Almost there!!

Skyetk

Earning My Ears
Joined
Nov 11, 2010
Messages
35
Almost There
Here is the first, and longest, post about our road to our Disneyland wedding.
Summer and Dave May 19th 2011
Who IS that? *2006* The first time I saw Dave I was standing outside with a friend of mine and saw him walking out of our squadron, both military. I nudged my friend and said, “Who is that?” Over the next few weeks I made sure he noticed me too.

So this is love - After 6 months of dating, nothing too serious, he got orders that would move him to Germany for two years. He said that he wanted me to come with him, if you are unfamiliar with military orders the only way to make something like that happen would be if we were married (and even then it’s not a guarantee), this is when I realized how serious he was about us.
Trials and complications - For those who have not had a long distance relationship I’ll give you this bit of advice; Always plan your next reunion. Once he was settled in Germany I applied for a passport, paid the extra cash to get it “rushed”. Two weeks after I received my passport I was on a plane to Germany. 18 months, three pond hops, and 4 countries later we were still together and going strong.


The beginning of my Happily Ever After*2008* For Christmas we decided to go to St. Martin with my parents. The other intent was to look for the ring and for Dave to “officially” propose, I say officially because these days most couples have the talk where they pretty much determine the intent to get married but there really isn’t a proposal. Well we found the diamond had it set and before we left the store he took my hands looked into my eyes and asked, “Will you marry me?” Two weeks later I started emailing with a Disneyland wedding planner.


Again with the Trials - 3 months later I received orders to go to Germany, I know sounds great, but Dave was returning stateside in 18 months, I’d be leaving in 6 and staying for 4 years. Meaning more long distance. I had a decision to make. 8 years and the military had been very good to me, I liked my job and I was great at it. But I decided I was ready for my new life.
Being a normal couple again *2009* We bought a house and I had my first meeting with the Disneyland wedding coordinators. It was late November and I, flew in from Oklahoma, met up with my aunt (mom #2, drove in from Arizona) at Disneyland to meet with Traci, the Disneyland wedding coordinator I had been emailing with for the last year. We arrive at 11:45 and “receptionist A” does the how can I help you bit, we tell her we have a 12:00 with Traci and she asks us to have a seat and tells us that Traci stepped out for a moment but will be back in a few minutes. We sit down, and at about 11:55 “receptionist B” asks us if we have been helped. I tell her that we spoke with the other receptionist and that we had a 12:00 with Traci. She gets this look on her face and says, “Traci is on maternity leave.” At this point I start to panic, because if a receptionist doesn’t even know that someone who they work with wasn’t on a 20 min break, did anyone know I was coming?! Did I just fly halfway across the country for nothing? By now my aunt has me turned around so I’m face to face with her and she’s saying “it’s ok, calm down, it’ll be ok”. This is not working.
I meet Cynthia – Then a woman comes out greets me and says hi, I have all your emails with Traci and I’ll be working with you today. I’m going to bet that through this meeting I was not the most pleasant person to be around. Cynthia was upbeat and a true wedding professional the entire time. P.S. I’ve been corresponding with Cynthia ever since and even through my continuous emails of “oh I had another question” she has continued to be great.

And the Trials continue *2010* April my mother is diagnosed with cancer and the doctors declare her one year terminal. My aunt and I spend a month in Washington helping out with my younger brother and 2 younger sisters while following my mom around 3 different hospitals. After 2 weeks the doctors say yes to a surgery, a week and a half later she has the surgery. Three days later she’s awake and off the ventilator. She’s doing well, we’ve been REALLY lucky so far with her recovery.
Wedding planning week #2 – Dave couldn’t attend again because of military work stuff, so I invited my mother. Mom has a bit of difficulty walking but she loves showing off her surgical scar (ITS HUGE) and telling people how she’s no longer terminal. So the plan was Monday morning meet the photographer and the afternoon we were meeting with Cynthia, Tuesday was the Disneyland Halloween Party, and Wednesday was a hair and make-up trial THEN blue bayou for lunch in the park! Monday morning we got stood up at the photographers office, during lunch he called me apologized and said, ”There is no excuse it’s my fault, what are your plans for the rest of the day”. My meeting with Cynthia went great, of course, I did see the photographer he and his wife were very personable and my mother loves them. Tuesday was very cool, see…

Wednesday, my hair and makeup trial started an hour and a half late, thank you CA traffic, and we missed our Blue Bayou reservation. But we still went to the park and ended up getting a walk in at about 3pm at the Blue Bayou.
A final thought: For some reason when messed up things happen with me, they are all things that are beyond human control and things you can’t get mad at. I’ve been late to a meeting, I’ve gotten stuck in traffic, and I’ve been left out of the loop of why someone wasn’t there. It’s frustrating knowing I can’t actually be mad about these things; all I can do is have faith that the week of my wedding planets align and everything goes right.
 
Now that our couple story has been told here are some wedding details and photos for those of you like me who LOVE to look at the pictures...
Let’s see where to start…
I’m not going to post the dress or the shoes till after the wedding, gotta leave some surprises. And keeping surprises for your wedding is SOOO hard cause you want to tell everyone who asks cuz your SOOO excited!
So I went with the Ceremony at the Rose Court Garden
 

There ceremony and the Reception actually have two different themes. The Ceremony colors are Pale pink, Peach and Ivory - I wanted a relaxed romantic feeling.
Here are some examples I gave to Kelly, the floral and decor rep at my last meeting at Disney.
 
The Reception Theme is bolder and the colors are Red, Blue, Black and Ivory. Not a strong flower presence.
This is the basic idea for the centerpieces:

 
Bridesmaids.
When this was going to be a smaller wedding.... I was going to have my three best friends, Leonor, Lizzie, and Joanne and that was it. Well then I thought about it a bit and I realized I really wanted my future stepdaughter, Juniper, to be my maid of honor. Well when I told my mom that we had set a wedding date she said well your sisters are going to be bridesmaids right? Anna and Alex were added. Then I made a new great friend and she was SO great with helping me with wedding stuff that I knew she HAD to be in the wedding, enter Brittney. It's hard for me to tell people "you will buy this" and "you must pay for this" when I'm asking them to go all the way to California on their own dime. So I made a style card for their clothing and hair that way they can have a bit more of their own style.
 
Mother of the Bride Attire
I need help... I started thing the red.. now i'm thinking the gold. what do you think?



 
if anyone can tell me how to delete these ones i don't need, that would be AWESOME!!!
 
I am so glad that the long distance worked for you both. When are you getting married? I like the dresses for the bridesmaids and I like the gold for the mother attire.

I am not sure how you can delete the other entries.

It would be hard for me not to post the pic of the wedding dress. It is hard keeping it from DF. Soon enough he will be able to see it. Can't wait to read more. :)
 











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