ooh

This vase is super neat.

I kind of want to buy a couple sets of them and, instead of putting full bouquets at each table, do a single flower. With twiggy accents, like this. Or these. Or both! I might find different flowers for the centerpieces altogether... maybe just the two types of branches? Hmm.

Also, I might have my ladies of honor wear these wrist corsages instead of carrying bouquets.

Double hmm....

Vegas, baby

Most of the wedding stuff is planned at this point. Now it's just a matter of making all the purchases.

Side note: it's hard to save money when you somehow end up overdrawing your checking account by $150 despite diligent budgeting ARGH I HATE MONEY! Whatever, I'm dealing with it, plus when Darren gets his tax return next week I'm getting $900 of it so I'm going to stop freaking out now.

We haven't officially booked an officiant, but Darren's mom has a few she said she'll be in touch with for us (and she'll give them my contact info, la de da), and a photographer hasn't been officially booked either, but I've been talking to a couple people so we're mostly good to go there too.

Other than those few things though, it really is just a matter of spending the money. And there's not a lot to be done right this second. So, in the meantime, I'm looking up awesome, inexpensive stuff to do in Las Vegas. Sounds like this is for sure what we'll be doing for the honeymoon, so why not be prepared, eh?

The place we're staying has a kitchen and apparently it's right off the Strip, and I guess they have drivers who will take you wherever you want to go? Amazing. I definitely want to see Cirque du Soleil's Love while we're there, which is going to be spendy but totally worth it. Kate saw it when she was in Vegas on her MLP tour and she said she would've seen it again.

I think it's going to be a pretty amazingly fun week. We probably won't go the week immediately after the wedding, mostly because some friends are getting married on the 14th and we don't want to miss that. If we go the 16th through 21st, it'll work out perfectly: I'd get paid on the 13th, our renter's property tax refund would get deposited on approximately the 16th, and Darren's birthday is the 20th. And I could catch up on work the week before and spend the whole time bragging about how I was going to be in Vegas. I'm only half kidding about the bragging.

Wee!

At the wedding fair, there was a catering vendor who had these fantastic plastic forks that totally looked like real silverware. I picked one up and was like OSNAP! These are plastic! WANT!

And I can get them here. Or here. Or here. Booya!

The Save-the-Dates are finished and have been ordered! Wanna see? Sure you do! Even though you're getting one in the mail in the future. Ha.

Here's the front:


and here's the back:


Designed by my favorite Eric in the world. Yay!

more stuff

Sounds like we're going to Vegas. WHAT UP?! Darren's parents have a timeshare there and they're not going to have the time or money to go this year, so they offered it to us for our honeymoon. Amazing.

Anyhoodle. Darren mentioned paper lanterns, so I'm looking into places I can buy them wholesale. So far this place has the best prices. Oh wait, maybe this place does. IKEA has them, but $4 each? Really? Come on.

And finally, iffn' we end up getting tables and chairs for free from Darren's grandma's church (hope, hope), if the chairs are ugly, I'm going to have to get covers. And this is the cheapest place I can find them.

Doo doo doo...

notes

Shoes: received. Fit. Super cute.

Rental company: emailed. Sweet Jesus, I hope their stuff is available that day.

**edit: It is. She's working on an estimate/invoice today (Friday). Wee!
Unfortunately, I was doing my taxes last night and it looks like I'm going to be getting less than half the return I usually get. That sucks, since it was going to go toward the wedding. Argh. I should still be getting enough for the 25% deposit, though. And hopefully Darren will be willing to hold off on buying his new TV and donate more to the wedding fund than originally planned. :( Money is frustrating. I wish I could just blatantly ask for cash gifts only, but some people aren't into that. Oh well. We'll make it work.

Wedding fair: planning on going on Sunday at Darren's insistence. It's $15 bucks to get in, but hey, if we get lucky we could win a friggin' honeymoon. Or if we're really REALLY lucky, a $150,000 dream wedding. Ha!

We're hoping Darren's uncle will do the photography for us. For free! Or really really cheap! Cross your fingers for us...

Ha. PS: I asked Darren about porta potties last night and he told me his mom had called him earlier in the day to ask the same thing. I LOL'd.