Erin Akin Carroll

Someone mentioned to us tonight that the wedding is 37 days away. Just typing it gives me butterflies. I don’t want this posting to turn into a copy of my to-do list, but there is seriously some stuff to do! Todd hasn’t ordered gifts for his attendants yet. I still have to make those wands and stuff the welcome bags for the guests. I’m still waiting on the music to send out to all of the musicians and singers. I have to finalize details with our florist and get all of the wedding signage designed and printed for the buffet tables, guest book, etc.

In the mean time, I have just realized that I will only be in Columbia for two more weekends until the wedding. One of those weekends will revolve around the golf tournament that I’m planning for work. That’s right. I’ve got a huge event that I’m planning for work! Did I mention that I’ve considered quitting my job to focus on the wedding? Just kidding, Todd.

With all of the stress, I’m comforted every day when I look at Todd and think about the beautiful relationship that we’ve developed over the past few years. No matter what else happens, we’ll still be married on May 3 and will spend the rest of our lives loving each other and building each other up. I’m so proud to have found the perfect man for me and I feel so lucky that God put him in my life when he did. His plan is truly perfect and I can’t imagine what my life would have been like if I had taken that job in Charlotte instead of working at the law firm where I met Todd or if I had not chosen to attend graduate school at USC and never ended up in Columbia in the first place. We were both perfectly placed at that law firm in August of 2005 and everything changed. My goals, my dreams, and everything that I had expected out of my life completely changed when I met him and I knew that my place was with him.

I know that I’ll end up getting everything done for the big day, but it’s just a day. It has been extra fun finally getting to plan an event for myself, but I know that it will not compare to the event that is the rest of our lives and the little lives that we’ll bring into this world. Thanks to everyone that has supported us during this really fun engagement. I’m going to saver the next 37 days (36 days in about 10 minutes) and look forward to helping other excited brides-to-be plan their big day in order to not go through wedding planning withdrawal!

Ever since the first time Todd took me to Greenville and we dined at Soby’s, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. The White Chocolate Banana Cream Pie. It’s to die for. It’s gooey, it’s chocolatey, it’s banana-y, and it has beautiful swirls of white chocolate on top.

Soby’s is a fine Southern restaurant that is conveniently located across the street from the Westin Poinsett hotel, where our reception is located. Soby’s also serves our favorite pie, the White Chocolate Banana Cream Pie. When I asked Todd what kind of groom’s cake he’d like to have we threw around a few ideas; Jimmy Buffett parrot head cake, chocolate and strawberry cake, Gamecocks cake, law books, or scales of justice. These were all fine, but none of these really captured the devine dessert that we were looking for. Our wedding cake will be white cake and white butter cream icing, my favorite kind of wedding cake, and there will also be a surprise layer of red velvet cake. We wanted something fluffy and Southern for the groom’s cake, so we chose Soby’s White Chocolate Banana Cream Pie. It’s honestly one of the things I’m looking most forward to about the wedding.

We’re serving miniature pies that will be 3″ a piece. Practically bite-size! We decided to display them in these giant brass scales of justice that I got from my mom’s best friend. We’ll have two very large pies in the scales (one heavier than the other) and 200 miniature pies arranged on the groom’s cake table.

I advise coming to the wedding just for the pie. Unless you don’t like bananas.