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Greetings from Phoenix!

Hello lovelies! I am so incredibly excited to be blogging here at EAD and sharing all my wedding inspirations, experiences and DIY trials and errors with you. Before getting engaged I was ‘secretly’ checking out wedding blogs, including EAD, for about a year (or two…). I actually started my own little blog called Blissful Wish over a year ago as a way to show my invitation design work and share wedding and party ideas. I have been dreaming of my wedding for years! My grandparents founded a party rental business here in Phoenix, so I have been surrounded by event planning my entire life. Now that it is time to plan my wedding, my mom and I are going nuts picking out linens, table setups, colors and DIY projects.

So a little about me. As I previously mentioned I design wedding invitations, but I have my degree in graphic design from Arizona State and work for a small publication company as an art director. I have always been a little on the OCD side of things, so that profession is perfect for me! I was born and raised in the east valley of Phoenix (minus three years in New Mexico in middle school).

My fiancé Mike is also a native, born and raised in Mesa. He is a die-hard Suns, Sun Devil and Cardinals fan. Mike also went to Arizona State and has his degree in art education. He is an amazing artist, I can’t wait to share some of his work with you! He is also a very talented musician who can play multiple instruments — piano, guitar, bass, trumpet and drums.

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While in college I started working at a steakhouse restaurant where I met this cute guy, Mike and I fell head over heels in love with him. Okay, okay, that’s not exactly how it went. When I first met him I was actually really upset. I was a hostess at the time and had just turned 19, so I was trying to get moved up to be a server. Instead of moving me up they hired Mike. Now, I am thankful they did, but boy was I upset! He ended up being an amazing friend for four years and someone I looked forward to seeing every day at work. We even brought back gifts for eachother when we went on trips. I went to New York and I brought him back Conan O’Brien souvenirs. When I went to India I brought him back some handmade paper and pencils made out of tree bark. When he went to San Francisco he brought me back a shot glass. I think I won on the gift creativity.

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Eventually I quit the restaurant world to pursue my career in design, but we still stayed in contact. We both dated other people over the four years we knew each other, but in the summer of ’07 we were both finally single. Since I was just in a five-year relationship, I was trying to just enjoy the single life and explore the dating world. In October that year we went on our first date (finally!). For our third date, Mike invited me to his younger brother’s basketball game versus ASU. I of course said yes and then he told me I would be meeting all his close friends and his entire family! So as much as I tried to remain single, I just couldn’t resist being with Mike and we became ‘exclusive’ that night. We dated for two and a half years before we got engaged and now we are planning our April 2 wedding for next year! We are both so excited to be marrying our best friend!

Soon I’ll be sharing our engagement story, but if you just can’t wait, head on over to our personal blog where we share more details!