Home for the Holidays

We're spending a few days at my parents' house for an early Christmas. Trying the alternating method for holiday time with our parents until we have kidlets. This year is a "stay home year" but my folks couldn't make the trip to Delaware later this month. The upside to celebrating the holidays early means no procrastinating on presents, less stress and more holidayness.

While I'm home, I thought it'd be nice to finally clear out my boxes of stuff. Last night I found notes from each year of high school. Not kept in a shoe box but a binder in protective sleeves, organized by year. Apparently my organizational tendencies go back further than Brian and I realized. Digging past the notes, I found old school newspapers, book reports, class schedules, awkward artwork, etc. Most of it got tossed, notably love letters from my first boyfriend and diaries... some things I am not sentimental about!

Tomorrow I'm tackling the baby albums.

When did you start delving into the family archives? What did you find?

Officially speaking

The officiant search started in August, stalled in September and October, then resumed in November. Now that's it's December 1st, we're ready to pick an officiant. Finally, right? I don't know why we took so long to make a decision! It took all of 15 minutes to review the available officiants, select a package and email the coordinator. Procrastinating just made it worse and turned it into something that gave us agita, like preparing and filing our self-employed tax returns.

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Falling flat: a cake story

Pinning down a baker has proved tricky. Our venue recommended Baker #1, a popular bakery with a great pedigree, but offered us the option of using a credit toward whomever we wish. Since we knew nothing about wedding cakes or the process, we started off with Baker #1. We were still a year out and hadn't even found my dress, let alone picked colors or flowers. In our initial email, we emphasized that the flavor of the cake was more important than the appearance. And we were more than willing to pay for the privilege of a tasting. Just let us know the cost and when would be a good time. And that's where Baker #1 dropped the ball.

A cake that has fallen. Quite literally.

We need a wedding

Our holiday weekend in New Jersey was meant to end on Friday morning, but it's late Monday night and we're just now returning. Tragedy struck Thanksgiving night. Mr. P's grandfather suffered a fatal heart attack, which we unfortunately (and fortunately) witnessed. This is the third Thanksgiving in a row that we have spent in mourning. (It's the fourth death in 3 years for the family.) I'm beginning to think there is a black cloud over the holiday and our engagement.

To say we are exhausted is putting it lightly.

Gobble gobble

We're out of town for a few days so posting is on hold. Lots of late-night entertaining (ah, here come the holidays!) has kept me from building up a cache of vacation posts. Once we're back, I'll make it up to you! In honor of the gluttonous holiday before us, I'll have two cake-related posts, including a tasting, for you.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Goldilocks of wedding gowns

Whose been wearing my wedding gown? Uhm, no one, that's who! *

One of the inherent problems with choosing an uncommon wedding dress is you don't have the benefit of seeing it on other brides. Everyone has different taste but seeing how other women accessorize it is oh so helpful. I'm talking about the veil, shoes, hairstyle, jewelry, makeup and more. I'm visual (and a planner) so naturally I googled all the possible name combos to find photos of this elusive gown. Here's what I found:

I Heart Paper Art

Collages by Helen Musselwhite
Probably the easiest to attempt out of everything on this page, but I'm not fooling myself. It's still hard. And time consuming.

Rittenhouse, a year later

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Smack dab in the middle of the park is the guardhouse.
Where Mr. P proposed.
In front of everyone.

Happy Engage-iversary

In what simultaneously feels like yesterday and a lifetime ago, Mr. P got down on one knee in the middle of a Philadelphia park and asked me to marry him.
Cheers!
We're heading back to Philly today to remind us of the what and why behind our decision while remembering our past and planning for the future. (My camera is coming with me this time!) As I type this, the church bells at St. Thomas are pealing. I can't help but think of weddings every time I hear the bells.

Something in the water

With almost 2 full years of engagements and weddings, our circle of friends and family averages a wedding every 2.3 months. We're in the middle of the celebrations: 6 down, 4 to go. It's a lot of showers, cards, gifts and vacation time. When I bring this up with anyone in outside of my generation, there is no sympathy. Instead, it's a "been there done that" attitude and a variety of explanations:

1. It's cyclical. What does that even mean? We're not cicadas.
2. Everyone is the same age so of course they'll do the same things at the same time. This is so not the case! The age range of these couples runs from 24-50. We have friends that are far older who haven't begun to think of settling down and younger friends with several children. When you get married has little to do with age and more about where you are as a person. Sorry, I just don't like sweeping generalizations...
3. You're just more aware of it since you're getting married. Also crap. Looking back over the last 10 years, it's been one wedding (at most) a year -- not every 2 months.

All together now

Bridesmaid Revisited

Quick recap: The 'maids and I thought their gowns were all set when we walked out of the doors at Priscilla. They'd been measured, gave their contact information, approved the color and even agreed on the same gown (save for a small difference in the skirt). Then I received an email that changed all of that.

Things happen for a reason. I wasn't feeling the first choice so this setback wasn't actually a bad thing. It gave me a chance to regain control of the creative direction. (That sounds awful, but true.) I knew what gown to order. It was an early favorite that wasn't given strong enough consideration. I didn't speak up even though it was my favorite... Making sure everyone was happy was more important. Lesson learned. Now that we were on the same page, I had their blessing to pick the back-up:

PB 415

Shoe kismet

Aside from keeping my feet happy and having some style, I don't have too many requirements of my shoes. Why would my wedding shoes be any different? I am not one to suffer for fashion. My high arches turn even sneakers into torture after awhile. While I love my stilettos, they are not comfortable for all-day wear, especially when showing house after house or trekking across lawns. My favorite shoes are kitten heels and flats. They're my go-to styles for sophisticated comfort that lasts all day. (I sound like an orthopedic shoe ad...)

Penguins!

Before I even found my dress, I knew I'd wear flats. For so many reasons.

Matchmaker, matchmaker

Do you remember taking those teen magazine quizzes? Most of us probably did at least once or twice, right? Please tell me I'm not the only dork who thought it was fun! And who didn't look forward to Psych 101? It was one of the more interesting freshman level offerings.

(I remember buying this one.)
Now we're a little old to buy teen magazines... so I've got a new quiz for you to try, no teenybopper magazine required.

Yog-urt

I think that's what I'm going to feel after my first yoga class tonight.

That's me.
It's something I've wanted to start for over a year and just never found the right combination of motivation, time, and people. I'm not a Y or gym membership kinda girl. The whole gym thing intimidates me, which is odd considering how athletic I was in high school. But that was 10 years ago!

Let the DIY begin!

Once the Evites for our annual NYE party were sent out, it meant our first DIY project was fast approaching.

The Photobooth.

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Early on, I decided our wedding would have one. D&T's wedding last December was a blast, partly because of their very busy, very funny photobooth that hosted all sorts of mischief during the reception.

Yep, that's us. Being goofy.