What a week.
Friday night Mr. Smith and I were invited to a dinner party with john johnson and Amanda Womac by Gina and Zack McMurray! Dinner parties are supposed to be fancy, no? Supper was super yummy, complete with Ta-boring-a (dubbed that by host Zack McMurray due to his wife's propensity to make this meal for him too often HAHAHA) but instead of going the usual route the ever creative and inspired Ms. Gina McMurray to be ingenious and make us all work for our dessert.
Growing up, I cannot recall ever eating a caramel apple. (MAMA. My childhood is incomplete.) Mr. Smith worked at a candy store when we lived in Sarasota and would bring home the caramel apples that were about to expire. This has given me ample experience with the caramel apple. Over the years we lived in Sarasota, I think I likely ate my weight in caramel apples - I'm a real pro. Here are some tips:
Don't try to eat it whole. You will make a mess of yourself. Cut it up like a civilized person and cut out the core. Things will go much smoother.
Well. That was just one tip IN ANY EVENT, I had NEVER in my 36 years on this planet ever EATEN a CANDY APPLE. Tonight was my night! Not only did I get to make and eat a candy apple, I learned how to make caramel apples too!
here we have gina showing me how it's done
i join in but am a real mess
i tried my best
but check out the puddle of candy apple slobber on the tray. no worries, i think i drank most of it 'cause it was super yummy by itself.
The caramel apples were a bigger hit!
don't worry. i told them all about my 'cut-up' tip and this was a staged photo. they all wanted to eat the apples but i made them give them back and cut them all up in slices. mr. johnson was especially appreciative.
thank you for the fun evening, johson/womacs and mcmurrays!
Next up, YEA YEA YEA!!! Party time! Bachelorette party, no less!
Shawn's sister Katie O'Donnell took it upon ourselves to organize. She was in charge of: reception at her home (awesome!), transportation to and from dinner (AWESOME!!), dinner reservations (AWE-SOME. and a ! for emphasis) and I was in charge of invitations (they sucked, but got mailed out in a timely fashion) and the hotel.
Well. Um. I plan events on occasion. And I thought by planning an event for Shawn in another city in accordance with her frantic wedding weeks before preparation would only involve me going, "When are you free?" She told me and we booked the date for Nashville, TN.
WE did.
And being a native Knoxvillian, I know, Know, KNOW that if I'm planning an event in Knoxville, TN, by gosh by golly, I'm going to check to see when the Vols play to make sure that I'm not sticking my finger into any unwanted pie.
Well. No one *ahem, AHEM, MEEEEEEE!* did not think to check a DOWN. TOWN. NASHVILLE CALENDAR. before setting said date.
Five major concerts.
Three minor.
Vandy. Oh, vs. LSU...
And the following day - home opener for the Titans. Yea. I did that. Queen Bee, that's me!
So, by the time this was laid into perspective and I started frantically calling hotels and in favors, I was totally out of luck. So I was completely dumbfounded (after a zillion frantic phone calls) when I called the hotel nearest Titan Stadium not only had one, but THREE rooms available at a reasonable (I'll say it - it was CHEAP) rate:
our scary, scary, scary hotel room. yup, that's razor wire. i brought my clothes to go running solo the next day but even i, who has run solo in central park sans map and internal navigation, determined this to be unsafe.
Um. It was clean. And cheap. Yet I had to offer profuse apologies.
NEVER MIND. Time to go play!
I miss living in a sorority dorm. It was like having 30 closets at your disposal. I took advantage of the situation, and:
hated the two potential going out-outfits i brought and borrowed two more HAHAHAHA. here are my rejects.
here is reject outfit #2. for the good; the satin gives me a beer gut. (it's invisible in real life SERIOUSLY) *ahem*
And we're off!
cab ride from hooptie-butt hotel to katie's AWESOME pad
Imagine my surprise when we go into the common area on the 31st floor of a fancy apartment building in downtown Nashville to find this:
see him over my shoulder? passed the hecate OUT.
So we relocate. To Katie's Abode. (tight, BTW)
stace, erin, ki, lauren, katie and shawn are RED to ROLL
(I am too but not in photo)
But first, lingerie shower!
shawn was properly embarrassed. i (literally) gave her one of my (BRAND NEW and CLEAN) wife beaters that i sleep in nightly (and am in currently) and told her this is how it ends up eventually.
NEXT - O.M.G. Katie arranged for a limo to take us to supper. I've only been in a limo once, and that was to my grandfather's funeral. So, doesn't count on the fun-meter!
to and from supper. i was a bit overwhelmed esp. when we saw a child gesture to us and ask excitedly who was in the limo. um. that was just silly ole us.
lauren and two-weeks-to-be-bride and friend-of-shawn and now-my-friend lauren get pulled up on stage at Bang That (fun. there's video. i will NEVER POST. almost.... never.... {love my friends but am waiting for the day you run for public office *ahem*})
As you may imagine.... the evening took off. I'll give you a few highlights in a sec, but check out the end of the evening:
At 1:30 CST (read 2:30 ME:ST {I go to bed at 10 PM EST, max}) I pulled a plug on the evening and shoved all butts in a cab and back to the hotel we went. I managed the butt-shove-in-cab move with the promise that we would stop for beer. Cabbie was totes amenable to the request but made no fewer than a half-dozen disclaimers that the gas station we were going to was dangerous and therefore a half-dozen urges to hurry in the gas station. Here we are hurrying:
ki and erin: GO GO GO GO GO!!!!!
and here am i scared and waiting for a robbery whilst paying. no robbery occurred, btw.
But allow me to rewind a sec and give you the epic shots of the evening:
almost every bachelorette party i've had a hand in planning i've determined that the 'bridesmaid veil' is worth making/giving for every participant. there's no pressure to wear the veil, but on almost every occasion, everyone involved wants to wear a veil. it gives you unity and hey? who doesn't get lost on an evening out and wish you had a marker like: HOT PINK VEIL. GO. to look for and latch back onto? on this occasion, i had the idea, and INTENT to make the veils, but no one else could drive and poor shawn had to sew all the veils herself.
Everyone loved them. They brought down the house!! But I'm so sorry that Shawn had to make them! (that was totally not my intention.)
Sidebar: hilarity; a man in all seriousness asked me if we were all getting married. And in a moment of shocking hilarity I responded that we were all Mormon, and yes we were all getting married to the same man. When he asked if Shawn was the head wife I had to crack up and respond that no... I was pulling his leg. True story.
and *scene*
the crazy girls leaving the bang bang piano bar
sweet katie is a VERY new mom and had to bring her breast pump (every two hours!) along for the ride. it is a testament to katie's hotness - she got bought an unsolicited drink with a breast pump on her back. i would have to say that's a world record. hat's off, katie! (you look AWESOME!! did you seriously just have an infant?!)
lauren and i have the same camera! we take pics of each other's pics... or... whaa? i dunno...
End of the evening pic of Shawn:
agua
And did I mention the hotel was sketchy?
please check out me and mr. thermosol morning after yo DON'T MAKE FUN OF MY PJS.
Lastly; I have very few talents. One of them is taking photos of myself (as you may have noticed) but I can also take quasi-self-photos of a rather... inclusive nature.
me plus one in scary gas station
me plus two in limo
me plus three before heading Ow-huh-how-tuh!
I'm going chronologically not sequentially now...
me plus seven
me plus five. this is about two minutes before we all went nite-nite.
Lastly, lastly: yes. I am a criminal. Not only have I engineered the steal of a girlfriend's dress, I have done it TWICE. First time: I really, really, really loved Kristina's dress. As evidenced:
i loooooove this dress and i stole it last weekend and wore it THREE times this week. yeah. but then kristina found it in my dirty laundry and nashville and i was forced to:
steal this dress of shawn's i'm wearing. i'm sorry, but i miss living in a sorority dorm.
Kidding. I will return all gear in a timely fashion! (ish!)
GREAT TIME!! Had so much fun - FL game is upcoming.
DUHN-DU-DUHN-DUH!
*hug*
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