Marty gets Religion

1. Marty has gotten ordained by the Universal Life Church. Over 20 million ministers ordained since 1959 can't be wrong! And it's free. :)

2. I just officially requested the Marriage License Application Packet from the Whatcom County Auditor. They are going to mail it to me, I should get it Wednesday. Then we have to fill it out, sign it in front of a notary, and send it back with a check for $63. Somehow, this feels like a Really Big Deal.

3. The fabulous James Guzman has agreed to perform the musical accompaniment for the processional and recessional parts of the ceremony. Something classical, maybe a little flamenco-ish, on guitar. Abe Davis may also be a part of this. Our wedding just got about 29% cooler.

4. We've decided what to do about cupcakes - I'm going to get them made by the co-op so they'll be mostly organic (and super yummy), and then Aimee and Keeley and possibly some of the other ladies will decorate them on site. That way we get organic AND fancy frosting both, without committing any of our friends to days of slavery in the cupcake mines. Instead, they get just a few hours of hard labor in the frosting factory, which everyone says builds character.

5. My mom has bought her dress. It is beautiful, of course. VERY Mother-of-the-Bride. :)

Wedding Favors

On Friday my Mom, Auntie Dale, Auntie Pam, and Uncle Harvey came over for dinner, and afterwards we made up a bunch of wedding favors. It was a lot of fun! Here's a picture of the group, during a key-lime-pie break. :)
The wedding favors consist of a small glassine envelope which we stamped a design on, and then filled with a mixture of organic vegetable & flower seeds that I ordered from Seeds of Change. Each one was closed with a little sticky label which I had printed with the varieties of seeds, our names and the wedding date. They really turned out nice! I hope people will like them, and beyond that, actually plant & grow the seeds. :)

Update: We will still be encouraging/allowing people to take home the plates & mugs as souveniers of our wedding as well. But we decided to do these favors as well since a) it's a really cool idea, and b) a lot of people aren't going to want to wash their own plates after the wedding.

Bridesmaid Shawls

They're here, and they are super soft. They are nice and large, 28" x 80", but very lightweight, finely woven of 30% silk and 70% cashmere. Pretty colors... not exactly as they appeared on amazon.com but they still look really nice. I'm very pleased and I think the rest of the ladies will be too.

Pergola, Invites, Tuxedos & Flower Girls

1. The pergola is finished. Yippeee!!!

2. I mailed the very last batch of invitations yesterday. Yes, that's two days after the date that I asked for people to return the RSVP cards by. What's your point?

3. This coming Satuday at 11:00 am Cary, Gabe, Nick, Eric and Brian are going in to get fitted for Tuxedos.

4. I have signed up my cousin's two little girls, Hazel & Hannah, to be flower girls. They are 7 & 8 years old and old pros at flower petal sprinkling. :)

Cupcakes

Anybody got any suggestions for where we should get our wedding cupcakes from? I think it's time to start comparing prices & availability. We don't have the confirmed number of guests yet, but we are starting to get an idea... 74 people have RSVP'd so far.

We need two kinds, carrot-cake and chocolate. Yum.

Ceremony Outlined

Marty came over this weekend, and the three of us sat down and outlined how we want the ceremony to go. It's pretty basic; short, simple, and secular:

1. Marty & Cary go and stand in the Pergola, in front of the audience at about 2:00. Marty says something to let everyone know it's time to sit down 'cuz we're going to start.

2. Bridesmaids & Groomsdudes procession up the aisle and join Marty & Cary at the pergola.

3. Flower girls go up the aisle, doing their thing.

4. I walk up the aisle with my Dad. (He then sits down in the front row, with the other parents.)

5. Marty talks a little bit. (Wuv... Twoo wuv...)

6. We say our vows. We haven't decided yet if Marty phrases them as a question, so we can just answer "I do", or if he says them and we repeat them back, or if we memorize them and say them without prompting.

7. Rings.

8. Smooching.

9. Marty says something nice to close the ceremony.

10. Recessional into receiving line - we take up position between the audience and the food, so the reception line doubles as the buffet line. This should help motivate everyone to keep the line moving.

Obviously, we'll need to refine some of the details, but this is a good start, I think. One question that I'm interested in hearing from you guys on is what music should we have for the processional and recessional? I think we should save the rockin' blues band for the reception. So, we can either have another musician play(maybe Cary's cousin Ashley would play his Viola?) or we can have a recording. Probably something classical, instrumental. Suggestions for songs, other ideas?

Bridesmaid Dresses Done!

This is IT!
Charlotte & I went to David's bridal tonight as planned, and found this dress recently consigned to the clearance rack for over 50% off - sweet! The style isn't being retired, just the color (black), so we sure lucked out. They had 4 of the 5 sizes we needed at the Burlington store, so we went ahead and bought them. Tombi should be able to get hers at the Alderwood store, according to their inventory computer. If they don't have it there, they can ship it up from another store.

Hopefully they will all fit, because their policy is no return on clearance dresses. But the clerk said if any of the sizes are crazy wrong (more than we can fix by taking in a seam or two) we can come back in and they might be able to do an exchange - assuming they still have the correct size in stock.

The little ribbon and flower thing at the waist will be coming off. It's not too ugly, but I don't think it will work with the individual color wraps.

I am SOOOO glad to have this taken care of. Another thing off the list!

Bridesmaid Dresses, part IX

A few days ago I went into David's bridal to get my dress hemmed & bustled. After I was done with that, I thought I'd take a quick look at the dress that we'd selected. I found one in my size and went and tried it on... and found it to be an absolute horror. The fabric was a lot clingier and sheerer than I expected, so every tummy bulge was instantly highlighted. The top was waaayyy too roomy for my average-sized bossom while the skirt sucked tight against my hips and thighs. Don't worry though, dear bridesmaids, I won't subject you to such a monstrous dress - I'm not that cruel.

So this coming Monday at 3:30 Charlotte, me, and hopefully Janet are going to meet at David's Bridal in Burlington and actually try on some of their selection and hopefully we will discover another, better, more flattering style. (If not, we'll go over to the mall and see what we can find there, since my coupon already expired at Davids.) I think looking at pictures is just inherently too limited to really make a descision, so it's time for the hands-on approach. Wish us luck!