3 More Days!

It's amazing...I am so excited and full of anticipation about the wedding! However, I really wish I had something to fill my time a little more. Even with the last minute errands and organization, I still feel like I have too much time to sit around and think about things!

The last few days I have just been an eager and fidgety bride! I keep tapping my fingers, my leg doesn't seem to stop and it's wearing me out! I feel like I need a nap :-)

Tonight is the wedding rehearsal, so fortunately we take everything that will be needed for the wedding and drop it off with the venue. So, all of the favors, the escort cards, the cake topper, ring bearer pillow, flower girl basket, etc. will all be out of the house as of tonight! The rehearsal itself will be very short. The Hacienda only allows for a 30 minute rehearsal...which I honestly find a little disturbing. I understand that The Hacienda does weddings and parties constantly, so they are comfortable with everything and know exactly what to do and what to expect. However, I wish they would take into consideration that the brides and grooms having their events at their venue don't have that comfort. We don't know how they do things, we don't know how things get set up there, we don't know how they take all of our wedding elements and set them up the way that we want.. Although the staff is incredibly friendly, they really leave everything hanging on the line of "oh we'll handle that at the rehearsal". Well, how are you supposed to handle ALL the details of a wedding at a 30 minute rehearsal? They really assume that everyone is just okay with their hands-off, "oh we'll take care of it" approach. I for one, am not...but have kind of realized that I really don't have a choice but to just accept it and deal with it. I'm just really hoping that my faith in a vendor that I've never done business with goes well.

I feel bad for Jarrod too! Today is the first day of his weekend, and since he works nights he's been up since yesterday at about 10pm. Knowing what's on his "to-do" list for the day, he won't get a nap or any sleep in before the rehearsal. I really don't like this, especially since he's been battling a cold this week. The last thing he needs is to deprive himself of sleep. Poor thing!

I do know that we are both looking forward to the rehearsal dinner at our favorite place, Lucille's BBQ. There will be SO much food, I know there's going to be left-overs! But, it will be an enjoyable time with friends and family!

6 More Days!

WOW...the wedding is only 6 days away! I think everything is planned and for the most part everything is done. There are just a few small errands and things to do at this point which hopefully get wrapped up in the next few days.

It's been incredibly difficult to get things done simply because of this cold I've had for a little over a week now! Sadly, Jarrod now has the cold and his just started last night...which means the poor thing is probably going to be miserable at the wedding and honeymoon :-( I'm praying that he is able to get rid of the cold sooner than I've been able to...yeah I still have mine.

Fortunatley, my mom and sister came and helped me finish up the favors yesterday! We knocked those out in a few hours, which really helped relieve a lot of stress from me!

The only things left really at this point are some of the presents for our wedding party/parents, etc. Everything else is just the "getting ready" part! The waxing, the nails, picking up the dress and the tux, etc.

We are also waiting for my "stand-in" ring. I was very weary about wearing my wedding ring on the honeymoon (didn't want to lose it or have it stolen), so we ordered a fake ring for me to wear. I still haven't seen what that one looks like, Jarrod seems to think it's funny to not let me see it until it arrives...so I'm nervous! Not really...he has good taste and it's just a fakey so that I have something to wear on the honeymoon!

I think I'm past all the pre-wedding cold feet (I hope), and at this point I am just so excited to see it all come together! I really hope that everyone who is coming has a good time and enjoys everything!

Wedding Money

Well, I think everything is "planned" for the wedding and those plans have been executed (for the most part). Naturally, however with that comes the part where you have to pay! I feel as though we have actually pulled off a LOT with our little wedding budget, but we are definitely over our allotted budget. It's all the little stuff that adds up...even if you try to do a lot of DIY stuff.

I actually think that Brides have the tougher end of the wedding bargain! We have SO much to buy and do in order to prepare for a wedding. I mean between the dress, the accessories, the hair and the nails and the million mile list of everything else, it really does get kind of crazy! The guys have it easy...they just rent a tux and poof they're done!

What does kind of suck about putting so many funds towards personal prep and wedding items, is that it leaves almost no money left to put towards the honeymoon spending. Thankfully, Jarrod's mom has provided us with a wonderful gift and has offered us a trip to Cancun! I am so excited about that and cannot wait to go and relax after these months of stress and planning! I almost see the honeymoon as our "prize" for completing the wedding to-do list...kind of crazy I'm sure?

Wedding Moss Cake Topper

So, since we had only had planned so far the moss trays that the place cards will sit on and the moss that the centerpieces will sit on, I wanted to be sure and incorporate more moss somewhere!

I had found someone on etsy that makes these moss monograms for cake toppers and I thought it was totally cute! I tried to contact them and purchase one since I really didn't want to put another "DIY" project on my plate. However, the owner stopped responding and I wasn't ever able to place an order. So, on with another DIY project!


I first got a small piece of styrofoam from Michaels:







Then I printed up a letter from Word, don't really remember what font size...but I wanted it to be big enough to be legible once it was cut-out and then covered with moss.

Then I laid the "W" on top of the styrofoam (without the packaging), and began to poke holes through the outline of the letter to provide me a guide of where to cut (I probably could have gone a little bigger...but there was NO WAY I was re-doing this again with all the other stuff I have to do):

Then I took a packaging knife (a small xacto didn't work because it was too short to get through the entirety of the styrofoam) and started cutting out my "W".

Once my "W" was cut out, I took my handy dandy hot glue gun and some sheet moss (I got mine at Shinoda). I'm pretty sure you can use whatever packaged moss you can find, but I used the kind that comes in a roll and has a backing so it's easy to cut.

Then I began cutting pieces that fit various parts of the "W" and hot gluing like crazy! It was a stringy mossy mess for a while there ;-)

Here is the finished product:

I had taken some scissors and dug a small hole in the bottom of part of the "W" and I had bought a small wood stick (don't know the proper word for them right now) from Michaels, and hot glued it into the hole for support. This stick will be placed into the cake for support.

This will be going on top of our 3 tiered squared carrot cake, the top tier is supposedly about 6" wide, so this should be a good size for it ;0)

Long Time No Post!

It's starting to get busier...and I don't know that it's so much getting busier with the to-do list or if I just feel anxious and therefore feel as though there are a zillion + one things to do? Either way, I'm stressing! I couldn't really tell you what one thing I am stressing about...I think everything has been thought of or planned out. I really honestly think at this point whatever hasn't been thought of isn't too terribly important enough to stress over. So why can't I relax? I don't know...I literally keep reminding myself to breathe!

Anyways, I am finally uploading a picture of the wedding invitation that we created! For the most part these were sent out in the beginning of September. More recent versions that went out didn't have the die-cut swirls.

Tent Cards?

So, you would think that finding a tent card template online would be an easy thing, right? Nope, not really! I've been searching for a good one for about a month now. Most of the ones that I find are really long (like 2 3/4" x 11"), which is ridiculous for a wedding.

Then I found a martha stewart templates site: http://www.print.marthastewart.com/ website...and although there are templates on there, they don't really provide you a sample so that you can figure out what information needs to go where so that it prints correctly.

It's very frustrating to say the least! I thought that maybe word would have a simple template, but apparantly not. I know that Avery provides one, so I'm now going to try and use their template without their cards and cut them out myself on my own paper...so hopefully that works. If not, then it's back to my trusty Photoshop to create another item from scratch.

In addition to making these, I still need to design the rehearsal dinner invitations, however I still need the wording for those from my fiance. So, hopefully I can get that from him this week since those have to go out SOON!

Yikes...I'm running out of time very quickly!

41 Days and Counting

So, I may have my handy-dandy "to-do" list (thank you to www.weddingwire.com) however, I still feel like there are a zillion and one things to do!

It's so difficult, I sit at work all day thinking of the things that I need to take care of, and then I get home and I'm so tired I can't remember which one I was going to take care of :-(

With only 41 days left, I don't really have room to procrastinate anything anymore...I need to stay motivated and get things done the second that I have time. Often times the trouble is the fact that I sit down to start working on one thing and then i remember something else and I go work on that and then i remember another thing and i go work on that...all the while never fully completing any one thing. Then the anxiety kicks in...

Although, I would have to say is that the "true" stress of wedding planning really doesn't come from the millions of things you have to pick out, buy, pick up, deliver, communicated. Nope, it really comes from EVERYONE else either involved or attending the wedding. My fiance and I have quickly learned that this wedding is not really for "us", it's for everyone else. Sure, it may have the elements that we prefer, but really all the work going into this is to please other people and their expectations. Which makes it even more stressful/disappointing when those people start to complain or disapprove and point out things that aren't going the way they think it should be.

I think at this point, the true motivation that keeps me going is the simple fact of knowing how much I love Jarrod and how much he loves me. It doesn't hurt that we're also getting to spend an entire week in Cancun! I just keep day-dreaming about lying on the beach and a drink with an umbrella in my hand!