Wednesday, May 5, 2010

My Favorite Scripture

Don't worry about anything; instead pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. If you do this, you will experience God's peace, which is far more wonderful than the human mind can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
                                   Philippians 4:6-7

This has been my favorite bible verse since I was a little girl. This scripture always gives me a peace of mind whenever I feel overwhelmed, confused, or anxious. It reminds me that the Lord is always with me and always there for me. I know the Lord has a plan for my life so I need to worry less, pray more, and be thankful for all of my many blessings! 

I just wanted to share this with everyone!
XOXO,
Allison

Brady's getting married!

This weekend Dusty and I will head South to Hamburg, Arkansas for the wedding of Brady Barnes and Bryan McDuffie. Brady is one of my Best Friends and I am so excited to be a part of her wedding! Brady and I met the first week of school our freshmen year when we both pledged Kappa Kappa Gamma. We became instant friends and ended up becoming roommates in the dorm a week later....What a blessing that was! We had such a fun time in our little room affectionately known as "the cave." We stayed up many nights laughing, talking and watching cheesy horror movies. We had a blast! God really had a hand in bringing us together, and I feel really blessed that he did!

Brady....or as I like to call her "Bwady" has been a special part of my life since the night we met freshmen year. She was there when I met Dusty, and watched as he went from my friend, "Crust" to my fiance "Duddy" ( I like nicknames). She will be a part of the biggest day of my life and I'm happy to be a part of hers too! I'm so excited for my friend, the future Mrs. Bryan McDuffie!!!

Photo Montage time...

I love you Room! I'm so excited for you!

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

It's Definitely Wedding Season...

We sure do have ALOT of friends getting married this year.....
     
         This past weekend we traveled up to Fayetteville to attend Mary Kate Chambliss' wedding to Jason Daugherty. If you are keeping track of our wedding count for the year, this one makes number 5!

Dusty and I love weddings and are very excited for all of our friends who have gotten/ or will get married this year.We love being included in such a special day!

So this past Saturday was Mary Kate's Big Day, but it was all DERBY DAY!!!! So before we made our way to the wedding we stopped over to Ryan & Allison DeJarnettes house for some Derby Day fun with friends! Allison had the house decorated so cute for the race! Unfortunately I did not take a single picture, so you will just have to trust me when I say it was pretty cute!

We were glad we got to see Super Saver win the muddy race. Thank you Ryan and Allison for having us over!

When the race was over we piled into cars and rushed on over to the church for Mary Kate & Jason's wedding.
We snapped a quick picture before heading into the church

The ceremony took place at Central United Methodist Church on Dickson street. 
I went to church  here while in school at the University of Arkansas, so I was very excited to be back to see it! It is a gorgeous church and if Dusty and I were getting married in Fayetteville our ceremony would be here.The reception was held at Pratt Place Barn, also in Fayetteville.

It is a beautiful place to have a reception, and Mary Kate had the place looking fabulous for her reception! Her colors were chocolate brown and kind of a coral pink and with sort of a natural overall theme.
                                                 The Brides Cake  
View of the reception from the balcony

Boom Kinetic played at the reception, which if you read my previous post you know how much we love      them! They will also be playing at our reception this October, so we were really excited to see them play at  a wedding. It gave us a little preview of what our reception will be like.....VERY FUN! :)                           
 
                               Boom Kinetic singing one of my personal faves...Tupelo Honey.

Here are a few more party pics from the reception...
                                       Cute Boys in their pink and yellow ties.
                               From L-R  Dusty, Chance Bankhead, Troy Gasnier, and Ryan DeJarnette
Girl Picture Take 1.....Failure!

Girl picture take 2 = Success!!
From L-R Ashleigh Green, Rachel Dill, Me, Heather Bankhead, and Ellen

                      I got to see Kady Kat two weekends in a row.... Woooo Hoooo!
I love me some Troy Gasnier!

Future Bride and Groom!!!!!


Here she is... the Beautiful Bride! 
Dusty & Mary Kate have been friends since highschool.


I love these next few pictures! Dusty and Chance were really enjoying themselves!!!




As you can tell we had an absolute blast at the wedding! Congratulations to the new Mr.& Mrs. Daugherty! The wedding was Beautiful!!!                                                                                                                      

Craws for a Cause!






Saturday April 24, 2010 Dusty and I attended the 3rd Annual "Craws For A Cause"event at Dickey Stephens Park. Craws for a Cause is the largest crawfish boil in the state of Arkansas and benefits Baptist Health's Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU).All of proceeds from this event will go towards purchasing much needed Giraffe-OMNI Incubator Beds for the Baptist NICU. This event included live music by Boom Kinetic( who we LOVE, and will be seeing at our wedding) and The Brian Nahlen Band, all you can eat Louisiana crawfish with all of the fixins and unlimited cold beverages. This is such a fun event, and of course the money goes to a good cause, so Dusty and I shelled out the $60 bucks it cost for two tickets and enjoyed a night of food friends and fun!

Heather, Jessica, and I taking a break from the crawfish to snap a picture!

Andrea Duensing...Love this girl!!! So glad I got to see her!

Showing Kady Kat some love. She is moving to Little Rock in August and I'm super excited about it!!!

So I stopped being a camera hog for a few minutes and managed to get a picture of my sweet fiance and his buddy.

Well if you can't tell from the pictures....we had a great time! If you were unable to make it this year, come out next year it is a lot of fun and supports a great cause!

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Brady's Bachelorette Weekend in Dallas

Here is a brief recap of Brady's Bachelorette weekend in Dallas:

The weekend of March 27, I packed my bags and went to Dallas for Brady's Bachelorette weekend. If you know Brady, you know she is a no frills kind of girl. So this weekend was going to be more of a relaxing weekend than a wild one. I was looking forward to a weekend of pampering, shopping, and good times with good girls! The weekend did not disappoint! Thanks to Brady's sister Julia, (who lives in Dallas with her husband Dave and two precious little girls, Aubrey and Leila) we had a wonderful time running around Dallas and eating at some great restaurants! I was bad and forgot to take alot pictures, but I did manage to take two...


Brady opening a gift at her lingerie shower



Opening more goodies!

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Brady & Bryan's Stock the Bar Shower

It's been awhile, but I'm back! Dusty and I have had a busy couple of weeks! I will try my best to get you up to speed with what has been going on in our lives.

The weekend of March 27, we went South to Hamburg, Arkansas where we were hosting a "Stock the Bar" shower for our friends Brady Barnes and Bryan McDuffie. Dusty and I hosted along with another bridesmaid Mallory Smith and her boyfriend Eddie. The shower was held at Brady's family deer camp on the Mississippi River. Mallory and I thought it would be cute to go with a "natural/country" theme for the shower since we would be at a cabin.
 Here are a few pictures:

A close up of a picture of Brady and Bryan and the aluminum candle holders we made for the shower.


Smores....YUMMY!


View of the whole table


Brady peeking over some of her gifts


Me and the Bride-to-be!


The signature shower drink


Making smores with my man!


Jessica roasting marshmellows

The Shower was a success! Everyone had a great time! Thank you Mrs. Joy and Mr. Bob for letting us use the river house!

Thursday, March 11, 2010

Lauren Kay Setzler



My friend Lauren was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblast​ic Leukemia (A.L.L.) on December 29, 2009. She started her first round of chemothe​rapy on December 31,2009. She is currently in remission, but now has pneumonia in both lungs. Lauren is such a strong girl and she has already proved that by beating Leukemia. So I know that she will kick this yucky pneumonia's butt too! I would like to ask everyone to PLEASE remember Lauren in your prayers. Pray that the antibiotics will do their job, that her pain will ease and that she will stay strong through this ordeal! The power of prayer can do amazing things and it WILL work amazing miracles in Lauren's road to recovery! Thank you for your help! Love, Allison

* I have posted a few pictures of Lauren so that everyone could see what a BEAUTIFUL friend I have both inside and out!


Trying to stay dry at a rainy Razorback football game!

Happy New Years! NYE 2008

Wedding time!
Lauren showing off Dusty's stain
Tacky Christmas Sweater Party
I love you friend!
Bean and Cholo
Lauren, you are an amazing person and I am so blessed to have you as a friend! Get better soon because we have many more adventures to come! I love you friend!

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Wednesday Weekend Rewind

Well I planned on posting this on Monday, but it just slipped my mind! So here is a late recap of our weekend....

Wedding Season has officially kicked off for Dusty and I. We went to our first wedding of the year this past Saturday and had a wonderful time! It was the wedding of Scott Lar and Holly Greenway. Scott and Dusty were fraternity brothers, but I had never met him or his new wife. They were such a cute couple and Holly was a beautiful bride!! They had their ceremony at Pulaski Heights Methodist Church in Little Rock. This is the same church Dusty and I will be using for our wedding so I was excited to see how everything turned out! It was beautiful of course! I'm now even more anxious than before for our wedding day to be here!! :)
The reception immediately followed the wedding and was held at Next Level Events( the train station)  downtown. The reception was a lot of fun! We were able to hang out with some good college friends that we don't get to see as often as we would like, and also enjoyed good food and music! After the reception we had a little night cap at Ferneau with some friends and then went to bed.

Sunday was an exciting day for Dusty and I. We went to our first marriage counseling session...whooo hooo! We met Dr. Jeff Hampton at 11:45 for the first of three sessions. The first thing we did was tell Rev. Hampton a little bit about ourselves and the story of how we met. Then he had us face each other, hold hands, and say. "Dusty/Allison I love you because........ This was so hard to do without getting emotional!!! I had chills(and tears) listening to Dusty tell me all of the reasons he loved me and vise versa! It was a really sweet moment for the two of us! Then Rev. Hampton gave us our marriage workbooks and had us answer ten pages worth of personal questions without sharing the answers. When we were finished we were supposed to switch books, read the answers, and highlight anything that we didnt already know about each other. Apparently we like to talk because neither one of us highlighted a thing! :). Rev. Hampton was pleasantly surprised and said that we must communicate well! YAY!!! We did a few other exercises and then we each did a closing prayer. We really liked Reverend Hampton! He was very sweet and had a great sense of humor! We know that he will do a wonderful job with our ceremony and we are looking forward to meeting with him again!

Well that just about sums up the highlights of our weekend! Other than that we laid low and did some yard work...how old married couple of us! :)

* We have pictures from this weekend that I wanted to post, but I can't find my camera cord so check back later!


Stay Tuned for:
Brady Barnes and Bryan McDuffie's Stock the Bar Party
Brady's Bachelorette Weekend
Wedding Updates Galore!!!!

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Wedding Countdown

I have been making count downs for events for as long as I can remember. I love knowing the exact amount of time until an important event occurs. When I was in Jr. High/Highschool on the first day of school every year Jessica Buckler and I would make a Christmas Countdown in our planners. We couldn't wait for Christmas to come. So we counted down the days until it arrived. We always knew EXACTLY how many days we had until Christmas, the greatest day of the year(besides my birthday...duh). So now I'm starting a wedding countdown. With a little help from my beloved i-phone and my wedding day app. I know exactly how much time I have until I make the trip down the aisle!!! So here it is as of 8:50 pm on Tuesday March 2, 2010 we have EXACTLY:
7 Months
6 Days
21 Hours
9 Minutes
35,34, 33...seconds
That is 220 Days! We have some time, so we are going to enjoy being engaged and planning our wedding. Although we are hoping those 220 days fly right by :)

*Also, in case you were wondering...
297 days until CHRISTMAS!!!!

Monday, February 15, 2010

Valentine's Weekend

DISCLAIMER: If you're not a fan of mushy gushy stuff then Do Not Read On!!!

Dusty and I had a wonderful Valentine's weekend together! Saturday night we stayed home and cooked a romantic dinner for two! It was so much fun! Cooking is something I love to do, but it is so much better when Dusty and I can do it together! We listened to music, enjoyed some wine, and cooked a delicious meal. It was a wonderful night! Sunday morning we went to church together. This is another thing I LOVE to do with Dusty. I absolutely love being able to hold my best friend's hand while we worship the Lord together! It's such a great feeling! We spent the rest of the day being lazy since it was cold and rainy outside. That night Dusty surprised me by taking me to dinner at Cafe Prego. Anyone who knows me at all knows that Cafe Prego is one of my favorite places to eat in Little Rock, so I was very excited!!! When I got into the car there were six red roses waiting for me in my seat. Dusty had surprised me the night before with six roses so I wasnt expecting anymore flowers. What a sweet surprise! We then enjoyed a scrumptious dinner and exchanged Valentines. It was a good night!
I hope everyone enjoyed the weekend as much as we did! xoxo

To my Valentine,
 Thank you for such a wonderful weekend! I'm so glad I get to marry you! Next year you will not only be my Valentine, but my husband too...I can't wait!!! I love you very much! Muah!

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Hello Hello!

My name is Allison and I am now a Blogger...Yikes! I'm not very techno-savvy so it may take me some time to figure this out but I will do my best to keep it updated! Since Dusty and I are engaged and in the process of planning a wedding. I thought this would be a fun way to keep people "in the know" about all things our wedding or anything else going on in our lives! We have already started the planning for our big day so let me get you up to speed...

We have set a date!
Wooo hooo!! We are going to the chapel on October 9, 2010. So everyone get out your calendars and mark that sweet little date because you have a wedding to attend! :) We have also decided to get married at Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church. Dusty and I both have attended several weddings here so we really wanted to use a different church. However, after searching all over Little Rock we could not find a church we loved like we loved this one! So after October 9, 2010 we can be added to the long list of couples who had beautiful ceremonies at Pulaski Heights United Methodist Church! :)

The Perfect Attire!
Ladies and Gentleman, I have found my dress! It is absolutely perfect and I LOVE it! I found it in Atlanta, and I knew the moment I laid eyes on it that it was the one(my mom knew too)! I tried it on and absolutely fell in love with it! I knew it was the dress I would marry the love of my life in! I can't wait for Dusty to see me in it!
My bridesmaid dresses have also been chosen and ordered. This was actually the first thing I did after we got engaged. I have seven Bridesmaids and they are all gorgeous! I know they will all look stunning in their dresses!!! We have also picked out what Dusty and his 7 groomsmen are going to wear and let me tell ya, they are going to look sharp! So we pretty much have the wedding wardrobe finished. We just need to figure out the flower girl dresses and the honorary bridesmaid dresses and we will be done! Whew!

We have a Photographer!
The Photographer we have decided to use for our wedding is Christy Hollingshead. If you have not heard of her then look her up! Seriously! She is fabulous!! I have been following her blog for sometime now. She is sooo talented. I just had to have her as my photographer! Mom and I had the pleasure of meeting with her a few weeks back and she is absolutely PRECIOUS! We are really going to enjoy working with her!

So as of right now we have a place to get married, new clothes to wear, and someone to take pictures! I think we are off to a good start,but there is still sooo much to be done! Can't Wait! :)