Weddingbee Blog

The weekend of our engagement party was nothing short of a success. There was lots of time for me to spend with my out-of-town family who flew in for the occasion from different states, and also with my friends who made the trip into town (from Dallas to Abilene) for the party.

Friday evening all the friends arrived, and we set up a sea of air mattresses in the living room. We wound up having exactly enough room for everyone!

Saturday morning was spent fueling up on tasty goodness and getting all of the weapons ready for target shooting out on the land. There’s quite a few gun enthusiasts in our crowd, and target practice always takes place when we travel out to Mr. High Wire’s hometown.

GM Benvolio preparing

Before we set out, my family who had made the trip from New York and Pennsylvania arrived, and we spent some time chatting on the porch.

I spent some quality time with the puppy.

Then it was time to head out into the land!

Cow spotting…

Mr. High Wire with his future father-in-law (my dad!)

BM Rivae looking very tough

Mr. High Wire’s dad with our targets (They are old canisters that provide a very satisfying hissing sound and blow white smoke when you hit them.)

It was a great afternoon of guns, dirt, and sweat before we got all fancied up for the party!

Oh, and speaking of getting fancy, here’s the dress I wore for the engagement party.

Please say hello:

Image via OK! / Designed by Kay Unger

It is pretty formal, but since our rehearsal dinner will be very informal (think burgers, hot dogs, swimming—it is going to be amazingly low stress), this will be pretty much the only other wedding-related festivity that I’ll be able to get fancy for (besides, you know, the actual wedding).

Quick side note: This is actually the second dress I purchased for the party. The first one was a beautiful lacy off-white stunner. But it was expensive ($200+) and a little too “ornate” for Mr. High Wire’s tastes. I think he also said it reminded him of a dress that someone should be buried in. Um, returned.

Moving on. The dress above is from the designer Kay Unger. (Pretty please, check out the rest of her line. The stuff is cuuuute.) I found the dress at Nordstrom’s fabulous outlet store, Nordstrom Rack.

Mr. High Wire picked out a new shirt in five minutes at Nordstrom and then picked up a watch at Fossil that same evening to wear for the party. It is so easy for them, huh? I shopped for MONTHS to find that dang dress!

Here’s Mr. High Wire’s brother and best man, dad, and Mr. High Wire himself at the party:

Best Man Garrett and his girlfriend Shawna, whom I love dearly!!

Some of my wonderful family! Clockwise from top: Uncle Bruce, Cousin Rachel, Cousin Dina, Cousin Josie, and Cousin Jim!

And the very first picture of my beautiful bridesmaids! All together under one roof!!! That’s BM Sara, BM Rivae, MOH Marcee, and BM Lisa. Aren’t they beautiful?!

Swoon!!!!

These are some of Mr. High Wire’s friends from high school:

BM Rivae and me

MOH Marcee and me

Our good friends Matt and Lyndsey! Matt and Mr. High Wire used to be neighbors and then roommates in college.

Here’s my dad showing off the banner Mr. High Wire’s mom had made:

Enjoying the party

My amazing grandma and me

We wound up parking ourselves right at the front of the buffet line, and that made it very easy to talk to everyone as they filed past!

The food! It was so so so so tasty.

More friends! Samantha (Ryder’s mommy) and Abby (soon to be a mommy!)

Randi and Ryder

Ty enjoying the food

Manske, Bradley, Aaron, and Groomsman Jerrad

Brandon and Kathy!

There were also posters for people to give us some words of wisdom!

Learning some “wisdom”

The party lasted on until the wee hours of the morning, and nearly on into the next day.

I met departing family and friends downstairs at 8 AM (that alarm sounding was unpleasant after basically no sleep) the next morning and spent the next few hours getting in some last bits of quality time as people filed through the breakfast area before leaving to go their separate ways.

One final group decided to grab some lunch on Sunday.

It wound up being hands down one of the best weekends of my entire life.

Mr. High Wire’s mom worked so incredibly hard at putting this whole shebang together, and she did an amazing job. She worked so hard, in fact, that I don’t even have any pictures of her! We sent her a bouquet of flowers after the party as a thank you. I’m so blessed to have a future mother-in-law like her.

If this weekend is any kind of precursor to what the wedding is going to be like, we are in for a real treat.

All pictures from friends Rivae and Kathy