is this a dream?

Ok, so as a lot of you know......Unexpectedly, this past Sunday, Matthew and I won the Times News Dream Wedding.

Before I go into details, let me take you back to a couple months ago. So, after Matthew and I got engaged, I saw an ad in the Kingsport Times News for the Times News Dream Wedding. The prize was a $25,000 wedding. Complete with vendors for every wedding need you might have. You had to fill out the application, submit your love story, and a picture. I knew we didn't have a chance to win this because, don't get me wrong I love Matthew with my whole heart, but our love story isn't the most spectacular one you have ever heard. We weren't high school sweethearts and I haven't known him since kindergarten or anything like that. But I wrote our love story anyway and we took a couple of quick pictures one day after church. I submitted all of our info 5 minutes before the deadline of the contest. I had a long day and almost completely forgot about it!

Anyway, you had to be present to win the Times News Dream Wedding on Sunday, October 21st at the Women's Expo at Meadowview Convention Center. You can imagine how hard it was to get Matthew to go to this thing. All kinds of women everywhere. I counted the number of men I saw on one hand lol. But he went with me anyway. We sat in front of the stage and waited for the bridal fashion show to end, so they would announce the winners. Still knowing we had no chance of winning, we were cutting up and not really paying attention. Then the announcer starts reading a couple of lines from the story I submitted. Matthew and I just looked at each other. My palms were sweaty and my heart was seriously racing! When she announced our names, I immediately started bawling! I could not believe (and still can't) that we won! We went up on stage and they put the picture we submitted on the big screen. It was so overwhelming. When the announcer started asking me questions, all I could get out was, "We are broke." haha how embarrassing! But oh so true! We were then introduced to our "Dream Team", which is the team of vendors who are going to make our wedding possible. Everything is included with this $25,0000 package. The dress, cake, venue, music, bridesmaids dresses, groom and groomsmen attire, hair and makeup, photography, EVERYTHING is included in this.

Even if I wanted to, I couldn't have had a $25k wedding. Heck, I was trying to have a budget of $5,000. We just don't have the money, and I was not about to put that huge burden on my mom and dad. I had actually just started a part-time job last week to help pay for some of the expenses. I was accepting to the fact that our wedding was going to be planned on a budget. Yes, I was a little sad, but I knew I could pull it off. Hello? that's the whole reason I started this blog! But now, I want to blog about my Dream Wedding experience and encourage brides from this area to apply! I think it is an amazing thing.

I am so so so so blessed! I do NOT in any way deserve this dream wedding. I am so unworthy of the love and mercy God shows me every day. But this is proof that he knows our needs and he will provide for us even when we least expect it. I can't blog about this without giving him all of the glory. He is so good to me! I hope He shines through on our big day, so everyone can see that He is the center of our relationship, our marriage, and our life. Please keep reading my blog! I will continue to post about my wedding projects and experiences with vendors along the way :) happy wedding planning!

Here is the link to our love story, if you want to read it! I have to admit my friend Stacey helped me edit this, to make it sound much more awesome! :)

 https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=gmail&attid=0.1&thid=13a2717eeb2b3c58&mt=application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document&url=https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?ui%3D2%26ik%3Db2d5182ed3%26view%3Datt%26th%3D13a2717eeb2b3c58%26attid%3D0.1%26disp%3Dsafe%26zw&sig=AHIEtbSUC_B21otN6DKP4irLvrJNyhpK9g