Vacation Days: Cottage Life

One of the reasons that I have been completely MIA recently is that I am right in the middle of prime vacation season.

At the end of July I spent five amazing days here


With 11 of my closest friends (and pretty much my entire bridal party).

The cottage is my absolute favourite place to go (yes, I would actually prefer to be at the cottage over Cuba or Mexico). I feel like the minute I get there I am instantly relaxed, which lately is exactly what I need.

Our 5 days were spent:

Swimming

Even Brady participated


Drinking (probably a bit too much), which may or may not have led to...

...Antics...



Photoshoots by the lake

Girl Talk

Reading:


and most importantly...

RELAXING!

Perfection!

In other vacation news, this Wednesday the bestest, her mom, my mom, my mom's bestest, a whole bus load of woman and I will be leaving on a road trip to New York City. I have never been, but have always wanted to go and am extremely excited.

The bestest has gone every year for a few now, so she knows where to go, and pretty much has a whole itinerary fully planned. Can.Not.Wait.

Be expecting a full post about my adventures when I get back!

This Post May Lose Me Some Followers.....

I have a confession.....

.....I hate football.

C and I are in the middle of planning a mini vacation. He has the weekend of the American Thanksgiving off of work, so it was decided that I was going to take it off as well, and we were going to do something. Initially, C and my brother were talking about going to the cottage for a weekend again with some friends. Realistically, this was a really bad idea. My cottage is small, like 2 bedrooms, a kitchen, bathroom and living room small. Going in the summer means people sleep in tents. Going in the winter means sharing rooms, and sticking 10-12 people with enough drama on a normal day in the same 4 rooms for 5 days.....not going to happen. So I told Chris as much, and expressed that I would prefer to use my vacation time on spending some quality time with just him (we both still live with our parents, so privacy is not something we currently enjoy.) He agreed, and then came home with an elaborate plan.....I had NO idea what I was getting myself into....

So here's the plan: We leave Wednesday November 24th and head to Detroit. Keeping in mind that this is on my insistence, the boys original plan was to leave at 3ish Thursday morning, drive to Detroit for the football game, then leave Detroit that night, saving us spending money on another hotel. I made it quite clear that if he wanted a pleasant girlfriend at said game he better make sure I have a good nights sleep and a shower in the morning. I won. So we will be in Detroit from Wednesday night until Thursday afternoon, for a football game (don't ask me who is playing...I have absolutely no idea....I would assume Detroit???) Thursday we are driving to Eerie Pennsylvania. This part I'm actually really excited for. I have been to Pennsylvania before and I know it has amazing shopping. We are leaving Eerie Sunday morning and driving to Buffalo for yet ANOTHER football game, after which we will drive home for me to be in class on Monday.

Now don't get me wrong, I have nothing against football fans. In fact, I find them very passionate people who love their sport. I just don't get it. Hockey is much more simple. Shoot puck, puck goes in net, 1 point.

There are SO many rules to football and I just can't follow it. Believe me I've tried. C watches football every Sunday. I typically fall asleep or read a book. Don't hate me.

I'm not sure how I got roped into all of this, but apparently at the end of November I will not only be attending my first football game, but my first two. Any tips to make me like or understand this sport would be greatly appreciated.

Oh and I'm very excited because my wonderful fiance (yes he's still wonderful even if he tricked me into attending his stupid sporting event) surprised me with this yesterday night:

The boy definitely knows what I like!!

A Much Needed Vacation

So I'm back after 5 glorious days looking at this:

And This:

And this:

And spending time with my favourite people. Like him:

and them:
It was honestly just what I needed. A relaxing weekend away with good friends. A break from work, and wedding planning and just day to day life.

But now I'm tanned and back to the real world. I spend the better part of yesterday catching up on all of your wonderful blogs, and trust me, there were a lot. But I think I am now officially caught up, and this is just a quick post to let you all know that I am alive.

I don't really have anything significant to say at the moment, just trying to get back into my day to day schedule. Doing things that don't include sleeping until 11, planing my butt on a deck chair right in the sun and reading the afternoon away, napping at 5 and then waking up to fatty foods an a drink to start the evening.

I miss vacation.

Wedding Frustrations

So I promised you a bunch of updates last week....and it never happened....

....but I'm doing it now. Better late than never....right????

July has turned out to be an INSANELY busy month. We leave on Thursday for 5 days at the cottage with a bunch of friends, so I have been going nuts trying to get together last minute details. I'm always tired and stressed in the weeks leading up to a trip, but it always ends up turning out fine.

On top of vacation stress, I've have been in complete wedding mode lately and stressing myself out even more (this is supposed to be relaxing summer vacation....right?) Remember me talking about frustrating wedding plans here? Well that had to do with my centerpieces, which I showed you here. They look fairly simple right? WRONG. These have been the most IMPOSSIBLE things to find in my entire life. Now granted, I could go out and buy them for about 30 dollars a set (only the vases, this does not cover the costs of the stones, flowers and candles that will be placed inside of them) but I am marrying the most budget conscious man ever, so if I did that I would probably no longer be having a wedding. I could also order them from the US....if I wanted to pay double the cost for the shipping (not going to happen).

So lets just say, I have spent the better part of a month searching the internet, checking prices, sending C endless texts about places we need to go, and getting more and more annoyed. I FINALLY found the perfect vases at Michaels, but they were still a tad over budget, but I knew if it came down to it, I would buy them because to be honest, I was sick of looking and was ready to move on to bigger and better things. I decided to look at one more place (Walmart), but I decided to leave C at home because I think he's pretty much sick of the whole centerpiece debate, so I dragged the bestest and V to Walmart last Friday, and wouldn't you know...they had them! They are EXACTLY the same set of vases as Michaels, but half the price. You are now looking at a happy bride. Hopefully I can get C to come with me tonight, to give his heartfelt approval (more a if-you-like-it-then-I-don't-really-care nod) then we can buy them and be done with this whole thing. I will post pictures as soon as I get them.

I'm thinking my photographer is next on the list. Hopefully this search goes smoother than both the centerpiece and venue hunts.

I know I promised some book and movie reviews, but I think a post on vacation and wedding stress is enough for one day. So I will save my Eclipse review for next time.