Showerd

We went home at the beginning of June to take care of a number of things for the wedding. One of those things was my bridal shower. It was thrown by Katie, my sister/maid of honor, and she did a spectacular job! We got a lot of wonderful things and I had a very lovely time. Thank you to everyone that was there and to everyone that could not be there but sent cards, gifts, and recipes.

Stacey and I are playing the great games that my other bridesmaid, Maria, made for the party.

All of the questions had an answer of 'Sarah' or 'Gordon'.

Kate, Marge, and me

Katie made wonderful favors for everyone to take home. They are cupcakes in a jar! Vanilla cake with chocolate icing and spice cake with cream cheese icing, so cute and sooo yummy. They were a huge hit.

Let down.

Way back in November I was surfing Etsy for bridesmaids gifts. I came across a necklace that I loved. It was a lovely engraved locket with a Czech glass flower beads. The seller was having a bogo sale on all of her necklaces so I was hoping I could score a good deal on the gifts. I contacted her about the locket.

This is the original locket. Cute right? I explained to the seller that I was getting married and that I would love to give my girls this necklace as well as wear one myself. I asked her if she could make it in silver and if she could do Kelly green and Navy flowers. A few days later she got back to me and seemed really excited to fill the order. She said that she had to do some looking around to find matching lockets.


She came across these. She wasn't able to get all 4 of them to be the same but we decided to give the girls the smaller matching ones and I would get the larger, slightly different one. I asked if they could be ready by Christmas. I didn't find out till the last minute that they were not ready yet. I was planning a trip home in February and I asked if they could be ready then. She said she would probably be able to do that. Once again, they were not ready. Easter? Nope. She finally emailed me back shortly after Easter with photos of the finished necklaces. The pictures were little thumbnails and I could barely see them. But, from what I could tell they were exactly what I was looking for. I got so excited I emailed her back to find out the price and asked to set up a delivery. I didn't hear back from her. I emailed her again 2 weeks later. I waited another 2 weeks, nothing. And another 2 weeks, not a single response. At this point I have emailed her 4 times with out a response. I know that she has been on her site because she has updated her page, adding new items, posting new sales, etc. It has been almost 2 weeks since my last email.

I asked my friend Kathryn what she thought. I never put down a deposit or paid for the lockets. Kathryn agreed that I should just walk away and find something new. I sent the seller one final email. I explained that I was upset that I was unable to contact her for almost 2 months and that my wedding is about 2 months away. I stressed that I was disappointed I would not be wearing a locket on my wedding day.

Time to move on and find something new. Sorry girls, I really wanted to get you something special and I thought I had found it. I will do my best to make your neckline dazzle.

Tic tock goes the clock

Only 4 more months till we say 'I do'! We have accomplished a lot but there is still so much left to do. When I stop and write everything down it feels a little daunting. Why does it take so much to make a wedding?

The check list:

Venue- Check
Photographer- Check
Wedding Cake- I'm making it! Gordon keeps hinting for a tasting
Bride's Dress-Check (first fitting this week)
Groom's Tux-
Bridesmaids' Dresses- Checkish (they've been found and bought, still need fittings)
Groomsmen's Tuxes
DIY Projects- In the works, my sister and I are working on the little details that will make the day extra special
DJ- Check (I think... this is Gordon's job)
Welcome Bags- this is a process because we want to make them extra fun for our out of town guest that will be visiting Chicago for the first time.
Hotel Blocks- Check (we still need to book our room though)
Engagement Photos- Check, we are going to have them taken while we are home in June.
Guest book
Save the Dates- Check, they were sent out and look awesome
Photo Wall
Invitations- Check (part 1.. I bought them now we have to print and assemble them)
Registry- Check, this was a lot of fun I'm super excited to see what we get for our honeymoon and for our home.
Honeymoon- Check, the tickets were bought yesterday, we are going to London Baby!
Passports
Favors
Menu- Check, this is super secret, we are going to do our tasting in June and I'm so excited
Play list- this is one of Gordon's jobs, we need to choose our songs to walk and dance to plus the overall feel of the whole night's dance party
Decor for the space- this is a bit of a process as well, some will get chosen when we have our tasting and some is being done as diy projects I hope my vision comes true.
Officiant- Check, this was a huge relief when he said yes. Our wonderful friend Dan is going to do us the honor of marrying us.
Transportation
Rehearsal dinner
Open house
Gifts for Bridal Party
Flowers
Wedding Bands
Marriage License
Write our vows

We'll get through the list and it will be an awesome wedding. Because event though all these little things need to get done and I have no idea when I will have time to do most of it, but, at the end of the day Gordon and I will be married. I get butterflies in my tummy each time I say it out loud.

Where my girls at?!

I've always known I wanted to have a smaller bridal party. Just the few closest people to Gordon and I by our sides that would always be by our sides. Things seemed like they were going to work our perfectly because I have 1 sister and 1 brother and Gordon has 1 sister and 1 brother. But then Gordon mentioned that he wanted 2 of his friends to stand up. I'm fine with an uneven bridal party but 2 girls to 4 boys is a bit much. Gordon kept saying, "I cannot believe you don't have any friends that you can ask to be a bridesmaid." Its not that I don't have friends, because I do, but I didn't want to deal with the potential conflict of asking one friend and not another. Gordon said, "I cannot believe you are letting someone's potential feelings on this matter affect your wedding planning. Do what you want, they can get over it." I went back and forth over this for weeks and finally came to a decision after talking to a dear friend that is married that had a similar issue resulting in a very large bridal party. She said, "If you ask one person, then it turns into 'why didn't you ask your step sister?' and then 'what about friend X, you've known her since the 5th grade?' You gotta know who are your stronger friends that will understand your decisions and who are your friends that might be upset about it. If they get upset, that's their problem. Its your wedding do what you want, choose who you want." I thought about it some more and then made the decision. Once I told Gordon who I wanted to be my 3rd bridesmaid he was so happy. He wanted me to choose her.

Then I went on a quest to find a unique way of asking my girls to be 'my girls'. There were some cute cards at the paper store and then I thought I could make cards and put a special little note in it for each of them. Then I stumbled on this. Super cute way to ask, and a handy info sheet. Since I live in Philly and 2 of the girls are in Chicago and 1 is in Austin I figured this was the best way to get them all the info they may need in one handy little place. So I set out looking for envelopes, cards, ribbon, and stamps to put together my own version of Elise's cards.

Here is what I came up with.

I think they came out pretty good. They're a little different than the ones I found on Elise's site but that's what DIY is all about right? Finding something you like and making it your own. I gave them to each of my girls along with their bridesmaids dresses (I found great dresses at a great price... check back for that post). They all said yes!

My girls include:

MOH: my sister Katie

BM: Gordon's sister Stacey

BM: one of my best friends Maria

I love them each so much and I can't wait for them to share our special day with us.