Kandace and Jason

2009-08-12T17:26:00.001-05:00

Just had to share

2009-02-26T18:43:00.001-06:00

Brandi Thompson is a rockin' awesome photographer that we were lucky enough to meet up with a couple of times for photo shoots. She's made some banners for us to post on the web that directs people to her site, and I just had to share my favorite!

Yes, that's me and Jason!!!

My new 'do

2008-12-30T23:40:00.004-06:00

I cut my hair about a month ago and was too lazy to get pictures up right away. So here they are, even though I bet my readership has dwindled to 2 readers on a good day.

2008-09-22T19:38:00.002-05:00

The moment I've been waiting for...

2008-09-21T11:34:00.003-05:00

Danielle is in labor! We're headed to the hospital shortly to meet our new nephew. Apparently we got the call last night, but had crashed early due to getting up early yesterday for a boxer fund raiser. Good thing she's not supposed to give birth until this afternoon/evening... I would have been really sad if we'd missed it.

Logan Thomas Fitzgerald, come meet Aunt K.C.!

Update 11:51pm - what a beautiful baby boy. He's going to be so spoiled rotten!

A new challenge

2008-09-07T09:14:00.004-05:00

Yesterday, we picked up our new foster boy, Boo, from the Lewisville shelter. We are excited to have another dog to help, and look forward to helping this cute face find a forever home.

This time, though, things will be a little different. The white Boxer we picked up yesterday is deaf! Believe me, we have yelled and screamed and clapped our hands behind his head. No dice. So what's neat about this situation is that Jason and I will be learning doggie sign language and teaching it to him so we can communicate to each other.

Oh, just because he can't hear doesn't mean he can't speak! Deaf dogs don't actually lose their hearing until about 6 weeks old, so in his first month and a half of life he definitely learned to bark and whine to get things/attention. It's a funny bark, halfway between a laugh and laryngitis.

The first night went better than expected. We put his crate in the middle of the living room so he could see Buffy and Sabrina while they slept, and maybe be less scared. Though he did paw and chew at the crate, and bark intermittently through the night, we were actually able to get more sleep than the first night we had Jenna!

He's a good sleeper once he's out though. Because he couldn't hear the garage open or the door slam when we came home last night, we actually had to stomp our feet so he could feel the vibration in the floor.

This looks to be an interesting experience, and we are ready to accept the challenge!

Meet Boo. White Boxer puppy. 6 months old. Needs a neuter and a vet eval to see if he needs any other treatment. He's full of life, and loves to play ball :)

Life and such

2008-08-18T22:17:00.002-05:00

Still looking for a job. Mine seems to get more annoying by the day. Maybe it's the people. Maybe it's the rude customers and their "Southlake mentality." Either way, I need more money, and more paid time off!

Jingles got adopted this weekend to a wonderful family in Weatherford who has a huge yard for him to play in. So glad he's home. In a way I want to jump right into the next one since I know there are so many who need help. But in a (selfish) way I want to take a few weeks off and just enjoy being a family of 5 - me, Jason, Buffy, Brina and Rocky. Guilt may get the best of me, though it will be hard to make sitting/boarding arrangements for the 3 weekends we are planning on being out of town between now and the end of September. Probably best to wait it out, and that's what I think we'll aim for - unless we're the last resort...

Can't wait to see my family next month!

2008-08-04T23:28:00.004-05:00

Dear Jason,

Tonight we had a discussion about kids and families. About how some people we know are getting married but have no plans to conceive. About how we'd love to start a family in a few years. While I don't want to wish away our years "alone together" (and I'm so surprised how quickly our first year of marriage has flown) I really do look forward to that time when we're financially and emotionally ready to begin trying in earnest. I'm also very grateful that God gave both of us good heads on our shoulders to realize that now is not the time.

This weekend as we threw a baby shower for your sister, it got me thinking about babies (or maybe it was the babies in this house that made me think about it) and how I've known pretty much my whole life that I wanted to be a mom some day. Knowing that you too want kids makes me so delighted.

I see the way you love on our dogs, and how well you do with other children in our families. And I look forward to having your children, because I know you'll be an excellent father.

I'm not ready for our adventures as a couple to be over, and there are a million things I still want to do together with you, but the imagining, in the meantime, makes me giddy with anticipation of what's to come. I can't wait!

Love,
K.C.

[I would like to revive this blog at least somewhat. Don't know how long it will last. Here's to a good running start.]

Grateful

2008-06-23T08:36:00.002-05:00

Lately I've been in kind of a funk about some things. Namely, my lack of a real job and therefore, the lack of funds in our bank account. No, we are not broke. Yes, we can pay our mortgage and other bills just fine. No, we're not reduced to eating scrambled eggs at every meal. I guess I am specifically lamenting our lack of disposable income. Which is ironic, since we aren't on a budget and just dropped $60 for a new DVD player.

Jason's grandparents, parents, aunt and uncle are all leaving on Wednesday to go to Europe for 10 days. The primary reason for the trip is the wedding of a distant cousin of the family, but aside from that event they will also be quite the tourists, country-hopping, sightseeing, shopping, gorging on amazing cuisine.

Jason and I are not going on this trip. Instead, we get the privilege of house and dog sitting. Watering plants. Taking in mail and newspapers. I'm happy to do it, since I know that some day we will ask for the favor to be returned. But yesterday when we went to the grandparents' house to learn the alarm system and where everything is kept, we got to talking about all the trips that Jason's grandparents have taken in their 60 years of marriage. And the more we talked, the more I could feel myself turning Hulk-green. I'm sure the jealousy was leaking out of my pores and into a puddle around my feet. Bahamas, Switzerland, Hawaii, and tons of other places I'd love to go.

Couple those emotions with watching The Bucket List last night (where they climb the pyramids in Cairo, see Mount Everest, dine in France, etc.) and it put me in quite a slump.

I know that in less than a year of marriage, and less than two years out of college, Jason and I aren't supposed to be rich. We are supposed to be "barely making it," held together by our love in a tiny one-bedroom apartment on the wrong side of town. And we are way ahead of that curve. We bought a house for goodness sake! We pay all our bills on time, with money left over, and we are not hurting for food or fun. But somehow, that's still not enough for me.

I want to travel with my husband. See all sorts of things together and share new experiences. The one thing my dad keeps stressing is that we need to see the world before we have kids (which is not happening any time soon, God willing.) But how can we do that if I'm making less than 20k? I'd love to go on a trip for our first anniversary, and it's something I started looking into a few months ago, looking for deals, exploring our options. But after spending almost as much on a new air conditioner as we did on our honeymoon, it seems that our anniversary will be spent in the appliance section of Home Depot, picking out our new range. No tropical drinks and gorgeous sunsets in our forecast.

I'm trying very hard to keep in mind all of the wonderful things we do have, all the blessings in our lives. I'm also trying hard not to "wish away" these first years of building our life together. I know that in time, things will improve - I'll find a better-paying job (a whole 'nother topic altogether) and we will keep paying our debts until we pay off our credit cards. Some day, we will take exciting family vacations. We'll leave the kids with their grandparents and take a romantic retreat somewhere breathtaking. But for now, I'll just have to settle for daydreaming.

Ugh

2008-06-10T22:44:00.002-05:00

Dropping $1300 for a new air conditioner is not conducive to taking a trip for our anniversary...

Milestone

2008-06-02T19:34:00.000-05:00

Today we paid off the remaining balance of the Kay credit card that had our wedding rings on it! Who wants to go shopping ;)

2008-01-29T17:19:00.000-06:00

What's new in the Williams household? Well... an actual household!! Jason and I are currently in full swing of the house buying process. I'm still in shock myself, waiting for the panic attack I'm sure to have any moment now, but here's the story (the more I tell it, the more real it becomes.)

Last year when we moved to Fort Worth, we signed a lease at our apartment complex for three months. We figured it would give us (ok, me) time to find a job and then we could focus on finding a house. Only I never really found a job. Nevertheless, we went with our realtor (a longtime family friend of Jason's parents) to look at a dozen or so houses. We found one or two that would have been nice I'm sure, but nothing that made us drool, or want to go into major debt for. So we decided that we would sign another lease with our apartment complex, and try again in another year. We wound up moving to a bigger apartment across the property, and here we've been for 10 months now.

The new year rolled around and we knew that we wanted to try, try again to find a house. So off we went with Jarod the trusty realtor on our second installment of drive-bys and walk-throughs. This time, I had a better job (though still not a career) and so we went a little higher in price range. And we were shocked to find even less than we did this time last year! Every house we looked at had something wrong - missing appliances, foundation issues, washing machine hookups in the kitchen, etc. We didn't even make it inside one of the houses because the neighbor was feeding his 10 foot long python a big fluffy white rabbit - ON THE FRONT PORCH. So we quickly moved on.

Just when we had resigned ourselves to signing yet another lease (at an increased rate thanks to the bastards running our complex) Jason spoke with his dad about a house that he was renting out. Turns out the tenants' lease had ended and they were paying on a month-to-month basis. A lot of phone calls and a visit to a mortgage company later, and it looked like we might be able to buy the house from Jason's dad.

The most recent developments have come in the last 48 hours. Jason's dad called the tenants, told them the situation and gave them 45 days to vacate. Then he had Jarod send them a list of other properties for rent in the area. To clarify, Jason and I are not trying to kick them out or anything. We want them to have as much time to find a nice new place. After all, our apartment lease isn't up until the end of March.

Well, the tenants called Joe back today. Apparently they are looking at moving into a rent house right across the street! And what's even more unbelievable is that they are thinking they can be out mid-February. So it looks like the house we were planning on having in April may be ours in the next two weeks!

As for the apartment, Jason's dad is going to pay our last month's rent if we decide to move in Feb/March (it's cheaper for him than having to pay mortgage on a house no one is living in.) Since we get a month's grace period of paying nothing on the house from our mortgage company, we can move in any time starting this Saturday and not have to pay anything on the house until April. On top of all of that, Jason's dad is paying all of our closing costs AND Jason is getting a raise starting this week!

So there's our crazy house story. It happened all of a sudden, and while I'm scared to death, I'm also really excited! Who's up for a housewarming party?!

Vendor review: Focuslight Productions

2008-01-08T17:16:00.000-06:00

[Wow, it's been awhile since I wrote last. Partly because I've been enjoying the married life, partly because of the holiday rush, and partly out of sheer laziness. But what better time to pick things up again than the new year? Hopefully I will get back in to the blogging speed I was at a few months ago.]

Hiring a videographer was something that Jason and I went back and forth on several times. All we wanted was a record of the ceremony, plus the important things like first dances, cake cutting, etc. and we couldn't seem to justify shelling out a whole lot of money for something so basic. So we finally decided that if we weren't sure we wanted it, the decision was made for us - no videographer.

During the time when we had contemplated hiring someone, I contacted several people I found online. No one over-the-top professional (read: expensive) but I thought maybe I could get a good deal from someone starting out a business who didn't have much experience. Since we were looking for bare minimum anyway, we figured even an amateur could set up a tripod and film the entire ceremony without too much hassle. We probably would have done this ourselves if a) we had a video camera or b) we had someone to work said camera. But we realized that once the wedding actually started, we wanted our families and guests to have fun - not to be behind a camera the whole night, worrying about if what they were doing was good enough.

In the end, it happened suddenly. I had spoken to Chris Campbell, a student at the Art Institute of Dallas, a few months prior. He showed me some little things he had done for classes, and the work was pretty good, especially considering he was still learning. But then we decided not to hire someone and I put the whole thing out of my mind. Then at the last minute (and I'm talking the Wednesday before the wedding) he emailed me out of the blue to see if I still needed someone. I thought that was very professional of him, and given the fact that our guest count was smaller than we planned for, we had some extra budget to play around with. So I emailed him back and said "sure why not" and two days later, there he was at the rehearsal, with his assistant, getting a feel for the venue and for us. We literally didn't meet him until after we'd hired him.

We just got our DVD in the mail this week, and I have to say I am impressed. There are three components - a highlights chapter, a ceremony chapter, and a reception chapter. The ceremony and reception ones are pretty self-explanatory as to what they encompass. The highlights chapter is only a few minutes long (actually it's as long as me and Jason's first dance song, since that's the music he put this chapter to) and it encompasses everything from pre-ceremony picture taking to ceremony and reception shots.

While the DVD wouldn't pass for something done by Spielberg, it's exactly what we wanted and it's perfect for us. Here is what we got for the $200 check we wrote Chris:

* Both Chris and his assistant came to the rehearsal and were there for the entire length of the wedding day.
* They did all filming and editing of the footage that they took.
* We got the finished product on DVD, and will shortly be receiving all of the files on disc for the purpose of backups. (There was a small typo on our DVD, so he's fixing that for me and sending me another copy. So technically we will have two copies.)

As you can see, we got an amazing deal! If I ever need video in the future, I won't hesitate to call Chris at Focuslight Productions. And I won't be surprised if his rates go up as he gains more experience in the film industry because as it is, he's worth more even now!

Final grade for Chris Campbell and Focuslight Productions: A

Vendor review: Mega-Mix Sound Systems

2007-11-09T18:27:00.000-06:00

www.fwmegamix.com

Jason and I knew that we wanted a DJ, as opposed to a wedding singer or a band. We knew that we'd want a wide range of music and the best way to get that was to hire someone who had access to all sorts of music.

Juan and Gil are brothers-in-law who both have other jobs. They DJ in their spare time for fun more than for profit. They had also previously worked at the Abbey, which was a big selling point for us because they knew the environment, as well as how to find the place!

This was the only DJ company we met with. The price was right, we got along great with them, and that was really all that mattered to us. I went a little control crazy and wound up pretty much dictating to them all the songs I wanted played and not played. If they had followed the list I gave them, they wouldn't have had to do anything except show up and load a playlist. After I realized that I wanted something more than an iPod could give me, I emailed them saying that they were free to disregard my list (except for the special dance songs) and make decisions based on how the crowd was responding.

These guys did a terrific job! They encouraged everyone to dance without harassing them. They did an amazing job reading the crowd - if people sat down when one song ended and another one came on, they had no problem changing it 10 seconds in if it meant the new song got people up again. We actually ended the reception early, but I didn't mind in the least because it was due to everyone having so much fun dancing that they wore themselves out really fast.

For the ceremony, I made a CD of all the songs I wanted to have played, including the classical music that played the 30 minutes before the processional started. Then I wrote a list of each song and it special instructions (fade when bridal party is at altar, only play from :54 to 1:28, etc.) and passed that on as well. That was all they needed to run the music for the ceremony, and because our DJ was able to take care of it, we didn't have to hire someone for a 30 minute time frame (of 10 minutes of actual work.) There was a small incident when a song played at the wrong moment, but our pastor fixed it by saying loudly "Let us pray," and the music was quickly turned off. Honestly, I didn't even mind, and I still don't. A story for the kids, I suppose.

Juan and Gil were so amazing, they even kept an eye on time the whole evening, updating me and Jason on how things were going (according to the master schedule I had sent everyone.) Because of this I didn't have to hire a coordinator, which saved me even more money. Don't be afraid to ask your vendors to take on additional tasks - providing they are capable of doing so, and you feel comfortable passing it off on them (if you are going to be more worried about it being done right than you are going to be relieved someone else is taking care of it, spend the money. No amount of budget friendliness will make up for stressing about jobs you've passed off to others.)

A++ for Juan and Gil and Mega-Mix Sound Systems!!!

Vendor review: Hot Chocolates Bakery

2007-11-07T20:36:00.000-06:00

www.hotchocolates.net

Typically, brides agonize over every decision, second guessing themselves and exploring a million different avenues. If there's an option, they'll consider it.

While that was the case when picking a design, when it came to Jason and I choosing a baker it really was a piece of cake! (har har) We only met with two bakeries, and we had two very different experiences. First, we went to Hot Chocolates in Hurst. For this, we set up a private appointment where we got to sample different cakes, fillings and icings. We got the undivided attention of Becky, one of the co-owners, and she really talked to us about the wedding and what we wanted. She showed us books of different cakes that they had done before and we talked about what it was that we wanted, what they were capable of doing, etc. I even kicked Jason out of the room so I could talk to her about an idea I had for the groom's cake. Since I don't like strawberries, but love the little bride/groom chocolate dipped idea, I asked her if it would be possible to use Oreos instead. I thought it more fitting since that's Jason's favorite cookie :) Becky said it would be no problem. We left the meeting with assurance that we were all on the same page and were all happy.

The other bakery we went to was Creative Memories, also in Hurst. This company runs things differently in that they don't do private appointments. Once a month, they host an open house where they bake up a storm of different cakes and whoever wants to talk to them is welcome to swing by some time during the day to sample cake and discuss their vision. While the cake was good, the service was not so hot. Jason and I went in and got some cake (assembly line style) and then asked if we could speak to someone about our wedding. It took them awhile, but finally someone made themselves not busy and we discussed our ideas. I kicked Jason out again to ask about the Oreo idea, and after the lady I talked to had to talk to someone else, I was told that they wouldn't be able to do it. Honestly, I was shocked. I wasn't asking them to do anything absurd - it's not like dipping Oreos is that different from dipping strawberries! The fact that I was flat out told no didn't sit well with me. To top it off, when I got home I did a price comparison between the two companies, taking into account the design, how many people it would serve, and what my money would get me. Hot Chocolates turned out to be the better deal, even with the added cost of the Oreos!

So back to Hot Chocolates we went. I knew I wanted a vanilla bride's cake and a chocolate groom's cake, so it really was a matter of picking which combinations went best together. We wound up with yellow cake/vanilla cream filling/buttercream icing for the bride's cake, and devil's food cake/fudge icing for the groom's cake. I sent them pictures of what I wanted for each design, dropped off our cake topper, and let them do their thing. And I could not have been happier with how everything turned out.

On top of providing two amazing cakes, they also gave us boxes, one for each cake tier, just in case there was some left over (there was, but not anymore!) They also left an instruction sheet on how to cut and serve the cake (our caterers were the ones who did that) and how to save our top tier so it keeps and doesn't get freezer burned so we can enjoy it on our first anniversary.

I give Hot Chocolates an A+ rating. The only thing I would have changed is the vanilla cream filling - it tasted fabulous, but I would have liked it to be a thicker layer in between cake tiers. I was thinking it would be kind of its own mini layer, but it was more like just enough to hold the layers together. Something that could easily be taken care of by being more specific, and it's really not that big of a deal - in fact, I keep looking for a reason to order another cake from them because what they made for us was so amazing!

Vendor review: The Country Abbey

2007-11-04T14:17:00.000-06:00

www.thecountryabbey.com

I knew that I wanted an all-in-one wedding venue where we could have both the ceremony and reception. Jason's sister got married at a place like this last summer, and I saw how much easier it was compared to other weddings I'd been to where you go one place for the ceremony and then have to travel elsewhere for the reception. I think by keeping it in one location it really unifies the ceremony and the reception into one grand event instead of two separate ones.

The first thing we did after getting engaged was make a rough guest list. This way we could know when talking to venues what size room we would need. We only visited a handful of places, because there really aren't that many all-in-ones around here (more on that later) and we narrowed it down to a few. In the end, The Country Abbey won out because of a combination of staff, services and pricing.

I can not say enough about how wonderful the Abbey staff is. I worked mostly with Elaine and Naomi, who is the owner. The phone number for the Abbey is Naomi's cell phone, so even if she wasn't at the Abbey when I called, she would still answer the phone. The best part about the Abbey is that we got to hire all of our own vendors. Some people might find this to be too much work to take on having to meet, hire and keep track of so many vendors. To this I say it really wasn't that bad. We were able to find the vendors that worked best for the vision we had for the wedding, at the prices we were comfortable paying. It turned out to be only five vendors - the catering, the cakes, the DJ, the flowers, and the officiant. We got to choose exactly what foods we wanted, exactly how we wanted our cake to look, what kind of musical vibe we were going for, the flowers that we liked, and the person who got to marry us.

Oftentimes, venues partner with certain vendors and require their brides to use them. For example, Danielle's venue, The Mediterranean Villa, required the use of their in-house catering. That meant all the food, bar and cake decisions were made based on what the Villa already offered. Be careful about venues that require you to use a vendor, because it can really limit your wedding to the talents already on staff. I've heard stories of other brides loving a venue, but being eh about the food or the bakers to choose from. Some venues offer you only one choice, usually an in-house company that works exclusively for that venue. Others give you a list of vendors to choose from, which could wind up only being a handful of each type (usually the venue is getting a kick back for referring you so that's why they force you to use their lists.) If you do come across a venue that has a vendor list, you should be free to see the list and talk to the vendors before making any type of a decision. Jason and I went to one place who wouldn't let you contact the vendors until you'd put down a deposit for their venue. Needless to say, that was the last time we've spoked to that venue!

The Country Abbey wound up being exactly what we wanted. At first, I was a little nervous about the size of the guest list, but in the end it was perfect. We were free to decorate how we wanted. We were able to use some of their decorations free of charge. For brides who need a little more help, they also offer coordinator services as well as different decorating packages. Naomi is always available by phone or by email. She's very helpful, and very knowledgeable about the wedding industry and how to really help brides out. She's creative, but she'll let you do your own thing if you have something in mind.

I give The Country Abbey a solid A. [The only reason I took off the + is because there was a scheduling issue that came to light two weeks before the wedding. Luckily, we were able to resolve it, and Naomi threw in extra time free of charge to make up for it. Everything worked out, but it was unnecessary added stress. I'm just glad we were flexible enough to work around the issue or it might have been a lot worse.]

Vendor review: Jerod Foster Photography

2007-11-03T15:26:00.000-06:00

www.jerodfosterphotography.com

After getting engaged in December, we decided that we would have the wedding in DFW. As much as I wanted to get married in Houston, we knew it would just be too hard to plan long-distance, especially if I was also in the process of looking for a job. I knew that toward the end of the planning I'd be commuting to Houston every weekend, and we quickly realized how expensive that could get. So we setlled on DFW and began looking into doing engagement pictures. We thought about where we would like to have them taken since we knew location was a big part of any photo shoot. We had moved to DFW in the beginning of the year and I really didn't feel like it meant anything to me, or to our relationship. Of course the logical choice was the Tech campus, because that's really where our relationship was formed and nurtured. So we began talking to wedding photographers to see what we could come up with. Initially, we were thinking that we would do engagement pictures in Lubbock, my bridal portraits in Houston (since we were living so close to Jason's family, I wanted to involve my family in as much of the planning as possible) and then the wedding in DFW. We talked to a few DFW photographers who had packages that included all three shoots, but everyone we talked to threw out pretty hefty traveling charges (one guy flat out refused to travel, which is totally understandable since it would essentially mean 18 hours of round-trip travel for maybe 4 hours of shooting time.)

So we contacted some photographers in Lubbock about doing just our engagement shoot. While the pricing was mostly decent, it still seemed pretty high for an hour or two on campus plus a disc of images. Honestly, photographers make the most money on their packaged deals, so to do just a single shoot for us, it really wasn't economic unless they upped their prices.

Then I got the idea to talk to Tech professors. I contacted a few photo profs, as well as some people in the Mass Comm college who taught photocommunications, to see if any of them did photo on the side as a hobby/small business. I also emailed a few students studying PhotoComm, thinking maybe they'd want to offer a good deal in exchange for using our pictures in their portfolios. I talked to the guy who does most of the photo work for Tech - I'd actually met him while working at the campus computer store because he was friends with my boss. He suggested one of his students, a guy who is somewhat an assistant to him in teaching some of the classes. I got in contact with Jerod, and we had plans to meet on the Tech campus one Saturday in March to play around and take some photos.

I was so impressed with the results! For $200 we got Jerod for about three hours, and he wound up taking over 400 shots. We showed up in formal wear (the red and black) took some photos, changed into nice casual (the purple) took some shots, then changed into our Tech shirts and took some in and around the stadium. Jerod was great with posing us, but also he let us try some things that we had in mind too. It was kind of anything goes. A few weeks later, we received a CD in the mail of the 64 best shots that he had taken, and they were all in high-resolution. They turned out really well thanks to his fabulous camera. We took the disc to Walmart to get prints done, and they were so cheap! We definitely saved money this way, as opposed to having to buy copies from a third party.

I highly recommend that anyone in Lubbock who needs photos done (of any kind) talk to Jerod. If we hadn't already booked a wedding photographer when we hired him, we would have asked him to do it because he was that good. If you're not in Lubbock or if you can't get in touch with Jerod for some reason, I encourage you to check out your own local resources. College kids, especially those in their junior and senior years, really do have a lot of skill in the area they're studying, and will definitely be cheaper than professionals with lots of experience, often with just as much talent. You may even be able to work out a deal of some sort where you exchange something other than money for services (trading trades, if you will.)

All in all, I give Jerod an A+ because the whole experience was so wonderful. It took him a little time to get back to us, even after leaving him several messages, but it all got figured out (just remember he's a teacher/student, so if he's off in the middle of nowhere on an assignment, he may not have cell phone signal to get back to you right away!)

The first of many

2007-10-29T19:55:00.000-06:00

I will be dedicating this milestone, my 100th post on the subject of our wedding, to the things that I did right throughout the planning and the big day. I guess the following is a list of advice that I would give to any couple planning a wedding.

1. Stay organized. As soon as we got engaged I started accumulating all sorts of wedding things, like pictures of dresses and swatches of fabric. I wanted to stay on top of all the crap I knew I'd be collecting, so I used a big binder to keep it all in one place. That binder became my wedding brain - I took it to all of the meetings I went to so any contracts or info sheets could go into the binder right then and there. I attended a bridal show that gave out a wedding planner packet, but it would be just as easy to buy folders/dividers for each section of the wedding (attire, vendors, registries, honeymoon, etc.) so that when you need something, you know exactly where it is. I also kept extra notebook paper in the back so if I was meeting with a vendor or needed to make a list, I had a way to do it quickly. The binder was an easy way to stay organized, and I could grab it on my way out the door knowing that everything I needed was already in it, which helped avoid a lot of mad scrambles to collect things from multiple locations.

Being organized also includes things like detailed schedules and timelines. Everyone laughed and made jokes about my four-page itinerary, but I guarantee the wedding went as smoothly as it did because everyone knew exactly where they had to be and when. Vendors didn't clash because they anticipated what the other vendors were doing. Everything was on a list; everything was labeled. Here's a secret: I didn't have a wedding planner, or even a day-of coordinator. Everything at our wedding was done by friends and family, and it only came together because everyone had a specific role and list of duties.

2. Early is on time; on time is late. No matter who you are and how many promises you make to stay on top of things, you will inevitably wind up taking on more than you can chew. This could easily backfire into half a dozen projects being partially done the night before the wedding, thus inducing those bridezilla-at-2-in-the-morning fits we all see on TV. The best way to handle this is to do things early. Take those checklists you can find in any magazine and do as much as you can. Anything you can do now, do it. Anything you can't complete right away, make a rough draft. If you can't write up an order-of-ceremony until you talk to the officiant, go ahead and design the rest of the program pieces, such as acknowledgments, quotes and other blurbs. That way, when you get a chance to meet the minister, you can decide on something, plug it into you draft and send it off for final approval all in the same day. Start a running checklist that you can keep adding to when you remember new things. Create a rough timeline of the weekend so you know how much time you have to play around with when you start making final plans with vendors.

I remember looking at my to-do lists about 4 months out, wishing there were something I could be doing on that list to get it checked off. I really was at a standstill for awhile because I'd taken care of everything. I did wind up taking the week before the wedding off so I could run those last-minute errands (things that could not have been done earlier) but even then the week wasn't that hectic because my to-do list was reasonable to accomplish in the time frame given. Not everyone is so lucky to take two weeks off work like I did. If this is the case for you, imagine doing a million wedding things on top of a full week of work. Now imagine scolding yourself because so much of your stress could have been avoided by getting those things out of the way sooner. Now go do those things!!

3. Don't expect a miracle. Always anticipate that something will go wrong, and be ready to roll with it. Buffer in extra time between every activity, so if there's unusual traffic or someone forgets something at home, there's still plenty of time to get back on track. Also, be realistic in your expectations. No one can be in two places at once. No one can make cheese and crackers into a four course meal. Know your vendors, their capabilities, and their limitations. Same for your wedding party. Have a backup plan for the what-ifs. Know when to fight for things and when to let them go. Remember that the big picture isn't the wedding, but the marriage.

A week before the wedding I got an email saying our venue had double-booked us for our rehearsal and dinner. We changed the time and pushed everything back an hour. There was an air show that we didn't find out about until it was pretty much happening, which significantly increased traffic and decreased the availability of hotel rooms. Thanks to quick thinking, neither of those turned into a crisis. And because of the hotels being completely booked, our plan to use the room the girls had stayed in the night before, to do hair and makeup, was dissolved. So we moved over to my mom's hotel, which had been booked for that night as well, and wound up having more space. There was a moment in the ceremony where the music played was wrong. We forgot to bustle my dress (which I tripped on going up the altar stairs) before our first dance. The bartender didn't pour drinks into cups so there were cans everywhere. We paid for extra reception time and then cut the night short. But we got married, which was the ultimate goal, and it was still the most fabulous day of my life. Period.

A masterpiece

2007-10-28T21:29:00.000-06:00

I'm so proud to be Mrs. Kandace Williams! The entire wedding weekend was so wonderful; we honestly could not have been more blessed. Jason and I spent the last 8 days aboard the Carnival Conquest enjoying each other's company and we had a blast soaking in all the perks of being newlyweds!

There are so many things in my head that I want to make sure I mention, but for now I think I'll keep it short and sweet:

Thanks to everyone who played a role in our wedding, whether as a member of the wedding party, as a family member, or simply as a guest. I could say a million words and still be at a loss for how to convey the gratitude and love we feel for all of you. We were absolutely humbled by the generosity and support that poured out for us. The deck is definitely stacked in our favor with all of you behind us and our marriage.

It's now been 8 days and we have only seen a small handful of pictures from the whole thing. I set up an account at www.photobucket.com where you can add your pictures to the collection. The login ID is bunnwilliams and the password is wedding. Please please help us out by sharing any images you might have in your possession.

Thanks again to our friends and family. We are blessed beyond words and we love each and every one of you so very much.

A million little pieces

2007-10-18T21:52:00.000-05:00

So it's less than 48 hours until my wedding. Am I a sobbing wreck? No. Am I stressed? No. Am I nervous? No, though everyone keeps guessing that I am and telling me not to be (seriously, my florist kept telling me I was nervous. I think I would know!)

What am I then? I'm excited! Excited that we are finally packed for the honeymoon (save for things like cell phone chargers and toothbrushes.) Excited that 3 of 4 wedding party members are on their way from Lubbock right now. Excited that my family will be here tomorrow.

What am I doing? Going over the packing lists I've been putting together for months to make sure I have everything (even though I checked it off as it went in our bags!) I'm also about to get in the shower. And I'm helping a friend find a hotel. Yes, that's right. My friends are very last-minute people. Romie didn't pack until tonight and Kevin, Zach, Shawna and John don't have a hotel yet. I could let it bother me, but they're never gonna change so why hold my breath? Don't get me wrong, I love my friends to death, but whatever happens is a result of their unpreparedness and the only have themselves to blame.

OK enough rambling. Time to move on to something else.

It's been one week since you looked at me...

2007-10-13T15:26:00.000-05:00

Holy crap a week from right this minute I will be in full bridal get up awaiting the signal that it's time to meet my handsome groom at the altar!!! I can't believe how fast it all seems to be going now, even though a few months ago I wished it would hurry up!

I'm done with work until we get back. This week I will tie up all loose ends (there aren't that many) and then focus on getting good sleep and eating well since I know that'll all go out the window on our honeymoon cruise :)

Eeeeeee I can't wait to see everyone in a week!

No amount of words

2007-10-10T22:19:00.000-05:00

First and foremost I want to wish a very happy birthday to Jason. I'm so glad that he came into my life, and it's so weird to think that for his next birthday I will be signing my card to him "From Mrs. Williams!" I thank God every day for being blessed with such a great guy and I look forward to sharing another million birthdays with him in the future :)

In other news, it's ten days until the wedding! With less than two weeks to go I'm still not stressing out. Tomorrow is my last day of work and then I have over a week off to get everything done, so that may be a huge reason why I haven't yet turned into Bridezilla. Of course, something like STILL not having all the RSVPs in is irking me, but I refuse to let it turn into a problem. I still have time to figure everything out that I'm working on, so it's whatever.

We got a very unexpected gift yesterday and it makes us appreciate what we have and will continue to have when we get married. Our families are our backbone and we couldn't have done any of this without them. I am just so lucky to be gaining more family members that I care about, and who care about me, just as much as my own family.

And the most exciting news from today: we got our marriage license! It's so authentic looking, with black scrolly writing on a yellowed paper. We just have to wait three days for it to process/clear, so we are golden. I will try to get a picture of it up soon.

Happy birthday to Jason again. God I'm a lucky girl.

A single score (as in four score and seven years ago)

2007-09-30T14:37:00.000-05:00

Well friends and family, this is it. We are down to the final 20 days. I am starting to get excited! People keep asking me if I'm nervous, but why would I be? It's not like after dating Jason for 3.5 years I'm all of a sudden going to realize I hate him. Does that really happen to people? Well, I mean people in real life (*ahem* Burke and Christina!)

Though I'm starting to get a little busier putting together last minute things, I think going through everything, packing it up, labeling it and writing specific detailed instructions helps me double check that everything is in order. It also helps me de-stress, believe it or not. Our dining room is beginning to get piled up with boxes, which is a good feeling to see all the crap that won't be returning with us (well most of it won't at least.) I have a few little projects left to tackle, but if I don't get to them it's not a big deal.

This week we move into Danielle's house to house sit for her while her and Thomas are vacationing in Florida. While it will be nice to play house for 10 days, it kind of puts a damper on organizing wedding stuff in my spare time. So that's why I'm trying to take care of so much of it today and will continue chugging away tomorrow after work. I'm taking everything out, setting it up on our dining table, taking a digital photo of how it should look, and including that photo in the box to make sure when Jason and the boys set up, they can zoom through things instead of worrying what to do. As it is, Jason has banned me from seeing the reception room on the day of the wedding, so when we get announced and enter the reception, don't be surprised if I'm paying more attention to decorations than to you all. That will quickly pass!

On another note, RSVPs are due this Friday. I was hoping to get them all in by now, but it's my fault for making the date so late in the timeline. There's a very slight chance that we might be able to get away without a seating chart, but only if everyone we haven't heard from is a no. My biggest fear is that we would have enough seats for everyone, but somehow there would wind up being a single empty seat at each of the tables, and a dozen people without seats. We will see what happens Friday (ok really, we will see what happens Sunday when I call everyone I didn't hear from - I know it's going to happen because people these days don't bother to RSVP!)

I need to get my dress cleaned. I need to choose which bridal portrait to blow up to display at the reception (my sister and I have narrowed it down to two, now to make a final decision.) I need to drop the cake topper off with our baker. And I need to rob a bank to scrounge up the rest of the money to pay off the caterer and DJ and pastor, who all take cash or check only. Oh, and I need to pack for the honeymoon! In the meantime I'm house sitting, spending next weekend in Lubbock (be there bitches!) and attending the renewal of vows of Jason's aunt and uncle. Oh, and I have to clean the apartment so when we get back from the honeymoon it will be nice and tidy (with gifts piled everywhere, which will make it seem like a wreck.)

Thank God I took off the week before the wedding!

Smile for the camera

2007-09-22T18:48:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I had my bridal portraits done. I want to say a huge thank you to my mommy who made the trip up from Houston to be there with me. Larry did take a few of us together at the end, and I can't wait to see how they all turn out!

One really nice thing about yesterday was that it was a sort of dress rehearsal for the big day. I have to say that I felt very pretty in my complete bridal outfit, but there will be some changes made with regards to scheduling, that's for sure. We started out a little late which shouldn't have been a problem, but everything took longer that it should have, and we got stuck in major traffic, so we wound up being almost 30 minutes late to the Japanese Gardens. In the end, we only lost about 15 minutes because we took some pictures after the gardens had closed, right outside the gift shop, where we were technically not in the gardens but in an area that still had a little bench and a waterfall and such. Thanks to Larry and Jill for staying a little late and waiting on our late butts.

The biggest issue of the day were the flowers. I went to pick them up from the florist, and they pulled this dusty pink and light purple bouquet out of the cooler. I was like um that's not mine but it had my name on it. Lucky for me they really wanted me to be happy, so they literally took apart the entire thing and I dug through their flower supplies in the back to show them exactly what I was going for. I'm still not sure where they got that pink was one of my wedding colors, or how they went so wrong considering I had multiple meetings with them, we specified exact flowers and colors, and I even brought lots of pictures to illustrate what I couldn't describe in words. Not to mention we have a contract that explicitly states all of that. They did manage to fix it though, and it looked fabulous. I took lots of pictures of the new bouquet and plan on sending them in to make sure that we don't have an issue like this on the wedding day (they'll be delivering the flowers to the Abbey, so we won't have the luxury of a fully stocked shop to fall back on. They kind of get one shot at it next time.)

All in all, the experience was positive. Now I can't wait to see how they all turn out! Sorry guys, you won't get to see them until after the wedding. A girl's gotta have some secrets! How else do I make you all breathless at the sight of my beauty on the big day?!

The race is on

2007-09-20T13:58:00.001-05:00

Well, friends, guess what. It's exactly one month until the wedding. People keep asking me if I'm nervous, and honestly I'm not. What's there to be nervous about? Emotions that I am feeling are excitement, anxiousness and impatience. I am so excited that Jason and I are taking the next step in our relationship and starting our own family. I'm anxious to see how many guests we will have on our special day, and I'm impatient because I want it to be here already!

Last night I sat in the living room watching Bridezillas and putting together stuff for the reception. Maybe it's just that I don't have ridiculous expectations, but people like that always make me wonder "why is he marrying her if she calls herself a princess and only cares for herself?" Seriously, the wedding I watched last night involved a glass slipper carried in on a pillow, a dramatic reenactment of the groom trying the slipper on all the wrong feet (a la the bridesmaids) and a trumpet bray as he finally made a connection with his Cinderella!

My mommy will be here tomorrow because I am meeting with the wonderful couple Jill and Larry of Larry Reynolds Photography for my bridal portraits! Yesterday I took my dress out of its garment bag, hung it up, gave it a good once-over with the iron, and blocked the room off from all directions so Jason can't enter. I even hung signs that say the penalty for peeking is death! In all serious though, I'm proud to say Jason has never even hinted at peeking. He knows how much it means to me and so he's doing his part to avert his eyes until the wedding day.

Now I'm down to working on the last-minute details - tying ribbon on the ceremony programs, creating a checklist, drawing up a master timeline of the day, and fudging a seating chart (hard to do when you have less than half the RSVPs - please send them back to me NOW! No really, I'll wait while you go to your mailbox...)

Yesterday I confirmed and paid for the rehearsal dinner. I met with a piercer who helped me take the bar out of my industrial in favor of clear retainers so the piercings won't show in pictures. Having previously booked our dolphin swim in Cozumel, I am now awaiting some transactions to go through at the bank so my poor self can book and pay for our zipline tour in Jamaica and our private charter in Grand Cayman. Then the cruise will be taken care of, except for packing!

I'm still trying to stay on top of everything so my last week as a single gal can be spent having fun with friends and family instead of working out things that could have already been done. At this point it's all in the details. Anything that doesn't get resolved or pan out won't really matter to me because it won't affect the wedding as a whole. Now we are working on sprucing things up to make what we have nicer. Sometimes I fantasize about what I would do differently if I could get all my money back and start from scratch. I know it's not productive, but it's all the more incentive to stay together for the purpose of implementing my other ideas into our 50th wedding anniversary extravaganza!!! Not that we need something like that to keep our marriage together though...

Tomorrow I will get to see what my bouquet will look like for the first time. I'm going in early, so anything I don't like can be fixed and I can have it just like the vision in my head (however faint it may be.) Then it's off to get my hair done like I did during the trial, but this time she will do my makeup as well, which we didn't have time to do last time. It will be the first time I see the entire look put together from the veil to the shoes. I'm excited my mom will be here, I'm excited to see how I mesh with our photographers, I'm excited to head out to the beautiful Japanese Gardens again, and I'm excited to soak up a few bridal moments before it all goes back where it came from for a few weeks. I guess you could say this will by my dress rehearsal. A time to figure out any problems that might arise and how to combat them. Bring it on!

Sorry this is so long. I'm obviously excited about everything that's coming together! Pretty soon we will be seeing all of you all dressed up and looking lovely :)

Kisses to all!

C. Final answer.

2007-09-07T16:05:00.000-05:00

I never really envisioned my wedding as a little girl - now, actually planning it, I don't have any nostalgic memories of elements I want or how anything should be. In the unique "made to order" society that we live in, just about everything can be customized to make it unique. From a myriad of invitations options (paper, vellum, cardstock, embossing, thermography, inks, letterpress, pocketfolds, A7s, etc. etc. etc.) to sensory stimuli (custom lighting, fabric draping, even signature scents) it seems like a no-brainer that no two weddings could possibly be identical.

While all the choices can be really fabulous for those with a vision, for someone like me they can make everything more difficult! It's easy for me to make a decision given two or three options (sit down dinner or buffet, dj or live band) but starting from scratch is so intimidating. I'm stuck at a crossroad between making our wedding unique and keeping it from becoming ridiculous.

Anyway, the point of this rambling post is to preface the fact that I have again changed my mind about wedding cake designs. Yes, we have chosen the shape, size and flavors (again a limited number of options) and will not waver on those, but for some reason what it looks like has been tormenting me. I see a design that I like, pick apart the elements I would change about it, then worry my vision won't all come together right. But fear not! Last night I made an executive decision. Ta dum:

The only change we will be making is the icing color. Imagine it in a deep royal purple. And we are looking for an alternative cake topper since we aren't sure what to think about the flowers.

What do you think?

Dazzling!

2007-09-05T22:22:00.000-05:00

Tonight I started using Crest Whitestrips. They feel really weird, like I have wrapped my teeth in saran wrap. I can't talk or spit while they're on because they shift really easily. So far, 5 minutes down, another 25 to go. I really hope I can continue to use them for the whole time I'm supposed to, because Romie's teeth were so white and pretty when I saw her and she said she's been using them and she likes them. I know my sister had issues with them when she first tried them, like they made her teeth really sensitive so she stopped using them halfway through the kit. Hopefully I'll adjust easier than that. With only 16 days until my bridal portraits, I hope I can at least make my pearlies a few shades whiter. If I like them I think I'll try them again right before the wedding but if not it's no loss since I got this kit free for being a first-time patient at my new dentist's office.

6 minutes down. Has anyone else had good or bad experiences with these?

I hung out with the pool boy

2007-09-03T20:27:00.000-05:00

Holy crap I'm tired. What a fabulous weekend. It started Friday night when Arthur, Romie, Thomas and Allison came to stay with us. It continued Saturday at our wedding shower where we were joined by Chelsea, our parents, Jason's aunts and uncle and grandparents. It continued Sunday though we lost Allison and Chelsea. And it came to a conclusion this afternoon as Arthur, Romie and Thomas headed back.

I can't even begin to describe how overwhelmed we were by the generosity of our friends and family. Not only did Jason's mom and aunt throw us a lovely shower, but we got so many nice and useful shower gifts including lots of stuff to use on the honeymoon!

Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the weekend (more on Facebook). Thanks again to everyone who made it special for me and Jason. We love you all so much and are so glad you are sharing this time with us. We can now say that we are getting married NEXT MONTH!!!

Heads, shoulders, knees and toes

2007-08-24T21:00:00.000-05:00

Wednesday we got our first RSVPs in the mail :) They were all good news. Sadly, yesterday we got a "decline with regret" which is too bad, but I kind of knew the couple wouldn't be making it - still would have been nice to see them since they're family and we don't see them nearly enough.

Along with the loss of my computer, I'm mourning another loss involving my bank account and my car. Really glad I didn't buy a new laptop because I just spent that much to get the Focus fixed, with a list of things that still need my attention (and money...)

Hopefully this weekend will be good. We're not supposed to get any rain, and Sunday we are going to a water park with Jason's sister and her husband in celebration of their one-year anniversary :)

So far behind

2007-08-22T14:56:00.000-05:00

Hello again, everyone! Wow can you believe how long it's been since I posted? I attended the funeral of my laptop and have yet to replace it, so for now I am sneaking onto Jason's desktop to bring you bridal updates :)

All invitation pieces have been printed. All invitations have been assembled. Some invitations have been mailed (but not all.)

We had our final meeting with Rev. Jason. We figured out ceremony order, what we will have and won't have, and other day-of things. I just got his approval of my programs, so I will be printing them shortly (shortly = whenever I get to a computer that I can hook my printer to.)

I picked up my altered dress and I scheduled bridal portraits. I just need to find a reputable dry cleaner to take care of my dress between bridal portraits and the wedding. I also need to get my sister's dress to her so that she can get alterations started.

We've continued making purchases here and there to get everything taken care of. Still a few loose ends, but mostly coming together nicely.

We planned the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner.

I paid off some vendors, and will be making next payments to some of them soon. We are trying to pay off as many as possible with checks/cash, but a few vendors like our baker and our photographer take credit card, which is a huge help since we can keep paying those off after the wedding (I'm so glad I have good credit and just got a new card with no interest for another 14 months!)

Things are quickly coming together. The big things are taken care of, and anything that falls through at this point won't really affect anything that much.

Now off to rob a bank (attention Suzi!) to get enough money to pay the rest of it off :) And by rob a bank, I mean look for a job ;)

Reality check

2007-08-10T23:29:00.000-05:00

Right now I'm working on printing the response cards that will accompany the invitations I'm going to print tomorrow. Next week we will send out batch one (family from far far away to give them extra time to make travel plans) and wait anxiously for people to reveal their agendas for October 20 (and let us know if we are important enough to get penciled in!)

It's finally starting to feel real. The dress that I put on again for the first time in months, the bridesmaid dress that is hanging in my closet for me to look at whenever, the first gift purchased because someone loves us, and now the big indicator that it's real and that it's happening, our invitations and assorted inserts that will accompany them in their transcontinental journeys.

I'm so excited. And each day closer just adds to the excitement. I'm getting married to an amazing guy who loves me as much as I love him. God, what did I do to deserve something so fabulous?!

19 years ago

2007-08-07T22:59:00.001-05:00

Happy birthday to the best maid of honor and sister I could ever ask for. I know it's an hour too early here in America, but I'm 7 hours late where you are so I'm sure I'm not the first to say it to you. Enjoy the last year of your teens kid! I love you!

With 73 days to go...

2007-08-07T18:30:00.000-05:00

Today I got two emails that items from our honeymoon registry had been purchased! I know the givers saw the info on the invitations to our (family-only) honeymoon shower - but the invites only went out yesterday! Obviously the first ones to see the registry info had an easy enough time using it. Let's hope that others do as well. I'm a little afraid for the older generation (older being grandparents) but that's why we also have two physical in-store registries too.

Of course we want to make it clear that we are NOT expecting gifts. Some of our guests we haven't seen in years, mostly because they are living out of state, so them being able to make it is gift enough. :)

It's mine, my own... my Preciousssss!!!!

2007-08-02T22:32:00.000-05:00

If you have talked to me lately or even read any of my most recent entries, you can guess what finally arrived on my doorstep today after four months of waiting and getting anxious....

It finally arrived in all of its bridal glory, and of course the first thing I did was to whip off my clothes and zip that sucker on. I took caution to make sure my hands and such were clean, and I picked it up as I walked into my bathroom to look in the full length mirror so that it wouldn't pick up uninvited dust bunnies.

While I must say that it is fabulous, the bust is way too big for me! I must have lost weight or something, because when I tried on the sample at Alfred Angelo, I don't recall being able to fit a whole second set of my boobs in the bodice with me. So along with a hem and a bustle, it now seems that I will need to get the bust taken in. I suppose I should be excited that I've shrunk, especially considering some familial "mentionings" the last time I was in town.

Since you all are just going to have wait until after the wedding to see shots of the BIG DEAL DRESS, I leave you with these:

The good news:

You have no idea how hard it was not to rip into the box before getting a picture:

Inserts from Netbride that came in the box: a message saying they want to see pictures of me in the dress (so they can put them on their site), a thank you card with general pricing info they gathered about alterations costs in their area (Minnesota), and business cards so I can hand them out to others I guess.

[While I won't be handing them out per se, I would like to take the time to mention how amazing Netbride.com was to work with. All of my questions were answered quickly, even when I was being overly bothersome. The service was fast and I got my gown three weeks before the promised date. The best part is that I saved over 50% as opposed to buying direct from the company and still got the EXACT same dress brand new, untouched, with all the tags on it. I highly recommend Netbride.com if you need to order any type of formalwear.]

Tauting, teasing, driving me crazy!

2007-08-02T12:12:00.000-05:00

Last night at 11:10 PM it was "In Transit" to Denton.
This morning at 7:20AM it was "Out for Delivery" in Denton.

WHERE ARE YOU MY BEAUTY???

All's fair in love and... guest lists?

2007-07-31T21:49:00.000-05:00

I come from a blended family. Both of my parents have moved on since their divorce, finding wonderful people to (re)dedicate themselves to. Both of these wonderful people have children from a previous marriage - four boys and a girl total. They are my siblings as much as my biological sister, except we don't have the foundation of years worth of memories.

My oldest brother got married a few years ago and now has a lovely wife and a beautiful daughter. The next two oldest brothers are both seeing someone, and both relationships are rather serious from what I can gather.

I love all of my extended family very much - they have all had a hand in making me who I am, even if it's only on a small scale. When it comes to my life I am happy to share it with them; rather than having to divide it out into smaller portions, I feel my heart getting bigger with each new addition. [I have heard mothers say this about second children you don't give each child half a heart, your heart just grows twice as much to handle all the love.]

One of the great things about my family is that, to my knowledge at least, they all accept and love Jason as much as they accept and love me. It's rare to find two families that come together with no sticky issues to work through. But somehow, we have managed to make it work so far.

Except for this one little snafu. Remember the Seely House I posted about last go round? The one that barely has enough table space for all those directly involved in the wedding? I kind of forgot to factor my other siblings and their families into the guest list. I know, it's a pretty major afterthought. And it's not that I don't want them there. It was just a horrible mindslip.

So now the question becomes what to do. Technically, none of them are involved in the wedding, so they don't HAVE to be invited to the rehearsal and its successive dinner. On the other hand, they are family, and therefore should be invited. Weddings are a time for families and love and sharing together, and it doesn't work with a big chunk of mine missing.

The easy solution is to cut out anyone that isn't directly part of the wedding (and their spouses, naturally.) That way there are no hurt feelings, there's a protocol to stick to, and a clear understanding of who would and would not be included.

But what about my stepdad's kids? And his father that's flying in from New York? And my mother's parents that are flying in from Florida? They will all be arriving Friday morning/afternoon and will be the responsibility of my mom and stepdad. Do we just give them the number to the nearest Domino's and tell them we will see them in a few hours?

And if we invite my stepdad's kids, shouldn't we invite my stepfamily from my dad's side too? And since we're doing all the extended siblings, wouldn't that lend itself to definitely adding invites for Jason's sister and her husband?

It's a snowball effect. Pringles if you will. Can't invite just one (without having to add four more, at least.) Either we offend someone by being extremely exclusive, or we risk offending Jason's parents by asking them to finance a small-dinner-get-together-turned-pre-wedding-gala.

The only solution I seem to like so far is to play it by ear. Only send invites to those that need to be there for the sake of the wedding itself. Then, the week of the wedding, check out Friday's weather and make phone calls to invite more people, in the event that the weather will be agreeable and we can bring extra lawn chairs and make more room outside.

Of course, the other option is to find a new place to hold the dinner...

EEEEEEEE! (bridal squeal)

2007-07-30T23:57:00.000-05:00

Message from NETBRIDE.com:
Hello, Below you will find the tracking number for your package. From all of us @ NETBRIDE.COM, have a wonderful wedding!!!

Scheduled Delivery: 02-August-2007

Shipment Detail

Ship To:
Me
Myapartment
Mycity, Mystate, Myzip
US

Number of Packages	1
UPS Service:	GROUND
Weight:	8.8 LBS

Tracking Number:	********************
Purchase Order Number:	***** Alfred Angelo NB

~~~~~~~~~

It's FINALLY coming! It will be here this week!! Can you tell I'm excited!!! Eeeeeeee!!!!

Breaking up is hard to do

2007-07-26T15:21:00.000-05:00

Last night Jason and I made it over to the Seely House, the little building next door to the Abbey, to check out its potential for our rehearsal dinner. It's really cute inside with bright colors and nice furniture. There's a kitchen area, a bathroom, and three rooms, all which have dining tables and chairs. There are also extra chairs, benches and couches throughout the house that don't go with any certain table but are still functioning (I don't really know of too many chairs that don't function...)

There are enough chairs for everyone who needs to be invited to the dinner, and we can invite a few extra (grandparents coming from way out of state) if people don't mind squeezing together a little tighter and making room, which I'm sure no one will.

My only concern is that everything is spread out between three rooms. We estimated there was enough room in the largest of the three to just move furniture around and have everyone, and everything, fit. But Naomi, the owner of the Abbey, said the dining table in the middle room can't be moved into the larger room because it had already ruined the floor from someone doing it in the past. The only way she will let us move it is if we call a moving company to come do it, and the last time they did that it was an $80 charge. On top of the $135 fee to rent the building and the cost of catering, plus a rehearsal dinner cake (paging Chef Meagan!) it just seems like a silly fee to pay.

Is this going to be a problem? Should I be worried about it? I just feel like if we are in three different rooms, it will force us to split into three groups, and no one will really stray outside of their family zone (ie the Williams family all sitting in one room) meaning that no one will really mingle, which is what we wanted. Especially since it'll only be the second or third time our parents have gotten together, I would hate for our seating arrangement to hinder them getting to know each other. Plus, it becomes a hassle for things like when Jason and I cut the cake or want to pass out gifts.

What do you guys think? It's been such a hassle to figure any of this out, I just want to make a decision, tell Jason's parents where to fork over their money (in more pleasant terms of course) and be done with it. Is a place that works in every other aspect (especially one so close to the Abbey) worth getting over the awkwardness of dividing into different rooms? Or should I keep looking until I find something that exceeds ALL my expectations?

Kitchen area, where the caterer will set up the food, buffet style:

One dining room (the largest room of the 3):

Second dining room (note Extremely Heavy Kitchen Table center stage):

Dining three (the smallest of the three):

Three months out!

2007-07-20T19:48:00.000-05:00

We are exactly three months away from our wedding. And we actually got something major accomplished today - the rehearsal dinner which I've been so unmotivated about :)

I've been emailing back and forth with a lady who works for a local barbecue restaurant (Sonny Bryan's). Their catering menu is neat because they also offer fajitas, which we figured would be different enough from what we are serving at the wedding to not bore people with the same food two nights in a row.

The lady I've been talking to followed up with me yesterday to ask if I'd gotten the stuff she'd sent me and if I'd like a personal price quote. I told her that Jason and I wanted to go in and eat there before we made any decisions. She told me she would set us up with free lunch whenever we wanted, which I thought was very generous.

As luck would have it, today I wind up getting off work 4 hours early, right around lunch time. I called Jason to see if he wanted to go to a different place (Dickey's barbecue) and he suggested we go to Sonny Bryan's. So I called Adrienne and she called the SB closest to us and told them to take care of us.

Boy did they! When we got there, this really nice guy helped us figure things out. I was all set to order a barbecue baked potato, but he made an even better suggestion. Since whatever we wanted was free, he said we should each get a three meat plate with different things, so we could try a little of everything. So today Jason and I sampled the following menu:

Pulled pork
Chicken on the bone
Pork ribs
Beef brisket
Roasted turkey
Ham
Green bean casserole
Barbecue beans
French fries
Macaroni and cheese
Hot dinner rolls

It was so much food we came home with a to-go plate big enough to make a whole extra meal! To top it off, we also got free drinks, and they even sent us home with apple and cherry cobblers!!

I am so glad we went for the variety. We were able to try everything and make a decision based on all 20 people that will be in attendance that night.

Here is the final menu we are looking at:
Pulled pork
Pulled chicken
Beef brisket
Mac and cheese
Barbecue beans
Potato salad
Dinner rolls
Tea, lemonade, water
Chocolate chip cookies

What's great about this is that they drop everything off and set it up buffet style. The food comes in those big aluminum pans, so whatever is left over can be easily taken home. All the plates, cups, napkins, silverware, and even sweeteners for the tea are included! In addition, they are also going to bring buns in case anyone wants to make a sandwich.

Now we just have to present this to Jason's parents for the final approval. I'm sure they'll say yes because not only do they know how bothersome this has been for me, they agree that there aren't a whole lot of options around here to do something otherwise. Jason and I need to make an appointment to see the house that we are holding the rehearsal dinner at, but barring any complications we should be all ready to go!

Thank God this ordeal is almost over... and yay for only three more months!!!

The little things

2007-07-19T18:53:00.000-05:00

I've been looking for some more ways to customize our reception. Sadly, we don't have the budget to do a fireworks display as we leave or to hire the cast of Cirque du Soleil to perform during dinner (though how AWESOME would that be?!?!)

The things I have in mind are on a much smaller scale, but I know that oftentimes the most personal things have little to no monetary value at all.

Last night I was talking a few friends about what they think of when they think of me (or what makes them think of me when they see it) and I came up with a fairly simple idea.

Using a template I found on About.com, I came up with personalized candy bar wrappers!

Now, I know that there are dozens of sites online that will make, print and ship these to me, but I really think paying over $1.50 apiece for a project this simple is silly. So I copied the template into Powerpoint, played around with fonts and colors, "borrowed" a bar code image from Google images, and voila! (As always, click to enlarge.)

The original template was a little different, so I covered up what I didn't want by making a box, then making both the fill and line colors white. The biggest secret was ordering everything from front to back so nothing peeked out that I didn't want showing. I even made up my own serial number (5 points to anyone who figures it out - besides Jason!)

Now I just have to decide if I want to use my toner or take the file to Kinko's to color copy. Then I will cut them out (they fit perfectly two to a page with a little margin altering) and tape them together. Easy, no?

[I am still looking other easy ways to personalize, so quiz time: what are the things that make you think of me, or, what do I make you think of?]

My baby is so tough!

2007-07-15T19:02:00.000-05:00

Early Friday morning I got up and left for Houston. The plan was for me to get down there around 1pm and shop with my sister. Jason, who had work on Friday, was coming down later in the afternoon so that he wouldn't have to sit around while Chelsea and I did girly things. Then Jason was going to leave earlier than me on Sunday so I could shop with my mom for what she is going to wear to the wedding.

Just about as I get to Houston, I get a call from Jason, about an hour earlier than I was expecting him to call. I thought he was taking off early so I was excited. We chatted for a minute and then he goes "I don't know if I'm coming down now." So I (naturally) asked him why.

While working at a job site Friday midday, Jason was trying to bend a piece of metal. I guess he pushed it too hard because the metal not only bent, it snapped, and the resulting force was more than Jason was braced for. The base of the metal that he was holding suddenly had no resistance, and whizzed through the air. It finally stopped, after slicing Jason's arm wide open.

So, Jason finally decides the injury is bad enough to merit seeking medical attention, and proceeds to drive himself to the emergency clinic. 20 stitches and a tetanus shot later, he's all patched up. But he no longer feels like traveling alone in a car for four hours only to sit around being miserable all weekend.

I offered to turn back and come home, but he told me he didn't want to ruin my weekend and that he was a big boy who could fend for himself. So I spent all weekend wishing he was with me instead of home and all alone.

Boy is he brave. I know I would have been terrified of the whole ordeal, and I certainly would not have wanted to spend an entire weekend by myself afterwards.

And now, pictures! (A parental advisory warning to anyone with a weak stomach...)

Click to enlarge:

Cien, cent, hundert, cento, sto, hundra, hundrede!

2007-07-11T21:36:00.000-05:00

100 days until our wedding!!! It's so close and I know time is going to fly. Ok, who am I kidding - I want it to be here now now now *stomps foot a la Veruca Salt*

I really don't have a whole lot to do in the grand scheme of wedding things. The major things can be listed in a rather short compilation:

1. Arrange the rehearsal dinner. For some reason, this is the bane of my wedding planning. Stupid little towns outside the city not having good eateries!

2. Get the dresses altered/fitted. Of course, that means I have to have the dresses in my possession. Hurry up, Alfred (yes, we are now on a first name basis, apparently...)

3. Meet with our incredibly busy pastor to finalize how everything is going to go during the ceremony. Once that's done, we can print programs, then invitations and other paper products (invitation inserts, place cards, misc. reception labels.) Then we can send the invites off so it feels more real and you all can RSVP that you're coming!

4. Bridal portrait, couple's shower, bachelor/bachelorette parties.

5. Pack for the rehearsal, pack for the ceremony, pack for the reception, pack for the honeymoon.

6. Stop worrying about everything else and enjoy our big day :)

Easily attainable in 100 days right? Of course. No worries. I refuse to fall behind. Who needs a wedding coordinator? I AM the wedding coordinator!

[Note: I'd also like to figure out one more something to help personalize our wedding a little bit more. Maybe something for the reception? I have no idea what. I just think it needs a little more *us* thrown in there. Suggestions welcome.]

Cake update

2007-07-10T22:02:00.000-05:00

I've been emailing back and forth with Hot Chocolates about this whole cake thing. First of all, I want to clarify that they have been absolutely wonderful, patiently explaining everything to me, making suggestions, offering advice, etc. I don't want people to think I'm unhappy with them; I just had a few questions that needed answering.

We have decided to stay with the classic wedding design of stacked layers (picture 1 in my previous post) and here's why: if we opted to do the satellite set up, it would make the cake cheaper, but then we would have to pay an additional cost for the filling we wanted, for it to be two layers in each tier, for the design/decorations we want, and to top it off we'd have to buy or rent the stands for each tier. We realized that in the end we aren't really saving enough money to settle for a non wedding looking cake. So that's settled.

~~

In other news, I finally was able to verbalize my current state in all of this wedding planning: I'm at the point where I don't really have much to do (I will get busy again once the dresses come in) and so I'm starting to second guess some of the planning we have done. The biggest issue right now is the song we chose for our first dance. Don't get me wrong, it's a great song, but it's all about "her" and "she" and I kind of feel like our first dance should be about "we" and "us." Isn't that what everyone will be there for? To celebrate "our" marriage? They're not celebrating me alone. Jason will be there with me by my side all day. Shouldn't he get a mention in the song too? Am I just being silly? It's really bothering me because I focus a lot on the lyrics of songs and I just hate for it to be so one sided. Maybe it's bothering me more that every new suggestion I make Jason shoots it down without offering any other options.

Somebody do something quick! I need help!

Hot Chocolates

2007-07-07T13:27:00.000-05:00

I spoke with my bakery the other day regarding a discrepancy between the price I was quoted for my wedding cake and the prices listed on their website. The response I got back was very interesting.

While the price-per-slice ($2.50) is very reasonable, especially considering what a big metro area we are in, if I did nothing to change the cake but opted to do it satellite style instead (where the tiers are not directly stacked on top of each other) they said they would give me the prices listed on their website, which is their pricing for birthday cakes.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around this one. For the same amount of cake, icing and decorations, simply isolating each tier suddenly makes a $164 difference? I kind of find that a little aggravating - just because it's a "wedding" cake means they can charge me more? But if I rearrange it and call it a "birthday" cake it gets cheaper? A rose by any other name is just as sweet, right?

So now I'm at a loss for what to do. Do I suck it up and pay the higher price so I can get the traditional-looking cake, or do I err on the side of saving money, since after all it's just cake and will be gone just as fast as it was made? I asked them to send me some pictures of how they would set the unstacked ones up, so when I get them I'll pass them on here. What do you guys think? What would you do in my situation?

or

or

Wedding season

2007-07-05T13:45:00.000-05:00

Love is in the air. By the end of this month, three ladies I've known at least since high school will all be married. I'm surprised I only know one 7-7-07 bride, though I "know" another through an online message board.

It must be terribly exciting to be able to say "I'm getting married in 48 hours!" I know that I will eventually be able to say it too, but not for awhile yet. I'm really trying hard not to wish away the next 3.5 months, because I know that they are just as monumental a time in my life as every other chapter in the book. It's one of those things that you want forever to start NOW! because you've known it was coming for years. Honestly though, with as excited as I already am (last night I looked at Jason and said "We're getting married!") I hope my poor heart and head can take the inevitable increase in these emotions!

This weekend's lake party, coupled with spending time with the family at the lake again for 4th of July last night, just makes me appreciate all that I have in my life because I know just how blessed I am to have friends that would lay their lives down for me. I also could not be getting a better family if I had asked for it. I just need to focus on these feelings of belonging and acceptance and love, and it puts the little wedding "things" back into perspective.

Now where is that amazing fiance of mine...?

Energizer keeps going

2007-07-03T23:22:00.000-05:00

After the party this weekend and realizing how truly amazing all of my friends are, it makes me even more eager for the wedding to get here already! I'm still trying to get everything done now to avoid the stress of running around wishing I'd taken care of things sooner.

Today's big project was to tackle a lot of the DIY printing stuff. I made a mock-up of our ceremony program and I also picked out the music that we will use at all the different times. The one thing I wanted to avoid was long songs where we just stand around while our guests watch us chat with the pastor, so be prepared for some songs not to make it from start to finish. I ran all of the details by Jason when he got home, showed him my mock-up and he likes them, so now I need to purchase nicer paper (or some type of print-it-yourself kit) and finalize the order of events when we have the next meeting with our pastor - whenever that is - and they'll be ready to go to press!

Along with the programs, I created the inserts that will go in the envelope with the invitations - there's a map, suggested hotels to stay at, and driving directions coming from the two major highways near our venue. [FYI - Hwy 45 is NOT a practical way to get here, so get over that now!] I also am including a little blurb directing everyone to our wedding website for more info. I just have to decide if I'm going to do each piece as a separate insert, or save myself the time of cutting each sheet into three separate pieces. My laziness may win out on this one. Have to buy semi-decent paper for this project, too.

I started thinking about how I want to do escort/place cards and I'll admit I haven't got much. Originally, we weren't going to do a designated seating arrangement, but given that our guest list is larger than what we can (comfortably) fit into our reception room while still having enough room for a head table and a dance floor, we realized we can't afford for every table to have an empty seat open. As it is, many of our tables will be seating nine, so unless we work and rework numbers a bunch of times, there will inevitably be people forced to sit alone in those odd onesies. We don't want to cause guests awkward turtle moments because that's when they'll opt to just leave, so we will be putting a lot of thought into who sits where so that everyone at least knows one other person at their table. Of course, I can start working on how to set the display up and how to design it to fit with the rest of our wedding, but I can't very well assign table buddies and numbers until I start to get most of the RSVPs back. So listen up, people - when you get an invitation from us, please please PLEASE send back the response card quickly!

I keep having to remind myself to slow down, enjoy being engaged (it's the shortest "chapter" in my life) and focus on more things besides just this weekend. While the party this weekend really opened my eyes to who my true friends are, it also helped me reconnect with many of them, face to face, being active and generally not talking much about the wedding, except for how excited everyone is. That makes my heart happy that the people I care about most are not only supportive, but excited about our marriage. It reaffirms (not that I need it) that Jason and I really do make a great team!

Happy trumps exhaustion

2007-07-02T19:42:00.000-05:00

This weekend we had a party with all of our friends down at the Granbury lakehouse. We're sorry to those of you who missed it, we missed you too. We had a lot of fun and it was wonderful to see all of our friends and have them finally meet Jason's parents who, everyone agrees, were wonderful in every way. Our friends all finally got to meet each other and everyone got along great. We are so excited for October to get everyone together again.

We have the best friends in the world!

Too revealing?

2007-06-27T16:32:00.000-05:00

I don't know if I've ever actually come out and said exactly what is happening when Jason and I take off for our honeymoon. *Drumroll*

We are going on a Western Caribbean cruise! That's right - 8 glorious days to lounge around being married while we let everyone else take care of us. Saturday night after we make our grand exit, we are heading to the hotel and going to bed so that we can get up early the next day and drive to Galveston, where our cruise takes off from mid-afternoon.

From there, we sail to Montego Bay, Jamaica. After spending two and half "Fun Days at Sea" on the ship, we will be ready to get out and stretch our legs! We have been looking at shore excursions offered here and below are our favorites:
1. Royal Beach Experience with Lunch and Falls - in short, we get to climb a huge waterfall (over 600 ft!) hang out with dolphins, hang out on the beach in our private cabana, have a little lunch, and then get free foot massages!*
2. Dunn's River Falls and Dolphin Touch Encounter - with this one we also get to climb the waterfall, and then afterwards we are actually allowed to get in with the dolphins and take pictures and such. Then we get to enjoy a Jamaican-style buffet lunch.*

From Jamaica we head back out on the water until we reach Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands on the fourth day. We are a little disappointed in the lack of anything exciting to do excursion wise, but here are the three we've narrowed it down to:
1. Coral Reef and Stingray Safari - a boat ride to some pretty coral, and then an area heavily populated with stingrays. We can hold, touch and take pictures with them, too.
2. Stingray City Island Tour - a tour of a turtle farm/conservation center, a visit to the town of Hell, then a trip out to the stingray sandbar to feed them and such. On this one we get complimentary drinks (including rum punch) and get to listen to "great Caribbean music" as well.
3. Cayman parasail and beach escape - lasting only an hour and fifteen minutes, this excursion includes riding on a powerboat, parasailing (for 6-8 minutes), seeing some scenic views, and then exploring the beach (but only if we want to pay a taxi to take us back to the ship.)

Not really excited by Grand Cayman offerings. Maybe we'd be better off just exploring what we can of Grand Cayman on foot. When we cruised to Canada a few years ago, my family didn't pay to do any "organized" shore excursions, but there was still plenty to do and see (and buy!)

Our last leg of the trip before heading home is Cozumel, Mexico. Here, the activities promise to be more exciting, but which to choose?
1. Cozumel Bike and Snorkel Adventure - a triathlon of sorts. Biking, snorkeling, and then roaming the beach. While I initially balked at the idea of doing something this physical, the description does say the bike ride is "flat" and "paved." Not to mention that I hate to think of myself being such a lush for 8 days that I can'tbe bothered to do something besides be chauffered.
2. Mayan Jungle Explorer - ferry over to Playa del Carmen, bike through the jungle, do some zip-lining, watch a Mayan purification ceremony (performed by a "real Mayan Shaman") and have lunch before heading back. Again with the bike thing, but this one says the minimum age is 8 - I can keep up with an 8 year old, can't I?
3. Mexican Beach Cooking and Tasting - learn from a "prestigious chef" how to make authentic Mexican fare. Then eat it, paired with Mexican wines and an open bar. Then play around the water for a bit.

A little more excitement going on in Cozumel, eh? Now let's take a vote: which ones sound the most appealing to you from each city? Let's take another vote: who wants to treat K.C. and Jason to a honeymoon shore excursion!

Have any of you been on a cruise before - either this one or another one? Did you do any of the shore excursions? Were they worth it or would you rather have stayed back on the boat or done the free activities within walking/exploring distance? Should we do something in all three ports, or pick two, or even just pick one?

A spin on tradition

2007-06-24T15:32:00.000-05:00

Racking your brain trying to come up with the perfect gift for parents, wedding party, or even just birthdays? Why not make a donation in the recipient's name. So many of us get caught up in the materialistic side of things, like having tangible favors (that will be tossed out if they ever even make it home with your guests.)

There are couples who decide to make donations instead. If they both believe in a common cause, they write a check to that organization, then announce to their friends and family what they've done, in the name of everyone else.

But isn't that a bit altruistic? Doesn't that really say that the couple didn't want to spend money on their favorite cause AND their guests, so decided to lump it all together? Wouldn't it be more charitable for a couple to tell guests to make donations in their name, instead of bringing a traditional gift? This would work especially well for those couples who are older, have furnished homes and don't need the starter-home type of gift.

For those who are still interested in making a difference in the world, there is still a way to do so without seeming quite so selfish. Instead of sending one lump sum to your chosen philanthropy, why not do a little more research and make the donations more personal?

For your animal-loving mother, you could make a donation to the SPCA. For the music loving cousin, a donation to ASCAP. While each organization wouldn't stand to inherit $1000, it would be more meaningful to each guest that you took the time to think about what truly mattered to them, and acted on it. Then it would totally unselfish, and thoughtful to boot!

If that seems like a nice idea, but realistically would be too much work for your fete of 500 closest friends, why not pick 3 or 4 charities, then go through your guest list and decide which of them each person would most likely identify with.

Having a hard time deciding how to name all the tables at the reception? Why not make a different donation for each table? Then your table card could have a picture of someone (or something) who has been impacted by the donation, as well as a brief history of the group you donated to.

This would work especially well for smaller parties, as thank you gifts. Even if Uncle Ned was the only one who would appreciate a donation to the preservation of blue-footed boobies, and even if that donation would up only being $10, every little bit helps, right?

Guilty parties

2007-06-22T10:56:00.000-05:00

My wonderful ladies have been coming to me with some neat ideas lately for my shower and my bachelorette party. Someone suggested a lingerie party, which is great because I could definitely use some, but on the other hand, I think my personal supply is limited because I'm so picky, and so oddly shaped. It's true that you become way less active after college. While I am in the process of trying to remedy that before October, I'm still in that awkward limbo zone.

One of the things I've read about lately and thought would be a neat idea is a honeymoon shower. Especially since I think we're doing a couples shower instead of ladies-only, it's not fair that most of the things we would get would be cutesy, girly things.

A honeymoon shower is also the perfect place to mention a honeymoon registry, too. I've seen testimonials of many a couple who could not have gone where they did and done what they did without the help of cash, cleverly disguised in a honeymoon registry.

While I know it's taboo to solicit gifts, because it's really all about the family and friends celebrating together, those who do want to mention something about gifts are faced with the difficulty of being tasteful about it. I came across this poem the other day, written by the bride's sister, explaining the honeymoon registry concept, and smoothly linking to the couple's own. The way it was worded, I don't think anyone would be offended.

From http://www.thebigday.com/help/KarenGenePoem.asp

It reads:

"Karen and Gene are planning to tie the knot,
off to Maui they'll go, but invited we're not.
The couple's sunset nuptials will come true
On Saturday, the 26th of October, 2002.

Per their request, no parties or showers and that's no lie,
but Karen's big sister, Debbie, would not comply.
Let's join together and send them on a honeymoon to remember,
a Bon-Voyage party by Email with gifts for both genders.

TheBigDay.com is where the registry can be found,
log on to the website and take a look around.
Our collective contributions will add to their fun,
or simply give them an extra day in the sun.

Our assistance will help with their flight or rental car,
kayaking, windsurfing, or drinks at the bar.
Champagne breakfast, a luau, or beach bar-b-que,
or an evening dinner cruise with a sunset view.

Since we won't be in attendance we can all be a part
Karen and Gene
will appreciate our thoughtful gifts from the heart."

Very cute, and it gets the point across. I think once people realize everything costs money on a trip, they'll be more willing to help out. I love how the sister threw in actual things they can do with the money, instead of just saying it'll help them a lot.

I really think it's a cute idea. It would be a neat way to get some of the things that we need anyway (like sturdy luggage, good beach towels, stuff to do the days we are at sea, maybe a pineapple slicer?) but it will help us out beforehand (getting luggage as a wedding gift we will open after we return doesn't really help us!)

As for the lingerie theme, I think we will save that one for the bachelorette party. The difficulty in planning that one is that my sister isn't old enough to drink, so we can't really barhop, which is fine by me, since I'm more of a dedicated bar girl than a hopper. What we can do is go to a nice dinner and have drinks there, then go home and do the lingerie/pajama/girly stuff in the privacy of our own home. Of course, we can all drink there, too, without worrying about being carded. I'm trying to think of what else people do at bachelorette parties that don't involve strip clubs or entire nights at bars. I'm open to suggestions, people!

Four on the floor

2007-06-20T22:14:00.001-05:00

Four months from right this moment, Jason and I will be on our way to the hotel to celebrate our wedding night!

Getting carded

2007-06-20T18:54:00.000-05:00

I'm determined to do some more craft projects for my wedding. There are so many things out there that are way overpriced, just because they have the word "wedding" in their name. So many things are so simple, yet brides stress themselves trying to be too perfect. Plus, the more projects i do myself, the more our wedding has a personal feel to it.

I present to you my latest project, that took little time and few supplies. I'm going to use it at the wedding so guests who bring cards can have a safe place to put them without worrying about someone stuffing all that cash and gift-cardness into a jacket and walking out the door.

Step one: Find a box. Any old box will do, so long as it's big enough to hold all your cards.

Step two: Using a pair of scissors, or an exacto knife, carefully cut the two smaller flaps off of the box. I left just a bit of flap to keep it sturdier, and if you really want to be frugal and use the box again, you can just tape down the flaps inside the box (make sure to tape really well because if the flaps pop up the cards may not fit.

Step three: Tape the box closed. Make sure you really tape everything well, especially around the perimeter. Don't worry so much about the middle seam where the big flaps join, because it won't matter in a minute.

Step four: Using an exacto knife (or in my case, a large kitchen knife) cut a strip out of the middle of the top where the big flaps meet. Make the strip long enough that big wedding cards will fit, and thick enough that cards stuffed with something in them won't get stuck.

Step five: Wrap the entire box in wrapping paper. I used old paper I had lying around from a wedding a long time ago. That way, it blends in with the other gifts in their pretty wrapping. You could also get creative and use gift wrap in your wedding colors, or some other type of paper (recycled paper for a green wedding, newspaper for an editor-in-chief bride, etc.)

Step six: Using the knife again, cut the wrapping paper so the strip in the box is visible. A hint here is not to remove the paper that you cut, but instead wrap in along the flap and tape it into the underside of the box, so that you can't see the brown color of the cardboard underneath.

Step seven (optional): Add a matching bow for a little something extra.

P.S. - sorry about the unmade bed!

Ch-ch-changes

2007-06-19T17:45:00.001-05:00

One of the things that's most shocking to me as I look back on my life is how my sister is now my best friend. Growing up, maybe it was just too much time spent together, forced to get along on too many family outings, that shook up our relationship. I had a friend in high school that I was so jealous of, because her best friends were here younger sister (a sophomore our senior year) and her younger brother (not yet in high school) and it always made me wonder about the "picture perfect family" that she must go home to every night. To be honest, they are an amazing family, and you can see their love for each other even after just a few minutes with them.

My sister and I fought all the time. Most of it was verbal - throwing insults, screaming matches, saying really hurtful things that we really didn't mean. And then there were the occasional instances where it got physical - biting, scratching, hitting (she swears up and down I broke a phone when I hit her with it; while I don't remember that I do remember covering her head with a pillow and then sitting on it.) Finally, my mom quit trying to referree and just let us go at it. My poor dad got more calls at work from one or the other of us crying about something. We were just plain awful. The few times we managed to get along great were more often than not ended on a sour note. Yes, I will take the blame for a lot of it happening. My teenage hormones, coupled with the difficulty of my parents' divorce (though now I see it as a blessing in disguise) made me a really unpleasant person to be around, at home if not with friends.

Now, things have changed. We call, we email, we chat online every time our schedules match up. When I go home to visit, I'm excited to see her and to do things with her, even if that thing we do is nothing. Every now and then, we get exasperated with each other (we've grown up to be two very different individuals) but deep down, we have such a fierce love for each other it make the trivial stuff, well, trivial.

Of course, everyone loves friends. Especially best friends. And what could be better than a best friend? How about TWO best friends! And what am I gaining when I walk down the aisle (besides an amazing husband?) A sister-in-law. Another girl, who even lives in the same city, that I can share things with, talk with, commisserate with. Right? Wrong.

Here's the problem: Jason and his sister aren't close. They're not best friends. It's not that they don't love each other, or even dislike each other. They just don't have the same close relationship Chelsea and I do. And what makes it hard for me is trying to find my boundary in all of this. I feel like, in fairness to Jason, I shouldn't be closer to her than he is. Because after all, she's only my sister IN LAW.

Sometimes I feel like I pressure him too much to call his sister, see what she's doing, see if she's free, if she wants to hang out. We have a wonderful time when we finally do manage to make plans, but those times are few and far between due to 4 very different, very hectic schedules.

I'm stuck in a veritable tango - take the initiative to adventure with her and overstep my boundaries, or back off for Jason's sake and potentially lose a great friend. I really want a great relationship with Jason's family (and I have it with most everyone from parents to grandparents) but I don't want it at the expense of his own relationships!

There are times when she makes effort towards me as a friend - like the fact that after we got engaged she let me borrow/have a lot of the wedding stuff she still had from her wedding last August. And the fact that I am borrowing her veil and headpiece to wear on my wedding day. There have been times where she and her husband have invited us out to dinner, or even over to their house for a cookout. While she and I aren't to the point of calling each other directly, we definitely aren't at ground zero.

What's the best way to approach this, to let my relationship with her blossom, without offending Jason or making him out to be a bad brother because I'm more involved with her than he is? I really hope we can have the type of relationship that Jason has with my sister, the type where alone in a room the two of them wouldn't sit in an awkward silence or make small talk. My sister loves Jason, and in his own way, Jason loves her. I want to love Jason's sister, too, but not at the expense of Jason's own love for her.

Keeping costs low

2007-06-18T19:25:00.000-05:00

It's no secret that Jason and I are paying for 95% of our wedding, The only things we're not paying for are the rehearsal dinner, my dress and alterations, and things typically covered by the wedding party like their outfits and travel. Everything else rests upon our shoulders. And our credit cards. Gotta love that 0% APR.

Awhile back, Jason and I were looking at buying a house. We spent an entire day with our realtor (friend of his family) and played around with a bunch of different financing options. In the end, we decided that paying for a wedding while I still didn't have a full-time job (I still don't) and trying to pay a mortgage was just too much financial strain. So we signed a lease for another year in our apartment.

During the house hunt, I talked to my mom, who said she thought buying a house was a better investment than having a lavish wedding. But I don't think our wedding is going to be lavish. I think words that more appropriately describe our wedding are intimate, modest and beautiful. Of course, any wedding is beautiful, so that's a given.

I got to thinking of the way we are keeping costs down, and while some people may be shocked by what we are/aren't doing, we're only looking to celebrate with our friends and family, not receive any type of awards or win any contests. Here are some of the ways we are making it work, to make it wonderful:

1. We are not eating on fine china. There will be no polished silver, no crystal goblets. Not only is our venue too country-charming for that stuffy elegance, it's just silly to spend so much for getting so little (not only was the china service an outrageous expense per person, we would have to hire additional staff to bus tables, as well as people to spend the entire night in the kitchen, washing dishes.) This ties in with point two.

2. Our caterering is untraditional. Yes, there will good food served at the wedding, and plenty of it, but don't expect caviar and pate or a six-course whirlwind. Expect home cookin. Comfort food rather than aesthetic food that tastes like cardboard. As a bonus, our caterer will also be cutting and serving the cake, and pouring and serving champagne for the toast (this ties back in with point one - they couldn't do that stuff if they were stuck washing dishes. Thus, we get more for our money in the end.)

3. Champagne is the only liquor that we will have at the wedding, for the toasts. We want our wedding to be a celebration, not a room full of drunk people. Especially since everyone will be driving home that night, it's something we don't want to risk. So we will have champagne, which people are welcome to drink (until it's gone) and anyone who needs more liquor than that can go out and experience Fort Worth nightlife on their own time (and their own tab!)

4. I'm a great bargain hunter. We have hoarded Michaels' coupons, gone completely out of our way, kept track of upcoming sales, and smooth-talked our way into getting some really great bargains. Online shopping is a wedding Godsend - especially eBay and Netbride. Craigslist was another helpful site, as was just doing general Google searches. The key factor is shopping around. Though we may have gone with the first vendor we met with from a certain category, it certainly wasn't the only meeting we had. We met with two of at least every kind of company, and some we had contact with as many as a dozen!

The point is, it can be done. Given a limitless budget, I can't say I'd choose all the same things anyway. But I can't say I won't be happy with everything that we will have. Because, in the end, what we have is better than anything money could ever buy.

To the lists!

2007-06-17T00:11:00.000-05:00

I'd like to think I'm a very organized person. It's only about 80% true. While the majority of my life is relatively orderly, there are the occasional incidents where I think to myself "I really should sort this out." The fact that Jason and I are attempting to coordinate this wedding entirely by ourselves means that there's not any room for being absentminded or scatterbrained. So I have been making lists like crazy, and it's even starting to bleed over into other aspects of my life (which, in the end, is a good thing!)

This week, I made a master checklist. This four page beauty (double columns on every page) has everything I can think of that I will need from now until we return on our honeymoon on October 28. We are talking what to bring to hair trials, beauty appointments, portrait sessions, various family events, the wedding (broken down into chapel, reception room and other) as well as a complete packing list for our honeymoon cruise (more on that soon.) I'm sure that this list isn't complete, but now when I randomly think of something while in the grocery store I can come home and have a designated place to put it so it can be safe and sound with all of its catergorized buddies.

Last night and tonight, I have been working on a list of photos that I want to make sure our photographer knows to get. I even arranged them according to the order they should be taken in (grandparents first, then siblings, then parents, then just us - that way once a group is done they're completely done and can leave and quit being distracting.) As if that weren't compulsive enough, I then went back and COLOR CODED each item to fit into one of six subcategories (Jason's family, my dad's side, my mom's side, just Jason and me, the wedding party, and everything else.)

On my computer desk right now I have four additional running lists. These include two different lists involving price/quantity breakdowns for something still in the works (can you say "top secret") as well as a list of all the things I want to blog about (all of a sudden came up with a bunch of things but don't want to tackle them all at once.) Lastly I have my grocery list in progress (which used to be kept on our dry erase board on the fridge, but then I had to write it down a second time so I could take the list with me, so I eliminated a step.)

Another big list I made this week was a breakdown of the shore excursions we can go on in each of the ports of call on our cruise. I've been talking to Jason and have now deleted anything that we don't both want to do. So now I can go back in a few weeks, read over them and pick the best one without having to weed out the junk again.

Of course, the ultimate list is my Knot checklist. Today we found a sale going on at Party City, so we bought all of the glasses for the champagne toast. Another one down. We still have yet to buy all of the dinnerware (which, by the way, will not be fine china, so prepare yourselves now - don't worry, it's not paper plates, either) because I want to coordinate with my caterer so the stuff she's bringing and the stuff we're bringing go together at least.

Look at that. What I just said has prompted me to add another item to one of my lists. I guess the visual side of me is really going to come out, which is fine, because it's such a WONDERFUL feeling seeing another checkmark, another item crossed off, or even another document created (which leads to being able to check something else off.)

Now if only this organization could bleed over into things like keeping the apartment clean, finishing laundry the same day I start it, or keeping my car clutter free!

My first (and only) hair trial

2007-06-15T15:37:00.000-05:00

This afternoon I met with a lovely woman named Deborah who lives in the town next to where we are getting married. I brought in about 30 pictures of different hair ideas that I liked and we played around for a few hours. Here is what we came up with:

Me before. I didn't notice how long my hair was getting until I saw this. Deborah also leases a salon and so she's going to meet with me in September to trim it and add some layers. That way she can get it how she thinks it will work best for my hairdo.

And now, with no further adieu...

Side view. I really like the side sweep thing. It gives a little more to look at than a bland forehead. Also, it helps draw attention from my very Jewish nose!

You can see my industrial piercing in this one. I think I will wind up taking out for the actual wedding day. Maybe find little sparkly things to put in instead. Or nothing at all. I haven't decided yet.

Close up of the curls and the placement of the veil. She lifted the hair to insert the veil comb, so if I decide to take the veil out for the reception (I'm thinking I will) it won't mess up the style itself.

Artsy-poetic picture. Mom approves, and so do I. Of course, we will do something similar once I'm actually in the big white dress.

Sorry for the poor picture qualty. It was way darker originally and I auto-fixed it so it would lighten enough to be able to see me. I think I may have the sweep come down a little lower at the top. What do you guys think?

Crunching numbers

2007-06-13T23:43:00.000-05:00

Let's talk numbers, shall we? In no order of importance, but in increasing value (because I have to have some kind of order) I present to you the following:

1 - The One. You know, that guy I'm marrying.
2 - The number of fabulous ladies that are my bridesmaids.
3 - The number of kids I want to have (2 of my own and 1 adopted)
4 - The number of shore excursions that even look remotely interesting in Grand Cayman. Maybe this will be the day we just walk/shop/lounge around and don't do any paid activities.
8 - The total number of days we will be participating in our wonderful honeymoon cruise.
77 - To-do items left on my list. In my defense, the only thing I'm overdue on is the rehearsal dinner stuff (which isn't a surprise and hopefully will be taken care of this weekend) and mind you 17 of them are either due the day before or the day of the wedding
128 - DAYS UNTIL THE WEDDING!!!
129 - Days to the honeymoon, naturally.
130 - The perfect number of guests to have so the reception room isn't overly crowded.
150 - How much they want us to pay to swim with dolphins.
1,000,000 - How much money I wish I had, how many thank you notes I will have to write, and the number of times happier I will be once I marry my best friend. Awww!

I promise

2007-06-11T14:55:00.000-05:00

The wedding on Saturday was wonderful. Congratulations to Lauren and David on a beautiful marriage and an amazing reception. While my part was pretty insignificant (the thrill being running downstairs to grab the toss bouquet and running it back upstairs) I still learned a lot about wedding planning in general, and have taken a lot with me as I keep pushing for our own wedding.

Yesterday I made a master checklist of everything to pack, from the bridal portrait to the honeymoon, I've got four pages of double-columned items to not forget. I'm sure I'll be adding to the list in the next few months.

We also crossed a huge item off our list because we sat down and wrote our wedding vows! They're a little untraditional, in that they're not going to be "I promise to do this and this and never do this and always do this" but they will be beautiful and meaningful nonetheless.

I have an appointment/consultation scheduled on Friday with a lady who has had 30 years experience doing hair and makeup. She's really sweet, and just up the road, both from us and the Abbey. Her son even got married at the Abbey, so she's definitely had experience with the things we will be dealing with come wedding day. Her prices are really reasonable, too. I hope everything goes well and I can book her on the spot. Now I just have to gather pictures of what I think I want my hair to look like so I can give her an idea.

This morning I was on call at work and they didn't need me, so I've been home trying to do little odd jobs that need doing for the wedding. So I assembled centerpieces. 17 wreaths were painstakingly put together, each one following a distinct pattern so that they were all uniform in appearance and size. My fingers hurt now. But it's one less thing to do come October.

There are a few things I still haven't figured out, like the rehearsal dinner and accompanying invites. Justin, Texas just isn't a hoppin place for good food. I don't even know if they have a restaurant in the town... Of course, this also means I haven't been able to design invites to said rehearsal dinner. Maybe I'll just make them the same as the wedding ones, since we have a whole lot more of them than we need. But I'd like to make them cute/different, so we'll see.

The thing that I'm most puzzled about is the seating plan for the reception. Originally, we weren't going to have a seating plan, but space is so tight at our venue that if we don't delegate who sits with who we could wind up with single empty chairs at each table, forcing a family to break up and sit alone at a table of people they don't really know. So now I have to come up with a cute idea for telling everyone where they'll be sitting. Of course, I can't even begin to think about it until I know who is coming and who isn't. I did sit down the other day and arrange tables assuming every single person we invited is coming, but even that's not realistic because one family that declines means rearranging it all again. At least I know it can be done. I think.

Eeee!

2007-06-08T20:22:00.001-05:00

Recently, I've been in touch with the company that I ordered our dresses through, netbride.com. I'm trying to figure out exactly when our dresses will be coming in so that I can have a plan in place in terms of alterations. It turns out that even though I bought a brand new Alfred Angelo dress, Alfred Angelo won't alter it for me because I didn't purchase directly from them. So now I'm stuck looking for someone to alter my dress, and I still don't even know when! Netbride originally said that the outside date I would get the dresses would be absolutely no later than August 18th, which still gives me a month for alterations, but I know that's not much time at all. When I emailed them the other day, Laura said that they are expecting the dresses to come earlier, but to keep the 18th as the outside date still. She said that once it's on its way to me they will let me know and provide a UPS tracking number so that I know exactly what's going on. I guess AA sends them the dress first and then they send it on to me.

Other things I'm trying to work out now are hair and makeup, as well as my bridal portraits. The thing is, I haven't gotten anything done to my hair since before I moved to Fort Worth. We're talking six months without so much as a hair cut! I literally have no experience with anyone in this city when it comes to my hair.

I guess I should look around for people in this area who do hair, but I've only ever gone to a place like Supercuts, or a friend of my mom's who doesn't have a whole lot of skill with updos. Plus, it's not like I have the money to play around with a million different hairstyles at a dozen different appointments. I kind of need to find someone soon, but don't really know where to look. I don't think the women in Jason's family have specific hairdressers, either.

That brings me to makeup. The only time I've ever had my makeup "done" was when I was dating a guy whose mom worked at Estee Lauder. She did it a few times for things like homecoming and formals, but that was 5 years ago and she's in Houston. Ideally, I'd like to find someone that does hair and makeup that can come to us on the wedding day so we don't have to be driving all over the place. Factor that into my budget.

Finally, the bridal portraits. Beautiful pictures taken of the bride in her nuptial best to be displayed at the reception for everyone to "ooh" and "ahh" over. Many brides use the portrait as a way to test out different things - hair, makeup, jewelry, flowers - so that they have time to make any necessary changes before the show - a dress rehearsal, if you will. Problem with that is what if I do change my mind about things? Then we have lovely portraits of K.C. looking nothing like she does at the wedding. People will be going "does she have a twin?" And then someone like Jason can say "no, she's just being her usual indecisive self!" Thanks for pointing that out, honey.

Which brings me back to the dress. I can't very well schedule alterations until I know when the dress will be in, and I can't schedule my portraits until I know alterations will be done. Obviously, this all needs to take place before the wedding itself, with enough time in between for Larry our photographer to be able to print us a beautiful copy of the portrait for display at the wedding.

ANXIOUS++

Executive decision

2007-06-07T23:13:00.000-05:00

This morning as I was running wedding errands, I got a phone call from Kay saying that the ring we had special ordered in all white gold for Jason had come in and that we could swing by to take a look and see what we thought.

I swung by before work to see it myself, since I had enough time to browse and not enough time to go home between what I was doing and when I had to be at the BN. I also got my engagement ring cleaned, and tried on the two rings that were my top contenders - ring wraps with the only real different being the carat weight. Believe it or not, I chose the lesser weight because it makes my solitaire stand out more. The lovely ladies put the wrap in the safe with Jason's ring to make sure that no one would come in and buy it out from under me. Then I went to work. After work, Jason met me at the store and tried his ring on (it looked much better on his hand than it did on my thumb while I tried to imagine it on his ring finger!)

And... after filling out a credit card application so we could have 12 months to pay sans interest, we bought our wedding rings!!! I was so excited, I wore mine home. Sorry to anyone on 114 around 8pm that I might have almost hit because I was paying more attention to my ring than the road!

As a special treat, when Jason and I went to dinner tonight, we wore our rings! I know, I'm weak. But it's so pretty! We made a deal though, and now our rings are safe and sound in their boxes locked away in our floodproof/fireproof lockbox. Now I have to wait a whole 'nother 4.5 months before I can wear it again. I can always sneak a peek though, right?

As a side note, the restaurant we went to tonight is a top contender for the rehearsal dinner. By top contender, I mean we aren't totally opposed to having it there. So now I have to call in the morning to talk to the owner about reserving the patio and what types of food setups we can do - plated or buffet or everyone-order-from-the-menu.

But I don't have a black suit

2007-06-06T22:56:00.001-05:00

Yesterday's wedding excitement has to do with shoes. White shoes. Bridal shoes. Long story short, I bought two pairs.

The first pair is a very basic white pump. Mine are similar, though not shiny patent leather.

The second one is more of a sandal with a closed toe (imagine it in white.) They're a little rounder at the toe because I have fat feet and think pointy shoes are hideously ugly!

I just got a whole bunch of email stuff about the wedding I'm working on Saturday. Yes, I said working. I'm going to try my hand in the wedding world. Right now, I'm a lowly intern, but if I like it and the company continues to grow, I could move up and up to head coordinator. The only problem is, I don't have a black suit. I have black slacks and assorted black tops, but no jacket. Yikes. Looks like I better go shopping before Saturday!

I'm excited to help make someone's wedding day that much better, and excited to see a wedding all come together (it will give me a boost of confidence) but at the same time, the biggest emotion I feel is:

Every Kandace begins with K

2007-06-02T19:25:00.001-05:00

Today was productive. After sleeping in until almost noon (!) we finally quit dragging our feet and headed out for an exciting day. Our first stop was Al's Formal Wear, where in about 30 minutes we had everything picked out for what all our handsome men will be wearing. The exception being my dad, but I'm going to let him choose what he wears to walk me down (within reason, and within the contraints of the rest of the wedding decor.) After putting a down payment on all three tuxes (because Jason is generous like that) they just need measurements from the guys and we are good to go until we pick everything up two days before the wedding.

This is what Thomas and Arthur will be wearing, except the tie will be solid purple. Jason will be wearing the same thing, but in all black. Everyone will have the same black jacket, pants and shoes, and the white wing-tip shirt with black/silver cufflinks. How dashing they'll all be!

After that productiveness, we headed over to the Zales outlet store to peruse wedding bands. [Note: here's where it gets tricky. I don't know how many of you know this, but Kandace is allergic to nickel. No, not the coins (which aren't even made of nickel!) The actual metal nickel. The metal that comprises a majority of jewelry out there - everything from ___-plated jewelry to various alloys, including white gold, contain varying degrees of nickel. For this reason, I don't have a college class ring. I'm not sure what the extent of my allergy is (the higher the karat of gold, the less nickel in the mix) but it was such an expensive investment to purchase the highest karat they offered (18) if I wasn't sure it would be pure enough.]

But that's not the main focus of this story. Jason was wonderful enough to purchase my engagement ring in platinum so that I might enjoy it for all our long years without redness, swelling, itching or scabbing (gross, sorry.) So when we went into Zales today we had a pretty clear idea of what we needed. They showed us some stuff both for me and for him, and it helped us decide even more what would work for us. I fell in love with ring wraps. Ring wraps are essentially enhancers that tack on to the engagement ring, making it look as though you are wearing one ornate ring. They come on a separate band, but have a gap in the middle so that your original stone "nests" inside, creating a unified piece.

After talking about pricing and various other details, we decided we weren't quite ready to drop that kind of money yet. We thanked the saleslady (who had the audacity to ask us if we were kidding when we said we didn't want to buy today, and then guilted us because she had already cut the tag - BFD!) and we headed out the door. Even if we decide to go with those choices from Zales, we will definitely be visiting a different person at a different location!

From Zales we headed to Kay Jewelers in Southlake Town Square. Three lovely ladies helped us patiently, throwing out ideas, making suggestions, giving opinions. Much better than Zales. I fell in love with a ring wrap there as well. I know it's perfect because while looking at the other options besides that one, I pointed to another one that I liked that was in a yellow gold - come to find out it was the same ring in two different golds! The only downside to this whole ordeal is that they're not sure they can get it for me in platinum. They are going to do some research, call their vendors and their craftsmen and see if they can have it cast in platinum for me.

Below are the pictures of the concept of ring wraps:

This is the exact wrap I want, but in platinum. Notice the wide gap in the middle and how it drops down lower than the back of the band. This ensures that the two pieces fit together and look like one solid ring.

This is what it would look like with my engagement ring in the middle. The thick sides help hide the fact that it's two different bands. Isn't it gorgeous???

Very similar to the one we are looking at for Jason.

Fingers crossed for good news on Monday!

Opposites attract

2007-06-01T23:49:00.000-05:00

I just sent my sister a list of the women who are most important in my life. You know, the ones that I've deemed worthy of getting drunk with us while sending me into marriagedom. Let's just say I don't need even to take my socks off to count the number of girls on that list.

I know they say opposites attract, but isn't that supposed to just pertain to chemistry/romantic endeavors? Or does that hold true for all relationships regardless of their intimacy level? I guess I've always had more guy friends. Well, I've never been able to keep girlfriends is more like it. I think back to my "best friends" in my younger days and am sad to think of how many of them I've drifted far from. A lot of it was my fault. For some of them, I can name specific incidents that caused the rift that never got fully patched again. Sure, I'm still friends with all of these ladies, but I don't think we will ever be as close as we were then. If I ran into them in public we could talk and "catch up" but then what? No exchanging of new phone numbers, no future plans made (save for the vague mentioning of the fact we should get together some time) and then maybe a hasty online message via Facebook.

I wonder why it's so hard for me to befriend women and keep them close. It seems like someone always fails the relationship. When I was 8, it was my best friend who had moved away after living next door to me for years. She was coming to my birthday party and I hadn't seen her in some time. I was beside myself, looking out the window all the time, asking my mom when she would be there. I put my other friends on the back burner waiting for her to show. And she never did. And there was no phone call to say she wasn't coming. All I know is that I think my mom finally called her mom to see what traumatic event had caused her to not only not show, but not even bother to call. I believe the lame response had to do with which parent had custody of her that weekend. Or something equally pathetic. Maybe that was the first time I learned not to let myself get too close to a girlfriend if I didn't want to get hurt.

It goes on from there. Several altercations at various birthday parties, fighting on the school bus, name calling, preteen awkwardness and sensitive little girls all somehow made it clear that girls carry too much baggage. Even today, I love my female friends, but can only handle them alone in small doses. Even my sister, who is my best friend in the world, can get on my nerves pretty easily. Maybe there's some underlying competition going on. Who knows.

So my bachelorette party won't require the renting of a party bus or an entire floor of a hotel. But I like it that way. A handful of close friends is better than two dozen acquaintances that I might not even be friends with a year from now. My little baby sister will be the only one not legally able to drink, so we will either have to find a good 18+ club, or create Club Bride at home.

It's up to my wonderful girls, and I know whatever we do will be special no matter what.

A DIY Mother's Day

2007-05-30T20:59:00.000-05:00

So I know Mother's Day was a while ago, but I'm really lazy and just getting around to uploading all of the pictures. I wanted to do something special, more than just the greeting card and dinner route, but since I don't have a lot of money to spend, I got creative.

One of the bees (Miss Plum, I believe?) posted a cute little craft segment involving pens, fake flowers and a flower pot. Since I can't see my mom with a frilly collection of flowery things, I decided to tweak it a little to suit her tastes.

So instead of using flowers, I used... CAT TOYS! My mom is crazy about her cat Puck. Seriously, the cat can do no wrong, and when he does, it's only because of the "bad influence" her other cat Rocky (now our cat Rockstar) had on him. At any rate, I figured it would be cute to tweak the project a bit to suit her needs.

(Because of my lack of originality, and because Jason's mom is a teacher, I made her gift out of the regular flower/pot combo.)

All of my materials:

Flowers, flower pot, pen cup, floral tape, cat toys, paper clips, glue sticks, glue gun, basic pens.

First, you have to take all of the little ends off the pens. Eventually, the lids too.

Next, put a good amount of hot glue into the open end of the pen. You can feel the heat through the plastic, so be careful not to burn yourself! You don't have to fill the entire body with glue, I filled about 1/4 to 1/3 of the way down. The most important thing is that there's enough glue where the toy and the end of the pen meet. Quickly press a toy (or flower) into the warm adhesive and hold tight for a few minutes while the glue initially sets. You have to be careful with the round toys, because if you set the pen down before the toy is set it will roll right off the end of the pen!

Since some of the toys were a little large, I reinforced the bond by putting a layer of glue around the base of the toy/pen. This will be mostly covered up later, and it's better to have the hold too strong than too weak. On several of the toys that didn't have a good surface for sticking straight onto the glue, I threaded a paper clip through them, then glued the entire clip into the barrel of the pen. You can't see the paperclip and it's really good for reinforcing the strength of the bond.

After the glue has completely dried and the bond is very tight, take a piece of floral tape and, starting at the top, wrap it down and around the entire base of the pen. Since I went with both blue and black pens for a little variety, I stopped taping at the part of the pen that shows what color it is, since having toys or flowers on top won't necessarily indicate the ink color. I secured the floral tape at the bottom with a tiny bit of glue, just in case.

That's pretty much the gist of it. I then put the cat toy pens in a pink pen cup (Mom loves pink) and the flower pens in a little glazed flower pot. If you wanted to get really creative, you could even decorate the pot yourself.

The finished products:

Voila!!!

Updates galore

2007-05-29T14:30:00.001-05:00

First of all, congratulations to the new Mr. and Mrs. Courtney and Will Qubty! I'm so sorry I couldn't be at the wedding, but I'm so happy for you guys!

The reason I couldn't be there this weekend is I was in Houston (yay!) visiting my family. It's the first time I've met my niece, who is almost 6 months old and ADORABLE!!! Just a happy baby all around, hardly fussy at all, fearless (my big teddy bear of a dog made friends with her very quickly) and cute :) She loves seeing herself in the mirror - she was starting to fuss so I walked around with her a bit and put her in front of our big mirror wall in the dining room: instant giggles. We just sat there and played until her bath was ready. She was too cute and so much fun and the only negative about the whole ordeal is that I don't get to see her more often. I think the next time will be at the wedding and she'll be 10 months, a lot different!

Having all of my family there was great because I spread the word about a lot of details. We aren't sending out save-the-dates because most everyone knows the info via word of mouth, and our website of course. Just as a reminder I shot out a quick email last night to those traveling the farthest. I was going to use the Knot's handy automated one, but it linked to my Knot webpage, which I haven't set up since we have the one at weddingpath. So the email one worked just as well and I was able to include the correct webpage address!

There was another wedding this weekend, and although I don't know the couple personally, she posts on Weddingbee and is probably the poster I feel closest with (because she's my age and had a lot of the same college related elements as me.) One thing that was so helpful was that she continued posting updates all the way until about 8 hours before her wedding (when she had to leave to get her hair done and then head to the venue.) She gave a lot of helpful advice about taking care of as much stuff as possible, even though you have a lot of time. All those little things that are 90% done, except for xyz, really come back and haunt you that last week leading up to the event. She suggested evaluating what things we still had to work on and try to completely finish up as many as possible.

Something else helpful was that she took each element (centerpieces, altar decorations, guest book table details, etc) and wrote out very specific, detailed directions for what was supposed to happen, then boxed that element and its directions in a box by itself. That way, when her family and friends came to help, they could grab a box, follow the directions, get her approval, and start on something else. It was a very organized way so she wasn't bombarded with "where does this go?" and "how do you want to do this?" and "should we do it like this or this?" I definitely think it was a brilliant move on her part. Especially since I know I'll be a perfectionist when it comes to my wedding, might as well get started on that stuff now.

So today I went to Michael's and purchased even more stuff! Among that stuff was a wooden "W" that I am going to decorate myself with little crystals to go on our cake (probably not as a topper, maybe on the second tier.) I got some big vases on sale for $5 apiece and then some little clear bags with twist ties that I'll use as favor bags.

It's so interesting to talk about my wedding with my sister in law. It made me realize how much we've gotten done, and how much there is left to do... I'm really hurting for a paycheck to finish up the purchases I have left to make, but this week is the last of my training at Barnes and Noble and next week I'm on the regular schedule, so that should help some. I get another paycheck this Thursday! Of course, it will go straight to my credit card, but since I'm charging all the wedding stuff anyway, it's like making a wedding payment. Sort of.

Sorry for the long boring post with no pictures. Maybe this will help:

A beautiful butterfly. One of many hanging around our apartment in the past few weeks. I was hoping to see them in more colors, but this is all we got. Still pretty.

Check, check (check)

2007-05-24T09:34:00.000-05:00

According to my oh-so-helpful Knot reminder checklist, I have three things left to do this month: Start planning the rehearsal dinner (and give Jason's parents all the info re: the guest list), visit tux shops to make a decision on Jason's day-of finery, and then actually book the place we decide to hold the rehearsal dinner. To number 2 I'm adding figuring out what Arthur and Thomas are going to wear. Might as well take care of it all at once while we're there. I think that we can squish 1 and 3 together into one, but I have no idea where to get what I want. I even tried talking to the owner of our venue to see where other brides go afterwards (yes, Justin is so small everyone has to go back into Roanoke, FW or Denton for food - unless we want to rent out the Abbey's little house next door, which then we'd have to book a caterer just for that night, so no.) The suggestions she made were the three places I was expecting her to say, none of which I'm really interested in. I really don't want a fancy restaurant rehearsal dinner. I want something totally laid back where we can just chill. Somehow, the local fried chicken joint isn't doing it for me. Oh well. Maybe I'll have Jason gives his parents my ideas and let them decide. They're paying, after all; if they choose for me I can't very well be ungrateful.

This lack of much left on this month's checklist comes after yesterday's very productive day. Not only did I finally make a decision about a florist, I went and put down a deposit and signed a contract. We went over everything again, just to make sure we are on the right page. I typed everything up in a spreadsheet to make sure I didn't miss anything. It's a very detailed spreadsheet, all the way from what colors of what flowers to what color and type of ribbons we will be using. As a bonus, she's going to make me a smaller version of my bouquet as a sample, and then I'll use it as my bouquet when I take my bridal portraits. Which I should probably book soon. But I have to wait for my dress to come in first (hurry up!) and get it altered and all.

Lots of payments need to be made soon. Good thing Jason got a slew of 0% APR credit card offers in the mail yesterday!

Yikes

2007-05-16T11:31:00.000-05:00

I finally buckled down and ordered our wedding cake. I know we only met with two places, but we both really liked the first one, and they can do all the "extra" stuff for Jason's cake that I was hoping for. Their prices are really reasonable, the staff is friendly and talented. It just seemed logical to book with someone we had such great experiences with. We changed our minds from our original design, so hopefully we have a winner now.

I also met with a florist here in town to talk about flowers. She was SO helpful! I brought in a few pictures of things I liked, and not only was she able to identify every flower in each picture, but then she could tell me what other colors it came in, how hard they were to work with, how expensive they would be to get, etc. She made so many good suggestions, pulling out most of the flowers we discussed from their own cooler to physically show me. She even showed me how they can spray flowers to get them the right shade of whatever color we are looking for. And on top of all her help, her prices are really reasonable and she was very professional, emailing me the same day with a written invoice that included everything we had talked about and a price breakdown. It looks like we have another winner - I just have to put down a deposit to reserve her. I guess I should just go ahead and do it now, why wait.

Yesterday we had our first meeting with our pastor to start our premarital "counseling." The meeting was short and sweet - he gave us a book to read together and then a packet of info we each have to fill out about ourselves. The hardest part is going to be coming up with 10 reasons I want to marry him and 10 reasons I think I'm ready for marriage. Don't get me wrong, of course I can come up with all 20, it's just that I've never had to put this kind of stuff into words before. How do you say "I just know" ten times? Isn't love an indescribable feeling? I have about 5 of each so far, and we have almost a month before we meet with him again, so I've got some time to keep thinking about it.

We have to turn in our packets a few days before our next meeting with him so he can compare our answers and prepare our discussion for the next meeting. I'm interested to see what things will jump out at him as something that needs to be discussed. I wonder what Jason really thinks of me...

I lied...

2007-05-11T23:07:00.000-05:00

We aren't doing cake stuff this weekend. Not unless you count designing a cake for Jason's mom's surprise party next weekend. And even that is stretching it, because I'm going to have them decorate her cake to match the invitations we sent out :)

What I did do, however, was scope out Craigslist to see if I could find an affordable videographer in the area. By affordable, I mean next to free. In Jason's mind, he's generously budgeting a whopping $100. In reality, we'd be lucky to get an hour of someon'es time for that much. It's one of those things that's a pretty divided issue on Weddingbee whether they're worth it or not, and it's something I keep flip flopping on.

On the one hand, I've read about a lot of previous brides who say the day just flew by and it would be nice to have the video to go back and actually WATCH what happened, instead of remembering a big whirl of events and sights and sounds. Sure, professional photography is nice, but still film can't capture the way Jason's voice cracks during the vows, or how drunk Aunt Ida hits on all the teenage boys (note: for the record, Jason has long since reached puberty, and I don't have an Aunt Ida that I know of)

On the other hand, most of the pricing I've seen is in the thousands, or in the upper hundreds for JUST the ceremony (and our ceremony should only be about 25 minutes, so that seems a bit much, no?) I know there's some editing involved, but it can't be that hard to stand still for half an hour while we say we do and lock lips in matrimony.

I'm not looking for fancy editing. I'm not looking for interviews with every guest. I'm not even looking for more than just the highlights (do I really need to watch two hours of the dance floor?) All I'm looking for are the important things - the ceremony obviously, our first dance, dancing with my daddy, Jason and his mommy, cutting the cake and tossing our respective baubbles, and the gathering of family and friends as they wave goodbye to us on our way to [somewhere, not sure yet, maybe a hotel, maybe just home.]

Why does this have to be so freakin expensive?!

Let's see...

2007-05-10T11:18:00.000-05:00

I am in the process of contacting more bakeries to meet with this weekend. I'd like to find someone on this side of the metroplex so delivery fees won't be as outrageous as from companies coming from the other side. It's hard because since there's NOTHING in Justin save for our wedding chapel I have to go elsewhere for everything!

I have a meeting with a florist on Tuesday. Going to sit down and discuss not only ideas but specific flowers, and then prices of course. I'd really like a florist who could deliver instead of someone having to pick everything up. We'll see.

We have our first meeting with our officiant on Tuesday. We have to take a few classes with him. Easy breezy.

It's official

2007-05-08T10:22:00.000-05:00

Jason and I are now full members of the First United Methodist Church of Keller. Yay. We talked to Pastor Jason (I know, I know haha) about marrying us, and he said he'd check his calendar and get back to us. Haven't heard from him, but on Sunday he was talking to us about the three "sessions" we'd have to take with him prior to the wedding. No big deal. Jason's sister Danielle was married by him and she said the sessions were more just talking about the wedding than anything deeply religious. So it looks like we're golden. Good to have something else (almost) done.

I'm back to being indecisive about flowers. Now I'm thinking I'd rather spend the money and not have the headache. Especially since the prices that I got from a girl I kind of know are pretty good (ie men's bouts for $5 each). She has her own floral/design company, and she even made her own bouquet for her bridal portraits, and will be making everything for her wedding. So she has the experience. And I've seen pictures of her stuff and it's good. She definitely knows what she's doing. I'm wondering if I'd really be saving money by doing flowers myself, since I would have to essentially have to buy double of everything, one for practice and one for real. Then what if on my wedding day we are making flowers and they don't look so great? I don't want to have to settle for ok flowers that will be preserved in pictures for centuries to come. *Sigh* I wish I could just make a decision and stick to it.

Currently in the process of working on hotel discount stuff for out of town guests. We visited the 5 closest hotels last weekend and picked one that was fancier and one that more economic. I'm just waiting to hear back from them about what exactly they can do for us in terms of discount. I also inquired to several car rental companies for those people who are flying in and will need to rent a car for the weekend. So that's pretty much taken care of.

Next up is the rehearsal dinner I guess. It's really early to be thinking about it, but I'm trying to at least get a general idea of the style we want to have. It's hard because Justin is so small that I doubt there's anything IN the city that will work. So we are going to have to drive back into FW. And since none of my family is familiar with this area, the directions have to be pretty simple. Right now, I'm thinking a backyard BBQ type of dinner. Something really laid back where we can spend more time just hanging out and talking than doing anything formal and planned. But that's a lot to ask Jason's parents to host all of these people at their (or someone's) house, provide all the food, and then clean up after 20 some odd people. So we may shift focus to a real casual restaurant. Nothing like McDonald's or anything, but maybe somewhere that we can rent out a room and just chill. I want it to be really informal where we can wear jeans and stuff and not worry about a whole lot. So if anyone has ideas, let's hear them!

Inspiration

2007-05-02T15:02:00.000-05:00

So I read and sometimes contribute to this online community called Weddingbee (is this really the first time I've mentioned it?!) It's composed of a bunch of brides-to-be from all over the US (and Canada, too!) and they share all the stuff about their weddings that we as readers might find helpful. There's all sorts of pictures, DIY (do it yourself) project ideas, polls, tips and other interesting tidbits that keep me giddy to read new entries! I guess you could kinda say it's the reason I started this blog - well, that and because I'm sure I was starting to annoy Jason with all this mindless wedding chatter!

Anywho, there was an entry recently from one of the bloggers (Mrs. Bee herself, actually) about this company called Patch NYC that makes custom cake toppers based on a couple, incorporating things like actual scraps from her wedding dress, or a replication of his tux style. The only problem is, they take four months to go from idea to your hot little hands. Oh, yeah, the $500 PRICE TAG might be a small hindrance, too!

While one of the readers commented that she actually did spend that much money on one, most of us either thought they were hideouly ugly or cute but not $500 cute. But one of the readers commented that she had made her own for about $25 in materials! That's more my price range.
First, the $500 offering:

Anyone here salivating? Rushing out to order one? No? Me either.

And now, for Melissa Sue's contribution:

If you click on her name, it will take you to a page with her instructions, as well as a picture of her and her future husband to show that they really do look like that :)

I smell a project - and one that could be done with other wedding-crazy friends? Of course, these are cute to have even if you don't use them for your wedding cake. Any takers? Anyone?

On this day in history

2007-05-01T10:11:00.000-05:00

Today is our three year anniversary! I highly doubt he's got anything special for me because he's so romantic like that, but we've made it through three years so far and I know I'm looking forward to the next hundred!

Wedding cake take two

2007-04-29T22:30:00.000-05:00

Today we went to our second cake tasting. This bakery has an open house the last weekend of every month where they make 20 of their most popular (most basic?) cakes and couples can "come and go" for a taste. There were also several employees on hand to sit down and talk to us about our visions.

So between the 8 groom's cakes and the 12 bride's cakes, I think we sampled 6 or so. I knew I didn't want any type of fruit filling, and I'm not a big fan of liquer or beer in my cake (especially for something as classy as a wedding!) so it ruled out many of them. Plus, I'm pretty simple when it comes to things like that, especially since I'm such a picky eater ;)

After having cake and punch, we kind of sat around waiting for someone to be free to talk to us. We finally got some attention and proceeded to discuss all the things we wanted in a wedding and groom's cake. Then I had Jason step out of the room to discuss the surprise elements of his cake that I wanted to add. When they told me they couldn't do it, I was a little shocked (I think it was because at bakery #1 they didn't even question if they had the ability to do it, but said of course they could.)

We were the last ones there and they made me a plate of leftover cake to take home with me, which was great! I had some tonight and will have some for breakfast or something.

When we got home, I crunched some numbers. Given the fact that bakery #2 was charging me a $75 delivery fee (that's three tanks of gas for my car!) and that they couldn't do the extra I was hoping they could but they were STILL more expensive than bakery #1, it looks as though we have ruled them out. The cake was good, but nothing special. All the books they had of cake ideas were not actual cakes they had done, but magazine tear-outs, which made me leary of what their real abilities are.

I'm still hoping to find a bakery that has good stuff for cheaper than bakery #1, because I don't know if I'm ok shelling out $500+ for CAKE!

Anyone here got mad baking skills?

Boo. Yay.

2007-04-28T18:13:00.000-05:00

I did a whole bunch of work on our wedding website this past week. Then the site gets hacked this weekend and while it's back up and running I have to start over. Boo.

On the upside, we went to lunch with Jason's mommy today. Really, she just wanted an excuse to not finish her homework from school, but it was still a nice few hours. Yay.

Oh dad

2007-04-26T13:26:00.000-05:00

So today my dad sent me an email that says "You know you're from Texas when..." and one of the reasons was "Someone you know has used a football schedule to plan their wedding date."

...

One more thing

2007-04-23T20:56:00.000-05:00

I forgot to mention that I changed it to where you don't have to register to leave a comment. Apparently it was always an option but the default is that it's not allowed. So I manually changed it (and therefore expect ALL of you to chime in on EVERYTHING now!)

Drumroll please....

2007-04-23T19:05:00.001-05:00

Engagement pictures are in! Check out my Facebook album for more info. :) :) :) :) :)

"Mother"/daughter bonding

2007-04-22T19:08:00.000-05:00

Jason and I just got back from spending a weekend at his parents' lakehouse. They've made a lot of wonderful improvements to it in the short time since they bought it, and I know one day it's going to be spectacular. The purpose of the weekend was to celebrate Jason's paternal grandfather's 80th birthday, which was today.

The reason I'm posting this here and not on my regular blog is that yesterday afternoon Jason's mom and I went into town (haha) and spent a few hours together shopping for today. First we hit up the liquor store (how lucky am I lol) and had an interesting experience with the worker there. Then we went to Kroger to shop for all the drinks and snacks and cake and cards and such. I know it wasn't the most glamorous trip, but I am so glad we got to spend that time together. It really wasn't awkward at all, and I feel like this weekend brought me a lot closer to his family. I am so excited and so lucky to be marrying into such a great family!

I just hope Jason's as excited to become a part of my family...

For Suzi

2007-04-20T21:32:00.000-05:00

Because she was such a dear to think of me!

This is what I'm currently in love with:
I will say that I'm not a big fan of the color green, so my suggestion would be to change it to a bright blue. See next image for example. I would keep the little round purplish ones (if I could figure out what they were!) and keep the fushia roses (not sure about the lily looking ones - they look like old people fingers to me for some reason :/) I might throw in some lemon yellow too, but it would have to be pretty bright - none of that sunflower goldenrod stuff.

This made me think of you when I saw your post because I know you wanted blue but not light blue. I don't know if this would do the trick, but I think it's another form of hydrangea. It's still not navy, but I don't know many flowers that are. I think, though, that if your wedding party is in Navy, really bright blue flowers would make your pictures pop! so don't worry about matching exactly.

Other top choices include:
For some reason these flowers don't look real to me. They're all such perfect blooms in such vibrant colors that they just don't look real. But something like that with wayyyyy less green could work.

This is lovely. Just change the color of the wrap from green (ew) to purple!

I really like the vibrance of the purple, red/yellow and little bit of blue pokin out. I don't like the big leaf grass blades or the stuff in the back that makes it look like a bunch of wildflowers. I would clean this up a bit to give it a classic round dome shape.

Then, just when I think I've decided on something, I go and find this:

The perfect combination of traditional purple colors.

Sigh. So many choices.

Happy half anniversary?

2007-04-20T14:18:00.001-05:00

Six months until the big day! I get more and more excited every day!

Serious doubts

2007-04-17T21:18:00.000-05:00

So tonight I sat down to look through millions (not really) of pictures of flowers to get an idea of a style I liked as well as flowers that come in dark purple, as well as how to differentiate my bouquet from Chelsea's and Romie's while still keeping continuity between them.

The more I sit here and think about it, the more I wonder if I really should be paying a florist to do this. After all, it's four bouquets (1 large, 2 small, 1 for tossing) and a dozen pin on bouts/corsages. Going very simple with the dozen (single flower with a minor amount of greenery) and all bouquets would only cost me a total of around $250 plus delivery (or sending someone to pick them up the day of) from the florist I'm currently talking to.

I wonder if I could take care of this task myself. I could order a bunch of flowers wholesale and then work with Chelsea and Romie that morning to put them all together.

I really don't have a favorite flower. Nor does Jason. Romie and Chelsea share the same favorite of gardenia, but those suckers are EXPENSIVE. So the flowers themselves will have no significance for me other than they'll match the bridesmaid dresses. Which is why I thought about making my own arrangements - that way they'd be special to me no matter how indifferent I was about the flowers themselves.

My biggest concern is timing. Since flowers don't always hold up so well we would have to make them the morning of the wedding. Between hair, makeup, food, getting dressed and pictures before the ceremony, I don't know if I want to add in the time and the possible stress of arranging flowers.

Opinions? Would I save money doing this or does the florist offer the best deal? Is it worth the extra money to save the stress even if we can do them cheaper ourselves? Is there another option I'm overlooking? Anyone have suggestions for dark purple flowers that will be available in October, and how I should do the bouquets so they're different but the same?

[As a complete afterthought but still related, is it possible to incorporate a fall theme at this point, or is it too late? The centerpieces are fish bowls with floating candles with a purple wreath around them, and that's how they'll stay. Would it be weird to all of a sudden throw in leaves and rust colored flowers if that's the only place I can see incorporating the fall theme? I wish I would have thought about the fall/Halloween thing a little more, since I'm a huge fan of candy corn (any candy in general really.) I've seen some really cute pictures lately of stuff using pumpkins, leaves and acorns, but I just don't know.]

Eeeee!

2007-04-17T12:01:00.000-05:00

Our engagement pictures are on their way in the mail! Hopefully we will get them by the end of the week! Stay tuned for more...

Check and check

2007-04-16T09:41:00.000-05:00

The contract for the caterer is signed and in the mail. The contract for the dj is signed and in the mail with the deposit. Check and check!

We joined our church officially yesterday. Tomorrow we have a meeting with Dr. Shelly to discuss everything including possibly being baptised. Should be interesting. After we get squared away we are going to ask Pastor Jason to be our officiant :)

Keep the ball rolling

2007-04-14T16:44:00.000-05:00

Yesterday's DJ meeting was short and sweet. We met with one of the two-man team and he gave us a contract to look through, talked to us about our vision and what we wanted, and about 20 minutes later we were on our way. He supplied us with several references, one of whom actually got married where we're getting married, and so far everyone I've talked to has had nothing but great reviews of these guys. They're reasonably priced, especially considering our reception is going to be on a schedule so we can fit everything in that we want to. I filled out the paperwork last night, and now I just need to write a check and mail in the contract!

Today we went to our first cake tasting and it was so great! We tried yellow, devil's food, red velvet and butter rum cakes. We also tried a vanilla custard filling, cream cheese icing, buttercream icing, chocolate buttercream icing, and a chocolate fudge filling/frosting. We looked through a huge book of cakes they've done before, talked about the pictures we'd brought in, and decided on flavor combos and a design both for the wedding cake and the groom's cake. Part of the groom's cake Jason doesn't know about because I had him leave the room so I could discuss parts of his cake with the baker. We're not positive we are going with this baker, because although everything tasted great, they charge a nice fee for delivery and set up and they're pretty far from our venue. Plus, I want to talk to more people to not only comparison price shop, but taste more cake and icing!

We've been on a roll with all the good luck we've had with vendors; cross your fingers for us that this luck continues!

More excitement

2007-04-13T11:24:00.000-05:00

Last night we were invited to dinner at my future sister-in-law Danielle's house. Danielle married her husband Thomas last August, so she had a lot of bridal magazines and stuff she let me have after we got engaged. She's so sweet, because now she's also letting me wear her veil - my something borrowed!

And it looks like my mom found a mother-of-the-bride dress. She's ordering it from online, so we will wait and see how it looks in person before giving it the final ok. But it's a nice dress online, not to mention it was on sale, and she had a coupon! She can always return it if it doesn't work, but fingers crossed it does!

Big ol check!

2007-04-13T10:20:00.000-05:00

My wedding dress and Chelsea's maid of honor dress have been ordered!!! What a huge relief. Instructions have been sent to Romie so that when she figures out her size tomorrow she can order hers.

Don't even THINK about asking me to see my dress! There are three ladies who have seen it, and everyone else will just have to wait until October 20!!

I feel like a huge task has been accomplished :)

Hindsight is 20/20

2007-04-12T10:41:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I wonder if I will look back on my wedding and regret cheaping out on so many things. Every opportunity to cut corners, we have. In the end, we will have the main components of a wedding (ceremony, reception with food, dancing, cake) but I hope I don't go "gee I wish I would have had x instead of y."

What helps comfort me is knowing that at the end of the day, if Jason and I come out of the ceremony married, it will have been a success. The other (more comforting!) thought is that 50 years from now when we are still married, have grown children and big, fat bank accounts, we can throw a 50th anniversary party that will knock the socks off of the queen of England!

I had a very weird wedding dream last night. I was already in my dress while all of these parents (my mom included) were preparing stuff in the kitchen. The place where we were wasn't our venue, but had the same name. I remember crying because the bridal suite was a tiny closet, while in my head I could envision the nice suite at our real venue. It was the day of the wedding and I remember waking up and greeting everyone with a big excited smile. But for some reason, we were doing the rehearsal that morning, and since I was already in my dress, I had to wear a black (black!) sheet around me to cover myself up so Jason couldn't see me. I wound up not paying much attention to the sheet and apparently it slipped down enough that he saw me in my dress after all. I was disappointed because I was hoping he would try not to see me. Then we had like 12 male attendants (none of which I recognized) so we had to refigure everyone's entrance.

Several things that amuse me. The first is that in my dream, even though we weren't there, I could clearly remember the name of our venue and what the bridal suite looked like. I could also remember my dress. This makes me feel like we/I made several good decisions, as I wasn't dreaming about some other venue/dress, but the ones that really will be. So the wedding "of my dreams" still involves our venue and my dress! Secondly, the tiny bridal suite closet in the drream looked exactly like the dressing room where I tried my dress on. Again, a good sign I think. Lastly, there really is a black sheet on my side of the bed, because I am usually colder than Jason, so it makes sense why the sheet I wrapped myself in would have been black (so no, it's not a sign of impending doom.) Which brings us to the last, and most important comment - in my dreams and in reality, I'm marrying the same wonderful Jason!

Continuing with success

2007-04-10T16:52:00.000-05:00

We have our first DJ meeting on Friday. The people have been really nice to talk to via email, and they are really willing to work with us. They paid for their own wedding 20 years ago, so they know that a lot of couples have to work with very constricted budgets but still want nice things. They've worked at our venue before, which is a huge plus since it's kind of out of the way off the main road. Hopefully we'll like them so much we won't have to meet with any others. They're drawing up a contract for us just in case, which is great to have to read over and adjust before booking/sending a deposit.

In other news, a friend of mine lives close to here and has her own cake business. I've tried getting in touch with her several times but she never gets back to me. I would have liked to ask her to do my cake, and even mentioned that in the last message I left for her, but obviously she's not interested because she would have at least contacted me by now, even if we couldn't have a lengthy chat right then. So on Saturday we have an appointment to check out a baker that we saw at the Fort Worth bridal show a few months ago. It'll be fun to go in and see what they can do, not to mention we get to try four different flavors we picked out, plus all the fillings and icings and such! Yay for free food! I emailed a few other bakers but no one has gotten back to me yet. That's really bad for business, especially considering how impatient us ladies can be - if they do get back to me, though, I won't turn down free cake!

This coming Sunday we are joining our church officially, so soon we will have an officiant. Then all we really have to worry about are tux rentals, and a videographer. What do you guys think about hiring someone to videotape? It's a lot of money to be honest, but I don't want to not get a wedding video and then regret it. I've seen nice ones, but I still don't know if I can justify that cost. Anyone have a video camera and want to volunteer to tape everything for us?

A very successful weekend

2007-04-09T10:30:00.000-05:00

Wow, I got a lot done this past week/weekend. Last week, I made the photgraphy deposit, signed and sent in the contract. I also picked a florist who should be sending me a contract soon so I can send her deposit. Friday we drove to Houston to attend my friend Kim's reception (pictures on my Facebook). It was lovely and she looked so beautiful. It was the first time I'd ever met her husband since they're in school in Utah, but I like him a lot and I'm happy for them both.

Saturday morning my mom, sister and I got up and went out to try on the bridesmaid dress we had picked out online. We really liked it, and decided to try on a few more that the lady suggested. While my sister was doing this, I figured I might as well try on some wedding dresses, since I only have six months to get everything ordered and altered. Man was I glad I did. I found my dress! I tried on three, and the third one was definitely the charm. After seeing it on me, the lady that was helping us brought out a new bridesmaid dress that mimics the design of mine. We never would have picked it out ourselves, but I'm glad she made the suggestion, because we have it all figured out now! I'm going to order the dresses online though, since there are several places that sell dresses brand new for a fraction of the cost. Including shipping, my dress will work out to be HALF of what it costs in the store. Anyone looking for formal/wedding/bridesmaid type dresses should definitely check out netbride.com where they have free price quotes if you know the designer and style number of the dress you want. I've continued to be impressed by them, and have heard so many great reviews that I'm confident in buying from them!

After our little shopping trip, Jason and I made a trip down to Arne's Warehouse. We found a lot of stuff we could use and decided to come back this summer to buy most of it. We did wind up buying all of the party supplies for Jason's mom's 50s style 50th birthday.

We also got the signed caterer contract in the mail. Now we just have to sign one copy and send it back to her so we both have copies for our records.

To top it off, I talked to our engagement photographer yesterday and he said our CD will be in the mail this week. We're really excited to see the pictures since it's been over two weeks since they were taken.

I have to talk to my bridesmaid Romie so she can go try on the new bridesmaid dress we picked to figure out what size we need to order. Then some time this week I'm ordering all three of our dresses! I know mine and my sister's will come here, but I don't know where Romie will want hers sent. I just have to figure out what place to send them to here because Jason and I living together means they can't be stored at our apartment!

We got a lot done and I'm so glad I tried on dresses because not only does it take way longer to come in than I would have thought, but I found my wedding dress! I hope this coming week/weekend proves to be as successful as the last. I know Jason's talking to DJs, and we are officially joining our church next Sunday, so after that we'll talk to the pastor we want to be our officiant.

Next up: finding a bridal alterations place in Fort Worth, making appointments with bakers to have tastings, picking a cake design, and planning a family get-together!

I wish I...

2007-04-04T15:08:00.000-05:00

... had an unlimited budget. I keep coming up with all these neat/cute ideas/projects that I think would be so perfect for the wedding. Then a few days later, I come up with something else, then realize I don't have the budget for both. So I have to decide on one or the other. Then, when I think I've made a choice between the two, I think up something else. It's very frustrating because I keep having to return purchases I've made.

But I finally made a decision yesterday. So back to Walmart I go to return the stuff I bought Monday! I'm sticking with this latest idea for sure, though the details may get altered. The big picture will stay the same for sure, because it's such a part of who I am (well, was is more like it, though still slightly am to this day) and it naturally lends itself to the wedding.

Got the photography contract in the mail today, so it should get there by Friday. I'm going to go ahead and check it off my list, because it's done barring any confusion at the post office. Wow it feels good to SEE it get taken off my list!!!

A lull

2007-04-03T23:43:00.000-05:00

Not too much wedding stuff lately. Waiting (rather impatiently!) for our CD of engagement pics so we can show the world. We finally decided on a wedding day photographer and made the deposit. Now I have to remember to drop the contract in the mail and I can check that off my list.

Began talking with a lady who does flowers out of her house since the only flowers we need are the bridal party (don't need any ceremony stuff or reception centerpieces). Her prices are pretty reasonable, but she's a little slow to respond (she's a bride-to-be herself) so I wonder if I should either look for someone else or attempt making everything ourselves. The only problem with the DIY route is that since flowers don't last, we'd prolly have to do them the day of the wedding. Not sure I want that much stress the day of. Anyone want to volunteer to do my flowers if I buy all the materials?

Making a quick trip to Houston this weekend (prolly won't even be there 24 hours) to dress shop with my sister. We know what we like, so we just need to go try it on for the sake of verifying in person and making sure we order the right sizes. Also attending a friend's wedding reception Friday night, so maybe I'll see something creative that I can borrow/alter/steal for my own!

Guess that's it. Coming up next - Jason chooses a DJ and I talk to a friend about the prospect of making my wedding cake!

A wonderful weekend

2007-03-26T08:15:00.000-06:00

This past weekend Jason and I went back to Lubbock and took our engagement photos. We spent three hours on campus taking picture in three outfits (formal attire, casual attire, Tech shirts) and had a blast with our photographer. The highlight of the day was when we went to the stadium to take pictures and the guy told us we couldn't come in because there was an event going on in the suites. So we walked around by the student entrance to the field - and it was open! So we went in and took pictures in the empty bleachers. I think they're gonna look really neat with just the two of us and nothingness. We didn't go down and take pictures on the field (we wanted to so badly!!!) because we didn't want something to happen and for our photographer to somehow get into any type of copyright trouble for taking pictures without permission. Our photographer did say he knows the guy who does all the field photography, so next time we come into town he's going to try to get us in touch to maybe go back and take some.

I'm so excited to see how they turn out! He wound up taking about 400 shots, even though I know they won't all be good. He's going to edit them and then send them to us on disc to print ourselves.

The entire experience was so wonderful, we are trying to figure out a way to use him again. If anyone needs a photographer in Lubbock (attn: Suzi!) let me know because I'd love to send more work his way.

:)

2007-03-20T21:31:00.000-06:00

Tonight we met with our other top choice for a photographer. We really like her because of how well we clicked. Supposedly there's another couple looking to book her on our day so it could come down to who books and sends a deposit first. We are going to compare what we get from each photographer, then see how much it would cost to get that stuff from the other photographer, and then see which one turns out to be the best value.

In all honesty, I was kind of hoping we would have gotten bad vibes from one of the two photographers. That way, this decision would have been an easy one to make. Now we have to nitpick our way through and actually decide on something!

I'm thinking about holding off on it until we get back from doing engagement pictures this weekend. I'll compare our photographer in Lubbock to each of the two here to see if that gives us any insight into what works best with us.

Seven months until the big day!

This or that? Him or her?

2007-03-19T08:50:00.000-06:00

We met with a photographer and his wife this weekend to look over his work and quality and to discuss our wedding photography needs. He was really nice and we clicked well, which is a huge deal for me since he'll be right there with me the entire day. The only thing I would have liked is for his wife to be in the office with us instead of in the living room playing with her son. She's going to be there just as much as he is, so it would have been nice to see how we meshed with her.

Tomorrow after work we have a meeting with one other photographer. We're meeting at a Starbucks so it will be interesting to see how she displays all of her work (at the other meeting we watched a DVD slideshow of a lot of his work - don't think we'll get that tomorrow)

The goal is to have a decision made and a deposit sent by Friday since we are leaving to go out of town this weekend. It'll be nice to have one more think on my list checked off.

I really need to find time to go look at wedding dresses...

Another meeting

2007-03-16T20:10:00.000-06:00

Tomorrow we have a meeting with a potential photographer. It's a husband and wife team of over 25 years. What I like is that they work together, so not only do they understand the dynamic of a couple as a partnership, but she can be with me while I dress and he can be with the guys while they dress and that way there's no way a photo op can go unnoticed. Of course, pricing is good for what we need. Now we just have to meet with them to see how well we click with their personalities. They say you have to trust your photographers like you would a good friend, since they'll be with us (almost) the entire day, behind the scenes and giving directions.

Hoping to hear back from the other photography front runner soon so we can set up a meeting with them too. It's always best to have options. Plus, based solely on email correspondence, we seem to get along really well.

One week to Lubbock!

Thank God I get paid tomorrow

2007-03-14T21:51:00.000-06:00

The caterer has received our deposit. Now we just have to work on getting a formal quote in writing and then sign the contract!

The closest thing to

2007-03-12T21:17:00.000-06:00

I just did a bunch of update stuff on our site so definitely check it out! Also, I added a message board feature, mostly because there is no option for a guestbook. So go by and just start a new topic to say hey!

Répondez s'il vous plaît

2007-03-10T19:07:00.000-06:00

The last of the invitations have been purchased. I know we have a really long time to think about that stuff, but since Michael's has those 40%-off coupons in the newspaper each week, we took advantage of that, buying one package a week so we could use a coupon on each of them. Now I guess we will move on to buying something else, maybe vases for our centerpieces or paper for our ceremony programs. Jason and I have been stealing his parents' newspaper on Sundays so we can go through all the coupons they don't want. We found some for Linens n Things and B3, but don't know what we need from there (we don't want to buy stuff for the sake of getting the discount).

Monday we are sending in the deposit for the caterer, so that's one more thing we can cross off our list. The major things we have left are photographer, DJ, cake and officiant. I'm going to talk to a friend about the cake, and we are going to talk to the pastor from our church about being our officiant. I have already talked to several photographers and it just comes down to making a final decision and sending the deposit. Might have to make appointments to meet them first though. That's a lot of money to spend on someone we've never met!

And I saved the most exciting news for last... Jason booked our honeymoon!!! That's right, folks, the day after the wedding my HUSBAND and I will be going to..... somewhere. I know, I'm a tease. But it's a surprise! Don't worry, baby birds - you'll know soon enough :)

Venue, caterer. Caterer, venue.

2007-03-04T17:01:00.000-06:00

Today we met our caterer at the Abbey so she could get an idea of the space and the kitchen she'd be working with. We sat down and discussed plans for appetizers, entrees, sides and drinks. Jason and I have to make a final decision on a few things, but it looks like our menu is mostly planned out! Now we just have to purchase all of the plates and silverware and stuff (unless we want her to do it and charge us a surcharge on top of the cost).

We also took one of our centerpieces up there so we could see it in relation to the size of the table we are having. Looks like we might be renting/purchasing larger fish bowls and possibly mirrors. Still have to play around with it a bit and see what we can find (and how much it will cost!)

Next on our list: the officiant and DJ. I guess we will set up DJ meetings for the next few weeks/weekends.

Lubbock in three weeks!

Flower pictures

2007-02-27T23:03:00.000-06:00