Shop, Shop

I placed my order for the navy blue peep-toe flats from Kathryn Amberleigh today. I actually placed the order yesterday, but it didn't go through so I placed it over the phone today. They should arrive in time for my dress fitting next week.

I also purchased a snow white cashmere wrap for the reception since it can get rather chilly at night in Maine. J.Crew sale + extra 20% coupon made it worth the splurge. Actually, the price was so good that I don't even think it qualifies as a splurge. Splurge would have been panicking two days before the wedding and buying it at full retail.

Invitation Proofs are Here!!!

And they look ok for a first round.
This is the RSVP card:

I'm tempted to just lay everything out myself. It's simple enough and I have the right software. It's more frustrating to outline changes than to just do the work myself. I'll give it a couple days....

Menu, Rentals & Service

After several weeks of back and forth emails with our wonderful caterer, Stacey, we have what should be a near-final menu and rental agreement. Stacey worked some magic with the square table request and located a rental company in Portsmouth, NH that will rent us a few extra square tables that our rental company couldn't provide (apparently they only have half as many as we need).

In addition, Stacey also worked with me on a few changes to the menu. During the cocktail hour-and-a-half she'll serve four passed hot appetizers and we'll have stationary cheese, crackers, basil torte and crudites. The bartenders will serve drinks made with the alcohol collected from S's students, a variety of cold bottled beverages, and there will be pitchers of fresh pink lemonade with blueberries & iced tea available.

The waiters will serve salads to the tables as guests are called to the various grilling stations where options like fillet, chicken, stuffed portabella caps, and seafood will be cooked to order. The mashed potato bar with assorted toppings will surely be a hit with the guys (and bridesmaid SCL)!

Late night, after dinner is cleared, the bonfire is lit, and the remaining cupcakes are displayed in their take-away boxes, Stacey will lay out a midnight buffet complete with assorted wraps & sandwiches, chips & munchies, and fresh baked cookies.

As the last bus departs at 1:30 am we'll remind our guests to return in the morning (unless they're camping in the back field) for the 11am brunch, when Stacey will return to our house with fresh fruit, pastries, scones, biscuits, mini quiches, a spiral ham and of course, Dunkin' Donut holes.

It's a good thing that I'm going strong with the marathon training plan since this sound like a 5lb weekend for sure. Now we just need to organize a pre- or post- wedding 5k fun run for our guests!

Handwriting Font

I found this site where they will make a font that replicates your handwriting. I think I may have to try this out, just for fun. Here's a sample of their latest creation:

Weekend Progress

We made a little progress this weekend, but nearly as much as I had planned. On Friday we tried on wedding bands, but our local store didn't have the bands that match my ring exactly. So they're ordering the single width:
and the double width:
bands for me to try. They should be in stock by the time I return from next week's trip.

On Saturday I created bridesmaid W's baby shower invitations in Photoshop. They're very cute, in my humble opinion. She had a massive yard sale Saturday morning to make for for baby, so I stopped by Friday night to claim a few of the votives she used at her wedding last year. I also grabbed another pan to use on Great Cupcake Day 2009 (tentatively scheduled for 8/28 - get ready to lend me your kitchen aids, ladies). (S is wondering if his coveted yard gnome was rescued from the yard sale pile.)

Finally, on Sunday I wrote detailed notes for S regarding various bus companies I called a few months ago and asked him to make guest transportation arrangements given that our first choice lost his chance when he failed to send a contract after my third reminder. Before S had a chance to follow through, however, I got a call from choice #2 this morning and booked this beauty for $100 less than their original quote.
It's amazing what the words, "I'm willing to pay $xyz" can do! Don't worry mom, we've discussed parking and the bus company plans to park at the park-n-ride when the bus is not actually in motion (or at McDonald's since the driver apparently isn't allowed a catered meal).

Scrap the Wrappers

What a P.I.A.! I'm probably not going to torture our caterer with the cupcake wrappers. Maybe I'll pull out the pattern for a smaller 12 cupcake event. But, 300+ cupcakes would just be a little intense. (I just heard mom turtle's voice, "what 300? what are you doing? oh F." Relax mom, I heard cats for a living, we can certainly handle managing an inanimate heard of sweets.) Back to the flags we go!

Cupcake Wrappers

I fell in love with Paper Orchid's cupcake wrappers months ago. But at $1 each I couldn't justify using them over simple cupcake flags with our monogram on them. On a whim today I decided that I would look into buying a set of wrappers and then using them as a template to create our own. Two minutes later I found a shop on Etsy selling cupcake wrapper patterns. They should arrive in my inbox shortly at which time I will struggle to edit an article about privacy litigation instead of designing the graphics for our wrappers.

What's This Development?

It happened very quickly. A few calculations on the iphone, a few trips to the stock room, and quick check of prices on the Interwebs and viola:
Canvas out-of-town welcome bags ready for their custom stencil of our monogram!

I found them on sale at Joann fabric when I was picking up some fleece for Lexi's special bed. I like the size more than the $1 bags I found online and when I account for shipping, they're only 10 cents more each than the bags from the 'webs. They're lunch bag sized and will fit a couple of water bottles, some treats and a map quite nicely. Yet another reason for our guests to stay at the hotels we booked. And S thought there was a lull in projects.

Please be Seated

Here they are, 160 escort cards (plus 20 extras for mistakes).

table name theme suggestions?

Escort Cards

I hate, hate, hate, hate glue. It's icky and picks up any little bit of dirt or lint on your fingers. It makes your fingers yicky and dirty. Hate it. So I'll wait for S to get home to work on gluing the remaining 122 escort cards. In the meantime I'm working on escort card layout. I've come up with the following options.

small monogram, small font:

small monogram, large font:

large monogram, small font:
large monogram, large font:
small monogram, large font below fabric:
small monogram, small font below fabric:
large monogram, small font below fabric:
large monogram, large font below fabric:
large monogram, large font and table name below fabric:
and finally, small monogram, large font and table name below fabric:

All of the options without table names would have a supplemental table name on the back of the card. Which option do you like the most?

Monogram Alphabet

I created this monogram alphabet today

I plan to use these monograms on each of the escort cards above each guest's name. Below the name will be a 1 inch circle of the guest's table's napkin pattern showing through. We'll add table names on the back because some of the napkin patterns are similar.

Off to work on the escort cards now. I finally have the circles punched out after taking four trips to Michael's for different paper punches yesterday. Martha Stewart's brand won in the end. S said I can leave them for him to finish when he gets home so I may work on baby G's gift instead. But first I need some dinner; I'm starving after running 12 miles today. Week 5 done!

It's Slowly Coming Back to Me

I took a Photoshop class at least 6 years ago and haven't used Photoshop since then. After signing up for DIY Bride's Photoshop invite tutorial, (which is still in production) I dug out the old install CD and loaded the software on my computer. Surprisingly, the basics came back to me fairly quickly and I was able to come up with this monogram using the Souvenir font that I purchased a few weeks ago.
Bridesmaid S keeps telling me that the f is huge is comparison to the s, so I tried using a different font size for the f so it wouldn't be so much taller than the s. However, when the font sizes are different between the two letters, their widths very clearly didn't match, even with a 1 font size difference. In this image the fonts are the same size, but I lowered the s so it isn't centered with the f like previous versions. I think it looks much better and I'm actually pretty happy with the result. Now that I've mastered this monogram I may actually be able to conquer layout myself, if the budding designer doesn't work out for us.

Boutonniere Inspiration

I saw these boutonnieres a little while ago and fell in love with them for bridesmaid G's and brother's loosely ski-themed wedding.
They met on the ski team in college and are avid ski vacationers. I found a source for the actual mini ski set so we'll be making these for their wedding this fall. But, I'm still left searching for the perfect boutonnieres for the men of honor at our wedding. S and the groomsmen won't be able to wear boutonnieres so the men of honor are limited to my dad, brother, S's dad, and S's grandfather. I thought that perhaps I'd create a unique bout for each man, highlighting his favorite hobby. Skis or a Jeep for bro, running shoes for S's dad, a 1040 form for my dad (ha.). But it just doesn't seem to fit within a cohesive theme. So off to the Interwebs I went, in search of some inspiration.

A fuchsia dahlia would fit with the wedding flowers and I love the fullness and simplicity of this bloom.

(source M.S. Weddings)

And I like the way these two incorporate a knot of ribbon

I also like the possibility of using a single orchid bloom, if one of my 50 orchid plants happens to be in bloom on 9/5. (I'm really trying to find a house big enough for the orchids, mom.)
Ultimately these are all beautiful flowers and any one of them would look lovely, but I just want something more. I want something to tie "it" all together. (Did my dad really mean for me to go this far when he said any job worth doing is worth doing right?) And just when I'm thinking the men-folk will just have to wear pocket squares that match Lexi's collar and my table's napkins, I find this ah-ha photo.
Look very closely; that's a piece of fabric cut to the shape of a leaf with the man of honor's initial embroidered on it. Perfect. Monogram. Fabric. Elegant. Understated. Simple. I'll use a pink bloom and wrap it with navy ribbon. And I only have to make four. I can hear bridesmaid C rolling her eyes as she says "good god, girl."

Backyard Games

Backyard weddings call for various lawn games, bonus points for those that are entertaining for drunk AND sober guests (not beer die, S). On our list of backyard games are:
Corn hole (from hillbillygames.com)

Croquet (photo from llbean.com)

And perhaps some bocceI was shocked to see that brides.com posted about corn hole today. Apparently they know some hillbillys too. I'm hoping brother can whip up some regulation corn holes this summer and I'll take care of the corn sacks, in navy and fuchsia, of course.

Custom Stamps

Today I did a quick tally of the cost of the invitations and other paper goods to make sure we're staying within budget. Luckily we are, thanks to a budding designer building her wedding portfolio. I also went to the USPS web site to see what 44cent stamp options will be available after the rate-hike in May. Much to my dismay I found a horrifying selection of Simpson's stamps. Some quick research on Zazzle.com and Stamps.com revealed that custom stamps for the invitations and RSVP envelopes are within our budget. Less than a minute later I had this sample:
We'll wait until we have our final monogram from the designer before we order these (yes, I know the f is huge), but I think this design will tie all the elements of the invitations together nicely. I love this stuff!

Flowers?

This makes it look easy enough.

More Shoes?

I thought the shoe search was over until I read a post from the Bride's Guide yesterday, which led me to Kathryn Amberleigh's web site. Where I found these shoes:

Which, coincidentally are perfect. They match my dress and are much more understated than fuchsia shoes. I could jazz them up a little with a flourish from etsy designer ohmydeer or let a fuchsia pedicure pop through.

Kathryn Amberleigh only has a 14 day return period so I'll be ordering these the week before my next dress fitting. I just hope they have them in stock when I need to place my order.

Basket 'O Flops

Basket o' flops, check.

Center photo is the inspiration & side photos are the flops I purchased for our wedding guests.

source: Old Navy, Unknown Blog, Old Navy

Get ready to kick off your heels and dance the night away :)

Wedding Map

I can't get those 5 hours back that I spent working on the line-art map (post below), but finding this vendor on Etsy may make up for it! $20 for a custom map? Done. Here is a sample of elanink's work:
I hand drew a map a few weeks ago, but I'm not sure that I want to include a 4-color insert with the invitations. I may have to check out this vendor!

Decorating the Cake

S and I bought a piece of foam from JoAnn's a few weeks ago so I could do a trial-run of the cake decoration. I obviously don't have an off-set tool here, but even without it the frosting smoothed on fairly easily and evenly. This photo was taken moments after I frosted the cake and now over a full week later, it still looks the same.

The ribbon darkened immediately from the moisture in the frosting, but still looked navy. S suggested that we buy lighter ribbon, but the light will be lowish and there will be hot pink fresh flowers on the cake. I just don't think it's a big deal.

I originally anticipated decorating the cake the week before the wedding, but because it was so easy and fast I think I may set aside a few hours on Wednesday or Thursday for the task. Mom Turtle, ever eager to suggest ways to spend unnecessary budget has suggested no less than 6 times that I have the original cake decorator frost the cake and wrap the ribbon around it. The decorator is on back-up call, but I'd rather save the cash and put it toward something that will alleviate a significant amount of stress, like a day-of-coordinator.

Lexi's Wedding Atire

Bridesmaid W made Lexi a new collar and leash for the wedding using the same fabric that I used for the napkins S and I will use at our table. Lexi won't be at the ceremony, but she will be in photos and she will be at the reception.

Now I just need to decide whether I want to attach a "do not feed me" sign to her neck, write it in the programs, or have a card on each waiter's tray. It's a big deal since she has zero tolerance for anything other than one particular kind of dog food.

I think she'll look quite snazzy with her new collar. I love my dog :)

Name Changes

My law school's alumni association called asking for my contact information for a guide to be published next January. I gave them a new name. Bridesmaid G asked me what my monogram will be after the wedding. I gave her a new monogram. I bought a cool old metal block letter of S's last name to use as a cake topper. I suppose this all means that I should change my name in September. It all sounds like a needless P.I.A. to me. But, luckily there are services out there to make the process easier, like MissNowMrs. Now to tell S that the fees associated with all these changes will come from his pocket. It is his name after all!

RSVP Envelope Solution

My fabulous new printer, the Samsung CLP-315, is great for everything except feeding small envelopes and cards. Bummer. After chatting with the folks at Paper Source and bridesmaid C, I decided to go with clear address labels on the return envelopes.

S and I went to Office Max last week to purchase said clear labels and were rather taken aback by the cost of one package. At S's suggestion I looked on ebay and found an unopened package of the exact Avery labels for under $13, including shipping. Every little bit helps, espcially when S pointed out that the savings are equal to the cost of one reception meal provided by our fabulous caterer Stacey.

During the recent visit with the mom & dad Turtle we finalized the invitations style and wording. I mailed everything off to our layout artist today. I'm excited to see how she works her magic.

Here's a photo of the labels, RSVP envelopes and invite mock-up. The stickers make it look like a total disaster, but so it goes in the world of privacy.
Honestly, how many times am I going to say that I need to use the good camera instead of the iphone??

I also packed the Turtle full of all of our booze, vases, bridesmaids gifts, throwies, fake cakes, etc.. And then I waved good-bye to the fruits of our labor. I wish I took a before and after photo, but packing was a little stressful and photos didn't cross my mind. Every empty space is filled with some goodie wrapped in packing paper. I hope I balanced everything ok and I hope mom & dad Turtle don't get too thirsty and crack into the vodka I stashed under their mattress (and bunk, and cabinet, and . . .).

I guess we ought to get crackin' on some more projects so we have something to show for all our efforts around these parts.

Wedding Map & Web Site

I just created an online map and embedded it in our wedding Web site. Check out www.weddingmapper.com for a really cool resource.

update: the how-to-create-an-invite-map guide on wedding mapper is great too, but I highly recommend using powerpoint instead of word. And, if your invitation inserts are tiny like ours, save yourself 5 hours of work and just give your guests the link. I want those 5 hours back.

LMAO

I found this great how-to for the Gocco:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiIMoDu6TN8

Love the outfit and the music!

Gocco is Here!

The Gocco arrived today. S has only asked ~6 times what it's for. My response? "Crafty stuff."

Cupcake Testing & Tasting

Making the Throwies

Wedding Time-Out

For Baby Selwyn :)