Pardon the interruption...

I know it's been a while since I've posted on here. I have several excuses, ranging from holiday angst issues to deal with, to finding a new job, to dealing with the lack of routine, all of which really breaks down my blogging stride when it comes right down to it. Usually, I get to work in the morning, get all work-things in order and happy, and enter a blog post within about an hour of sitting down if I have something worth posting. Since I haven't had a regular job for the past month, I haven't had the regularity of a work schedule to work with in my daily activities, and when I'm not working, sitting down at the computer for any length of time isn't usually in the cards. Working out, playing with the dog, watching t.v., and hanging out with Jesse is what I generally focus on. I run errands, I visit with friends...the last thing I think about is blogging, writing e-mails, or surfing the net.

Which is weird, because it's a big part of what I do when I'm working!

But a part of the problem with working on the computer at home is the dog nipping at my feet and legs while I'm in the computer room trying to catch up on stuff. The only reason I've been able to type for this long is because she's found something outside that is exciting to her, and she's been leaving me be.

Anyway, I'm very sorry for the interruption in any kind of regularity we had with posting out here over the last few months.

In wedding news, I found a dress, we've booked the photographer, and my maid of honor (Twin) and co-maid of honor (best friend of myself and the Twin) are now blessed with the task of helping me find reasonable, pretty, and fun bridesmaid dresses. The next step is to start looking for a DJ, which should be fun. I'm waiting until after the new year, though...for obvious reasons.

So stay tuned, if you're still reading at all, and I promise that in the new year, I'll be posting more often and with more interesting info. (I hope!) Happy New Year everyone!!

Ummm...

Are the photographers supposed to cost this much? Yikes.

Not much to update. As usual. :) I will be trying on the dresses this weekend, calling Dad to discuss the photographer thing tonight, and hoping that what they're charging is normal, and then the next step will be to buy the dress that I find to be the most perfect, book the DJ and order a cake. I'm hoping those last two things can wait a few months, though. I'm pretty sure they can.

Thank goodness I have a year to deal with all this stuff. Seriously, if I was dealing with looking for a new job, finding a dress, and having to talk to my dad about photographers/caterers/everyone else that wants money from us all at the same time, I don't know that I'd be able to pull it off. This way, at least I have something to look forward to every now and then, to fit between the nerve-wracking appointments for interviews.

I really, really need to find a cool job AND dress though, ok? So everyone put their ju-ju together out there for me and send me those cool vibes, will ya? Thanks!

Update to nothing...

Ok, so I made appointments to go try on dresses, have two trusty girlfriends that will be accompanying me to help me figure out what looks good and what looks bad, and I'm so excited I could burst!!

I had lunch with one of the bridesmaids yesterday who happened to get married about 2 years ago, I think it was. It was before I knew Jesse, so I'm not sure, actually. Anyway, she advised me not to wait too long to pick out a dress. I've heard this from more people than I expected, actually. And it's not that I was waiting for any particular reason to go and look, I was just not ready.

And now that I am, it's like I've released every butterfly that could possibly exist in my belly when it comes to wedding-day jitters. I'm kinda worried that I won't look good in any dress, which is probably just a bit of my own self-consciousness creeping forward. I'm not usually a super self-conscious girl. But I've never tried on a wedding dress. Yeah, it's a bit intimidating it turns out. Just the thought of it is intimidating. What's wrong with me???

On other fronts, I've signed and sent the contract for the reception location, and now the caterer is asking me questions that I'm unsure of how to answer. We're working it out, though. I just don't feel like trying to decipher certain aspects of an event, such as how long the clean up should/will take, that isn't going to happen for almost a year! (The reception site has a very stringent policy on clean-up, and apparently the caterer warned that he will need to staff accordingly to make sure that the clean-up can happen in the time allotted, so we don't wind up running into surprise fees for OT on the space rental.) I asked the caterer to prepare his proposal with what he thought would work best, as he's been doing this sort of thing for MUCH longer than I have, and I trust him not to screw with us on it.

And the only thing I feel I'm behind on is contacting a photographer. That's kinda giving me a bit of heartburn, but I'll put it on the list for next week and get it done. December is going to be a busy month, I think. Between finding a new job, football madness, trying on the dresses, and decorating for the holidays, I don't know when I'll find time to eat and sleep!

Somehow, I think I'll figure it out, though...

This is new...

I'm kinda in the mood to shop for dresses, suddenly. I don't know why. But I think I might need to call and make some appointments at places for early December.

We have the church set, as I've mentioned previously. We have the reception site set, although the contract hasn't been sent to us yet, but I followed up on that today so hopefully we'll be done with that by end of next week. The event planner at the Brewery suggested that I get a wedding planner for at least the day of our wedding, so I have someone specific to deal with all the vendors/issues/little things that pop up along the way. I thought about it and feel it's a good idea, so I might start meeting with someone about a month before the wedding, so we can make sure we're all on the same page, and then they can help with directing the DJ where to go on the day of the wedding, and make sure the cake is set up properly, and help my twin with the centerpiece set-up and all that good stuff. I also noticed that the chairs at the Brewery are unacceptable, so we'll have to rent some. Which sucks. But hey, we get free beer! Woo!

Next on the list of to-do's is to meet with the caterers. We have found that the caterers we want are available on our wedding date, which made us very happy, so now they're working up a proposal and should be getting back to us within the next 2 days here, I hope. I can't wait to see what they come up with!

But I'm definitely in the mood to start trying on dresses. Time to round up my super-honest girlfriends for a tip to a couple different salons, I think! As long as they can give me appointment times that don't interfere with football on Saturdays, of course. If not, then the search might have to be put off until January...we'll see!

Quick update for the week...

Just an fyi, I might not be posting much here for a bit. Things are in an ugly place for me right now, and besides the bit o' depression and problems with needing to put on a happy face regardless of them all, I've lost my job, sprained my ankle, and USC fell to #9 on the BCS due to their absolutely fabulous loss to Oregon State last night.

I'm sure I'll be in the mood to update again sometime next week. I hope. Maybe after I figure out the job thing, anyway.

Thanks to those of you whove been reading lately!! I'll try to be more upbeat in my next post, I promise.

It's already happening...

Last week, I was having a hard time at work, running on very little sleep (for me, anyway) and feeling the stress of my constant attempts to lose weight (which consistently go no where, and can be very frustrating/troublesome/tedious/etc, etc, etc...). So when Jesse didn't come home at his usual time on Thursday, and I wanted to go to bed since I needed to wake up at 5 on Friday to go workout, I sent him a text message to find out if he'd be home soon.

No response.

I waited 10 minutes, and called him at about 10:40. He was having a beer, he said. He was on his way out and would be home soon.

I have this thing about schedules...while I know that Jesse's isn't "normal" in any sense of the word, if he's going to be home later than usual, I'd expect him to let me know. Just call me quickly, or send a text if he has time. Not a big deal. It's what I do if I'm even running just 15 minutes late leaving the office, even though I know he probably couldn't care less if I get home at 5:35 instead of 5:20, like usual. I see it as a common courtesy kinda thing.

So as we laid in bed that night, we "discussed" the issue for a bit. I can tell when he feels like I'm being a harpy, nasty old thing, and I didn't like that my request for a bit of courtesy on his part was bringing out that kind of tone. After a while, we just agreed to continue the discussion the following night, since it was getting late, and we both had early mornings the next day. We squeezed each other's hands, wished each other a good sleep, and drifted off.

After work the next day, I stopped off at the Moose to meet him for a drink and sat with some friends while I waited for him to finish his day and join us. One of the friends said, "So, I hear you're getting a jump-start on your wifely duties, eh?" Obviously, Jesse had shared with the group prior to my arrival, and now I needed to deal with the fall-out. I know this friend was just giving me friendly jabs...he's been married before and it didn't turn out all that well, I suppose. I replied, "Oh, wait a minute...so one of the things I need to learn once I get married is to just forget about my expectations of any kind of common courtesy on my husband's part?" "Well, YEAH!" my friend said.

He's funny.

After further discussion at dinner, Jesse and I came to an amicable point on the issue, I think. I told him that, as always, I think it's fine for him to hang out when he's done with his shift, have drinks, talk with friends, and enjoy himself as much as he wants to. But just let me know when he's planning on doing that, so I don't sit up well past my bedtime waiting for him to relieve me of the puppy-watching duties and hoping to see him before I hit the sheets. Because, had I known that he was planning on sticking around for an hour after he finished on Thursday night, I would have popped the puppy in her kennel, and shut things down at about 10:00. But I didn't know. And so I sat up and wondered. (It also can be kind of a pain to put the puppy down at 10 if Jesse is planning on coming in at 11 or so, since it generally wakes her up, and gets her scratching at her crate door looking for attention from the other parent in her life...) And I hate it when that happens.

So it begins...the fun of people mocking us for being newlyweds, dealing with these little quirky things we still have yet to figure out about each other, and all that good stuff that's bound to happen over the next 3 or 4 or 20 years.

I'm up for it, though. Thank goodness I think Jesse is, too!

Still not much going on...

This must be what it's like for a woman to be in the early stages of pregnancy. Nothing much happening for her except possibly some additional trips to the bathroom and the question of what to plan for this early, but still knowing that in about 9 (or in my case, 12) months, something BIG and life-altering will be happening. Unfortunately, when it's still such a far-off event, it's kind of a yawn-fest for everyone else to even think about!

This week, I had a review at work that included some complaints about my initial wedding-planning activities. It really pissed me off, to be frank, because (a) when else am I supposed to call vendors/churches/reception locations except during the week? They happen to have the same hours as me - 8 - 5 Monday through Friday. And from what I understand, they're usually kinda busy on Saturdays. And (b) the initial planning that I did do was very slight, involved calling 2 churches to see about their availability, sending out several e-mails to arrange to see certain reception locations, and didn't interfere with my work whatsoever. Now that I've found the church and the reception location, and possibly the caterer, I'm DONE with planning for now. And the whole comment that I got in my review about the office being "happy for [me]" and all, but that I needed to do wedding planning on my own time? Puh-lease. I asked my coworker if I needed to make up for the extra time I took during TWO LUNCHES when I went to see locations, and she told me not to worry about it. Apparently, our boss told her that if she's going to make decisions like that in the future, she needs to "check with [him] first." Mind you, this is a man that I'm not sure can even do laundry, he's always had someone else completing his tasks for him. I honestly don't understand where these uppity-ups come off telling their administrative staff that they can't take care of personal tasks - if they have the time to do so!! - while they're at work. Does he know how long I put off calling churches because my work schedule didn't allow me to? No. He's just heard that I was calling them, and that makes him angry. It really chaps my hide. I guess I should have had my personal assistant - a.k.a. our DOG - doing it all for me, right? Jeezy chreezy...

Aaaannnyway...:)

Work should be fine from now on, as the only tasks I need to complete in the next several months involves picking out my dress (will be doing that on weekends), picking out invitations (will also be doing that on weekends), registering (will eventually be doing that on a weekend...not soon, though), and all that good stuff. Jerks.

Jesse and I have a special wedding savings account that is slowly building up steam at this point in time. It's an account that can't be touched for anything other than using it for purchasing gifts for groomsmen and bridesmaids, for purchasing honeymoon tickets/paying for hotels, and that sort of thing. I'm hoping we'll have a decent amount of cash in there by the time another 6 months rolls by, but we'll have to see. He and I earn bonuses at such sporadic levels thanks to the funky businesses we're in, so while this next quarter promises to be really rather good to me, it's not so much to him. And Lord only knows what's gonna happen next year! We might have to cut out some of the date-nights we have...or at least change them up a bit so they're more stay-at-home dates, I guess. Those can be fun, too, right? But the point is that we're really making a very conscious effort to set aside a good amount of money each month, if possible, so that we can have a truly wonderful honeymoon. Because did you all know that the groom is supposed to pay for the honeymoon? Yeah, I didn't know that. And I would never ask him to bear the brunt of such an expense all on his own! That doesn't seem very friendly-fiance to me. we still don't know where we're gonna go, though. Someplace tropical...preferably that doesn't require the use of passports. That's what we're running on at this point. Suggestions are welcome. :)

Ok, I'd better get moving to finish up my work for the day. Just wanted to update a bit and get some stuff off my chest. Have a great weekend, everyone!

The Painted Living Room

Not much of anything going on on the wedding planning front. So I thought I'd post some info regarding the domesticity of mine and Jesse's lives together.

This past month has been focused on updating some areas of the house. One of those areas is the back porch, which unfortunately turned a random purple/rose color from the stain we chose. We're still working on fixing that, but the main thing is that the wood is protected out there, and that's all that matters. The other area that needed updating was the living room. The paint treatment on the walls started to look a bit tired and kinda dirty to me over the last 6 months or so, and it became clear that a change would be necessary. I've been planning for a couple of months, actually, and have been working on deciding on a new color for as long. With Jesse's help, we came up with a Behr color called "Classic."

Here is the living room before:
And here is the living room after:
Yes, I'm aware that it looks a bit pink. And to be honest, the color "Classic" does have some rose undertones to it that give it that appearance in some lights. But it looks really nice with the furniture, and the walls don't look dirty anymore, which is a really nice change in my opinion.

This weekend, I'll be rearranging the furniture and resetting all the knick-knacks and art so that they're in a new configuration, which should be fun. The room had been the same for the past 3 years, so it's nice to shift things about a bit finally. Change is good, right? Right!

Off to work I go. Check back next week for more updates on the exciting domestic antics of myself and Jesse! WOO!

Slow month, it seems...

Still not much going on in the planning area. I've done everything I need to do at this point, and most other things need to wait a few months before they kick into gear. Right now, the main goal is to set up a specific spreadsheet of immediate expenses/deposits that are required to reserve spaces/caterers/send out "save the date" cards, and then I don't need to deal with anything until the day I find a dress to put a deposit down on. And that won't be happening for at least 3 months, I think.

The important thing is that we've found the church and reserved our wedding time with them, and we've also found a perfect reception spot, and we've been penciled in there as well. (Still working out the little details for the contract right now, and I hope to have it all in writing, in pen, by the end of October. Maybe earlier...we'll see.) The reception will be at The Boulevard Brewing Company. Unfortunately, they don't have the new space listed on their website just yet, since they only just opened the space officially last week, but I'm hoping to have a link to it up in the next couple of months. Or maybe y'all would like to be surprised when you first see it? Hmm...

My main struggle when it comes to the wedding planning these days is the distance between my father and I, as well as the issue of time. I feel like giving ourselves a whole year to plan is the most frugal and proper thing to do, considering that both Jesse and I work full time jobs (Jesse is even more than full time most weeks!), and are planning the wedding ourselves. Also, according to most planners, wedding websites, and venue managers, it's not abnormal to book spaces 9 months - 1 year in advance of the date of the event these days. Jesse has a coworker who is planning a wedding in a very short period of time...she got engaged mid-summer, I think, and she's planning her wedding for November of this year. She had a very hard time finding a proper venue that was (a) available and (b) affordable. When you limit yourself with time restrictions, you limit yourself otherwise as well. And I'm really glad that Jesse and I could both agree on having the wedding on a date that's as far out as it is, so as to give ourselves plenty of time to make sure we have the best celebration of our wedding we could ever imagine.

My father (and I hope he doesn't mind me talking about this...) and my stepmom planned their wedding in a relatively short amount of time, and due to certain circumstances, had to change the date at least once during the planning stages. With that experience behind him, he is extremely cautious about setting a date and putting down deposits on locations over a year in advance of the event. And I don't blame him! It's this sort of behaviour that I was exposed to when growing up that made me the no-nonsense, somewhat detail oriented kinda girl that I am today. (I hope to become even more detail oriented as I grow older and wiser...I can't really get any more no-nonsense about things, though. People might not like me much if I get worse on that end!) But the frustration remains when it comes to having to discuss these matters over the phone, with a man who can be sillier than I am when he wants to be, and without the ability to be face-to-face to discuss the details as quickly and efficiently as possible. It's my own fault for moving my ass to Kansas all those years ago, I know. But hey...if I hadn't moved to Kansas, I wouldn't have met Jesse! So there's the end to that argument. :)

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go find some reasonably priced "save the date" cards to order, so I can plan accordingly for the expense. Hope everyone is having a great week!

Oh joy.

Well, I've discovered the truly fun part of being a bride in the 21st century...e-mail spam and phone calls from vendors soliciting my business. It's my own fault, I know...

I signed up about 2 weeks ago for a free wedding packet from KC Weddings, hoping that I could save a couple of bucks on having to purchase a magazine (which I received a free one of about 2 days later from one of the locations I visited, but I'm hoping that I'll receive a fall/winter magazine when they finally send one to me), and looking forward to receiving information about local vendors via e-mail and mail. The e-mail spam doesn't bother me, really. If I'm not interested, the "delete" key is only 2 inches from my main keyboard.

But on Tuesday, I received a call from an unknown number. I wasn't sure if it was my trainer at the gym finally getting in touch with me to set up our next appointment, or if it was someone calling to confirm my hair appointment a few days early, or what. I answered. It was some girl from a local bridal shop inquiring about my dress purchasing activities. First of all, they want to congratulate me. Nice. Secondly, they would like to know if I'd like to come in to look at dresses, or have I already purchased one? I had some questions of my own, too...how did they get my number? And did they realize my wedding wasn't for over a year? HELL no I don't have a dress yet!

I suppose that some girls will wear their mother's dress still these days. And perhaps there are those out there that would pick out a dress as soon as a whole year before they get married. Personally, I'm taking my time. I'd not only like to lose another dress size before I start shopping (I'm already down one size over the past 6 weeks...so I'm hoping that by the end of December I'll be in a size 14 - that should make it easier to try on more styles in more shops), but I've got other stuff on my mind right now. Finding the venue was one of them, and I think we've got that under control, but I'll know better at the end of next week. Still, it was just sort of shocking (and a bit annoying) to have someone call me out of the blue, in the middle of my work day, asking me about my dress-search activities. I managed to end the phone call without being too bitchy, explaining to the girl that their shop is actually on my list of ones to check out eventually, but that I wasn't going to start shopping until December. She thanked me for my time, and probably hung up hoping I'd lose their shop name and not come in to look for dresses there.

I don't like the feeling that I'm being rushed, and having these folks contact me before I'm ready for them is putting me right in that place, unfortunately. It's uncomfortable, and I don't like it. I can't WAIT to go look at dresses...but just not yet. It's not time. I hope the other stores will respect that concept, and hold off on calling me for a while.

In other news, the church is booked, and the deposit has been paid. The lady that helped me is really nice, and she's apparently the one that deals with most of the wedding planning stuff for the church outside of the priest that we'll be dealing with and who will be marrying us. When I went in to drop off the deposit, she gave me a little packet of information to take with me (basic rules about who they can allow to get married there, and what to expect, and how much it costs, etc...), and she offered me a second packet "to give to [my] mom..." I told her that it wouldn't be necessary. Actually, I think I said, "Oh, my mother is deceased." (I've been saying that a lot lately. To the priest, to certain location coordinators, now to this woman...seems that everyone expects a bride to be doing all this stuff with their mother!! I guess that would make sense, really, if my mother were alive of course. But even in that case, she would be in California...not very convenient for the wedding planning stuff, in my opinion.) The woman said, "Oh, I'm sorry!! My mom's deceased, too, so I understand how you must feel to have people saying that to you." I told her it wasn't a big deal, and she gave me the packet anyway, so I can pass it on to whomever else I have helping me out with certain stuff like dealing with church details (probably going to send it to my twin, so I can have a second brain helping me remember things like when we have to be done with pictures within the church, and what we can use as decorations inside the church itself). It's just funny to me, I guess. I know that a lot of people perceive my age as being much younger than it actually is, and while that's a nice thing, it still causes little hiccups like this now and then, and makes other people feel uncomfortable and excuses need to be made, and it's just a big mess sort of.

But that's ok. Because I have a wonderful stepmom who's willing and ready to help me in any way she can, and a new mother-in-law-to-be that is exactly the same way, and while it's inconvenient to be as far away as I am from the both of them (one in California and one in Indiana), I surely will be taking them up on their offers if I need to!! And I'm sure that mom's here with me too. I know she is, in fact. And for that, I'm always grateful...

Happy weekend everyone! (Go Trojans! Go Irish!)

Clearer and clearer...

Well, it's starting to pay off, all these fabulous fun visits to different venues meeting different salespeople/coordinators, seeing the spaces they have to offer and hearing how much they can do for us and all that good stuff. I think that both Jesse and I have a much better idea of just what will make us happy, and what will make our celebration a special one...outside of the whole getting married thing, I mean. :)

Meeting with the priest at Redemptorist went well last night. He told us that we need to come in and fill out a little "compatibility questionaire" that he will then "score" on his computer, so as to give us something interesting to talk about at our next meeting, I'm sure. In the mean time, we need to put the deposit down on the church (no credit cards, dammit! Not fair...) to reserve the date, and then we'll be meeting with him again a couple of times over the next few months, and planning to go to an engaged encounter weekend sometime as the wedding date approaches. Jesse will likely have to take some time off for that, but hopefully he'll have some to spare at that point anyway, as we'll both be building up some off-time over the next year for our honeymoon, I think.

Now if I could just figure out who the heck I'm supposed to invite from my office, I'd be in a better spot. Thankfully, the location that is #1 on our list right now isn't as tight as the others we've looked at with regards to space for guests, so I'm thinking that the original total of guests isn't completely out of the question. Budget-wise, it might throw things off, though. Shoot...hadn't thought of that! Back to the drawing board!

Tonight...

Tonight, we meet with a priest at Redemptorist. Jesse has agreed to go through whatever he needs to go through in order to let me have the Catholic wedding I've always hoped to have. Now I just need to call and see if they take credit cards when it comes to the deposit I need to make to save the date and time they have available...

A little over a year to go

This week has been considerably better than last in some ways, and not so much in others. I feel like I'm in a hurry, hurry, HURRY to get certain things done, but then I sit back and think about the amount of time I have and I wonder if I'm overreacting and being silly about it all. Then I read little blurbs in magazines or online about how I'm right on track with what I should be doing, and I feel a bit better.

Today, I finally nailed down base budgets for 3 different places, and feel like I can call and have a real conversation with my dad now. The budget is based mostly on what I've learned from 3 different venues, what they have to offer, and then the additional costs that I can figure out on my own for now. I have an idea of what the dress will cost, but as for alterations and the veil and stuff? Dunno. My twin really wants to do the flowers, and has assured me it won't be a pain (I want her to come into town and have a good time without having to worry too much about details like decor, you know?), but I haven't the first clue what they might cost, so I'm not even adding that into my budget. Basically, I've looked up a couple of DJ's, photographers, cake creators, and seen a wide variety of dresses, and I've based my numbers on those sorts of things, putting in an average number for most items.

It hasn't been easy. But then again, not a lot of big purchases I've made over the past 4 years have been, so why should this be any different, I wonder?

Jesse has been really kind and supportive over the past couple of weeks, helping me in the kitchen even after he gets home from a grueling 11 hour day in his work kitchen, and trying to keep me on track with my new eating plan. (I started the eDiets.com Glycemic Impact "diet" about 5 weeks ago, and have really loved it so far. The only problem is the amount of preparation it requires for meals the next day, but I've found that making large amounts of certain meals ahead of time, like I did this last Sunday, saves me money, time, and from spending nights bent over the stove instead of doing what I really love - like doing laundry and watching t.v.)

As up and down as my mood swings have been, we've really been doing well when it comes to talking about our plans, both for the wedding as well as our life beyond that. (I'm quite tired of his jokes about children and stuff, though. Ok, not really...the way he kids with me about children really shows me how well he knows me. It's funny and endearing at the same time!) Last night, while discussing the issues he has (yet again) with the amount the food costs at the Hotel Phillips, I turned to him and told him, "PLEASE! Stop thinking about money...leave that up to me and my dad." After I paused for a moment, stirring my ground turkey and salsa concoction in the saute pan on the stove, I turned to him again and said, "You don't understand, do you? I thought I would have to wait until I was like, 65 to meet you! I have been waiting for this for a LONG TIME, and we're going to throw a party to celebrate it that will make us happy as hell!" He just stopped and said, "Can I get a hug then? I think we both need a hug." And he was right. :)

So. Budget is coming along, my mood swings are right on track, it seems, finding time to plan and work my regular job is proving to be a bit of a challenge (it's been hard to focus at work, and this week really proved to me how crappy I've been at keeping up with everything since the proposal, unfortunately...I'm hoping to remedy that over the next week or so), but it's all working out. For now, anyway. Makes for a boring blog, I'm afraid, but hey, I'm sure that'll change with time...

Catching up...

I know it's been a couple of days, and I'm sorry...work is busy this week, so I've been pretty tied up.

Not much is going on anyway. Jesse and I went and saw another location on Tuesday, and it's one that I love, but it poses some problems. Jesse is focussing on food costs, and is having a hard time listening to me when I ask him to stop it. (Since he's a chef, he simply can't stand seeing how much places are charging for items like prime rib or filets...) At a more expensive location, such as The Hotel Phillips, food is gonna cost more than it would at, say, the golf club we looked at over the weekend. Yeah, different quality product, I would imagine...so we need to accept that, and see if we can find a menu option that will give us the most "bang for the buck" so to speak. It's a really beautiful location, but we're still keeping an open mind, and trying to check out at least 3 or 4 more before we settle into one place as being the target location to go to my dad with.

I also spoke to the DJ company that most everyone recommends, and have an idea of how much that'll cost, so that's nice. Now I just need to see about a photographer, and I'll be right on track with giving a base budget to my dad to look over.

We're also meeting next Monday evening with a priest at a church I'm highly interested in having the ceremony at. They have the date and time available, but now we just need to see if we fit the other requirements they migt have for us. Cross your fingers for me! It's a really beautiful church...apparently, it has the longest center aisle in all of Missouri! Which is good, because I really like keeping people in suspense, and having a long walk down towards the altar will definitely help with that...

I'll be able to post more later, I think, but right now, work is calling yet again! Sorry for the short and crummy posts I've been putting up...it'll get better, I'm sure. Especially after I start looking at dresses in a couple of months! Yikes!!! :)

Change of plans...

We've changed our projected wedding date to October 27, 2007. Jason (a.k.a. the friend of Jesse's that allowed him to propose to me at his wedding a couple of weeks ago...) called on Friday night to let us know that October 20, 2007 is the date that USC and Notre Dame will be playing each other in South Bend.

First of all, I really wish that those teams would get it together. Last year they played in October, this year they play in November, next year they play in October again...c'mon guys! Let's be consistent, shall we?

Second of all, this is not that big of a deal. Apparently, the leaves look prettier later in the month anyway, and that's part of the reason I wanted the wedding to be in October in the first place, so we're still good.

Sorry for all the confusion!

Jesse and I went to see the golf club venue option on Saturday this past weekend, and it seems that Jesse didn't like it much. While it isn't ideal, it is still an option. It's really pretty, and has a great deck off the main room where people can go to smoke, hang out, etc..., while still remaining in plain sight which is helpful and important. But the separate space for kids to descend to after a certain point in the reception would be behind a curtain, and that's not really what he and I want, so much. So we're still looking, and I've contacted several new places for info already. We'll see what happens.

Ok, back to work I go! Hope everyone had a lovely holiday weekend...

Short Day

Today looks like it's going to turn into a short day for work, so I think this afternoon I'll be calling churches and finding out the info I need to know. Finally!

Jesse and I will be going to the golf club tomorrow morning to see what it has to offer, and I'm honestly thinking it might work out better than the other choices I've been looking at so far. We're both interested in finding a venue that has an attached terrace or patio that people can go out on to get air, have a smoke, just look at the night sky, etc...And the venues downtown that I've looked at don't have that option, unfortunately. Yesterday, I went to visit The Clubhouse on Baltimore, and it is lovely. Very pretty rooms, very pretty building, and right smack in the middle of a very good area of downtown. Tons of hotels around it, plenty of parking available (especially after the construction clears for the H&R Block headquarters that is about a block away from the location), and in general a really top notch choice. Except it doesn't have any place for people who smoke to go and do their thing. They'd have to go outside the front doors, and that doesn't work for me. I want people to be able to relax and have a nice place to hang out, and not to have to leave their drinks inside to go stand by the street and have a cigar or cigarette. Especially since the groom is such an avid smoker, I'd hate to keep losing him throughout the night and have to go downstairs to find him for the cake cutting or the first dance or to do whatever. So I'm afraid that one might be off my list. Lovely place though...

This is helping, though. Going to see places and checking them out, seeing what they have to offer...it's opening my mind to other possibilities. And, it's fun. I can't wait to see how it all turns out!

Happy Friday everyone!

Ookaaayyy...

Last night, Jesse and I sat down to look over the menus for the Hotel Phillips, and after doing the math, we figured out that having the reception there would cost us a minimum of $20,000 - $25,000. That's just for room rental, food, and drinks.

Yeah, I'm thinking that might not work out. Unless I decide to wear jeans instead of a dress, pick some widlflowers for my bouquet, and have people take pictures with their digital cameras and send them to me later via e-mail. Oh, and we can all hum songs as we dance instead of having a DJ. And we'll be eating my famous brownies (from a box mix!) instead of an actual wedding cake, but I'm sure I can figure out how to make that work between now and the actual wedding date.

No. Maybe not. I'm kinda looking forward to wearing a really pretty dress...

HOWEVER, I do intend on reserving a block of rooms there for the wedding, depending on where we wind up for the ceremony and venue of course. In October this year, their basic room prices are at $129, which is totally reasonable when compared to other hotels in the area, and it's such a lovely little place.

I'm going to keep tweaking it to see how I can/if I can get it to work out, but it really might not come together. It'd take a LOT of extra planning to get it there (and a LOT of cutting of the guest list, too), so I really don't think it'd be worth it in the end. We'll see...

Blow number 1 to my wedding planning ego...

The Hotel Phillips in downtown KC. I haven't looked at it yet, but I still think that it would be my number 1 choice for venue (their menus look AMAZING!), and it's not big enough to handle the sit-down dinner Jesse and I want to have.

Shoot, shoot, shoot...

Actually, it can accomodate the number we'll probably end up with, but it'd be all funky, with the dance floor in one room, the game room in another spot, and the dinner on a totally different level of the hotel. Which would mean a need for 2 DJs. I don't know...maybe it'd work. I don't know, I don't know...It could be neat, I suppose. I'm just gonna have to go look at it, I think, so I can have a better picture in my head of how it'd all break down.

I start visiting venues tomorrow! Jesse would rather skip the visit to the golf club on Saturday morning so he can try to work earlier so he can finish up earlier and sit down to watch the Notre Dame game with me after he's done in the kitchen. That's fine with me. (Even though we have TiVo and can record the game and watch it on Sunday night, which I probably would want to do anyway as the USC game is on at the exact same time as the Notre Dame game on Saturday night and it's gonna be hard to focus on both games at the same time, but whatever. Boys are silly sometimes...)

I'm feeling better today than I did yesterday. I got a lot of sleep last night (a whole 7 hours!), had a fun morning dropping the puppy off for her snip-snip appointment - and no, I don't mean a haircut, and a coworker is buying lunch today because I hauled a bunch of cases of beer (with the help of my co-admin here at the office) to a 4th floor open house they were throwing at one of their properties last night. So yeah...so far, so good. Hopefully I'll have time to contact all the churches on my list sometime this afternoon! I'll keep y'all posted on what I find out...

Week 2 - Only 52 more weeks to go!

Today's challenge is to find the time to contact a church regarding performance of the ceremony. Right now, I do not attend any particular church on a weekly basis, as I have been "saving myself" (in a way) for the proper community. I love our neighborhood...I really do. My neighbors are awesome, we look out for each other, we're in a fabulous location in the city, and our street just got re-paved. Gotta love it. However, when I moved in 3 years ago (pre-Jesse, of course), I had only planned on staying in the house for a maximum of 5 years, and got a home loan accordingly. The biggest question looming over my little life prior to the proposal was should I sell the house first, or should we get married first? I knew that I wanted to marry Jesse, and I knew that I wanted to sell the house. Preferably, I would be able to do both in 2007 sometime.

And I can almost hear the shaking of the heads out there as people think exactly what I thought immediately after asking myself that question every few days or so. I would say, "Self? Can I sell the house in the summer if Jesse and I plan on getting married in October?" And Self would answer back with a resounding, "HELL no!" It would be insane. There is no way that I would escape institutionalization after attempting to do both things in the same year, so plans sort of made themselves after I resolved that battle within myself.

Annnnyway....so we'll be living in the house for a bit longer than I anticipated when I originally bought it. But I also love the neighborhood a bit more than I anticipated, and I also hate the house a little more than I anticipated. It's a big mess, really, so let me scoot along to my original point.

I never started going to the Catholic church down the street because I didn't want to start in as a member of the community without knowing that I was going to be there for a long while...like, at least 10 years kind of long while. Some of you may not know this about me, but I've moved around a bit. Ok, actually, I've moved around A LOT since I originally started college and moved out of my parents' home back in 1992. I've lived in Malibu, West L.A., Kansas City, Overland Park, San Diego, Chicago (when I was traveling for work), Northern California, Boston, and back in Overland Park again. Since I've been back in this area, I've only moved 3 times, but each time has taken me to a new church community boundary, meaning that I would have had to change churches 3 times since 2000, and that just gets soooo old after a bit. If I could have picked up my church in Boston and brought it with me for my last 3 moves, I would have. I loved it there.

Hey. Can I have the ceremony in Boston, and then have the reception in Kansas City? Wouldn't that be fun?! No? Whatever...party poopers.

So that's that. I've moved a lot, and I was tired of switching from church to church, and basically stopped attending regular mass back in 2000. I'm still big into my faith and love being a Catholic, and completing my next sacrament (i.e. marriage...since Jesse saved me from becoming a nun at some distant point down the road) is important to me. Unfortunately, the church that we live "within the boundaries of" isn't my style. (Family members, it reminds me of St. Bruno's. Yeah...it's that cool...) Jesse doesn't like the looks of it from the outside (I tend to agree for the most part), and I've never been inside it, so I don't know what to expect. They have an enormous mural of something...not sure if it's Mary or Jesus, to be quite honest...above the main entrance, and it just looks gaudy to me. I'm sure it's a lovely little community of people, but I can't bring myself to be that interested in wanting to get married there is the thing. It's last on my list.

I'm feeling a little bit uncomfortable contacting churches that I don't belong to, asking them if they will let me marry my currently-agnostic fiance at their altar, and trying to figure out all the fun details that go along with that question.

What it's looking like is going to happen is I'm going to have to accept the fact that I will likely have to have a ceremony someplace other than in a Catholic church, and that adds another fun dimension on to the scouting of the reception venue! AND does that mean we can have a pretty huppah over us and Jesse gets to step on and break a glass at the end of the ceremony? That always looks like so much fun. It's like, "Yeah! We're done! Now let's break things and get this party started, yo!!" (Although I'm sure it has a different meaning from that interpretation all together...it's kinda what I hear in my head when I see it on t.v.)

So. That's what's happening today. I have two appointments this week to look at locations, one of which Jesse will be able to attend with me I hope, and then I'm working on a third for hopefully another day this week or early next. One is a specific location just for events like meetings and weddings, another is a golf club that I've always admired and thought of as a possible location for my eventual wedding, and the third is this really cool looking, very elegant and yet relaxed "boutique" hotel downtown. Which happens to be across the street from the first location.

This is fun an exciting, I swear. But these first couple of weeks of the whole thing have been a little overwhelming, to say the least. Stay tuned for more fun updates...

And so it begins...