Southern Weddings

After an entire year of searching, combing through hundreds of applications, and meeting many wonderful people, we welcomed two lovely new ladies to the Southern Weddings team this month! Amber Housley may need no introduction–as you’ll read below, she is a longtime friend of SW and a speaker at the Making Things Happen Conference. But, in the rare event that you haven’t had the chance to get to know Amber yet, I’m honored to officially introduce her today!

Y’all may remember the two job postings we shared last year–one in early spring and one in late summer. Adding to a team that is as small and close-knit as ours is a huge deal, and I don’t think any of us expected that it would take us almost a year to find the right person, not only for the job role, but also for our company culture and team dynamic. Every single one of us read the hundreds of applications we received, and we genuinely loved getting to know many wonderful women! It was truly humbling to know that so many people care about what we’re doing and share our hearts for our mission. That means the world to us! As we got to know the applicants, though, something funny happened. We realized that what we really needed didn’t quite match what we had originally thought we needed. We put out another call, read many more applications, and actually got pretty close to hiring a new SW gal, when out of the blue, Amber sent Lara an email about the position. And something just clicked! Amber is a brilliant marketer, knows our brand inside and out, and shares our hearts for marriage and intentional living in a deep way. We already know her and trust her, and we knew almost instantly that she was the person who could take our company to the next level!

As our new Marketing Director, Amber will be working with every person on the team with this overarching goal: to share our mission in the best, most impactful way that we can. She’ll be collaborating with Lara and Nicole on the direction and messaging that will be the most powerful. She’ll be keeping Emily and me informed about what our readers need to see on the blog and in the magazine to help them plan meaningful beginnings to married life. She’ll be working together with Marissa and Kristin to make sure our reach is as strong and purposeful as it can be. Gracious, there is a whole lot more she’ll be doing too, but that’s a starting point :)

To help you get to know Amber a little more, we asked her to fill out the “getting to know you” interview that each of us have on our About pages. In her own words, here’s what you need to know about her!

Hometown: Orange County, California
Birthday: October 4
What fires me up: Fresh flowers, gardening, beach vacations with my family, creating, inspiring and encouraging others, reading and learning, date nights with my husband
You would be surprised to know: I spent more than half my life in Southern California and Nevada. However, after living in Nashville for ten years, I now have a slight Southern accent! I always say, I wasn’t born in the South, but got here as fast as I could.
How I met my husband: Crazily enough, we met on Match.com back when it first started! I declared to my friends when I joined the dating site that I only wanted to date a guy like my dad: a guy who could make me laugh, was handy around the house, and drove a truck. I was shocked to find that after a few dates, Brandon met all of these qualifications and more! We were the perfect match. :)
Favorite memory from my wedding: Having all of our West Coast family and friends gather one the front lawn of a 150-year-old plantation house to witness our wedding. Never in a million years did we imagine we’d end up marrying and making our home in the South. It was a delight to give them all a taste of Southern hospitality and traditions.
Claim to fame: Best Smile for the class of 1998. I still do love smiling.
Favorite class I took in college: My Spanish classes. I minored in Spanish and it led me to study abroad in San Sebastian, Spain the summer of my junior year.
How I came to work at Southern Weddings: My wedding was published on the Southern Weddings blog back in 2008 when the team was just Lara and her cat. I can still remember the emails we exchanged and what an excited bride I was! Our lives weaved together for many years through the wedding industry and Making Things Happen. As a former wedding planner and designer, I’ve had the honor to produce two editorial shoots for Southern Weddings (Song of the South and Fun and Fancy Free) and have a client’s wedding published in V5 (Lynae and Brenton). Eight years later, I never would have dreamed I’d be working on this side of the white picket fence and I’m thrilled!
Favorite Southern Weddings editorial ever: I am going to be biased and say Fun and Fancy Free. It was such a fun summer shoot and I loved dreaming up all the details with an amazing team of vendors in Nashville. Food trucks, sprinklers, and fireworks–what could be better?
Best part of my job: Pairing my love of marketing and analytics with a mission I truly believe in, and working with a team I’m grateful to call friends.
Why I do what I do: I wasn’t raised here, but I sincerely love the culture and spirit of the South. I believe in celebrating family and cultivating a life and marriage that means something even greater than just a one-day celebration…though I really love the pretty details, too!
What I do in my spare time: Garden, scrapbook, cook, visit barn sales, decorate the house for the next holiday.
The cause/organization/charity that most captures my heart: I have the honor to call Paige Chenault, founder of The Birthday Party Project, a friend, and I absolutely love her organization that brings joy to homeless children through birthday parties.
True love is: Making each other laugh every day and welcoming each other home with a six-second hug.

Friends, please help us give Amber a big SW welcome in the comments below! You can also say hi and get to know her on Instagram.

P.S. Thanks so much to our Blue Ribbon Vendor Robyn Van Dyke for these photos of our new gals! We’ll be introducing Jess in a few weeks as well, so keep an eye out!

Written with love by Lisa