Last night felt like the official kickoff to our wedding thus the blog title. It was a weekend of firsts. It was the first time our parents have met. It was the first time our friends received our invitation. And, it was our first official party of our engagement. What a party it was! There is something very exciting and, yet, humbling to have so many of your friends, family and loved ones gathered to celebrate in our lives. I want to thank everyone who was able to make it. I hope ya’ll had a great time and enjoyed it as much as we did. I’d like to give particular thanks to the Bolton’s for opening their home as well as the hosts and hostesses below. 

Michelle and Chuck Bolton     Lindy Alderson     Helen Balch     Tina and Steve Bowie     Mari Elliott and John Dorrill     Laura and Will Gurner     Meredith and Scott Poore     Jana and Trip Tayloe     Lisa Turner     Kristen and Richard Vining

Trip shootin’ pistols

Dallas, what did everyone think of the party?

Ashley was in NYC on a Thursday through Sunday trip to see a long time college friend as well as fit in some shopping and site seeing. A good friend from Memphis, Helen, joined her in an effort to keep the liquidity of the US financial system moving. Unbeknownst to basically everyone including my mother (until Friday night), I was planning a surprise trip to NYC on Saturday. I had contacted Ashley’s college friend/NYC hostess Emily Gould several weeks earlier and began putting together my surprise proposal. It would not have happened without Emily so she is the true reason for how perfectly the proposal went.

After a ride to the airport with my father and a quick diversionary text message to Ashley stating I hadnt seen any deer, I was off to New Jersey. I arrived in NJ around 12:15 then on to Penn Station. Once out of Penn Station I was off by foot. Ashley’s friend Emily who is an event planner in NYC arranged for me to drop my bag off with her chef, Hernan, at Strata. Once I left Hernan, I had two main objectives. The first was too avoid running into Ashley and the second was NYC pizza. After much texting of locations/paths of travel as well as copious amounts of parmesean cheese, I accomplished both objectives then was off to Rockefeller Center to lay my ambush.

Upon arriving at Rockefeller Center, I was amazed at the number of people there. The streets were blocked of for two blocks in all directions. Since it was around three in the afternoon and Ashley was not to get there until sevenish, I had plenty of time to scout the place out. I found the perfect place amongst the trumpeting angels in the first picture. At one end was the beautiful Rockefeller Christmas tree and at the other end was Sax which had huge snowflakes set to music. Now all I had to do was wait. Ashley, Helen and Emily showed up around seven forty five. With Ashley’s back to me, I was able to sneak up behind her and surprise her. She was PUMPED and confused since our conversation an hour earlier had me in a Memphis mall. As she came out of her elation/confusion, she started to ask “Why are you here?” but only got to about “Why are you….” before her body stiffened like a board. We were still hugging at that point and she began to sway as if it was a slow dance at the Double Duece. After I was able to say a few personal words, I took a knee and she accepted. From there we were off to have dinner at Tavern on the Green where Emily had contacted a friend and VIP’d our reservations. The whole proposal was perfect.