Mr. Jones and Me

Mo’ Money, Mo’ Problems

Stephanie — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 04:36:33 +0000

If that is really true, why am I the one stressing about not having money?

Today provided me with a moment of hopelessness as I thought about the wedding budget. This was not a good Monday, and financial worries just got the better of me. I sat in my cubicle contemplating if our Save the Dates were really worth the money to send out.

Over dinner, I mention this to Fiance, and he brings me back to earth. His list of reasons to continue with the Save the Dates are

We are getting them pretty cheap. Each postcard is getting printed for 16 cents on any of the papers this printer provides. That plus stamps doesn’t equal too much
The time that I have already invested into making the darn things in InDesign
The time he has spent getting the addresses in order long before we needed to.

Needless to say – we’ll be sending out the Save the Dates. Once we do, I’ll post the final version and some tips on manipulating PDFs

Working on Weddings

Stephanie — Sat, 06 Oct 2007 17:30:39 +0000

I have a confession to make. I’ve spent a lot of time the last two weeks working on wedding-related business. But almost none of it has been for my wedding.

Last week was a lot of planning and getting things for my Oldest Brother*’s wedding.

I love my best friend (whom I am co-MOHing for) so I usually don’t realize when I spend loads of time working on things for her wedding. It has been all fun stuff. This week, Co-MOH* and I put together and sent out the invites for the bachelorette party. That included me making the back of the invitation in InDesign (maybe after the party I will post it).

Tuesday was some back breaking work to assemble the parts of her wedding invitations that we could. I have a new appreciation for the tissue paper in invitations – its NOT just about tradition after all!

I was commissioned to create the map insert for the wedding invites, so I’ve probably spent the most time on this project, creating a map and a layout that looks good, and incorporates her themes. It was very satisfying when she loved the first draft of it. C

Creating the map wasn’t always fun. I’m terrible at freehanding art, including straight lines on the computer. But I can trace! Upon finding a neat (and smart!) tutorial on Weddingbee about saving a Google/Yahoo/etc. map of the directions and tracing, I was thrilled. Now the map looks neat, it’s accurate and best of all, the bride loves it!

I used InDesign to layout the two pages, and Illustrator to create the map. Maybe once I get the final version done, I’ll post it, but any DIY instructions came from the Weddingbee article I mentioned, so that is where credit is due.

In my own wedding related news – Graphic Designer Roommate* brought home the book of paper that I can choose from to print our Save the Dates! I’m so excited. We’ll hopefully be sending these out by the end of the month.

*I’ve decided to descriptively name people. Instead of saying my roommate, the graphic designer, he has become Graphic Designer Roommate.

Making a list, checking it twice

Stephanie — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 05:03:48 +0000

I got to visit the lovely San Francisco for the first time this past week. The event was my brother’s wedding. Andy came along and was also in the wedding. He has only met my brother and his now wife a total of three times before this, and one instance was for a funeral. Nevertheless, Jason needed to recruit guys because I think symmetry was important to this wedding. In the end, they still ended up one guy short.

Since I am bestowed with the goodness of wedding planning, I tend to pay a bit more attention to detail. This was also the first wedding that I’ve gotten to participant in since I don’t know when. I also had many people, upon finding out about our engagement, encourage me to take notes. I didn’t expect encouragement necessarily, but I guess – what else do you say?

In the end, I came up with a list, indeed, of things to remember from this wedding:

It’s not okay to bash the bridesmaid dresses two days before the wedding. It’s definitely not kosher to do this at the bachelorette party. Sisters especially should not be complaining if they agreed to do so. (This was not me, simply an … observation)
Arriving 8 minutes before the ceremony not in your dress may not be the best idea, but things still manage to work out.
An impromptu “Trash the Dress” session in a hot tub while wearing a red bridesmaid dress may turn the pool red.
Driving a Mustang convertible through a McDonald’s drive thru in wedding gear is awesome. Driving a Mustang convertible on your wedding day is awesome.
The shorter the aisle, apparently the slower you walk.
A cocktail hour is a fantastic idea (This was the first I had seen, and it played out beautifully)
The wedding party dance should be set to faster music.

I hope people read (most) of these as tongue-in-cheek. I loved the wedding and spent most of my time having fun, not making a list of things to remember to do. This list consists of things I reflect back on as generally fantastic times.

Always a bridesmaid

Stephanie — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 16:15:57 +0000

Last Friday I took off early from work to go pick up bridesmaid dresses for the wedding I’m co-maid of honoring for.

I leave this week for San Francisco for my brother’s wedding (the red dress). I’m so excited to see my brother get married, and also to visit San Francisco.

I was looking on Craigslist last night and saw people offering half-season ticket packages for the Minnesota Wild hockey team. Being an avid fan, I mentioned this glorious news to my fiance. He gave me the ultimatum (jokingly) of having a photographer at our wedding or going to 20-some Wild games. Tough choice!

It’s Just a Dress…?

Stephanie — Thu, 20 Sep 2007 04:59:49 +0000

I decided to post pictures from our bridesmaid dress blitz. I apologize for the weird angles – we were at David’s Bridal and they don’t allow pictures unless you’re buying the dress and I didn’t think to ask after we basically confirmed the dresses. So instead I would always “help Crysten unzip” while really just taking a picture.

I was surprised by the variety of styles, especially since I don’t like bubble hems all that much. Picture all dresses in a marine blue or a more tropical blue.

Option 1: This one surprised me but I wasn’t blown completely away

Option 2: I always liked this one online and it looked cute but the fabric was not something I wanted to put my bridesmaids in.

Option 3: This is a bubble hem which was adorable, but this was their only blue color and it didn’t really convince me of… blue. Cute though.

(insert a couple that I didn’t even bother to take pictures of)

Option 4: This is it! For the bridesmaids that aren’t Crysten, they will be wearing this. The more pro looking picture is the color they will be in. This dress rocks.

And finally, the maid/matron of honor dress: The top and bottom are separates and I think the ribbon will actually sit at her hips, but it looked so good on her! (On a side note, the colors that she tried on were black and red and she looked saucy!)

And that’s it! I need to introduce the dresses to the girls. I think I might DIY a newsletter-type announcement so I can put all sorts of info in.

I’m not sure what I’ll do for shoes yet. I think it’d be adorable to have the girls get dyed shoes that match Crysten’s ribbon. David’s Bridal had a sign that said free shoe-dying, but I assume that’s only if you buy their shoes. Their shoes are a bit spendy for a color that might not get worn again. However, if I think a place like Payless Shoes can make a good color match, I might have them do that.

I’m trying to be a good bride and remember that if I’m on a budget, then the rest of the girls might be too.

I feel pretty, oh so pretty

Stephanie — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 20:22:22 +0000

I ventured out with my MOH this week to David’s Bridal for bridesmaids dresses.

Originally I was leery of going to David’s Bridal at first because it seems like most of what I see are halter tops and strapless, and designs that are all the same. I toyed with the idea of their separates mostly because I love their shades of blue.

Customer service has also been hit or miss at David’s Bridal, whether it is busy or not. I did not want to deal with pushy salespeople, but I wanted some attention to us. I guess I wanted more of a sell than what David’s Bridal can usually provide. I’ll probably post this experience separately.

One gem I found on David’s Bridal site (besides this dress) is a program to “dress your party.” It’s been helpful to see colors next to each other, especially a darker blue dress and a black suit, and also to see bridesmaid dress styles next to what is closest to the style of my dress.

So the actual trip:

The somewhat spacey “wedding consultant” followed us around, grabbing dresses that I thought might be nice. I think I didn’t even really take time to look at about 2 full racks because, well, sometimes you just know.

My MOH modeled the first three, and I wanted to choose each dress. I thought the trip would be disaster because I wouldn’t be able to chose. When she came out styling the one I linked to earlier, I fell in love… again. The first time was through my glowing LCD screen. I even found myself liking a bubble hem.

We found two or three that fit into the category of “it looked pretty online …” Tulle is such a love/hate fabric. There was a fun dress that looked way better than it felt. After this, I felt better about being picky for what I wanted.

My point is – I think I found my bridesmaid dresses! The fiance approves, the maid of honor approves, so I think I’m good to go! The next challenge is matching a suit style and color with the dark blue that I ultimately chose.

Updates!

Stephanie — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 14:30:09 +0000

So when I bought my dress, the woman tried to sell me on this veil, but it was mega-expensive – well, more than I was willing to spend when I could just go to Joann Fabrics, and make one myself! I found out this weekend that my mom called the store a few days after we got the dress and bought me the veil as a surprise! How sweet is that?

It’s been hard to get a lot of planning done in the last few weeks with school starting again (my last semester!) so my updates currently are few:

- I need to start looking for a photographer, stat!

- We officially got our reception site booked! We’ll be at Piney Ridge Resort and Restaurant on the beautiful Whitefish chain of lakes. Before we were debating between Timbermist and Piney Ridge, but for the same price, we could be on the lake!

- Andy may be changing his mind about the tuxes and having the groomsmen get suits that are similar instead. I like this idea.

- My MOH and I are going to look into bridesmaids dresses tonight. For simplicity’s sake (I have a bridesmaid that is touring with a show around the country), I’m going to do David’s Bridal. I can’t decide on doing one color, one dress or choosing a range of blues and having them each get a dress (different or the same) within each of those colors. I think that’d be pretty I know there are some brides who say a color and the girls can get a dress from wherever they want, but I don’t know if I’m that risky. Is the shades of blue idea a cool one?

- I’m finishing designing our Save the Dates, sending them to the printer and then I can show them off!

This is disjointed, and I apologize for that. I’m settling more into classes and new work schedule now so I should be good to post more often.

Hiatus?

Stephanie — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 03:09:43 +0000

First of all, thanks for the comments that let me know I’m not the only person to either lose a ring or freak out about it.

My last semester of school starts this week, so I figured I’d get a quick update post in before the craziness starts. It’s going to be an extremely hectic end of August – beginning of October. For official plans, I have to start classes, start my new 40hours/week job, go to Rapid City, South Dakota over Labor Day weekend, see my friend when she is in town (twice), work at the State Fair (twice), endure Homecoming, go to San Francisco for my brother’s wedding, run a marathon (plus all the training) and hopefully meet with photographers for the wedding.

*whew*

Needless to say, if I’m not blogging, you know where I am. Anyway, on to the updates.

I think I’m going home in 3 weeks to meet with some photographers – yay! I’m excited. Most seem to have about the same prices for packages, and mostly comparable stuff in the packages. I did see one package where it was for about 3 hours of coverage and not a lot of extras, whereas most in the area give at least 5 hours for the same amount.

So far my top contenders for photographers, without meeting any yet are:

Treeline Photography

Woody’s Photography

Kelli Engstrom Photography

The other update, which is somewhat related to photography, is that Andy revealed that for a guestbook, he wants a photo guestbook, where we create an album of sorts with pictures of us, and leave people room to sign the pages. I’ve seen them featured and discussed a lot of Weddingbee, so I’m sure I can either find a good deal on getting one made, or finding instruction to make our own.

Oh, and one more update. One of my housemates is a graphic designer is getting us a fantastic deal on our Save the Dates, so they will only be .16 each plus postage. In case I have failed to mention this before, our Save the Dates are going to look like the cover of a Playbill (that I designed/manipulated) and will be sent as postcards. Once they are printed and sent out, I will give a view of them.

I am not a ditz

Stephanie — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 04:43:34 +0000

I don’t even know if I should be admitting this online. Here goes.

I lost my engagement ring tonight. I put it in my pocket because I was at a girls’ night that involved waxing girls legs and eyebrows. Of course, I don’t want it to get all waxy gross. After waxing, I go to visit the fiance before heading home. I get home, am reading a post on Weddingbee about diamond cuts, and go to gaze lovingly at my ring. Only instead I see a blank finger and a realization that my ring is in my shorts pocket. Check shorts pocket. The shorts I chose to wear today do not have good pockets – they are very loose because it’s a stretchy material. Cue to FREAK OUT.

I scared Andy by calling him sobbing after I’ve convinced myself that the ring won’t magically appear in my pocket. He thought someone had died. Nope, just me, sitting on the road by my car, checking the seats and crying.

My mind was reeling with He’sGoingToThinkIDon’tTakeCareOfThings or ThatItDoesn’tMeanMuchToMe or a million other horrible things because that was how I felt. So very beyond horrible.

Andy found it. Drove it over to me at 11:30 at night. Calmed me down. Said he understood a parable from the Bible better, one about a lost gold coin. I’m marrying a wonderful man.

And I’m never taking this ring off again, I swear.

ceremony reading

Stephanie — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 21:13:26 +0000

Seeing as how our wedding ceremony is (hopefully) going to be outside, I was okay with mixing up a bit of traditional bits with nontraditional bits. Nontraditional? Me? Who knew?

One of these “bits” is the readings for the ceremony. There are some Biblical readings that I’m pondering, but I really wanted to have at least one non-Biblical reading, in one form or another.

I found one. I read it to my friend the other day, and her face tingled. It is that good. It’s still spiritual, but I think it is beautiful; the language, the sentiment, as it were.

From Blue Like Jazz, by Donald Miller.

“I will love you, as sure as He loved me. I will discover what I can discover and though you remain a mystery, save God’s own knowledge, what I disclose of you I will keep in the warmest chamber of my heart, the very chamber where God has stowed Himself in me. And I will do this to my death, and to death it may bring me.

I will love you like God, because of God, mighted by the power of God. I will stop expecting your love, demanding your love, trading for your love, gaming for your love. I will simply love. I am giving myself to you, and tomorrow I will do it again. I suppose the clock itself will wear thin its time before I am ended at this altar of dying and dying again.

God risked Himself on me. I will risk myself on you. And together, we will learn to love, and perhaps then, and only then, understand this gravity that drew Him, unto us.”