Jenna & Tom's Escape to Happily Ever After 12/17/12

[JenJen88]

Hello there, how are you today? If you are reading this then it means I have finally decided to take a step off of the lurker platform and try to start my very own planning journal. I have been snooping around the boards for awhile now and find the journals of other brides so informative and inspiring! I only hope that this board is as helpful to someone else later in time. So at this point you are probably asking yourself, who is this couple that believes in magic enough to join the smart people of the world by having a Disney Fairy Tale Wedding.

The Bride and Groom:

Well for starters, I'm Jenna, a 24 year old law student from Ohio, with a somewhat unusual sense of humor and amusement, but I suppose if you don't like it then you can chalk it up to my chosen profession. Regardless of your feeling, love us or hate us, eventually everyone needs a lawyer. Hopefully you will like me though. I promise that I don’t bite. I have just 9... yes thats right 9 months of school left and I am so very happy for that. I will then be taking the bar exam in July, and with any luck be a practicing criminal attorney by October of 2013. I wa s meant to be in a courtroom. A good argument that goes my way is seriously better that the drugs the clients are doing where I work.
The grooom, well he is a bit of a story. His name is Tom, the love of my life, and until August of 2009 he worked for the street department of the city where we live. Unfortunately, while training in martial arts to become a police officer he broke his neck when an inexperienced student preformed a move wrong. We are thankful each and everyday that he is still in this world with us, because to hear his doctor tell it he shouldn't be alive. Instead, he got up and drove himself home and I had to force him to the hospital....men and their thoughts of invincibility... But he is walking and talking, and looking very forward to being my trophy, house husband lol
Together, We have three wonderful furbabies.

Tinker, a rescued 19 year old cat that we took in when his mother went into a nursing home and could no longer keep him,

Kitty- named by Tom and our resident princess, and

Mambo my baby that I rescued from in front of a semi-truck when he was 3 weeks old.
The Basics:
Arrival dinner/rehearsal dinner: 5 pm Sunday December 16, 2012 at Garden Grill, Epcot
Ceremony: 10am Monday December 17, 2012 at Disney’s Wedding Pavilion
Lunch: 1pm Grand Floridian Café
Dessert Party: 8:30 pm Morocco Oasis
Farewell Dinner: 5pm Tuesday December 18, 2012 at the Rainforest Café Animal Kingdom
Lovers breakfast: 10:15 am Thursday December 20, 2012 at the Crystal Palace

Up next: The Details

 

[SeaBreezeBride]

What a great story! Welcome to the boards! Can't wait to hear all about the details!

 

[XxsmortzxX]

Wow! What a relief that your DF is okay! I totally agree with you though, that men can be so stubborn when it comes to how bad they have been injured. Sometimes you just gotta poke them until they give in and remind them it is for their own good!

Your entire trip sounds truly amazing. I love the Wedding Pavilion! It is truly a beautiful spot to be married (watched a wedding there, not mine. ) Plus, your photographer will have tons of places for magical shots!

I am looking forward to the updates! I am sure time is flying with it being so close.

 

[Alifay]

Welcome!! So happy to have another PJ to follow . Looking forward to details!

 

[CinderALLIE]

Congratulations.

Glad your DF is okay.

 

[Bewitch324]

Oh my goodness that must have been so incredibly scary!!! I'm so glad that he is ok!!

Can't wait to hear more about your plans as you go forward!!

Brooke

 

[PrincessSamtastic]

So Glad your DF is okay. That must have been so scary. Can't wait to hear more of your plans.

 

[NoOrdinaryPrincess]

Welcome!

 

[JenJen88]

Thank you all for the warm welcome! So nice to log in after a very long day dealing with criminal defendants and see that there are smiling Disney loving people that are normal still left in the world!

Wow! What a relief that your DF is okay! I totally agree with you though, that men can be so stubborn when it comes to how bad they have been injured. Sometimes you just gotta poke them until they give in and remind them it is for their own good!

Your entire trip sounds truly amazing. I love the Wedding Pavilion! It is truly a beautiful spot to be married (watched a wedding there, not mine. ) Plus, your photographer will have tons of places for magical shots!

I am looking forward to the updates! I am sure time is flying with it being so close.

I suppose you are right. Men will be men- but ohhhhh how I get mad at him sometimes- to this day he is still incredibly stubborn. But, I can't argue with it, he keeps me on my toes and smiling so...

Oh my goodness that must have been so incredibly scary!!! I'm so glad that he is ok!!

Can't wait to hear more about your plans as you go forward!!

Brooke

So Glad your DF is okay. That must have been so scary. Can't wait to hear more of your plans.

Thank you all for your concern, and it was incredibly scary, and we are so thankful everyday.

So now onto the details.
PINK
I think now would be a good time to introuduce the fact that I have a love obsession with the color pink. All of the shades and degrees of pink, but most particularly deep full pink. Um, maybe people would call it hot pink- but not hot pink like neon pink, hot pink like Princess Aurora's dress pink. (hmmm gotta love that everything can be referenced to something disney) Anyway, this love of mine was totally fueled a few months ago when in the signature line of a bride what did I see but none other than a pink car. And we are not talking just any old pink car, but a beautiful pink rolls royce that I believe was named Penelope. Well that's what the news article online said when I looked her up and saw that she even did charity work- riding in the breast cancer awareness parade in Florida. I was in love, my mom was in love, Tom- well he didn't really fall in love, he is more of a black tee-shirt kind of guy, but it was cool. So I finally get around to starting to try and work out some plans, only to be told sadly by my planner that she is no longer available because she wasn't getting booked enough. It's ok though, I think this just makes for a better sales pitch on why I need the carriage to my parents. Ok, enough of that rant for the day, (unless someone wants to petition DFTW with me to bring the pink car back?) lol- sorry its a law school thing to always look for a loophole?
Now, lets see, I mentioned my planner, her name is Vita. Anyone know anything about her? She seems to respond quickly, just curious.

Well my sweets, sorry that I haven't gotten to the good stuff yet, like the DRESS but bed is calling me, and I need to leave some things to keep you coming back for more. LOL Until later, remember to have a magical day!

 

[JenJen88]

So, it has been forever since I posted. Law school has not been kind to me this semester. It's my last year and in theory this is supposed to be the easy year. The year where I understand things and can get work done quickly. Well, I understand the material, but my professors are hell bent on keeping me bogged down with all kinds of busy work. I swear I have turned in more papers this semester than in the last 2 years of school combined. Uggg To make matters worse, I have come down with a terrible case of senioritis. Thank goodness I am just about done!

Now on to the stuff that really matters…. Disney and the Wedding! I get married next month!!! Yay!!! I am happy to say that everything as of today seems to be working out. A month ago was a different story. My “maid of honor” has made things difficult for me. Don’t get me wrong, the girl has been one of my best friends since middle school and I love her, but man I want to strangle her. Her son was supposed to be my ring bearer and her husband was supposed to be a groomsman. My friend was the second person to know that the wedding was at Disney. I gave her almost 2 years to save for this day. I paid for her dress, and offered to pay for their park tickets for the two days we were doing in park events. All they had to do was pay for air and hotel, which they were not going to stay on property so the total cost- I pricelined for her was $900 with her work discount. That would have meant that she needed to save roughly 45 dollars a month to make it. Last month, she text me, did not call but text that she was not going to make it and none of them were coming at all! I was deeply hurt by this and still have lingering feelings of betrayal, because this is the only thing I have ever asked of her. But, as my mom and Tom have continually told me, it is probably for the best.
There has also been drama with the best man- Tom’s brother in law- because his sister doesn’t know if she wants to stay married to him- so he is no longer in the wedding either. He will still be attending however to avoid the wrath of his sister, he is just a guest. Leaving our wedding party with two bridesmaids and no groomsmen…. The solution we have come up with is that Tom’s sister will walk in and stand next to him and his cousin (my other bridesmaid) will stand next to me. Hopefully this won’t look too silly in pictures. At this late date it is just impossible to expect anyone to come up with the money to make it to Florida near Christmas.

I just keep telling myself that none of the drama with his sister or my friend matter because at the end of the day I am still marrying my best friend and my closest family (parents and grandma) will be there with me.

Now to the happy things.
Rosie with Disney is wonderful. She has been extremely helpful with planning my flowers and so sweet and kind when corresponding with her. All of the flowers are going to be in shades of pink. She is going to do my bouquet in the island style (taking away all of the crazy greens) with pink orchids, deep pink callas and hot pink roses. I am so very excited to see it. And of course everything is going to have crystals and sparkles. We have also decided to do a petal toss staged exit because the pictures I have seen of these are amazing!

Also we have decided on the star buffet menu for out dessert party in Morocco Oasis the night of the wedding and we are adding Mickey Rice Krispy Favors and Mickey Premium ice cream bars! Yummy! Hopefully we can stay at Morocco with the reduction in our party size. Maybe some of you ladies should just come to meet the guest count! I feel like I know and love you all from the boards and facebook already! It's Disney and I am sure we would have fun

Randy Chapman and Stan of STVS video will be on hand to capture all of the magical moments of the day. And we have decided to have Rev. Kevin Knox preside over this day. At this point I need to give a big shout out to Brevard County Court- they are extremely prompt and super easy to get a marriage license through the mail without paying a third party!

Question time because you ladies are the best advice givers anyone could ask for!
1) Any must have pictures that I should ask Randy to take around Port Orleans French Quarter, the Wedding Pavilion, or the Grand Floridian?

2) Stan has asked us to provide 2 instrumental selections and 1 vocal selection for our video. Being the Disney fanatic I am I want them to relate to Disney and be upbeat. I do not want the video to have a slow soppy feel. It should be fun like we like to live our lives. I am thinking one of the instrumental pieces could be Married Life from up- but I am lost on the vocal song and other instrumental. Any suggestions?

Well, that’s all I have for the moment. I know when reading these things I most love pictures and I have plenty of pictures of the dresses and invitations and other specifics that I have bought so far that I will upload tonight when I get out of class.

 

[JenJen88]

Ok, so my wonderful thoughts of making a great planning journal have gone down the tubes. Law school is a real time suck and I didn't ever seem to have the time to keep up with things. So in lieu of writing something silly, I'll get straight to the good stuff. The pictures, because in the end that's always what I want to get to!
Invitations:
Stacy from pinkappleink on etsy did an amazing job on my invitations and I couldn't be happier. She has also designed a mickey shaped program for us, but I was late ordering so no pictures yet.

I sealed the invitations with wax, because I have always thought that it was such a personal and sweet touch.

My Dress was a bit of a trouble maker. From day one I knew that I would never be able to buy a dress without seeing Cinderella (205). Well the nearest Alfred Angelo store is 2 hours away, but I got lucky and there is an authorized retailer only 30 minutes from me. I got to the shop, and they only had the new Cinderella. I just wasn't happy. The other dresses they showed me did not have the glitter tulle and just weren't right at all. So I made a leap of faith and ordered Cindy without ever seeing her in person or trying her on. Once she came in, we had a whole new problem, I had lost more weight then the shop had expected. My hometown seamstress came to the rescue. She ended up taking the dress in 7.5 inches. I am fully in love with it and hope that Tom thinks I look like a princess.

My shoes, bracelet and earrings are here, but after trying my dress on I needed a necklace, so that's on the way to me

As a fun twist, everyone will be wearing pink shoes in honor of my love of pink. I think it will make for a fantastic picture! I even found shoes for my girls that appear to have a hidden mickey without me having to add it myself!

The girls will be wearing the one shoulder dress from Alfred Angelo Maidens in Charcoal. They are a very pretty shade!

I bought their jewelry as part of their gifts, along with hair and makeup and couple other things.

I also bought these bracelets for everyone. The girls say bridesmaids, also grandmother of bride, mother of the bride, mother of the groom, and mine says bride which I am going to wear to our welcome/rehearsal dinner Sunday at the Garden Grill.

I don't have as many fun things for the guys, but I did manage to find mickey cufflinks.

 

[JenJen88]

Flowers:
For my bouquet, we are altering the island bouquet. There will be none of those crazy green leafy things, and the flowers will be hot pink open roses, dark pink calla lilies, and light pink orchids. And of course my love of sparkle does not end so crystal mickeys throughout! The girls are going to carry hot pink roses.
For decor we are going minimal because I think the wedding pavilion is already so pretty. We are having the unity candle with the mickey crystals on it and flowers around it like the picture, but one vase roses, one vase callas and one vase orchids.

The flowers will be moved for the dessert party and they are going to add glow cubes to them.
For welcome/rehearsal dinner I made all of the ladies shirts! I am so pleased with how they came out!

My ring is finally sized and I'm so happy

Oh, before I forget, I must show you the amazing times guides and fastpasses that Tom of PSEventDesigns on etsy made for me. the Times Guides I am having printed on rack cards from zazzle and the fastpasses are the perfect business card size. I really think that our guests will love these in their welcome bags. Since our guests are all family, the bags also include jewelry, shirts, and the black and white mickey gourmet coffee mugs.

Well, that's all of the updates I have. I am sure I am missing some, but hopefully my pictures will be helpful to someone. At least when the wedding is over I can do a trip report with all pictures and very few comments! I am so excited that we leave in 11 days- but I must focus on wills, trusts and estates now because I have an exam tomorrow
I leave you with a sampling of my bridal showers....

 

[rachaelk101]

Wow that's a ton of great pictures! I've always loved the fastpass idea! I'm looking forward to watching your thread and reading more!