Ok this is a way way WAY over due update...
My MOH, MaryAnn, of course said yes, she is taking her "job" very seriously. She looked up all her responsibilities and is looking forward to planning a bridal shower in Oregon and then one here in GA. She will be flying out next May for the planning session and DF and I need to decide when we can go to Oregon so he can meet the family and such.
MOH and I went dress shopping one day while she was here...I can't remember how many dresses we looked at...We have our top three for bridesmaids.
We are really hoping that more designers come out with a turquoise color, right now from what we saw it was more of a pool blue or a green.
This is our top choice - European Glacier
http://www.billlevkoff.com/style/bridesmaid-dress/418
Choice #2
http://www.alfredangelo.com/collections ... &colorId1=
Choice #3
http://www.alfredangelo.com/collections ... &colorId1=
Memorial Day weekend we went to Disney to meet with Randy for our engagement shoot and meet with Kristi for a site visit to look at the different ballrooms.
We rented points from a DVC member for the AKL studio.
We decided Monday to go to Hollywood Studios, we had an ADR at 3:05 and upon check-in at AKL Allen checked to see if they had anything earlier, they had a 2:45! I'll take the extra 20 minutes to get ready.
HOLY GEEZERS the park was PACKED every ride was an hour minimum wait, Toy Story Mania was 2 hours. We decided to go over to the new Star Tours, about 20 minutes into the line outside DF stated we are never to come back during busy season :mickey: It made me laugh!
Here's the new 3-D glasses for Star Tours hehehe
After the ride we had about an hour until check in for our ADR so we went to the shops, I was trying to find the Sleeping Beauty Shirt "True Love" because DF has the "Sorry Girls I'm Taken" Prince Phillip shirt. No such luck
Apparently it's in high demand and just about impossible to find in stores.
We checked-in about 40 minutes early and they were able to seat us early :cheer: We were to meeting Randy at the Boardwalk at 7 so it just made me a bit nervous because I didn't know how long the hair would take.
We were out of there just after 3:00. Time to go get ready!!
Randy was great!! We are so excited to see the pictures!!!!! Every time I get an email I hope it's the pictures, even if it's just two to hold me over until the rest are done :mrgreen:
Tuesday morning we went to Magic Kingdom to get the cinnamon rolls from the bakery before our 10 meeting with Kristi at Francs. It was our first time trying the cinnamon rolls, I've heard a lot of good things about them so we thought it would be quick and easy. I don't know if it was an off day but they weren't something to write home about, I was kind of bummed. The outside of it was hard and I like my cinnamon rolls oooey gooey, may be just me but yummm when they are like that!
So we headed over to meet with Kristi to look at all the ballrooms. Yacht/Beach Club was not available for our day because there was a big convention being held all week and all those ballrooms were booked. We also looked at pictures of Ariels, the fish is the only big thing that stopped us from picking Ariels; the colors are beautiful and it would go awesome with our bright colors. DF gave me a yeah right we are not having it with fish look.
We chose the Grand Floridian (really thought I would chose the Boardwalk over GF)
The cocktail hour will be on the patio of the Whitehall Room and the reception will be in the St Augustine Room
Kristi was also able to dim the lights for us so we could see how the room would look for the night. DF was hooked on the GF.
We went to the Boardwalk next and he stuck his head out the St James Patio and stepped back in with the look of he made up his mind already. I agreed with him, I thought the patio at GF was nicer and I loved the chandeliers at GF. We still had to look at the Contemporary.
Kristi had warned us that the Contemporary was a plain box and would need a lot of draping to make it look really beautiful. We wanted to look at it anyways. We looked at the Nutcracker and she was not kidding! There wasn't even a chandelier in there, just rows of recessed lighting. Sorry I didn't take pictures, we walked in and turned around and walked out.
So we are penciled in for the WP @5 with reception at the GF St Augustine room on Monday 10/08/2012 and a welcome dessert party for Saturday 10/07/2012 at Lower UK.
So we decided since we are doing the Welcome Party on Saturday that's when we will do our Drinking/Snacking Around The World in Epcot. Team Bride is going to start out on one side (probably Mexico) and Team Groom is going to start on the other side. DF had an idea to have a scavenger hunt of some sort to make it a competition Team Bride vs Team Groom.
Has anyone done this? I'm thinking since there are 11 countries that each team will have 5 countries so we are not spending all day trying to find things. I want to make it fun for everyone since I know we will have a couple people under the age of 21 and I don't want us to drink too much.
I was thinking for Mexico points for having Bride/Groom in a sombrero bonus points for getting the entire group in sombreros. I would love to have pictures of both groups so I'm still working on everything. Anyone have any thoughts/suggestions?
Invitations - DF and I talked about invitations, I know we have about a year before they go out but I want to personalize a lot of things and want to have enough time for everything.
DF is really stuck on having scroll invites. I want card pocket invites. My concern with the scrolls is how are we going to fit all the information in there, RSVP card, Welcome Party info, and all the other info that comes with a destination wedding. I'm trying my best that if DF has an opinion on something about the wedding I try to accommodate it as much as possible (as long as it's a sane idea, he was nixed on having a monkey ring bearer... :roll: )
Has anyone done the scroll invites and if so how on earth did you include all the info to still make it look nice. Next week I'm going to order samples so we can see what they look like.
My mom was down for about two weeks, we went dress shopping for both me and her and I have narrowed it down to two dresses!!
We first went to Alfred Angelo, they were super nice there and they had one dress I liked, my mom looked too but didn't really find anything for herself. We next went to a store called Bride Beautiful and sadly they had a very strict rule that we were not allowed to take pictures of the dresses unless we have already purchased the dress from them. My mom was not very happy at all!! They allowed me to try on 6 dresses and if I did not find anything I would have to make another appointment to come back and try on another 6 and so on. (I thought that was kind of silly but I understand its for time management purposes
) They also would not tell you the style number on the dress and they had taken all the tags off except for their own with a vendor number on it. I was so happy that I noticed that at the beginning and asked who vendor number such and such was with every dress. At the end of the six dresses when we had it narrowed down to two I asked the assistant if she could take note of the two that I liked, she said she would while I was changing back. When we got up to the front though they would not give me the information "it was stored in their system in my file".
Thankfully I found two...I had the feeling with both! hahaha not good for my budget! I got all teary eyed when I put them both on and fell instantly in love!
They are both Mori Lee dresses and after searching through all the dresses and trying to go off memory I finally found them!
Dress #1
Dress #2 if I choose this dress I'm having it made into a sweetheart neckline
They both lace up the back too!
I can't decide between them so in a couple months I'm going to go back in and try them both on again and hopefully I'll love one more then the other! I may drive to North Carolina to the Bridal Mart if they have them in stock and let me take pictures, I called all the stores around here to see if they had theses style numbers in their store and none of them did.
I refuse to order from Bride Beautiful just because the customer service was not there in any way. I'd rather spend my money at a salon that is nice and helpful!
We went to Brauvara (the same place MaryAnn and I went to look at bridesmaids) LOVE them! They are so nice and they do not care how many dresses you try on or take pictures of every angle and they give you the designer and style number and swatches if you would like!
My mom found her dress, it's a Jade Couture style #K2296 she's going to get it in "eggplant" which is about a royal purple, just a smidgen darker.
http://www.jasminebridal.com/ugC_Product_Detail.asp
We may order all the dresses from them, we would get a discount if we do that. MaryAnn is going to check the Portland area for stores that carry all the dresses we want and see if we order together if we would get a discount. The nice thing about ordering all of them in Oregon is no sales tax plus the discount!! It's like a double discount haha
I think we have narrowed down our florist choices! I contacted about six different florists to get quotes and ideas from. I'm still waiting on Emily from Charming Events for a complete quote but so far Rachael K Designs is awesome! She's a little high in price but I think with moving everything from the ceremony to the reception it will cut the price down dramatically. She's been awesome and she really gets what I like and the look that we are going for. I gave everyone the same information of things we like and don't like, our colors and flowers that we like. Orchids are one of the flowers that we want to incorporate and she has done a beautiful job at it! Emily has been great to work with too, she has some awesome ideas that keep the cost down but still looks amazing. Has anyone used either of these ladies for decor?
Tears of Love packets...I saw the tears of joy poem but it was altered to be Tears of Love Tears of Laughter Tears of Happily Ever After and I just love that!
At JoAnns in the hobby section I found clear self sealing packages. I was so excited I was searching everywhere for something like that and I hadn't found anything. Who would have thought to look in the hobby section?! (ok clearly everyone but me if that's where they are stocked haha)
I have found that turquoise is a hard color to consistently match. So I decided on a sheer turquoise ribbon and adding the bright pink solid to make the pink really pop. I bought the cuttlebug a couple months ago and I LOVE it! The next toy I want is the Silhouette SD machine, it's a cutting machine but instead of needing cartridges like the cricut you use designs on your computer and you create your own or use a template from online.
Anywhos...I found a embossing and die cut for the cuttlebug I bought cardstock and printed out the saying and then put it through the rollers. Goodness did that take a little bit of time to find the right spot for the wording to be centered. I bought the raised glue dots and attached them to the front of the package. It didn't look quite finished though so I had to add a little bling! Half the packages have a lighter pink and the other half have a darker pink set of rhinestones. I bought them last year (mainly because they were pink) and I figured at some point I would use them and ta da I did!
I ordered our engagement announcements from Zazzle (50% off!) I know they are so late but I was trying to wait for our pictures to come back so I could use them. I played around with our return address and added the monogram that Dolly did for us in the background. I love it! I haven't decided what to do for a seal or sticker yet...or maybe not put one... thoughts? ideas?
So Monday night Allen went to the gym while I was still at work and he played basketball after running. He jumped at the hoop and when he came down
I took him to the doctor the next day (thankfully he already had an appt scheduled for a physical the next morning) She took x-rays of his ankle and sure enough he fractured his ankle and tore his tendon. He's in an aircast walking boot and crutches. He has to stay off of it for the next 4 weeks.
And just for happiness and fun here are pictures of our puppies....they are the best of friends. Its so funny to watch them chase each other. Ella thinks she's big like Kayleigh and Kay thinks she's Ella's size
Kayleigh
Ella Belle
and he has graciously agreed to have the wedding at Disney World
