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We have just a few more days of quiet before the wedding week begins. Family starts coming in on Saturday, and thus starts the kick off for the BIG DAY. We're trying to semi take it easy, but also made it our personal goal to finish every single thing pertaining to preparation for the wedding by Friday. According to my good friend Julie (married 3 years), that isn't going to happen. She's probably right.
The marriage license is signed. My last dress fitting was Monday, Nick's decided on his wedding day tie and bought his backup to his backup shirt. The guest room in our house is now serving as storage for everything we need to have for the wedding week. It's looking a little crazy.
Nick is now at the point where he is thinking past the wedding day and all about the honeymoon. Can't wait to get a good night's sleep then.
Started taking vitamins to prevent getting sick...but my throat's been tingling x 1 1/2 days now. Lovely.
An FYI to our female guests- bring a shawl! The weather here in LA has not been anything like the weather in the east or midwest. We will rent heat lamps, but come prepared.
Off to continue watching Teen Nick's the 90s are All That!
Well, two weeks y'all!
Our excitement is taking over. Can't you tell by my use of wedding colors???
It is definitely safe to say THE BIG DAY anticipation is building. So far there have been two days this week when I have not slept well because I'm constantly thinking about last minute wedding-y things. My desire to take on a million tasks is both enjoyable and slightly stressful. I guess it's eustress? On a walk with the dogs the other day we both confessed that we're feeling a bit nervous- not about getting married, but about the minor things we still seem to need to do. Really there isn't much left, but it feels like there are umpteen things to do. I love my sleep, and I am not a fan of opening my eyes, suddenly wide awake, looking at the clock and seeing that it reads 2:39. Screw you, internal clock telling me I shouldn't be sleeping. Screw. You. And not in the enjoyable way.
Nick helped me finish the wedding programs (don't you just love the idea of tying 120 bows? Doesn't it make you just go ooooo?) I had fun yesterday buying goodies you will see as part of the whole wedding experience. I went to a Jewish bakery to ask about challah, and we might need something larger than a sedan to transport what we have in mind.
Somehow we seem to have taken care of non-dire aspects of the wedding, and didn't really come up with wedding music ideas until this week (or at least I didn't). And we love music! Fail.
Tomorrow we have a woman coming to the house to bring our marriage license paperwork. Our coordinator told us about the long and hideous process of applying via the LA Courthouse + finding a notary, and we decided that idea sucked. So instead this woman will come to us, bring everything, and is a notary! Thus comes to the next major decision...
What will my new name be? Duh duh duhhhhhhh (visualize the man with curly mustache drumming his fingers together, looking both thoughtful and mysterious). But you know...Kelly minus the masculine features.
At last! We're in the home stretch of this whole wedding thing! I must say, Nick and I are sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ready for the wedding day to just be here!
Our photographer Aileen emailed us the link to view our engagement photos, and there are a ton of them. It took some time to click through each photo, but we are happy to have some winners in the bunch.
Last night we met with our florist Inna of Butterfly Florals and saw a sample set up of the arrangements. They look great! We've hashed out the last minute details with Inna and then had our meeting with Amber, our wedding coordinator. She cheerily gave us numerous forms we now have to think about (name changing instruction, how to apply for a marriage license, etc). LA County apparently makes it rather difficult to go through the whole marriage license process. While I've felt pretty okay about the wedding day itself, we definitely started to feel the "whhhaat??" part when she broke down the entire wedding day, hour by hour. Basically, I need to be at the wedding site at 12 noon. The wedding doesn't even start until 6. By the time I arrive at noon, my hair should already be done. I should be eating a little after 12 at the wedding site. Makeup fits in somewhere...Nick is supposed to arrive by 3 so we can have our couple photos taken at 3:30, and the rest of the bridal party and some family need to arrive by 4:30 or so for more photos. While I'm still happy to have the wedding in August and outside, I honestly didn't think I would need to be dressed in full wedding garb outside in LA at 3. Is there any sort of sweat sucking injection I can use? Yikes.
We've received most of the RSVPs- thank you! One of our many new tasks- seating chart...
Nick and I started researching wedding program wording, and I started the programs yesterday. We also need to figure out the wedding reception song...who has a song that is "their song" nowadays?
What else...I had my second dress fitting today, and it's looking great! Last fitting is in a few weeks...on Saturday we meet with Rabbi Jim again to discuss more ceremony details.
That probably isn't everything, but my mind is slightly frazzled with all of the last few things we need to knock out...August 6th, we are so looking forward to seeing you. August 5th too, because the rehearsal dinner should be great too :-)
Can't wait to see everybody!!!
Also, the copyright info didn't show up on the photo I posted...Aileen Secord of Aileen Secord Photography took this photo, and I love it! Thanks Aileen!
After 18 months of engagement, Nick and I finally scheduled our engagement photo session and went to meet our photographer Aileen Secord on Sunday. I think we had mixed feelings of excitement and slight apprehension since we have the tendency to not take the best photos. One of us usually ends up looking awkward as we try to smile the way we think we're supposed to smile. I always think it's a little amusing when people tell you to "just be natural". Really? "Look natural" when you know someone is following you with a large camera? Right...
Fortunately, Aileen said we did really well! She was great and offered helpful tips. We had the photos taken at TreePeople and Fryman Canyon, which is a short local trail we often hike with the dogs. We thought it would be nice to go somewhere we really like and that has been pretty significant in our shared lives here in LA. That sounds a little cheesy I guess.
I've spent the past few weeks putting the finishing touches on the invitations. It's taken 4 post office stops for stamps + mailing, 5 visits to Macy*s to get the right number of registry inserts, two Bed Bath and Beyond trips, one stop at Crate & Barrel in Scottsdale, and an embarrassing number of visits to Paper Source for ribbon and labels to complete this task. The latter was so bad I stopped going to the store closest to us and drove some 15 miles to Pasadena yesterday to prevent myself from looking Paper Source obsessed. We had an envelope stamping party- Nick chose to wear the stamp remnants on his forehead- and called it a day. Needless to say, we're relieved to be finished with invitations.
We also ordered our wedding Ketubah this week. My next task is to move onto more paper projects...continue the place cards and pick thank you notes. I'm starting a non-school rotation tomorrow so I definitely think I'll be recruiting Nick to help with this (he just doesn't know it yet).
3 days less than a full two months! We're just excited for the big day to come...is time flying by? I can't even tell any more.
Somehow I managed to never post the wedding date on this blog...wow.
It's May, which means I'm finished with my first year of PA school and finally get to focus on the wedding!! Hooray!
We just got home from registering at Macy*s (I don't know how I just noticed they replaced the apostrophe with an asterisk) and I'm starting to wonder how one can register at even more places. There were so many similar items to what we saw at Bed Bath and Beyond that we already scanned, and yet we still managed to spend a couple hours there. To check out the registry, go to Macys.com, click on wedding registry, and I think you just type in my name and Nick's (he's under Nick, not Nicholas).
I've been to my new favorite store Paper Source four times in about 1 1/2 weeks, and it's a little embarrassing because the same salesperson sees me staring at the wall of stamps and then at all the paper options and I think I'm starting to look a little obsessed...or like I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm making the table numbers and place cards and I think the wedding programs myself. Right now it doesn't seem like that horrible of a task to complete until I start thinking about creating over 100 place cards. And of course Nick could care less whether the place cards have a ribbon with a bow or without one. The fact that I just typed that and am actually having a bow debate with myself makes me want to vomit a little. I may have inadvertently fallen into a pool of "things that annoy me about wedding planning because they really don't matter at all." Boo.
We're revising a few things on our reception menu, and are meeting with our rehearsal dinner caterer soon. I'm really excited about her because 1. We've had her tuna tartare and it's amazing and will be present at the rehearsal dinner and 2. she's a pastry chef, and I LOVE dessert.
We're getting the invitations together and double checking addresses and whatnot. Nick and the boys have most of their wedding attire all together and the ladies are coming along as well. MAJOR muchas gracias to Ian and his mom Nora Hollinger of Erica Koesler for my amazing veil and hairpiece- she is so awesome. We're finally getting our engagement photos taken June 5, super delayed since we probably won't get them until the wedding! Umm...what else...we picked our Ketubah (artwork/document that lists the rights of a women within a Jewish marriage...essentially the vows in Hebrew and in English) my first dress fitting is coming up.
We have some pre-wedding festivities coming up...one which is rated PG and the others...well, they're not ;-)
Now that the big day is getting closer and closer, we are getting all the more pumped!
We started registering, and so far have items selected from Bed Bath and Beyond. If you go to www.bedbathandbeyond.com, scroll down to "find a wedding registry" and type in "Kelly Jennings", there are actually a few other Kelly Jennings who are also registered! Obviously select the one that says and Nicholas Morin :-)
Our first registry experience was one we are likely not to forget any time soon. The first day we went was the day southern California got insane amounts of rain- so much so the sidewalks disappeared under the water and...the power went out while we were scanning items at Bed Bath and Beyond! Apparently another customer screamed (afraid of the dark), and while we appreciated our registry person energetically getting flashlights so she could continue to show us different duvets, we decided it was probably best to come back post-crazy rain.
We're close to selecting our wedding invitations- I found a website that allowed us to customize them to exactly how we want them, and save oodles of dollars too (mygatsby.com).
We have our caterer booked for the rehearsal dinner, and she makes amaaaaazing food! The plan at this time is to have the dinner in Karen's backyard; I really like the idea of the more intimate and relaxed setting. So, phew! One more big thing taken care of.
Time is flying by! I suppose it does and it doesn't feel like we've been engaged for quite a bit of time now. I've noticed though that as the date approaches I'm getting more excited, and it's seriously affecting my ability to focus on school...good thing for spring break! Amber emailed us a list of things we need to be doing, so I'm trying to knock out most of it this week.
Last weekend Nick and I went to the jewelry district downtown and purchased our wedding rings. It's weird to have them already, but know that we aren't supposed to wear them yet. I told Nick he should get a practice ring to get used to wearing one.
We booked Auntie Em's Catering for our cake and desserts, and I am sooo excited! I love desserts! Sorry, there will be no chocolate or champagne fountain. We were able to save quite a bit (yay!) and I'm confident the desserts will be yummy. We had been going back and forth on what we wanted so I'm glad we finally sealed the deal with Auntie Em's.
Right now we're looking into invitations...I have an appointment tomorrow to meet with Diana of Emily Rose Papers and hopefully we'll at least get some ideas about the look of the invitations.
Erm...I think that's about it as far as what's going on here... things are coming along...
