The morning of...

I told you all about our rehearsal dinner, our date at the nail salon and our hotel set-up... and now here's--

the morning of...

...the wedding I woke up really early. Way too early, actually. I had nothing to do but just lay there and be excited. So, that's exactly what I did... while watching Fresh Prince. :)

I wasn't nervous. I don't think I got nervous until later...

I just wanted "things" to start... like hair & make-up & mostly just putting on my dress... just getting married!

The girls left the hotel room to get their hair done so it was just me. It was really relaxing and I watched tv and moved around the hotel furniture until the girls doing our make-up arrived.

Here are some pictures of the BM hair:



Once the girls got back... things moved quickly. Maybe, too quickly?


Soon, the room was filled with music, chatting and laughter. And my hair started!



After my hair was all ready to go I ate lunch. I was starving!


And then, it was time to get my makeup done. :)



After all my hair and makeup was done... we took pictures!

And suddenly, it was time to get on the shuttle!...

The hotel room.

We had our rehearsal & dinner on Thursday and the girls got their nails done on Friday afternoon... and quickly after, we went to the hotel to check-in.

And that's where we had a little incident. At the time... a few tears were shed (out of frustration!) but looking back it really wasn't a big deal. See -- we had booked the girls a suite for Friday night AND the boys a suite for Friday night. Turns out -- the hotel doesn't actually have "suites" as much as they have "business suites" (even though they claimed they did), but there's a difference.

Especially when you're looking for space for 8 people to sleep and get ready the next day! So it was a little issue to change rooms. We ended up getting the girls adjoining rooms and the boys adjoining rooms and it worked out very well.

My bridesmaids were pretty sneaky and ended up having the room decorated after the fiasco. It was perfect.




After hanging out and relaxing for a while, I took a shower crawled into bed and guess what was on the movie channel?... Eclipse. It was true perfection.

Happy Birthday, Martin Luther King, Jr.

I'm still pretty much in love & obsessed with my shoe purchase!



And today was really successful, too!

I figured out the hotel fiasco. Remember how they wouldn't call/email me back.. and weren't helpful?

WELL! I found a hotel that did email me back, and was helpful! So I'm going to sign the contract and mail it back tomorrow! So I consider that as an accomplishment!

I called a shuttle service and they were so helpful and pretty reasonable with pricing so now I just need to make a decision!

I emailed our photographer about having a first look photo session! We're going to do it! I know it's not traditional and not the norm... but I think it's so cute!

And my bridesmaid/cousin Lindsey found me a make-up person! I have a trial set for March 19th... which is also my bridal shower so I'll look all fancy! ;)

Today was great! Great, great, great.

And now for some Twilight & bed. Yay!

Hmm..

I'd like to state my first (?) formal complaint I've encountered while planning the wedding.

Of course, during the process I've run into the annoyances of how much things are costing, frustration overcame my body when I was told gerbera daisies were too informal for our wedding, and creating a guest list and sticking to a number may have been the most difficult task as of yet.

But nothing, and I mean nothing is as annoying, frustrating and difficult than when someone doesn't return your phone calls.

For example...

Last summer, I checked out hotels near our venue because I want(ed) to book room blocks for the night of the wedding. These hotels both told me that I needed to wait to book off the rooms until December because they weren't sure of the rates for next July. Fine.

On December 1st, I called both hotels and the women that I need to talk to were both gone for the day. Fine. I understand that I called after 4:00. I mean I have a job, too. I left messages for both of them.

No call back.

A few days later, I called again. Both hotels. Explained to the desk, again, why I was calling and they transferred me to voicemail, again. And I left voicemails, again.

No call back.

A few days later, I called back. Both hotels. Explained to the desk, again, why I was calling and when they asked me if I wanted to leave messages I said no. Because, honestly? I was annoyed.

So. Now, I'm on vacation. And I thought to myself: "this is perfect! it's 11 am on Tuesday morning! call now! They'll be there!".

So, I called. And explained to the desk, again, and the first one transferred me to the woman I need to talk to and I got her voicemail! AGAIN!

The next hotel, took down my information(for the first time, apparently!) and said that the woman I need to talk to would call me back within two hours. Fine.

Do you think she called me back?

Nope.

CAN YOU BELIEVE IT?!

It's like impossible!

I feel defeated, annoyed and frustrated. And now, I don't even want people to stay there! Because they're not helpful, or courteous, or professional!

What to do... what to do.

I love planning!

Today we stopped at Judy's Village Flowers and I set up an appointment to meet with her about the possibility of working with her store for the wedding. I can't wait until July 15th!

We also tried to map out the mileage between Christina's and hotels in the area. We stopped at the Holiday Inn Express in Foxboro which was very, very close, clean and nice. It seemed perfect for what I'm going for. The rooms are equipped with plenty of things... tv's, fridges, microwaves... they're spacious and very affordable. This hotel actually seemed like the most fantastic thing in the world until...

We stopped at the Renaissance Marriot hotel at Patriot Place [right next to Gillette Stadium]. Now this hotel was gorgeous. Anything you can imagine... was in this hotel. It was seriously perfect and they were friendly and honest.

The catch...

Because it's right next to Gillette Stadium [which is home to the Patriots but also a very popular concert venue] IF [by chance] there happens to be an event on the day/night of our wedding [which sadly is very likely - because July's prime concert season] the hotel charges an overnight parking fee of $50 per car EVEN if you're a guest at the hotel. Now this charge is on top of a relatively high room rate. So I guess that's what we're contemplating now. On the upside, neither of these hotels charge a fee to book a room block. So if I choose to ask them each to hold 10 rooms and they all don't book, we don't owe a penny -- the rooms just go back into the hotel inventory for the general public. So we wouldn't lose out on anything.

But then again, if there's no event -- there's no parking fee. And if there's no event, the room block rate is pretty affordable. Unfortunately, both hotels asked me to wait to book room blocks until they find out the events in the area which will be posted in the fall. At that time, they will be able to give me the right numbers and I can book as many rooms as I want.

I think it was successful...

I also got a name of a company that works with the hotels at organizing shuttle services. So that's the next thing we'll look into!

Early mornings..

I wake up early every day -- but today I woke up and became functional immediately. I did this because I'm going to look at hotels!!

I know of three within a mile of the venue so we'll start there...

Hopefully, I'll either have funny or really positive things to say in the next post.

We'll see!

Have a happy day!

June, To-do's...

Some of you may [or may not] know that we have a very busy summer ahead of us! In about a week I'm off to California for Chelsey & Tucker's wedding. Sean will join me about a week & a half later and we'll return in the middle of July. We'll be home for about a week and then we're off to Seattle for Joe & Kim's wedding! By the time we get back it'll be August and before I know it, I'll be back to work and that means our countdown will be at about 10 months. Can you believe that?! The time will fly...

Because of this, I'm choosing to do as much as I can in this next week. Because, CLEARLY, time is passing! So first things first...

Flowers: I need to decide which flower shop I'll go with. I have a package [thankfully] but I can still choose the specific store and I need to find out what the money allotment for the flowers actually is. I need to find out which flowers will be in season and which ones I want. These are big choices! I'm about 98.5% sure I want pink.

Hotels: Proper etiquette says to book off room blocks at three separate hotels. I don't know how necessary that is but I do need to go look into the hotels around Christina's. I know a few offer the bride & groom a free night -- but I don't know if any require money down to block off rooms. So I need to find out the terms and conditions and things like shuttle services, parking fees, prices, etc.

DJ: We have the DJ and he's perfect! But we were asked to make an on-going list of must-play songs and a list of do-not-play songs. I haven't really gotten started but I think I should... I mean, music is the most important part of the whole event [besides the marriage itself, of course].

I love being busy!