My photo album hasn't come yet. Grr, argh. It better show up.

FYI

We don't know for sure yet whether or not camping out at the farm is going to be okay.

I'll let everyone know as soon as we find out for sure.

this is a story about how much i rule.

Last night, Darren and I were brainstorming guestbook ideas and came up with an awesome one. We think it's awesome, anyway. Acquire a bunch of old wedding photos from antique stores, have guests write messages on them, and then put them in our wedding scrapbook or a separate book.

Well. I thought to myself "I bet I could find some on ebay." So I did a quick search and right there on the first page was an auction for a full album of vintage wedding photos. For five bucks. Ending in 34 minutes. I bid, I won. Rock.

Unrelated: I bought the ties.

Also unrelated: Instead of going to Ikea and getting a bunch of matching vases, we're going to scour Goodwill/thrift stores/antique stores and find a bunch of random ones. All the flower arrangements are going to look the same so I figured it might be a little more interesting having a variety of vases.

I am pleased.

more progress! man, i'm awesome.

I finished the card box and those banners today, and the dyed program pieces are drying. We finalized the ceremony text and picked our readings.

Eric will read "A Lovely Love Story" by Edward Monkton.
Darren still needs to ask his grandma to do a reading, but assuming she says yes she will read "The Art of A Good Marriage" by Wilferd A. Peterson.

Our to-do list is getting pretty short. Rock.

dreams. And progress.

I had two wedding dreams in a row last night and it was ridiculous.

In the first one, it was the morning after and I was sitting on a couch at my grandma's old house when I realized that everything had gone wrong the day before. There was no photographer, hardly any guests showed up, I never got to eat anything, and the worst: we forgot to sign the marriage license. I was freaking out hoping that it was all a dream. Then I woke up. My heart was racing but I was quite relieved that it was a dream.

In the second one, we were setting up the reception inside a house. We cleared out all the furniture and brought in tables and stuff, and it looked amazing. Some dude was practicing his toast and I overheard it while I was setting up and I started to cry a little. And that was it, end of dream.

Anyway. I spent most of yesterday working on wedding projects. I made a card box, dyed more program pieces, and made necklace things for my ladies of honor. They're not fancy or anything- I fully intend on throwing them away after the wedding- but I think they'll look nifty. Maybe not though. I'll decide the day of, I suppose.

Today I'm going to finish dying the paper, finish the card box, and maybe make the signs to hang. They say "guestbook," "food," "drink," "beer," and "games." When I realized how expensive chalkboards would be, I decided to steal the idea that Heather used at her wedding: paper banners. Bam.

ties

I think I'm going to buy the dudes' ties when I get paid on Tuesday. This is just my note to self so I remember...

1 black tie for Darren.
2 hunter green ties for the ushers.
4 pear green ties for the groomsmen and Kyle.
2 olive green ties for our dads.

go team Baxter

Darren and I had a good talk last night about how we're going to face - nay, attack - the next two months. Two months!

He's starting his new job today, which mean he'll theoretically be making more money than he was on unemployment (they're only paying him $10 an hour, but it's better than nothing). We're going to stick firmly to our monthly budget plan and try to reduce our grocery allotment. We won't be going out or doing anything that involves spending money - no bars, movie theatres, restaurants, and the like. All the money we have left over will go toward the wedding.

We'll also slowly but surely stock up on frozen ground beef for the taco bar. If we can find ground chicken at a good price we'll pick up a bunch of that too. We'll pick up the perishable stuff (lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, etc) probably the day before.

We haven't made any decisions about side dishes. If his mom still wants to help, she can do those. Rah rah.

We're going to need crock pots.

programs

Okay, so it might take a little convincing to get Darren to go along with this taco bar idea. Fingers crossed!

In other news, the most time-consuming project is proving to be the ceremony programs. I mentioned in an earlier post that I downloaded a template to make fans. I have to cut out each individual piece- five sections per fan. Three of them will be printed on both sides (one side with actual ceremony and wedding party info, the other side with a design), and the other two are blank but there to make the fan larger and more fan-like.

I decided that instead of leaving the blank pages boring and white, I'm going to stain them with tea. I've got some test pages drying right now, but as long as they dry to the same stiffness as before, then it's a go. I've got almost all of the blank pieces cut out. I'm not going to print the other pieces until after I get more ink, so I can do them all at once (my current color cartridge is about half empty and I'd inevitably run out half way through printing).

So it's going to take a long time. But they're going to be pretty nifty I think.

Ugh

So, you know how cows and turkeys were going to be raised for our wedding feast? Yeah, that fell through. So now it's all going to have to be purchased. Oh, and Darren's aunt told his mom that it's been too cold for the sweet corn (70-80 degrees is too cold??) so that's going to have to be store bought too.

It was my understanding that Darren's mom's family was going to take care of all the food. But she just got off the phone with him and she asked him to ask me what kind of food budget we have. Um, we have zero dollars. I had just gotten off the phone with her myself after explaining that we were over budget as it was. And I don't see why she couldn't have just asked me herself.

We have two months. Food won't be purchased until a couple days beforehand so we have time to save extra money, but it's not going to be much. Especially since we have to save extra money for our over-budgeted-ness.

We should have eloped.

*EDIT: We had accounted for the side dishes, but not the farm-provided food. But Brenna, bless her, had a brilliant idea: taco bar. BAM. Ground beef, ground chicken, black beans, and the usual taco fillings. Delicious, and way more affordable.

Confession

Now that invitations have been sent, I'm totally girl-ing out. We've gotten two RSVPs so far and both times I've been all "tee hee hee yay *giggle*" despite the fact that one of them was a no.

It is ridiculous, and I hope I calm down.

But the first RSVP was from Beth & Dan and they're totally coming and I get super excited every time I think about it. Yay! Yayayay!

I'm also inbox stalking, since every time someone RSVPs via the website I get an email. I don't know what I'm going to do when someone responds by phone. Probably not answer and then listen to the message and have the same response.

Bah. Total girl.

In other news, we finished pre-marital counseling on Tuesday. Now we just have to wait for Anna to send us the official, notarized thingy saying that we received counseling so we can get our discount on the marriage license. Pip!

Progress!

Invites are going out with the mail this afternoon! Holla!

Also, my pretty sage green crinoline is finished and was shipped today:Hopefully it arrives soon. Although I noticed she shipped it to my home address, so... I might end up having to fetch it from a post office somewhere, because we can't really accept packages at our place if they don't fit in the mailbox. Oh well. I'll get it somehow.

I also started cutting out pieces for our programs last night. Just the blank sections. I want to buy more ink before I endeavor to eff with the actual colored portions. This project is going to be the biggest pain in the ass yet. If I end up baking cookies as the favor, it's going to seem like a breeze compared to these programs.

Anyway. I finally got around to creating a To Do list and it's getting pretty short. Mostly just making purchases, with some shopping and writing and creating thrown in. It looks long but it's kind of not. Although I do feel like I'm forgetting something:

To Do

• find vases for centerpieces

• make centerpieces

• find square placemats or something for centerpieces to sit on

• acquire marriage license

• book flights to Vegas

• ask Darren's grandma to be a reader

• choose readings

• buy Darren's suit, shirt, shoes

• buy all ties

• buy groomsmen gifts

• finish buying bridesmaid gifts

• acquire games and stuff for reception

badminton
bocce ball
board games
bean bag toss

• decide where to stay before the wedding (book rooms if necessary)

• decide where to stay on wedding night (book room if necessary)

• finish vows

• finish ceremony

• finish programs

• make guestbook

• make description cards for food

• make signs (may scrap this idea depending on what resources end up being necessary. I want to use chalkboards but damn if they aren't surprisingly expensive):

"guestbook"
"games"
"food"
"drink"

• buy place settings, cups, serving utensils and bowls

• buy lanterns for decorating

• make playlists

pre-ceremony
dinner
dance

• try to go to Bertha to decide layout

meet with officiant if possible

• make signs to put along the road to direct people

• buy all beverages necessary

wine
water
soda

• favors??

• finalize day-of timing and details

• 2 weeks out: make sure officiant has final ceremony

• 2-3 weeks out: make sure rental company has final numbers

• determine any tasks for wedding party

• decide who will coordinate day-of setup

• write toasts

• do name-change paperwork