Change of Address

Hey everybody!
Hate to pull the ole switcheroo on you, but I've moved this blog over to WordPress. So update your feed reader and or bookmarks!

The new address is http://andswedding.wordpress.com.

See you there, and thanks for reading!

The Booq... The Bouq... The Flowers

I'm not what you'd call a huge flower girl. Sure, I love when Dustin sends me the occasional bouquet, but I don't plant flowers in the spring, and I don't even have a favorite bud.

Combine this with the price of floral arrangements and the long-distance drive and communication, and you've got yourself a bride that doesn't want a floral bouquet. I need something to hold, because I'll be nervous, and I pick at my cuticles when I'm nervous. I'm not too big on the parasol trend (looks great, just not for my Thanksgiving in the mountains wedding), and if I carried a lantern my arm would get tired and I'd catch my dress on fire. I like the way flowers look, but not so much on the silk flowers.

So I'm opting for something that will cater both to my penchant for vintage goodies and desire for something that at least looks like a traditional floral bouquet: a vintage brooch bouquet.

Feast your eyes on these babies:


I *love* these. They've got the color of a floral bouquet, but I don't have to 1)rely on importing flowers coated with chemicals and a huge carbon footprint, 2) paying for organic, locally grown flowers, 3) working long-distance with a florist, and 4) kick starting anybody's seasonal allergies.

I can customize a bouquet like this pretty easily, and brooches shouldn't be too hard to find. And I love that I'm perhaps saving some things from a landfill, too.

Now I just need to figure out how to put this thing together.

All images from Fantasy Floral Designs

341 Days and Counting

Now that the semester is over (All As, woot woot!), I've got the time to update everyone on the wedding plans.

We'll still be getting married on November 22, 2010 (that's the Monday before Thanksgiving), but we've relocated to Asheville, NC. Planning a Florida wedding just wasn't coming together, and once we started looking at everything Asheville had to offer, things just felt right...kinda like us.

We'll be married by a river at Hidden River events, and we've got our cabin for the week reserved. Hidden River is GORGEOUS. And we're loving Jeanne, the owner. I'm not going to reveal prices here (unless I decide to do a major budget breakdown later), but Hidden River was WAAAAY under budget for us. Like, when we were give the price quote, we thought for sure there was supposed to be a few extra zero's tacked on to the end.

And apparently it's bad luck to reveal your honeymoon suite? I didn't know this. So I won't link to it, but I will tell you we've rented a cabin that's way too big for us. It's got 3 bedrooms, and sleeps 9, so clearly, there's going to be too much extra space for us. But we don't care. Because the cabin we've rented is the only one sitting on 260 acres, so we are COMPLETELY secluded. There's a 1/2 mile path along a mountain stream that leads to a waterfall, and mountain views all around. It's going to be GORGEOUS, even if we do miss the full splendor of the autumn leaves. Now, the cabin itself: Humongo fully stocked kitchen (which is important to us, as we'll be hosting Thanksgiving Dinner for our families on Thursday), really awesome vessel sinks (this is less important, but the girl in me is totally overjoyed), a 4-person tub, and in the Master Bath? A 2-person jacuzzi tub AND A STEAM SHOWER. Yes. I'm convinced I need a steam shower in my life.

Both our venue and honeymoon cabin are reserved, with down payments pending. The next thing we're working on is 1) finding a restaurant for our post-ceremony dinner, cake and toasts; 2) finding a photographer (I think I found one! I just need to contact her); and 3) Finding a wedding dress.

Really, after we get those next three things lined up (and those are fairly big things to line up), there won't be too many big things left to do. I'm excited by this.

Sad.

My family-cat, Socks, died today. He was 13 years old. He pretty much always looked like this.

If Only All Advice Used the Word "Asshole"

This is the kind of advice I'm hoping to get for my marriage (via The Slackmistress):

On your wedding day, you're going to get all sorts of advice, but there's always going to be someone who says "don't ever go to bed angry." If you don't go to bed angry, you might not get any sleep. And it's never a good idea to argue when you're exhausted. So I'll say this: when they're acting like an asshole, just remember: they're your asshole. That's the asshole you fell in love with, and you still love. Don't forget that part.

Preparing for David

We've got 17 months until our wedding, but I'm trying on wedding dresses on Monday. Martha says I don't have to start looking for a dress until I reach the 6-8 months out bracket, but since we've decided to elope, I don't have much else to do (find a beach, rent homes, buy Dustin a suit, hm, what else?). I'm taking my mom and mother-in-law with me, along with print-outs of a few dresses I like. But other than knowing where I'll be and at what time, I have no idea what to expect. When I made the appointment, the salesperson said I'd have my privacy invaded (remind me to shave), and that it would take about 2 hours to try on dresses (remind me also to chow down on some granola bars).

After scouring their website, so far, I'm really attracted to lace and A-lines. If it's too poofy and princessy, or if it has too much beading, I almost know I'll hate it. But just for kicks, I'm trying on a super poofy one, just to have the picture. I can be a cupcake bride, at least for 10 minutes!

These have been more my speed, though, in no particular order, though I do think the second one and last one is my favorite so far:






This is either going to be awesome or tortuous, but I'll post pictures either way.
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A New Plan, and the Comfort That Comes With It.

Dustin and I have been thinking about our wedding since the day after we got engaged (okay, so it's been mostly me thinking about our wedding--Dustin's excited to get married, but he pretty much doesn't care what color flowers he'll wear in his boutonniere).

Our first thought was to have a mostly traditional wedding in our hometown--wedding, reception, with cake and a first dance and photographer. But the more we got into planning, the more research we did, the less settled we felt about our plans. As much as we were excited to have a hometown wedding, with all of our friends and family in attendance, nothing felt right. We couldn't justify spending the money it would take to create the wedding we wanted. We didn't feel right limiting some family and friends to save money, especially when so many lived in our hometown. We couldn't decide on venues, on vendors, on how we would accomodate out of town guests when we would be out of town guests, too.

So we've changed our plans. We've decided to elope, immediate family in tow. At first, Dustin was worried that I would regret not having a traditional wedding. I was worried that Dustin would miss having all his fraternity brothers, WoW friends, and fellow Geek Squad Agents in attendance. But once we talked it through, we realized that as much we love our extended family and friends, there just isn't a way we can pay for a wedding that would accommodate them all.

So instead, we're taking our parents, grandparents, and siblings to a beach in Florida, where we'll spend Thanksgiving week in rented beach homes. We'll get married early in the week (who says weddings have to be on Saturday when it's just your family?), and while I'm sure we'll eat dinner together that evening at a nice restaurant, our "reception" will be the Thanksgiving dinner our newly combined family shares together. Other than getting married, that's what I'm most looking forward to. Thanksgiving has always been our favorite holiday, and I can't think of a more perfect way to celebrate our marriage (wow, that sounds good to my ears).

We've had this plan for about a week now, and already, we feel so much more comfortable with our wedding. There isn't the nervousness or the doubt. We feel good knowing our families will be there, and that we can treat them (and ourselves!) not to a day of stress, but a week of vacation. We feel good knowing that we're saving money to pay off our student loans and save for our first home. We finally feel like this is the wedding we should be having.