Sunday was our 1^st wedding anniversary.  I couldn’t have asked for a better first year with my sweet, sweet husband.  Derek and I got close quick, but not in the way you would imagine.  You see, Derek and I began dating back in November of 2005, and in February 2006 just three short months later Derek broke his leg, and I had just quit my job (worst job/boss ever…that’s another story) and was able to stay with Derek and help him with his recovery.  This way his parents didn’t have to take off work to help him recover.

Derek broke his leg clean in half and had a titanium rod inserted into his bone.  Yea…ouch is right.  With this surgery, they don’t put on a cast, the rod is your cast.  For two weeks I had to help this poor kid get to the bathroom, I had to wash his hair, cook for him, clean “around” him, and make sure he was keeping up with his medicine and blood clot prevention treatments.  I’m sure for most this would have ended the relationship, but it only brought us closer.  We learned a lot about each other in those few short weeks.

Back to our 1^st Wedding Anniversary story….

We decided to start the weekend off with going to the local Haunted Corn Maze and then out to dinner on Saturday night.  The corn maze was a bust.  We w-a-y underestimated the amount of rain that fell the past few days and were not prepared to sacrifice our shoes to the Murky Mud Maze.  We decided to forgo the muddy maze and come back later in the week, but it hasn’t stopped raining since Saturday.  Maybe next year.

Since we were not all muddied up we headed to Huey’s a local burger joint, and one of our favorite places to just kick back and eat.  I had planned to take pictures while walking through the corn maze, but I had to settle for a picture of us outside of Huey’s.  We exchanged presents at midnight.

Here is what I gave Derek, passes for “Charlie Work,” a new iPhone radio alarm clock, dog washing passes, foot rub passes, and head, neck, and shoulder massage passes.  He loved them.  His gift to me was perfect, but I just don’t know how to write about it.  Especially if I don’t want to burst into tears.  I might fry the keyboard with all the water flowing from my face.

If you watch It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia you will know what Charlie Work is.

Sunday, we started the day off with heading to church, we got Pumpkin Spice Lattes and a Morning Bun (my new fave)  from Starbucks after service, then we headed to the Pottery Barn Outlet.  Unfortunately, we didn’t buy anything on this trip, but it makes me happy just to walk around that store.  We stopped by my parents’ house to enjoy the top layer of our wedding cake.  Still as yummy as I remembered.

Then we ended the day by taking in a movie.  We saw Couple’s Retreat. This was a pretty hilarious movie.  I am a huge Vince Vaughn fan, and have been since he made the movie Swingers.  We decided not to go out of town for this anniversary, because (as I mentioned here) we are saving to take an amazing ski trip to Whistler, Canada in December 2010.  Can’t wait…sooo excited!  I think we will count the ski trip as a second anniversary trip.  December is kind of close to October.  Kind of…

Okay so I can’t stop thinking about how in 5 days Derek and I celebrate our 1st wedding anniversary.  Aside from celebrating the whole marriage thingy I am super stoked about getting to eat the top of my super delicious wedding cake.  I don’t normally use this term, but….O-M-G!  That thing was to die for.  No, seriously.  Too die for.  I got my wedding cake from bakery in Southaven, MS called Brown Baguette.  The website doesn’t do their work justice.  You have to go in and see some of their work yourself.

My wedding cake, excuse me, our wedding cake was a four tiered fondant covered masterpiece.  It was simple classy, and unbelievably delicious.  I am a huge Red Velvet Cake fan.  I mean…like HUGE!  Wanting to make sure I wasn’t too selfish of a bride, and understanding that not everyone has the same likes as little ‘ole me when it comes to food, I decided to have 3 different flavors in my cake.  That’s right I said 3 flavors, but 4 layers…I snuck in an extra layer of red velvet!  I don’t remember the order of the flavors, but we had vanilla, chocolate, and red velvet as the bottom 3 layers, and the top…you guessed it RED VELVET!  My mouth is watering just thinking about this glorious thing.  The cake was iced with European buttercream frosting and had an outer covering of fondant.

Maybe it’s the Dutch in me (my dad immigrated here from Holland…cool huh?!), but I am not a big fan of super sweet icing on cakes.  Derek likes to describe my taste for foods as bland.  I just like to think that I enjoy the natural flavors the foods I eat.  Anyway, European buttercream isn’t quite as sweet as traditional buttercream, so that’s what we went with.  THE END.

Like most present day brides-to-be I searched the web for inspiration, and fell in love with a cake I saw on The Bride’s Cafe blog.  Now that I think about it, this cake may have been what lead me to the main colors of my wedding…green & white.  Something about this cake was fun, but also classy.  I don’t like a lot of fuss, so this cake was perfect for me.  I brought the green grosgrain ribbon to my baker and she took it from there.  At first my mom was at a loss for words when I told her I wanted a green cake, but she said that once she saw it she fell in love with it too.

Can you tell getting to taste the cake was one of my favorite parts of the day.  I mean just look at that face I’m making.  I’m doing the Yummy Yummy Cake Dance.

Oh yeah, one of my other favorite keepsakes from my wedding…the cake topper.  My grandmother (my mom’s mom) passed away before I was born and to remember her we always put a white dove in the tree during Christmas.  My grandma Shirley, or Grandmother Dear is what my mom said she wanted to be called, came to mind the second I saw these porcelain  doves.  The doves link together at the neck as if they were in a loving embrace, and the dove itself was a symbol of my grandmother being present at my wedding.

So needless to say I am super excited that I get to eat cake on Sunday.

Our cake couldn’t have turned out any better.  We had a bakery in Southaven, MS named Brown Baguette make the cake.  I brought in a photo to the baker for inspiration and she took over from there.  Derek and I both think that our cake turned out better than the cake we mocked it off of.  Take a look….

This is the cake that I modeled mine after.  Mine has some slight variations though.  I will not spoil the surprise and tell you about them.  I will tell you that my wedding cake will be 4 layers with the top and bottom layers being Red Velvet (my absolute fave!!!!), and the two middle layers being white & chocolate (one flavor per layer).  I figured that not everyone likes red velvet cake so I decided to to Bridezilla out on this one and give the people what they want…..chocolate & white layers.

I know, I know…..I am too kind.  You can thank me at the wedding when “my” teeth are stained a lovely shade of red from the cake.

- Jennifer

I still haven’t quite decided on what I would like to have on the top of our wedding cake.  At first I just thought I would have some flowers.  Then I thought it would be funny to have a figurine of the bride dragging the groom by his collar.  Haha!

I keep coming back to these two sweet doves.  I think they are simple classy and show the love that Derek and I show for each other.