A very happy Tomboy Bride

What a weekend this has been - and it's still only Sunday morning! Friday night, we kicked things off at Sur La Table with Giada De Laurentiis. I was so nervous about this. It

ended up getting really warm, so I wore a dress. I didn't have time to curl my hair, so I was kind of bummed but it took me way longer than I thought to get ready to the point that Bryan even beat me to the Mall to stand in line (he had gone straight over from work)! The line went from the store, through the width of the mall (along the Macy's entrance, I'm sure they were THRILLED), down a hallway, out the door, and around the corner of Macy's. There were alot of people.

When we finally got to the entrance of the store we could see Giada through the glass (to the left is a picture of me waiting outside the store with her new book - notice I have it open to

the page she is about to sign - I was READY!).

She's super pretty. For all of you that think she has a gigantic head, the only reason her head looks big is because the rest of her is so small (and I don't think her head is big, if I looked like her, I would NOT complain). She was wearing her hair straight (I'm a much bigger fan of her curls) and she had super adorable shoes on (strappy black wedges). Anyways, when I finally got up to the front, the guy handed my book to her and said, "This is Miss Stephanie"

This was the interaction (which you can obviously see to your left, so yes it really happened), and yes I'm documenting it!:

She said, "Stephanie!"

And I said, "That's me! Thank you so much for doing this, this is thrilling for me."
So she said, "Aww, thanks! Well thank you for coming!"

This was sort of going on as she was signing the book, which probably took a good 20 seconds but it felt like minutes - a wonderful extension of slow-motion time in my mind.

Then I said, "Of course! I've looked through the book already and everything looks so delicious, I can't wait to start on these recipes!"
And she said, "Well, I hope you enjoy them!"

Needless to say, I had been worried I'd walk up to her and either stare (and not manage to say anything!) or say something royally stupid (like, "wow, you're an actual person!"). Instead I successfully completed full sentences. I walked away beaming, proud of myself for that accomplishment and so excited that I had met her...is this a little insane? Anyways, patrons weren't allowed to take pictures with her, but you could take them from about 10 feet away - hence, the real reason Bryan was there (he leaves the Italian cooking to me and had no idea who she was). So he snapped a few, I hope you enjoyed them. There is one more of me giggling like a big doofus as I walked away, but I think it looks slighty psychotic, so I'll spare everyone from that picture.

The set-up of Sur La Table itself for the signing was cool - they had people cooking things up from the recipes in her newest book so you could sample them! There were so many people though that Bryan and I only made it over to the Italian Pub Burgers (yum!).

Bryan is chomping at the bit for us to go down to the gym, so I'm going to conclude this blog for right now. Later on today I will be adding some of the engagement pictures from our session with Caroline and Matt of One Six Photography. You can also find them on Facebook, just look up One Six Photography, or go through my page - the pictures are under "Bryan and Stephanie's Sneak Peek". This is basically part 1 as our session took us to three different locations, but I will share what has been posted so far. They came out great and we are really happy! I can't wait to for you to see them, but hopefully my riveting Giada story hold you over until I post the pictures later tonight. Enjoy this beautiful weather and check back later!!!