!!

I haven't posted in over a month! A lot (I suppose) has happened. I guess I'll recap.

• We booked a photographer! Amanda Alt WORK IT OUT. We weren't necessarily looking for a photographer yet, but I had a million people suggest that I "fan" her Facebook business page. I'm very glad I did. Her work is very fresh and new, and she's really inspired me to think outside of the box and just go crazy. I thought I had a lot of ideas about wedding pictures- what would look nice, pretty views, etc. I threw all of that out the window, now I'm just concerned about having fun and staying true to ourselves. Big bold colors and kitsch. Seriously. I'm done caring about what people will think!
  

• With our booking we receive a complimentary engagement session! We weren't going to do this otherwise, but this is free and gives us a chance to really get to know Amanda. I think we're going to do this later this summer. We've talked about it, and we're going to go with a yellow and gray color palate. I guess it's not necessary, but I'm into it. I've already bought...stuff..for the pictures, I can't wait! I don't want to give too much away, I love surprising people!
  

• I'm ditching those shoes I posted about. I woke up the other day and realized I hate them. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have the boldest, bluest shoes I can find as my "something blue". I'm a total shoe freak, I have a million pairs in a million colors. nothing in the wedding is blue...I think that makes it all the more fun.

• We ordered half of our centerpieces! I bought 12 manzanita branches, 2 bags of moss, and 12 black wooden containers from Blooms and Branches.

Sorry the picture blows, I took it on my phone. You get the idea, though. I lined the base with a plastic grocery bag, then filled it halfway with plaster and placed the branch in the container. Once it was dry, I stuffed it to the top with moss and this is the (almost) end result. I love it...it's exactly what I had in mind. This is a little gloomy and not the end product- I'm going to add hanging tea lights or little ivory flowers to the branches. Maybe both.

• Today I entered Mike and I to win a wedding in Bermuda. LOL at this. In the contest rules, it says you are judged on your picture and 10 reasons. I am notoriously ugly in pictures, but I think we picked a decent one. Please comment if you feel compelled to do so. I don't think it has any bearing on the competition, but it can't hurt!

• I need a photobooth. I'm obsessed with this idea, and it NEEDS to happen.

More later, maybe!

Some Goodies.

As promised, another juicy update. I've been able to cross a few minor things off my large to do list lately and I'm pretty excited! First, we decided on and purchased pew decorations- for under $20!!! I think I might have mentioned before that I really liked the idea of hanging kissing balls from the pews, and that's what we ended up going with. Michael's just got in all of their spring shipment, and I found little baby hydrangea kissing balls in ivory. They are smaller than the 5"-6" ones I had pictured...about as big as a balled up fist.


They are obviously fake flowers...not quite silk...more like parchment flowers. They are gorgeous. Closer to the date, I just have to attach thick brown ribbon I bought with some straight pins and we're good to go! Our chapel has 8 pews on either side of the aisle, so we're going to place a ball at every other pew on each side. I am so happy to cross pew decorations completely off the "need to buy" list.

I had mentioned in a past post that I really liked the idea of an apothecary jar filled with nature-y items...feather balls, pine cones, twigs, etc. While I was picking up the kissing balls, I notice Michael's also had big bags of potpourri on sale. They have a really pleasant vanilla scent. The bag is full of ivory and brown natural items. It has twig balls, bark, pine cones, and plenty of other things that fit exactly what we were going for.


I was SO happy to find them! I bought every bag they had in stock- I want to say 4 or 5. I'm not quite sure how many centerpieces each one will make...I'd like to stretch it to two. I originally planned to buy everything separately and mix it myself, so maybe I can supplement the potpourri with stuff I can find on the cheap. Each bag was only 4 dollars (!!!), so if we really had to I could afford to buy 12 bags.

Probably the biggest and most exciting update is that Mike and I joined the gym together! I'm really not so concerned with how much I weigh when we get married...maybe I will be when I see the pictures? I don't know, it's just not something that's on my mind. What is on both of our minds though, is long term health and making sure we're around to enjoy each other for years to come. We've really made a commitment to each other to stick with this and be a team. I personally love our gym. I was a member in high school until college and I loved it then, too! We go about 2 or 3 times a week and it gives us time to be together away from electronic distractions. Obviously very excited about this!

One last thing- I might have bought my wedding shoes. It's totally random...last Saturday we were shopping and I saw them on a sale rack. They are ivory (the same color of the sash on the dress I think I'm getting) flats with little (what else) hydrangea-looking textile flowers at the toe bed. Gorgeous!


Even if I don't wear them for the wedding, they'll make cute spring shoes!


Awesome, right?!! I can call and reserve our wedding date with the baker this Wednesday. I'm very excited to get that done!

Yikes.

It's been awhile! Please don't mistake my lack of posting for lack of updates. We've kept up our momentum. I've been so busy with work - fall is our busiest season, plus I'm catching up from being gone a few weeks in September. Add a move and the holidays, and there is little time for blogging!

The post below this is one that TheKnot.com posted automatically for me. It's a review I wrote today for products we purchased. I ordered our save-the-date magnets from their wedding shop last week and they arrived today! I think it's cool they'll blog my review for me, but I don't know how relevant it is. Maybe if other brides read my blog, and just not my married friends? Who knows. Anyways, back to the magnets! They are so awesome. I'm pretty sure they were the very first item we knew we wanted post-engagement...before we were all about birds and branches (more on that later). I bought them so early (a year ahead of time to be exact) because I couldn't beat the 65% off sale. Not to mention, I'm constantly worried about things we want going out of stock or being discontinued. I would give these away now, but I really think we should wait until after next September, so no one thinks we're getting married September '10. I have relatives that thought we were getting married this past September, and of course people still/always think it's next September. I think Christmas next year will be good for giving away to most of the guests...no confusion that way.

I had mentioned birds and branches earlier...we are all about it! don't get me wrong, I totally shy away from themes and I'm trying not to be super tacky...everything is just falling together nicely. I bought the branch centerpiece kits from bloomsandbranches.com that I had mentioned in an earlier post and they turned out excellent. Mike made a sample centerpiece that is pretty sweet...sorry about the quality, I took the picture with my phone!

We really like it, but it doesn't quite fit the feel we're going for. We're going to replace the big pink flowers with small off-white hydrangeas, and 86 the glass and river rocks in favor of more modern square bases. Hopefully we get around to that soon and I can post the finished product.

For our alternate centerpieces, we're going to go with medium sized apothecary jars filled with twig balls in our colors, pine cones, and feather balls. Target has the PERFECT jars on sale right now, so hopefully I can scoop up the 12 I need soon. I'm thinking we'll have some votives on the branch tables and bud vases with hydrangea bunches on the apothecary jar tables.

So I guess some feathers here and some branches there don't really make a theme, right? Man, I hope I don't go overboard.