Absolute Perfection

This is how I felt this morning...

Source

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!

Day 7: The Last Hurdle

Source

I can totally relate with every emotion this little guy is experiencing. All day I've been carrying this track race analogy around in my mind.

For closer examination of this picture, I'm the little dude jumping. My face is saying, "The finish line is right there! It's so close. Just one more hurdle and I can do it!" The people behind him watching are all of you! I've had so much encouragement along the way and I'm so thankful for it! The people behind him standing up and looking are all of you who are saying, "Girl, you crazy!"

This morning I got up an hour before my alarm went off because I'm so excited to go home. I usually roll over and check all of my random emails that I get throughout the night and when I did that this morning, I came across this...

...thus the reason for my excitement.  David's Bridal, I am eager to see you as well!

Today, the cleanse is supposed to be all about the soup. I packed everything up in my handy-dandy Publix bag, packed my car with dress shopping supplies, clothes for the weekend, and my ice chest full of fruit and I was off to work. About 4 miles away from my apartment, I had to pull over and rearrange how the soup was situated because it was spilling.

I was planning on just eating some soup around 10:15 or 10:30. But by the time I got to work, I was really hungry. Since soup was about the last thing I wanted at 8:30 a.m. I decided to cheat just a weeeee bit and I grabbed a handful of grapes from the ice chest. I very highly doubt that eating six grapes first thing in the morning on day seven is going to ruin my cleanse (but if it does, I'll let you know).

Out of curiosity and excitement, I checked Jason and my wedding website to see how many days we have until we say, "I do."

I almost squealed at my desk. Less than 150 days!

On a side note, but still an important note, today is the one year anniversary of the tornadoes that affected so many lives in Alabama. I hope and pray that those who have lost loved ones as well as dear possessions will rely on the hope that we find in Christ alone.

Growing up on the coast of Florida, I feel like I know all too well the power that a storm can have on our lives. In my almost 23 years of life I believe that I've also experienced storms spiritually and emotionally that affect each one of us in different ways. Whenever I hear reports of storms on the news, or experience them first hand whether literally or figuratively, I am reminded of Job.

Job 1:20-22 says (after all of his possessions, wealth, AND children had been taken from him), "Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. And he said, “Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong."

A dear friend of mine, Mandi Mapes, wrote a song after the earthquake struck Haiti in January 2010. I believe that the lyrics of this song are true in our lives in any type of storm.

In Your Arms (by Mandi Mapes)

 To read the rest of the lyrics to this song, go to the Radical Experiment page. If you'd like to read the story behind these lyrics, visit Mandi's blog. If you'd like to buy this song, go to iTunes.


So onto soup...

Eat to the smile!

I ate my first soup around 10:50 a.m., my second bowl around 12:30 p.m., and my third bowl around 1:00 p.m.

I was able to leave work today around 3:15. It was so wonderful to get on the road a little bit early.

After four hours of driving, I entered Destin with this beautiful view.

I truly do love my hometown. I'm proud to have been born and raised in paradise.

When I walked in the door, I was greeted by my parents and my beautiful sister, Carlee. I was starving. I had only eaten about 150 calories today, and I was in need of something...but not soup.

I heated up my soup and took a bite. I almost gagged. I've heard that a lot of times when you change your diet drastically, your body will give you cravings when you're in need of a type of food (I don't think this is true with ice cream though, unfortunately). 


This is what I ended up eating for dinner:

PROTEIN!

Dinner:
Mom's leftover ground turkey
Corn
Black beans
Kidney beans
Watermelon

Although I "broke" the cleanse tonight, I feel good about my decision. You have to listen to your body. And I didn't break out a gallon of ice cream, I just reverted back to the previous day's eating plan (poultry and veggies).

Well, I'm going to call it a night and spend some quality time with my family. My mom just said, "I think I'm obsessed with wedding stuff right now." I think that's my queue!

Tomorrow = COFFEE!
Cleanse = COMPLETE!

P.S. My mom just said, "Ruching does amazing things for people." We're watching "Say Yes to the Dress" preparing for tomorrow! AAAHHH! I'm convinced my mother is a cartoon character.