Meg{Moir}

And we’re back from the weekend. This weekend was full of shopping, food and fun.

Friday night Patrick came over with Caden to hang out. After working on a petit loaf of Sourdough bread we sat around and enjoyed some general laziness while we decompressed from the week. About the time we started cooking dinner, Patrick got called into a surgery. He headed out (Caden stayed, he’ll be here for the next 2 weeks anyway) and I sat down to watch a netflix movie.

Saturday we met at the Flea Market to do some shopping. I was looking for 5×7 picture frames, and a few larger ones for another project. We didn’t find as many as I needed, but we rounded up 4 or so at $1 each and a poster size frame for $5. We checked out lots of pure junk and some fun items (Mickey Mouse cookie tins!) along with some that I can’t imagine anyone buying (a swatiska flag???). On a whim we stopped by Big Lots and managed to round out the rest of the frames that I needed for my table number project for $2 each. Not bad!

I also dropped by the Target in Cary….BIG MISTAKE. It was move-in weekend for NCState, and the Cary Target is where all the parents go to load up their kids on Easy Mac and tv stands. It was a nightmare. I did snag some sweet outdoor chairs on sale for $10 each outside the neighboring Home Depot though, so I’ll call it a draw.

Saturday night we headed over to a going away party for one of Patrick’s friends. There were crab legs, hamburgers, hotdogs, and homemade salsa that was out of this world. The highlight of the night for me was talking soap with another girl there who also dabbles with a soap pot.

Sunday morning I drove Patrick to the airport (again! boo!) and he is now in Colorado for the next two weeks. Once I got home, I got to work. I spent the afternoon making favor tags and prepping for my table number project. I don’t want to spoil the surprise, so I’ll give details (and maybe a tutorial) after the wedding. Here’s a little something to whet your appetite.

After a butt-kicking workout (I did kickboxing for cardio and slow & heavys with weights) I hit the showers and relaxed a bit before calling it a night.

So that’s how I spent the weekend, but if you actually read all that, I know what you are really here for….the Race to the R.S.V.P.! I have to say, my trash talking must have worked, because Team Loftin really stepped it up this week. Of course, Team Stallings is still in the lead, but Team Loftin made big strides. Keep them coming!

Week 3 Results

Total Yes: 51
Total No: 25

Team Stallings Yes: 27
Team Stallings No: 17
Team Stallings Total: 54

Team Loftin Yes: 24
Team Loftin No: 8
Team Loftin Total: 32

This weekend was our second wedding shower, this time in Belmont. It was a fun weekend of Barbecue, presents and friends.

Friday night we got on the road after a late start. We didn’t get to Patrick’s parents house until a a little after 11, but that didn’t stop us from all hanging out for a while and catching up. Eventually every one was off to bed to rest up for the big day!

Saturday we had our usual Belmont breakfast, chocolate chip pancakes! After we were well hopped up (as Grandma Doris would say) it was time for showers and Saturday morning laziness. Once everyone was ready to go we headed to downtown Belmont for a barbecue cook off. I have never eaten so much western NC barbecue in my life! (Yes, I am a purist.) There were people from all over the place set up cooking their pigs. It was a hot day and the asphalt and cookers only added to the heat. I wouldn’t be surprised if the one tent handing out bottled water won!

After about an hour it was time to head back home and get ready for the shower. We arrived at the church half an hour early and my bridesmaid Jackie was already there and helping set up! She is too good to me. We had a great time catching up and visiting with the rest of the family. I got to see Ashton’s dress, her “princess dress.” A girl after my own heart! Soon it was time to start opening presents and once again we were overwhelmed by everyone’s generosity.

After the shower, mom, dad and I decided to drive out to Ikea (how could we resist?). Mom and I had a great time walking around and exploring everything, dad got lost and sat on a bench outside for the remainder of the shopping trip. Typical.

While we were shopping, Mr. Benny was getting the grill hot. We had a huge dinner with filets, grilled corn on the cob, broccolli, cheesy rice and garlic bread. Because we hadn’t been eating all day.

After dinner Patrick and I headed downtown to a tavern to meet up with some friends. It was nice seeing everyone, but that is about all you could do due to the dude with the guitar and HUGE speaker on stage. Seriously, we all love live music, but if you can’t hear anyone else talking then it makes your night out a little pointless.

At church the next morning our crew took up a whole pew and Patrick’s Aunt Myra called us out to the whole church. That was fun. We had a nice lunch at a new restaurant in Cramerton, Center Street Meeting Place (I think) before getting back on the road.

Once back in Raleigh, my parents took off as fast as they could for the second leg of their trip while Patrick and I settled in to work on Thank You notes. We are almost finished with the ones from last weekend, it has been quite a project. Before long I was in bed, sleepy but happy after another great weekend.

P.S. I know, another weekend with NO pictures. I hands have been to busy for a camera. My bad.

P.S.S. I’ll update our R.S.V.P. race when tonight, but rest assured, I am still winning.

Whew. I am still recovering from the weekend. It was fun, exhausing, relaxing, and completely overwhelming.

Hello loves.

It’s early Monday morning, and while I’d love nothing more than to crawl back in bed, I suppose it’s off to start another week in the working world. But first, let’s relive the weekend! Shall we?

Friday afternoon I left work a little early and went to pick up my parents from the airport. They had just got back from a fishing trip down in the Lousiana bayou. My gift for being their chaffeur was a bag of trout and a bag of red fish. Yum!

For dinner that night, I cooked Patrick and I fried trout, potatoes fried in olive oil with vidalia onions and caesar salad. It was very very yummy. After working on invitations for a few hours, I was zonked out on the couch.

Up early-ish on Saturday for the beginning of a very busy day. Patrick and I met our “church lady,” Lib at Hayes Barton at 11 to go over ceremony details. After that, we picked up Cook-Out trays (with milkshakes, no less) and headed over to Jared’s to pick up Patrick’s wedding band. We’ve been trying on our bands all weekend and looking at them in this shell-shocked amazement, like, “are we really doing this?” Heck yes we are!

After a few more errands around town, it was back home to really settle in and finish up invitations. We decided to close them with wax seals, which looks sweet but takes forever. Patrick was on wax seal duty while I assembled the last parts on the invites and stuffed them in the envelopes when we were finished with them.

We could have finished them all that night, but we got a call from some friends asking if we wanted to go out for putt putt and go-karts. How could we refuse? It was an awesome night, we rode go-karts, got almost the full time and then they brought us in a little early because of thunder and lightening, so we got a rain check. Next we shot each other up in laser tag. Finally, we headed out to the putt putt course and got all the way to hole 15 before the rain really started coming down…so we got another rain check! Not too bad, paying for 3 activities and getting 5. We couldn’t figure out a way to rain out laser tag though. Oh well.

Church was Sunday morning followed by a quick lunch and FINALLY finishing those stinkin invitations. You better enjoy them! After some time in the sunshine, Patrick headed home and I was extremely lazy. It was awesome.

Hope you guys had a great weekend too!

My apologies for not getting this up earlier. Yesterday was Syngergy at work, which always requires a lot of work from me so I’ve just been busy, blah, blah, blah tired of excuses yet? Good, let’s move on then.

Friday I was so excited to get home. Mom and dad, along with their fishing buddies Mike and Cheryl were coming to stay the night. On Saturday they were flying down to the bayous of Louisiana for red fish. Mexican for dinner, followed by invitation making once we got back home. Between Cheryl, mom and myself, we busted through 125 of those bad boys. Soon though we were worn out, and if was off to bed.

Up early on Saturday to cook a big breakfast before taking everyone off to the airport. Once back home I tidied up around the house, and sat outside for a couple of hours while re-reading the last Harry Potter book (Deathly Hallows). Before long, it was time to go back to the airport for the highlight of my weekend….Patrick was finally coming home! After waiting about 45 minutes for the plane’s luggage to be unloaded (we always have a hard time with luggage at the new terminal), we headed home and began working on invitations. I know I sound like a slave driver, but we have 250 very involved invitations to make. Give me a break! Patrick assembled while I addressed.

We decided to head down to North Hills to see if we could get into Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Of course it was sold out, but all was not lost, because we discovered Five Guys! For those of you not in the know (which I was a part of before Saturday night), Five Guys has AMAZING burgers. The kind your neighborhood grill master makes.

Sunday I slept in. I meant to get up and go to church, but I didn’t wake up until almost 10 and it was too late then. I kinda knew that was coming, I had been feeling only half alive for almost a week. Still, I had a bit of alarm shock when I finally opened my eyes. Patrick and I hit up the HP matinee, and we both really enjoyed it. I can’t wait for Movie 7 part 1 and part 2. 16 months!

Back home, it was time to prepare for another week.

Hope you all had a great weekend!

With Patrick out in Arizona, I spent this weekend all by my lonesome, and it was some kind of awesome. Not that I didn’t miss him, but I am just so content to spend time alone.

Friday night I spent way to much time checking out my favorite new website, WeddingBee. I mean, WAY too much time. A little mindless TV and I was off to bed.

Saturday morning I woke up with the worst headache I’ve had in years. A couple of years ago I got headaches every day, like clockwork, and this one felt just like that. It was like having someone from high school come to visit you, which is great except for the fact that you never liked them that much. After I finally recovered from that it was around noon. I did a quick workout and then went out to run some errands. After dinner I watched a Netflix dvd about Windsor Castle (I know, I’m a nerd) and ended up reading Harry Potter (book 7) until about 2 am. That’s crazy, I never stay up that late anymore. Amos fell asleep hogging the remotes. Typical man.

Sunday morning was church, followed by some walking around at the flea market. I was looking for something specific, a 3 tiered fruit bowl. Something like this, but solid-er.

Luckily, fruit baskets are kinda tall, so I was able to mostly walk by the tables and tables of stuff while scouting. I found a few options, but nothing close enough, so I let it go. Next I rode over to Yates Mill Pond and checked out the location as a possible bridal portrait shoot. I think it will work, the old mill there is really cool.

I spent the rest of the afternoon being lazy and went to meet Jessie at the dog park around 6 to let the boys run. We had a good chat, then it was back home to get to work on invitations. 250 quarter inch paper cuts later, my green mats are ready to go. Thank God for my new paper cutter!

Another week has come and past. Why is summer flying by this year? No me gusta.

Let’s see…my weekend technically started on Thursday afternoon last week, which was amazing. Nothing too interesting happened, I did some exercising and finished up the documentary on Windsor Castle that I had on loan from Netflix. Patrick came over and we settled in for Burn Notice, our favorite show to watch together. It was a repeat (boo!) so I switched over to the results show of So You Think You Can Dance? Usually I just watch the highlights of the results show after Burn Notice, and after watching the whole hour long show, I much prefer the highlights only version. Oh well.

Friday morning after a little breakfast, I did a few more exercise videos. FitTV on DVR has been the best thing for my workout routine. I record three shows every day: All Star Workouts (which is usually a form of cardio), Cardio Blast (which is actually weigh training, with some occasional cardio thrown in) and Namaste Yoga. So each day I do either All Star or Cardio Blast, followed by Namaste Yoga for a total of an hour and a half. Not bad! The only problem is that all 3 record every day, so Im building up a bit of a waiting list.

After the exercising, I sat outside with a couple of magazines to relax a bit. Patrick came over and joined me outside after he finished his rounds at the vet school. After lunch and showers, we headed out to run some errands. While we were out, Patrick got called back to the school so I dropped him off and did some Target shopping. I picked him back up, and after stops at Lowe’s and Michael’s, we headed back to the house. Friday night is a bit cloudy. I know that Patrick was on call so we didn’t go any where…but can’t for the life of me remember what we actually did!

Saturday morning was much like Friday. Exercising followed by sunshine. Later that afternoon, Patrick and I took Amos and Caden out to Millbrook Exchange dog park, followed up by a pork dinner. We headed down to the state fairgrounds to watch fireworks, and ended up watching them from the vet school.

Sunday morning I was up early as I had to take Patrick to the airport. He is spending the next two weeks in Arizona, completeing an externship at a vet hospital there. I’m pretty open to living wherever, but Arizona isn’t on the top of my list. After I dropped him off, I did even more exercising (don’t worry, I’m taking some time off this week), realized that I had skipped church, and decided to take a nap. 2 hours later I got up, did some chores around the house, and got ready for another week.

Hope everyone had a great 4th!

This weekend was a blast! It flew by and let me tell you, I am exhausted, but in a really, really good way.

So let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start….a very, very good place indeed. On Friday night, Patrick and I took our engagement pictures with Cheyenne & Geoff Schultz of Cheyenne Schultz Photography. They were so much fun to work with…we shot on NC State’s campus around the Free Expression Tunnel and then downtown around City Market.

Here’s a funny story. When we got down to City Market, Cheyenne says, “I hope you guys don’t feel uncomfortable with all these people around.” To which I reply, “Oh it’s no problem. We don’t know any of these people.” Right as those words come out of my mouth, this sexy black Volvo SUV pulls up, the window rolls down and I hear, “SHUT UP!” so of course it has to be my friend Erica! How random was that! It was too funny!

So after all of our picture taking, we stopped by Woody’s City Market to cool off and chat for a bit. It was a late night for everyone considering that Patrick had to get up early to check on patients, I had to get up early to volunteer for Habitat for Humanity, and Cheyenne and Geoff had to shoot a wedding all day. It was still a blast though and we really enjoyed spending time with those guys.

Saturday morning I was up early to help with a Habitat deconstruction project through the CapCommunity Foundation. I arrived at the site, which at one point had been a 4,000 square foot house that was move in ready. The owner paid $750,000 for the house and then paid again to tear it down, only to eventually pay again to build a larger house. We spent the morning de-nailing 2×4s. Silly me, I thought that since there were power tools involved, it wouldn’t be that hard of work. Let me tell you, my shoulders hurt, my elbows hurt, my wrists hurt, my fingers hurt, even my finger nails hurt. It was intense. And hot. And fun. Yes, fun.

After a quick clean up and costume change, I met Erica and her friend John at the Flying Biscuit in Cameron Village for lunch. I had never been there before but it was pretty good. Erica came back to my house to hang out and I laid on the couch for about 10 minutes before deciding that I really did need to go outside and pull some weeds that had sprung up since we had all that rain a couple of weeks back. It only took about 30 minutes to get them all up, but humidity some how stretches out time, so I felt like it took forever.

We showered up and headed over to Patrick’s house for a crab boil. Um…well, we ate one crab, got a little grossed out and decided that what we really wanted was Panera. One wrong turn later, and we had some substanital food.

Sorry that this picture is so little, but I was cracking into a crab claw.

Some of the party hanging out on the patio.

So Sunday morning Patrick and I met for big church and then got some lunch at Pei Wei. Yum! We hopped the short hedge to the next parking lot (Jared’s) and bought our wedding rings. Just a little more bling, nothing too crazy! Josh and Gabby came in to get his ring resized while we were there, they were fresh off their honeymoon, so it was great to get to see them. They were so tan! Haha I know Patrick and I looked like ghosts standing next to them.

While we were out we finalized the tuxedo’s for Patrick’s half of the bridal party. I’m so glad that is wrapped up!

Last night we went to see “Up” by Pixar. It is everything that a Pixar movie is supposed to be…happy, sad, heartfelt and repeatable. I loved it.

I think that’s all for me. Anybody else looking forward to the 3 day weekend coming up! I can’t wait!

Patrick and I spent the weekend in Hertford. One of my very best friends, Josh got married on Saturday, which was absolutely beautiful (but hot!).

Friday night we went to a cook-out in my parent’s neighborhood down on the creek. When we got there mom was playing cornhole badly, while dad was busy loosing at horse shoes. They need to come tailgate with us and get some practice!

We spent Saturday morning being lazy around the house before getting ready for the 2pm wedding. Here are some pictures from the big day!

Josh and me. I cried when he walked out at the beginning of the ceremony.
Josh & Gabby cutting the cake. I think this is such a sweet picture of them!

Beautiful cake. Tasty too!

Tiffany, me, and Danielle.

Patrick wouldn’t take off his sunglasses.

Me, Kyle the Style and Danielle.

Daneille and Joe.

After the wedding, our crew (me & Patrick, mom & dad) went to Coinjock Marina for seafood. I wish I had thought to take pictures there. Mega yatchs come and dock right outside of the restaruant. It’s so cool to see how the “other half” lives.

Back at home I took some pictures of mom’s berry bushes.

Crazy grass.

Raspberries. Yum!

Blueberries. Yum again!

Sunday was church followed by a huge lunch of smothered chicken, zucchini and yellow squash and sourdough. Full, fat and happy, Patrick and I headed back to Raleigh. Another weekend that has come and gone too soon.

So it’s back to the grind after a super nice weekend in over in Belmont. We decided last minute to go, as Patrick lucked out and didn’t have any patients at the hospital. I think that most of our weekend trips will be like this one for the next few years, last minute if things work out right.

Friday night we drove out to Belmont, getting there around 9. After a few slices of pizza, everyone was passed out on the couch. Amos woke me up around 7 the next morning, but I just let him curl up on the futon with me and we slept until about 9 when Patrick came in and drug me out of bed. I went to the mall with Ms. Kim and bought some “maybe” wedding shoes. I really like them, but I’m wary of the 4 inch heel. I wear shoes like that to work frequently enough (like today), but sitting around all day is very different from making one of the most important walks of your life, followed by a night of dancing. We’ll see.

Saturday afternoon was front porch time, nice and relaxing in the shade. That night we had steak, cheesy rice, and grilled broccoli, and were joined by friends of Patrick’s parents. It was a great night, just right for grilling out and long conversations.

Church the next morning, followed by a house tour of the friends we had hung out with the night before. We love looking at houses, and the new house is beautiful.

We finally got on the road around 5, and back home at 8. I should have done laundry, instead I did an hour of weight training followed by half an hour of yoga. It was still a night well spent.

Next weekend it’s off to my parents home for the wedding of one of my best best best friends, Josh and his drop-dead gorgeous fiance, Gabby. It is going to be beautiful, I can’t wait!