Wedding Wednesdays

The wedding is in 3 days!!! The reality has yet to hit me, but I'm still looking forward to it.
The plan was to work this week Tuesday-Thursday, but with yesterday being a snow day (*yay) and me being sick, I've only worked one day this week.

I still have a couple of small things to get done, so tonight I started on the wedding programs. Most of our details were DIY and this was no exception. We managed to get our programs on clearance at Michaels for $12.99 for 30 programs. We picked up two packs.

Sorry for the bad picture, my cell phone was all I had at the moment...

I love how they came out and can't wait to finish them either tomorrow (on my unplanned day off) or Friday. Either way, things are coming together and I'm ready to get married!

Wedding Wednesdays

If I have learned anything during the wedding planning process, it would be to be flexible.

Everyone goes into planning their wedding with at least one thing they have in mind that they think is a must, but with planning your wedding, so many things can change.

For example...

I thought that having a three tier wedding cake was the only thing that I wanted. Not two, not four, but three. After meeting with our cake lady, we've decided that a four tier might be our best option...depending on how many guests we have as the final count.

I also thought that my dress had to be strapless. Nothing else would do. Oh, and I didn't want a veil. Needless to say, this didn't work out and I'm ok with it!

I had always envisioned my groom standing at the altar with a black tux and white vest/tie/shirt. Phil didn't want to wear all white, so he's going to be wearing an aqua tie, no vest, with a white shirt.

These are all things that I'm happy about and was thrilled that I was able to accept these changes as they came along. Being flexible has made planning the wedding fun, rewarding, and mostly stress-free!

My constant thought is that no matter what, the most important thing is that I am marrying my best friend. All other things are secondary. As long as the pastor, my groom, and a couple of witnesses show up and we are able to get married, I will be happy with that. Our marriage is more important than any one day. The wedding is just a big, fun day to show our love and commitment and we will be able to look back and say that it turned out perfectly because we love each other and got married...even if things don't go as planned.

Wedding Wednesday

DIY Unity Candle

Phil and I debated whether to have a unity candle or unity sand as part of our ceremony. At first, we thought that unity sand was better, but after a lot of research we decided on a unity candle. Once we had decided to have a unity candle, the next step was to find one that we could both agree on. Phil had set a budget of $30 for a unity candle set and was less than thrilled to find out that we would have to spend even more money on a unity candle holder. So, I decided that there must be something I could do to make it less expensive...I'd make one myself!

I saw this one online and wanted to imitate it.

After looking online on how to personalize candles. I came up with this...

And the close-up...

I am thrilled with how it came out! The same unity candle online would have been $30 and I spent a total of $5.50 to make this one! I can't wait until Phil can see it. I love being able to personalize things especially when we can save money doing it ourselves!

What do you think?

Engagement Pics Part 2

It's been long overdue, but we finally ordered and downloaded some of our favorite engagement pictures from our amazing photographer. We were so happy to be able to have the opportunity to take pictures with her before the wedding, so we would know how she operates and she would know how unphotogenic we are.

I love how happy he looks

I just love this one!

Isn't he adorable?!

Hope you have a great Wednesday!

Wedding Wednesdays

Figuring out the bridesmaids' gifts were easy. I knew exactly what I wanted to give them and it was just a matter of finding out where to get them from and buy them. Unfortunately, this was not the case with the groomsmens' gifts.

With Phil being the groom, I really wanted him to think of something to give the guys. I should have known better! Phil is such a great man, but when it comes to deciding on gifts for people, he tends to have no idea what he wants to get them and waits until the last.possible.minute.

I had been asking him for months what he would like to do for the guys, but he had no idea. None of the "traditional" gifts seemed to match any of the men. We even thought of doing individual gifts, but that was even harder to think of. We really wanted the gifts to be useful and not too cliche so, we sat there and thought about it again and again and finally came up with this...

A monogrammed leather wallet.

We figured that a wallet is something that every man uses. The website we ordered them from even had great reviews for these! The best part is that Phil really liked the idea and seemed happy and relieved to have finally found the gifts to give the guys.

What did you give your groomsmen?

Wedding Wednesdays--Funny Story

This past Sunday, Phil and I went with his parents to sign the lease on the new apartment! It was nice to have his parents there to make sure that everything in the lease was "standard" and there would be no red flags. We were reading the lease and got to the Animal Addendum which states that we are not bringing any pets. It also has breed restrictions for certain dogs. I was joking around and said that, because of the breed restrictions, he wasn't allowed in the apartment. Well, this prompted this conversation...

Dad R.: "Well, Philip, I didn't know you were an animal!"

Phil: "I guess you're just going to have to ask Kathleen about that after we get back from the honeymoon!"

Yes, my ultra-conservative fiance just said that to his even more ultra-conservative parents. My response...

"Well, at least then we'd be married!"

It was just the thing we needed to break up the boringness of reading the lease.

Wedding Wednesdays...Kind of

It's official...we've put in our application for a new apartment! We find out tomorrow if we are approved. It's kind of nerve-wrecking because all we're able to do is wait and we all know how good at that I am...not!

Assuming everything goes through, we sign the lease tomorrow and we will move me in to the new place December 4th. Phil won't move in until after we're married, of course, but it will still be nice to be able to have a place that we can call "ours" soon enough.

The wedding is just over three months away at this point and luckily, November is going by much more quickly than the previous months. I tell you, October was pure torture! I think the holidays give me something else to focus on and it's a nice change of pace.

There's really not a lot left to do except finish the favors, centerpieces, and bridal party gifts. A good friend of mine is coming over tonight to work on part of the bridesmaids' gifts so I'm super excited!

Wedding Wednesdays

A couple of weeks ago I shared what one of our favors were. If you missed it, you can check out this post to see the awesome coffee favors we chose.

Well, today I got a phone call from my future mother-in-law saying that the rest of our favors came in and that she would drop them off at my apartment! Have I ever mentioned how blessed I am to be marrying into this family?! So, she came by with the box and I immediately had to open it. She was able to stay with me just long enough to see what it was going to look like. Of course, I was thrilled with how cute they were and she agreed.

These favors are different than the other favors in that they will have minor "assembly" necessary to make them "work". Basically, the cookie cutters come separate from the card and you have to do something to make the cookie cutter stay in the cut-out part of the card. Luckily, I remembered how they did it in one of the pictures so I tried it out and this is what the end result looks like...

Thanks for sharing the magic of our special day...Kathleen and Philip...February 26, 2011

I am thinking that I might want to tie the ribbon off to the side more so that the guests can see the whole phrase, but I kind of like it the way it is. Plus, it will be difficult to get it to stay in the cut-out part of the card.

The inside has a sugar cookie recipe that translates all of the ingredients to ingredients of a good marriage (i.e. patience, hugs, kisses, etc.). It's super cute and something that I hope people will be able to use.

The goal is to make sure we incorporate both of us into the wedding, so what's better than cookies and coffee?