Boleros

Due to my back fat issues I decided to start looking for boleros.

Thus far and I am quite please with my findings. Although I have been having a heard time trying to decide on bridal accessories this decision is also going to be a little difficult. I love the old vintage glamour vibe and that's sort of what I was going for for my bridal look but with a modern twist.

Anyway I have to choose a color should I stay with white like my official ceremony dress or go with a purple bolero to match the purple birdcage veil I am contemplating. Or should I go with a black bolero and white birdcage. Should I add a hint of feathers on the bolero or not. The options are endless.

Checking in...

My wonderful summer is OVER and school is back! I feel like I'm already behind even though I am not. I guess I'm overwhelmed just a little. I am an Aquarius and by nature I think in the future so FI has to reel back to the present quite often. So far so good I have to stay ahead of the game here people.

In wedding planning news: I recieved my bridal shower invite in the mail the other day. I took pics but my camera is dead right now so I will post them later. It appears to be a old school hip hop themed lounge bridal shower. They have a weekend event planned. The bachleorette party is Friday night and the bridal shower is Saturday evening. Then I have a relaxation weekend somewhere with just my ManOH a week before the wedding. I am a tid bit confused but I going with the plans....HM will be paid off on Friday. YAY!!! The girls dresses are completed and ready to be picked up for the seamstress and I LOVE them.

what's important...

As the wedding draws near it becomes more clear as to what is important. Although I would love a beautiful wedding with all my friends and family in attendance to share with us as we began a new chapter in our lives. I realize that the most important thing to check off my endless list is making sure that FI and I are HAPPY. Making sure that we cultivate our love and listening to him and his feelings are more important than the color of our up lights. I am blessed with a wonderful man and I don't take it for granted. We have a beautiful relationship filled with honesty and respect. I love that I can me with him. I love that he accepts me for who I am as a woman. I can be difficult to love at times and I know that and I know that he wholeheartedly accepts the challenge. This is a feeling that I have only dreamt about. I want to enjoy the last days of our engagement.

I know and accept in reality I will get annoyed with everyone wanting to attend this wedding. Not sending in stamped RSVP and the such. But I will not let that annoyance over others interfere with my home and us. I have come to the realization that if I let people affect me then that's my fault not theirs. I am in "control" of what I give to others not what I get. Although I believe in the law of attraction so if I am positive light, positive energy will come back. I reflect over this past summer and all the things that lead up to this point and I am PROUD of what we have accomplished together. We make a darn good time and we have great cheerleaders to support us and for that I am GRATEFUL! For every crazy thing that happens 10 wonderful things happen.

Tomorrow the semester starts so I will probably be blogging less. But I feel that I am ready. I have done all that I could to prepare the rest is up to God. Thank you all for reading this blog. Thank you for your encouragement, and advise and love. It's truly appreciated.

checks

yesterday my dad brought our card box over and I completed it! I finished the all the signage including the photowall. I brought a treadmill! No excuses! We are making good progress with vendor payments. Thank God!!! Hopefully by the end of the month all the vendors will be PAID! ManOH and I boxed up everything last night and organized the "wedding room". I'm putting the finishing touches on the slideshow and program and were are done! I still have the dreaded seating chart but my planner will deal with it. School starts back Friday and I am glad that I did what I wanted it for the summer. It's a great feeling.

i have a problem....

what is it you may ask? My back fat!! LOL!!! so my dress came yesterday YAY!! and it's strapless and I knew that I had some issues now don't get me wrong but I thought that if I got the right size that it wouldn't be so noticeable and boy did I think wrong. So now I am on a SERIOUS diet. Realistically do I think I will lose it all before the wedding? Of course not! But I am about the try to tone where I can and mold it a little. If I stand with perfect posture it is not as bad! So that is an incentive. I will also get a bolero made just in case! I love her none the less with back fat and all. Thank God I have long hair! I can't post any pics of my dress just yet.

Our RSVP's

are coming in and I am so EXCITED! I mailed and hand delivered invites this past weekend and we had already received 4 RSVPs on Monday! I have been to the post office since then to check to see how many more have arrived. It's finally seeming REAL! We have a tasting at the venue at the end of the month. I met with the florist yesterday and gave her all the stuff I had collected for the centerpieces I still have a few more things to give her for the estate table. I started working on seating arrangements just for the estate table. Today I'm going to meet a client about a chuppah for her wedding and looking for a hoodie to get embroidered for the wedding. I need to shop for my bridal earrings and I don't officially have a veil yet. I have a purple blusher that I am pretty sure that I will wear I just need the dress to decide. My dress should be here next week. Cutting it close right? I know! The meeting with the florist went better than I expected she really did a great job on everything I have seen thus far. The centerpieces are huge! I worried that they may be too large. But I asked for it. I wasn't disappointed at all. Pics to come!! I need to download them!

Here are the feathered pomanders I made for the estate table.

I plan on using these on the estate table which is all white at this point but I may add in some black. I am not sure as of yet!

This is the linens for the guest seating. Sorry for the wrinkles. The green satin did not photograph well. But you get the overall idea! I am attempting to create a peacock feather with the linens!

Real Receptions

Here are some of the weddings we did last month. I just thought I would share.

Before

After

For this particular client we only provided the chair covers and sashes.

We provided chair covers and sashes only.



Before

After

If you noticed this is the same venue that will host my ceremony and reception. We provided the chair cover and sashes for this reception. It was huge... This is just 1 side of the ballroom.

I took this pic with my blackberry. Sorry about the poor quality.

As you can see Lilac or lavender is a popular color here in my area. We provided the centerpieces and chair covers.

Before

After

We provided the tablecloths, runners, and chair covers. The picture below this is where the ceremony took place. The grounds are gorgeous the pic really doesn't do it justice. We lined the aisle with organza sashes. I think satin sashes would have looked better but what the bride wants she gets! :0)

60 D-A-Y-S

Wow does time fly by? We are almost husband and wife!!!! I am actually starting to get excited. We are mailing invites now. So far so good with that. We will see how RSVP start coming in. All the DIY projects are complete for the wedding except the 3 feather balls and bridal suite and newlywed door hangers.

TO DO:

1. Get/apply for marriage license
2. I Do shoes (maybe)
3. Embroidered bridal hoodie
4. Get MY DRESS!
5. Get garter -cowboys for something blue
6. Order-toasting glasses
7. Shop for HM
8. Get FI's wedding gift
9. Start school
10. Finish vows
11. Finish invites
12. RELAX

I think that's all left to do besides box up stuff and give it to my planner and florist. I meet with the florist this week to give her the stuff and the planner at the end of the month. Our food tasting at the venue is at the end of the month. My dad is making the cardbox, and photowall this week. That's all FOLKS!!!!

Wood Walls and Uplights

This is room where our reception will take place. To the far left of the pic there is an airwall and that's where our ceremony will be! Anyway to the right of the pic you see what I call the "wood wall" well that wall is causing some problems for the uplights in the room.

The lighting company came out and mocked up a portion of the airwall in the reception. I really liked this look but the wood wall gives a different look that I don't like.

Here is the wood wall with amber lighting. Which looks pretty good but I would like green/blue lighting in this room.

Here is the problematic wood wall with flash on with the blue/green lights





Here is the blue/green wall with the flash off but it really isn't this bright in the physical so the questions becomes what should we do to fix this problem.

I have suggested 2 options with the company and I interested to see what options and ideas that they have to offer.

All aboard.....

Today we finally went to file for our passports. First, we went to the local Walgreen's where we took the photos. Armed with our photos and other pertinent documents we headed to the post office well when we arrived I realized that I had forgotten to make photocopies of the back of our licenses. Well that was cool because they provide the for .25 well I fill out the paperwork and the guy informs me that I need my actual birth certificate not a copy so at this point I am a little annoyed because I called before we went and FI had to go get his long form on yesterday. So anyway we go ahead and process his information.

Well we proceed to go to post office #2 but before then we go pick up my long form of the birth certificate and run to post office #2 where the guy at the desk is being an a$$. So while waiting in line I realize that I don't have the back of my license copied and this post office doesn't offer the service so FI has to run and get a copy while I wait in line. The guy at the desk is like you have 2 mins left and FI turns the corner. What a day!!!

The moral of this story is when the guy at post office #1 asked me to make a copy I should have said yes instead of pouting like a child because I was disappointed I had to go somewhere else. And no matter how prepared you think you are things just come up!!!! You got to roll with the flow. I hope I am able to do this on wedding day if something happens to happen.

Jamaica here we come!

DIY checks pt 4

I decided that I wanted peacock accents for all the bridal party so that's where this idea was born. I already posted about the guy bouts.

Here are the others. As I write this I just realized I forgot about the ManoH and Best Man. I will do that today.

Fathers

Hostesses/Ushers

We got all the guys bow ties made from the same material as the girls dresses. They are wearing sweater vests and suits instead of a traditional tux.

The girls dress hangers.

DIY insanity

Why do I have a photobucket image going down my blog? I have no idea. But I guess I need to figure that out. Here are more projects that I have been busy working on.

Here is our memory candle.

As of now I am not going to add any ribbons to get just because I like the simplicity of it.

Next up are the completed "through the years" table numbers.

A friend of mine was shopping at Big Lots and ran across this photo cake toppers for $2.00 and when I saw them I immediately knew that I would use them for table numbers. They have the pics in the front and back. We are showing our slideshow at the rehearsal dinner rather than the wedding so I thought this was a nice way to show some of the pics that the guests will not get to see.

Remember when I posted these:

All done!

I spray painted them copper, added some peacock feathers and wrapped it with a satin ribbon.

Breakdown:

Fans-$15.00 with shipping

Feathers- 2 for $5

Ribbon- $1.00

Spray Paint- $5.00

Total $31 for 5 ~a little of $6.00 ea not bad at all.

All things paper

I GOT MY COMPUTER CORD WORKING....yea!!!

Here are our OOT boxes without the goodies.

The Siggy Drink signage Sorry for the fingerprints all over it.

Kids Table sign

Guestbook Signage

Signage for the Cookie Bar

Here are the scavenger hunt cards for the kids.

Here are the bathroom baskets signs

Drink stirrers for cocktail hour

PMC Session #1

Yesterday FI and I went to his hometown so that we could meet with the officiant who is performing our wedding ceremony and it was fun. We had to take a little quiz/questionnaire to see just how well we know each other. It amazes me how much we know about each other. I am now getting prepared for the Fall semester to start. I am ready to go back to school just so that I am one semester closer to finishing. My goal is to have all the DIY projects completed and I have pretty much finished things up. I gave my MIL and SIL their invites to mail out. We divided them up and the RSVP comes to me and I will forward them to our planner.

I am pretty happy with how everything is going thus far. I have a million pics to share but my USB cord to my camera is not working. I will post updates tomorrow once I get a new cord.

Until then...I blogged about our guestbook but I didn't post pics. So enjoy!

This is the draft for the trivia napkins that we ordered for cocktail hour. We are using a variety using black and purple napkins with different ink colors for each question. I used Etsy seller The paper hat. We only ordered 100 napkins with 6 trivia questions.