Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving in Kearney, NE with Justin's family and friends from high school. It was such a non-stop 6 days... that we had to unwind and rest up from our 'vacation'!

The first night we played a game called Partini... highly recommended. One of the rounds is similar to beer pong, which is why Kevin has those silly plastic balls in his mouth. We stayed up til 5:30 in the morning... which didn't bode too well for us on Thanksgiving day.

Day after Thanksgiving was our annual Nebraska/Colorado football tailgate. It went a little too well. All of us girls drove our husbands/fiances/boyfriends nuts by distracting them from the game b/c we had a little too much pre-game fun. Whoops! So Justin spent $130 on tickets, got to watch 10 minutes of the game in our 11th row seats (should have been 111th row, but we mis-read the tickets and no one caught us!) only to watch the rest of the game from Old Chicago. Whenever Justin retells this story, he makes me look like the bad guy- neglecting the part of the story where I volunteered to sleep in the car while he stayed at the game. His niceness won out and we ended up at the restaurant:) Thanks Justin! PS all of the guys in the picture are some of Justin's groomsmen.

All in all, we had a really fun weekend with Justin's family and friends!

Halloween

Rebecca and I went shopping for outfits the Tuesday before Halloween. We both decided that we wanted to have outfits that went together. We couldn't agree on what we wanted to dress up as so I decided that I wanted to be a gecko and told her she could be whatever she wanted to be. She decided that she wanted to be a gecko as well......

The werewolf in the last picture is my good friend Brad. We spent the weekend in Nebraska with him and his fiance Mindy.

Wedding Planning

We've booked some of our vendors already! Visting vendors has been more fun than I expected!

Here you go if you want to check them out:)

-Wedding: Calvary Luthern; KC MO
-Wedding Reception: Berg Event Space; KC MO
-Florist: www.belladesignstudio.net
-Cake: www.rebekahcakeartist.com
-Photographer: www.versluisphoto.com

Rehearsal Dinner: Friday, July 17, 2009
Wedding: Saturday, July 18, 2009 3:30/4:30pm

Big Cedar Lodge

For Justin's 26th birthday I took him to the Big Cedar Lodge, a beautiful 1800+ acre compound in southern MO/Ozarks territory. We had such a great time and took an unbelievable 550 pictures. Whoops! But it was so beautiful and so relaxing!

We went horseback riding, paddleboating, and canoeing - by the way, Justin did all of the work for the paddleboating and canoeing! Those were all firsts for me, particularly because I'm not fond of the aspect of drowning in a lake. But we turned out just fine, with a lot of great memories.

Barney, my horse, was pretty ornery - even though I requested the 'extreme novice' horse. Every time Justin would try to bring his horse up beside me on the trail, Barney would quickly gallop away! I was caught off guard for the first gallop and said my prayers; after all, I had said no to wearing the helmet! I learned quickly to be the boss of Barney instead of Barney being the boss of me.

We had incredible lodging for the trip - our first night in a cabin, the second in a lodge. Bass Pro Shops owns the compound, so the entire resort is decked out like a Bass Pro Shop - very rustic, mounted game everywhere, even the cabinet and drawer pulls in our bathrooms were antlers! Whoever planned out the resort paid attention to every detail. We were pretty impressed:)

Dad Mom & Sibs - we should plan a family vacation here either Fall '09 or Fall '10. We'll talk about it sometime soon! You would all love it - trust me!

4th of July in KC

Here's a few pics from 4th of July - Dad and the boys came out for a fun & fast weekend:) Went bowling... tailgated for a baseball game... thanks again for coming out you guys!!!

Max in Kearney

Last weekend we went up to Kearney - Justin had a friend's bachelor party and his little sister had her confirmation. On Saturday, Max practiced his new swimming/fetching skills in the Platte River. (Same river you could alway fjord on the Oregon Trail w/o tipping your wagon!) Anyways, it was 4 feet at its deepest part that day, which is deeper than it usually is all summer. Moe is just relaxing at Justin's parent's house- he's not into the whole swimming thing.

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More from Engagement Day!

Here's a few other pictures from the Powell Gardens. These were from the morning we got engaged. The orchids were beautiful!

We're Engaged!!

Only a year or so until we're Justin & Rebecca Harp! -with our kids Max & Moe Harp:)

Here's the story: It started out w/ Justin planning a whole week of fun prior to our engagement, making me breakfast every morning and picking me up for lunch every day.

But Saturday was the day, each part of the day was a suprise:

Beautiful outdoor gardens in the morning, a cute Italian place downtown for lunch, followed by private pottery lessons. We went home to change for a night of margarita (my fave!) tasting festival and dinner... to be followed by a proposal? But Justin wasn't sure if the night would be as special after a margarita tasting festival, so he nixed that idea.

Instead, a wonderful proposal at the apartment before dinner, followed by champagne. Justin joked that the champagne was Dom Perignon's half sister - funny but seriously good!

Afterwards, we went for pre-dinner drinks down at the Power & Light district then had an amazing dinner at a rooftop restaurant overlooking downtown KC and the plaza. Then we danced the night away... Perfect day - I miss it already!!

No dates are picked yet and we're starting to work out all the details, so we'll keep you all posted! We're excited to celebrate this happy time w/ all our family and friends:):)