Polished

Things are looking a little different around here eh? I won a pretty blog template giveaway via a contest held by one of my very favorite blogs, Delightfully Tacky! The fancy new template is made by Sarah of xoSillygrrl on Etsy. I was so excited to win this as she just so happened to have a template with pretty bunting across the top which just so happens to be sort of a reoccurring theme in my wedding. 
So! It's March 23rd. Where are we? Well, it's almost midnight, so, it's almost 42 days to go. Forty-two more days to plan the event of our lives. 
Justin and I finally went shopping for his attire. We found some pants, isn't that exciting?! So far he only has pants and shoes. Ties are on the way. Finding the right vest is proving to be more difficult than one would think. 
I've been doing a bit of wedding crafting on the weekends, slowly plugging away at things. Stamping our little initialed heart onto things, writing place cards and making little paper cones out of old book pages. The old book that has sacrificed itself to the cause is called Run Sheep Run (you can't even google it, google doesn't even know about this book) and is something that I picked up in a thrift store once because it was a pretty teal color. As I've been sitting around ripping out it's pages I've almost wished I'd read it first. The snippets i've read sound kinda good and now I feel bad. Books are sacred!


I've also been harnessing a lot of brain power into planning our Honeymoon. Well, the main part of it is taken care of, thanks to Justin's amazing parents giving us our trip to Disney World. But I've been agonizing (okay maybe not quite agonizing but I did stay up one night until like 1am doing research) over which restaurants to make reservations at, what to do, etc etc etc. We're staying at the Animal Kingdom Lodge, which I'd been flip-flopping over until we watched some youtube videos of people sitting on their balconies watching giraffes and zebras go wandering by. I think my problem is that there is just an overwhelming amount of choices. I want to stay at every hotel, go to every restaurant, ride every ride...you get the idea. I keep trying to change my mind about things but thankfully I have Justin to reel me in. I think that I've also been having this same problem with the wedding planning. There is just an overwhelming amount of options, it's difficult to settle with just one choice. Can't I have multiple reception tents set up, each with a different decor theme? Can't I change my shoes 23 times during the day? Making wedding decisions is HARD.


I think my next post I am going to talk about all of the weird wedding-related dreams that I have had over the past several months. I hope this is normal. 




xoxo,


Caitlin

maintenance

Bear with me while the blog undergoes a little makeover. Having some technical issues at the moment!

In other news- 45 days to go!

Organizing

Just a quick note to mention that I've updated my little list of links over there to the right --------->
I'll try to keep a nice little list of all the vendors that we have used throughout the planning of our wedding, from everything to the food down to the fancy tape I used on the boutonnieres. I've also put a link on there to my Pinterest page which has proven to be massively useful as far as gathering ideas and remembering things to purchase, etc. (thank you Robin for showing me the light!). Hopefully this may be helpful if there are any brides-to-be reading my blog... or for people who are as obsessed with Etsy as I am, you can see what sellers I have used. Happy (almost) Friday!


xoxo,




Caitlin

Sixty-Five and Counting

Sixty-five days to go! Some exciting things have been happening lately. First we finally chose a ceremony officiant that was recommended to us by our caterer. His name is Captain Ron Gonzales (you can find his contact info here if you scroll down to Wedding Officiants), we met with him last week and he is going to be a perfect fit for us. We had put off finding an officiant for a long time because we were so unsure of how to go about mixing our beliefs, but I feel so much better about it now. 
Earlier this week we also finally went to have our wedding rings made! This was another thing that we put off for ages because we had no idea what we wanted. I knew that I wanted to keep with the theme of my engagement ring and have something old, preferably from one of our families. It was just a matter of finding the perfect bits and pieces to make up the perfect rings. Justin's ring is going to be one of his dad's old wedding bands that no longer fits. We're just going to have it fitted and polished, and then of course have something special engraved on the inside. 


As for my ring, it's going to made up of three things that are being melted down and combined. The first ring once belonged to Justin's dad's grandmother and was her high school ring from 1927. Her name was Willa Theadosha, how cool is that?!

The second ring belonged to Justin's grandmother (maternal) and is a gorgeous gold initial signet ring.

And now for the best part, the third and final component....

My dad's old gold tooth! So I know most people are probably thinking "Okay, well, that's weird." But it's perfect! I wanted to have a piece from my family included in the ring and we didn't really have any old rings that worked until my dad suggested his old gold tooth. I love it. It makes me laugh every time. And when I have that ring on my finger I will always have a perfect reminder of my family (and my dad's old gold tooth). Perfection.

Last bit of news, we picked up the invitations yesterday from Paper in the Park! They look SO good! Everyone at Paper in the Park did such an amazing job and were so helpful and fantastic to work with. They really were invaluable in helping to make my vision come alive. I started addressing them asap when I got home yesterday, we're a month behind getting them in the mail!

Here's a few sneak peeks at the invites:

Everything came wrapped up in this beautiful box!

xoxo,

Caitlin

A Wee Update

Basically what's been going on lately at the wedding-front has been a massive whirlwind of Etsy purchases. For those that don't know (and I'm not sure how you don't...) Etsy is the mecca motherland online marketplace of vintage, handmade and all things crafting supplies. Let me do a re-cap of what we've ordered from various Etsy sellers so far: my bridal headpiece, rubber stamps for the save-the-date cards, striped washi tape for the boutonnieres, feathers and other materials for the boutonnieres, supplies for the candy bar, pretty striped straws, the men's ties, place cards, and the cake topper! And I'm sure there will be many more orders to come. What did brides do before Etsy? What did brides to before the internet? Before Google? I can't imagine planning a wedding without it (the internet, that is). Imagine having to use a PHONE BOOK. I get chills just thinking about it.


I have my next dress fitting at the end of March which means that I have another month to stress about trying to lose a bit of weight in time. Justin and I have embarked on a nightly exercise regimen and are trying, TRYING to eat healthier. The day before my next fitting is our wedding shower, which I am so excited about! My matron-of-honor and future mother-in-law have been planning away at it, it's going to be a perfectly yummy dessert-fest. I'll also be going in for a trial hair and makeup run pretty soon. Why hasn't my hair grown out into beautiful long wavy locks yet? Am I going to have to get extensions? Extensions kind of make me laugh. Plus, they get sewn onto your head and that doesn't sound like anything I'm interested in having done to my scalp. Also, I don't like fake hair. Will I be wearing fake hair on my wedding day? Only time will tell.




xoxo,




Caitlin

INSANITY

I AM GETTING MARRIED IN THREE MONTHS YOU GUYS. THIS IS CRAZY. 

Wow! Three months exactly. Late last summer it felt like it would take ages to get down to these last final months. I can't believe it's almost here!

Yesterday Justin's wonderful mama hosted a bridal party tea that included myself, my mom, my matron-of-honor Becky (Justin's sister) and my bridesmaids, Robin and Megan. Oh, and of course special appearances by my favorite flower girls in the whole world! We had cucumber sandwiches (yum!) which I had never before eaten and was very excited about. So English! So fancy and proper! Sitting around sipping tea and munching on dainty snacks discussing wedding plans was just what I needed.

For about the past month (literally, all of January), I've been feeling pretty under-the-weather. First I had a cold, then suffered from some weird freakish horrible lower back pain, then developed bronchitis, and now am trudging through pneumonia. It's been fun, really! It's also been difficult to stay in wedding mode and be excited and giddy like I have been. All I've wanted to do is just rest and mope and cough...lots and lots of coughing. Both Justin and I have been in the market for better jobs and I've been continuing to volunteer weekly at the SPCA. So, combine being sick and sore for a month, stressing about work etc. and planning my wedding...all of that adds up to one very over-capacitated brain! So as of today, at the three month mark, I am vowing to myself that things will only go up from here. 

xoxo,

Caitlin

Coming Along

Yesterday we had a little site meeting with our [new] caterer and someone from the tent rental company. For some reason it really made things feel especially real and near. As far as the [new] caterer goes, we got a call from our original one a few weeks ago with some bad news. They said they are unfortunately going out of business and unable to do our wedding. So we quickly found a new one, the lovely Palate Pleasers in Annapolis and secured the date. 
Every time I visit the farm, I get more and more excited. Slowly being able to visualize everything and getting plans set in stone feels so great. We got the tent location figured out, different from my original vision but it will be great. One thing I am a little concerned about is the rather long walk I will have down the aisle. From the doors I will be stepping out of, to the trees we will be standing in front of, it's a bit of a hike! I haven't got an exact measurement, but it's long. Okay so it may be a slightly awkward, drawn-out and dramatic aisle walk, but that's fine with me. Plus there are stairs, so I will be nervous about tripping, yeesh!


We're just about through having the invitations made, I can't wait for everyone to see them! I think they will really be a perfect precedent to the day and set the right tone. I hate to use the term "quirky" because that's become such an overused buzzword, but it's true! This ain't gonna be no prime rib and green beans wedding.


Does every bride think that their wedding is going to be so much better and more unique than anyone else's? Probably so. 


In other news, I've been doing a lot of thrifting for various-sized mason jars. The bookcase in our guest room is quickly filling up. I will (with the help of my bridesmaids, mom and Justin's mom) be doing my own flowers. As in not just making our own bouquets, but putting together all of the centerpieces. I'm SO excited! There are certainly many people who raise brows at the prospect of DIY'ing your own wedding flowers but it doesn't scare me! They are just flowers after all, they're already beautiful by themselves. I want to be as hands-on as I can with my wedding. It has to be special.


In other, other news, I picked up some freebie wedding magazines recently (I long got over the wedding magazine-buying hype first experienced immediately after becoming engaged). Most of these magazines contain some form of a "Wedding Day Checklist" listing in monthly order things that you should be doing (booking a caterer, having dress fittings, ordering invitations, etc). One magazine in particular had a pretty interesting checklist. I think it was actually an ad, but still, behold:

 Welp looks like I'm pretty far behind schedule. 


And on that note, I'll leave you to ponder the current state of our society's standard of beauty [hint: it's absurd].




xoxo,


Caitlin