Gah. It's October already!

Well, not just yet...but almost!!!

Nothing against October, I actually love it. It brings crisp weather, pumpkins, Halloween parties, decorations and Halloween candies (...and last year it brought me cavities from eating too much of that candy), my Mom's birthday and most importantly it marks the anniversary of our engagement. I know I keep saying that I can't believe it has been a year already, but seriously...I can...not...believe it!

In the last few weeks though, I have made some ground. We found the location for our ceremony. After looking for a place for about the last 11 months, I discovered that the hotel where we are having our room block has a nice outdoor location and is willing to do just a ceremony and the "inclement weather" back up ballroom is actually not terrible either. It will be nice for our guests, because they will be able to come to the hotel, attend the ceremony and then if they are staying at the hotel, they can just check in right afterward (or perhaps even before?) The location fee is less than what we were going to pay for the Schram and it's pretty much exactly what I wanted all along.

Well, this is pretty much my perfect location, but I don't live anywhere near anything this amazing:

(I don't know the exact source of that photo, but I'm pretty sure I pulled it from marthastewart.com)

But like I said...it's almost perfect.

Here are a couple photos I took when we went to look at the location.

I can use these chairs, or they have white garden chairs which I may use instead.

As you can see there are a few big trees in the area that provide shade which is very nice, especially in July. (eek!)

The coordinator at the hotel said she can set the site for at least 200 people, which is nice to at least have the option. Not sure how many we should expect yet.

I'd like to use some flower pom poms (my nice technical word for them). Either from real flowers or fake, depending on how much the real things would run.

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I also would like to hang something from the trees if possible, but I don't want to run the risk of looking gaudy. Maybe a couple of paper lanterns or something. I haven't really looked into that yet.

Only other thing I have been considering is having a chuppah. Sean is Jewish and though we technically aren't having a Jewish wedding, it would be nice to honor that part of him with some traditional aspects. He will be breaking the glass at the end of the ceremony (spoiler alert: it's actually a light bulb! I guess it has better pop?)

Well, I guess that's all I have for now.

I'm still looking for the right photographer, I thought I had found him...and then another him...yet both were already booked. More on that next time. I bet you'll be living on the edge of your seats until then!

Where does the time go?

It's been a month...lot's has happened, and then again, not a lot has happened.

It's mostly been research. Researching photographers, photo booth companies, still looking for the perfect ceremony spot (which is becoming one elusive beast!). But we did make some progress yesterday. We met with the officiant we will be using, Toni Maddi. She was so great. I felt totally on the the same page as her and I'm really looking forward to her performing our ceremony. We also went and visited our reception venue last night as they were setting up for a reception. The main purpose was to see where they set up the photo booth, but it turned into a great opportunity to take Sean's Mom and her boyfriend Ted on a tour of the venue and then they treated us to a delicious Tapas dinner! The place looked great all set up and the location of the photo booth is prime. We'll definitely be using that as our favors and guest book.

All in all I felt pretty accomplished yesterday!

My Mom is going to look into us possible having the ceremony at Indian Lakes, where she works. Toni has performed ceremonies there before and suggested it. I never even considered it before, but at this point...I'm going to try to exhaust all resources.

The search for the photographer continues. There are so many great photogs in Chicago, I didn't know it was going to be this hard of a choice! I just hope that by the time we choose to meet with someone they are still available!

I can't believe it's already mid-September. Next month we will have been engaged for a year. This makes me nervous and also makes me wonder what the heck I've been doing for the last 11 months!!!

In order to make myself feel better, I'm going to watch the Coco Channel movie on Lifetime and eat some Toblerone.

ta ta.

Well...it would have been nice.

I got the dresses from Jcrew in the mail and as soon as I ripped open the box, my heart broke a little bit. The color is not at all what I was expecting--a cheery yellow as portrayed in the photos on the Web site. Instead it's more of a mustardy/muddy yellow which in some lights almost looks limey. I showed two of my girls last night and my Mom the other day and they all agreed it wasn't what we were expecting. I also tried one on just to see what the shape was and it just wasn't as cute as I thought it would be. Plus, now that I have found my dress (more on that later), I think I will need something with a bit richer fabric texture.Wah Wah....back to the ol' drawing board. I'm sure I will find something that is exactly what I want, it's a good thing I started early in the game!

I guess I've learned my lessons--always request a fabric swatch and if it seems to good to be true, it probably is.

I'll take some photos and post them later.

It's allllll happening!

I just ordered the dresses for my girls! We decided to go with the JCrew dresses I posted about here. After hearing from JCrew and getting the good news that I would in fact be able to return or exchange the dresses, I decided to e-mail my girls and I'm so happy that they all really liked the dress!

I hope that they are just as adorable in person and that everyone likes them on. I know it's difficult to forecast sizes, etc. this far out, so I'm really greatful that everyone was so totally flexible about it.

Things are starting to get rolling--very exciting!

Okay, back to work.

She Comes in Colors Everywhere...

Well, I never heard back from JCrew about the final sale policy on the dresses below. So...I guess it's not meant to be. I'm sure they will come back around. They seem to have a lot of the same stuff every other season.

So, I've been going back and forth about colors for well...about 9 months now. At first I really wanted to do jewel tones:

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I found the board above and really liked the colors. I also found some jewel tone inspiration in other places too. Oddly enough, my Christmas tree ornaments were one.

Then I started reading wedding magazines and wedding blogs and wedding web sites and was changing my mind on a weekly basis.

First I loved Aqua and Emerald a la Martha, but alas I need more color than that:

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And then I really liked the cranberry and orange combo, but later decided that was a bit too much like fall:

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Then I was thinking brighter shades, maybe pink and orange?


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or maybe a more subdued version:


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I really like the pink/orange but I feel like it could be a little overwhelming. So then I thought about yellow and pink with small amounts of orange. I have been seeing a lot of things that I like in this area.

Some marigold and fuschia

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So, I'm pretty sure I'll end up with some variation of these colors. I love these flowers:


Here are a few more yellow (and little pink) favs.


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(I'm pretty sure this is a Martha)

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I guess it's never a bad thing to have so many great ideas to choose from and so many resources to tap into! Some day I will have enough time to update my links section to include the gazillion blogs and sites I visit on a daily basis. Hey, I only have 11 months left to drool over all things wedding, I'll do it all day if I want!

GAH!

JCrew is having a sale and one of the dresses I really like is included:

It was originally $260.00, now $179. Normally, this would be great, right?

Problems would be:

A) it's only onsale until Friday.
B) my wedding is still 11 months and some odd days away.
C) you can't try them on.
D) and most importantly, it says you can't exchange or return!

Waaaaaah. Waaaaah. I e-mailed them to see if problem D can be worked around at all. I really think these dresses are so cute and even though $179 is not cheap-o, it's almost as much as I've paid for dresses from David's Bridal.

Le sigh. I don't know what to do.

The count down is on...

I hate those internet count down clocks. But, I thought it was worth mentioning that I'll be getting hitched in like 364 days and some odd hours, minutes, and of course...seconds.

woo.