In current news: Vendor searching was almost the death of this Michigan bride...

I have some FANTASTIC news. I am done searching for vendors!
Venue – Check! Includes food so DOUBLE check! Plus, they work with fabric/chair people so all I had to do was tell them want I wanted…. TRIPLE check!
Officiant – Check!
Dress place – Check!
Photography – Check!
Bakery – Tasty check!
Flowers – Check! AND, under budget. Double point bonus for me.
DJ – Check!
Hair/makeup – Check!

Before I found all my vendors I felt like this:

My favorite adopted neice, Lucy, and I with not so happy faces...

Now I feel like this:

Pure joy!!! Lisa and Matt, your baby is fabulous.

I am congratulating myself with a glass of red wine as we speak.

However, getting to this day was not an easy one…

The other week I almost decided to forget about having a “super awesome” wedding and just send out some invitations and call it a day. It seems so much simpler to say “I do” and then eat some cake that you got at the grocery store that morning. Who really needs fancy flowers or the best DJ in town? In the end, you’re married no matter what.

Why was I feeling like this? Well, I found it very frustrating to try and find all the vendors for the right price. I love DIY projects, but I definately found that vendor searching made me anxious and/or frustrated. I absolutely hate trying to figure out whether I think someone is worth the price that they are charging. I hate bartering. (I hate to stereotype, but Wes should never let me go buy a car by myself, haha.) I hate trying to determine if someone is trustworthy. And, when you think you might have found some wonderful people to work with… BAM…you get the news that they are already booked for your wedding day. I can live with not having the best DJ in town, but it feels terrible to start the search all over and go through the process of accessing the quality of someone else. Note to all June brides: it is not too early to look for vendors! EVER! Tell your fiance I said so. On top of it all, it feels so rude to say, "You're great, but we decided to go with someone else".

Then, I realized why I love planning the wedding (i.e. customized with tons of details and hands-on projects). I realized that, while I may be the only person who truly cares about having handmade invitations, I get to share the time making things like that with my family and friends. Living in NJ, I don't get to see all of you that often. For instance, finding bridesmaids dresses gave me the perfect excuse to pester my friends and go to Michigan to hang out with them. I get to call my maid of honor anytime I want because she agreed to be my maid of honor. My mom, Wes’s mom and I all spent a wonderful week together bonding over wine and wedding inspiration photos. Wes realized that when I ask him to do a wedding project with me, what it really means is that we are going to spend some extra time with each other doing something other than watching TV. I love spending that time with people and I love that I can type up all my thoughts and share them with whoever does care about my experience making 200 fabric flowers that day. And, all the effort I spent on finding great vendors is leading up to one terrific party. We will get to share at least 6 priceless, PRICELESS, hours with family and friends from all over the country. So, the personalized super awesome wedding is back on!

Thank you to everyone for being a part of this experience and a part in our lives (mushy, I know, but weddings are supposed to about mushy love stuff, right?).

Where shall we wed?

I feel like I got ahead of myself! Here I am talking about wedding outfits and I haven’t even told you WHERE we are getting married. That’s because finding bridesmaids dresses was a lot more fun than finding a place.

Finding a place to get married was quite the experience. I have mentioned that we really loved a place in Florida called Deering Estate.

Deering Estate in Florida

Relaxed and beautiful. We had decided to get married in Michigan, though, so it was our goal to find a place in the Great Lake State that made us feel like this place did.

How to book a wedding venue:

Step 1. Make a preliminary guest list. And by preliminary I mean, a list that includes everyone you seriously want to invite minus the yet-to-be-born babies. 

Step 2. Google, explore wedding websites and make a list of places that you like AND that will fit all of your guest. Do not visit places that are either too big or too small. I am really glad that we made sure to do this. Most places do not tell you how expensive they are on their websites, so it is a little difficult to know whether they are in your budget or not.

Step 3. Call and visit all those places. Does this sound terrible? Because it was.

Step 4. Get serious about one place.

That place was Meadow Brook Hall.

Meadow Brook Hall in Michigan

It is such a beautiful place. The house/castle is historic and the grounds are so lovely. There’s a big white tent outside where you have unlimited space to do what you want. It was also at the very tippy-top of what we wanted to spend.

Come December 2010, I contacted them to reserve our wedding date and put down a deposit. The person I had met with when we took our initial tour was on maternity leave at the time, and my experience with this new person was terrible. In order to make the price work for us, I had made some cuts here and there. For instance, I was going to use cupcakes instead of cake to avoid a “cake cutting” fee. All of my cuts were not okay with this lady. Instead of calling it a cake cutting fee, it was described to me as a caking “handling” fee so I still had to pay it. Sounds stupid to me. What do you think? The “it” place quickly became something else to me:

As we were driving to Michigan to spend Christmas with my family, I emailed our second-pick place to see what their contract would be like. I didn’t consider this place to be our first-pick mostly because my friend had her reception there and I didn’t want to copy her. I am not sure why I ever overlooked the beauty in this place.

Waldenwoods

Personal Photo

This place is Waldenwoods. Beautiful and relaxed.

Over the course of that 12 hour drive to Michigan. I realized that Meadow Brooks Hall wouldn’t work with me the way that I needed. Wes said something to me during that drive about how it would be nice for our wedding to be about us and not the place we are having our wedding at. I agree. Meadow Brook Hall would have made the wedding about them, not us. It didn’t help Meadow Brook’s cause when I emailed the woman at Meadow Brook Hall to tell her that the place was becoming out of our price range so we decided to go elsewhere and she emailed back to say “We understand that Meadow Brook isn’t for everyone…” Did I just make that sentence sound mean in my head?

Overtime, it has become increasingly apparent that Waldenwoods was the right choice all along in so many ways. The people at Waldenwoods are helpful beyond words. The view is stunning when the sun goes down over the lake that is not but 50 feet away from a big white lodge. Flowers grow all around the lodge. It is like going to northern Michigan without the drive. All of this would have been worth a big fancy price, but it is less expensive as well. Also, we recognize now that we want a wedding with simple and refreshing charm and Waldenwoods can give us that. That is probably why they were voted one of The Knot's 2011 Best of Weddings top pick in Michigan.

Waldenwoods makes everyone happy! Even the moms:

See the big bright windows of the lodge?

Lesson learned: the people who you work with matter.

Step 5. Drink a glass of wine and congratulate yourself on making your first big wedding-related decision!

I'm too sexy for a tux

The articulate and handsome Wesley has now introduced his group of stand-up guys. I would just like to say: I adore this group of guys. Adore. Especially you, Josh W.!

Now, how do we dress the MEN? I am sure all of them would prefer to don something close their usual dress for our wedding:

Just kidding! I have requested that the wear something a little more traditional.

For sure, the wedding industry over prices EVERYTHING and is filled with scams. But, in my opinion, the biggest crappy thing the wedding industry does is exploit the groomsmen by making them wear tuxes. The poor groomsmen have to wear whatever the bride tells them to wear because they love the groom. In addition, tuxes are expensive, so the guys usually get stuck renting a tux that doesn’t fit right, cost way too much to be a rental, and has been wore by possibly hundreds of other men. The groomsmen at most of the weddings I have been to have worn some quality tuxes, though! However, by the time you spend money on all the bells and whistles to get a nice-looking tux, you might have well bought a nice suit!

Now, there’s an idea... What if the guys wore suits!?! Hear me out…I believe this is a good idea because:

1. They are less fancy and since our wedding shindig isn’t a black tie event, that works out very well. (It is a cocktail attire affair, fyi!) Random fact: the difference between tuxes and suits are that tuxes have silk incorporated into the jacket/pant somewhere. Who knew?

2. They would be new! BIG plus.

3. The guy gets to keep it!

4. Mens Wearhouse and Jos. A. Bank are always having ridiculous sales so we can get a good price. So, if the one of the guys hated the suit then he shouldn’t feel so obligated to ever wear it again. But seriously, what is there to hate about a standard sexy charcoal suit? J

5. They will be new! Did I say that already?
6. Men in suits are goooood looking! See below:

From theknot.com

Kristen Taylor Photography

:) I heart Ryan Reynolds

But I like my groom a lot more! A pic of him and my lovely to-be MIL taken at Wes's mom's cousin's daughter's wedding... better known as Kristen who is now married to Paul. Yes, Wes's family is huge and yes, they are all super close. It is pretty awesome!

A pic from the Faris Wedding in Kentucky! What great looking guys!

So, how about it? Do you think we should go with suits?

A few more wonderful people

Hey all! I just got to Finland a few days ago! I know, it is crazy. We have a little over 10 months until the wedding which is prime planning time and I am off gallivanting in Europe. What was I thinking!?!?! Good news, though... we almost have all of our wedding vendors booked. I got a lot of the big planning stuff done this summer before I left. I have much to tell you.

But, that must wait because I have an important message from the groom. Since I got to talk about my some of my wonderful family and friends so should Wes! So, without further ado here's Wes to tell you about some of the important people in his life standing up for him in the wedding:

Wes says....

"Before I go into specifics on the great guys that fill out my portion of the wedding party, I want to emphasize how truly blessed I feel to have so many very good friends and family members in my life.  I think that I could easily have picked 20 men and women to stand up next to me if it wouldn’t have made the wedding photos so unmanageable and probably single-handedly caused a run on the market in gray cloth (for the bridal party outfits) that may have succeeded in sending us into the back half of a double-dip recession.  Being the stalwart patriot that I am, I had to sacrifice for America, and identify only a few of the many people who I’ve been lucky to experience life with. I am incredibly grateful that they’ve agreed to come to Michigan from all over the country to stand with me on the most important day of my life.

BEST MAN: JOSH (Florida)

One of two Joshua Davids in the wedding party, Josh is my best and “longest-serving” friend (yeah, it is literally work sometimes to willingly deal with me regularly).  Like all the people on this list, he’s an all-around great guy.  Additionally, his and my personalities are particularly complimentary.  I can name countless times where we almost got into BIG trouble due to all the hilarious, reckless, and fun thoughts that reside within his brain, but where we narrowly avoided most of the negative consequences of our actions due to my quick-thinking and slightly greater threshold of risk-avoidance for situations causing severe injury, illness, or death.  I love the kid like another brother, and my high school years in particular would have suffered if we hadn’t met.  One of my few regrets over the last 10 years has been living too far away to be able to regularly hang out with him. Despite all the time removed though, when we are able to meet, whether in Miami, Orlando, Nassau, Grand Cayman, or Cozumel, it’s like nothing has changed.  It’s the way I expect it to be between him and I for the rest of our lives.

GROOMSMAN: JEFF (North Carolina)

“Dis how dey know you”!  It doesn’t matter whether you call him JDM21, Mill-town, or Millaire; everyone knows Jeff is rolling to his own beat (of course he’s doing what I can best describe as several rounded horizontal fist pumps during that time).  Jeff and I have been great friends since our freshman year at Duke.  He’s an incredibly thoughtful and welcoming person that I may never have gotten to know as well as I have had the honor to if not for the trajectory of one golden-winged, and subsequently tarnished and uneaten, french fry at Elmo’s in Durham.  He’s also one of the most competitive and imaginative friends I have, and we are sure to hold a ten-event competition we refer to as “The Decathlon” each time we meet up that includes some known and some lesser known (or altogether-made-up-on-the-spot) challenges to face off in mano-a-mano.  As one of Durham County’s finest, and one hell of a model American, I hope he knows that I’ll always hold the laces out for him, as I’m sure he’ll do for me.

GROOMSMAN: ECK (Utah)

There’s a reason why “Cinco de Ecko” has become one of my favorite days of the year.  For those of you who don’t know, it’s thought that the Germans who originally laid claim to this date named it “Cinco de Mayo” but now it’s mostly just remembered as Eck’s birthday- at least I think that’s why all the mexicanos and Parkers at Cosmic Cantina get so geeked up for it.  I’ve known Eck, like Jeff, since my freshman year at Duke.  Eck is a stand-up guy and one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. He is one of my favorite people to kick around ideas with. We spent a lot of time philosophizing through New England and the Canadian Maritimes, two weeks before our graduate school days began, as we made our first treks to Acadia National Park, the Bay of Fundy, and Cape Bretton, Nova Scotia.  While our thorough conversations almost never result in an accord, we did both pass on trying the McLobster sandwich in New Foundland.  I’m glad to call him one of my best friends.

GROOMSMAN: EGAN (Oregon)

Someone get this kid a mike at the reception! My boy “E” knows more lyrics to more songs than anyone- I guarantee it.  Feel free to challenge him at the DJ booth.  More than anything, I think Egan and I just get each other.  He’s a genuine, hard-working, family man who knows what he wants from life and is primed to take it.  I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the great times we’ve spent together from skiing Beaver Creek and Vail, to hanging out in his home state of New Jersey, or when he’s come down to MIA.  One of my all-time favorite nights took place with Egan and I living like high-rollers on South Beach, with courtside seats at the Triple A and VIP club tickets, becoming part of Dwyane Wade’s inner circle (literally), and staying at Nick Arison’s place overlooking Biscayne Bay.  I love this kid. 

GROOMSMAN: ZAC (New Jersey)

Zac has been my best friend at Rutgers since we lived on Jones Avenue as members of the same cohort in the Graduate Program in Ecology and Evolution.  He’s one of the nicest and most accommodating people I’ve ever met.  I have always been able to rely on him to go with me to the Golden Rail or Corner Tavern, chat about our research, gossip about the goings-on in our department, or head to NYC or Atlantic City.  He and I had a tremendous ongoing beer pong series that got to well over 300 games that first year of grad school though I can’t quite recall our head-to-head record or much else really from umm... two-thousand and..?  I do, however, remember the Ice Bowl Series, a best-of-seven played in conditions that would make Lambeau shiver.  Our beers were freezing in the cups within minutes of being poured! (Don’t worry honey, I think I pulled out the series win in 6...) Since then we’ve seen a lot of people and fine drinking establishments come and go but I’m confident the scarlet bonds we’ve forged here in Central Jersey will always remain strong.   

USHER: BRIAN (Minnesota)

My older brother is flat-out an amazing guy.  He’s an accomplished businessman and an even more accomplished and loving father to my four beautiful (and loud) nieces and nephews.  I’ve always admired him- after all he was my big bro.  But he has always been a great example to me of integrity and courage.  Life may not always go as you’ve planned it, but if you charge ahead with dedication and hard work, you may well just land on a pretty special path anyway- I learned that through Brian.  Because of our age difference and the miles that have often physically separated us, we have not always been able to be as close as I would like, but I’m looking forward to making sure that the family Megan and I will soon start together is every bit as loving and hectic as his so that they’ll fit right in together during many anticipated visits and holidays.

USHER: LANDON (Florida)

My little brother is pretty special in his own right.  He’s super talented, and always ends up being good at nearly everything he decides to apply himself to- drumming, fishing, wrestling, track, pool, the list goes on and on.  I have always enjoyed our time together, whether it was playing basketball in the driveway, running routes with a football in the street, or going fishing and lobstering in the Keys. He’s also been really helpful with my research, whether it was his helping my plant surveying efforts at Deering Estate or Camp Owaissa Bauer, or serving as gator bait (just kidding!) while catching sunfish and spotted tilapia in Big Cypress. I’ve also always appreciated the fact that he looks up to me the same way I look up to Brian.  I am so excited to see the kind of man he grows up to be over the next 10 years. "

One dress, two dress, three dress, four.

Sorry I have been so absent from the blog! I spent some quality time at home in Michigan and then in Miami. In Michigan, we got tons of wedding stuff done!

Something I was really excited to do in MI was to hang out with Colby and Rachel and go pick out bridesmaid dresses. Everyone in my wedding party has different taste so I decided to choose a designer, fabric and color and then let the girls pick out their own dress.

We started off at Brides by Demetrios in Troy where I purchased my wedding dress. I tried it on so my future mother in-law could see it in person and so I could see how awesome my shoes looked with my dress. Trust me, it looks awesome. Demetrios carried a few bridesmaid lines I was interested: Dessy and Alfred Sung. We started with the Dessy chiffon dresses, which was a good place to start. Rachel walked out first in this dress, which looked like it was meant for her (minus the shockingly bright yellow color).

Colby also found a few numbers that she looked super in! After seeing the color swatches, I liked the idea of these dresses being in charcoal gray.

Then, we moved on to Alfred Sung.

Sorry for the purple splotch on the pic. I am in the pic wearing my wedding dress and I am keeping it a secret because I like the idea of keeping it a secret! I will give you a hint... it is white...whitish.)

These dresses have a more shiny appearance and came off very “little girlish” and too “bridesmaidy”. Yes, bridesmaidy is a word. It was obvious very quickly, that these dresses clashed with my dress style. Mom, future Mom in-law, Colby, Rachel and I all voted these down.

We had some lunch and moved to a dress shop that shall remain nameless. This shop was horrible. Although they had a large selection of dress, the shop was dirty looking and the staff was not particularly helpful. At Demetrios, the saleswoman was super helpful and pulled all of our dresses for us. And on top of those minor things wrong with the nameless shop, when we first arrived, there was another bride upset because the shop had suggested to her to order a size that was completely wrong. The bride could not fit into her dress and the shop refused to take responsibility. Even more so, after the bride left, the sales staff continued to talk badly about the bride right in front of us. So. Be careful, about who you decide to work with! Sometimes it is worth spending a little bit more to go to a nicer shop.

All of that didn’t really matter since I planned on ordering the bridesmaid dresses online from frenchnovelty.com. It has amazing prices and if you want they will make sure all of your dresses come from the same dye lot. Knowing that we were just there to look, we checked out some Bill Levkoff dresses.

These dresses also came in a beautiful charcoal gray color.

I felt really good about bridesmaid dresses at this point. Plus, we ended the day seeing our other friend, Bridesmaid Lisa, and the adorable baby Lucy.

What do you think? You like the easy breezy chiffon dresses?

Dressing the maids

So, I had to introduce the maids because we are going to talk FASHION.

Next week, I will be going with two of my lovely maids, Colby and Rachel, plus the moms to look at some dresses for them. Thus, I have to get a more concrete idea of what I would like them to wear. And Josh, no, you will not be wearing a dress.

Since our wedding isn’t going to be super formal (cocktail attire) I would like the ladies to have knee length dresses. I honestly don’t want them to look stupid although it is tempting to make them wear something like this:

Ha! I have looked through 1,000 bridesmaid dress pics. And, it seems we could go a few different ways. First, I could pick one dress and make all of them wear it because I am a bridezilla.;;">

After Six, From Dessy.com

But, that seems unappealing because all my ladies are different. I love them for their differences so why not play that up? They could all wear a similar dress in the same color and fabric. I would then let them pick the style and whatever shoes and jewelry they wanted.

Alfred Sung, all from Dessy.com

Or, I could give them some rules and then send them out to pick out their own dress so it would hopefully end up something like this:

From greenweddingshoes.com

I like, but I have heard from other brides that their bridesmaids hated this third option. It seemed that it puts a lot of pressure on the girls to go hunting for a dress that fit the style and color scheme of the wedding… and who has the time to do that when it isn’t your own wedding. So, I am leaning toward option 2. I would like it if the dresses were gray/pewter so that their purple flowers would pop against their dresses. But I am open to purple dresses, too. We’ll see what happens!

What do you think I should do? What did you do for your wedding?

Representin' the bride, yo.

I would like to introduce you to my maids plus an usher!

Colby and I have been friends since high school when we were in color guard together. We happened to apply to the same college, Albion College, so I approached her one day and asked if she would like to room together. Ever since, she has been one of my best buds. Most of the summer before starting college I was at her house or we were going on 3am Meijer runs shopping for nothing in particular. She has always been someone I can lean on. She is the Yin to my Yang. I love how spontaneous she is… whether it was rearranging out dorm furniture in the middle of the night or playing pranks on our neighbors. She picked me up from a lot of low times and we have shared some of the happiest times in my life. It only made sense to ask her to be my maid of honor!

Josh will also be representin' that day! Yes, he’s male. Josh and I have been friends since middle school. He knows more about me than anyone because we have been through so much together. I know it is a bit unconventional to have a male stand up on the bride’s side, but it wouldn’t be the same without him. He can always make me laugh and he is the most loyal person I know. If I needed him, he would fly across the world just because I asked. No joke. It mattered to me the most what Josh thought of Wes when Wes and I first started dating because I value Josh’s opinion so much.

My big sister, Nicole, is also one of my maids. I can’t tell you how happy it makes me that she agreed to be in my bridal party. We didn’t always get along, but I love her so much. As sisters sometimes do, we tease each other…but I will tell you what, she will never let anyone else say anything bad about me. I looked up to her quite a bit growing up. She is incredibly beautiful and creative and I am lucky that I get to bug her to help out with some of my wedding crafts. Seriously, you give her some yarn, a stick and some glue and she can work wonders!

Lisa is a friend from college. She has graciously agreed to be a maid even though she is super busy in med school and taking care of her baby, Lucy. Isn’t Lucy freakin’ cute? Lisa and I lived together most of college as well and are in the same sorority, Kappa Alpha Theta. Her nurturing personality meant that she always was the one to take care of me when I was sick in college! She is a true friend. She is so good about keeping in touch with me and all her other friends and I admire that about her. Lisa always gives good advice. Having already planned her own wedding and married for a few years, I count on her for lots of planning and newlywed relationship tips.

Rachel... I love this girl so freakin’ much! Rachel and I also lived together for most of college and are sorority sisters. Rachel is always fun to be around. She will definitely be one of the people having a ball at my wedding. In college, when life got a bit too dramatic, I went to her for a no-fluff opinion. She was always there for me when things were tough and I know that 30 years from now she will still be there for me. Side note: She also has impeccable taste. In college, I often went into her closet for clothes and shoes! So, I know she won’t let me make the female bridesmaids look stupid. J We were in the same pledge class in our sorority so I feel like I share a special bond with her. She has such a big heart and I am so lucky have her as a friend.

Last but not least, is my baby brother, Andrew/Andy. He will be an usher on my wedding day. I am pretty sure that anything wedding related very much bores my brother, but he is such a softy deep down that he agreed to be in my wedding. He is by far the funniest person I know. I think he developed his sense of humor to balance out how crazy his sisters were/are. I know I annoyed him a lot while we were growing up but I am very proud to have such a down-to-earth and caring brother. He sat through every single one of my dance recitals with minimal complaint. He was even my “date” to one of my sorority parties when a stupid guy backed out of going with me. Wes and my brother get along so well it is scary…mostly because they both know every quote in the show Family Guy. Ladies, he is single and you would be lucky to date such a nice guy!

These are a few of the people who helped make me the person I am today. I guess this means I will have to introduce the groomsmen and the two other ushers soon!