i need a weekend to recover from my weekend.

First off, I want to send my heart and prayers to Boston. I cannot imagine another community hurting and grieving. I pray for our nation and that we are able to find the one responsible for this tragedy.

On to happier news. We had the busiest weekend possible this weekend and I think after sleeping all day yesterday I have recovered!

Friday night I met my aunt to watch her daughter and my cousin play soccer. I can honestly say it was the first time I've pulled for my high school rival, Orangeburg Prep. Though I cheered for them, I couldn't bring myself to wear Indian red!

Saturday I woke up bright and early and drove to Bluffton for a 5k that I signed up for last minute. This runner's high is a serious thing! It was not quite a full 5k, so my time is a little deceiving. The profits from the race benefitted oral cancer awareness. Did you know April is Oral Cancer Awareness month? I love running small town 5k's, but I also love running them when they benefit a philanthropy! I won 1st place in my age group, 7th overall, and my "time" was 23:27. I'm going to pat myself on the back on that one!

After the race we finally got in some boat time! We packed our things and Sarge for four hours out in the sunshine! It was a beautiful day.

Saturday night we went to the Junior Service League BBQ here in Beaufort. I'm trying to get involved, so I wanted to go ahead and meet some of the girls. It was so much fun and they had a great band! Here's a picture with my sweet Beaufort friend Anna. She immediately took me under her wing and has helped me make friends and shown me the ropes here! Our husbands work together so that makes it even more fun!

hey don't we love these arrangements!?

Sunday morning we headed to Charleston bright and early to meet with Tyler's brother and his wife. So weird to say my brother and sister-in-law! Crazy! We had a great lunch at Poogan's Porch then walked down King Street for Second Sunday. Tyler and I were almost cross eyed from such a late night! 

On our way out of town, we met up with my blog BFF Shannon for a drink at Triangle in West Ashley. It was so fun to catch up with her and compare wedding stories! It is funny we both planned and planned and talked about weddings for the past few months together and now they are both over! I am so thankful for her and our friendship!

Whew, told y'all it was crazy! But so so fun! 

How was your weekend?

Cooper River Bridge Run

Oh my gosh what has happened to my blogging abilities? Sorry, guys. We are still getting settled to newlywed life and I haven't been at a computer in days!

This past Saturday I ran my second 10k ever. It was an absolute blast. I was a little nervous about it because I took 10 days off from running during the wedding and honeymoon. Last week I got a little bit of running in, but I was still nervous about running 6.2 miles OVER the Cooper River Bridge in Charleston. I'm not used to running on an incline which usually hurts my calves, but I think my adrenaline kicked in and I kicked booty!

I stayed with my sweet friend from Wofford, Elizabeth Friday night and ate lots of carbs before the race. I then got up at 5 am and got dressed and ready to hop on the bus to take us to the other side of the bridge at 6 am. I'm not one to run with others which is fine because I am very independent, so I just planned all of this alone and did it!

Pre-race selfie

We got to the starting area at about 6:15. It was freezing. So stinking cold. I stretched and just people watched and even ran into two friends from when we lived in Illinois! I met my cousin Adam (who has become a crazy good runner- props!) and we caught up while we waited until start time. He went up to his fast corral and I stayed back in corral F and was ready when the gun went off.

Except I didn't have any music..... Lately I've been running with Pandora and with 40,000 people running this race, any extra internet wasn't working. I also got a new phone and hadn't added itunes yet. I wanted to freak out but remembered there were bands at every 3/4 mile so I wasn't too nervous.

I just kept running and running, staying impressed with my Nike+ app telling me my time and pace.

It was really fun running over the bridge. By the time I got over it, the weather was perfect! There was a great breeze!

At this point (about 2 miles in) I was getting a little shaky so I grabbed some chocolate GU (never had this stuff before but it was legit) and just kept running!

We finished the race downtown and it was so weird finishing the last mile or so down King Street by the bars. I would have love to run into Midtown for a beer!

The finish was weird, though. There was no excitement at the end, they just kept yelling to keep walking up towards Marion Square where the festival was.

I was so pumped after the race! I read my time and went CRAZY. I finished at 54:49. This time last year I ran a 10k in 104 minutes. Link to that blog post HERE.

That is TEN entire minutes off of my time!! And Monday I ran 6.2 miles in 58. So can you see why I was so excited!?!

After the race, I met up with my cousins and Elizabeth and we walked around... Even checked out the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile.

Ahhhhh what an awesome day!

Now I'm running a 5k on Saturday and a 12k on May 4!

Charleston

Thank you to everyone who commented on my last post! We are so thrilled!!

****

After all of the excitement last Friday, we still had to go to a wedding for another couple on Saturday!

Saturday morning I woke up, still sort of in shock that I had a gorgeous diamond ring on my finger! I changed into my bathing suit and we headed to the Law's house to pick them up and hit the beach. We had never parked at Isle of Palms before at the public walkway because we normally rent a house in the summer. We had to ask a policeman on his bike where to park and I think my mom scared him because he completely flipped over on his bike and totally busted it. It was absolutely hysterical! All of us in the car couldn't stop laughing!

showing off my bling

I LOVE Isle of Palms!

After a few hours on the beach, I finally was about my grab Grouchos (my absolute favorite sandwich place in the world) and then got ready for Brandon and Lindsey's wedding. I had never met them before, but Cameron was a groomsman and his entire family was invited to the wedding. It was gorgeous!

The wedding was at a really old church downtown and was very pretty! The reception was at a plantation on the river and was gorgeous. It was super, super hot, but we had a ton of fun anyways!

the brides drink

beautiful decorations

LOVE this. probably stealing the idea for my wedding!

gorgeous flowers

mr and mrs lewis

bride and groom signature drinks- great idea!

the family

sweet Ty

We had so much fun taking lots of pictures in the sunset! I love some of the pictures so much, I am contemplating using them as engagement pics :)

future mother in law!

so in love with this picture + this guy!

Thanks for reading!

Ta ta,

We're ENGAGED!!!!

I can finally let out the good news that Tyler and I are ENGAGED as of June 29, 2012!!

I am going to write out the ENTIRE story so that I will have it forever and ever. Sorry if it gets pretty lengthy! There are so many clues throughout the past couple of days and weeks that he was going to propose, but I didn't catch on to any of them!

Tyler had gone to the town about 1.5 hours away to get the ring we had looked at in May. There are only 2 stores in the state (I think) that sell the brand, so he had to do his work! One excuse was to go for work, one excuse was that he was helping a farmer put up deer stands, and I am not sure what the other way.

Last Wednesday night I went and got a manicure JUST in case something happened because Rebecca has been calling this for months! Leah and Virginia had emailed each other moments before it happened. My work friends told me it HAD to happen because our families were together and I've said that I want our families to be together to celebrate. My Illinois friends texted me earlier that morning to remind me to call them if it happened. I didn't believe them!

I bluntly asked Tyler last week if he was going to propose over the weekend and he said he hadn't bought the ring yet! Sneaky. His friends here knew and he called my mom to tell her he picked up the ring. The ring had been hiding in the attic of his house and he said he checked on it hourly! So sweet. He had lots of guy beer drinking nights where he was trying to get advice from the guys on how to get through security with the ring!

i love love love love my ring!

Tyler and I flew out of Illinois at 6 am Friday morning. Our airport is really small so we didn't have to get there super early. Ty was acting strange in security but I didn't think anything of it; he told me to go in one line of security and he'd go in the other. I thought this was because he was afraid we'd be late, and I even asked him if I could go to the bathroom before we got in line to board. I wasn't sure why he was stressed in security but (clue #1) it was because he had the ring in his wallet and was scared it would trip off the alarm and I would see it!

Success.

We got to Charleston at 11 am and his parents (Heather and Ken) picked us up. My mom had let them borrow her car for the weekend since it has 6 seats and we could all fit in it. We got to their townhouse downtown and regrouped before lunch. Tyler's mom was trying to suggest to me to change as she and Lis (future sister-in-law, future wife of Cameron in Sept) changed into dresses and skirts. I thought I was dressy enough in my new BR shorts that I posted about earlier last week! I felt cute enough to go to lunch at Magnolia's on East Bay. I thought his mom was awfully dressy for this restaurant, but I just let it go. I did change my shirt and off we went for lunch. Ty got in the drivers seat which was kind of strange as he hates driving in congested areas (clue #2). We dropped his family off to get reservations and we went to "find a parking spot." It was really hot and Ty wanted to get out and walk to see Rainbow Row and the Battery. I suggested we go back and just wait with his family at the bar until we could eat.

He insisted we go to the Battery, one of the first places we had a date back in December 2010. On this particular date, we had a close encounter with Tyler almost locking the keys in his truck so I MADE SURE that did not happen again in my mom's car in the 100+ heat. I completely blew his cover. The keys were part of his plan.

We got out and walked on the battery, talking about going to the beach the next day and what we would do that weekend other than the wedding. We pointed to Ft. Sumter and I kept complaining how hot I was and that I was ready to go to the restuarant. I hate having people wait on me! 

The next thing I know, Tyler asks: "Do you love me?" Me: "A lot?" Tyler: "Enough to marry me?" Then he got down on one knee! My mouth hit the concrete. There was a guy weed-eating next to us and he saw Tyler get down on one knee so he stopped to make it quiet. Tyler would always joke about asking me to marry him routinely and I told him not to cry wolf because when it really happened I wouldn't believe him!

Well, I didn't believe him until I saw a sparkly diamond!!!

I was shocked! Of course I said yes after much hyperventilating and him having to ask if I was going to say yes! We walked under the oak trees because it was SO incredibly hot so I could regroup and catch my breath! Tourists came running up to us asking if we just got engaged and if we had a camera. I threw my phone at a lady who snapped a couple of pictures.

Then this couple walked by and the girl goes "Oh my gosh! Did you just get engaged?? Were you on our flight from Atlanta??" I said yes, surprised, and she said she recognized me by my SHORTS! I knew there was a reason I didn't change!

After a few pictures, I called my mom and asked where she was. She told me she was at the grocery store to throw me off but then I realized she was at the restaurant. We talked about her coming back to Charleston because she and I were supposed to stay in one of her client's townhouses near the Laws. Also, my dad said on Thursday, "see you tomorrow" (another clue) but I let that slide because I knew he was super busy. Turns out that my parents had gone on a carriage ride with Tyler's family earlier that morning and they went to dinner the night before (which I did know about)! Everyone is so sneaky.

mom receiving the news

they pulled it off!!

We finally drove back to the restaurant where my family and his family were waiting with champagne! My brother even came down! We enjoyed a great lunch as I tried not to text everyone in my phone to tell them the good news! I slowly started telling people and it was a snowball from there!

the Laws

Laws + Perrows

the Perrows

so excited!

After lunch, we went back to the Law's townhouse to relax and just giggle. I made phone calls to friends and family, and then before we knew it, Lissy and Cam had to go to the rehearsal dinner and then the rest of us went off to dinner. Tyler's mom was really sweet and got me some wedding magazines at dinner and after dinner we took lots of pictures on Shem Creek.

I talked Tyler into going out with me to see some of my friends from Wofford downtown. I was so excited to see Grace Perry and some of my guy friends! We finally ended our night with a rickshaw (my brother, Tyler, and me) and me falling asleep with my ring up against my face!

I had to make sure it wasn't a dream the next morning!

Day 2 coming tomorrow. Hope you like the pictures.. Many many more to come!

Ta ta,