"B" Is For Better (1 of 2)

The Wedding-Venue-Hunt or WVH for short can be one of the hardest parts of planning. For many brides there are SO many options they become overwhelmed with pros and cons of all of them. Luck for me, I am not one of those brides. Both Mr. Aardvark and I are Catholic. That did a lot of venue limiting for us. We knew we wanted the ceremony in a church. However, being relatively new to Wisconsin, and having family and friends all over God's green earth, we were not sure which city or even which state would be the best place for us to tie the knot.

After a little bit of discussion we decided that my home state of Michigan would be best. If you are not familiar with the shape of this lovely state it looks like this:

(image via google maps)

As you can see there are lots of lakes around it, and that's great! It's so great in fact, they decided to call them "Great Lakes"! Now it just so happens that one of my many parents grew up in a small town on the shores of one of these lakes, and we as a family spend lots of time there in the summer. I will not be disclosing the name of the town, or even the lake, due to the fact that the town is small, and this story is a bit unpleasant. Anyway, we spent lots of time in this little town, attended their Catholic church on weekends, and really thought it may be a nice spot for our wedding, for the following reasons:

1) At the time the priest was the only one I knew in any of my childhood parishes
2) The location would be fairly central for all of our guests
3) The church was quaint and small
4) Our cottage was within walking distance of the church
5) There was a really nice American Legion just a few blocks from the church

That pretty much sums it up. Note, there is nothing in there about cliffs, beaches, outdoor weddings or the pier. (We already had April in mind at this point. Michigan+April ≠"Beachy")

 I called up the parish office a few days after getting engaged and asked about availability. I was told they are very selective about who the let get married at their parish due to its beautiful location and high demand for weddings. Fair enough.

I thought, "Well, we're Catholic, my family attends this church on a pretty regular basis, they are friends with the priest, and one of my parents is an alumni of the perish school, this should not be a problem." I thought wrong. The priest, (who had been nothing but pleasant in the past) would not discuss our potential wedding on the phone. He had to meet us in person. He also informed us that it would be quite impossible to meet on a weekend.

 Ok then. At this point I should have seen the big red flag flying in front of my eyeballs. I should have realized this was not the person or place I wanted for our wedding.

However, in the mania that is wedding planning my brain had one thought process, "MUST BOOK VENUE!!!MUSTBOOKMUST BOOK BBOOOKKKKK VENUE!!!" or something like that. So Mr. Aardvark and I both took time off of work to make the 5+ hour drive to meet with this priest. Our appointment was in the morning and I had dreams of scoping out reception venues (by that I just mean stalking the American Legion) nearby, calling caterers, and finally asking my lovely ladies to be bridesmaids. (I wanted to have a firm date before I asked, is that weird?) the rest of the weekend would be wedding planning bliss!

Well, we pulled into the parking lot at approximately 9:47am EST. I will not get into the details, but by 9:58 we were on our way back to my parent's house! That's right the meeting that could not happen on the phone, or on a weekend, had taken about seven (7) minutes. What went on in that seven minutes? I will tell you. We were asked to write a letter. Yup! A letter. A letter explaining why we feel we deserve to be married there. Clearly, this would be an impossible request to make over the phone!! If you cannot tell, I.was.livid. For the first time in our month long engagement I cried.

Angry tears. By yours truly

I knew at that point that I did not want to get married there. As fate would have it there was another, better opportunity right around the corner. The weekend ended up being a nice chance to see my family and celebrate our new engagement.


Epilogue:
I did write the letter. I even refrained from using massive amounts of profanity. It was sappy and flowery and everything I could imagine a curmudgeonly old priest would want to hear. A month and a half later, I got a call from the priest saying he was "leaning towards" letting us get married at his church, and that we would need to come in and meet with him again (on a weekday of course!).

I was polite. I thanked him for his time and told him that we had already made other arrangements.

 It was on to "plan B." (B is for better!)

Did any of your wedding plans not work out the way you originally imagined? Did they turn out for the better?

Pretty Maids All in a Row: How I Asked

As I explained in an earlier post, my ladies are spread out all over the mid-west. Sadly, this made asking them all in person nearly impossible.* I wanted to do something more than just a phone call. However, I am not very patient, and did not want to wait for them to get something in the mail. The solution was easy: I would make cards and call them. The best of both world right? Right!

 I went about collecting pictures of myself with each of the bridesmaids. I also tore out the most obnoxious pictures I could find in bridal magazines. I do not have any pictures of this process because I was not blogging at the time. So sorry.

I then cut out my own, and the bridesmaid's, faces and affixed them to the overly foofy bridal magazine bodies. (As a side note, if you are into foofy dresses more power to you! They look like a lot of fun to wear!) I then stuck these wedding-ed-up versions of my friends and me to a card, wrote a nice note, wrapped the whole thing in silver rick-rack I had laying around, stuffed 'em in an envelope and popped them in the mail. Easy. Peasy. Would you like to see?

 Bridesmaid OT was

kind enough to send me a picture.

Of course before doing all of this I called each one and asked over the phone. It was not overly classy, or sophisticated, but it was fun/sweet/simple. Perfect for my girls and me!

How did you ask your bridesmaids?

*I was able to ask BM Sis and BM OT in person.

Alternative

There are so many parts and details to any given wedding, it must be assumed that some are totally superfluous. For me, one detail I really don't care about are flowers. I think flower are lovely. I am getting married right after Easter, and the church will be full of them. However, I just cannot justify them as a major budget item. I have plans for flowerless centerpieces (more on that later) and am currently working through flower alternatives for the wedding party.

For the groom, his men, and our fathers, I have found this lovely how-to thanks to Ms. Ferris Wheel and intend to make my own version of these boutonnieres for the big day. They can be made in advance, won't cost an arm and a leg, and should stand up to a full day of hugs and dancing without looking smooshed or wilty.




Picture thanks to Ms. Ferris Wheel

 Now, for the bridesmaids, I cannot make up my mind. There are SO many options out there!

There are paper bouquets, like these from and greenweddingshoes.




Photo and how-to by greenweddingshoes.com



I really like these, but why if you are going to carry flowers why not live ones? That will live on.... Like these!

Photo by Troy Grover from greenweddignshoes.com

Why even mess with flowers at all when there are great options like these:

Photo from Offbeatbride.com (shop)

CANDLES!



Photo via Sheila Hallatt

 HANDBAGS!

Photo from weddingbee.com

PARASOLS!



Photo by Mighty 5146 from Offbeatbride.com

 FANS!

Clearly there are lots of options. Clearly, I need to do some narrowing down. I asked MOH MD if she had any suggestions for flower alternatives for the bridesmaids. After giving me a funny look she suggested this:

(Photo via Chicagoist.com)

HA! She is soooo funny. Maybe the bag-o-wine is not such a bad idea!

Are you using bouquet alternatives? Which ones?

Pretty Maids All in a Row: 5 Girls in 5 States

Over the Labor Day weekend, I took a trip with my mom and Mr. Aardvark down to Ohio to visit my grandpa. We also got to catch up with Mr. Aardvark's parents and MOH MD. It was a very nice family filled weekend with lots of chit chat, catching up, and just a splash of wedding talk. It was the first time I had been able to meet with MOH MD since becoming engaged, and though it was only a few hours, it was so nice to have some time with a member of the wedding party. As we were heading home, across four states, it got me thinking about my side of the wedding party. You see, as the title implies, I have five bridesmaids in five different states. That's right, MOH MD is in Ohio, Flossy is in Nebraska, Red is in Minnesota, Sis is in Michigan, and OT is now here, in Wisconsin. That's a pretty big spread!

So far it has not really caused any issues. Everyone is pretty computer savvy and e-mail has been a life saver. Not all of the girls knew each other when we started, so I made a private facebook group to facilitate stalking, or at least putting faces with names. That also seems to be working well. They are all such fantastic ladies I can't wait to have them all in one place at one time!

Speaking of one place at one time, there has been some talk of a group-dress-shop-weekend in Chicago in the fall.  This would be the best case scenario. All of us are very busy, but we should know in the next week or so whether or not our schedule stars will align to make this possible.(Keep your fingers crossed!)

If that falls through I think we may divide and concur and have a "West of the Mississippi River" and "East of the Mississippi River" groups and shop that way. If that also proves impossible (hey, we are some busy ladies!) We will do a virtual group shop, in which, everyone would go to her local store with a list of "contender" dresses. Take pictures, send pictures and comments, vote. For obvious reasons, the biggest one being I would not get to hang out with my ladies, this would be less than ideal.

 Earlier in the planning process I isolated the dress styles pretty quickly and sent the following image out to my girls. There has been lots of talk and agreement and three of these styles are favorites, but we will have to try them on to know for sure!

Photos from Dessy.com and Bari Jay.com


At first, I was pretty amazed at how easily women with different body types who had never met each other could come to agreement so quickly. Then, thinking about my ladies as a group I realized that despite their geographic differences they all have some pretty big things in common. 1) They are all amazing women 2) They are all very smart, 3) They are all pretty easy going about things like dresses, and 4) they all the kind of friend that you can, not talk to for a very long time and then, pick up as if you have never missed a day together. This last point is critical for maintaining long distance friendships, not to mention distance wedding planning!

All in all, I could not ask for a better group of women to support and celebrate with me during this exciting time. I am so blessed to have so many fantastic friends and we are not going to let something as little as a couple hundred miles or state lines stop us from having a great time!

Did you have any (or all) long distance bridesmaids? How did they shop for dresses? How did you all stay in touch?

The W.I.C. and How to Avoid It.

Perhaps I should answer the question, "What is the W.I.C.?" before I launch into an explanation of how and why it should/can be avoided.

The W.I.C. refers to the Wedding Industrial Complex. I am almost positive I did not come up with this term on my own, but I cannot for the life of me remember where I heard it first. I apologize. The W.I.C. has gotten bigger and badder in the last 20-ish years and I blame the media! (why not it seems like everyone else does...) The W.I.C. is a monster that brides are bombarded with daily from the time  they become engaged until they come back from the honeymoon. It creates a HUGE focus on a wedding with hardly any mention of a marriage! It can be is so easy to get sucked into and so hard to climb out of. It encourages a sense of entitlement and need for things and services that are totally superfluous (I love that word) to the marriage itself.




Original Illustration of W.I.C. Monster. By yours truly

 Now, don't get me wrong, I am not saying that a wedding is not a beautiful thing that should be enjoyed and celebrated. I am not saying that you shouldn't buy pretty things or hire professionals to help. I am not saying that you should not splurge on pretties for the special occasion. I am saying that you should be aware of what you want and what you like and not let the magazines and trade shows and blogs (even this one) tell you what you need.

In the beginning of the wedding planning journey Mr. Aardvark and I had a fairly easy time avoiding the W.I.C. We had a pretty small budget, so, many of the things that can pull you in were out of our sight line. Then, The Parents jumped in with their amazing and generous financial contributions and doors started opening left and right. Suddenly things I never considered, I now needed. I was willing to throw a fit over not having something I previously considered over-kill. I was out of control.



This is what I was like... (personal photo)



Lucky for me, Mr. Aardvark is very patient and level headed. He listened to all of my tantrums and asked some simple questions like, "Why do we need that?" Sometimes, I was able to answer. For example we now have a videographer because it was a nice way to capture the vows and reading that pictures could not. .  Sometimes, however I was not able to come up with an answer that made any sense. We do not need a second shooter for photo or video, for example, even if such-and-such an article said it was great, and       so-and-so photography studio highly recommends it (not the studio we picked by the way). There will be tons of people besides our very talented professionals taking pictures all day long. There will be so many priceless moment captured it was truly absurd that I was trying to talk Mr. Aardvark into doubling out photo/ video budget for my whims.

Now I am on the lookout for the W.I.C. I am ready to spot it and stop it in it's tracks. I have learned asking a simple "Why do I want this?" has gone a long way towards A) saving our budget and B) keeping our wedding "us" and not a competition with anyone else who has ever been married or is planning a wedding. (Yeah I can get a bit competitive sometimes...)

How else can the  W.I.C. be spotted? One of the tell tail signs of the W.I.C. is the phrase, "Must Have". I get (lots of) e-mails every day from various wedding vendors with ideas, sales, specials, or promotions , and inevitably at least one of them will have a "must have" list of some kind or other. I'm pretty sure the only things I "must have" in order to be wed are, my fiancé, a priest and a witness (maybe some legal documents if you want to get fancy).

Remember, even if your cousin had it, or that girl you went to high school with, even if it has gotten top ratings in all the bridal magazines, make sure its something you really want as part of your (you being plural for yourself and fiancé) wedding.  And if it is, go for it!

Ok, I will step off my soap box now.

Did you, like me, fall victim to the Wedding Industrial Complex? If not, how have you avoided it?

Planning Pickle

Ladies and gentlemen, I am in a pickle.



(Photo via hot dog halloween costume. net)

To be fair, I am fully responsible for putting myself in said pickle.
When my we came up with the idea of having the reception at the current location, we were very excited about the prospects of a microbrewery as our reception hall. We talked with the owner saying we were expecting between 100-200 people and gave him our budget. Everything was very informal and a few days later my dad let me know that we had gotten the green light. Everything was rolling

Fast forward a couple of weeks, our guest list has ballooned well over 200 (close to 250 with +1s(which had been given to each and every unmarried adult(married coupples wer invited together naturally)) and save the dates have been sent out.

Fast forward a couple more weeks. I am speaking with the my contact at the venue starting to get into details and a detail I was not expecting pops up. They can hold 175 people. Ok, deep breathes.... this is not a crisis. Yet.

I looked at the guest list. While I would never dream about un-viting anyone, or not sending an invite to someone who got a save the date, there are many people who (99.99999% chance) will not be coming due to distance or timing or any number of other reasons. Many of these are also friends of our parents' friends or distant relatives I may have met once as a baby. So I highlighted those. Then to the plus ones. There were lots of single guests who knew lots of other guests... Their plus ones got chopped. It kind of felt like this:

(Photo Via Ketterman Photography)

So far, with the adjustments to my side only, we are down to a MAX of 220. Now I know I am not the best at math but I don't think 220=175. I know Mr. Aardvark has a lot of cousins (who have a lot of kids) that he doesn't think will be able to make it. There are also a few more +1s I could take out.  We will have to take a closer look tonight... Or think about renting a tent for the parking lot.

I do have some guilt about hoping people can't make it. I mean we are inviting them because we want our families and friends near us right!? However, as I stated above, neither Mr. Aardvark nor I are particularly close to many of the people on the "chances are they won't come" portion of the list (that's how they got there to begin with!)

Let this be a lesson to you.  Get a hard number from your venue before you send out save the dates! I am still very very excited about the venue, the food, and the atmosphere is AMAZING! We will work it out somehow, even if it means our reception has to be a block party!

Did you have any missteps in planning? Do you know how you will solve them?

Nightmares

Hive, I know I am not the only one to have wedding nightmares. I have read about them everywhere and even remember my Step-mum telling me about a few she had years and years ago. I have had a few strange dreams about the wedding, don't get me wrong, but until last night I don't think any of them could be called nightmares.

Personal Photo (This is what I felt like upon waking up!)

I could tell you all of the horrific detail, from forgetting to hire a photographer, to no one wanting to come in and dance at the reception (apparently something was going on outside), to having lots of trouble keeping my shoes on, my teeth falling out!....Folks, it was one thing after another. I was so relieved when I woke up to find it all a dream! But I did learn some important things about myself and my wedding fears.

I kept trying to smile though it, thinking, "Oh well, this will be a great story later." or "Well, I'm sure lots of other people will have taken pictures" things like that. Which, I guess is good. Even in my subconscious state I did not break down into a raging wrathful evil bride. 

There were also some good parts. At the very end, right before I woke up all of my roller derby friends showed up! It's true, before the most recent move, I was a derby girl. I have missed them TONS since leaving town and was so happy they made it to my wedding! (even if they were in full derby garb!)



Yours truly. Photo by Papa Razzi  


The moral of the story being, its ok to stress about wedding planning. There is SO much to plan! Just try to keep it all in perspective and remember its about friend's, family, and love more than food, photography or dancing.

Have you had any wedding nightmares? How do you deal with the planning even taking hold of your sleep time?