greyfuzzy

quick update

Sat, 13 Sep 2008 13:31:59 GMT

Back from the honeymoon! Lots of excitingness to post later, but no time now. We got in around 10 last night, went through all our wedding gifts/cards/photos, got to bed really really late (at my parents' place)... and today we are MOVING!!! Huzzah! And we have a lovely new bedroom suite being delivered at the new place this afternoon!

I still have a bunch of stuff I had no time to pack pre-wedding, but I don't know that that will be happening this morning. The first order of business is to go buy some more of our crap off the registry. We don't own a shower curtain (or the hooks for it) or ANY queen-size bedding to go on our new grown-up bed, which are things we will definitely need within the next 24 hours.
Next week I get to go buy kitchen towels, drinking glasses, various kitchen gadgets, a vacuum cleaner and I don't know what all else. Really, it is amazing how few useful everyday items we actually have, considering all the stuff we own between the two of us. We only have 2 trash cans, even!

All right, I am in for a busy next 12 hours. May be a while before I am online again... we will not have the internet hooked up for another week or so.

Thu, 10 Jul 2008 14:51:15 GMT

Feeling kind of ambivalent about posting these days. Too little time, too many secrets that still need to be kept. I did, however, run across this funny-but-true quote worth sharing.

"We’re all seeking that special person who is right for us, but if you’ve been through enough relationships, you begin to suspect there’s no right person, just different flavors of wrong. Why is this? Because you yourself are wrong in some way, and you seek out partners who are wrong in some complementary way. But it takes a lot of living to grow fully into your own wrongness. It isn’t until you finally run up against your deepest demons, your unsolvable problems – the ones that make you truly who you are – that you’re ready to find a life-long mate. You’re looking for the wrong person. But not just any wrong person: the right wrong person – someone you lovingly gaze upon and think, “This is the problem I want to have." - Andrew Boyd

Sat, 09 Feb 2008 02:01:50 GMT

I am so, so glad I have Steve. Were it not for him, I sometimes feel like I wouldn't have a friend in the world. There is nothing sweeter than someone who is always there for you, even when no one else is... sometimes I just hate people.

What works, what doesn't?

Wed, 23 Jan 2008 17:24:14 GMT

Wow, almost a month since my last entry here... I guess that we've been too busy planning for me to talk about it. More things are coming along... save the date cards sent. Officiant chosen. Dresses are in (might even be going to the shop to pick up today, in fact). We now have every major vendor booked except for a rental company and maybe a videographer. The annoying, pink-exclamation-pointed checklist on theknot.com only has 2 things on it for us to do in the next 30 days. We're actually ahead of schedule. We rock.

Last night we met with our officiant to go over some preliminary details, and for her to get to know us a bit better. Part of this meeting included (for interest's sake) asking us what we loved about each other, and why we wanted to get married. Let me tell you, I know exactly the answers to both of these questions, but they're not the sort of things we're accustomed to being put on the spot about, to give an answer to a near-stranger. Both Steve and I later said that we felt we'd given incomplete answers, just because trying to answer on the spot was kind of weird. We had a good giggle over it though, agreed that we might send her an email or something at some point to fill in more details, and then had a lovely evening eating at Qdoba and watching a Kurosawa movie we'd picked up at Wild and Woolly.

One of the weirder things about being engaged is that it has lent me the tendency to analyze not only every wedding I attend, but every relationship I come across, in a harebrained effort to deduce what works, what doesn't, and why. For example, I've been trying to assess the whole theory of bigger/expensive wedding = doomed marriage. For my part, I've been able to think of an equal number of big weddings and small weddings I've attended where the couple wound up divorced... but then again, I think that a couple's choice of wedding has more to do with their personalities than an effort to 'show off' getting married. Smaller weddings seem to be more common among the quieter, non-partying people I've known, people who would just plain rather spend their cash elsewhere, and folks who are older or younger than the average marrying age and don't care to go through the fuss of a big wedding. However, I've heard the whole theory spouted off enough (by people who've been to many more weddings than I have) that I feel there must be something to it.

I think I may have come up with a potential real factor: the problem is not spending the money or inviting hundreds of guests, not in and of itself anyway. I think that the problem may be the MENTALITY behind it for some people - trying to buy a fairy tale. Maybe the sort of person who is willing and able (or expects mommy and daddy to give them) $100K to spend on a wedding is just used to getting their way, and doesn't know how to handle it when a marriage isn't exactly what they'd planned it to be. Maybe the sort of person who goes bridezilla over the peony centerpieces not matching the exact shade of pink in bridesmaid gowns is too used to micromanaging, and expects everything to be perfect.

We won't be spending enough to feed a starving country for a month. We won't have 500 of our most intimate friends there to celebrate. We've had to do a lot of compromising(!), both because of budget and to keep us both happy. There's a lot of things that aren't going to be storybook perfect, and I'm sure things will go wrong on the big day. But you know what? It will be something we crafted together, and it will leave us with great memories and a story to tell, mishaps and all... a lot like real life.

Budget 201: Cheating the system

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 17:03:19 GMT

I just tweaked the budget for about the millionth time last night. Somehow, I have a feeling that if normal people spend $X on Blah, then they just enter '$X' into the 'Blah' column of their budget and be done with it. I, however, am a bit more complicated.

So, let's say for example that I just spent $100 for a deposit on a $300 item that I had budgeted to cost $400. I change the budgeted amount to $300, put $100 as the amount spent thus far, and add the $100 overage to the 'Miscellaneous expenses' column. Then I go to the payment tracking page of the budget, list the vendor name, the deposit amount, and input the other payment amounts along with the dates they are due. At any rate, by re-budgeting every time we come in under on an item, I keep adding money back into the Misc. fund. I may be re-budgeting when we go over and having to take money out of that fund, but it keeps getting replenished every time we come in under. As a matter of fact, I think we now have MORE money in that fund than we did at the beginning.

Also, if I buy a $25 item that is 'for the wedding' but is also something I'll be using in the meantime (and afterward), then I don't put it into the budget at all because it's something I would have bought anyway. This may or may not be cheating, but I maintain that if the wedding is not its only purpose, then I shouldn't count it as a strictly wedding item.

Thus far, here's the breakdown of where it seems we will be coming in over or under the original budget (though in the current version, we're not over on anything):
Over original amount budgeted

food and drinks
wedding programs
officiant's fee
honeymoon

Under original amount budgeted

cake
attire
flowers
invitations, save the date cards, thank-you notes and guestbook
rental items

General decor and videography are still up in the air. There is really only one videography place in the city who seems to offer hourly rates for weddings, and for the life of me I can't get in touch with them. We do not want a huge $3000 package with 3 camera people running around for 6 or 7 hours, slapping wireless microphones on the whole wedding party, and getting pointless footage of me putting on mascara or people standing in line to get cake. We just want to pay someone like $200-300 to stick around for 3 hours or so with one camera, get the important bits like the ceremony and first dance, and maybe whip us together a short DVD without a bunch of fancy editing tricks (but heck, that can always be done somewhere like the Video Kitchen, so no huge deal). Basically we just want some footage of the stuff we'll never get to see in action otherwise.

Anyone have any ideas on this front? Any professional place that will do this for us? Any friends with a good video camera, a good eye and a few hours to spare in August? Anything at all?

A big day!

Wed, 07 Nov 2007 15:48:23 GMT

The tasting is today at 5 PM... such excitement!

I'm still not certain of just what is so exciting about it... we are paying $15 per person to try food that Steve and I have eaten before and we're 95% sure everyone else will like. (Granted, that $15 per person will go towards the total catering charge.) I guess it is just getting to see a little slice of what our guests will see. I try to maintain some perspective about the wedding in general - sure, it's 'our' wedding, but in another sense, it's a party for 100 of our nearest and dearest, and I try not to overly concern myself with things no one will likely notice or care about (whether the forks are silver or stainless steel, for example). On the other hand, when it comes to things that people will definitely notice (like the food), I am being very particular. I'm convinced that that is why many people's budgets explode... they lose sight of the big picture and start spending vast amounts of money on tiny, increasingly unimportant details. The big picture is attire, food/cake, flowers, music and venue. It's not about fancy table linens, chocolate fountains, monogrammed cocktail napkins, or ice sculptures. Those things can be nice, but not everyone needs them, and all too often they are the budget-busters, it seems.

Z will be in town around noon (edit: she just called, so let's say 12:30-1!), and I have some things to show her here at the house before we head off to the dress shop. She hasn't seen the dress on me in person yet; while it's flattering in pictures, it still looks a zillion times better in person. And this will be the first time we can look at bridesmaid attire together, too.

A slightly off-subject question, but what does anyone think about the necessity/frivolity of having a videographer?

Modern music is teh suck.

Tue, 23 Oct 2007 01:04:36 GMT

Why, why, why are all of the good love songs from the 60's or earlier? Or at least, why are all of the good modern love songs (ugh) country? Not that I mind playing a bunch of older songs. Some of them are fantastic... but variety is nice, too. Thank goodness we have almost a year to get ideas.

What we probably won't be doing...

Thu, 27 Sep 2007 15:16:35 GMT

Let me take a break from incessant posts about details of the planning process, and instead talk a little bit about my thoughts on some common American wedding traditions and activities.

Don't get me wrong, I am not bashing anyone who DID choose to do these things for their wedding. I am simply stating that I don't really understand their purpose, and that they will likely have no place in OUR wedding.

The diamond engagement ring. Do your homework, ladies - we only feel we 'need' diamonds because DeBeers had more diamonds than they knew what to do with and had to figure out a way to market them. The diamond engagement ring hasn't even been the norm for 100 years yet! Seriously, your grandmother likely didn't even have one, and your great-grandma almost certainly didn't. Not to mention that it's a pretty American phenomenon anyway. Did I mention that sapphire engagement rings are fairly common among royalty...?
The white dress (and white everything). Am I the only one who finds it a little odd that the shade of your dress was once thought to be a picture your virginity and wealth (or lack thereof)? Whose business is that, anyway? And why didn't the groom have to wear white? The main purpose of wedding attire should be to make the bride/groom look and feel attractive. Period. And what of the white cakes with white icing, white linens, white invitations, white flowers, white-white-white? Would a little color be so bad?
Mania for monograms. Why must every single cocktail napkin, matchbook, cake serving set, place card, favor box, aisle runner, customized postage stamp, thank-you note and piece of glassware be emblazoned with your names, initials and/or wedding date? Are you afraid that someone will forget whose wedding they're at, or what day it is? To my mind, paying twice as much (or more) to get *everything* with your name on it is just a waste of money.
Dancing for Dummies. I have a theory - if you DON'T play the Chicken Dance or the YMCA, no one will notice or care. Seriously, when was the last time you said 'Dick and Jane's wedding was lovely, but I must say, I really hate it that they didn't play the Chicken Dance. I was so looking forward to that!'
Lining up for mugshots, uh, portraits. I would much, much rather have a photo of me hugging my mom, or of my bridesmaids fixing each other's hair, than a photo of all of us standing in a line with pasted-on smiles. Photos should tell a story.
Look, more freebies! Another fairly new phenomenon - the favor. Because we all know that a full day of entertainment, dancing, food and drink free of charge means nothing - you must give out those monogrammed matchbooks or tiny boxes of candy or your guests will hate you! Seriously, one of the nicest weddings I've ever attended had no favors, and I didn't even notice it until a month later. If guests want a keepsake, there's always the invitations or programs.
Throwing stuff at your guests. Seriously, lobbing used undergarments and bundles of wilting flowers at your loved ones sounds pretty bizarre. Anyway, there's a lot of (likely apocryphal) theories about how the garter tradition came about, but who cares? It still amounts to removing my underthings in front of an audience and throwing them to an assembled crowd. Sounds like an activity better suited to a strip club than a wedding. The only good thing about this tradition is the inevitable amusement of watching women practically kill each other over the bouquet, versus the men who stand with hands in pockets and watch the garter drop to the ground. Haha!

I'm sure that this entry will practically require a 'Part 2' in the future, but that's it for now. Stay tuned...

Yay food and booze!

Wed, 19 Sep 2007 00:22:10 GMT

Our first appointment with a caterer is tomorrow at noon! It should only take an hour at most, but I'm actually pretty damn excited. This is our choice A place, and thus far, things are looking up. It seems that we got an outdated version of the 'approved caterers list' for our site, and that Caterer A is already on it! We can buy our own alcohol and pay a flat fee (instead of a per-guest or per-bottle-opened) fee for their liquor license. Steve said the manager sounded super nice over the phone.

I'm still kind of afraid that the food will end up busting the budget, though. I just noticed that the posted prices on everything took a huge leap - as in up by $5 a person for everything. And that doesn't include tax, rentals or labor fees for any staff. I am keeping my fingers crossed that the places we'll be under budget will make up for the food/alcohol/service going OVER budget. So long as we don't go more than 20% over on food and alcohol, I can deal.

The cake will end up being cheaper because we're going to have to use a more local (and cheaper) bakery. The non-food rentals are already going to be cheaper than anticipated, because we won't have to rent extra chairs, tables OR a dance floor; they are all amply provided by the site. I also talked to Steve's mother about flowers this weekend - showing her some pictures, giving her a rough idea of number of centerpieces needed, etc. - and she said that my flower budget is almost certainly higher than needed, even though I do want to use a pretty high proportion of more expensive flowers. That's the awesome thing about knowing an ex-florist-shop employee - we get all of the arranging for free, and all the flowers ordered wholesale. She's fantastic with flowers, too. Yippee!

Anyway, between the flowers, rental fees and cake being cheaper, and having the 'uh-oh' fund, I think it will be okay if our food is a bit over the budgeted amount. I'll try not to sweat it. Even if this place quotes us twice as much as we wanted to spend, we have several other options to consider.

Sat, 08 Sep 2007 00:13:39 GMT

Fleh. Back to square one on bakeries. The woman we wanted emailed back and said she won't deliver somewhere as far from her business as our venue. It's only an hour. An hour isn't ideal, but I've been to a ton of weddings where a bakery didn't even EXIST within an hour of the reception site... unless you count Wal-Mart bakeries (yuck).

The only other baker we were currently considering is in Covington (!!) and she still delivers as far as here. I don't know. I would agree that I'd rather it not be driven that far, but I'm not sure there is anywhere significantly closer that can do a decent cake. (Hey, I make cakes too, I'm being picky.)

If anyone knows of a fabulous bakery in southwest Louisville, please tell me. I'm beginning to be afraid that we'll have to pay delivery fees out the wazoo or have a cake-free wedding.

Planning update

Fri, 07 Sep 2007 15:21:23 GMT

I hadn't posted here in a while, so I thought it might be about time for an update.

Well, for starters, we have booked a venue. Site A (our first choice) wound up working out just fine. Their catering list was big enough that they had a couple of appropriate choices, and they said they would be willing to add someone if we wanted, so that was no problem. This was a relief. Steve and I had both said that we'd had problems envisioning the wedding taking place anywhere else after seeing Site A, so I was already a little antsy at the idea of possibly having to book elsewhere.

This is half old news, but our photographer is booked. The new part is that our engagement photo session is also booked! It'll be at our wedding site on October 10. I am terribly excited! I don't know if I mentioned this before, but our photographer was raising his rates effective on the day we booked him, but actually gave us the old, lower rates because I'd made the appointment to meet with him before the rate switch. This was AWESOME, because his rates went up quite a bit. So... in short, technically, we have a photographer we can't afford! This amuses me no end.

The music situation is good. A friend is doing DJ duty for us, but let me note that this friend is a REAL DJ, as in a pretty high-profile local. But before I say too much... the equipment situation is also taken care of. We shouldn't have to rent anything, except maybe a few extra speakers.. maybe not even that.

Right now we're just starting to get into booking the foodstuffs. As it turns out, our site REQUIRES that we buy our own alcohol. We cannot buy it through the caterer. I find this a bit weird, but won't question it, as it will be cheaper for us. Anyway... This morning I emailed the baker we're interested in, and asked about meeting with her before we book. She's already fully booked for a few weekends in June and July, so hopefully we can snag her! I've passed the responsibility of contacting caterers on to Steve. He has a list of their contact info, the very few vitally important questions to ask when he calls/emails, and my work schedule (so he knows when NOT to book us to go in and talk with anyone). It looks as if we have more food possibilities than we'd thought, because there are many places that will create custom menus. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that we can meet with at least ONE caterer within the next week.

We'll also be booking our honeymoon flight and lodging in about 1-2 weeks, but that is another subject altogether. We're at least settled on the locale, now it's just a matter of selecting our time frame and where we want to stay.

As an aside, we actually won some free dance lessons at the last bridal show I attended. We have our first one on Monday afternoon. Frankly, I don't expect to get much out of a handful of lessons, but if we can walk away from it able to dance together without feeling completely awkward and giggly, I'll consider it a grand success. This may sounds odd, but even though Steve was a raver boy in his youth and I was a club kid (hence we both danced well and often), we've never really danced together. We've danced a little around each other. Separately. But that's not the same. Hopefully the freebie lessons can at least get us used to the idea.

There's a whole plethora of upcoming planning and plotting not mentioned here, but I don't want to bore people to death. More to come in, uh, the days to come.

One year...

Fri, 31 Aug 2007 03:11:44 GMT

...from today. That's the wedding day. Hard to believe... from here on out, everything is just going to zip by.

Lots on my mind, but little time to write it now. More later.

Starting off on the right foot

Tue, 24 Jul 2007 17:44:07 GMT

For some reason, I am chock full of energy today. Of course, I doubt it will last all day, but I am taking advantage of it while it is here.

I thought I might LJ a bit about some of the goals I want to accomplish before the wedding... after all, it's not just a one-day event, but something that will impact my life from that day onward. Not only will it help to have accomplished some things on this list beforehand, but it's also a good opportunity/motivation for change.

These are, by the way, in no particular order other than the order in which they came to mind.

First of all, I've lost a ridiculous amount of weight since I've been with Steve, about 40 pounds. Goal 1 is to stay in shape. I don't want to go gaining a bunch of it back now! I want to be fit on the day of, to look great in the pictures, have a ton of energy for dancing and such... as well as look and feel good for the honeymoon. I've really been active lately; I foresee wanting to do something outdoorsy (hiking, water sports, etc.) on the honeymoon, and I want to be fit enough for that. Simple enough.

Goal 2 is a bit more involved. I've been working on a major purge of my belongings. It is a slow, laborious process, but I really don't want to be taking dozens and dozens of boxes of MY stuff into a small apartment. I've spent most of my life as a notorious pack rat, so this is going to take a while. I've got boxes piled high in the garage from before we moved to this house, full of stuff from elementary school and before. My room is full of... well, full of crap. Even my closet still houses a ton of now-too-big clothes. It is taking a while, but I want to streamline my belongings. They take up too much space AND trying to keep them organized and such just drains my mental/physical energy. Life will be simpler with less.

Goal 3, once again simpler - wipe out the tiny amount of debt I have. This amount fluxes (it's always been well under $1000, though), and in a way it's related to the first 2 goals - namely, having lost weight and needing to buy new clothes because the old ones don't fit. Clothes, unfortunately, cost money. I'm trying to keep a leash on it and only buy what I need, but it's still easy to let it get out of hand sometimes. Anyway, if I were to really buckle down, I could probably pay off my teensy debt in about 4 months' time. That's not going to happen right now, though, because I'm trying to save money for the wedding. So, I have 13 months right now to knock it out, which should be a piece of cake, provided I don't keep buying oodles of clothes. If I manage to do that, Steve and I will start off with only his school loans to pay off - no credit card debt, no car loans, no personal loans (heck, he even got lucky - a lot of his school money has come through grants).

Goal 4 - save, save, save. Steve and I are contributing a decent chunk of the wedding budget. We've got the numbers crunched, and now it's just a matter of actually saving it. Anything extra is good, too - that's just more money for the honeymoon, or a deposit on an apartment, or some furniture. This will be made easier by the cake and photo work I'll (hopefully) be doing on a semi-regular basis for the next year. I've been thinking about doing some actual *work* part-time, too. Whether that will happen remains to be seen.

There are some other minor or less-related goals (finishing craft/sewing/photo projects, scoping out grad school options, maybe testing out the cake thing as a small business, etc.) that are also on my mind, but I won't get into those right now.

So, with all of this pent-up energy, I've been working on goal #2 today. I've gone through my wardrobe yet again (this is about the fourth time, mind you), except for winter tops and the dressy stuff that has to hang up in my closet. Probably half of what was left of my wardrobe (including, sadly, about 2/3 of my pants) is now sitting in a DAV-bound pile. (As a side note, if any of my female friends out there would be interested in perusing some gently used size 8/10 bottoms or M/L tops, please let me know!) I'm being brutal. I've also gone through some of my stuff in the kitchen, organized some wedding things, chucked out a big pile of magazines and cleaned the computer desk.

It's alive!

Mon, 02 Jul 2007 16:16:38 GMT

To kick off this new venture, here is a writing made prior to the beginning of this wedding-journal silliness...

..but before that, a few caveats/FYIs:

We are trying to keep a lot of aspects of the wedding secret for as long as possible. This may require a lot of cryptic entries or esoteric notes (what else is new, right?). We have a lot of secrets to keep and a long time to keep them, so please don't expect things to be clarified for a long while. And please don't be offended if I don't blab everything to you - even my own mother doesn't know any of the details!
I'm still not sure whether to allow comments. This journal is primarily for me. I plan on leaving comments enabled for a trail period, and I'll see how that goes.

And now for something completely different!

**********

Well, now that Mrs. Vaughn's wedding is over (tee hee!), the hardcore planning for mine and Steve's has officially begun. Yes, it has only been a week and a half, but you see... attending/being involved in a wedding got us talking over a lot of ideas and such, so we've done a lot since then. For months we looked over websites and talked here and there over a few aspects, but no real planning had been done because of timing. I/we had wanted to wait until THIS wedding was finished, so that we were not taking my attention away from it.

So... last week we went to see THE photographer that most interested us, and as of yesterday we mailed a contract and deposit back to him. In other words: the date is officially set in stone, and we have made our first major non-refundable (or resellable) purchase decision. This sort of thing worries me a little. I keep thinking things like 'what if the location we have our hearts set on gets booked by someone on our date before we can get it?' (not likely because no one can book it until August 1, and we plan on jumping on that right away). I really need to relax about it; I am just a worry-prone person. I told Z long ago that our weddings would be very different, and the sort of things we would be worrying over would be very different... Half my job as maid of honor was to keep her calm, sane, happy and smiling, so I'm sure it will be the same for her at my wedding. :)

From here on out, the planning will be in full swing! Within the next 2 months, we will be booking the site, and within 3 months or so afterward, we will need to be settling on a caterer, an officiant, a baker and maybe a videographer as well. We need to book our honeymoon... Then we've got to make our choices on the florist, attire for the attendants, save the date cards and invitations, rings... we've got to do the registry thing sometime before the end of the year, too.. aaargh! It sounds like so much when you put it all together! I printed out a checklist from theknot.com, and even though we don't really need to do everything on it, it is 5 pages long (in a small font)!

On the upside, we've already taken care of most of our attire, the photographer is booked, we've made a formal and detailed budget, started a rough guest list and have great ideas about everything else. Oh, and I have stocked up on thank-you notes, hehehe.

I will have to remember to be really careful when talking wedding on here, to make sure I do not give too much away or spoil any surprises for anyone.

I can already tell that this is going to be a big crazy roller coaster of a journey for the next 15 months. Here's hoping that I will be able to go through most of it with my hands up going 'wheee!', and not screeching in mortal terror. (Or turning green and puking, for that matter.) I love roller coasters, the bigger, faster and crazier the better... so this one should be the most fun of all, right?

More to come later, I'm quite sure.