wedding

May152010

Dress and Shoes… CHECK!

Fantastic news… I bought my [replacement] dress this morning!

Steve has to spend 6-7 hours at a work orientation in Miami, so I was a nice fiancé and drove him up there. Good thing too since the most direct route was all torn up and I needed to use my old shortcuts around the city. Rather than drive the 45min back down to Homestead, I hung out in my old stompin’ grounds. I went to Dadeland mall, with the intention of hitting all the anchor stores and seeing what they had.

Nordstrom, not anything of my taste in the dress section. Moved on to Macy’s, wandered around checking all the rack, honing in on white and blue and finally saw it. White, short, lace, full skirt, ribbon belt. I grabbed 2 sizes, wandered some more, then hit up the dressing room. A-dor-able!

I could envision it with a different color belt. The skirt is full enough to allow for numerous petticoats, depending on how full I want it. The straps are wide enough that I don’t need to worry about special undergarments… hello, Spanx! And the lace is simply gorgeous! I texted a handful of friends with a picture and posted it to twitter. The reaction was all positive and for a whopping $75 plus tax, the beauty was mine! Yes, she was on sale, but even the regular price of $99 was damn reasonable.

At the “suggestion” of a friend, I ended up hitting up all the shoe stores in the mall and found some super cute cobalt blue wedge sandals. Granted, by the time I bought them, I felt like my feet were going to fall off between the blisters – Chucks with no socks is evil! – and walking on the sprained ankle. The sales girl was wearing them in black, which is always a good sign of extreme shoe comfort, and told me she is pregnant, another good sign. They were mine. Another $45.

Bear in mind that the other dress sold for $279 plus shipping, so I am definitely under the budget I set for myself.

Here’s a little sneak peek of the gorgeous lace and shoes:

I purchased 1.5″ wide orange ribbon and 5/8″ blue ribbon. My plan is to sew the blue to the orange and replace the black ribbon currently on the dress. The ribbon currently falls higher up that I like, so I’ll be cutting off the loops as well.

May012010

A real update!

I know I do not post nearly as much as I should. But in all honesty, I do the majority of my wedding “planning” on twitter these days. I am also the featured bride on Tuesdays over on TweetMyWedding. The other brides are amazing and you should really go check us all out. 🙂

sneak peek of the design for all the “invites”

That little plug aside, I’ve finalized the design for our “invites” and just need the final head count to order them. I put it in quotes because it’s a whole package of Vegas wedding announcements, Miami reception invitation cards, Miami reception RSVP cards, and little cards for our photo dump website. Our what? You know… when you go to a wedding, take tons of pictures with your camera then eventually get around to putting them on Facebook. Well, I created a Shutterfly site specifically for people to be able to upload everything there so we can see what everyone has done. We, and anyone viewing the site, can create books, bags, or whatever else from those pictures.

My main reason for posting is that we have been working on the guest list in the last few days. We have a fairly comprehensive list of family and friends. The problem lies in my father’s family. To say they’re all estranged is probably too harsh of a word. I am good friends with one of my cousin’s, and facebook friends with her and 3 others. However, my father hasn’t uttered a word to his step-mother, step-brother or step-sister in years. We kinda like it that way. My dilemma is do we be the bigger people and invite the lot hoping the “adults” decline and the cousins I like accept, or just not invite anyone?

What do you think? I can give back story if you want via email.

Thanks!

Apr022010

Possible Budget Resolution

Yesterday’s April Fool’s post earned me the highest daily click thru’s on the blog since it began last July. Wow, that’s crazy. Apparently I disappointed a lot of people. And one person used it as a spin-off fooling to my poor best friend.

Anyhow, during my mass procrastination and crying fest last night (over homework, moving and not having time for either) I cracked open the wedding budget I started in the very early stages when we were still planning a cruise wedding. This was about 5 date/ location changes ago. =) So yeah, opened that sucker up, added a bunch more tabs, and feel pretty OK with it.

On the Vegas Only tab, I am including Vegas-specific items. If it can be used elsewhere or won’t be coming to Vegas, it’s not included. I have the flight/hotel estimate as $1200, though it might be a smidge less. Our huge suite for 4 nights/ 5 days with the major discount is $594, including all fees and taxes. From all estimates I’ve seen, flights should be about $550.

Other than that, I included tips to the hair dresser, limo driver, photographer, and officiant. The wedding package itself (duh!), the marriage license, the cupcakes and wine (reception), wedding hair, the favors (kick ass polycarbonate water bottles), and a handful of other items are in this list. I didn’t put food and entertainment on there cuz I don’t really know how to budget for those. Ideas?

Glaringly missing from that tab is the dress, veil, and his suit since we will be able to wear them again. Actually, we’ll wear them to the Miami reception. Also missing are our wedding rings, ketubah, the stamp I bought, cupcake wrapper pattern (totally reusable!), “something blue” necklace (I wear it 2-3 times a week already), fake flowers (future home décor), and a handful of other things that I’ll think of in the future.

The Miami reception tab is still relatively blank. Well, it does say “Publix cake” in large letters but is otherwise blank. Ha! I think only Southerners will get why that’s such a big deal.

Mar302010

March 16 TMW post

Check me out every Tuesday on TweetMyWedding!
++++

Tweet: @msrib our vegas budget is $1500, but flight & hotel is about $1100. methinks we need to rethink that budget. *sigh*

One of the biggest wedding-related things on my mind lately has been our budget. We picked Las Vegas to keep our budget low – as well as about a hundred other reasons. Being tight on funds, and unsure when Steve will find a job in Miami, our budget is even more precarious. That said, I have been trying to re-figure our Vegas budget. It’s basically come to my attention (due to crazy amounts of research) that a destination wedding can cost upwards of about $30,000.

Not ours!

We have the ceremony/ officiant, photographer/ videographer, limo, flowers, and I’m sure other things booked with Scenic Las Vegas Weddings for the grand total of $399. They came highly recommended by 2 different friends and have been amazing about responses via both email and their Facebook page.
Our hotel suite for 5 days/ 4 nights is roughly $600 at the Luxor. No, it’s not the classiest hotel on the strip, but it’s affordable and fun. We both love Egyptian things so it is perfect. Also, with their nearly weekly Twitter Tuesday specials, all our guests can stay in the same hotel if they choose.

Our airfare is the problem. Having never purchased 2 airline tickets anywhere, it’s baffling to me that they’re between $5-600. Sure, that’s 2 round trip tickets from Miami/ Ft Lauderdale to Vegas, but still.
Pretty much, as our budget stands, we’ve blown the entire thing on flights, hotel and wedding. This leaves no room for food, Grand Canyon day trip, souvenirs, food, food, food. Notice a small problem? We need to figure this out, and sort of soon.

How would you handle something like this? I’ve seen DW wedding budgets handled as adding what you’d spend on the honeymoon and what you’d spend on the wedding. Considering we’re having a reception sometime in 2011 in Miami, our budget is ridiculously low.

I think our “problem” is we’re both thinking of this as a one day event when the most amount of time, energy and money should be spent on our relationship and marriage. On the other hand, this is a vacation trip with a couple hours of wedding-related things shoved in there. Yes, we’re kinda weird that way. =)

Tweet: @msrib I am so happy that the gorgeous wedding dress i no longer love & adore will be sold today & go to a new home this week. thank you, @ebay

That’s right, it finally sold. For a whole lot less than I paid for it and after being posted on 5 wedding resale sites and on ebay 8-9 times since May. I will be getting a grossly lower price than I wanted, but at least it’s gone. I took a friends advice and dropped the price and voila! gone…

Tweet: @msrib i had the not-so-startling realization this morning that i only have 15 more working days at my wonderful job.

I am fortunate for having so much time until my wedding due to the fact that we are making a North Carolina to Florida move in just under a month. And I am graduating (read: loads of writing and studying and exams) with my MBA in about 6 weeks. I have no idea when I’ll be starting my new job, but there’s leeway on my start date.

Mar262010

Bringing in Food

This is me not working on my midterms or paper. My brain seriously hurts.

But anyhow, I started looking for a hair salon – cuz hey, why not, right? I asked @luxorlv if there was a salon onsite for us (ok, me) to get our hair done, and she pointed me directly to their price list (PDF). Bueno! Last time I’d checked, I only saw stuff about their spa.

I’m definitely thinking of getting my hair done. Since I’ll be wearing Converse, I won’t need a pedicure. And since I bite the hell outta my nails, I won’t need a manicure. Granted, if I really wanted a mani or pedi, I could easily get them at home the day before we leave.

I also started playing around on the Amenities page to look at the food prices for a possible in-room meal. They are crazy! I’m still totally OK with the whole group heading to one of the many buffets in Vegas after the pictures are done. However, after reading their Policies (PDF) I’m worried that we may not be able to bring the cupcakes in from Retro without an extra charge. I’ll give them a buzz on Monday to double check. Pretty much because while their cakes look amazing, they are also pricey (PDF) for wedding cakes or even “special event” cakes.

198 days until we’re married. Um, wasn’t it just like 300++ yesterday?? Seriously, time is flying, but not fast enough.

Mar252010

The Dress… she is GONE

She is currently in the hands of the very capable USPS folks. I even paid for insurance and spent more than she paid me for shipping. But I don’t care, cuz she’s gone baby gone!

Mar232010

March 16 TMW post

Check me out every Tuesday on TweetMyWedding!
++++

Tweet: @msrib we had a very productive day: goodwilling, food, packing supplies, & paper/ stamps/ ink pads for wedding cupcake wrappers. to emboss or not?

We’re having so few actual “wedding” items in Vegas that I feel the need to DIY everything that I can possibly make. For example, we’re having a champagne (or wine) and cupcakes reception in our suite after the ceremony and pictures. Should I be content with the cupcakes as when I pick them up? Of course not! I’m planning on making super cute wrappers and cupcake flags for each one. Or at least the wrappers as both might be overkill. This weekend I started working on a stamp to have made to use for things like embossing the wrappers, stamping napkins, and post-wedding, using to stamp letters.

Tweet: @msrib: http://twitpic.com/18o4k8 – Revised font.. Like so?

Our favors are 32oz polycarbonate water bottles that I’m putting our logo on. The good thing is we’re moving to Miami in a few weeks where the company is, so I have plenty of time to order and pick them up. The biggest problem is settling on a logo I like. As the designer, I’m the picky one; Steve isn’t all that concerned with what the logo looks like.

After a bunch of different logos and polling my twitter friends, I ended up ordering the stamp off Etsy from BlossomStamps for really reasonable. It’s $10 plus like $2 shipping for a 1″x1.5″ custom stamp. Now to find the embossing powder, cute paper, and free time to work on all the projects.

208 days left!

Mar222010

Vegas On My Mind…

The dress? She is G-O-N-E! Seriously. The 843rd time was the charm I suppose. It was lowering the price considerably and just continually reposting it on ebay that most likely worked. Within 2 hours of the auction ending, I already had the money in my Paypal account. It is amazing! And it only took 10 very freakin long months to sell…

Now onto other things…..

Steve keeps asking me what I will do with my free time after the wedding is over. Seriously, I can sit online for hours and look at cake boards, dresses, cupcakes, new projects to undertake, ketubah imagery, look up and customize favors, and the list goes on and on and on. I could occupy a very large chunk of my days playing with wedding things.

Want to see our suite and Vegas party reception? I am so excited and can’t wait to stay here! Sure, it’s not the highest end hotel, but I don’t care. We’re staying in a suite for 4 nights/ 5 days and enjoying ourselves the whole time. Our wedding is actually going to be IN our suite, followed by a cupcake/ champagne reception.

Image from Luxor Las Vegas

Slide show and 360 video

Info page with the floorplan

She’s just a really pretty room and I’m super excited. 6.5 months to go.

Also, we’re moving to Miami in a little less than a month. 17 hours away by car. It’s been coming for a long time, but was finalized a few weeks ago. Well, about a week and a half ago when I gave my notice at work. It seriously hurts that I’m leaving such an amazing job and the best bosses I’ve ever had (sorry Jeffy) but I have to do it. Also, after giving my notice, I learned that I don’t take praise all that well. I am the person that laughs it off or turns 6 shades of red. Who knew I was so.. humble?

We’re leaving to move into my parents place, well, the cottage on their property. It’s a 2/2 complete with kitchen, family room, dining room, and everything. It’s really cool. Right now my family (yes Cathy, you’re my family too!) is renovating and painting it for us. It will be difficult at first moving back to the place I swore I wouldn’t return, but it will definitely help when we have children. My parents are about 150 yards away, brothers, aunts, uncles, everyone are super close.

As crappy as I feel about leaving my job, this means I will be able to have a bridal shower. And start planning our Miami reception. And plan for zee bambinos. Ahhh bambinos!

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