Crashing to a Halt

So last night as tempertures reached into the 20's I found myself talking to my co-worker as to how slick the roads must be outside. We both said to eachother we weren't worried about the way we drove rather the about the other crazy drivers around us.

Well lunch time hit and I headed home for lunch at 9:10 p.m. I was just about to turn down the street I live on when I saw the whole street was a patch of ice. So I slowed down,went into the other lane to allowed my car room to slide without hitting anything and well that wasn't enough. I knew I was going to slide and as I started to slide I figured it wasn't going to be that bad. What I didn't think about was the little downward slope in the road. (side note: there are these people that always park on the street and I always say "One of these days their car is going to get hit" funny thing they thought that same thing.)Well I slid into their car. Kinda embarrassing to admit that it was a parked car. My car spun around to the front and I was just in total shock. The people came running out of there home to make sure I was okay. I looked at their car...minor scratches and a dent in the floor board. They had a 2000 Ford Expedition. I was driving my 1996 Toyota Camry. My car on the other hand...crumpled up fender...smashed in front bumper and broken blinker lights.

I'll tell you this much if the whole ordeal was in reverse there was such minor damage to their car that I would of just been like"Oh it's okay don't worry about it." But I guess to them it was a huge deal so we had to exchange all the insurance info yada yada yada...then of course a cop showed up.

He didn't give me a ticket because he said there was no way I could of avoided the situation and it would of happen pretty much anyways to someone else if it hadn't happened to me (people were dumb to park their car where they did). Needless to say the people moved their car away from the road. The police officer moved his car to avoid it from getting hit as well, while he filled out the acident paper work. Well funniest thing ever. He went to move his car and it was stuck. It was so icy he had no traction. We asked if he needed a push but he finally go it going.

Since I was so close to home Travis walked down the street to make sure I was okay. I asked him if he'd move my car out of the street until I was done with everything and we pulled into where the cop had been parked before. The cop told me it would take about 10-15 minutes and I could just wait in my car. I was sitting in my back seat when "Bam" a car slid into mine! They were trying to make the same turn I had been trying to make. (side note: I parked where the cop had parked the poor chick would of hit his car if he hadn't of moved)( other side note: Thank goodness the people whose car I had hit had moved their car other wise she would of hit their car!) I got out thinking, "Great how bad is the damage on this side of the car?" Well fortunately she just scraped some paint on her car and had a few minor dents....on my car the drivers door was a little dented but it just looks like someone threw a basketball at it. She was freaking out and I told her everything was fine and that she didn't have to exchange insurance info with me. (Like I was going to make her insurance rates go up for something as minor as that.) Oh yeah and this whole while the cop was filling out paperwork he never even noticed the chick hit my car. By the time he got back to my car and I told him what happened and he was like "Really?"

Needless to say it was an eventful night. I will be investing in snow tires!

Preparing for the Wedding

Well I finally convinced Travis to let me set up a blog page and he decided I should start a blog about planning for our wedding. I'm pretty excited so hopefully I can help give people helpful hints for planning their weddings as well.

We are planning on getting married May 23,2009 in Hidden Springs,Idaho at a really neat community building. (Building shown in picture)

I've set up a $1,000 Budget to cover the main costs of the wedding & reception. It's broken down like this;

Location $50
Wedding Arch $30
Wedding Attire Bride/Groom $310
Bouquet $20
Invitation/Thank Yous $230
Decorations $50
Wedding Cake/Food $310

So far I've done really well in the things I've bought. Last weekend I went with two of my friends; Kelsey & Jenny and bought a lot of things. We went to D.I. and I was able to get a gorgeous wedding dress for $65! It's perfect and besides a few dirt marks it looks brand new. Nothing that taking it to the dry cleaners won't fix. It almost fits perfect but is about 1/2 inch too tight in my rib cage section so I'm going to try and lose a little weight. If that doesn't work I figure I'll just get it altered and that will still be cheaper than buying a new dress.

Michaels has been a saving grace in costs. I found each time I go to Michaels and I buy something with my receipt I get a 40% off coupon. The only main regulations on it is 1 coupon per customer per day. They have just plain make it yourself invitations a pack of 100 envelopes/100 blank card stock sheets for $14.99 so with the 40% off I got 2 boxes for just $19.06! Then I can just design them whatever way I want.

JoAnn Fabrics has 50% coupons that you can get in the mail if you subscribe for free to the mailing list. So I bought my wedding arch for $14.11 by using one of those.

The flower I've chosen for my wedding is sunflowers. To cut on the cost of flowers I just have bought silk flowers. I got a whole bunch on clearance from various places because they are out of season...JoAnns had a heck of a deal online 3 huge pots of sunflowers (picture to left actual picture of what I bought) for $20.23 (shipping and handling included in that price)the total usually it is almost $15 a pot plus the additional shipping & handling. I figure I'll just cut the flowers the length I want and use them as needed. I'm making my own bouquet as well so that will cut on the cost a lot. I bought everything I'll need to make it and it totalled about $21.00. Travis has asked against having boutonnieres so that really will cut my costs too even though I was just going to make my own of those as well.

At the dollar store I was able to find glass vases in the shape of old glass milk containers. I plan on buying 10 or so and using those to put water in. (It'll be used in place of a pitcher of water for each table)

Well those are just a few of my good findings I've got so far. I hope you'll continue to read along on this wedding planning journey and maybe get some helpful ideas for yourself.