Wedding Wednesday - Tuxes!

That's right people, we did it!!

Now I know in my last blog, I said that the tuxes would be checked off the list by the end of the week. Well we did it on Monday, I'm still giving it to myself because it's done! (and technically in less than a week from when I set the goal)

When we firts got engaged, we joined out friends Steve and Vanessa for a wedding show, and for some reason ended up signing a contract with Moores which we thought only guaranteed $30.00 off of each tux.

While Chris was searching the internet he found a new deal, that still offered $30.00 off of each tux but the groom could choose between a free tux rental or a credit for a $400.00 suit.

We decided to go in on Monday and see what we could get, and we were lucky enough to be dealing with the manager who has amazing customer service.

He walked us through the process, and we ended up deciding on this Calvin Klein tuxedo for all of the boys to wear, as well as Chris, our fathers and the MC (with different coloured vests and ties).

The tux is originally 179.99, but the manager was nice enough to offer us the current wedding show deal, which was $40.00 off each tux as well as the credit for a suit for Chris. Sold.

At this point he handed us off to his associate, who he said was better at computer work. She came over and started typing and after a few minutes looked at us and said the original deal that we had from the original wedding show was better because it not only offered $30.00 off each tux, it apparently also held the 2009 prices.

So in the end we ended up getting an 180.00 tux for 119.00 a person, and to top it all off, because the manager felt bad for steering us in the wrong direction (which he didn't, he was just trying to help) we are still getting the 400.00 credit for Chris's suit.

I am so excited that we got this done, and got it at a price that was reasonable.

Wedding Wednesday: To Do List and Check in

Happy Wednesday!

First of all, I have to wish my bestest a very happy 27th birthday!!

So it's officially 2012, which means that it is also officially my wedding year! This means that as of January 1st, I have turned into a crazy bride who needs to get everything done NOW.

Since I barely did anything in December (Christmas break....for the whole month..) I figured I would use today to look at the to-do list that I made in November and figure out what I actually did, and what still needs to be done.

* LIMO, LIMO, LIMO: This really needs to be done. If I don't have a lime by the end of the month there are going to be problems.

* Invitations: I did this! I got them from Invitation Styles and I absolutely love them. Now I need to get them all together and addressed so I can send them out in mid February

* Favours: I swear I know where to find them and I know exactly what I want. It's just the ordering that seems to be the problem. Another must for this month.

* Tuxes: Yeah there are no words. This isn't a monthly goal, this is a weekly one. My boys WILL have tuxes by the end of this week.

* Alterations: I'm working on it!

* Guestbook: Something I actually did! My guest book was ordered from Shutterfly and it's perfect.

Bachelorette Weekend: I'm making this one blue to help with my pride. I did my part of the bachelorette weekend. The second last weekend in April, my bridesmaids, mom, sister and a few close friends will be heading to Blue Mountain to spend the weekend in a beautiful chalet. I nailed down the date, guest list and venue...my work is done.

Bridal Party Gifts: Yeah not even close. I have ideas. Lots of ideas actually. My problem seems to be execution.

So I have managed to accomplish 3 things on my list...since November.....

And of course the list keeps growing, so here is what I hope to get done by the time February rolls around

*Flower Girl Dresses: This is probably the one thing I have been excited for since I got engaged, other than buying my dress. I can't wait to see the two cutest little girls all dressed up in their pretty white dresses. We have been putting it off because they are 7 and 3, and growing every single day but I think we are finally at the point where we can buy them and they will still fit at the end of May

* Shopping for my mom's dress: She's the one who has been putting this one off, but it needs to be done

* Go for my first dress fitting: My dress is in. As soon as my shoes get here I am making an appointment for my first fitting. I absolutely cannot wait to put that dress on again.

* Find a Card Box: I think I want a card box that holds pictures, I just need to find one that isn't going to cost me a fortune. I know you can make them, but the tutorials look a bit ambitious for this girl.

* Book hair and Make Up Appointments: This one is easy. I see blue in my future

* Get Invitations ready to be sent: I want to have them addressed, in envelopes with stamps, sitting and waiting to go.

* Decide on an engagement print and order it: I do really need to do this. My photographer wants to work on it and he's going to start getting mad.

I'm sure there is so much more that I am forgetting but I think all of this grouped with all of those daunting little red tasks above are going to keep me busy enough.

Wedding Wednesday: Invitations!

I ordered them!!!

Now obviously I can't show you them as I am currently buried in invitations, envelope's, response cards and maps, and they haven't been sent out yet.

But I did want to talk about the amazing website that I ordered them from.

Invitations were beginning to become the worlds most annoying wedding duty. I couldn't decide if I wanted to make them or have them made, and when I went out to look at either option I couldn't find any that I liked. Not only that, but prices were ridiculous. Most packages I saw did not include reception or response cards and were already over 200.00. Not going to happen...

So two weeks ago when Chris and I were both off, we made it a mission to find our invitations. After an unsuccessful day of searching stores, Chris decided to take to the internet and found invitation styles

This site is amazing. They have thousands of templates for you to choose from and everything is totally customizable


I picked my invite, and pretty much changed everything about it. The colours were off, I wanted different wording and I played with the spacing. I sent them my order and I had a proof e-mailed to me within 48 hours. I made some small changes and had another proof sent in less than 24 hours.

Once I approved the final invite they shipped them and the whole process, including delivery took less than a week. I actually sent my order in a week after my guest book order and my invites showed up two days before the Shutterfly package (which came today...one day late but who's counting?)

The process was completely painless and I absolutely LOVE my invitations (not exactly loving the assembly process, but that's another story).

What makes it even better is that I got 110 invitations, reception cards, response cards and two envelopes per invite and saved myself around $200.00.

So if your looking for invitations check out invitation styles (I'm not getting anything for this. I just love a good deal and want to share)

Wedding Wednesday - Guest Book!

I have been on a roll with this wedding this week. All of a sudden I got motivated and have been ticking things off the list everyday.

Since getting our engagement pictures done, I have become obsessed with getting my guest book finished.

If you know anything about me, you would know that I am obsessed with pictures. I ALWAYS have my camera with me, and I'm pretty sure my friends have just stopped bringing theirs because they know I will have mine and I will be taking pictures.

My room is covered with pictures of friends and family and I'm slowly running of places to put frames (this doesn't mean that I stop buying them or printing pictures. Nope, it just means that I have a nice pile of frames sitting on the floor waiting for a place to go).

So, when looking for a guest book, I knew right away that I didn't want a generic one. I didn't want a book filled with signatures that I probably wouldn't be able to read and would probably end up in some box in my non existent attic.

I wanted something that I could display, that showed our personality, that I loved looking at and most importantly that used the million engagement pictures that I payed a fortune for.

I used Costco to get my Christmas cards printed because of the location and price, but when I went to look at their guest book, I wasn't impressed. Not to mention that Costco's website limits the sizes of the pictures that you can upload, so most of the pictures that I wanted to use I was unable to actually upload.

I spent days on different photo book websites, Costco, Blurb, Walmart, Black's and my fussiness was starting to show because I just wasn't loving any of them. Either the photo book wasn't what I was looking for, too pricy or the website was impossible to use.

I finally decided to bite the bullet and listen to all of my bloggers and try Shutterfly. This was the one. The site is super easy to use, they put no limits on the size of your pictures, and you essentially drag and drop the pictures to where you want them to be. Super easy.

I worked on it for a few days, adding boarders and playing with the pictures to make sure it was exactly how I wanted it. I ordered it last Thursday (when it went on sale for 30% off) and I got the notification that it had shipped last night.

I cannot wait until it gets here. This was my first experience with Shutterfly and I can honestly say I will be returning. The prices are amazing, the shipping is reasonable and the website is so easy to use. I should have saved myself hours and just went there first!

In other wedding news my dress came in! Stay tuned for updates of fittings!

Wedding Wednesday: Cake!

First of all, I apologize for the lack of blogging lately! I feel like I only post on Wednesday's. I have a million drafts of posts that I start and then give up on halfway through.

Lots to talk about, but too much going on to actually finish a complete post.

This week I actually made progress on my cake!

I should start talking about my cake lady. After much debate, Chris and I decided to go with a family friend to make our cake. She has recently started a cake business, he cakes taste amazing, and to be honest, her prices are a million times better than anywhere else we have looked. The cake it not hugely important to me. I want one, but it doesn't need to be 18 tiers with special filling and a fountain.

I'm very indecisive (you have probably picked up on that through this wedding planning experience), so I was having a really hard time deciding if I wanted an actual cake at the wedding, or cupcakes.

When we first got engaged I wanted a cake. I wanted to have something that I could put a topper on and cut.

Last year we went to three weddings and the cake got cut only once. Two out of the three couples ended up taking their entire cake home because the venue either a) forgot to cut and serve it or b) ran dinner too long so it just never happened.

After thinking that through I started to lean towards cupcakes. They are cute and super easy because people can help themselves. I figured we would still have extras but at least I wouldn't be forced to eat an entire three tier cake just so that I didn't feel wasteful.

I was still on the fence because I figured cupcakes would be way more work and therefore way more expensive. I was not willing to go over budget on the cake, it's just not worth it to me.

I also wanted something to cut.

After about a million e-mails between me and my cake person, we have finally narrowed it down.

I'm going for something similar to this:

This way I can have the top portion to put my topper as well as do the cake cutting ceremony. It will be decorated with blue and silver gerber's just to give it a little extra something.

The flavours will be chocolate with vanilla icing and vanilla with vanilla icing (I'm boring, I know) and she will be using blue and sliver cake dust (matching my colours of course) to help guests know which is which.

And to top it all off it will only be 25.00 more than a regular three tiered cake!

I'm very pleased that this is crossed off the list, that my guests will get cake and that Chris and I will not be eating it for the rest of our married lives!

Wedding Wednesday: To Do List

Since nothing significant has happened in the world of my wedding since last week, I figured I could use this week's wedding Wednesday to tell you about some of the things on my to do list. Maybe writing it down will motivate me to actually do some of it!

* LIMO, LIMO, LIMO: I seriously need to get on this one or I'm going to be walking to the church on my wedding day. No I still haven't made the decision between the party bus or the old car. Maybe if I got off of my behind and called for quotes this would become an easy decision.

* Invitations: I'm on the fence between being ambitious and doing it myself or being lazy and getting them done. Either way a decision needs to be made and soon.

* Favours: I know what I want. I know where to get them. I just need to order and pick them up. Who knew this would be such a problem

* Tuxes: Yeah this would be another must. My bridesmaids have dresses but at the moment the groomsmen are going naked. It's not like this is even difficult. It's just a matter of dragging our butts over there and making some choices.

* Alterations: Due to some dress drama (trust me, you don't want to know) I need to find someone else to alter the girls dresses. We are picking the dresses up on Tuesday so I have time.... right?

* Guestbook: We have our engagement photo's. I have pretty much decided on using Shutterfly to make it. Now I just need to DO it.

Like my shameless excuse to post another engagement picture???

Bachelorette Weekend: I want to go away with my bridesmaid and a select few of my favourite girls for a bachelorette weekend. Since I have had a recent MOH change, and the bestest has had a lot dumped on her, I am having a heavy hand in planning this little trip. So I need to find a place to stay, decide on a weekend and nail down a few other little details. Then my MOH and bridesmaids can go crazy.

Bridal Party Gifts: I have some idea's. Kinda.

Yeah this really didn't help.....and I'm sure this isn't even half of it. Cue Panic mode.

Wedding Wednesday: Lessons

When Chris and I got engaged almost three years ago I pretty much had my bridal party decided. I have three friends that have been like sisters to me since grade 9, so they were obvious picks. Chris' sister and my brother's girlfriend and I have gotten pretty close over they years so I knew I wanted them involved. And of course I wanted my big sister right beside me as my MOH.

My sister is ten years older than me but we have always been really, really close (I intended to have cute baby pictures posted here, but my scanner was being a large pain in the you know where, so I'm settling with those that I found on my computer)

Looking back through my childhood she has always supported me through any step I tried to take. Granted, being 10 years younger I'm sure there are times when I drove her absolutely crazy (stealing her clothes on a constant basis comes to mind) she was always right there when I needed her to be

I was her Maid of Honour when she got married to my brother in law 10 years ago, and it was always known that she would be returning the favour when that day came for me. I honestly think I was engaged for less than 24 hours when I officially asked her.

Probably the biggest lesson that planning a wedding has taught me is that absolutely nothing is perfect. When I first set out on this adventure I was convinced that by giving myself lots of time and micro managing every single detail that absolutely nothing would go wrong.

At this point SO many things have needed to be adjusted or changed, steering me away from my original plan and making me shift directions. Every time this lesson gets driven in just a tiny bit further....and it is now officially pushed as far as it can because......

.....my sister, and MOH, is 8 weeks pregnant!

Her official due date is June 4th, but because she had so many complications with Miss B. she will need to have a planned C Section, and from the sounds of it they want her to go 2 weeks early, which puts her right around my wedding day.

So this has forced her to drop out of my wedding.

Adjustments.

You have heard me talk about my bestest before, and how absolutely amazing she is.

We met the first day of grade 9 and connected pretty quickly over our mutual love of this boy

Over the course of our friendship we have survived 4 years of highschool

College

University

She's now almost finished teachers college and I could not be more proud of her!

There have been parties



Weddings

Broken hearts, stupid boys, arguments, experiences and far too much laughter.


I could honestly go on and on and on. She's the kind of girl who is always only a phone call away with ice cream, a girly movie and the ability to call whoever it is an asshole and take my side just because I need her to.

She is also the kind of girl who is willing to take on the responsibilities of MOH, including a shower, bachelorette and anything else that is required of her with only 7 months notice without batting an eyelash.

She is essentially another sister, and we have probably been through more together than some sisters have.

All of my friends and family expected me to flip when I found out that my big sister and MOH was pregnant. Like I said I have learned that weddings are about adjustments. My sister has already given me two absolutely beautiful nieces that I would give the world for. She is having a baby and there is no way I can be upset about that. If it means that she will be sitting behind me on my wedding day taking good care of my future niece or nephew then so be it.

Lucky for me I have an awesome best friend who can take over and who I know will do an amazing job.

So to my bestest... Thank you so much for stepping in. You know I love you and I could not be happier that you will be standing right behind me, supporting Chris and I on the most important day of our lives.

Wedding Wednesday: Tranportation

With just a little under 7 months to go before the big day, Chris and I have all but one of our major contracts signed, all that is left is transportation.

The reason that the OCD part of me has yet to nail this part down is largely due to the fact that I have absolutely no idea what I want.

The church and venue that we picked are about 45 minutes apart (I was very picky when it came to my venue site, and nothing close to Chris's family church was working for me, so we had to look elsewhere), so there is no doubt that we NEED something to get us from point A to point B.

When we initially got engaged, this was my FOR SURE method of transportation

....until we booked our venue, and Chris nicely informed me that horses don't travel well on highways.

Then I was convinced that I wanted something like this

so that Chris and I could have some alone, down time (the very little that we will get that day from what I hear) in between the ceremony and reception sites.

If this was the plan, I would also book a limo to make sure that my entire bridal party had safe transportation both to the venue, and to the hotel after the reception.

Sounds like a good plan right? So why am I even bothering talking about it? Well because when I was at the bridal show last November I met with a limo company who was offering this


for about half the price of what we would pay for the car and the limo.

This wouldn't have been an option except for the fact that my loving sister (and MOH) dragged me onto one, and I actually kind of fell in love. It's like a mini club inside, with a big screen T.V, music, lights and a fully loaded bar. Not to mention that it will comfortable seat 25 people. I have vision of the fantastically wild time that we could have with our entire bridal party on the way to our venue.

And of course the price doesn't hurt. Chris and I are all about saving money where this wedding is concerned.

So now I'm conflicted. Do I want the quiet ride with Chris, or do I want to party it up with some of the most important people in my life?

What did you do? Was the down time worth the extra money?

Wedding Wednesday: Engagement Pictures

After some very unnecessary photographer drama, we finally got our engagement pictures done.

Oh wait...I didn't tell you about the photographer drama...(trust me. If I told you all of the drama that has been surrounding this wedding lately you would be shocked!)

If you remember, booking my photographer was a bit of a difficult decision. It was probably the most important one I had to make, other than picking my venue. I'm going to have these pictures forever, and I want them to be something I am proud to display. This being said, I also didn't want to sell my future first born in order to pay for them.

After searching, we found Piper Studios. We met with them, looked over some proofs, got some questions answered and booked. I still had some concerns, namely that Piper is a studio and they employ many photographers, and the person that we booked with wasn't one of them. I was reassured before we booked that I could get the same photographer for our engagement shoot and wedding day, and if I had any concerns at all a new photographer would be assigned.

I wanted my engagement pictures done in August, and a photographer from Piper contacted us at the beginning of the month to make arrangements. Due to scheduling conflicts we couldn't arrange to meet in August, but we did set a meeting on September 25th. All was good. Until he e-mailed me at the beginning of September saying something came up, he had to cancel and we could reschedule for the last weekend in October.

Um No. Don't get me wrong, I understand that things happen. I am the queen of things happening. But my pictures were already booked for a month later than I originally wanted, and he wanted to push it back another full month. That would put me in a whole different season.

After a few e-mails to the lady I booked with, Piper proved that I made the right choice booking with them by promptly finding me a new photographer that could do my engagement shoot on the original booked day, as well as our wedding day.

So on September 25th we ventured out and met with Paul, who was awesome. He made us feel so relaxed, and he knew exactly what I was looking for.

We started at Graffiti Alley downtown, to get some contemporary, different poses that was what I was looking for in my pictures.

We then moved to a beach/park area to take what Paul referred to as the "mom pictures"

Although the drama was a bit more than I needed, Paul was amazing and I absolutely love my pictures.

Wedding Wednesday - Registry!

This week for Wedding Wednesday I'm talking about our wedding registry.

This is something we were putting off big time. We don't currently live together and our plans are still a bit up in the air, so I figured this would be both frustrating and a giant argument waiting to happen.

But with only 9 months to go, I really needed to get on this as I know talks about my shower are in the works (yes loving bridesmaids. Your not as sneaky as you think you are.) So a couple of weeks ago we sucked it up, got in the car and went to Sears to at least get the registry started.

Boy was I wrong about the whole process. This was probably the most fun I have had since I started planning this wedding two and a half years ago. It's like shopping without spending any money.

I will admit to getting a bit out of control with the scanner. There was an incident with a cute tea set that wasn't priced but I scanned anyway. I think it totaled about 1000.00. Chris won't leave me with the scanner ever again.

Anyways, it feels great to have this at least started, with plans to finalize it within the next couple of weeks.

And seeing as nothing makes you want to buy and decorate a house more then scanning things to put in it, I figured I would show you some of the ideas that my registry has inspired.

For example, my duvet has made me long for a bedroom that will one day look like this:

And my red appliances have me dreaming of a kitchen that looks like this:

or this:

That's what I have so far, but I'm sure as my registering continues I will get lots of ideas for my hypothetical bathroom and living room.

Stayed tuned and happy Wednesday!!

Wedding Wednesdays and Weekend Update

There has been a lot going on with this girl over the last couple of days. Some of it good, some of it not so much...things that are causing stress that I really don't need at this point in my life. I'm not going to write about that stuff. I'm sure I will at some point, because I look at this blog as a type of an outlet, but today I feel like writing about things that make me happy. That would be the weekend that just past and my wedding (of course).

This weekend update was meant to be posted on Monday, until I got a call at 8:00 at night from my sister telling me that she fell and was at the hospital with a potentially broken wrist. Four hours later we emerged from the hospital with a shinny new cast, and a blogger who was way to tired to write anything. So that's why we are late

Friday: Was one of bridesmaids birthday party. We went to Jack Astors and then to a bar. Believe it or not, I have no pictures. I have some, but none that really require posting, and I actually didn't take all that many. That's very unusual for me. Either way we had a lot of fun drinking, catching up and of course watching the Toronto Maple Leafs take home win number 4. (This post would have been a lot more fun if it had been posted Monday before they lost game number 5. Details.....)

Saturday is where I also get to talk about Wedding Wednesdays. I have a total of 6 bridesmaids all who have very different schedules and lives. 3 of these bridesmaids have been my best friends since grade 9, and I think we have the busiest lives out of all of us. From teachers college, to full time jobs, to classes and part time jobs, finding any time to get all 4 of us together is next to impossible. I am making a slide show for the wedding, and I wanted to get all of us in the same room to go through those terrible high school photo's and all come to an agreement of which ones to use. This was much harder than I thought. I had the last two weeks off of school, but finding a day that worked for all 4 of us apparently did not exist. After trying to make plans for a couple of hours and learning that no day was going to work I became frustrated and gave up. Until Friday at said bridesmaid's birthday party. There we were all together, and we all learned that we were conveniently free the very next day. Done.

I have to say that this was the best day of my weekend. Spending a few hours with these girls is always so fun. Grouping this with pizza and old photo's is hilarious. I gave each girl 5 poker chips, and called them their veto's. The rule was that they could veto any photo and had to give up one of their chips, and then I could not use the photo. Once their veto chips were gone they no longer had a say, so they were cautioned to use them carefully. I honestly thought this would become an all out war, but it actually went better then I thought, and only two veto's got used.

And for a final random thought on Wedding Wednesday: I love each and every one of these girls. They have always been there for me no matter what, despite insanely busy schedules. I know that if I need any of them, all I need to do is pick up a phone and they will make time. I also love the fact that these 3 girls
that posed with me for prom pictures, will be standing beside me for my wedding pictures 9 years later.

Sunday my mom and I had K and we made candy apples


My mom and I found this set at Costco which makes 8 caramel candy apples. It was so messy, but so much fun. I think it may have to become a fall tradition in my house.

So that was my very busy weekend!

Hope everyone else had just as awesome of one!!

Wedding Wednesday: Father/Daughter Dance

Centerpiece update: There really isn't much to share here. We realized a few days after my first post, when Walmart still hadn't called me back that my sister's best friend works for head office. So I have her looking into it and am now just playing the very-frustrated-bride-patiently-waiting game.

I have been stressing for the last couple of months over the song for my father/daughter dance.

I should start by saying that my relationship with my dad is an interesting one. My mother tells me that we are exactly alike, both immensely stubborn and headstrong, which therefore causes us to clash on many things. Despite that I have been known to fight him to the death over the littlest things (stubborn...I can't help it) I am also a pretty big daddy's girl when it comes down to it. Like I said, interesting.

So, needless to say, I have been having a ridiculously hard time finding a song that I felt related to me and my father. I have listened to probably 50 songs and every single one would warrant the same reaction, it's nice, but I can find something better. So, finally, after weeks of frustration I decided to actually bring my father into it and give him a choice.....
.....now I have too many options and I can't choose.

My mom and I like this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIBPC4YUUqY

- Steve Kirwan - My Little Girl
I have no clue how I actually found this song, I just found it in my music list, probably from one of my crazy downloads where I was downloading anything and everything that had to do with daughters. I played it for the first time with my mom and it brought us both to tears, and I still can't get through it. I think it's perfect. My dad.....not so much

He likes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ab4VRWX8y1A

-Heartland - I loved her first
Don't get me wrong, this is a beautiful song, and I was considering it for a long time, but I get the feeling that it's a bit overdone....?

I also like

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KHAaRxyuQk

-Chuck Wicks - Stealing Cinderella
This one kind of goes with the whole princess themed wedding which mine is becoming. When I first heard it I was SURE it was the one, but now I just don't know

I also stumbled across this one a few months ago

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hq4W68_h6rw

-Taylor Swift - The Best Day
At first my mom wasn't too thrilled with this one, but she called me yesterday after listening to it again and told me that it made her cry and that she really thinks that it could also work. GRR. I think this one describes a father/daughter relationship perfectly, and it's different.

So now I'm totally lost. My dad and I will not give over on our choices, so one of us is just going to have to pick. And in case you haven't noticed...I'm horrible at making decisions.

So yeah, that's where we are. We went from zero songs, to four and are still no closer to making a decision.

What did you dance with your dad too? Are there any other ones that I should consider??

PS- I hope those youtube links actually work. Let me know if they don't