Is this Texas..no..its just Winterset, Iowa

Well, 72 hours of being Mrs. Goodding, and married life has been anything but dull, especially within the past 24 hours. Perhaps I should start from the very beginning though so I don't leave anything out!

Saturday, July 17th I officially became Mrs. Goodding! That has been the best feeling in the entire world being married to your best friend. That day went by faster than I was ready for, and I feel like I wasn't even myself that day. It just felt like such a surreal experience, but despite it being the hottest day ever, I wouldn't have changed it for anything! It was the perfect day, and I couldn't have asked for a more beautiful ceremony and reception, as well as how great it felt to have so many family and friends there to share the excitement with us! Our videographer did a fantastic job as well of putting together a ceremony hi-light video (which I will probably watch everyday, its so good!)

Laura & Danny's Wedding Day Rewind... from Tom Haggas on Vimeo.

That next morning was full of tearful goodbyes, as we said good-bye to all of our friends from out of town that came for the wedding. It was hard to say good-bye when you don't really know just how long it will be before you see each other, but just because there's distance doesn't mean that great friendships can't be maintained. None the less, it was still really hard. That night Danny and I went to bed early to prepare for our next big adventure..a 14 hour drive to Tyler, Tx. We went monday morning bright and early to pick up our 26 foot Penske truck + car dolly. We spent alll day packing it, and finally pulled out of Des Moines at 7 pm...got to the Walgreens down the street to get some snacks and came back out to find out that Danny's car had died. What a great start to our trip! So Danny's dad..my father in law :D came out to jump the car and we started out on our trek again. 40 miles later all of the service engine lights come on in Danny's car that I was driving so we pulled into a rest stop where his car proceeded to die again.
2 hours later finds us en route back to Des Moines, and a dead alternator in Danny's car. The
plan for today is for Danny's dad to trade out his alternator for a new one, and then start our travels to Texas again. Hopefully we won't run into any more troubles along the way. In the mean time, I'll put a link to pictures so you can see those as well!! :D

~Mrs. Laura Goodding

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/album.php?aid=2062978&id=1175280053

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/album.php?aid=2062982&id=1175280053

Wedding Week

So here I am entering my last week as a single girl...this time next week it will be all over, I will no longer be Miss Rhein, but Mrs. Goodding. I can't believe that after almost two years of planning for this wedding that it is actually here! It feels so weird to think about that, I still don't think that my brain fully understands that when I say that the wedding is Saturday that I'm actually really really going to be getting married this Saturday! I have never been more excited for anything, and I have never felt more ready for anything in my life!! I feel like I should have so much left to do because I'm so used to having a million things left...all my checklist on theknot.com says is "have fun at your rehearsal" and then "Smile, Relax, and enjoy your wedding day" :) Actually I guess I have one more to add..."memorize your vows" haha I've gotten them written..just need to memorize them..and make it through them without crying ((yeah right))
Friday night was my bachelorette party thrown by my little sister aka maid of honor :) SOO much fun :) I don't think I have ever taken that many shots in such a short amount of time haha. Lessons learned from the evening: Lemon Drop shots are the greatest things ever. Swinging on a swing over a bar is SO FUN. and most importantly, selling suckers for $1 makes you major mulah!! I only had something like 40-50 suckers to sell and ended up coming out with $115 at the end of the night!!! Um why didn't I do that every night until the wedding?!
My aunt from New Jersey is here in town to spend the week with us before the wedding, so thats been exciting! My grandpa comes wednesday, and one of my bridesmaids comes thursday. :) I'm really wishing that I took this week off of work, but we needed the money so I'll survive I suppose, it just would have been nice to have that week off to get things done, but money is money :) Sometimes though I just feel like I'm going to wake up and really have like a year left to go until the wedding or something! It just hasn't completely hit me yet.
One thing that didn't completely hit me until last night was the fact that moving to Texas with Danny meant leaving behind everything and everyone. I mean I know when you move you move away from people, but it just didn't connect with me for some reason until one of my best friends started talking about it at a friend's wedding the other day and we both just started crying. It's going to be so hard moving away from all of our friends and family, and I'm going to have an even more hard time because I won't know anyone other than Danny. He at least has other students he'll study with at grad school. It just won't be the same without my besties close by, even if some are a few hours away now. A few hours is nothing close to 12 hours..
Sorry for the scattered post, my mind feels so jumbled right now!! Next time I blog though I will be a married lady!!! See you on the other side!! :)