Cause everyone wants to be on camera eating a corndog...

Scroll to the bottom to see Mike and I eating a corndog at the Spring Arts festival last spring. *sigh* :)

http://www.gvlculturalaffairs.org/website/programs_events/DFAS/downtown_art_fest.html

Thanks to Erin for pointing this out.

One of my favorite places

Mike and I spent last weekend at my grandparents lakehouse, Sandy Run. It was, as always, a fun and relaxing time. I have spent countless summers at this spot and am always happy to return- something about turning down that familiar gravel road takes you away from your everyday life and offers the perfect place to unwind. Our time was spent laughing with family, eating way too much of Grandma's delicious cooking that's always too tempting to resist, boating and fishing, and playing washers and dominos. We didn't take many pictures but I'll share a few that we managed to capture.

We had to take the ferry over the river. I was not excited by this. At all. If you look in the mirror you can see the semi behind us. We were convinced they couldn't possibly let it on the ferry with us as it was full of milk and must weigh over the limit. We were so wrong. Miles of fields on the way there.We caught a billion of these blue gill.
Baby fishies!Then he caught a monster cat fish without trying. Pretty sure it made his day :)This is the tool we wished we had remembered to take on the boat with us!

I'm happy to report...

We are officially all moved in to our new place (Apartment 1111- so lucky!) in Nashville. The move up was uneventful as our stuff fit easily into the uhaul and the drive was suprisingly quick thanks to Mike and his Dad's skilled (or perhaps kamikaze?) driving of the truck/trailer combo. We hadn't yet seen our apartment building in person and were pleasantly surprised to find that it exceeded any expectations we had from the website. The building is beautiful and our apartment is perfect. We are eleven floors up with a corner unit that looks out over the city. Our building is right in the middle of downtown and just two quick blocks from Broadway Street which is the main attraction of Nashville night life as it's home to endless bars, restaurants, shops, and live music day and night. We're also in walking distance to the main performing arts centers, museums, hockey stadium, Titans stadium, and Cumberland river. Adjusting to city life is an interesting thing- one way streets and the extremely large homeless population keep things exciting. Pouncey stares out the windows for hours and can't quite comprehend why he's unable to catch the birds that fly by. It will also take a serious effort not to gain 300 pounds by trying to eat at all the tantalizing restaurants surrounding us in every direction. Hopefully the hills (weird concept, I know) will help keep that in check since my legs haven't stopped hurting since we got here. Every day when Mike gets done working we set out to explore a new part of the city so we'll know all the best places to take you all when you come visit us :) We miss everyone already and I don't think I've even realized yet that I'm living in my new apartment and not just on vacation at a great hotel. Here are some views from our apartment windows that we get to look at all day every day. Pretty neat to us small-town folk...

Pouncey obiously wanted to be in a picture...

View of the skyline. We're by the building on the right with the two tall points.The piano building (country music hall of fame)View of our building from the outside.

City at night. Also where the fireworks are seen!

Wedding Recap 1: The Girls get Gorgeous!

The girls in my wedding are 5 of my most favorite people and I could never live without any of them. Spending the wedding morning getting ready with them is one of my favorite parts of my wedding day. We laughed and relaxed and I believe it's the reason I never got stressed out or nervous. These are some of my favorites of us getting pretty!

Hair salon with the amazing Becca who did all of our up-dos

Girls at the hair salon in the shirts I made everyone!
I loved that each girl's hair was unique to them. I thought everyone looked so fabulous!

Makeup time back at the hotel!

Reading my love note from my groom! We totally got each other the exact same card :) I guess it really was the perfect card!
Hair, check. Makeup, check. Time for strawberry mimosas!
Awesome champagne flutes made by the bridesmaids.
Cheers to us!
Beautiful Mother-of-the-Bride!
All the girls in the limo on the way to the church!


Alyssa admiring my pretty dress while we waited for the weirdo funeral people to get out of the room so I could get dressed!

Finally getting to wear the dress!


Up next: Guys get ready

We vowed, we kissed, we wed

It's taken me awhile to decide to write this post due to my inability to find the words to describe our perfect day. It was a day I'd planned for for a year and a half and dreamed about since I was a little girl with Barbies in white gowns. I expected something incredible and ended up with a day far exceeding anything I could ever have imagined. I am constantly looking back on different details of our wedding day and marveling at how well each part turned out. I am thankful for each aspect falling into place and constantly changing my mind about which was my favorite part. The planning process was fun for the most part, agonizing at times and ultimately worth every frustration. I expected to be nervous and to cry and I expected to be happy, but, in the end, there were no tears (from me) and more happiness and fun than I ever anticipated. Marrying Mike was so exciting and yet so obvious as it was a step we knew long ago we would eventually make together. We loved having the opportunity to share our love with all of our closest family and friends. We are so lucky to have found each other and I'm thankful every day that I can call him my husband.

I'm a graduate!

Graduation was Friday night and, despite the ridiculous number of speakers, it was pretty great to finally walk across the stage and shake hands with the guys that got us through it all. There were over 500 engineering kids that graduated with me and, unfortunately, the eleven nuclear students were the last to have our names called. I suppose it was worth the wait though. :) It's pretty crazy to think I'm officially an alumni. Once a gator, always a gator!

Told you my cap was cute...

Stressed!

I know I've been seriously slacking in the blogging department lately, but life has been crazy! The end of the semester madness has been going on for 2 weeks now and I'm hoping I make it to the finish line tomorrow. I have my worst (but last!) final exam tomorrow at 7:30am. While I don't think I could ever be fully prepared for a cumulative final in electromagnetism (yuck), I'm so ready to be done with this semester and on to finishing up all the wedding details I've been neglecting. Oh and there's that small detail of graduation on Friday! Yay! Though those awful gowns leave much to be desired, you all will LOVE how I decorated my cap! I can't wait to show you :)

Okay, I'm off to my last day of bootcamp (since my silly exam is making me miss the real last day). Hopefully I can sweat off some of this stress. Thought I'd post a picture of us after finishing a 5k last weekend on campus. How amazing of a coincidence is it that our race numbers are the Pouncey twins football numbers?

Almost official!

We decided to celebrate my last day of undergrad classes by taking a trip down to the county courthouse and getting our marriage license! It was not actually as exciting as I'd hoped (despite doing the whole "raise your right hand" thing), but it's another check mark off the to-do list which is nice. We enjoyed dinner and dessert at the Melting Pot afterward to commemorate the occasion and I even convinced an embarrassed Mike to take a picture of the "event." Only 23 days till we get to sign the thing!

a little like heaven

It's hard to believe that two weeks from today I'll be wearing my lovely cap and gown and graduating from UF. It's been a long road and it's almost here (as long as I survive my upcoming finals). Tomorrow, I'll be attending the Orange and Blue game to see my gators play one final time before we move. I thought it would be a good time to tell you all (who don't already know) where the name of my blog comes from. It's the title to an awesome song by Drew Copeland (of Sister Hazel) about Gainesville. Enjoy!

It was out on Paynes Prairie where I got my first kiss
There's the school yard where we would play as kids
We pulled arrow heads out of Hogtown Creek
And when the cops came 'round, we'd all hide our drinks

Where I come from, it's a little like heaven
And I can't stay gone too long
Where I come from, yeah, yeah

We'd water ski on Melrose Bay
And we could wear flip flops on Christmas Day
When we had enough cash for gasoline
We'd all skip school and go to Crescent Beach

Where I come from, it's a little like heaven
And I can't stay gone too long
Where I come from, yeah, yeah

There's the old graveyard where my loved ones lie
The church still stands where I was baptized
It's the place I go when I can't think clear
And when my time is up, please bring me back here

Where I come from, it's a little like heaven
And I can't stay gone too long
Where I come from, yeah, yeah

Meet Pouncey!

One of Mike and my favorite weekend rituals is to go see the animals for adoption at Pet Smart. This past weekend was the semi-annual Adopt-a-thon at the Oaks Mall where all the different pet adoption agencies in town try to find new homes for their pets. I've been asking (begging really) for a kitten for some time now and was so excited to finally find the perfect little guy on Sunday. He is 10 weeks old and completely crazy. We named him Pouncey (after the gator football players of course). He warmed up to us almost instantly which we were happily surprised about and has absolutely no fear. Besides waking me up at 4am every morning by biting my fingers and ears, he's really the perfect kitten. We both laugh about how we hate being away from home now and can't wait to see him. He's such a purr ball and loves to play and cuddle. I wish he would stay this small forever! Here are a few pictures of our micro-kitten (as I refer to him).

Check out the video of him seeing himself in the mirror for the first time. He did this for nearly an hour the first night and we couldn't stop laughing. He's finally decided the other kitten isn't threatening so he tries to play with it now. It's adorable!