Friday Favorites

It’s wedding season, and if you’re anything like us there are weddings every other weekend!

It may be hard to pick that perfect gift for a new couple starting out. We received so many wonderful gifts from our friends and family, so to help YOU out I am posting our Five Favorite Wedding Gifts (or at least the most useful).

1- ANYTHING from Pampered Chef!

This had to be a category all in itself. I use a piece of Pampered Chef gear every day. The mixing bowls, the measuring cups, the scrapers and the stoneware are my favs. If you live in the Birmingham area and need Pampered Chef contact Rebekah Henderson at cookingshowmom@gmail.com!

2- Giftcards to Walmart (or other grocery store)

OK, so you may think this is the easy way out of buying a gift...and honestly the Bride and Groom may think that as well too...however, this was a GREAT gift. When we got home from our honeymoon we went to Walmart because we had NOTHING in the apartment, and when you are starting from scratch and buying everything from salt and paper to meat and potatoes it is expensive! We were incredibly grateful to have gift cards for groceries.

3- Crockpot

I love all of my cookware. I do really. But I also work 40 hours a week and when I come home I don’t want to pull out the pots and pans. I want a meal that is ready when I walk in the door and for that reason I LOVE my crockpot!

4- Knives

Because my mom is a chef I have heard over a hundred times that good knives are important. But because I’m not a chef I thought I could get by with whatever was around. I was WRONG. I lived in a college apartment with cheap-o knives and when we got married Harrison and I both wanted the good stuff, since we cook so much. As much as I love the knives we got, I have to say that Harrison loves them more. If you don’t want to buy the whole knife set for a couple (which is understandable for finances), then think about purchases the knife block and one or two knives to get them started. And let a few other people know you did that so they can supplement other knives.

5- Dish towels and Oven Mitts

Seriously, do I need to say it again? Newly weds have NOTHING. Even moving from a college apartment, I didn’t have much because I lived like a graduate student. We got two boxes of dish rags and towels and oven mitts. I would have a lot of dirty dishes and burnt fingers without these.

Alright, so I realize that all my favorite items are from/for the kitchen, so I could be slightly biased since we LOVE to cook. However, most of our wedding gifts were for that room, so if you want to give the Bride and Groom something out of the ordinary, look for gifts for other areas of the house.

Definitely check the couples registry list to see what they are in need of, and if at all possible, buy something from their list...you KNOW they want that! But I really don’t think you can go wrong with any of the things listed above. We use them all the time!

What's your favorite wedding present you received?

Anniversary

As of yesterday I have officially been married for one month. (Don’t worry, Harrison took me to Joe’s Italian, our *FAVORITE* restaurant, for dinner on Saturday to celebrate early and then I surprised him with Godiva Chocolate Cheesecake from Cheescake Factory for dessert on Tuesday).

**SIDE NOTE** Yesterday also happened to be my sister and her husband’s anniversary, 8 years!! I would link to her blog in the note, except that she doesn’t have one, even though I really think she should...

So as I ponder the last month of our new life I’m thinking about the things I have learned in that time. In no particular order, here are the top five.

• It’s really nice to have somebody else fix the coffee in the morning.

• Even if you normally wash all different colors of clothing together, if you throw in a brand new pink shirt, it WILL ruin your husbands favorite white shirt.

• When you're a newly wed, everyone wants to know what your "biggest problem/fight has been about"...they seem really disappointed if you tell them you haven't really had any big issues...

• You cannot use ALL of your new wedding gifts in your new apartment. Some of them have to stay boxed up in the extra bedroom (and thank goodness we went with the two bedroom!!)

• Once you get married, all of your married friends immediately want you to hang out with them (which we have thoroughly enjoyed!).

I do have to agree with my sister-in-law, Jennifer, and sweet friend, Lauren, who told me that “being married is the best thing ever”, and I am incredibly blessed to have such a wonderful husband. Our daily prayer is that we would live out Ephesians 5:24-26:

“Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.”