WEDDING PICTURES!!!!

So we got married!  Woo hoo!  I am officially Mrs. Ashley Marie Brown now!  It's exciting!  The wedding was EXACTLY what I wanted and envisioned for the entire year leading up to! I had a great deal of help from family and friends, and my cousin (I can say that now, cause they are married), Amanda helped almost every night with the invitations!  Boy am I happy that she was there! I wanted everything to have a personal touch to it, so I made most of the items in the wedding.  The invitations were all hand-made, the favors.  Dustin and I opted for a SIMPLE, NON-Traditional wedding that was FUN and LAID-BACK!  We acieved just that!  Of course we first started with setting, I knew I wanted an afternoon wedding, OUTSIDE!  Next was where?  I knew it was going to be in the Show Low area since Phoenix was way too HOT!  We wanted my cousin Jesse to be there, but dates didn't work out for everyone, so we had the next best thing....AMANDA!!! The wedding venue we chose was naturally beautiful, outside, GREEN, and FREE!    Pico's Nursery allowed us to get married in the garden area for the most picturesque setting I could have ever imagined!  We wanted things done a bit different than other wedding we had been there.  We knew we were going to spend our money on things a bit differnetly.  First, my wedding dress was a gift from Uncle Matt & Aunt Fran, thank you guys sooo much for all you did! 

The wedding cake was a gift from my Grams!  It was the most bea-u-tiful thing I could ever imagine!  I think I was more excited about the wedding cake than anything else!  It was the first thing Dustin and I agreed on and stuck with!  We had a lot of opinion, but in the end the cake DUSTIN PICKED OUT won us over! We found the cake in a wedding magazine and both liked the simple elegance of it.  We chose the best on the mountain, Shellie Vallery!!!!  The cake looked and tasted AMAZING!!!

It was a 3 Tier white cake with white buttercream frosting and fondant.  The top layer had strawberry filling!  I was PERFECT!  Thank you so much, Shellie, for making this perfect wedding cake!  You deserve an award! 

Next was an idea from my very own MOTHER!  We talked about the date, and she was the one suggested July 3, 2009 which for me was perfect.  It was a LONG weekend, full of activities and fun!  It was perfect for guests, and we didn't have to entertain much!  Dustin and I both knew we DIDN'T want to WASTE the money on fresh flowers for the centerpieces.  When discussing this with my mom, she told us about the EDIBLE ARRANGEMENTS!  This was exactly US and exactly the right idea!  Kill two birds with one stone, feeding guests while looking nice!  We made a great deal with the Manager, MATT MEIER at Edible Arrangements in AHWATUKEE!  He personally delivered the arrangements to the wedding, THREE HOURS AWAY FROM THE STORE!

THANK YOU, Matt for making our day beautiful with the wonderful fruit!

Next was the guys attire!  Boy was this the HARDEST thing EVER!  From the beginning, Dustin wanted shorts, white button down and flip flops.  Okay, that's do-able!  Then the opinions started rolling in!  No, that will look stupid, His legs are too white, think of the pictures and that you will have them FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!  It's too casual.  You name it, we heard it!  So then we went with Tuxedo's.  Then back to shorts, then tuxedos!  UGH!!!!  Dustin, Christa, Aadyson and I went to Superstition Springs Mall in search of those PERFECT BLACK SHORTS and white shirt!  Needless to say, that trip went horrible, and ended in Dustin and I arguing!  This was NOT the way it should have happened!  Not at all!  This is suppose to be the most exciting time, the planning!  I knew it was going to be stressful, but not this bad! haha.  Finally, about 3 weeks before the wedding, Dustin made the decision that it was going to be Tuxedo's, mostly to appease me!  Thank you for doing that....the wedidng pictures looked amazing because of that!  I love you babe! 

I loved the black, white, green, pants and the small hint of YELLOW!!

Next we had the flowers!  I had contemplated the flowers for the wedding party really long and hard and for quite a while.  We were going to do them, then we weren't.  In the end, I'm SOOO GLAD we had FLOWERS!  I knew just what I wanted and everything!  Tricky thing was finding the MONEY to pay for them!  My mom and I went back and forth on who was going to actually make the arrangements, so we made our final deicison with DAWN HALL, a long standing familly friend!  I wanted White Roses, Green Orchids (can you tell my favorite color is GREEN?), and Green Monkey Balls.  The guys boutineers were up in the air, along with the girls bouquets.  In the end, Dawn came through with them ALL!  She did the best job I could have ever imagine and was by FAR better than I could have EVER imagined! 

The best part about my wedding bouquet is this:  It's exactly what I wanted!  It was wrapped in White Satin, the small heart attached meant "special person", underneath the white satin was YELLOW RIBBON for our SOLDIER, JESSE FRANTZ who is overseas serving our country and making our wedding POSSIBLE!!!

The girls carried 3 White roses with white and Yellow ribbon streaming down, in appreciation of Jesse.  Again, since Jesse was unable to attend the wedding festivities we had his wife, Amanda stand in for him.  She was the GROOMSMAID!  She stood on Dustin's side, but wore the dress like the girls!  She was the only one without a bouquet, because she PROUDLY wore a yellow ribbon, SUPPORTING JESSE AND OUR TROOPS!

Next we have the ONE thing I wish NEVER happened....that made me the MOST UPSET!  Casey DeJong, Dustin's best friend was suppose to marry us!  But we all drug our feet over the course of the YEAR and never got the certificate to do so.  We went with the Justice of the Peace, which I was fine with.  Casey, I wasn't upset at you by any means!  I had confirmed the wedding date, time, location, cost, etc. more than 4 times with the lady from LAKESIDE JP!  Here it is our WEDDING DAY and there is no ANNA ASH anywhere!  The wedding was set to start promptly at 1:00pm and here it was almost 23 after with NO MINISTER anywhere!  Finally, after making a few phone calls by Elisia (thank you so much Betty), Betty was going to head our way to MARRY US!  We were going to have John, Dustin's step-father do the ceremony and then BETTY WOOD would do the official ceremony with just Dustin and I and 2 witnesses afterwards!  Low and behold, after being late she shows up.  I was furious and in tears!  Uncle Matt set me straight, although I was NOT HAPPY and Anna proceeded with the ceremony!  Another thing, not to dwell or anything...but that lady got off with $170.00 when the cost was only $150.00!  Dustin had the money, then told Uncle Matt that he needed $10.00 change from Anna, I guess there was some misscommunication and Uncle gave her another $10.00, so she made out with a $20.00 TIP!  Not acceptable Anna!  But all in all, she read the WEDDING VOWS FOR THE ENTIRE WEDDING THAT I WROTE!  That made me happier! 

We got MARRIED!!!!

(here I am, crying like a baby)

Thanks Anna for doing a good job, even though I just chewed you out!  Sorry. 

The RINGS!!!

Our rings were bought about a year prior to the wedding!  Dustin picked his out and it was definitely HIS personality!  It's a nice ring!  Mine, was finished about 5 months before the wedding and it was DRIVING ME CRAZY not being able to wear it!  Just sitting in the box, it was killing me!

After all that, I deserved a BIG DRINK!!!!

Here are some random pictures which are my favorite:

There ARE more to come....I have lots more posts to talk about!  I'm excited about this new blog!  Also, thanks for EVERYONE who shared Dustin & My special day!  It meant so much...these pictures are JUST WEDDING CEREMONY!  There are more coming from the weekend!  We LOVED ALL THE PRESENTS AND company!!!!

We are SO BLESSED to have such WONDERFUL family and friends!!!