God taught me long ago that I could have the desires of my heart and His word never fails. This of course doesn’t happen without lining up in His will, a little hard work and a lot of faith. Going to William Woods University, joining Alpha Chi Omega, my amazing job, hiking the Grand Canyon, the upcoming wedding and my incredible future husband are just a few testaments to how faithful our Father is to His word!

This knowledge, combined with Ephesians 3:20 has got me thinking. Every bride says a little prayer that there will be no rain on her wedding day. I, just as every bride before me, have done the same while also hoping it isn’t too hot on our early August date. Why should I just hope for this? Why don’t I ask God for the desires of my heart and have faith that He will stand true to His word? If I truly believe that God wants to do exceedingly abundant things in my life, things beyond my own imagination, why not? Continue reading →

We future Gums tend to pack as much as possible into our holiday weekends, and the Fourth of July was no exception

Friday has never been sweeter than when it came after a very LONG week of moving for us. While 99% of my stuff is now crammed into every corner of Michael’s house, the other 1% is very spread out through my car and Aunt Nancy’s house. – Shout out to Aunt Nancy and Uncle Duke for being the sweetest people ever and letting me crash at their house until the wedding! – While I am normally very accepting and even excited about life changes, leaving my little corner of the world, known as D206, was a little traumatic so I am BEYOND thankful it was followed by the perfect weekend. Continue reading →

Over Memorial Day weekend, Michael and I traveled with our friend Cash to Fargo, ND for the wedding of Ben and Charity Bennitt. It was a total of 27 hours in the car so we obviously had to figure out ways to entertain ourselves. It was somewhere in Iowa when we made our first stop at Wal-Mart and was the beginning of many more. While roaming around to stretch our legs, I, without fail, ended up in the wedding aisle.

Recently we have been on the search for wedding favor boxes and with only two months to go, I am MORE than ready to get some loose ends wrapped up. After debating our options we settled on the perfect boxes conveniently sold at Wal-Mart. Unfortunately they are only sold in packs of 8 and we were going to need A LOT of them. So, I proposed the adventure of finding all 50 packs of these things on our trip to Fargo and back, instead of trying to find something online. Michael agreed and we cleared out the shelves of that little Wal-Mart and set out to find another. From that point on every gas stop was centered around the location of a Wal-Mart . Our first stop was successful with finding 14 packs but we weren’t so lucky on the next 10 stops. We hit 3 duds along the way that didn’t even carry them, but after our final stop on the last few hours of our journey in Liberty, MO. We had completed the task and had one more item checked off the list. Continue reading →

Well, “Folded, Sealed, and Postmarked” in our case Invitations are on their way!!!

First, a little shout out to those who helped make it happen:

Vanessa Cash – For your mad folding skills and patience!
Beth Hicks – For working her Circuit magic and making part of our dream invitations come true.
Aunt Nancy & Lauren Gum – For not giving up one those stubborn labels and counting/re-counting invites!
Steven & Uncle Duke – For being great cheerleaders! haha
Mom Gum – For recruiting help and providing delicious dinners.
Mom & Dad Welton – For assisting tremendously in the delivery of all the various parts of the invitations by either mailing them or making special trips to Ozark!
And the love of my life, Michael – Thank you for your brilliant ideas, ability to make things happen, and your patience when I get a little stressed – not that it happens very often. Ha! Continue reading →

This week has been a bit of a difficult one in the wedding world for me; so when I set out to look for wedding flowers with my beautiful mother and soon to be mother-in-law, I said a little prayer with Ephesians 3:20 in mind. Thank you Jesus for always exceeding my expectations!!

We started out visiting a couple of the local wholesale flower shops in town and leave it to Pinky to know one of the owners! We had a great visit with her and even discussed shipping in my FAVORITE flowers, which are out of season in August, just for my bouquet! The possibility of this could totally have made my day perfect on its own, but Jesus had a little more in mind. Continue reading →

This past weekend was a busy one in the world of the Gum family, current and future! I joined Michael’s dad, Mac, and sister-n-law, Lauren, in running Kansas City’s Rock the Parkway Half Marathon! It was a roller coaster of emotions for me, from excitement to regret all in that 13.1 miles, but I’m proud to say I finished! Continue reading →

In less than 150 days I will be marrying my best friend. While there is NOTHING more exciting than this simple fact, there has been a whole LOT of exciting going on in our lives recently that we want to share with you.

I’m not exactly sure how to begin to tell you about the past month of our lives. February 2011 may be one for the record books for the most amount of break downs and exciting moments in such a short amount of time. From linens to engagement pictures, Michael and I BOTH learned a lot about ourselves and not just from the expected marriage counseling personality tests. However, those DID inspire some active communication between us, and not always in the cute lovebird sort of way. I mean, I would be lying if I left you all with the impression that we belonged more in Mayberry than Wisteria Lane. Continue reading →

1623 – Anne Hathaway, the wife of William Shakespeare passed away.

1911 – The actress Lucille Ball was born. 

1926 – Harry Houdini performed his greatest feat, spending 91 minutes underwater in a sealed tank before escaping. Continue reading →

As most of you know, I went on a 12 day trip to Tanzania Africa. We departed from Springfield on January 3rd and returned on the 14th.
On our first day we visited the Masai village of Lobersoit. This is a village that previously had a well drilled and a health clinic built. They were beginning to build a school. Pastor John Lindell was asked to dedicate the well. There were government officials there to greet us along with the entire village. They were dressed in their traditional dress and were dancing and singing when we arrived. Continue reading →

Half way.

Also known as day 6, Michael is halfway around the world, halfway through his trip to Africa and halfway up Kilimanjaro! Here is where I want to give a shout out to technology and say, even without phone calls or emails; he has been able to keep me updated via text messaging! So yes, as you could imagine, I have gone from the girl who couldn’t wake up to the sound of a tornado siren, to being the fiancé that wakes up at 3:00am because she “thinks” she got a text message! Ha!

Here are some updates I have received over the past couple of days: Continue reading →