Going faster than a rollercoaster

Time keeps marching on.

Saturday I met with a florist and came up with some ideas and prices. I also went for my fitting. The dress fit fine, no hem required, just a bustle, and removing the straps on the dress. Rose, Tom's sister went with me. Rose has been really great about looking at wedding dresses with me. We also had a chance to talk about flower girl outfits.

All the bridesmaids were emailed today to see what they think of dress colors. 

This evening I meet with another florist. There is so much to do. I can't wait to see Carlan in Dallas. I may be purchaising a tiara or tiaras in the future. 3 guess about who "gets" to wear it/them. As Suzanne Sugarbaker said, "nothing bad can happen to you when you're wearing a tiara." She never said what happens if you try to put one on someone else :)

3 Months!!!!

It's getting busy. Today I go for my first dress fitting. I also have my first flower consultation and I really haven't decided about my colors. I think my colors wi be white and silver. The bridesmaids will either where dresses in vibrant colrs that they have chosen or purple. Deep, dark, royal purple. or I could go back to my college idea of black dresses.


Who knows.

I'm not ready to decide on flowers.

Why was it so much easier to decide to marry Tom than it is to make all these decisions? Maybe because I always concentrated more on finding the right guy than on planning the wedding.

It makes sense, since the marriage lasts longer than the wedding, but boy will it be stressfull for the next 97 days.

Piled Higher and Deeper

At 19 I moved into my own apartment. As an apartment dweller, there was very little yard work needed or required- water the potted plants, discard them when dead.

In August 2007, I moved into our current home with Tom. It's a small house with a nice backyard containing 7 trees. What I never considered was the raking. My family with land, has lots of land, so bush-hogging is more of the issue. In south Louisianian most trees loose their leaves in the spring, so they are sucked up with the grass.

That's not the case here. We have been raking all morning, since our lawn was covered in leaves. The bad news is that we still have 3 trees that haven't lost there leaves yet. The good news, is it appears we have our very own Madam Trash Heap. I'll just have to keep an eye out for Fraggles.

The Day After

Today after I have read and listened to McCain's concession  speech and Obama's victory speech, I am proud to have taken part in this election. This morning I heard an interview on NPR with a 109 year-old texas woman, whose father had been a slave, recounting saving money to pay the poll-tax to vote during the great depression and now seeing an African-American president-elect. It's nice to have a president-elect that is inspiring in a time when we need hope. It also doesn't hurt that llamas like him.

Reboot

Tom and I had, what my dad would call a "come to jesus" moment on October 20th. At the thought of paying over 6K just for a reception site and food, that little voice inside my head yelled- are you freaking out of your mind. 

I decided to listen to my inner voice since it rarely yells, expecially when it comes to spending -I am an expert at shoppon math afterall

Example:

Boots cost $100. If you wear boots 6 months out of the year to work, that's less than a dollar a day for the first year of wear and then it's free each subsequesnt wearing of the boots, because 6 months x 4 weeks x 5 days = 120 days of wear.  

Yes, I rocked the word problems in 2nd & 3rd grade. Thank you Mrs. Wilson and Mrs. Coker.

So Tom and I talked, and we realized what we really want is something small. we are both so releived. I contacted the reception place and cancelled.

So we are only  inviting 20-30 of our closest friends and family to the wedding. We will then take everyone out to dinner at a restaurant that we both love. We are reserving a private room, so we'll still have plenty of time to mingle and talk with everyone at our wedding. It will just be more us. 

In other news, we both voted today, but not together. Turns out Tom is still registered to vote in Reisterstown, so he had to go to his old polling place. He saw the priest that will marry us while he was voting, so you see it all comes full circle. Big changes to us, and possible big changes for the country.

Calgon, take me away

So it's a little stressful planning a wedding. I have completed the online pre-marital counseling test. The results should be interesting, since sometimes it took several tries to submit my answers and other times it only seemed to take several tries. Which means I inadvertently answered questions that I didn't mean to answer. Should be a fun meeting on Sunday.

So I wanted to share with everyone how I de-stress. Besides writing in this blog, I look at LOL Cats which always make me laugh. There are also LOL dogs, if the "kittehs" don't amuse you.

This one seemed appropriate for a wedding blog.

Culture Shock

On Saturday, Tom and I attended our first wedding together. It was a wedding for one of Tom's friends from work and it had some distinct differences from the weddings I'm use to attending in Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas.

I've already realized that groom's cakes are not a tradition here, but we will have one. Of course everyone I talk to in Maryland only knows about one groom's cake- the bleeding armadillo from Steel Magnolias.

However this wedding was very different. There was a head table, which seems very common here, though I've only seen it one other time (at Buddy and Jill's wedding in 2006- btw their baby, Jack, is an adorable 1 month-old now!) However the introduction of the wedding party, family and friends by the emcee, was something I have never witnessed before- bridesmaids carried in by groomsmen, end zones dance routines, etc. I just chalked it up to being in the northeast.

Then came the tossing of the bouquet and garter. Tom kept talking about how nervous he was when he caught the garter at Dave and Rose's wedding. I thought it was sweet that he was nervous, but little did I know why he was nervous. At every wedding i have attended, the guy that catches the garter dances with the girl that caught the bouquet. When they asked for a chair, I assumed that the bride and groom were going to take a picture with the guy and girl. Little did I know what was to come. I fully understood Tom's emotions when I watched the guy that caught the garter, place it on the leg of the girl that caught the bouquet. I was shocked!!!

At least i don't have to worry about that at our wedding. Very few of our friends and acquaintances are unmarried. If there were more, I'd do cake pulls, but that's another Louisiana tradition.

and the dress

It's big, it's white and I will be removing the straps, but once I tried it on I knew it was the one for me. Plus it was in my price range, unlike the $1000 one I tried on previously.

It's from David's Bridal, Style # V9302 if you want a closer look or would like to see the back.

Of course the average high when we're getting married is in the high 50's so I may be a little chilly on my wedding day, but "I'll have my love to keep me warm." (Any ideas on where that line comes from?)

Reception

Here's where our reception will be

The church

Here's where we will get married

The Envelope Please

Today we are writing thank you notes. Tom's family threw an engagement party/barbecue for us last weekend at his mom's house in Westminster. Everyone was very nice and very, very thoughtful. It was an overwhelming success, despite the rain that kept all of us indoors, or at least in the garage. The day began with lots of food and ended with a rousing game of flip-cup in the garage.

Unexpectedly, many brought gifts for us, hence the Thank You notes, which were purchased at Target with gift-cards received at the engagement party allowing us to thank those that gave target gift-card with thank you notes they enabled us to purchase. It's the circle of life, or maybe we are just doing are part to keep Maryland's economy going, or maybe we should all just buy Target stock.

I'll post the photos soon from the party.

In the Beginning

I want to keep a record of our engagement, so I decided a blog would be a way to keep everyone informed. Tom & I met on September 4, 2006 at Hightops Bar & Grill in Timonium. Mr. Sneaky, actually suggested we go out to eat there the night he proposed. His plan was thwarted however by the large crowd there that night due to the Maryland State Fair taking place next door. He perservered however, and proposed to me in our backyard that evening, August 22, 2008. My family is quite excited, as any reader of my step-father's blog can attest.

So I hope everyone enjoys this. With my friends and family scattered throughout the central and eastern time-zone, I still want to share everything with all of you.