Sheldon and I both love music. The biggest thing I had to accomodate when sheldon moved in was his CD collection. I thought it was crazy that he still bought CDs because I am completely addicted to iTunes. I'm not going to write a lot for this post, I'll let you listen. These are some of my favorite love songs and songs that mean something to us a couple. Think of this as a mini wedding music sampler. The youtube videos are songs I couldn't find on playlist.com.
There comes a point during wedding planning where you have to decide whether or not you want kids at your wedding. For us, it wasn't much of a decision, it was a given. We love the kids in our life and want them to have fun at the party as well. I don't know if I've mentioned it yet, but our wedding is going to be a huge festival of fun along with a wedding on the side.
Having attended many a church wedding in my life as a child, I know how boring these things can be. It is important for me to think about our young guests as well as the older ones.
Image from funnyweddingphotos.net
We've discussed having some kind of Children's play area near the reception tent. We haven't nailed down exactly what it will be yet, but we've discussed a moon bounce, water slide or some kind of carnival type game(s). The downside to these things are that they require adult supervision, and we want the parents to be able to have fun and would never want to ask anyone to be kid wrangler for the day.
I like the idea of coloring sheets, or busy bags with toys and crayons, maybe an activity book. That way they can be with everyone else and still amuse themselves.
If you were following my flickr account around mid January you would have seen this little peek of an embroidery design I was working on.
Well that peek was of a piece I designed (with a little help from the sublime stitching sparrows) and embroidered to be on the front of our save the date postcards. I can show you the full design now that they have been mailed and received by our wonderful invitees.
FYI - ths piece is pretty big. It's probably 11 inches at the widest point. That's how I could get all the small details.
I'm pretty proud of how they turned out. I wanted a handmade touch to our invitations and what not, but there was no way I was going to embroider 150 save the date cards. I think this was the perfect solution.
Thanks to VistaPrint, these were also very economical. 
I've decided that I should have a scheduled wedding talk post once a week, so welcome to Wedding Wednesdays!
With all of the crazy things I have going on in my life right now, wedding planning is probably somewhere closer to the bottom of the list at this point, when it should be at the top. However, I am on schedule and have a lot of plans already in the works. My favorite friend throughout all of this is the Real Simple Weddings publication.
I know there are plenty of books and planners out there to assist with the wedding planning process. I've looked through all of them, but none of them have been as helpful as this little magazine. I'm not sure when Real Simple began this publication, but I bought the 2009 copy as soon as we got engaged. And when 2010 rolled around I bought that one too. They are pretty much the same as far as all the resources are concerned. All of the inspiration photos, real wedding features and everything else are updated in the new issue.
While you should definintely pay the $15 for this magazine (it's so much cheaper than many of the planners out there and comes with some really great inspiration as well) most of the best resources in the magazine are free! All of the great checklists and lots of other great information are on the Real Simple website. The ultimate wedding planning checklist is perfect for me because it has about 10 things you should be doing at certain times throughout the months before the wedding. I do those, I check them off the list and I'm golden. I love it. :)
We also found the registry essentials checklist to be very helpful while we were registering at Target on Saturday. We were able to decide what we could get at Target and what we wanted to get at Macy's or other online stores through myregistry.com. There were a few things we could check off because we already had them, and didn't need an upgrade. It really helped keep Sheldon from getting trigger happy, although we did get a little over excited in the electronics section.
This publication is my bible right now. And did I mention that if you buy the magazine all of the checklists are in a little tear out booklet that you can keep on your person at all times?! The 2009 version was smaller than the 2010 so I have it taped into my little inspiration notebook I keep in my purse. I love being able to have everything at hand and not having to lug around a big notebook.
So wedding graduates, what were your favorite tools for wedding planning when you had to go through the process?
On Friday, I decided that I needed to make some practice cup pies to see what I wanted to do for the wedding.
They turned out very well! A couple of the tops weren't secure and some filling oozed out but, other than that they were fantastic! I used this recipe for the crust and just used some canned apple pie filling. Next time, I'll be making them with wild blackberries from my parents' farm.
I even spread some honey on top of the crust for authenticity. It made it golden brown and yummy!
They were perfect with vanilla ice cream. I can't wait to make another round of practice pies :)
I've been looking at wedding blogs before Sheldon and I were ever even thinking about getting married. They're just beautiful inspiration. Since we got engaged, I really started to focus on what I wanted my wedding to look like. I've copied photos into an inspiration folder and have come up with a few ideas here and there, but never really had a good solid foundation to build on. I haven't really done a ton of planning because I don't like everything to be scattered. I will waste time and money that way.
Well today, it struck me... Pushing Daisies... I have a muse!
It was a given really. I wanted lots of bright colors, daisies because they are my favorite, and cupcakes (for me)and cup pies (for sheldon). I just wish my parents' lawn was a floral oasis like the above picture. There will be plenty of handmade elements a long the way. I'm super excited!
Now I feel I can go somewhere with this.
Sheldon proposed on Monday!!!
Most of you probably already know this... but just for documentation reasons, I will blog about it as well.
Let me start with some history...
I thought Sheldon was hot the first time I saw him a few years ago at our staff development day at work. I figured I didn't have a chance with him so I avoided talking to him. I'm dreadfully shy when it comes to guys. Then I accepted a new position in the Downtown library where he is a librarian. He noticed me -- "the cute girl in the planning office" and told my friend Mary his friend Chuckie that he thought I was cute. I had told Mary that I thought he was cute and that I liked that he had tattoos. We didn't really talk much because we were both really nervous and shy around each other. Then, one magical night in December, a group of work friends planned a canal ride downtown and dinner at Earls. I was invited without Sheldon knowing it (he wouldn't have been there if he knew). We ended up sitting together on the canal ride and at dinner (I'm sure our friends made sure this happened) and we talked all night. Afterwards, he invited me to McNellies for a beer where we continued to talk for another hour or so. He got my number and said he would call me the next day.
I went to my parents' for the Christmas get together the next day. He texted me and asked me out for that Sunday afternoon. I did a giddy girl dance in the living room, but I wasn't sure when I'd be back so I said I would still be at my parents' which he thought was me blowing him off. I'm so glad I texted him back and said I could do something that night. We went to Tokyo for sushi (my first sushi experience!) for our first official date on December 21st. The date was great and we went on more dates and on New Year's Eve decided to officially be a couple. The DTR (OBU talk for determine the relationship) conversation is so random and awkward but we made it through.
We've been talking about getting married since before Sheldon moved in in May. I started planning in my head, but any time I would try to talk to him about it he would say something about me getting him a ring before we could start planning. He was all about a mangagement ring, because he thought it was funny. I found it annoying.
He asked my dad for his blessing on September 13th. Funny enough, my dad was cleaning his guns all day so Sheldon had to go out and ask him while he was with firearms. What a brave man I have! I really didn't think he would propose right away since he just asked my dad, but sure enough on Monday afternoon, I found this in our dining room...
Which made me do this...
Then this...
I must admit I picked out the ring a few weeks ago... I have tiny hands so trying them on was a must to get an appropriate size. I am totally in love with it's vintage flair!
So there you have it. I'm engaged. And no we haven't set a definite date yet, but know that it will be a DIY extravaganza. We have decided that we are getting married at my parents' farm in front of a pond three-quarters encircled with cedar trees. It is a beautiful setting and I can't wait to start with planning!
