Absolute Perfection

This is how I felt this morning...

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I woke up this morning and looked to see what time it was. When I saw that it was a 8:00, I decided that I still technically had 30 more minutes to sleep, so I rolled back over. But then, I remembered coffee. The sooner I got up, the sooner I got coffee.

The first sip was everything I hoped it would be...and more!

Needless today, when I came to this realization, I hopped out of bed and headed downstairs. I chose Vanilla Biscotti by Folger's as my first cup of "happiness".

When I walked into the kitchen to get my coffee, I found my dad making a wonderful breakfast!

Look how precious my dad is making breakfast for his girlies. Whole new meaning to "provider".

He made turkey bacon, eggs, and sliced watermelon. I opted to just go for an egg, watermelon, and some coffee, but the smell of bacon was delightful!

Around 9:30, it was time to hit the road. We had an 11:00 appointment at David's Bridal in Pensacola, which is about an hour away. But we weren't sure where in Pensacola the store is, so we made sure to leave with plenty of time.

The view from the Destin Bridge is my favorite in the entire world. Today was perfect in many ways, but this is definitely one of them:

I'm glad that we decided to leave early, because we walked into the store at 11:01. I also spilled my coffee in the car and it got all over the back of the sundress I had on...great way to walk into a wedding gown store. I might as well introduced myself as "Clumsy".

As soon as I started looking at dresses, everything got better. My consultant's name is Joan and she's been "in the business" for over 25 years. Let me tell you, that woman knows her stuff. She guess my dress size about five minutes after she met me. Incredible...

I wish I could post a picture, but my loving and supportive fiancé does read my blog (Hey Jason!), so I cannot. I will just say that we HAD to find a dress today. I told Joan that I was walking out of the store with a dress and she sure did make that happen. We were there for two and a half hours and I tried on six dresses. I never put a dress on twice. I bought the sixth dress and knew it was "it" before I even looked at myself in a mirror. My family literally gasped as a walked out of the room (and one of the consultants did too). I felt so special and I just knew that was the reaction that I needed to get from the perfect wedding dress.

Even though I was/am on a super strict budget for my wedding, I ended up getting a designer dress that was on sale. I really don't know any designers for wedding gowns other than Vera Wang, but this guy who designed mine also designed Jackie Kennedy's and Grace Kelly's dresses. I thought that was a fun fact.

For anyone who is about to go wedding dress shopping soon, or even someday, here are a few tips.
1. Don't wear a lot, or any face make-up such as powder or foundation.
2. The shop will have all the undergarments you need. You don't need your own (I was way over prepared).
3. If you have your shoes, bring them with you! It helps so much.
4. Set a budget ahead of time.
5. Plan the appointment early. Plan to be there for a while. Don't plan it close to a mealtime.
6. Take people who will be honest with you, but who will also celebrate the experience with you.

I did a lot a little research before dress shopping today so thankfully I did all of these things. It made the trip run very smooth! It was so special and I got to ring a bell when I "said yes to the dress". When I rang the bell, everyone clapped. I truly did feel like a bride and buying the dress made it seem so much more real!

After dress shopping, we hit up Ruby Tuesday's for their salad bar.

The Garden Bar is always a good choice. 

I had a delicious salad topped with cucumber, egg, sunflower seeds, a few black olives, balsamic vinegar, and olive oil. I also had a little bit of Waldorf salad and something that resembled potato salad, but I decided not to eat the potato salad. When we got home, I fixed an afternoon coffee. It wasn't as exciting as my morning coffee today, but it still hit the spot!

By request of, well, me, we picked up some fresh red snapper from the seafood market on our way back into town. I am super picky about seafood, but I knew that fish would be a great way to ease out  of the cleanse. Since I'm picky, I usually only eat seafood if it's fresh and if it's from Destin. My dad marinaded it in this lemon pepper sauce and then grilled it.

I volunteered to make my parmesan crusted asparagus tonight. It was a big hit with my family, and I honestly think I ate too much of it. Usually, I use the sprinkle kind of parmesan, but all we had at the house was fresh shredded. It all worked out okay.

Cousin/yogurt love

After dinner we hung out with my cousin Matt. I decided to treat all of them to a yogurt. I opted for a small helping to reward myself for completing the cleanse and for finding my wedding dress.

I believe that the whole meal (and really day) has inspired my plan for realistically maintaining a healthy lifestyle. Since the cleanse is over, I have to space out my topics for posts though :) I will share my plan soon, but not tonight.

Enough rambling, it's been a perfect day and this bride-to-be is super tired.

P.S. Jason comes home tomorrow!