Time Flies When You're Having Fun

I am such a total slacker.  Please excuse my lack of updates.  Larissa is totally winning on that end.  Anyways...

Usually, like, 99% of the time, when you're REALLY REALLY looking forward to something, it seems like time slows to a crawl.  Whether it's 8:17 am and you're tapping your foot waiting for 5pm to come so you can get out of work (or 3:40 if you're me ;-) ), or you're a little kid waiting for your birthday or Christmas to come around on the calendar, time moves at a snail's pace.  This had crossed my mind back when I first proposed an we were in our early stages of planning and picking a date.  Going the more "traditional" route and having a year or longer engagement seemed like an eternity to wait.  I was (and still am) really excited when it turned out that July of this year would work so well for what we're planning.

I had NO IDEA, however, just how fast the time would go.  We got engaged on January 18th (it was a Tuesday, if you're counting).  The wedding, as you know, is set for July 23rd.  That's just over 6 months. Plenty of time.  And honestly, in the smack dab middle of January, picturing a summer day lakeside seemed like eons away.  Suddenly I blinked, and now we're down to 87 days.  Less than 3 months.  HOLY COW.  All the big super important stuff was figured out and booked months ago now, and we're on to the smaller, nitty gritty details that make this whole thing feel way more real and concrete.  Like... ordering and creating favors.  Buying a cake-topper.  Figuring out a rough schedule of the actual wedding day.  Whoa.  This is happening, and it's happening super-soon.

Don't get me wrong.  The last thing I mean to imply is that I am scared of the approaching date.  Far from it.  I'm so excited about it and looking forward to it that I expected time to creep by super-slowly.  But here we are.  Soon the school year will be over, and then it's on to Summer and the beginning of the rest of my life.

In other unrelated news, I recently signed my letter of intent to return to my teaching job in the fall (for all intents and purposes, renewing my contract).  This is the first time I've ever accomplished this, having been laid off from 3 different positions in 3 years.  I feel a little bit like a teenager who keeps getting dumped but is now in a really great relationship.  I've been burned one too many times in the past and I'm afraid to start trusting again.  I have to keep reminding myself that yes, they do like me and yes, there is money in the budget to keep paying me to do what I do.  Anyways... Unrelated to the wedding (though, a continuing stream of paychecks definitely helps in getting this event off the ground), but I felt like sharing the good news.

~T

All the girlie things

I love the wedding boards, they provide entertainment and advice, but sometimes they point out the rather obvious differences between a typical bride and me. Most of this has to do with regards to typical female loves, shopping, jewelry, make-up, clothes, etc. I’m not the biggest fan of shopping, I only recently started wearing jewelry and that’s mostly due to Tim, and make-up is still not a regular thing though I wear it more often now due to the business casual dress code at work. So when I see all these women talking about being so excited for their fitting or their hair trial or figuring out their make-up, it makes me realizes that not only do I not look forward to most of this stuff but I’m sort of dreading it. My first dress fitting is next week and I’m totally scared. Scared it won’t fit or won’t be like I remembered. I know things will turn out fine but I’m not bursting with excitement over putting the dress on, I’m the complete opposite. A few days after my fitting is my hair trial which made me realize I should probably figure out what I want done with my hair. I have a basic idea of what I’d like but have no idea if it will actually look good or work with my hair. I just feel like a visitor on an alien planet. These things aren’t exciting to me, the sort of scare and overwhelm me because I’m not a girlie girl and weddings are sort of the biggest girlie moment of a woman’s life.

I recently found a sundress to change into after the ceremony which actually closely resembles my original casual wedding dress idea I had a few months ago. We didn’t stick to the casual/informal dress idea for very long because I couldn’t find anything like this back in February and didn’t want to chance them not coming out and me stuck with no wedding dress (as it’s rather late in the game to order a formal wedding dress). So we went with the more formal approach and after showing Tim the reception dress and telling him this was my original idea for the wedding dress, he likes the more formal route we are going. I enjoy it too because I do love my dress (though man it’s gonna be hot, hence the second dress) but by opting to go the more formal route it has added more girlie things to the list. Had I gone with the sundress option there would be no fittings and alterations and no hair trials as I would have had my sister do my hair but now with the more formal feel, I think it would look better overall to have a more formal hairstyle. I wouldn’t have to be as dressy and girlie. But for as much as I’ve kicked and screamed in the past about dressing up, once I do, I actually enjoy it. I just have to remember it’s worth all the work and it won’t be as horrible or torturous as I imagine.

I don’t, however, think I’ll be bouncing with excitement and gushing on the boards about my fittings and hair trials . . . .

Turning Ideas into Reality

For the past few weeks/months we’ve been coming up with ideas of things we’d like to do for the wedding but they have always been just ideas or suggestions, nothing concrete until now. We’ve stopped saying oh wouldn’t it be nice to do x,y,z for the wedding and have moved onto the okay let’s do this and now let’s go get the stuff we need to make/do to get it done. It started with the wine charms and programs and has moved on to a variety of other projects and we are starting to actually mark things off our list rather than continuing to add to them.

The wine charms were a fun project this past weekend. Tim and I worked together to bead them and Tim designed and printed out the name label part (he’s so great with the computer). I’m thankful again for the small size of our wedding. While it was a lot of fun making them, I couldn't imagine it staying fun if we were to create 80 or 150 of them. We then ordered the wine glasses to go with them. Creating the design was a bit trickier than we thought and we are still waiting for the proof just so we can be sure they are correct before being made. It’s funny it was cheaper to order 36 of them rather than the 28-30 we needed, so we’ll definitely have a few extra.

We also started to look into the exact price and process of ordering a box for the Time Capsule for the ceremony. Again it was another moment of price shock. It wasn’t that the price was unreasonable (it’s handmade and personalized) but still we both were like that much for a box? We’ll end up getting it because it’s something that we’ll have for a very long time and it’s very nice, it’s just sometimes hard to get over the spending money part. The knee jerk reaction is to run but then you have to reason it out. We aren’t letting the once in a lifetime/big day excuse influence us into extravagant purchases in many areas of the wedding especially for things that will only be used on that one day but for this I think it’s acceptable to go for the super nice thing as it will be a keepsake.

I’ve also begun to realize there are a lot of little things that I sort of overlooked, the most recent one being that I should probably factor the photographer into lunch plans. I really need to start a physical list of not just the big picture things but the small details as well. I always rattle all these things we need to do when we are out shopping or out to dinner but once I get home I never remember to write them down or think it’s important to write them down. I have a feeling another Panera trip might be called for this weekend so that we can revise the ceremony script and start hashing out the details and getting them into a list. I just can’t focus at home and put things off but if I’m out with nothing else to do, it’s a lot easier.

Lastly is the dress. Now that both the sash and dress are here, I’ve really needed to make an alterations appointment for my first fitting. It’s just that I’m really nervous about it. While there is no reason to think it won’t fit, I’m still scared. But I bite the bullet and made the appointment for May 5th.

3 months from today we’ll be getting hitched :)

We have reached 100 days and counting

Today marks 100 days until the big day and things are still going really smoothly. Last weekend Erica and Ross drove out to the Penn Yan area to meet with some florists. One was a florist shop in near by Geneva (that we learned later Tim's father had worked for way back in the day) and the other was shop in Penn Yan. They came up with lots of great ideas but luckily while their ideas based on what I like were similar, they were different enough to be able to pick between the two florists. The bouquets had changed a bit from what was discussed in Buffalo but I love the ideas and the simplicity as I think it will go well with our casual wedding. The bouquet will be made up of bright yellow and pink gerber daisies with a very simple wrap, but it will be jazzed up a bit with the inclusion of two rhinestone butterflies (I love the sparkle!). The Penn Yan florist showed Erica a bright rainbow colored rose that she thought I might like from my description of wanting bright colors and loving a rainbow feel.

While I loved the flower, I just thought a whole bouquet of it would be way too busy and since Tim thought it was neat and unique, we decided to have his boutonniere be made from the rose. So I'm really excited that this last vender has been picked and things are moving along on that front.

We also have settled on our favors and have started moving along on that topic. We were toying around with the idea wine glasses and finally decided to go with that along with personalized wine charms so that everyone could (if they wanted to) use their glasses that night and not get confused plus they could serve as a sort of name tag/place card (though we aren't having assigned seating). Another bonus was that it's a DIY project I could do here :) So we spent an afternoon trying to find all the pieces we'd need to make them. We had seen some tag charms on Oriental Trading (sort of prompted the idea) but we were worried about the quality. But after trying a few different shops (even specialized bead/jewelry making stores) we couldn't find anything that would allow us to personalize a charm. We did, however, find some nice beads to go along with the charms. So we ended up ordering the charms from OT and they just came today. They are actually a lot nicer than I thought, so this weekend will be spent making wine charms!

On another DIY topic, we bought the supplies for and begun designing our programs. The sample one has turned our really nicely we just need to finalize the wording and add a bit more color and we can print those out. Sadly they can't be assembled until they get to Rochester for ease of transport. It's just nice being able to finalize ideas we've been tossing around.

Finally the last development of the past two weeks is that we've nailed down a location and day for the NJ party. It will be at a nice local golf course near my parent's house on 9/10/11 at 12. I find that date rather fun though I would have preferred the following weekend since it's right after Labor Day and we'll be flying on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 but at least security should be really good that day . . .

I think that's it for now but totally expect pictures of the charms as we'll want to show off our crafting skills :)

All's Quiet on the Western Front(?)

I feel as if I should update, as it has been a long time since I've said anything...  I'm unsure of a concrete topic, however.

I feel like we've got everything pretty much under control.  The big stuff is all nailed down, as you know, and we've got good ideas/head starts on the little stuff that is too last-minute to really work on yet.  We're still actively saving up money, and we've even put aside a chunk of cash for those 'day of' expenses like paying off the remaining balances for various vendors and such so we're not caught off guard and broke.

Larissa is pretty heavily entrenched in the message boards on The Knot, we've got lots of friends & family members who have gotten married previous to us, and we've both got a pretty good head on our shoulders.  What I'm getting at is that I feel like we've really got a good handle on stuff.  I'm hoping this will keep the stress at a minimum as the day continues to grow nearer, and we're not blindsided by some big terrible problem last minute.

Our wedding will be small and intimate enough that its not completely overwhelming to plan, while still leaving us the opportunity to have fun with it and do some pretty cool things.  I'm not going to give anything away now, but there should be some nice unique surprises for our guests come July 23.  It's too bad Larissa won't be flying in to Rochester until 2 days before the ceremony... I can tell she really wishes she could do a lot of the last minute detail stuff.  She'll have to trust it to me & Erica.

So in just under 4 months we'll be Mr. & Mrs. Krayer.  Sometimes it's hard to wrap my head around it, but mostly I'm just super-excited and can't wait for it to get here.  I'm glad we did not decide on 2012; I don't think I could handle the waiting...

That's one big field!

I knew it would happen eventually but I didn't expect it to happen this soon. Today my finger felt empty and I looked down to discover my engagement ring was missing. The worst part, I made this discover while standing in a rather large field after having spent the past 30 minutes walking all over it playing fetch with Daphne. I freak out because not only have I lost it but I might have lost it in this giant field full of hundreds of dogs and there is no way we would find it there. Tim is trying to reassure me that it's not the end of the world and perhaps I took it off or lost it not at the dog park. I mean it's not something that will easily fall off now that the weather is warmer and my hands aren't freezing (and therefore smaller) all the time. I had been reaching into my pockets a lot to get the folding dog bowl so I thought perhaps that's when I lost it. But then Tim makes a good point that it would have then fallen into my pocket and sadly it's not in any of them.

I begin to make us attempt to retrace our steps not wanting to admit it was gone. But then I start to retrace my steps mentally before we got to the dog park. I know I had it on when we were at home during our quick stop between dropping off groceries and picking up Daphne. I vaguely remember me thinking I should take it off because I was doing something or putting something on that I thought it best not to have it on (like I normally take it off when I put on hand lotion because I don't want that to gunk it up or dull it). But I couldn't remember what that was and therefore wasn't sure I actually took it off at home.

So we are wandering around this field and I'm scanning the ground everywhere while at the same time trying to remember everything we did between arriving home and heading out to the dog park and also trying not to cry and panic. I know it's not the end of the world and I wouldn't be the first person this has happened to but I felt so horrible about it. Then it dawned on me what it was that I did that had me take my ring off, suntan lotion! Before heading to the park I sprayed on suntan lotion (trying desperately to not have a farmers tan for the wedding) and figured that probably wasn't the best for my ring. And with the dog being so excited to go to the park and practically dancing in front of me to go, I must have forgotten to put it back on. So there was a very very good chance it was at home and even if it was at the park, I knew we wouldn't find it. So we gave up the park search and sped home. Thank heavens it was right where I thought it would be once I realized that I had indeed had a reason to take it off.

But that was definitely a scare and not something I want to have happen again. If only there was some way to safely glue it to my finger!