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Wedding Planning

So, do you remember that time I got ENGAGED?!?! Well, it happens to be exactly 2 months today (March 22nd) since I became a fiancé to my boyfriend, Gunter. Wedding planning has been in full swing since the day after the engagement (literally) and the wedding is exactly 7 months from today! I am so excited to marry my best friend.

Considering the circumstances of COVID-19 and the repercussions it has had on society and the economy, it has made me extremely nervous for the state of my wedding. So many weddings have already been cancelled and postponed that it makes me nervous that something crazy can happen with mine! I am hoping that by November everything will be smoothed over with the Coronavirus issues.

So far, wedding planning is what I expected… I never knew something could be so stressful and so exciting at the exact same time. Overall, I have loved going through this process and Gunter and I have fallen even more in love (which I did not even know was possible). We started a couple days after and went to tour our first venue in Rome, Georgia. It is called The Farm Rome and it was beautiful, but was not for us. The lady seemed a bit unorganized and it was extremely overpriced for the value. A couple of days later, we went to our second venue tour at The Wheeler House in Ball Ground, Georgia. We were so excited about this one because it was in our price range and the pictures made it look so pretty. After visiting, we decided to book it that day! The pictures did not do it justice and we absolutely knew it was the place that we wanted to tie the knot. One great thing about the venue is they have the cake, food, DJ, bartender, ceremony and reception built into one price. I like how they do this because it takes a lot of research off of my plate.

A couple of the things that I have recently been looking into for planning is the florist and a hair and makeup lady. I have found and booked my hair and makeup artist, and I love her style of work. As someone who does not wear a lot of makeup, I really like how she does a natural look. She does amazing hair too! As far as the florist goes, I have not booked one yet, but I have found someone that has great prices. So far, the planning is going well! I cannot wait to become Mrs. LaPrad.

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My Senior Year.

Wow. I graduate college in 12 days. TWELVE. DAYS. I cannot believe how fast these 4 years have flown by and how different I thought my college experience would be. When I think back to who I was when I started college, I was a completely different person. When I started college, I was at Kennesaw State University as student athlete. I was recruited in high school to come play on the softball team at Kennesaw State and expected that to be my life for the next 4 years. That quickly change, as I quit before my first semester was even over. There was a major coaching change within the program and all of the coaches that recruited me ended up getting fired. This completely turned my life upside down, as what I always knew was gone in the blink of an eye.

My sophomore year was a lot better and flew by even faster than freshman year. I moved off campus into an apartment and paid for it all by myself. I was working and going to school full-time, all while living on my own and being my own person. This eventually got to be too much for me to handle, so after my lease was up, I moved back home. Thankfully, my parents house is only 6 miles away from campus, so I was able to easily commute from home to school.

Junior year was the year that everything turned around for me and I grew the most as a person. It my first time being home in 2 whole years and was definitely a change of pace to say the least… I did not look forward to moving back home as my independence seemed to vanish by being back underneath my parents’ roof. This was a pretty rough patch in my life and I did not seem to enjoy the beginning of my junior year. When spring semester rolled around, I found the absolute love of my life. We have been dating since, are now engaged and set to be married in November of this year.

As I reflect back on my senior year, it has been the quickest to go by yet. I never imagined that I would be finishing school this way, in my house with all of my in-person classes being online. Although I am saddened my senior year is not the “typical” senior year, I know this is all happening for a reason. To those in their freshman year of college, hold on tight because the next 4 years of your life will fly by.

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All About Corona...

Okay, seriously… What in the hell is happening in our world! With this whole Coronavirus situation, it feels like we are living in a movie. There is no traffic on the roads (which is so odd for the metro-Atlanta area), grocery stores have empty shelf after empty shelf, gas prices are SO low (which I am not mad about)… Our entire society is on pause. This is not a drill. Never in my life did I expect to live through something like this.

For the past 3 weeks, I have been working remotely and obviously our classes have all been transferred to online as opposed to in class. This has left me for a lot, and I mean A LOT of time at my house. I live with my parents so as you can imagine, being stuck here with not much to do has gotten really old, really fast. The weather during first week of quarantine honestly sucked because it was raining the whole time! Thankfully, the past couple of weeks the weather has been absolutely beautiful. With so much extra time on my hands, I have been taking advantage of the beautiful weather by going on walks, working out and sitting on my back deck.

Thankfully, I have not been affected too terribly by the Coronavirus. One of the dads of my good friends from freshman year of college was actually diagnosed with the virus and was extremely sick. They were not sure if he was going to make it, but thankfully he pulled through and is now recovering back home after being in the ICU. That is the closest this has been to affecting me directly.

Before I go, I did want to talk a bit about my opinion on social distancing. I do not understand why people are not taking this seriously and why they think it is an overreaction! In the case of COVID-19, it terrifies me with how contagious it is and how ignorant people are. In all seriousness, I totally agree with the government mandated shelter-in-place orders and the heavy suggestion and enforcement of social distancing, despite the doubt of society. What I do not agree with is the use of social media surrounding the topic of the Coronavirus. I think that it is extremely important to be informed, but a lot of social media pages and websites are providing false information, which in turn blows everything out of proportion. This unnecessary fright should not be fashioned out of false situations!

Okay, my soap box is over. Now back to binge-watching.

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ATL Brunch Festival

A couple weeks ago, on March 7th, I went to the 2020 Atlanta Brunch Festival! It was such a fun time and I cannot wait to tell you all about it.

So, here is a little back story. I bought the tickets in January for a fun celebration. Friday, March 6th was my fiancé and I’s one year anniversary, so I wanted to make fun plans and surprise him with a day trip to Atlanta! I was going to wait until the night before to tell him, but he made me spill the details about three to four weeks before.

The day of, we woke up, got an Uber and headed to Midtown. Whenever we arrived, gates opened at noon and after waiting in a long line, we made it in and were immediately greeted with free mimosas. You saw that right. FREE. MIMOSAS. This was honestly one of my dreams that came true considering I am a huge mimosa connoisseur. With our certain type of tickets, I had purchased the “unlimited drink package”, which made for a really fun day. They had signature drinks like Brunch Punch which was vodka and strawberry lemonade, mimosas, White Claws, New Realm beer and so much more. It was great because I was able to try so many new drinks. We definitely got our money worth!

The best part about the day (other than the plethora of drinks), was definitely the food. There were over 40 food trucks and vendors that were there that day and they all varied with the type of food they normally provided. They all had brunch themed treats for the day, which was so much fun! I really enjoyed trying new things. Some of the things I tried were:

· Chicken and waffles (for the first time EVER!)

· Avocado toast with balsamic vinaigrette

· Strawberry and Nutella crepe (also a first for me)

· Bacon grilled cheese

· Blueberry donut sandwich

· Red velvet cookie with cookies and cream ice cream

As you can see from above, we were able to try tons of food. One part that I specifically liked about this festival is that each food truck and vendor only offered sample sizes of food. This way you would not fill up at one vendor booth and could continue to try other things. I liked this a lot mainly because each sample was $3 and I was able to try a lot of different brunch foods :) Overall, I would totally go this festival again and I would recommend it to anyone that enjoys good food and a good time!

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Indy, Baby!

So, I recently started a new job (actually it is my first big girl job), and I am loving it so far. I have been with Environmental Products Group as a Marketing Specialist since the beginning of the year. As of right now, I am part time but I have an offer for full time beginning after I graduate in May. The amount of pressure taken off of my shoulders is huge considering I have a full-time job waiting for me after I graduate! I am very proud of myself for having a full-time job offer lined up after graduation.

The company I work for is called Environmental Products Group. We are based out of Apopka, Florida which is near Orlando, but I work in the Atlanta office. We have 4 different locations in the states of Florida, Georgia and Tennessee. Although we only have offices present in 3 states, we have territories in all of our office states, along with Arkansas and the Caribbean. What our company does is quite interesting, and I must say, I never thought that I would ever be in this industry. We are a dealer for construction equipment – but it is not as simple as tractors or dump trucks. We actually sell hydro-excavation trucks, street sweepers, grapple trucks and sewer cleaners. I never even knew that there was a market for these products, but there definitely is. Being that the equipment itself is expensive, we are a very profitable company.

Given that I just started this job on January 13th, my boss wanted me to get familiar with the industry, and wanted me to do so by joining her and some of my other co-workers on a business trip in Indianapolis, Indiana. I have never been to Indiana and I must say it was a cool city! I was there for exactly 25 hours, so it was a quick turnaround time, but totally worth it. While I was there, we attended one of the largest trade shows in the industry. The WWETT (water and wastewater equipment, treatment and transport) Show is held every year and has manufacturers and vendors from all over the country show off their new equipment and products. At this tradeshow, I learned so much about our industry and the companies that we buy from. It was quite the learning experience and I am so happy that I was provided with an opportunity to go!

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This past weekend I had the best day of my entire life. Literally.

I got engaged!!! On Saturday, February 22nd, my boyfriend Gunter proposed to me. We have been together for a little bit over a year and I am so excited to spend the rest of my life with him. Keep reading to find out how it all happened :)

Gunter and I had planned a couple of weeks ago to go hike at a mountain in Helen, GA called Mount Yonah. Little did I know he had a whole day of special moments and celebration planned! The night before we went to Kroger to get some of our favorite snacks and champagne to drink at the top of the mountain. Since we knew it was going to be a long (and difficult) hike, we decided to hang out at the top for a little bit and enjoy the view! We also had planned to go to a local restaurant called Yonah burger after, which is why we did not have lunch at the top.

We left Kennesaw around 8 AM and took a beautiful drive to Helen. The weather had been really rainy for a couple of weeks, so we lucked out to have a beautiful day. Once we got there, we grabbed our packs and started the hike! It took us about an hour to get to the top, which is surprising because I expected it to take longer. Once we reached the top, we found a good view and Gunter told me he wanted to take a picture of me facing the mountains. Whenever I got posed to take the picture, he told me he had a surprise and for me to not turn around. About 30 seconds later, he started reading a note and I immediately knew what was happening. I started crying (and think I even blacked out), then when I turned around, he got down on one knee and had the ring. I could not believe the magical moment that I was in – it still feels like a dream.

After things settled down, I realized that one of our good friends that happens to be a photographer, was hiding in a ghillie suit and was capturing the whole moment on camera! We took some fun pictures and then popped the champagne that we had bought the night before. After hiking back down the mountain, we did go to Yonah Burger and had lunch, then headed back home. My family and Gunter had planned to have a surprise engagement party Saturday evening, so we were able to celebrate our engagement with our closest family and friends.

This day was everything and more that my 5-year-old self could ever dream of. I am so beyond excited to plan a wedding and be a bride to Gunter!

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Self Care.

Life has been so crazy recently. Between birthdays, starting a new job and school picking up, I feel as if sometimes I cannot keep up with everything. The past couple of weeks, my levels of anxiety have been higher than they have been in a while. Over the course of my life, I have dealt with anxiety issues and I had really, really bad anxiety in my first couple of years here at Kennesaw State. I think I always had issues with anxiety, but freshman and sophomore year my anxiety heightened immensely (to the point where I was medicated for it). Since then, I have learned to manage my anxious thoughts and feelings to the point where I feel like a new person. I have grown so much in the past year and have tremendously improved my thoughts which makes me extra proud of myself!

This weekend was the first weekend since before Christmas that I have had absolutely nothing to do – I mean nothing at all. It was FANTASTIC. After going to the Eagles concert with my family on Friday (which was awesome by the way), I enjoyed a Saturday by sleeping in late and catching up on my missed television shows. Saturday night I read a little bit and had a Chick-Fil-A milkshake for my cheat day snack. Today I went to church and have been hanging out around the house. It was a weekend full of much needed sleeping, binge watching, reading and eating. I guess what I am getting at is that this weekend was full of all of my favorite things. :)

I think that the majority of the time in life, we all get caught up in schedules, plans and staying on track. I know for myself specifically, I constantly try to fit as many things into my day as I can. Normally this turns into me wishing the day was longer because I did not finish or complete all I wanted to in a day. Isn’t this such a terrible outlook on life? We are all just rushing through our days and hours trying to achieve another item on our list. One thing that I myself am trying to work on is taking in the beautiful moments of life (a pretty sunset, flowers blooming, birds chirping) when I actually have a chance to. I am feeling called to encourage anyone I can to enjoy these simplicities in life as well.

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This past weekend was probably one of my most favorite weekends in a long time. My birthday was on Saturday, February 1st and I turned 22! This was a day filled with fun, laughter and overall great memories. Although I was housesitting during my birthday, my family made sure to make it a special day.

It started off with me getting to sleep in (which has not happened in a while, so I was extremely excited to be a little bit lazy). After getting some much-needed rest, my mom and I went shopping at the West Cobb Avenues. I am not a big fan of in person shopping because I prefer online, but I did not know what to ask for as a present from my parents, so my mom and I went shopping instead. We went to three stores (Altar’d State, Dress Up and Spirited Boutique) and only had luck at two of them. After shopping, I went home and got ready for my birthday lunch. Every year since my 17th birthday, I have had my birthday lunch or dinner at Henry’s Louisiana Grille in Acworth, Georgia. I absolutely love everything about Henry’s – the food, the music, the ambiance. It is overall always a good time and an even better place to have a birthday celebration! At lunch I had pretty much my whole family there and my boyfriend’s family came as well, so it was a lot of fun! After lunch, I had to run back to the house that I was housesitting so I could let the dogs out for a little while.

The second half of my day consisted of hanging out with my friends. About 6:30 pm, we went to dinner at the Marietta Pizza Company on the Marietta Square. The Square is one of my all-time favorite places because my family has lived in Marietta for generations. I love how it has a small-town feel, but still has tons of things to do! After eating dinner at Marietta Pizza Company, my friends and I walked to a local brewery on the Square called Glover Park Brewery. It has a really fun atmosphere with games like giant Jenga and giant Connect Four, which makes for some great laughs and memories. After staying at Glover Park for an hour or so, we made our way to another place on the Square. It is called Two Birds Tap house, and the ambiance of Two Birds is really cool. Besides being extremely trendy, they have good drinks and food too. I was a little disappointed because I wanted a glass of Frosé (frozen rosé), but they unfortunately did not have it. The last hoorah of the night happened at one of my favorite places on the Square, Johnnie MacCracken’s. It is an Irish pub that is always a fun time. My boyfriend and I, along with our friends frequent MacCracken’s a lot because there is always something fun going on there. Between the live music, great bar food and fire pit on the patio out back, it never disappoints.

Overall, I would say I had an amazing birthday weekend filled with great memories, tasty food and yummy drinks. I am so excited to see what my 22nd year of life brings!

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What’s Life Like Without Social Media?

So, I was recently challenged by my boyfriend to give up social media until February. He challenged me last week on Sunday, so it will be around two weeks total without social media by the time the challenge is up. This included all social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter), except Snapchat. Overall, I am really enjoying not having social media, which is genuinely surprising to me. Thankfully, this challenge has not been as hard as I thought it was going to be. I expected myself to be super bored and honestly miss it more than I have.

As soon as I deleted my apps, I found myself just randomly picking up my phone to aimlessly scroll through social media. This is something that I was not ever aware of until I had removed my apps. The amount of times that I picked up my phone with no intent was terrifying. I have truly realized how much time (whether I am conscious of it or not) I spend on social media platforms. Most of the time when I am sitting in my car, standing in lines, waiting between classes, or trying to pass time, I resort to social media. I feel like social media is something that is totally taking over our society. I do believe social media has many benefits, but I also believe that our culture is completely addicted to social media and what it offers. Many people become consumed by social media and often let it dictate their life, which is what I was guilty of (to a certain extent). I will admit that I was not super excited to do this challenge but it has genuinely opened my eyes as to how easily consumed I am by it.

Yesterday (the 25th), I had to take a brief hiatus in my challenge because it was my mom’s 44th birthday, so of course I had to make a birthday post on Facebook. She loves Martins Biscuits (as do I, they’re the best), so my dad and I woke up early on Saturday morning to go get her a “birthday biscuit”. I can honestly say that was my first time ever putting a candle in a pork tenderloin biscuit! My family and I had a lazy day of watching movies and then had a celebratory hibachi dinner at Volcano here in Acworth, Georgia. It was so much fun and definitely a great way to celebrate my mom’s birthday!

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My Experience @ G3

This past week and into the weekend, I went to an event called the G3 Conference. The conference is in Atlanta at the Georgia International Conference Center and it is a conference that is all about Christianity. The significance behind the name “G3” is the following three words: gospel, grace and glory. G3 is hosted by Pray's Mill Baptist Church, which is in Douglasville, Georgia and the pastor of Pray’s Mill is the leader of the event itself. The conference lasted three days, from Thursday to Saturday and it was quite an amazing experience. The first two days were from 9:00 AM to 8:00 PM and the last day was from 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM. The long days made for a very mentally exhausting time, but it was 100% worth it. I have never been to a religious conference before, and I am so happy that this was my first conference that I attended. This year, the theme of the conference was “worship” and what is considered correct worship in the world of Christianity. Although it seems like an extremely simple topic, each speaker at the conference went into extreme depth on the topic of worship.

Throughout the past year, I have grown immensely in my faith and this was something that taught me even more about who I should strive to be and who I should put my faith in. I started going to a new church in Acworth, Georgia called Four Points Church. The head pastor there preaches in an expository style, which means he reads word for word from the Bible and explains what each verse means. Through this type of preaching, I have learned so much more about the Bible itself and what exactly it means. The speakers at the conference all gave expository type sermons as well, which was extremely beneficial to my learning and understanding. There was a multitude of speakers over the three days (I think there were actually ten), and they all had great things to say. I thoroughly enjoyed each of them and what they had to say, but my two favorite speakers were John MacArthur and Voddie Baucham. I think I enjoyed John MacArthur because he actually has a podcast that I listen to often, so it was really cool to see him in person and hear him speak live for the first time. I also liked Voddie because of what he had to say. Not only did he have wonderful speaking abilities to keep me engaged the whole time, but he also made some very interesting and thought-provoking points.