We Have News

It's here!

2005-12-17T07:17:00.000-08:00

Matt here. Today's the wedding day. Hope to see everyone there! No time for wit, too much to do...

Bells will ring, the sun will shine....

2005-06-23T06:54:00.000-07:00

So I know I've neglected this poor pitiful blog, but alas, I have an update!

We finally settled a place for the wedding and secured it. The reception is still in question. Word to the wise: if you are getting married in December, EXPECT all pretty places to be booked solid a year ahead of time.

I booked my photographer, videographer, and band. I got some KILLER deals on stuff because I know people who do these things for a living. I'm very excited about the photographer in particular because he is the one who used to take all the family pictures when I was a kid and he has a great eye for detail. Thanks to Laura, who had him do her wedding, for re-introducing me to him. Otherwise I wouldn't have thought about it. I also stole him (via credit card deposit) from another would-be suitor for the day. Yay. :)

I guess the next logical step would be to figure out invitations and order dresses (since they may be out of season after July). Man, I'm really blessed. I was working up my budget and altogether the costs on things are like maybe 1/5 of what the average American wedding costs; all the time, things are remaining tasteful. This makes me a very happy woman.

I need to take a second to say some sweet things about some people here.

1. My mom: this woman is a great planner and decorator. She is constantly amazing me with her ideas.

2. My dad: who is like the father of the bride, stands there billfold open, watching his daughter slipping away. Oddly, he's not upset about it. I'm trying to remember to love on him some. It's not easy for him, but he's being a trooper.

3. My sister: gave up on wearing the dress of her choice for my preference, and then in the end, the one she liked looks better. Thought we would duke it out over that scenario, but she conceded like a good maid of honor. I'm kinda glad in the end she got her way.

4. Matt: he is wonderful. He likes the fact that I'm giving him a say instead of controlling everything. His taste is good (of course, look who he's marrying!). He is also, like me, more concerned with BEING married than getting married. I think we would elope if we could get away with it, but for now, we do thing that makes the most sense. In fact, a lot of the time, the only thing about my life that makes much sense is Matt. So I'm glad to be marrying him. :)

endless sea of white...

2005-04-26T14:49:00.000-07:00

she enters the door and is greeted by a tall and lovely woman with an accent who leads her to her guide. her guide sits her down, asks her about her background, asks her what precisely she is hoping to gain from her experience today and walks her to the floor. standing in the middle of the floor the guide points at them. they hover inches above the floor, a slight sheen on them from the gentle overhead lighting gives them a ghost like appearance on the suspended rails that hold them in place. once they have fully entered the realm of whiteness, the visitor turns around to see that she is fully engulfed in a sea of silk, satin, taffeta, lace, beading and designer labels. her mouth open, she looks to her far right, and there she sees it. without even touching or fitting it she knows that this is the one.

that's right. i got my wedding dress. it was the first i put on. all the others made me feel like a snow beast. :) this one is perfect.

and i look hot in it.

my dad has been complaining saying he's like steve martin in father of the bride (or spencer tracy if you saw the original). so we invited him to come with us to see my gown, he was there fifteen minutes (after i had found the one i wanted prior to his arrival) and was like "well this has been fun, girls, but i'm out of here." so much for sentamentality. :)

also i picked out the bridesmaids dresses and what they'll be carrying, etc. things will be uniquely classy. like me. :)

matt mostly just let's me run things by him and says "ok, i'm for it" if he likes it or just kinda winces if he doesn't. i like to suggest things like "honey, let's have an elvis impersonator. dr. brady would TOTALLY do it." just to see how he'll react.

i actually haven't run that one by him.

actually, that sounds kinda cool...

anyhow, yeah, we've pretty much got the location and date set. it's going to be at mt. gap church on dec 17 as far as i know now. it's cool too, b/c they're building their new building and will be in it by september which means that we can invite more people. now we're still not wealthy enough to invite the entirity of the us population, but it means that we can have our friends and family all there comfortably. that's really cool.

um, that's about it for now. i have tons more planned already, but the narrative about buying votive candles isn't nearly as entertaining as the dress one was. :)

Addendum

2005-04-15T10:21:00.000-07:00

yes, i got home from my georgia whirlwind trip at around 2:30 this morning. i'm on lunch from work now. SOOOOOO tired, but managing.

anyhow, some wedding news:

the place where we are having it is small. like 100 people small. so, like iris did earlier, i figured i'd go ahead and just let that be out in the open. we're doing what we can to include everyone, but it's difficult with large families and whatnot.

so if anyone has any suggestions or ideas for ways that we could include everyone, feel free to let me in. :)

december 17, pending the ability to use the church on that day, looks like the day. i picked out my dress and those of my attendants, and many of the decorations. i'm ahead of the game, b/c i am using my mom's help while i'm still down here. i'll be moving up to ga again this summer.

so yeah, that's what's going on. :)

like i said, feel free to share suggestions and stuff. just don't throw fiery bags of poo at me or anything for having a small (and affordable) shindig. :) y'do what ya can, y'know?

2005-04-14T15:34:00.000-07:00

a message from matt

alright, we haven't been terribly regular about the updates thus far. we'll try to do better.

so there's been a lot going on recently. jennifer got a job (check out her blog for the details). i'm searching out any leads i can find in my own job hunt. we've been discussing various details of the wedding (which i'll leave any of those details that jennifer wants to unveil up to her).

the date we're looking at is december 17. i'd say it's fairly set, but, eh, who knows with these things. i'm free next weekend. [DISCLAIMER: THAT WAS A JOKE. I'M NOT GETTING MARRIED NEXT WEEKEND. UNLESS JENNIFER WANTS TO. OOPS...]

i bought jennifer's wedding band last weekend. it's pretty and diamond-y.

last night, jennifer and her mom drove up from tampa so she could attend an orientation thingy for her school district. so not only did i get to spend time with jennifer (yippee!), but our moms were able to meet for the first time. they really hit it off, i believe.

and finally, here's a really blurry picture of jennifer's engagement ring. it doesn't really give you any idea of what it actually looks like, but it's a picture, so there you have it.

Update...

2005-03-28T16:22:00.000-08:00

so that this blog won't die, i'll start keeping folks posted on the wedding planning/scheduling and what not. :)

it's looking like some of the best times for the wedding will either be the weekend before thanksgiving or the weekend before christmas. we're talking about keeping it super small and intimate, and maybe having a shower for the vast majority of people post-wedding a couple of weeks. and by we're talking, i mean i mentioned it and matt said "that could work. " :)

plus there's the whole florida/dad and mom's church side of things. so that'll definitely need a post wedding party of some sort in tampa.

so yeah, i've started gathering info and ideas, and i want to do as much as possible while i'm here, so i'll be mostly done by the time i move away from the endless source of ideas and knowledge that is my mom.

anyway, that's kind of what's going to be happening for now, and uh, sorry this is so boring... a little of a disappointment after those few initial posts. oh well, at least the girls might be into all this stuff. :)

[matt's edit] boring? not on my watch! here's a picture of a monkey with a telephone to liven things up--

how it happened...

2005-03-21T15:53:00.000-08:00

so lots of chicks get to have these breathtaking stories of being whisked away to new york, or having this big ornate planned day of "perfection," but it's very few girls who can honestly say that they got the proposal they'd always dreamed about.

well we were out at st. pete beach walking around downtown looking in stores neither of us can afford. we weren't dressed up. we didn't have any plans at all. we had to ask some locals to point us to the beach.

in our search for the beach, we found this cute park where i suggested just sitting for a while. it was a chilly night and we just kind of snuggled up and sat on a bench there. it was pretty. there was no one around. and we just started talking. i knew matt wanted to ask me all week, but the ring was in georgia. so i just kind of let him know that he didn't have to have it to propose. and among a lot of sweet details that i'll keep between us, because it will probably nauseate you all from it's utter gooey sappiness, he asked me to marry him. and it was perfect.

i didn't want a big planned "event" because getting engaged isn't all about me. i didn't want matt all stressed out from making plans and running all over creation. i wanted him to enjoy it too. and he did. :)

just like how our relationship started, it just kind of happened. and it felt right.

it was sweet. doesn't sound like much from the outside, but trust me, it was perfect. :)

2005-03-21T15:16:00.000-08:00

some pictures for our adoring public

hello all. this is matt. i'm leaving the words side of things to jennifer right now, but here are some pictures...

the park where i proposed

the newly engaged couple

jennifer in the park

at downtown disney earlier in the week

dang, i'm smooth

some news...

2005-03-20T18:54:00.000-08:00

we're engaged. :)