Engagement Party!

You all thought I forgot about this little old blog didn't you?? Really, a ton of stuff has been going on lately and I've been taking a mini breather from wedding planning for the time being. However, we are now officially under 400 days till our wedding, and in just a few short weeks, we will be at the 1 year mark!! 1 year!! It's hard to believe I've been engaged for 9 months already!

This past weekend, Chris's parents threw us an engagement party for their friends and family. Chris's mom did an amazing job of preparing everything, and everyone there seemed to have a really great time! I was happy to have my parents meet Chris's extended family plus their very close friends who I have also become close with over the years. There are a lot of pictures that are still coming in to me each day that other people have taken, but here are some highlights. If I get a lot more, maybe I'll do a post called "Engagement Party Part 2".

Me and the parents!

It was a gorgeous day on Saturday, and perfect weather for a party! We had a tent set up in the backyard, which was good so the sun wasn't beating down on us too hard. I ate so.much.food!! For appetizers there was tomato and mozzarella, hummus, taco dip, cheese and crackers, and blue crab dip. Then for a buffet style dinner we had penne a la vodka, pork rollatini, balsamic chicken, eggplant parmesan, peas and onions, goulash, breaded broccoli, and I'm sure tons of other options that I'm forgetting right now! For my favorite part, dessert, we had cake:

Plus great chocolate cookies my mom made, Chris's mom's famous Crescent cookies, rugelah, a chocolate/cool-whip trifle that their neighbor made, sesame cookies, coffee, and tea. I didn't know that Chris and I would be put on the spot to cut the cake! I suppose it was a nice practice for the actual thing next year. We didn't feed it to each other though...I think I would have died from embarrassment. Best to save that particular tradition for the wedding.

Our first try at cutting the cake! I'll have to tell Chris not to block me so much next year!

It was a good thing Chris's parents got the tent for their backyard because it did end up getting cold and windy at night and it started to rain around midnight. The last of their guests left around 2:30ish and Chris and I hung out with our fellow engaged friends Mike and Kerry, having a great time and opening gifts, until we all passed out around 3:30!!

Needless to say, I did not run my half marathon
on Sunday morning for a lot of reasons all rolled together; Sleep deprivation, rain, and the desire to go to PA for the day to visit my grandmother who hasn't been doing so well. But you know what? You only (hopefully) get one engagement party in your lifetime (unless you're lucky and get 2! More to come in June!) and there will be plenty more half-marathons in my future. I trained really hard for the last 3 months..and it was not (naught?) for nothing. It kept me fit and working out, even through the dead of winter when it's so hard to get motivated. I feel like I could easily (ha) go run 13 miles on my own if I really want to, (not that I really do). Maybe I'll try and find a half marathon for sometime in May to June just so I can prove to myself that I trained hard and am getting better.

So that was engagement party #1. I can't thank Chris's parents enough for such a wonderful day, with good food, friends and family; Chris and I are very lucky! We have one more party in Pennsylvania coming up in June that is for our Bridal Party and any respective significant others and I'm so excited for that one as well! It will be a great chance for both Chris's groomsmen and my bridesmaids to all get to know each other if they don't already.

Lastly, Chris's cousin put together a really nice video montage of our day on Saturday. Enjoy!!