Bridal Bash Event

A couple of weeks ago (now) I decided to check out a small wedding event near the house. I knew it was going to be a small event, and sometimes some of those bridal expo type things can be kind of lame and they vendors can be all up in your face. It was on a late Sunday afternoon (it was a weird time I thought), but I had nothing else to do so I figured why not, you only get to be a bride once, so I might as well enjoy it and do some bride-activities, I do love all the wedding planning stuff!!! 

After barely surviving the ride there through the terrible flooding our town had. I was actually too far into all kinds of detours and it would have been impossible to turn around, I almost didn't think I was going to be able to get through all the road blocks and flooding, it was awful. I couldn't believe how the town got flooded. I did make it to the event, and once I got out our town the roads were fine. 

The event was actually held at a dance studio, a rather large dance studio I might add. It was all local vendors from the town of Nutley. I knew this one hair salon (The Pink Comb Salon) that I had been following was going to be there, but also knew they were out of my price range, but I figured it couldn't hurt to see if they had any specials or even dance lesson specials being offered since it was being held at a dance studio after all. I got some information and even saw some cute purses and then I headed back home. It was a fun little event to kill some time on a Sunday when I had nothing else to do.

Fun Dresses

 

Ok so this one isn't exactly wedding related but it could be. I was just excited that I ordered two cute new dresses from Ann Taylor Loft this weekend both of which I am already planning to take with me on the Honeymoon. The first dress is an adorable black and white strapless dress, a classic Rachel dress. And the second one is this great purple dress that my friend Bridget saw in the store and told me to try on and I absolutely loved it. And the best part is I had coupons and gift cards (from my in-laws)! I can't wait for them to come in the mail, I think I am even going to wear one to The Manor for Easter this Sunday. The hard part is going to be to pick which one I want to give to my Mom to hold for me, for any upcoming special occasions :-)

NY Yankees Bachelor Fun

Mike's bachelor party is officially booked for Saturday, August 21, 2010. His last big night out with the boys before the wedding (well he'll still have almost another 2 months to go, but close enough). They have a full day and night of fun lined up to mark the occasion. They'll be starting their day by seeing Mike's Favorite Team, of course none other than the World Champion New York Yankees take on the Seattle Mariners. There's nothing like a Saturday afternoon baseball game on a beautiful summer day. There's plenty of beer, hotdogs and baseball to keep them going through the afternoon.

But they can't eat too many hotdogs because after the game they'll be headed to NYY Steak, while they're have a gourmet steak dinner with all the steakhouse trimmings. After dinner they'll be picked up in a limo and then head into New York City for the rest of the evening for what I'm sure is a fun filled evening!

Great Friends, Food & Wine

This weekend two of my best friends came all the way from Long Island to visit me, and boy did we have fun! They survived the awful drive on the Cross Bronx Expressway (a personal favorite of mine) and made it Jersey. The night was filled with great food, lots of fun & even more wine. And as Bridget's Husband likes to call us, it was all Mope, Dope, and No Hope, the infamous trio, of adventures.

After being chauffeured by Mike and dropped off, we began our evening at a local Spanish restaurant, Villa Madrid, which also happens to be a BYOB (I love that about NJ). Can you guess why we selected this restaurant? We decided to go with a smorgus board of tapas. We had everything from shrimp with garlic, ham and chicken croquettes, chicken empanadillas, and many other delicious dishes of course accompanied by wine.

After our delicious feast and one big bottle of wine down we walked ourselves across the street (in the cold) to another local favorite of mine, a small wine bar, where you guessed it we enjoyed more wine. And kept ourselves entertained by playing the most arbitrary board game, Apples to Apples. Oh and it gets better, there was also karaoke, after we got our liquid courage warmed up, we were off to sign karaoke, boy do I feel sorry for the other people in the bar, but we had a blast!!! 

I can see us pulling off adventures such as this one till we're little old ladies. Thanks for a great time girls!!!

Toasty Delight

So our newest favorite kitchen gadget to arrive is our Cuisinart sandwich grill. As I told Mike the other day it makes toasty pockets of deliciousness! I never thought I would enjoy a toasty sandwich so much. Mike had told me about how he used to have one and how delicious they were but I never knew. I've already made like three different types of sandwiches, some turkey rubens, ham & cheese melts, and I even attempted a chicken fajita one.... I love getting fun new kitchen gadgets in the mail!

One Year Ago....

It's hard to believe, for me anyway, that a year has gone by already since Mike made the big decision to purchase an engagement ring for me and shortly thereafter ask my parents for their permission. I hope it is with the luck of the Irish, because after much shopping and studying (from what I'm told), Mike bought my engagement ring on St. Patrick's Day 2009. Of course I wouldn't see or know about it for another two months. Mike's Mom took the ring home with her and right to the safety deposit box (which I'm also told she visited several times to make sure it was ok).

Later that week, we were headed home to Long Island for my friend Kristin's wedding and we stayed with my parents for the weekend. It was during that time in between the church and ceremony Mike caught both of my parents and asked them both for permission to marry me, which my Mom thought was very sweet. I think she was caught the most off guard while she was down in the basement getting something from the fridge, and I was sitting just upstairs. I'm glad that he asked them, it meant a lot to me!

Invitations Check

Our most recent vendor to add to our list is invitations. I'm happy to say that Mike and I made a decision on our wedding invitation vendor, and it was relatively painless. As you may recall from previous posts, we had visited a small wedding store and looked through a couple of books, and then my failed attempt to go to another store. I made an appointment to go meet with a different invitation vendor. Much to my surprise as I was literally about to walk out the door Mike said he would like to join me!

After driving through the torrential  rain and traffic we finally arrived at our appointment. It was a husband and wife that own their own small invitation business. We began the process of looking through more books along with the owner this time, not the most exciting process. Most of the invitations we saw were not what we were looking for. We finally found one in the 'moderate' priced books that we would even price out. Needless to say the invitations were quite a bit more than we were certainly expecting to spend. It seemed crazy to us to spend so much money on a piece of paper that most people ultimately through out. So that was not happening. We both decided that was not the vendor for us. 

We were back to my idea of ordering custom invitations online. I had mentioned previously I'd been following Jessica's Blog for quite some time and I loved all of her work. I had requested a sample invitation in the mail and we looked it over again and both decided that was def the best option for us. Not only was it the most affordable we have the ability to customize everything including the design, so we may even get our monogram in there! 

Updated Website

I saw today on my Facebook (since I'm a fan of the Manor's Facebook page) that they have updated their website! The site is completely updated and refreshed including new pictures of the place and even menus and event information. You can see pictures of "our" room - The Imperial Room on there, and it overlooks the front fountain area. Our guests will be able to go out there and weather providing we might even be able to have our own bar out there! Check out the updates on their website here. 

A Girl Loves Shoes

So in my procrastination to do my homework I was surfing the web and I came across a wedding picture and the bride was wearing these beautiful Manolo Blahnik shoes. Now what girl wouldn't love to wear a pair of Manolo's for her wedding day or any day for that matter? But alas the ridiculous price tag of $715 for these shoes is just plain crazy. The Manolo's were very similar to the pair of shoes that I had been admiring for quite some time now, I couldn't even bring myself to stomach the $240 for these shoes even! And then I found it, "Real vs. Steal" a website that shows the expensive Manolo shoes and then gives up substitutes for shoes that look just like them for a MUCH more reasonable price! Provided they're the right color I think they will be just perfect. I am def going to look into purchasing a pair like these especially if I don't see anything else that I like more. The price is def right on these babies!

Limo's Check

Yesterday we had a very accomplishing day. One of the items on our list was checking out a limo place (our first actually). We were headed down to Mike's parents house for the day and there was a limo place nearby I was interested in looking at. The hardest part for us was actually finding the building. After a couple of loops around we were able to find it. I knew they were having a 'March Madness' "sale" and were throwing in some extras if you booked in March.

When we inquired about the vehicles available for our wedding date, we were shocked to learn that they had just ONE SUV limo left in their fleet for 10/23/10! Already taken were 2 Cadalliac Escalades, 1 Hummer, and 1 Navigator. Luckily they still had the Infiniti limo left which I was MORE than happy with! The limo seats 18 people, and we're only 13 so we should have plenty of room. They also do a red carpet champagne toast after the ceremony for the bride & groom -- which I absolutely love and wanted done. And they'll be champagne in the limo as well.

We booked with them on the spot even though we didn't shop around at all. I had done some preliminary looking on the local Knot NJ board and this company did come highly recommended by several past brides on there and their prices are pretty reasonable and they had tons of positive reviews on wedding wire also. It was one vendor I didn't mind that we didn't shop around for. The price seemed pretty good so we just went for it. That's one more item to cross off the list!

Wedding Bling

We also went shopping for wedding rings yesterday. Mike took me back to the place that he bought my engagement ring from. We headed down to the Woodbridge Jewelry Exchange to look at some bling. I have to say the salesman was very helpful and had some good recommendations and I was impressed with the selection. I thought it would be difficult to find something that matched with my ring given the three stones. After trying on a few I found one that I really liked. It had 5 stones across and the thing about it was that it was "low profile" so the setting did not come up as high as the engagement band so it sat nicely up against it. It was also a band that I could wear alone if I didn't want to wear my engagement ring.

Mike also looked at some wedding bands while we were there. He was much less fussy than I was and quite simple to look for. He knew he wanted something that wasn't shiny, no diamonds, very simple. He seemed to like the titanium rings the best and found one that we both liked.

We didn't order or buy anything but at least now we both know what we want when we go back, and best of all we came in 'under budget' on rings :-)

Signing In

I've been trying to think of different ideas or things that I wanted to do for the guest sign in. I thought about doing just a regular shutterfly photo book with pictures from our engagement session that people could sign around but then I've been thinking I'd like something a bit more unique or different. I've tossed around a few ideas.

I thought it might be fun to make a thicker journal type picture sign in book, where I'd actually print out the pictures and mount them on card stock in the book, that is an idea. And I can get the journal cover made up in a different prints or designs on the cover.

Another out there idea I had was to make a tree branch design, by making a manzanita tree and "potting" it and decorating it in a fall style and then I was thinking I could maybe make apples and pumpkin shapes in card stock that could be hung on the tree and then later mounted in something like a photo book I was referencing above. Or I could skip the tree idea and just do the apple/pumpkin shapes and put those out and maybe have people drop them in a pumpkin type dish and I could mount them later on.

I also thought this was pretty unique. It's a tree that comes with leaves that the guests sign and then attach to the tree. I thought it was very fall, and the colors are customizable. The problem with this is I struggle with where to hang/display a 'picture' like this. I don't think it's something I would put out on display. At least in this house anyway, we're kinda limited on wall space.

Again maybe blame it on my attention to little details, that probably don't matter much, or my desire to do some fun crafts, just some ideas I was thinking about. I've got plenty of time to come up with some ideas!