Lots and Lots of Lights

22 boxes to be exact. Just enough to go around the perimiter of the 45x100 foot pavillion, thats 290 feet of lights. Crazy! They were originally $9.99 per box but they were half off right after the holidays..hell yeah!

I still need a couple strands to put under the linens around the cake table and I also have to decide if I'm going to have lights for the head table set up. Better jump on it because I dont know where I'm going to get them from if I wait much longer!

Dress shopping with mom!

Let me just give you a short little history about my mom and I. We dont get along, ever. Most of the time when we're together we fight, its like we're both stubborn and have to get our own ways and we just clash. Well I moved out of her house to live with my dad when I was a young teen so we've never been close. Everytime we're together now its like we both walk on ice trying to be nice to each other, its weird.

She kept trying to try on strapless dresses, something which I said was a no from the beginning. It was like she wanted to be young again, and she's not. In fact, most of the dresses she tried on that she liked (and I didn't) were bridesmaid dresses! I know MOB dresses can be old, but they dont have to be.

Then she tried on this strapless dress that looked almost EXACTLY like the bridesmaid dresses we've narrowed it down too. It was strapless and pulled to the side with some sparkles on it. Even after she put it on and I said it looked way to similar she continued to talk about how she wanted it. Even that night once we were home she kept saying she wanted to go back and get it. I will cry if she does and not let her come to my wedding. ha I didn't post pictures of that one though becuase as I said, its a no.

Anyways, heres the dresses I've narrowed it down to..she only likes 1 of these though. The burgandy spaghetti strap one is the only one she likes out of the four, and its the only one I dont like out of the four! ha Figures huh? I had to include it though because it was the best looking 'young' dress on her. I still think it shows some pudge right in the middle tummy which is mainly why I dont like it, but I also dont like the fact that its spaghetti strap (although I'm willing to deal with it for her).

Which one do you like the best?

6 months

We've hit the 6 month mark! Remember this post? Yep, my first one back in April! We got engaged on January 23rd of 07! Its been two years already and we've now hit the six month mark..I. Can. Not. Wait.

Bridesmaid Dresses

One of the last things I did while home for Christmas was look for bridesmaid and mother of the bride dresses. I went with my maid of honor first and we narrowed it down to two choices. Either of which will be in yellow.

This first one is by Alexia but I can't find it online. The only problem is it either comes in too light or too bright of a color. The price is right around $200 I think.

This second one is Davids Bridal style F12385. I like how similar it is to mine but I'm not sure I like it as much as the one above. The color for this one would be the perfect shade of yellow though.

My MOH honostly doesn't care which one we get. I emailed this to Jerry's sister Donna, who is also a brisemaid to see what her opinion was on them. I'm guessing whichever one she likes best we'll go with. Which one do you like better?

Flowers

Although we don't know who will be designing our flower arrangements for our wedding we do know what type of flowers we want.

The flowers we will be using are lillies, roses, alstroemeria, stephanotis and babys breath.

The Ceremony:

We will have chair arrangements almost exactly like these. All the greenery will be there but lillies and roses will be added.

I love the bouquet below! My Bouquet will have the same fullness and be the same size as that one, only the flowers will change to what we're using. My girls will be about half this size and contain everything but stephanotis. Mine will also have more yellows where as theirs will have more whites.

The Bout's will be either alstroemeria or roses, although I'm aiming more towards the alstroemeria. My grooms will have some stephanotis in it to match mine though :) The mothers corsages and fathers bouts will also either be alstroemeria or roses with stephanotis and the grandparents will be the same minus the stephanotis.

We'll also be lining petals down the aisle runner to add to the day. Since our ceremony is outside I want to bring in as much color as possible.

The Reception:

Since we're having the reception outside in a pavillion I plan on covering the posts that hold it up with tulle and a bouquet of flowers like the picture below. In all we'll need 21 bouquets to do every post but I don't care, this is a MUST have. The cieling is flat in the pavillion though so nothing will go on it :(

Centerpieces are the only thing I'm still undecided about. I basically told the florists they could do whatever they thought looked best for these. They will be full like the picture below but in smaller vases so they're not so high. They will be made up of yellow and green flowers and have very little greenery.

There will also be some arrangements for the memory table, guestbook table, etc. but they will just resemble the centerpieces with some minor changes. In all I'm hoping not to spend more than $2,000 for everything, I can't wait to get our quotes back!

Florists

Another thing we did while we were back was meet with a couple of florists. Out of five florists we've only gotten one quote back so far so we haven't decided on anything yet.

First we met with Sue from Girtons Flowers in Jamestown, Ny. She had some great additions to what I wanted but I'm scared to get her quote back, they seemed kind of like an expensive place. I hope the price is on the lower end though because I really liked her!

Then we met with Anita from CRosiez who is also in Jamestown. She made me nervous because she wanted to design every little thing right then and there. She was more of the business end of the shop so she wanted to get everything right for her designer she said. I hope her quote is super high so I can feel good about eliminating her right away.

Next we met with a woman, whom I forget her name, from Virg-Ann Flower Shop in Warren, PA. She gave us a quote of around $1500 for everything including delivery and set up. I took pictures with me to every shop but hers because I forgot to print an extra set out. I thought her price was kind of cheap so I'm not sure she realizes how full I want my bouquets and centerpieces to be so if I think about going with her I'll have to email her a couple more pictures to make sure the quote is accurate.

We then met with Kim from Alleghany Floral. We eliminated her immediately because she was so whacky. Her phone rang the entire time we were there for our appointment and she kept answering it! She also couldn't remember my name and made me call her twice the day of the appointment to remind her about it! I do not want a woman like that ruining my wedding day.

Lastly we met with Marie from Ring Around A Rosey. This appointment went rather quickly because by the time I got to her I knew exactly what I wanted from meeting with all of the other florists. She seemed very polite and helpful and even put her input in on some color changes I may want to make.

Out of thsoe five I was really only interested in three. Since I've already received one of their quotes back I'm just waiting on two so then we can figure out who we're going to end up going with and put a deposit down. This is the last big vendor we need to book, well unless we end up having a videographer but thats still undecided.

Christmas

Finding a cake baker was one of the first things we did when we were back in PA. The next thing we knew it was christmas day and we were tearing open all of our presents like mad little kids. Needless to say I am very happy with how it turned out because I got everything on my list, which wasn't much but still. Here were my three larger presents:

Yes, a KitchenAid Mixer. I don't need a heavy duty mixer like this, I dont even cook that much! But I plan on trying, and I didn't know really what else to ask for. It gets hard when you get older and parents never just want to give you money, so why not ask for something you would never by yourself? I swear I plan to start baking more and will use atleast once a month to get my dads moneys worth.

Microsoft Publisher. I had a free trial of this when I was designing my Save the Dates and I really loved using it. Unfortunately, the trial ran up so I was forced to ask for it. I think its fairly easy to use and plan on using it to make my invitations, table numbers, reserved seating signs, programs and more. Can't wait to start!

Ipod. I have NEVER had an ipod before. I asked for it because we've been going to the gym lately and it would be nice to take along. I was hoping it would make me want to stay there more actually! I had to have my brother set it up and put songs on it though as I'm still in the stoneage and can't figure it out myself.

I got a couple other things including clothes, a dart board, sneakers, spice rack, new butcher knives (I think they were trying to tell me I needed to start cooking more now that I'm going to be a wife..ha) and some other odds and end things to go around the house. Overall it was a wonderful Christmas and I can not wait to go back home for the wedding!

I am also looking forward to tonight, I get to pick Jerry up at the airport at 7:30! I have missed him oh so much these past four days and can't wait till I can cuddle up next to him again :)

Bride Wars

Wonderful movie! Last night my BM Emily and I went and saw this flick. Which reminds me I never updated you guys on what was going to happen with my wedding date/her being in the BP but thats because we still dont know what we're going to do yet-I'll keep you posted, a decision should be made shortly :)

As for the movie, she said she understood why the ratings in the newspaper gave it a D while I thought it deserved a C, maybe even a B. Although some parts of the movie were slow I thought it was quite commical and enjoyed it. I love Kate Hudson, although her bangs bothered me throughout the entire movie. This is a must see for any bride!

Our Cake

Our cake will be a four tier hexagon shaped and will sit on a square mirror, although I want the mirror much bigger than the one in the picture below. I want to be able to see the entire cake going down into the mirrow when your looking at it. The icing for the top and third layer will be light yellow while the second and the fourth layer will be white. I think I'm going to ask her if the bottom layer can be tie-dyed white and yellow though, we'll see.

The top two tiers are raspberry swirl cake with raspberry filling, the third tier is yellow and chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream in between them and the fourth tier is plain white. I'm debating on changing all of this though because I dont feel its right..I dont know yet though.

The design will just be a scroll, like on the first and third tiers in the picture below but it will be in white.

There will also be a brighter yellow shade of fondant ribbon around the bottom of each tier. To finish it off we'll have a man and wife cake topper, which I have yet to find.

Cake Baker

The day after we arrived we met with a Cindy from Cindy's Let Them Eat Cake. She was very pleasant and actually gave me some great ideas to add to the cake that I hadn't thought of doing. She had quite a variety of flavors for us to try including spice, carrot, lemon, white, chocolate, red velvet and pistachio. I feel like I didn't really "ooooo" over any of the flavors though, even the fillings and frostings weren't that impressive. Her pricing was $660 which included delivery and set up, which I didn't think was bad since I had a budget of $700.

The next lady we were to meet was Linda from Linda Austin's Cakes. I had emailed the month before and set up a meeting for the 23rd. She said I could show up anytime before 5 so I wrote back that it would probably be right around four. We were running late because of the roads that day, she was an hours drive from my house, so I called her and asked if that would be okay. She replied that she closed her shop that day to make deliveries so she couldn't meet at all and asked if I could come the next day. What kind of person doesn't call to cancel their appointments?! I was furious because we had just driven all that way for no reason. Atleast I found out what type of person she was before I hired her for my wedding!

The last lady we met with was Joyce from Cakes by Joyce. She was also nice and had some good ideas, although I pretty much already knew what I wanted. She gave us a box with 6 different HUGE cupcakes in it-some with buttercream and some with fondant-to try. They were absolutely amazing, so moist and delicious. Her price for almost the same exact cake as Cindys was $430 including setup and delivery. As soon as we got in the car we immediately knew who we were going to choose. I sent her a check the next day so we officially have a baker! I'll share the finished product later!

I'm Baaacck

I am officially back. If you've been wondering where I have been I can now inform you; on vacation. Jerry and I went back to Pennsylvania on the 21st of December to spend the holidays with our families. I love going back to visit everyone buts its definately nice being back in our home. I actually am home by myself for a few days, Jerry isn't scheduled to fly in until Friday night. He stayed back to help his grandfather do some work on his apartment building. I can't wait till he gets back, I miss him already.

I managed to get quite a few wedding related checks done as well while I was back. I'll be sure to update on everything that happened later. As of right now, I'm crawling into bed because its eleven oclock and I have to be to work at eight. Goodnight!