Chaos

Lately I've been working on a dozen different DIY projects at a time. I start working on one and then I think of another idea or come across an idea that I absolutely adore online... so then I start working on that idea. I really do love working on all of the projects.

However, I've discovered today that I haven't managed to finish very much. I'm in the middle of each of these projects. Some of them, it's not entirely my fault. For instance, with the pocketfold invitations, I haven't been able to find the metallic gold paper/cardstock that I need for the background (in between the dark blue cardstock pocketfold and the ivory paper invitation). It's just too plain the way it is. I want the gold to go between to give it a little oomph. :)

Here is what they look like so far:

[My pocket-fold mock-up]

This one is just my mock-up of what I want the pocketfolds to look like. I like them so far. Again, I just want that extra "oomph" for the actual pocketfolds. If I can't find the metallic gold that I want, I will probably just end up choosing another color... I'm pretty sure I want it to be metallic though. The rest of the paper I have used is matte, so I think I nice shiny paper will give it that extra kick.

I'm also working on some reserved signs for the special people in the wedding. By that, I mean the MOB, FOB, FMIL, FFIL, the grandparents, etc. The people who will be sitting in the first rows. I really like my mock-up of those, but I am having some glue difficulties. I will hopefully be able to get them together tonight (or maybe tomorrow)... it just depends if I find a glue that wants to cooperate.

I also have a basket full of bubbles that are complete and a basket full of bubbles that are incomplete. The ones that are not finished are just waiting on labels. Philip liked the white labels better than the clear labels and I only had one sheet of white labels left... and I keep forgetting to pick up white labels for the bubbles. So, here they are:

[The basket of completed bubbles]

[A completed bottle of bubbles]

[The basket of incomplete bubbles]

I also have my aisle runner in limbo. I have almost completed the tracing (pencil outline). I am really dreading the painting... I think that's why I have been more focused on the other DIY projects for the time being. It's really going to be a pain. There are lots of very thin lines in the logo... it's going to be a headache and a half.

And, I'm trying to get our Halloween costumes together... Halloween is on Sunday! I really love Halloween. I've been counting down the days. However, now that it's only a few days away, I realize how much I still have to do before the big day! Ahhh! But, it will be finished soon. :)

I am hoping that since I have blogged about some of these unfinished projects, it will light a fire under my bum and get me into gear! So, hopefully in the next week or so, I will have some new blog posts about my completed DIY projects. :) Wish me luck!

Music...

So, I've been thinking a lot about music lately. I have made a few decisions, but not a lot yet. Here is what I have so far:
CEREMONY
Prelude: General Classical Music (no real preference yet)
Grandparents' & Parents' Processional: Handel's Air
Bridesmaids Processional: Pachelbel's Canon in D
Bride's Processional: Wagner's Bridal Chorus
Sand Ceremony: Come What May from the Moulin Rouge soundtrack (film version)
Recessional: the Star Wars Theme

RECEPTION
Bridal Party Entrance: The Throne Room (from Star Wars Episode VI)
Bride & Groom's Entrance: The Imperial March (think Darth Vader)
Dinner Music: Norah Jones (not 100%, but it's the sound I'm looking for)
First Dance: Only You Can Love Me This Way by Keith Urban
Father/Daughter Dance: ... The one I'm having a ton of difficulty with.
Mother/Son Dance: Forever Young by Rod Stewart
Bridal Party Dance: Stayin' Alive by The Bee Gees & Coolio (Remix)
Cake Cutting: Sweet Thing by Keith Urban
Married Couples Dance: Grow Old With You by Adam Sandler or God Only Knows by the Beach Boys
Dollar Dance: You've Got a Friend by James Taylor, Lean on Me by Bill Withers, With a Little Help From My Friends by the Beatles (depends on how many people want to dance!)
Garter Toss: Rock 'N Roll Part 2 by Gary Glitter (the "Hey" song)
Bouquet Toss: Rocky Theme Song
Last Dance: Here's to the Nights by Eve 6

Nothing is set in stone yet, but that is what I'm thinking so far. What do you think? I know, I know... a few are pretty nerdy, but what can I say? I'm marrying a Star Wars nerd and I know he'll get a kick out of it! ... it's a surprise! :)

Sneak Peek! :)

Lucas put up 12 photos on Facebook from our engagement photo shoot. I absolutely love them. :) Here is a sneak peek:

Again, Lucas only put 12 photos up on Facebook... these are just my favorites of the photos he put up. He told me that there should be about 40 to 50 photos on the disc that he sends us. If you are in the Denver area and are looking for a photographer, I definitely recommend Lucas McDonough. He has reasonable prices and he does an amazing job. :) You can see more here or here.

Engagement Photos... DONE!

I was a little worried because the weather forecast was calling for it to be chilly and rainy. Fortunately, the weather-people were wrong (what a surprise, right?). The day was beautiful. It was breezy, but it was sunny and 60s. :)

Even though the weather cooperated, I was still nervous. I felt awkward doing the shoot. I'm normally the person behind the camera. I didn't know what to do with myself. Philip felt the same way! I am sure that the photos turned out beautiful... I just can't wait to see them!

Lucas said that we should have the disc back within a week or so... he said that he will post some of the pictures to Facebook when he finishes editing them. He had one other appointment on Saturday and he has already posted their pictures to Facebook. So, hopefully we will get to see ours soon! I will be sure to put up the link when I see them!

Engagement Photos

We officially have an appointment for our engagement photos. I have put it off until now because I didn't want to spend a few hundred dollars on just e-pics. Well, thanks to Facebook, I found a photographer to do them for $50!

The photographer is Lucas McDonough. The engagement package is normally $100.00, but I saw an ad on Facebook for him with a 50% off deal... so, I contacted him immediately. He confirmed the deal and we set up an appointment for this Saturday at 3pm.

We're doing the shots in Downtown Denver. I let Philip decide. We could have done them anywhere within 25 miles of Denver, but our photographer recommended Red Rocks or Downtown. Philip said since our wedding pictures will be outside in a park, we should get something a little different for our e-pics. I think he has a valid point. Hell, I'm just thrilled whenever he gives input!

To be fair, Philip has been doing an excellent job lately. He has given input whenever I have asked, and he has even helped on a few projects! I am an incredibly lucky bride! :) In fact, I should have a post up later this week of a project he was helping me with... I'll get the post up as soon as the project is finished.

Oh! And, the paper for the invitations came in on Friday! It's darker than I thought it was going to be, so I am very happy with it! I used Craigslist to find a 24"x24" paper cutter for $30 (GREAT deal!) and I'm going to pick it up tomorrow after work... then I will get to begin creating my pocketfolds! I am so excited! :D

Lucky

I am so incredibly lucky. Why? In planning my wedding, I have spent a lot of time surfing wedding websites and message boards. I have seen a LOT of complaints about many different things: future in-laws, family, bridal party, budgets, etc.

I don't have any problems with my future in-laws. I don't get to see them very often because we live several hundred miles away from both sides of our families. However, when I see them or talk to them, they are very supportive. They want us to have the wedding the way we want it. They are happy to have me as a future in-law. They have been nothing but welcoming to me. They are becoming my family as much as my FH's family. :)

My family has been supportive as well. My parents are trying to help with the wedding financially. My sister is my MOH. My mom (and probably my sister) plan to help with many of the DIY projects that I'm doing. We are having our wedding in Pennsylvania (where FH's family is from) and my family (in Indiana) have not complained about the distance at all. They are just thrilled about the wedding (and marriage!). They love their FSIL. :)

Our bridal party is small. We will each have two people: a maid of honor, a bridesmaid, a best man, and a groomsman. There hasn't been much for them to do thus far. Basically, they have to buy their attire and show up. My MOH will be planning my bachelorette party and it will take place the night before the wedding (everyone is coming from all over! My family and MOH are in Indiana, I'm in Colorado, my bridesmaid is in DC, and many of my friends are in Virginia and North Carolina). The same goes for FH: his family is in Pennsylvania, his BM is in Tennessee, his groomsman is coming from North Carolina, and he has friends coming from Virginia and NC. So, we aren't really expecting a lot from our bridal party. Most of the details will be on the wedding day (helping decorate, getting ready, etc.). So, no real problems there!

My FH and I have been very fortunate. We moved to Colorado from North Carolina at the end of June. I found a job within 2 weeks and he had a job transfer (so he immediately had a job). So, financially, we are doing really well. This means that, although we have kept our budget small, we are able to do the things we want to do for our wedding... especially our dream honeymoon to Italy!

So, as you can see, we have been very lucky. I am so thankful that we have managed to be so fortunate. I hope that I will not be on the wedding message boards with complaints any time soon! And, to all of those brides who DO have those problems, I am so incredibly sorry. I hope that you and FH can work through them. Just remember, after all of this wedding stress is over, you will be able to spend the rest of your life with your wonderful husband. :)

Say Yes To The Dress

I've been watching Say Yes to the Dress lately. I had never watched it before but my mom mentioned it to me and I saw that it was available to watch instantly on Netflix. So, I sat down and watched a few episodes.

It's an interesting show, I'll give them that. However, being a budget bride, I find myself blown away by how much these brides spend on their dresses! Don't get me wrong, I plan to find my dream dress. However, I don't plan on spending more than $500 on the dress. So, when I see brides not even thinking about blowing $15,000 on a dress, I get a little nauseous. That's more than my entire wedding budget. Including the honeymoon! And we're going to Italy!

It just blows my mind! Where are these brides coming up with this money?? Especially when I see that some of them are teachers or SAHMs... I work full time and so does Philip. We don't have that kind of money to blow on our wedding. I know that many brides take out loans to cover wedding costs... we don't see that as an option. We'd like to buy a house and start a family in the next few years. $15,000 wedding dresses don't fit into that plan very well.

Am I the only person who thinks that spending that much money on a dress is crazy??

Invitations

I realize that I still have about 10 months until the invitations need to be mailed, but I just can't help myself... I've been working on them. However, I may end up needing a lot of that time to get them finished!

That is because I have decided to do my own pocketfold invitations. Phew! I am exhausted just thinking about it! For those of you who do not know what I'm talking about, I mean this:

Mine will be similar to this because I will be doing the vertical pockets. I do really like the look of the horizontal pockets like this:

...but I feel like that pocket is just going to be a lot of work. It looks like more hassle than it's worth. So, vertical pocketfolds it is!

Our wedding colors are navy and ivory. So, I wanted to do a navy

colored pocketfold with ivory invitations and inserts. I had a heck of a time finding navy colored cardstock in a large size. And, when I did, it was outrageously expensive.

Eventually, I did find some dark blue cardstock that I thought would work. I found it at Paper-Source. The exact paper I used is here. I thought text paper would be fine... it's 80# paper, so it should be sturdy enough to hold up, but not so hard that I have difficulty folding it into the pocketfold. I used the color Night. It's not exactly what I had in mind, but it's pretty close.

The paper is 20x26... so, enormous. I will cut it down into the sizes that I need (I'm excited because I finally get to get the cutter I've wanted for a while -- I'm a scrapbooker!). The paper is $0.60 per sheet. It's pretty reasonable as it is, but if you buy 10 sheets, you get 10% off; if you buy 25 sheets, you get 20% off; and, if you buy 50 sheets, you get 30% off. I didn't really need all 25 sheets, but I bought them anyway. I figured I could use the extra for programs. I also signed up for email from Paper-Source and I got a 10% off coupon. So, I ended up paying about $0.43 per sheet. Including shipping, my total was $17.80. I don't think that's unreasonable. Especially since pocketfolds can be as much as several dollars a piece!

The paper shipped out last night, so I should have it in a few days and I can see exactly what I'm working with.

In the meantime, I have been working up some mock-ups of how I want to do the pocketfolds. I had to glue two sheets of paper together since I didn't have any paper long enough at home, but I think I've got the idea.

This is what I've come up with:

The original that I made is to scale, but I shrunk this one so that it wouldn't be enormous for the blog page. So, I have a 20x26 inch piece of cardstock. Since the measurements of my pocketfold are 5x20, I can make 5 pocketfolds out of 1 piece of cardstock! I'll have to cut 1" off the edge of the paper, but then I can just cut the paper into 5 strips and, voila!

Then I will be ready to measure, cut, score, and fold! It's going to be an absolute pain, but I hope that it will be worth it when I see the finished result. They are going to be beautiful! :)

Save the Dates

I've been focusing a lot on the paper part of the wedding recently. I have been trying to figure out how I want the invitations and save-the-dates to look.

Well, I think I've finally figured the save-the-dates out:


The ivory part is actually going to be a magnet. The rest will be a card (folded in half). The front of the card will have our logo/monogram on it:


I am pretty excited about it. I am going to do the magnets myself. I am having the photos printed at http://www.photoworks.com/. They offer 3.5x5 prints (one of the few places I can find that size!) for $0.15 per print. I thought it was pretty reasonable. I am buying sheets of adhesive magnets to attach the prints to. I am still searching for the magnet sheets, but so far, I found these. The problem is that I can only fit about 5 STDs on each magnet sheet, and they sell them by the dozen. I'd like to make about 75-80. I don't really want to have to buy 2 dozen sheets when I only need 15-16 sheets. So, my search continues... If it comes to that though, at least they are fairly reasonably priced. :)

Once I have the magnets finished, I am going to attach them to the cards. I'm printing 2 cards per sheet of cardstock, so it will save a bit of paper. I haven't decided what color cardstock I want to use yet though. I had originally thought ivory, but I changed the magnets so that they are ivory (they were Philip's favorite -- I also made navy blue and black backgrounds). So, I had thought about doing navy blue cards, but I don't want the writing to be difficult to see on the card. So, I think I'm just going to go to the craft store and see what they've got on sale that will go with my STDs.

I will update as soon as I get a mock-up done! :)


**P.S. I went with a photo from our first date for the STD magnets. I thought it was a cute touch! :)

Wish Jar...

So, one of the ideas that I fell in love with for the wedding reception is a Wish Jar.

Basically, you put out pieces of paper or cardstock and writing utensils and ask your guests to write a wish for the bride and groom or even a piece of advice. Then, they put the note in the "wish jar."

Many brides use these scraps of paper for scrapbooking or as additions to their wedding albums... which is what I plan to do. :)

I am using a vase as my wish "jar." It will be the same sort of vase I'm using for my centerpieces. It's a fantastic vase... mostly because it's only a dollar. hahaha... Dollar Tree is my friend! You can see the vase here. I'm going to put navy tulle ribbon around the top (our wedding colors are navy and ivory).

I spent several hours last night cutting out pieces of cardstock (I have plenty since I do scrapbooking). I used several different colors. And, once I had a LOT of pieces, I used craft scissors to give the pieces a cute cut-out border. They look really cute, but the fingers on my right hand are KILLING me. Holding scissors (especially to cut cardstock) for several hours at a time is just not a good idea.

But, I will have an adorable addition to my reception. :) I'll put up pictures soon.