Greetings from Greece!

Just a quick note to say hi from Athens! We leave tomorrow to head to Heraklion, Crete. It's beautiful, hot, and we're taking lots of naps! Hope you're having fun at work - I'll be thinking of you from the beach tomorrow:)

Ciao!

Wedding Recap 1

I'm sure I'm going to have several wedding weekend recaps so here's #1. I had an amazing wedding weekend. We had our closest friends and family with us that made it so incredibly special. Little things went wrong, but only I noticed them, and some of them I didn't find out about until today. But those little things wouldn't have changed just how excited I was. It was an incredibly gorgeous day - no rain, sunny, perfect temperature and breezy. I was remarkably calm (I think!) and once that dress went on, I was ready to go! I couldn't wait to see Ian and his reaction and just be by his side. We danced until 1am when we were forced to end things, then there were several after parties that we skipped and instead opted to head to bed. We stayed up talking just the two of us and slept wonderfully. It was just about perfect:)

Lots more stories, details, and plenty of pictures to come. Now - off to finish packing and then tomorrow we're off to our honeymoon in Greece!

Calm

Everyone keeps telling me that I'm abnormally calm for being 3 days before my wedding. I'm not feeling particularly nervous or stressed out. I think my anal planning issues have paid off. I really just have a few little things to pull together tomorrow and then I need to pack and make sure we have everything together. Here's my updated to-do list:

• write 3 thank you notes
• put fruit in OOT bags
• send out rent check
• prepare last payments
• drop off OOT bags and valet cards to the Westin on Thursday
• download important reception songs
• fax list of must-plays to DJ

We had a very busy day. We woke up and both worked out for an hour then went on a walk with Tessa. It was a beautiful morning and I so enjoyed having the day off of work to breathe.

We then headed out to the mall to pick up the champagne flute (one of the originals had broken), picked me up a new dress for the rehearsal dinner and took it to be altared slightly.

We made a trip to the bank and got all of the tip money out, as well as cashing everyone's checks for hair and makeup.

Erin came by and picked up all of the ceremony and reception materials which was fantastic to get out of our house and not have to remember to bring all of it! Now, I just have to remember the marriage license, the dress, and the groom and I think we'll be just fine:)

Down to the Wire

As I'm sure you've either had experience with, or you can imagine, the week before the wedding is insanely busy! We did manage to accomplish some big projects this weekend while still having a night out with friends and dinner with Ian's family.

• We finished the Out-of-town brochures for the out-of-town bags.
• We finished designing the programs
• Got programs printed at kinkos
• The lovely Ms. Sarah came over last night to help us put the ribbons on the programs. They're all finished now!
• Met with our awesome DJ, Ray from Chris Laich. We went over details and we're good to go
• Finished writing cards to each bridesmaid
• Wrapped my junior bridesmaid and flower girl presents
• Got my hair highlighted
• Sent in my deposit to UMD
• Sent in withdrawal notices to other two law schools
• Picked up our newly engraved wedding bands
• Met with our music coordinator to finalize all music
• My mom picked up my wedding dress yesterday (after much more drama with the bridal store)

Today is my last day at work so I'm super busy trying to finish things up, while really just wishing I could be home or out running last minute errands - anything but here. Mentally, I am just ready for the wedding to be here - or at least to not be at work!

Am I nervous - a little. More excitement I think. But I do wake up with butterflies just getting so excited for everyone to be together, to be able to wear my dress, and have lots of time with Ian to relax and just be together.

We also decided this weekend that we wanted to find a way for our pup to be brought to the Chapel after the ceremony for a couple of pictures. Tessa gets super excited when she sees us so we are worried about her putting a muddy paw on my dress. So, the only way it's going to work is a) if it's completely dry outside b) if the dogwalker brings a towel with her to wipe the paws (even if it is dry out) and c) have the dogwalker bring a white sheet with her to put over me for the pictures. It's still a bit risky - so we're having either my brother or Dad hold her as they can control her a lot better than the dogwalker or other friend. So I'm hoping for good weather so we can get a cute picture of our little family!

My current to-do list:

• get fashion tape
• get heel/shoe pads
• get new engraved champagne glass
• write 3 thank you notes
• get outfit for rehearsal dinner
• put fruit in OOT bags
• buy champagne for car ride from chapel to reception
• go to the bank
• send out rent check
• prepare tip envelopes
• prepare last payments
• drop off OOT bags and valet cards to the Westin on Thursday
• buy more underwear for trip
• buy tissue packets
• download important reception songs
• fax list of must-plays to DJ
• bows for pews
• print readings for readers

I'm pretty sure this list will grow throughout the week!

Updated Forecast

I can now start obsessively checking the weather for our wedding day. So I looked it up according to the zip code of the ceremony location as well as the zip of the reception location.

Ceremony Location:
Isolated Thunderstorms
30% chance of rain
High: 84
Low: 64

Reception Location:
Partly Cloudy
20% change of rain
High: 86
Low: 69

Hmm - I think I'll hope for the reception location's weather to be right! And if the Ceremony Location is correct, then I'll just hope that it'll be clear for pictures outside and for me to be arriving and leaving. It can rain during the ceremony, earlier in the day, or after we've left!

Today my work is throwing me a lunch for getting married. We're going to a mexican restaurant nearby for margaritas and food! I am certainly going to miss these people when I leave here in a couple months.

Last night I got my nails done, went tanning and then picked songs with Ian. We picked the bridal party's entrance into the reception, our entrance, the bouquet toss, the garter removal/toss, cake and last song of the night. I would post them, but along with a ton of other things, I can't seem to remember anything these days. It's as if my brain has reached it's limit for memory and anything not already in there is just spilling out. Or sometimes the items exchange places - like at a bar, one out, one allowed in.

Fitting Fiasco

I've been getting lots of questions about the law school decision. So here are some answers. I had been wait listed at U. Maryland about 2 months ago. Maryland was one of my top choices. I had been accepted at many schools, but U. Miami and American were two that stuck out. I was just about to make a decision between those two schools when on Friday, I received a call from Maryland asking if I was interested. I expressed my interest and asked when I might hear - 2 days, 2 weeks or 2 months - not knowing if they could even tell me. The woman's response - I would hear on Monday but that it looked very probably. All weekend long, I had my fingers crossed and my stomach was in knots. Monday, the "CONGRATULATIONS" envelope arrived to my mom's house and I received a phone call with the happy news!

My reasons for choosing Maryland over American or Miami: it's a new location (in downtown Baltimore) so we'll be able to move (which we wanted to do), it's cheaper than American (by about 1/2), and it's ranked better than either school. So there you have it!

We've started asking around for recommendations for a realtor in Baltimore. We don't have a ton of time on weekends to go look at places to rent (since we have the wedding and honeymoon!), so we're going to have a realtor start looking for us to save us a lot of time. If you know of a good Baltimore realtor, let us know!

Last night was my last fitting. I was accompanied by my mom and Bridget so they could learn how to help me with the dress (and a couple other specifics which I can't share because of the boy reading this). Well, I arranged to leave work early to be on time to my appointment. About 5 minutes from the bridal shop, I get a call from their alterations woman. She asks to reschedule for later in the evening. I was a little heated and said nope, that I was 5 minutes away and that she should've called much earlier in the day.

I get there, and am kept waiting for about 45 minutes. What was she doing - finishing the alterations on my dress that should've been completed LAST Wednesday when they had to cancel that appointment because the storms caused the power to go out. When she finally came out and asked for 10 more minutes, I blew up. The woman got married on Monday and said she wasn't feeling well during the day which is why it wasn't quite finished. I said - unacceptable and that I was unhappy as I had taken off work early to be there on time.

I finally put my dress on after she's finished, and right, it is still too big in a few areas! So after she pins them and shows my mom and Bridget some stuff, we wait more time for her to complete all of the alterations and I try it on one more time, and voila - it's finally right! So after all of that, it'll be steamed and ready for picking up on Monday. Yay! I am sooo excited to finally wear this sucker!

IT'S OFFICIAL

We're moving back to Baltimore!!!!

I have been accepted into the University of Maryland School of Law (in downtown Baltimore) and that's where I'll be going!!

11 Days and Counting

Between work keeping me busy and wedding stuff - I haven't had time to blog! So here's what's been going on.

• Met with Russell from Freed to discuss all the details and timeline of the big day. We went over the names and relationships of the bridal party and families.
• My last fitting last week was cancelled because of the terrible storms. Boo!
• Had a 1/2 day on Friday and met Erin at The Westin for a complete walk-through of the event. Went through the timeline, made corrections and updates.
• Saw Sex and the City on Friday night with a few girls. LOVED it. It had me crying and laughing all in one. I didn't want it to end!
• I finally picked out a wedding present for Ian - I wish I could post about it but can't since he's a snoop and will look.
• Went to pick up our rings after they were engraved - they are engraved a bit wrong so I have to make another trip this week to pick them up.
• I missed Maggie's son's 8th grade graduation to do wedding stuff - oh joy.
• I missed Annie and Brad's engagement party to do wedding stuff.
• Finished the table layout.
• Assigned the table numbers.
• Finished the seating chart.
• Made the place cards. These were a labor of love. It took me between 5-6 hours to finish these. Printing them was a PITA (pain-in-the-ass) - the printer kept printing them crooked, or off center. I had to print each place card individually. I was supposed to have about 35 place cards leftover, however, after needing to reprint so many, I ended up with 3 leftover. Erghhh! Once they were all printed, I headed to Staples to get the colored dot stickers to identify everyone's meal selections on the back of each place card. I finally finished these at around 12:00am on Saturday night. About 1 table away from being finished with the printing, I was informed that I had done the place cards incorrectly according to etiquette. For example, I gave married couple separate place cards, when apparently they're supposed to both me on one place card. Additionally, I did not put the title before each name (Mr., Mrs., Ms., Dr., etc.). Instead, I just did formal names: i.e., instead of Jimmy Smith I did James Smith. Oh well - it's not enough of a problem to warrant redoing them!
• I was boyless all day Saturday into Sunday. I am going to hold off on talking about his bachelor party because I'm trying to persuade him to guest blog about it.
• When Ian got home on Sunday, we headed to Costco to pick up memory cards for our cameras for all the upcoming festivities, snacks and gum/mints for the out-of-town bags and some various other items.
• Ian put together all of the out-of-town bags and filled them with bottled water, snacks, gum/mints and metro maps. We'll add a piece of fruit to each bag closer to the big day.
• Worked on the Out-of-Town Booklet for each bag. We need to finish designing this and then print it and add it to the bags.

The only big thing I have left to do that is time consuming are the programs. I cannot finalize those until Friday when I meet with the music director. So until then, I am just working on designing them so that they are ready for printing after I get the go-ahead on them on Friday.

How was your weekend?

It's in the Details

Since a lot went on this weekend, I want to focus in on the shower details. I mentioned I was, for lack of a better word, showered with more gifts and love than I could imagine. Maggie ordered these and they were set out all over the house:

I was having issues with the camera so it came out all fuzzy - but they are M&Ms that say Ian and Kate and then our wedding date. Such a cute idea and one that I'll have to keep in mind for future showers I might be a part of!

We picked up all of the gifts from Maggie's house on Sunday and here's the pile of them once we stacked it in our house in order to start sorting through:

I have been writing thank you notes since Sunday night - trying to get a few done per day and hopefully should finish those by the weekend. Some of my favorite gifts from Saturday:

I think weekend breakfasts will be a little more tasty with this waffle maker:

I think my baking might be a little easier with this:

And maybe Ian can finally stop ironing my clothes

for me now that we have this garment steamer:

We also got some of our china which is super exciting -

I love that there are different patterns on each piece!

There are others I would love to post pictures of but I can't seem to save some of the pictures in order to post them. Plus - I'm not sure where some of the presents came from if they weren't on the registry.

Last night, we finished up the table seating assignments which is a huge relief. And we're one couple away from knowing the final count. Invited: 185. Attending: 123 or 125. The number is a lot lower than planned - but it just means we'll be able to spend more time with each guest which is fine by us!

Tonight, I am meeting with Russell, our photographer to give him a list of must-have photos. Afterwards, I plan on writing a few more thank you notes and then finishing up designing our programs!

17 days to go!

Highs and Lows

We had one very busy weekend so I figured I'd sum it up into some highs and lows, and end with some pictures.

Highs

• Lauren came into town for the weekend.
• I cannot rave enough about the shower. Maggie did a fantastic job organizing it, had yummy food and was a very gracious host. I was showered with more presents that I could've imagined and shared the day with about 30 other ladies. I can't wait to get back pictures as I forgot to give someone my camera to take pictures with.
• After the shower, I arrived home to a very festive decorated house with balloons, confetti, streamers, signs, champagne, cupcakes with little engagement rings in them, and much more. Then, 7 ladies took me out for a fantastic dinner at Zengo where we ate very yummy food and laughed over lots of stories. We played a cute game where my bridesmaids had talked to Ian beforehand and asked lots of questions, and I had to answer them. Out of the 21, I got 13 right. Not too shabby!
• Lauren and Lewis then came back to my place to play pin the ribbon on the bachelor and goof around until close to 2 a.m.

Lows

• The weekend FLEW by.
• The weather on Saturday changed the shower to an indoor one.
• The shower was about 3-4 hours long and felt like it was only an hour. It made me realized that I have no concept of how quickly the wedding day will fly by.
• Many people had to cancel on the bachelorette party.
• I didn't get much time with Ian which always makes Mondays that much harder to go to work.

And here are some pictures...

Question: What did Ian say is the the best thing you've ever cooked for him. His response: She doesn't cook. My face = I'M MAD AND HE'S A BIG FAT LIAR.

Question: What is Ian's dream car? My response: Porsche 911. I was right!

The food:

All the ladies in order from left to right: Lauren, Laura, Annie, Me, Lewis, Julie and Sarah

My work buddies:

Julie accidentally gave the finger using her pinky finger instead - now we like to immitate her.

Back at the house - that's a balloon under there!

Pin the bow on the Bachelor's package. Laur's first try hit his shoulder:

Lewis getting all decorated up:

Scratch offs courtesy of Maggie - def not PG rated! And Lewis made a mustache out of the bling tattoos. Hot!