turkey day, turkey day, turkey day!

i must say, thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays! it's a close second after christmas, but that's only because the christmas vacation is longer! this thanksgiving will require something new of me. although turkey dinner will be at mom'n'dad's, as usual, this year i'm SOLELY responsible for the appetizer goodies that our family and friends will feast on before endulging in the wonderful linner (we eat early...2pm. dinner? lunch? linner...? dunch...???). me. by myself. gigi. YIKES. i considered cooking a variety of amazing appetizers, but then realized i don't cook, and this would be the first time i'd be trying ANY of these new recipes. after slight consideration, i thought it cruel to use my family as guinea pigs for my appetizer-test-run...on thanksgiving! SO, i resort to tortilla chips and guacamole, an assorted variety of pre-cut cheese and tasty crackers, and pita chips with hummus. to my family - i'm sorry this will be such a boring menu of hors d'oeurves. maybe i'll work up some guts in the next 24 hours and decide to try something new, but i really can't make any guarantees. me? i'm an easy turkey day-er... i like turkey, gravy, and heaps and heaps and heaps and heaps of that classic green bean casserole dish. oh yeah, i almost forgot, i'm also obsessed with stuffing. my mom makes AMAZING stuffing. i can sense the inevitable coming, though...one year my mom is going to make me responsible for the whole dinner. i may freak. i know someone out there makes thanksgiving-TV-dinners... they have to! who knows, perhaps cooking will become a new passion of mine. eh, probably not..................
happy turkey day!

meet THE BRIDESMAIDS!!

i have yet to introduce my wedding party! meet the great girls that will be standing next to me, supporting me on one of the biggest days of my life!

meet kat.
my big sister and the matron of honor ...

in case you didn't know this, kat taught me to dance. she wins the award for coolest big sister, and she's kicking butt and taking names when it comes to wedding planning with me! one day we may go to her-ami together :-)

meet danielle.

my pea in the pod and my maid of honor...

dani and i have been step-in-step with each other for the last half of our lives (12 years!). dani has organized my whole bachelorette party, too. with oh-so-much class! very impressive...

meet alyssa.

or should i say "banks"? yes, i should say "banks". we should ALL say "banks". banks and i met in jr. high and have been best buds for at least 10 years! we played water polo together and i love this girl to death!

meet kristy.

her real name is "the nakid". that's a story all on it's own. she and i have been best buds since high school. ohhhh the days! now kristy's married to her love, jj, and has two BEAUTIFUL boys, braylon and jaxten. she's an amazing mommy!

meet jessica.

jessica is josh's sister, the older of the two. she is one of the sweetest people you will EVER meet! the more time i spend with jess, the funnier she gets... especially when i least expect it!

meet jacquelyn.

jacqui is josh's sister, too... the younger one. see the resemblance?! she's extremely creative and so fun to hang with. i'm so excited to have the future sisters in law in the wedding, and so happy that i soon get to be a part of the johnson family!

thanks, girls. i'm looking forward to the rest of the wedding planning together, but most of all, i'm so happy to have each of you in my life!

96 days!

that's right. we are less than 100 days away from THE BIG DAY! double digits! some days i think it's going by too fast (and by "some" i mean...a couple here and there... okay, i don't really recall WHICH days... i'm sure there's been at least one or two...i think....hmm) but most days it's a slow countdown that i wish would speed up! don't get me wrong, planning has been fun, but i try to be careful with how much energy i put into wedding planning, because i know that in the end, the "wedding day" is just one DAY. one afternoon, really. so, as exciting and as fun as all this planning is, what i'm really excited about is being married to joshua. i cannot wait to be a family...josh, gigi, and june :-). juggle that!
however, i DID promise this blog would serve as a "wedding planning update site" thingamajig, so i'll stick to my word. here's the latest and the greatest...
**we just took our engagement photos on saturday. OH MY GOSH i am SO excited to see them! the best photographer in the WORLD, ryel, took them. girl, you rock! (www.ryeljphotography.com) we had so much fun snapping away... josh and i basically played around the whole time and ryel just click-click-clicked, non-stop. i hope we don't look like too big of dorks in them, but we might :-) a picture's worth a thousand words, right? we finished the night up with dinner with ryel and her hubby, dayle. wow, guys, we finally got to hang out!! yay, good job, us!
**all the dresses are in, and it's getting close to time for the boys to start thinking about their get-up :-) they have it so easy it's almost rediculous. you'll find no hints on the wardrobe, here. you'll just have to wait for the big day.
**we picked our DJ and now get to start flipping through tunes to find the right ones for each part of the wedding. we're thinking some sort of 80's rock theme for the whole wedding. (no, we're not...) so far we have some GREAT picks that we are so exited about! the first dance song has been chosen for some time now, thanks to my incredibly musically inclined fiance, and we just decided on our "exit song" a couple days ago. josh and i love music, so this part is proving to be a lot more fun than i had expected. i didn't realize we get so much say in our music. (duh, i know...but still, i've never done this before.)
**the invitations are almost done and are going out in the next few weeks! those have been fun to make, but quite a bit of work! i can't wait to send them out!
**honeymoon plans are being finalized between now and the end of the year. we know we are heading down to cancun for a week, we just have to work on the flight, cars, hotel details...and the logistics of it all.

THANKS to everyone who's keeping up with us during this crazy-fun time!

WP - in full swing.

it's official. it's time to get our butts back into wedding planning. with only a 7 month engagement, you'd think wedding planning would be a constant, but i can honestly say that josh and i took a 2 month break from the planning chaos and just enjoyed "being engaged". the wedding is now only 4 months away, so we've got some serious stuff to think about! not to mention, between now and the wedding, we'll be sidetracked with a few things that will ALSO require our full attention... thanksgiving, christmas, new years, josh's birthday, wedding showers, bachelor and bachelorette parties, super bowl sunday, and valentine's day... phew. it's a good thing we don't have anything else to do.................... rightttttt......

oh yeah, i almost forgot--i kicked my baby's butt in mini golf this weekend! :-)