Hi everyone! I hope you had a good week. I’ve been following all the news out of Japan really closely this week. I don’t know why it is, but when something like this happens, I can’t peel myself away from the news. I’m always refreshing the CNN homepage to see the latest developments. I wanted to share a quick story with you all about my experience in Japan.
In Fall 2001, I did the Semester at Sea study abroad program. We departed Vancouver on August 31, 2001 and we were traveling west across the Pacific for 13 days before our scheduled arrival in Japan. So that meant that we spent September 11, 2001, completely unaware of what was going on at home. As we woke up on the ship on September 12, 2001, we learned what had happened by reading faxed printouts of internet news stories. We arrived in Japan the next day, September 13, 2001, just 36 hours after the attacks. While there, people would walk up to us with tears in their eyes. Blood donation trucks with pictures of Ground Zero were in every city we visited, and we waited in line for an hour at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo to lay flowers. Their hearts went out to us, and now mine goes out to them.
So, with all the sad stuff out of the way, on to the weekly roundup!
Links I’m Loving
I too am hiring a day of coordinator and luckily we were able to work out a barter deal. I don’t want to have to think about any wedding details on our wedding day.
I spoke about my doubt regarding “friendors” in last week’s roundup. Well, here are some tips for when NOT to hire Friendors.
Five tips for enjoying your engagement. Love these!
I really, really like all the signs pictured here.
I may buy my wedding dress online, so I enjoyed these tips for buying a dress over the interwebs.
Dude. I’m totally stealing some of these song ideas! This is why I love the internet!
Once again, I’m so glad I’m not having bridesmaids! I don’t have to worry about any of these types of decisions! Although, might I point out that the last photo in that post, the one with the bridal party wearing cardigans, is really cute!
Is this not one of the most adorable, yet simple weddings you’ve ever seen!
Yay, another person who wants to go to Alaska on their honeymoon! Me Too! (Although I love cruises)
I like the tips in this post, makeup advice for your big day. Especially the tip about going to a makeup artist and bringing your own products and they can show you how you can do your own makeup on your wedding day. Brilliant!
I agree wholeheartedly with everything that is said in this post (a rarity) about taking the self-doubt out of DIY
As my fiancé and I design our Save-the-Date cards this month, I’m uber inspired by these creative cards and videos! However, ours will definitely be very “us.”
What do you think it takes to have a wedding in NYC for $10,000?
This is a hilarious idea! Love it!
Hopefully I will not have to use a disc sander for any wedding projects! Yeowza!
My biggest tip for when you first get engaged? Don’t try to do everything all at once. We’ve been put in a situation where we won’t know if our desired wedding date is confirmed until six months before the wedding because it’s at a National Park. For the most part, it’s been a huge blessing because it has allowed us to space out all our major to-do items.
Bridesmaids get garters now? That’s news to me.
I am so curious if I will experience this type of stress in the weeks leading up to our wedding.
My fiance and I just booked our first dance lesson for Tuesday night! (A free trial). I’m nervous. Between the two of us, we have four left feet.
Fascinating list of things you probably didn’t know about UK weddings! No outdoor weddings? Wha!?
How awesome would it be to use these facebook stamps on RSVP cards? Like next to the “Yes I will attend” there can be a “Like” stamp. And next to the “No, regrets” line, there can be a dislike stamp!
When I read posts like these, I’m left a little puzzled. Why do brides stress over other people’s inputs into their weddings? If you’re paying, then you can ignore them. If they’re paying, then giving up some autonomy comes with the territory. Pick your battles folks. Grow a pair, express your opinions firmly, but don’t stress about it.
Wedding Fitness Goal Progress
Weight loss was stalled this week with a gain of 0.2 pounds. Ugh. Hate it.
March Wedding Planning Goal Progress
(as part of our Wedding Planning Timeline)
- Submit application for venue – DONE. Our potential venue has a strict application process because it is part of the National Park Service. We submitted our application on March 1, the date the application period opened, for our desired November wedding date. We should find out in May if our date has been confirmed.
- Design Save-the-dates, test-print – In Progress. Probably about 70% of the way done with design and we’ll order some test prints soon. Although they won’t be complete until after we get our photos from our engagement session, scheduled for early May. So for now, we’ll just test print using a placeholder photo.
- Interview officiants – In Progress. I left a voicemail for the priest from my former church to see if he could officiate a wedding in a non-religious venue.
- Research local restaurants for catering accompaniments – NOT STARTED
- Take some intro dance lessons – In Progress. Going for our first lesson on Tuesday!
- Develop content and design for wedding website – In Progress. Template is installed and I’m customizing it, and I’m developing WAY too much content. But so much fun!
In addition, as I mentioned in last week’s roundup, we scheduled our engagement session, plus I purchased some items for a wedding table design proof-of-concept and started making some table runners. More on that later!
Finances and Administrative
For the first time since I started this blog, this section is changing! I ordered some things to do a proof of concept design for the tables at our wedding.
- Wedding Related Expenses This Week: $161.48
- Total Wedding Related Expenses (all time): $267.98
- Total Budgeted Difference (we have a $15,000 budget): $14,732.02
- Estimated Hours Spent on Wedding Planning (not including blogging) This Week: 15 hours (spent a lot of time working on the wedding website, starting our Save-The-Date designs, online research for decor items, and doing a test run design of a table runner)
