Days 303 - 319

wow - so we're getting close. it's crazy.  things are going well -- lots of random etsy purchases over the last few weeks and the 1st packages are starting to arrive! here's the status update and recap --

• michigan trip was a success! it was so great to see everyone once before the wedding! however, i ate a ton and probably gained a few pounds. it's ok though, i made it to boxing class this week and need to kick-start that routine again.
• patrick's jacket is a bit loose, but fingers crossed it'll be ok after he tries it on with a button down instead of a solar t-shirt.
• i was in a wedding planning focus group. how perfect, huh?! $125 for 2 hrs and i didn't even have to lie once  :)
• i've discovered pinterest, according to them, it's a place organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. i am obsessed and i love it. so, lots of pinning  happening with new wedding ideas

and now, fun stuff we're acquiring--

• yep - that's a bird bath! can't wait to see that lovely addition in the courtyard area, can you?!

• paper straws.we're going old school here and are pretty excited to use these for drinks during cocktail hour!
• a beautiful vessel for the rings...sorry no pics, we're waiting for it to be created for us. and yes, i like the word vessel.
• burlap ribbon for our flowers. though we have 5 yards of it, so i'm sure we'll find more ways to use it too.
• and we're also looking into some photobooth props, but nothing ordered yet.

so, we're both off tomorrow and a long weekend of wedding planning is the agenda! we're going to the venue for another walk through in the afternoon with ashley and will be picking her brain and running our ideas by her. we'll have tape measures, notebooks, pictures, and diagrams in tow. and once we figure out how many more shutters, frames, etc we need, we'll be moving on to the ceremony. must figure this out soon. like really soon.
this is such a fun process! i'm going to have to find a new project after the wedding! someone else i know who just got married said that she hated everything about the planning process and that it was like studying for final exams and she couldn't wait for it to be over. man, that must suck.

Days 282 - 302

well the invites have been sent! and we've planted one as  test run but unfortunately I think we forgot to water it few times and so we may have missed out on wild flowers sprouting out of them....oh well. Hopefully others have better luck than we seem to be having.

we've also crossed more stuff off of the to-do list, which feels pretty good. I mean, the invites were top priority, but we also accomplished a few other things over the past 2 weeks --
We booked our mini-honeymoon! The plan is to go to Italy next spring, but we really wanted to do a smaller trip after the wedding. We found a cute bed and breakfast in Portland, Maine that got great reviews, so we booked our reservation. And we can take the train from Boston to Portland for pretty cheap - perfect!
We also found potential hair pieces (and by hair pieces, I do not mean toupees) -

Here's one of the ones we're thinking of getting. We also made hair appointments for Sept -- can't believe it's getting so close! Sept will be here before I know it!

Oh and here' s one of the dresses that the flower girls will wear. Ava and Layla will totally rock these!

Oh and we talked a little bit more about ceremony and have decided on who walks in/out when, using which aisle, with whom, and to which music! Pretty excited, I think it's totally going to work! Crazy how much you have to think about when you're making up the rules as you go :)

And finally the decor. We've been getting a bit nervous about the shutters.
While our 2nd bedroom is packed to the gills with wedding stuff, the venue is HUGE and we're really hoping that we have enough shutters and other stuff. But there's that fine line between 'we have a small selection of cool things but not enough to establish a theme' and 'wow there's way too much crap in here and it's taking away from the space'.  It'll be fine, I'm sure, but I think we just need to take some measurements and possibly go on another random adventure for more shutters....stay tuned.


And we're off to Michigan later this week for a long weekend! Looking forward to getting some time to spend with family and friends before the wedding!

Days 262 - 281

well well well...the days have been flying by lately. so what's new? let's see...

• liana threw a curve ball and got a new dress! yep, she wasn't sure if she was completely happy with the blue dress. luckily, j.crew had some other options and she ordered a new one last week. this is definitely a perk to not having bridal gowns, you can just find your usual size at the store and poof! you can have a new dress in just 5 business days. thank god it works! it's actually kind of perfect and has a similar mineral-like tone to mine, only more of a gold/copper color than silver. whew! sorry, no pics to share - we're going with the surprise factor for the blog-reading world :)
• ceremony planning had a good start -- though we still don't have it quite figured out yet.that's ok though, we spent a lot of time brainstorming and i'm not stressing yet
• i ordered this great  locket on etsy and think i'll somehow incorporate it into the flowers i carry and put pics of my dad and uncle in it to carry with me that day
• during liana's day off today, she may have found a dress for julia (sister) and a jacket/tie for my brother! and the cool thing is that the tie is from liana's cousin's boyfriend's company, the hill-side. wow that was a lot of apostrophe use in one sentence -- hopefully i got 'em all right! anyway, here's what we're thinking as of now (and no, that's not patrick :) 

ok that's all for now -- monday night and time for some bad tv to start the week off right

days 241 - 261

ready? set! here's the latest---
brimfield was a complete success! within 10 minutes of arriving we had made the 1st purchase and went back to the car with load #1. here are a few pics of our finds:

the copper tray above is used in traditional indian weddings and has a border of engraved acorns, a symbol of fertility and growth. cute, huh?! the step ladders on the right were some great bargains and perfect for the ceremony.


we were really excited to find this mirror. as you can see, it's getting some use now in the bedroom and will be displayed on a table with the tray and seltzer bottle. can you picture it yet?! excited yet?!

Liana received her etsy necklace and it is perfect with the dress!








And my purple peacock shoes arrived today too! and i think (or hope) i can totally rock them with the dress.

and then after having a blast at amy and dan's wedding in portsmouth last weekend, we came home and clearly had wedding stuff on the brain. we spent a few hours putting together a song list for our dj. we got a bit carried away and have over 100 songs to give him. it was hard describing the music we like when we have everything from  motley crue to tegan & sara to  rihanna on the list! :)

and the ceremony--- we've finally spent some time thinking about what we want. we had lunch with jess & christina (our wonderful friends who are visiting from berkeley this week- we are so lucky jess is also officiating our ceremony!) and started the conversation with them over the weekend. liana and i then went back to our local bar with laptop in tow and started jotting down ideas in appendix II of our notebook of lists.

we're really happy to be able to see christina and jess again this week to discuss more. they are both so great and helpful with thinking through all this. and jess has already done some preliminary research -- so excited to work with her to create the perfect ceremony for us.

we've got less than 4 months till the big day...i'm sure i'll be posting more often :)

Days 238 - 240

it was an incredibly productive weekend! i'm actually shocked we got so much done on the intimidating to-do list. there were even some appendices created to document the specifics we need to do for the ceremony and decor.
so for starters, we made our way to the boston flower market to see how overwhelming the store was. we're thinking about just doing our own flowers, and i was worried that this store and the ones next to it would be similar to a haymarket situation, but, no, it was totally fine. we even picked up a few bunches of flowers and 'tested out' the flower buckets and soda bottles (vases) at home...
and i think it will totally work. the lower photo is our attempt at mocking up the tables.  you get the picture, just imagine a lovely white table cloth and not a wrinkly fabric sheet.

and i ordered my shoes! purple peacock size 11's here i come! liana's etsy necklace arrived too, so once my shoes arrive, we'll be able to try on the full outfits -- fingers crossed that it all works together.

oh and then we wrote our our shopping (wish) list for the brimfield trip this weekend. let's just say that we'll be looking for everything from step stools to frames to lace to vintage boxes, crates, and bottles.

and finally, we sent out a mass email about hotels, etc to guests. and i figured out how to create a gmail group in my contacts - how excited was i?!  and yes mom, i'm sure the email was sent to all 70 people, not just you :) -  love the power of the bcc:

i am such a nerd. ok more later this week.

Days 211 - 237

wow -- so i'm a complete slacker, but the days have just been going by so quickly and all of a sudden weeks go by. but this just means that i have lots of updates.

1. we've ordered (and received this week!) our invites! that feels like a pretty big accomplishment and we're really excited about them. let's just say that they are in line with our green / sustainable ideas
2. we found a make-up artist and had a trial with lissa and she was great. of course we got all fancy on a stormy day wearing casual clothes and so it was a bit strange, and we both felt a bit, well, not like ourselves, but oh well. we're excited to work with her though.
3. hotel blocks are set and the website has been updated with details
4. this week we met with and booked our dj -- he was great - super laid back and seemed to be a good fit. now we get to really start to think about the music choices. and he liked our secret potential cute/silly 1st dance song...
5. and maybe the most exciting update--- it turns out i do not always end up with crazy eyes and awkward smiles in pictures! we spent about 3 hrs last saturday in harvard and central squares with ashley and had a blast! i think we ended up taking photos in at least 10 different spots including having a few beers in charlie's kitchen, a random alley in harvard square (that i'd never even noticed before), riding the redline, a quiet neighborhood street outside of central, standing outside of the middle east bar, among the funky murals in central sq, and ended up walking over a bridge across the charles river around sunset. the light came out just as we started shooting and the weather was perfect. check out the pics on her blog - this was the best idea EVER!

and with no real plans this weekend, there will be time to sit down and look at our to-do list. still feeling pretty ok about progress, but i'm just a bit nervous and hope that our ideas come together. it's brimfield antique fair time again and we're planning to go next weekend with the hopes to find any remaining 'things' we need for the space. 

days 177 - 210

ok back on track -- lots of updates, but i 1st want to share a necklace on etsy that i stumbled upon this morning.  it can be made with a different color scheme and a different brooch, but i'm kind of loving it. this may be too much with the purple shoes, or maybe this is better than the purple shoes. i'll need to consult with others on this one....

everything else seems to be falling into place - we're meeting with a potential dj next week, so fingers are crossed! he comes with great recommendations from my friends evan and jo, so i'm hopeful :)

and hotels?! YES, i finally got my act togehter and we've blocked rooms for fri and sat at the westin hotel on the waterfront  -- more details will be posted on the wedding website, but rooms are now available for reserving! we realize that this hotel is a bit pricey (although sadly pretty comparable to other hotels downtown boston). so, we're working to find a 2nd hotel with more inexpensive rates. We will be staying at the westin and working with them to have cabs available to take us from this hotel to the epicenter (a 5 min drive). 

food?!  oh we had our menu tasting and it was amazing! we're so excited about our catering team and the options.  i may have a post dedicated to the food later today. but in the meantime, feel free to look at the pics on the web album .