We've Been Bad

Bad bloggers that is, as it has been a while since we have updated. I'm now taking on the mission to make us better bloggers both on here and on ADK Wanderings. It is especially bad that we haven't been blogging since a lot has been going on in the wedding planning. In our last update we mentioned all of the vendors that we had booked already and today we booked another.

The vendor that we booked today is our DJ. His name is Nick Stylker and he comes very highly recommended by the Inn. After talking to him for an hour I know that we are making the correct choice by going with him. I also nailed down who will be playing our ceremony music. We are going with an acoustic guitarist named David Roth. I booked him through Nick and he will also play at the cocktail hour. The only vendor we still need to book is not really a vendor and probably the most important one; We STILL NEED SOMEONE TO PERFORM THE CEREMONY. The Inn listed someone on their recommendation list and Jessica is supposed to be calling her soon. In order to make the process of planning the wedding easier we have split up who is dealing with which vendor. The JP was originally on my list but I have pushed it off to Jessica's. We also need to make sure we get one before we go to the Inn in January. We are going to meet with some of the vendors and plan out the timing of the day with Amie. She said that the timing usually depends on when the JP is available.

In news other than vendors, I bought my wedding dress last week. Of course there will be no pictures of it because Jessica is way to nosy to not look. I will tell you however that I ended up going with a dress from a local shop in Latham, Juliet's Bridal. This Italian women took care of us and I felt like I was in the movie Moon Struck. She just ordered my mother and I around and didn't need to ask my size. She kept tell us that she had been doing her job for 22 years. Also the woman who owns the shop is the one who will do my alterations and this makes me very happy. I'm really glad that I could get it at a local shop as opposed to David's Bridal. Jessica has also selected her dress and she should be off to order it after Thanksgiving. She was originally putting it off until after her last test but now she is just so busy at work. I told her that I will not let it go past Christmas in fear that she won't get it in time. She is ordering her dress from David's but we are looking into getting it altered by a local woman. Someone at work recommended a friend of her's to us who does wedding dresses all the time.

Also a few weeks ago we went and registered at Bed Bath & Beyond. I wanted to be able to post pictures of that experience because it was tons of fun but both times we forgot the camera. Jessica let me play with the scanner the whole time and she got to be list girl. It was awesome and we have been back a few times because I keep changing my mind on which pots I want. I have finally decided and for now I'm satisfied with what we registered for there. We are also going to register at Sears. We were going to do Home Depot but you have to do everything by hand there and we can't do Target because of their donations to the groups who supported Prop 8. So Bed Bath & Beyond and Sears it will be.

I guess that's it for now and we promise to be better bloggers in the future.

It's been awhile

It has been awhile since we have updated here recently but we have been up to many things. For most of September the wedding took a back seat to classes starting and work. We did manage to book a photographer/ videographer. They are a husband and wife team that we actually witnessed in action the day we checked out the Inn. Here's the website http://www.jaycavallaro.com/ .


Also in September Jessica took a trip to Oklahoma and tried on dresses. She has narrowed it down to a few but there will be no pictures since we are both authors here. Last weekend I went shopping with my mom and I have possible also found the dress. Mom wants me to try on a few more dresses so I'm going to go home and to do so in November. After her visit we have been a little more wedding focused lately. I spent my day off on Monday contacting different vendors that were on the Inn's recommendation list. From this productivity we have decided on a baker for our cake (www.irenemaston.com) and a florist (www.nancysvermontflowers). We are also getting close to deciding on a DJ and the person to perform our ceremony music. All in all this week has been very productive and we are starting to feel as if our to- do list is getting shorter... I'll also be sure to up date soon on our unsuccessful trip to IKEA for our center pieces.

More photos of the wedding venue

I found some more photos from our wedding venue & wanted to share. Enjoy =)

Honeymoon Hotel is booked!

Although is this was NOT on the list Stephanie referred to last post, we have booked the Hotel for our HONEYMOON!! Yayeeee! We'll be staying at the Eden Hotel at Rembrandt Square in Amsterdam! Check it out their website below if you're curious.

http://www.edenrembrandtsquarehotel.com/en/overview.aspx

SAVE THE DATES ARE IN THE MAIL

The Save the Dates are finally in the mail and we could not be more excited about that :) There has been lots of stress and lots of fun around Goccoing our own STDs. Hopefully we have learned lots of valuable lessons and the invitations and everything else that we are doing for the wedding will go better. We will definitely post pictures after all you lucky people who are getting one receive them. We want the surprise of their beauty to come when they arrive in your mailboxes and not when you view them online.

In other wedding news we still have a lot to do on our August to do list and guess what... August is almost over. This list still includes ensuring our engagement rings, getting a JP or at least looking into it, Photographer, music, and flowers... yes we have been slacking. In fact we haven't crossed anything off the list this month. Instead we have been enjoying our 3 weeks of free time together without grad school and studying for the CPA exam. We are hoping to at least have some names on a list by then end of the month. The wedding coordinator at the inn has been swamped with the 2010 wedding season. Hopefully we will get some direction from her after the season is over. We knew there would be lots of work involved with planning the wedding but it might be overwhelming us a little right now.

Engagement Photos

Last Saturday (July 31st) Jessica and I sat for our engagement photos. We had the fabulous Bess take them with the help of Sherri and Donna. The whole day was super fun and we took photos on our roof (where I proposed), Village Gate and on University Ave here in Rochester. We took about 560 photos and walked away with a ton of great ones. I'll post some below but all those lucky folks who are getting a STD will be getting one.

These first few were all taken at Village Gate




This is one of our favorites from the traditional shots










































































































































These were taken on University Ave










































We have also finished the STDs and will be sending them out as soon as our envelopes arrive. They have been ordered but we ordered them from a little company in Kansas City and they did not give us a tracking number. We also have a nice list of things that we need to get done this month. Our list includes finding a photographer, DJ, ceremony music and a JP. Hopefully we will be able to get it all done and things will continue to go smoothly.

365 Days Away

Today marks a year until the wedding and we are already behind on our to do list. We were hoping to have our save the dates out by today but they aren't quite ready yet. We are in the process of completing them now and hopefully they will go out next week. Since we are Goccoing them ourselves, the process has had some snags. We believe that we have fixed the snags and we just need to finish printing a part of the STDs and the accommodation cards and we will be done.
Along with needing to finish Goccoing, we also have been waiting to have our engagement pictures taken before we send out the STDs. We have the fabulous Bess Watts taking them tomorrow for us (we finally found free time in everyone's busy schedules.) Jessica and I are celebrating the one year to the wedding mark by going to L.L. Bean tonight, with my sweet discount, to finish putting our outfits together. We are super excited and have been discussing places to go and poses we want all week. We will be sure to post some on here for your enjoyment afterwards.

July 30, 2011

Our date is finally set! WOOO HOO!! We will be wed on July 30, 2011. A quick anecdote on why we picked 07/30/2011: A while back Stephanie and I were looking at Saturdays in July & August of 2011. We were analyzing what date we wanted to get married on & what date we wanted to celebrate for the rest of our lives as our anniversary. It all came down to 7/30 or 08/06. Finally I said "Let's do 7/30 because it'll be easy to remember as it sounds like a time." (I meant something like 7:30pm.) Of course Stephanie called me out on the fact that 8:06 is indeed a time also, but the damage was done!

Other than a date, we've also set a location!! Yesterday we made the short drive to Arlington, VT to once again visit The West Mountain Inn. Website: www.westmountaininn.com We explored the grounds again, but the real treat was getting to see all of the guest rooms & imagining our friends and family filling the beautiful inn. We worked out many of the preliminary details and have a pretty good idea what our "Wedding Weekend" will entail. Here's a quick run-down: Friday rehearsal BBQ dinner, Saturday breakfast at the Inn, Ceremony & Reception on the beautiful grounds of the Inn, Sunday brunch before heading home (or on the Honeymoon!).

Welcome

Welcome to our wedding blog. Jessica and I are super excited to share all the craziness that will come with planning a classic, intimate lesbian wedding in Vermont. We do not have a lot to share right now but this Saturday we will be looking at three venues and we will be sure to update with pictures, and our thoughts and perceptions. Once we pick a venue I'm sure the ball will start rolling on all things wedding.