Meeting the Officiate

We had our first meeting with the officiate today. It was awesome. At the end of the meeting, he handed me a book of Mary Oliver's poetry and told me to read a poem. I selected "Morning," After I finished reading it, Matt said, "That's you alright. Loving the mess out of that cat and being happy in the kitchen. Although I would like to change the words around to the cat howling at the door and then tearing up your garden only to come in and puke on the rug NEXT to the linoleum." We all laughed and I passed the book to Matt. He read, "Picking Blueberries" and stopped periodically to say, "Don't worry, honey, the dear doesn't die."

Matt has never read poetry to me. I was thrilled! He picked the poem stating, "This is for that pound of tasteless blueberries you bought last week, except when you made the pancakes, those were good. Oh, and for that time in New Jersey when we almost hit a deer on our motorcycles."

The Vintage Table

This weekend, I came across a ton of old family wedding photos, some dating back to the early 1900's. I even found one of my great, great uncle (who was a dandy) and great, great aunt (who was wearing orthopaedic shoes on her wedding day)! I snatched up this photo, along with a few others, and decided that I would like to display these at our wedding. My parent's have tons more photos so how fun will it be to bring them out from dark, cobwebby closets? I'm hoping Matt's mother and grandmother have some photos to share as well.

I also picked up my grandmother's ring. It's perfect and it needs minimal restoration work. The ring had to be cut from my grandma's hand after she passed and the cut was made through the date engraved on the inside of the ring but only through the day. Once the ring is joined back together, it will read Dave & Betty 01-42. I plan to have Matt & Cindy 01-09 engraved alongside it. There are 52 years of marriage bestowed upon this ring. I’m a lucky girl.

Heirloom

My mom just called. She found my grandmother's wedding band and said that WE COULD HAVE IT!!! I almost cried on the phone when she told me. It's a 2 mm platinum band, plain on top with filigree work on the sides. It's exactly what I've been looking for and have been unable to find.

Items, in No Particular Order

White and cranberry has extended itself to ivory, burgundy, and gold, which will be a nice and cozy vibe for an otherwise cold winter day.

I'm dying my crinoline. Awesome.

Matt and I set up an appointment with the officiate. So that's on a roll.

We decided that we are going to have a fifteen minute grace period for the ceremony. On the invitations, we will write 3:00 but the ceremony doesn't actually start until 3:15, which we will note on the program. It's hard to expect 120 people to all be on time. We figure this way there is some breathing room and it won't push into our reception time.

Wedding Cake

I want a croquembouche. People keep telling me it's weird. WELL at the wedding we went to this weekend they had one and OMFG IT WAS SO GOOD. No one thought it was weird. In fact, they ate that shit up.

We're totally doing it. Enough said.

Honeymoon, Foiled Again!

The place we both liked doesn't take reservations for next year until early November. So sad! We decided to write it off the list and keep looking. Matt started talking about going to Vermont but we would have to fly and then drive a long distance and UGH. I said we should go out to the Eastern Shore for a couple of days and then take a rail trip throgh Italy next summer. Matt liked this idea and so do I.

It totally sucks that deciding on a honeymoon is the,well, suckiest part of the planning. Part of me doesn't even want a honeymoon; it just seems expensive and uncessary but Matt really wants to do it so I'm trying to be cool about it.

In good news, I had a nice day with my mom.

1. We decided on flowers for the ceremony, peace lilies. Simple, pretty, big but not extravagant, and we can bring them home to keep in our house for ages.
   
2. I mentioned that idon't want a guest book and asked her, "Am I going to care about it in forty years?" She laughed and said, "I remember it's the one thing I forgot to bring that day. We had to turn around to go back and get it and it made me feel stressed and you know what? Forty years later I don't even know where the damn thing is and you're right, I don't care. "
3. I requested that she start gathering wedding pictures of her and my father, both sets of grandparents, great grandparents, etc. In addition, any newspaper announcements they could find would be great because I want to do a family history table. (Note: I must make sure to let Matt's mom and grandparents know to start hunting these up as well.)
   
4. I tried on my great grandmother's mink stole and it is so-ho-HO awesome and will look even more awesome with my dress. What handsome winter wedding pictures we will have!

When all was said and done, I took her for a manicure/pedicure, which is something I rarely do but she loves to do. I was grateful that when I expressed my disdain for nail polish, the girl buffed and shined me instead. Score!

So Matt and I will figure out the honeymoon eventually. In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy planning the actual event.