Let's Drink Coffee, Darling: Red Dirt Beginnings

Good Wednesday morning to you all! Well, some might say Tuesday night, but to me, this is morning. Hooray for night owls. I thought I'd share with you some of what's been going on lately. I'd intended to share a little more about keepsakes, however I have had very little time to do much 'keep-saking' between working, having the flu, going to a wonderful friend's wedding, and making trips to see Tyler (my fiancé) in Oklahoma City.

This past week, a woman who has been one of my very good friends since the beginning of my college experience got married. It has been such a fun experience to watch her become friends with the man who is now her husband, and to slowly watch their friendship turn into love as they both grew in their faith in God. It really is a beautiful story, and you can check it out at her blog Passion, Pink and Pearls. Thursday I am actually guest posting this Thursday about my God-story for her while she is away at her honeymoon, so you can check that out too.

This is them!!

Anyway, these past few weeks have been so much fun looking forward to Veronica's wedding, who is the first of my good college friends to get hitched. Seeing her beautiful story has made me look even more forward to planning my wedding with my coffee darling.

The first big step I've been trying to figure out is WHERE? In my romantic envisioning of things before Tyler had popped the question, picking venues seemed like it would be so easy! But...the reality is, it seems there is no true perfect place. Or maybe that is that I just haven't found it yet. At first, I hoped to contact a Tree Nursery or a Christmas Tree Farm to ask if they would host a spring wedding. It seems plausible. They only have business during Christmas, so having a wedding in May could bring some extra cash in for them, and a fun experience for all! Right?! Wrong. It seems every tree farm I have contacted has either not replied or turned down the idea due to the large amount of work they expect from a wedding. Its understandable, but definitely the first glimpses of the reality that this just doesn't fall together without lots of investigation and work.

Tyler and I officially went to look at one potential venue together on Sunday afternoon. This day was the start of our real planning together, and together is always better. It was very exciting to be able to spend some quality time together. This summer we both have jobs that leave each of us working basically the opposite hours. I work the graveyard shift as a 911 dispatcher, and he works days for a non-profit organization. I work weekends, he works week days. I must say, it made my day to be able to spend the afternoon with just Tyler. We visited the Round Barn in Arcadia, which rents the loft seen in these pictures. We both think the interior ceiling of the barn is very lovely, however the place has a few pros and cons for us to think over. The building itself is beautiful, however, the bathrooms are not ideal and there is no kitchen. This will at least give us one option to mull over though.

After we visited the barn, we went to the other nearby Route 66 landmark, POPs and grabbed a few sodas for the road. We took a little trip into Edmond, found out Tyler's ring size at Kohls, gave ourselves a small tour of UCO's campus, and then worked on coming up with our guest list at Starbucks.

Its so exciting to have officially started planning things together, even though we haven't done much yet. I'm glad my guy is interested in helping plan everything and interested in having an input.

One last thing:

My newest yard sale find is relevant to wedding plans...now if only I can choose the venue so I can appropriately scope out what exactly I will do with these vintage treasures. (They are white on the other side instead of wood, but both sides are so much fun!) How much was this find? A whopping $8 bucks for both (my kind of deal!)