference to the song by the Coasters, but I definitely could swim in an "ocean of calamine lotion" right about now! If you refer back to my previous blog, I mentioned poison ivy several times, and at the time of composition I didn't have any visible or sensational evidence of poison ivy.
Well, I've learned you can't pray away poison ivy if you are allergic to it. It is mostly on the back of my right leg and a few spots on my left ankle and foot. It looks the worst on my right ankle, though. It looks like some kind of biohazardous outbreak on my skin, which I keep a gigantic band-aid on to keep the blisters from oozing - yes oozing! However, the itchiest part is on the back of my right thigh. I never realized until now, how much we take our thighs for granted. We use them ALL the time, and that makes this poison ivy less than tolerable. And scratching them is very unbecoming of a lady! Luckily, Adam isn't allergic, although that kinda makes me mad because he was standing right beside me in the thicket of ivy. I wouldn't wish this on him though - I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy! Apparently poison ivy can hang around for a couple of weeks, which I am not happy about. We have a wedding to go to this weekend, which is outdoors, and the weather is most likely going to be hot and humid - aww perfect conditions for me to want to scratch my leg off!

"Poison Ivy, Lord'll make you itch!"

Gilligan's Island Gone Wrong

I have to admit that the Fourth of July has always been a good experience. My father and his palls from The Kingston Optimist Club started Roane River Festival back in the early 90s. It was a several-day long festival around the Fourth of July with boat races, carnivals, vendors, and the area's best fireworks. Every year since, Kingston has maintained the best fireworks around and continues festivities. I've always had a great experience on the Fourth, going to Kingston to watch them, eating the best food and getting the best seats on the lake front. However, I have always wanted to be out on the lake on the Fourth, but never had the chance. My father said all the "crazy people" are out on the water on the Fourth, and he didn't want to risk the family getting hurt by some crazy drunk driver, much less deal with the insane amount of boat traffic. So today we were offered a boating trip by some of Adam's friends. I really didn't want to miss Kingston's fireworks, but knew I may never get another chance to go out on the lake on the Fourth, so we decided to go.
We drove up to Norris Lake to a marina where the friends of the friends had a houseboat, called Mixed Nutz and a pontoon boat. Basically when it all came down to it, our boating experience was to take place while driving a passenger/owner of the pontoon boat to Maynardville (2 1/2 hours away by boat) to deliver a birthday card to his friend, whose birthday was today - aww how sweet! Things were going pretty well but we knew that we needed a few more life jackets to have the regulation 1 life jacket per passenger. I am a big stickler about these rules because my father always was when we had a boat. I knew that if we didn't have enough life jackets that inevitably we would be pulled over by TWRA (boat police), and get fined for the lack of life jackets.
Lo and behold, it happened. The driver got fined $167 for being short 1 life jacket (luckily I can fit into a YOUTH sized life jacket or the fine would have been higher)! After that we still had a long way to go to Maynardville. The clouds started thickening and the sky started getting darker as we go closer to Maynardville. We finally reached our destination 2 1/2 hours later and then had to deliver the birthday card, say our hellos and goodbyes, and off we went back home. By this time the sky is looking pretty fierce in the direction that we were going. It started lightening in the distance and then it started raining. The rain finally got so fierce that we had to beach the pontoon on a small island and run for cover in the trees. I know you are not supposed to stand under a tree when it is lightening but we all figured it the safer alternative to being in a slow-paced metal lightening rod gliding across a completely empty lake!
So we took cover in the trees, and put a tarp over us to keep the rain off as best as possible when someone says that we should probably check for ticks when we get home - gross! As I started looking down to exactly where we were standing, I realized that we were standing in poison ivy. Finally the storm started to lighten up enough to where we could get back in the boat and head home as the last glimpse of sunlight left us!

Note to self: Never go out on the lake on the Fourth of July

So to make this a little more fun to read I have composed a song, "Mixed Nutz Isle," about our experience to the tune of the Gilligan's Island song.

Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
A tale of a horrible trip
That started from this redneck marina
Aboard this slow-paced ship.

The mate was a mighty irresponsible man,
The skipper knew the way for sure.
Ten passengers set sail that day
For a three hour tour, A THREE HOUR TOUR!

The weather started getting rough,
With lightening all around
The rain-soaked crew sought shelter in some trees
With ivy on the ground, with ivy on the ground.

The Mixed Nutz set ground on the shore of this lake island
With The Squirrel Master
The Skipper too,
The Engineer and his soon-to-be wife,
The other people
The Physical Therapist and Mandy Lou,
Here on Mixed Nutz Isle.

So this is the tale of the castways,
They had an poison ivy laden climb,
They wanted a Fourth on the lake,
But this is the very last time.

The first mate and the Skipper too,
Were surprisingly sharp,
To make the others comfortable,
They covered them with a tarp.

No phone, no lights, no other boats,
Not a single luxury
Like cats getting a bath
As miserable as can be.

So join us here each week my friends,
You're sure to get a smile,
From ten stranded castways,
Here on "Mixed Nutz Isle."

Virtual Makeover

My Mary Kay website has a new virtual makeover setting where you can actually upload your own picture and play around with the make up colors and hairstyles. Here are a few I've been playing around with today! Enjoy!

The Bouffant

The Vintage Look

The Fergie Look

The Jessica Alba Look

Go to my mary kay website to try it out for yourself. It's fun!

Final Cake for Course I

Today was my final class for Course I of my cake decorating class. I made a cake called "Brimming with Roses." It is covered with about 35 roses, which are NOT easy to make. I am definitely getting better, but some of them still look a little rough around the edges!
This is a strawberry cake with strawberry flavored icing - yum!
I start Course II in a few weeks, so I will be honing my Course I skills over the coming days!

Wes and Ashley Got Hitched!

Last night, Adam and I went to see some of our best friends get married! The wedding went off without a hitch! However, to start the evening off, I had to do my usual, which is to do something clumsy! As I was trying to walk down the steps at the church in high heels, one foot slipped out from under me and my other knee gave out and I ended up doing some crazy move that you would probably find in the Matrix movie, down the stairs! Luckily I had ahold of the rail, but still, it was embarrassing and it chipped some of the polish of my toenail! Then I heard Travis (Sweet Chuck, as we call him) say to Adam, "Your wife just fell down the stairs!"

Anyway, back to the wedding. Everything was beautiful - the church, the flowers, the dresses, and Ashley's gown! Everything at the reception was beautiful as well. The cake was simple but elegant - it kind of reminded me of my cake. The groom's cake was very cute with both UT and Duke helmets on them!

We had a great time at the reception. Thanks to a few brave souls like Polk and a few other's that I didn't know, who were willing to lead off most of the dancing. Sadly, Adam refuses to dance with me, so I have to find other dancing partners. Thanks Sweet Chuck for always dancing with me, and thanks for wearing your pink polo - also reminiscent of my own wedding!
I am sure it is going to surface sometime, so I will admit to leading the Thriller Dance - we didn't do so well, but you can always improvise by moon walking!!

Wes and Ashley are off to Disney World for their honeymoon. Hopefully they will be able to convince Adam to take me sometime! We love them both dearly!

A great time was had by all!
Here are a few pictures of the evening!

The First Dance as Husband and Wife!

Mother - Son dance

My Dance Partner in Pink!

Lord of the Dance!

Us!

The Bride and Me!

The send off!

Clown Cake

This week in class we made a cute clown cake! It was pretty easy and tremendously fun to make! My icing for the clowns bodies was a little dry so one of the arms broke in two, so it makes the leaning effect more realistic, I guess! This is my pracitice cake for River's 2nd birthday. Hopefully by January of 2009, I will have perfected my clowns, decorating techniques, and making Red icing (the pink icing is supposed to be Red) so his terrible twos will start out practically perfect!

We also learned how to make roses this week. It is a lot more difficult than I thought. Mine more or less resembled carnations instead of roses! We have to make about 15 roses for class on Monday for our final cake for Course I!

Clown Cake with vanilla pudding filling!