Wedding Inertia

There are twenty something days until our wedding.  I could look up the exact number-but why bother?

I feel that this is probably not the proper attitude, unless this is that wedding zen thing you hear so much about.  There is so much to do and now that I am pretty much done with my summer coursework, I have nothing but time to get cracking.

I haven't been completely idle.  I have figured out what I'm going to do to my hair, my bouquet situation, and I've found tutorials for how to do most everything else that I would like to do.  I have the information and the necessary technology.  Now I just need to get off my rufty dufty and do something about it. 

I'd rather watch Talladega Nights.

Project Wedding Progress Report

How about a picture less progress report?  I can't find my camera cord and I'm too lazy to figure out an alternative.

Let's get to it!

• I finally finished my wedding dress muslin.  I'm still futzing with details and decorations but I am probably 90 percent there.  This is only my second muslin but I want to be confident before I slice into the expensive stuff.  I have probably 20-30 hours in this muslin version at this point.  In addition to fitting and style details I've also been experimenting with ways to make the actual sewing easier.  To hell with rules!  I'm going Rogue!
• Wes found an excellent 100% wool grey suit for . . . get this . . . $5.00.  This is completely awesome but I swear it also kind of singes my grits.  First, I always assumed that 5.00 wedding suits was some kind of wedding blog trickery.  Second, where is the thrift store magic for big girls?!  The injustice.
• RSVP postcards slowly trickled in then stopped altogether.  So far we have eleven confirmed guests . . . but there could be more as both our mothers keep adding people to invite!  When we asked them there was no response but now that the first wave of invitations has gone out they suddenly have opinions. . . so we have to make more invitations.  Hopefully I can get them in the mail tomorrow.
• The time has come to think about . . .  decorating this here shindig and all the other projects that still exist on my list.  I left it pretty late but I think this might be a good thing.  I don't have forever to waffle over things like color choice and design details.  I just have to get it done.

DIY?=Epic FAIL

 There comes a time in every girls life when she just has to say fuck it. 

Friends, today is the day.

I’m kind of over this wedding thing.  I have been futzing with paper, obsessing over flowers, contemplating dress variations and various other ridiculous things and I would really like my regular life back now.

I want to remove Weddingbee from my daily blogroll.  I want to stop fishing my Brides magazine out of the bathroom trashcan just to look at the pictures.  It is time to stop the madness.

I looked over my insane four column list of things that still need doing and decided that at least half of them will not be done by me. 

Oh yes-I was lazy and cheap as hell before but friends, it’s about to get real.  Really real.

Mama will just have to be horrified.

Some things were great ideas and cost effective ways to include elements that I might not otherwise be able to afford.  Some were just showing off.  As in . . . “look how little I’m going to spend and what I can achieve anyway.  Aren’t I awesome?!”  

I'm holding on to the easy projects and to the things I really love.  Everything else is getting sent to the "Nope" bin.

Ultimately I am recommitting myself to simplicity.  Hopefully that will also translate into a lot less bitching by yours truly.

Wedding Planning Thus Far

We are quickly approaching the end of the semester . . . like Thursday quickly.  Summer courses are insane!

Know what else we are quickly approaching?  THE WEDDING!

So far six people are coming . . . and I am starting to freak a little bit.  I was all calm, cool and collected when I thought no one would come but oh the times they do change.

There is so much to do--not least of which finishing my wedding dress and Wes' wedding vest-oh yeah, haven't written about that yet.  Hopefully going forward with only one class and no job will give me more time to get things done!

To that end, I will be taking a brief hiatus from blogging to resume next week on Monday

Bouquet Alternatives

The crazy train has officially started!

The wedding is a little more than two months away, and I am neck deep in summer school.  We are going to have to get serious to get all of our DIT projects done.

Speaking of projects-I decided on one more.  Lookit . . .

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Pretty right?  Get this-they are PAPER.  

I love this as an alternative bouquet option.  I'm going to be practicing with various web tutorials, coffee filters, and crepe paper to see what I can come up with. 

Here are my first attempts.  Not perfect-clearly, but not bad either.  I think they could be perfected easily and a little paint would make all the difference.

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Would you attempt a crafty bouquet at the not quite zero hour?

Progress Report

Yesterday was my 100th post!  Go me!

Hopefully I can finish unpacking and sorting this weekend so I can get back to getting these posts out on time.  Wes and I have been really busy around here with projects.  I'll post on these in more detail in the coming week, but for now--want a progress report?

I sorted and organized our book collection.

All images personal photos.

We built a table.

We printed invitations.

We assembled invitations.

And I experimented with making coffee filter flowers.

Who knows what next week will bring!

In Which the USPS Cracks Me Up

We are thiiiiiiiis close to being ready to send out the invitations.  We devoted most of yesterday morning to printing and trimming and we assembled one complete invitation and headed on down to the post office to have it weighed.  This turned out to be a good move.

First, we assembled the postage we already have.  Fun fact about Wes . . . he has some kind of freaky sixth sense when it comes to finding spare change and yes, stamps, on the ground.  He's like some kind of weirdo things-with-monetary-value detector.

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We have some celebration stamps, some Liberty Bell stamps, a little American flag action, and assorted fruits and vegetables.  lI should probably mention here that I am not in any way invested in special wedding postage.  This might be because I have a somewhat adversarial relationship with the postal service and well . . . I like to pick my battles and postage ain't the field I'm willing to die on.

It's good that I feel that way because the postal service served us up this action.

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That's right.  A little Washington, some Purple Hearts and a random assortment of flowering herbs.   Patriotic pastoral.

I find this combination strangely hilarious.  Partly because I did not immediately recognize the dude in the wig with all the blush and also because my failure to do so reminded me of something funny from my high school days. 

My friends and I were hanging out at my friend Eric's house one day.  His mother had a painting of Jesus hanging over the piano--as one generally does in that part of the south.  This Jesus was the long-haired, blonde, blue-eyed, dirty hippie version.  My mother's version, which happened to be similar to my other friend's mothers' versions, was the Morris Chestnut-y, dreadlocked, bare-chested, muscle-y variety.  Which is why LaConda looked at the painting and asked Eric, "Who is that white man?"

Eric looked--aghast.  "That's JESUS!"

Hilarious.

Daybreak

Well . . . not quite.

Wes and I have decided on a morning wedding.  We are setting the ceremony time at 9:00 in the morning.

We have two very good reasons. 

First, we want to have an outdoor ceremony . . . in Georgia . . . in September.  It's probably going to be hot and steamy and not necessarily in a good way. 

We also are not having the traditional party all night long wedding reception.  Instead, we're aiming for relaxing picnic.  The goal is to have the ceremony in the morning, serve a nice brunch with a little side of wedding cake and enjoy our day at the park.

We might plan a little night time outing as well but the plan is just a really low key, beautiful celebration.

Deciding on a morning wedding might seem a small decision, but it wasn't one that we came to easily.  Our wedding vision is constantly evolving and I have finally decided that this is a good thing.  

When we first start thinking about weddings, we think of all the really cool/beautiful/awesome things we've seen/heard/read about and we want our wedding to be just like that.

This is good because it's inspiration.

Seeing beautiful, ingenious ideas fires up the imagination and motivates us to push forward because wow-look how awesome it could be! 

This is bad because it can feel like pressure.

How do you make beautiful detail x happen if you don't have the funds/space/time/skill?  If you dwell on these questions too long you begin to feel like failure and like your wedding won't measure up.  This can lead to inaction which is very, very bad.

While having a plan and sticking to it works just fine for some people, others need to just commit to staying flexible.

I wasn't willing to do that and for a long time I clung to my original wedding vision which was proving to be incredibly difficult to achieve on our own.

I cried about it a little--but I eventually embraced flexibility and the license to just do whatever we wanted to do.

Deciding on a morning wedding removed a lot of the guilt and competitiveness I was feeling.  It meant that we were not planning a dinner and dance party so it really freed me to feel that we can do whatever we want. 

And that whatever we want will be just fine.

Consulting the Book

This is our wedding on Excel.

 I created an excel document to keep track of wedding related minutiae.  I did this with list wizard because I generally don’t eff with Excel.  I can make some banging lists though.

Anyway-ours consists of three workbook pages.  They were originally separate documents but I consolidated because I am lazy and jeez . . . all that clicking.

The first page is our wedding budget.  There are tons of free downloadable templates for this online.  I picked one and customized it to make it blend with the theme of the book.  (I was having a purple moment.)

The second page is where I keep a list of itemized expenditures from the wedding account.

Items in red are outstanding reimbursements to the account for tangentially related wedding items.  We’ll keep them in our tally but they are not specifically for the wedding.

The third page is our guest list.  I won’t show you particulars because photoshop is another program I don’t have carnal relations with.  But check this out . . .

Click on that to get the full effect. 

WTF with the guest list!?

Crazy right?   

Wes and I fully intend to have a small wedding so we limited the family invitations to aunts, uncles, and select cousins.  Apparently we both have families that are all about the procreating.  Despite the ridiculous numbers, we fully expect less than a quarter of our guests to actually attend.  All but three live out of state and many probably won’t be up for the trip. 

Our dilemma, and the reason our list is so expansive, is that we wouldn’t be comfortable not inviting everyone and our efforts to limit a guest list might be futile anyway.  For most of our relatives an open invitation is just assumed.  “Someone’s getting married?  Of course the whole fam is invited!” 

(Don’t let the bourgeois posturing fool you—we really are not fancy people.  Country come to town anyone?)

At the same time, we don’t want an invitation to our wedding to make anyone feel pressured or compelled to go to the expense or discomfort of traveling.  Of course we want them here-we love them.  But we don’t want to bankrupt them or cause undue stress.

It’s a weird position to be in.

Our stance so far has been to stall on the invitations—which we have really elevated to an art.   

Now that we are officially established in our new residence we can’t use that excuse anymore.  Alas!

That does mean, however, that I will be sharing my handmade beauties with you soon!

An Example of What Not to Do

We will be getting married in three months—and we still haven’t mailed out the invitations . . . for our semi-destination wedding.

Why?

Because in the interest of making this whole wedding thing as difficult as possible, we decided that we needed a bigger apartment.  I mean, is there a better time to move than the sweaty heat of early June?  (Oh there is?)

I am conflicted about how I feel about this.  On the one hand, we NEED a bigger place.

·   Our current kitchen is tiny and not really made for cooking. 

·   When Little Bit the Kid* spends the weekend he sleeps on the futon in our room—which we squeezed in through sheer determination and cheapness.  (Who needs a big kid bed when he’s been sleeping on this one since infancy, he’s already peed on it.  Folks with kids know the drill.)  He’s five now and kind of a gross roommate.  (Don’t send me hate mail.  Yes he’s cute and adorable and all that jazz, but he also snores like a freight train and farts like a grown man.  He totally reminds me of the time I rented a room in a house in Maryland for a month-had this one weirdo housemate who always smelled damp.)  He really needs his own room-a room where Lincoln Logs can run rampant and I’m not stepping on blocks every five minutes.

·   We have one closet that can’t actually be used for clothing as it’s currently being used for storage and our laundry situation is slowly taking over our bedroom.

·   We need somewhere to eat together that doesn’t involve our “nice” futon and TV trays.

These might be first world problems but they are totally stressing us out.  We stuck it out for a year in our tiny house-it’s time to upgrade.

On the other hand-I can not think of a worse time to schedule this little relocation.  (And I do mean little-we are literally moving to a building across the street.)  I am in the middle of a summer school session and I spend roughly three hours in class and four hours at work everyday.  Who has time to breathe-much less pack?  And the invitations?  Well-I just don’t want to send them and our RSVP postcards out with our old address on them.  Y’all don’t know our families—but it just isn’t worth the headache. 

Set up an online RSVP on your wedding website you say?  Well, yes-and I did.  Then I thought about who I was actually dealing with.

Ours is a small wedding made up of mostly family-quite a few considerably older than us and those of them that aren’t choose to live in areas that have not yet been blessed with any internet connection faster than dial up.

Nightmarish.  I know.  I used to live there too.

Do I really want to torture my aunt by forcing her to wait thirty minutes for a page that may never load?  Do I really want to explain to my tiny little grandmother what this here email address thingy is? 

We may as well just cough up the change for the postcard stamps.  Invitations are pretty much a formality at this point anyway—as everyone knows about the wedding and several folks have already invited themselves (um, awesome!).  I decided to just hold off and drop them in the mail with our new address on them a couple of days before we move. 

Then I plan to harass them all for responses before August.  Great plan!

Has anyone else done anything crazy like this? 

Oh-and an envelope teaser . . . I really love what we ended up doing.

* The Little Bit has requested that I stop calling him Little Bit.  Since he’s five and all now.

Hair Trials and Tribulations

I have no idea if it is too early to be talking about this.  I have no idea where in the wedding planning time line hair trials and all that jazz falls.  I can't handle time line pressure-which is why I religiously avoid the knot.

Anyway, I have been concerned about my hair and what to do with it pretty much from the proposal.  I'm still learning the basics of caring for my natural hair and as you an see, it's preferred shape is rather Russian hat-like . . . . as you might have noticed in my last post.

Observe . . .  Me. . .

 . . .  and lady in a Russian hat.

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 Okay, so I might have some hair issues.

I wrote about my "natural hair journey" here but I find that I'm struggling with my hair more as I try to decide what to do for our wedding day.  In the past, when my hair was straight, I would curl it for special occasions.  Now that my hair is kinky-curly . . . I just don't know.

Should I straighten it?  Flat ironed it would look a little something like this-

I have a lot of hair but I don't really want to straighten it for the wedding just to put it back up in a bun or whatever.  I can't leave it loose-because it grooooows.  I wore this hairstyle to work and by the time my shift was over it was pretty much standing straight up in the back.  Plus it's going to be hot and hair on my neck was so sweaty and annoying.

This is how it usually looks-my go to day to day style is a twist out set.

It lasts about a week and it works pretty well.  I do, however, have to beware the Frederick Douglass.

"What's that?" you ask.

FD in full effect

 This.  I'm not kidding when I say my hair grooooows, lol.  Strategic bobby pin placement will save the world one day y'all.  I'm sure it already has on some episode of McGyver.

Anyway-this is basically the style Wes and I are leaning towards.  We like it-it suits my face and it's good for my hair.  It's reliable and easy to do myself.  How to make it wedding-y though?

I could add some narrow ribbon and a flower.  This could be really cute with the added benefit of keeping my hair off of my neck and off of my face.

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 I really like the structure of this one and I wonder how it would look on me.  Since I will be doing my hair myself* I will get started attempting different styling techniques every week until I come up with something I like.



Our mission-cute wedding hair style.  Our obstacles: the Russian fur and the Frederick Douglass.  Can we do it?  I think we can.

Join me!

*I could go to a salon but since cutting off my relaxed ends I have really been focusing on maintaining and caring for my hair myself.  Also, the salons I can afford don't have a lot of experience with natural hair and I'd rather not take the chance of permanent damage for a one day look.

Dragging Ass on the Wedding Invitations

These invitations . . .

Envelopes to the left-along with my recent reading material

. . . might be the death of me.  We just are not super motivated to finish them although we do-finally-have all of the components ready to go.

Of course, the prep stage was pretty damn murderous as it involved making an envelope template, prepping and cutting out fifty envelopes from paper bags and realizing that they were too small to close properly.  Scrapping that plan and making envelopes out of scrapbook paper.  I couldn't find the cardstock weight I wanted to use for the RSVP postcards plus I figured we could save money on postage so we scrapped the whole postcard idea but now . . .  I kind of don't like how they look so maybe I will go back to it . . . you get the idea.  Figuring out how to print addresses on these envelopes is also turning out to be a monumental pain in the ass.  And . . . I might change my mind about that as well.

Wedding Adjacent

So I've noticed a phenomenon recently in my wedding planning journey.  In the process of unplanning the wedding, Wes and I have been spending the wedding budget on things with long-term usefulness.

Exhibit A: The Mixer of My Dreams

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We bought this stand mixer.  The mixer I've been lusting after.  And we got a pretty decent deal.  Why did we buy this?  Well, I've mostly written about Project Wedding Dress so far however, there is also a Project Wedding Cake on the horizon as well.  So far Wes has made a pound cake.  I'll be testing out the dough hook soon and bake some bread.

Exhibit B:  A Fitting Assistant

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Continuing on with Project Wedding Dress requires more hands and agility than I have.  Fitting on myself is just hard and while Wes is a real help, I just wish I had a little more control over the whole process.  Hence, the dress form.  Beyond Project Wedding Dress, I also plan to make a lot more of my own clothes.  I'm pretty much over ready to wear clothes that just don't fit right.  Project Wedding Dress has really given me a lot of confidence in my construction abilities.

Both of these are fairly major purchases.  (Of course, anything over fifty bucks is a major purchase to me.)  However, they both will have usefulness that will outlive the wedding. 

Yay! for longevity.

Un-Fancying It: Wedding Invitations

So it's May.  Officially.  It takes like, three days for that to happen for me.  And we have yet to send out the invitations.

I'm working on that though and hopefully we can make it happen by the end of the week.  Here's a little preview though.  Think RSVP responses, lol.

Wedding Cakery

How about some cake porn?

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Clearly there is a theme.  I have a weakness for ruffled cakes.  They're simple but textured.  I think they're gorgeous.

You might also remember that along with my dress project we also decided that we would have to make our own wedding cake as well.  So my realistic side is thinking that most of these beauties will just be dreams.  I mean, Youtube can only take you so far right?

But you know I have to at least give it a try.  I already started researching construction techniques.  As far as I can tell, the ruffle cakes are all made out of fondant.   Zero experience there but from what I've heard, it doesn't taste all that good.  So I am also looking for buttercream icing inspiration too.  I love that kind of spackle effect on number two.  Although spackle is maybe not an appetizing visual image.

And what about un-frosted cakes?  These are seriously gorgeous as well.  The one on my inspiration board looks like it has been dusted with powdered sugar, but how pretty!

Cake trials will need to start soon and I better get started practicing decorating sooner than later.  I made Wes a pound cake the other week that killed my hand mixer.  Like flames shooting out, killed it dead.  So . . .  could there be a new mixer in my future?  A new AWESOME, lust-worthy mixer?

We shall see.

In Case of Rain

It's a rainy, grey day today and it makes me remember how enjoyable rainy days can be.  I know it's probably the secret dread of anyone planning an outdoor wedding, but I think a little rain is actually kind of romantic.  The fact that it might cool the temperature down enough to facilitate cuddling helps too.  I have been working on a rain plan just in case.  While I wouldn't necessarily mind a downpour, I would like my family and friends to be comfortable. 

Enter . . .  the picnic pavilion.

You know, that park structure that looks a little like nyah*  There is one that overlooks the falls and we are considering reserving it as well.  Just in case.

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That would get us out of the rain, but it could use a little dressing up.  We are having a little wedding along with our picnic after all.  I especially wanted structures or details that could be installed without nails or tape.  I generally like to abide by the rules in places.

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These curtains could be hung around the sides or the entrance with rope.  They are also fairly simple and quick to make or rig.

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Paper or fabric banners could be hung the same way.

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Picnic blankets could be re-purposed as tablecloths.  Add some flowers and some candlelight and you get serious ambiance.

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See the moody colors in this picture offset by the sunshiny flowers.  This really reminds me of a rainy day.  I think it could be beautiful.

*Random South Park reference. . .

Creating Atmosphere . . .

Wes and I are getting married here . . .

Personal photo . . . Exterior, Mill Bridge Falls

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Watson Mill Bridge State Park in Comer, Georgia.

The pros are that it's beautiful yet inexpensive.  The cons are that it's about a thirty minute trip from Athens, and its a public park and people seem to think that strangers might wander through the ceremony . .  which, who would do that?  Also, the structures are what you would expect at your average Girl Scout camp.  That's awesome in it's own way . . . but wedding awesome?  We'll see. 

As you know, I took a break from wedding planning because I was just stressed about the whole issue.  I needed to creatively problem solve and it just wasn't happening.  Since then, I've recovered somewhat.

Wes and I would like to have our ceremony by the water, weather permitting.  There is a small picnic area with it's own parking lot on the high side of the falls with a nice strip of river bank.  The noise of the water won't drown us out (and if we sneak in a little music maybe it will mask it).  Having it by the water kind of negates the need for a lot of decoration, but I think it might be nice to wedding it up a little.  Create some romantic, fun atmosphere.

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Some picnic blankets spread out for ceremony seating . . .

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With some nice pillows and flowers . . .

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With a few chairs for our less mobile relatives . . .  They're in the background of that last picture.

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In addition to that, I think we might also need a little table if we decide to incorporate some type of unity ritual.*

If the sun is shining on our wedding day it will probably be doing less shining and more blazing . . . it's only April and we've already had some pretty hot days here . . . so I'm picturing another table with cold beverages and plenty of sun parasols.  

We don't have a rain plan . . . yet.  But it's coming and it will probably look a little something like this. . .

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*This unity ritual will definitely not be the dreaded unity candle.  I proclaimed as much and Wes was like, "why is it dreaded?" to which I could only reply, "because I don't like it."  Hmm.  That looks bitchier in print.

Un-Planning a Wedding

Remember our tiny budget?

That budget was a major stressor for a while.  I couldn't figure out how to make it work and still feel like a event.  I was struggling with the casualness of it all.  I wasn't immediately sure why that was because as I've mentioned before we are actually casual people.

Part of the reason might be that most wedding blogs, sites, resources, whatever are so opposite of our goals and definitely our budget.  It was a little disheartening.

I've mellowed since then.

First, I let the wedding planning go for a little while.  Wes and I have a lot going on here these days and he's going to be out of the frame for a while as he gets ready for his qualifiers.  There's a family reunion coming up and I have a project to complete for that.  The Little Bit's birthday is next month . . . and life goes on.

Second, I have learned to find inspiration elsewhere.  As time went by and I focused less time and energy on wedding planning, I started finding inexpensive options elsewhere that could work for our wedding.  Things that won't cost a fortune and will still feel special.  I plan to feature some of those ideas here in the upcoming weeks.

I call it un-planning and it is really kind of awesome.

Halting the Wedding Train . . . and Chugging Along

I was making myself a little crazy with the wedding planning so I decided to take a short break. 

I've never planned an event like this before, obviously, and I was fully prepared for it to be way more intense than it actually is.  The reality is that the size of our wedding, and the budget, kind of negate a lot of the stress and pressure.  We can't afford all the bells and whistles so bells and whistles get left off the list.  Which means our list is pretty damn short, lol.

I decided to take a step back and just let it ride for a while.

Now that I've had my breather and some perspective, I've decided to get back on the horse.  And . . . now that I'm no longer crazy eyed crazy person, my wedding vision has mellowed a lot.  And it was pretty damn mellow before.

Budget Planning: When It's Cheaper to Pay Shipping

I got busy spending some moolah, some scrilla, some samolians today, 

I had two glorious weekend days off in a row and rather than spend them cooped up in a car, I let my fingers do the walking and ordered this.

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The Paper-Source Swatchbook. 

Now, I am not what you would call a big internet shopper and there is a Paper Source in Atlanta which is only about an hour or so away from our digs.  With our two glorious days of freedom we could have easily made the drive.  Shipping costs nearly as much as the product itself.   So why order it online?

In this case, my dears, I find seven bucks worth of shipping a small price to pay.  Seven dollars is less than the gas money such a trip would use up.  Espcecially since it's unlikely I would make up my mind about invitation colors and whatnot after just one trip.  Seven dollars is also a reasonable price to pay for a satisfyingly lazy weekend.  No road trip.  No traffic.  And I love myself a nice swatchbook.  I find it a cost-effective solution to an internet shopping problem

What's not to like?

Now of course, I'll be counting the days until my pretty gets here.  And yes. . . this means we are finally getting around to starting invitation production!