Well my favorite jewelry store was having a blow out sale, and I could not resist stopping in. I was really just looking for a band for my fiance, I promise! Mission accomplished we got him a ring and it was even 30% off. Well while I was there I thought why not just browse around. Long and be hold .... I found something I wanted. A new setting with a matching band. Here is the thing, I liked my ring, but couldn't find a matching band and I really wanted one that matched. So I stumbled across a 50% off case, and this is what I found.

Our Save the Date Design is finally complete, thanks to Chad Michael Peters. Chad knows I love paisley and purples and blues, so I super excited to see that he came up with this design. I can't wait to see them in person!

So, I think I may have mentioned in my 'Dress Diving' post that I found my Bridesmaid dresses. It was purely by accident. Myself and two of my girls were out trying on dresses for me and I thought for fun, maybe they could pick a couple they liked and test drive them.
My friend Jen had mentioned green to me before, and to be honest I wasn't feeling it for me. I was thinking icy winter themed blues and things of that nature. Green in December screams Chrstmas-which is nice..but, not for our wedding. However, when she pulled out this dress none of us could take our eyes off the color! Of course in this picture it looks just OK in my opinion, but in person it is so flattering! Also, as soon as two of my girls tried it on I knew that it was such a universally flattering dress. So, very much by accident we picked our dresses! So far 4 of 7 of my girls have tried it on and everyone is happy! Success! So, that totally changed my color scheme.
However my FH is happy with green--he feels like it is earthy. I'm thinking my colors are going to be greens, golds, ivory, some silver...ohh, I don't know. With the green we have does anyone have any knockout color ideas? I am a color girl! I would love to hear your ideas!

Limo's are finally booked! This was a tough one, we really wanted to go with Russo Limo because well, their license plates say Russo and my new married name will be Russo, but they were a bit pricey for us so we ended up with a recommendation from the Fraga's and checked out Lynette's Limo in Wilmington, they gave us a great deal so we booked them this weekend. We will have the 10 passenger limo, the 35 passenger limo bus, and the rolls royce.

Me and my BM's will be getting ready at my parents house in Pelham while the boys will be getting ready at Andover Country Club. The rolls royce will be picking up me, my dad, and my mom at my parents house and the 10 passenger limo will be picking up my BM's and flowergirls. The limo bus will then pick up the boys. After the ceremony in Wakefield, the limo will no longer be needed and our whole bridal party will go in the bus to the reception while Rich and I will be in the rolls royce! :-) So excited!

Looking forward to getting some wedding planning this weekend while I am in the area, and my prep work has been done today. On my to-do list today was to create a cake collage to bring to my first cake tasting tomorrow. I've been capturing images of cakes that I like over the last couple of months, and I wanted to bring my favourites to my appointment tomorrow.

I was supposed to have two appointments, but unfortunately one of them had to be rescheduled, but I still have a meeting with Something Different Cakes (http://www.cakescouture.net/ ). This is my first cake tasting, so I am very excited and my stepmother and future mother-in-law will be joining me at the tasting.

Thought I would share my "cake collage" with you, and I look forward to sharing my tasting experience!

I ordered my dress in December, through the fantastic ladies at the Bridal Garden in East Greenwich. I had some experience with them from my MOH experience this past fall. They are super accomidating and friendly, not to mention they will work with you on price. I highly reccomend them :)

I only tried on one dress, the Maggie Sottero Monalisa Royale, I ordered it in white with pweter accents. The embelishment on this dress is gorgeous, I love the detail, just being in it for a minute made me feel like a princess :)

Chatties, I'm here, in the land of Engs, officially and legally a Londoner. Happy Days! My fiance and I met in London, we own our house here, so even though I love the SouthCoast of New England more than any place in the world, I am now an ex-pat. We think we will move back to America someday, but for now we are happy to start our new, little family here in England.

Now that I am here though, I have suddenly realized that I have done as close to nothing as possible for our wedding here! EEK!!!! So, I need to get cracking. I've left mom back in Westport with a list a mile long of things I thought I'd finish for wedding number 2 before I left, but didn't quite get to.

We have the venue... it's going to be a civil ceremony in Chelsea Old Town Hall, which is on the King's Road. The King's Road was the hot place in the 1960s (think Austin Powers), then Eric Clapton and Mick Jagger land, and then in the 80s it was where Princess Diana used to hang out before she was married.

With all this talk about engagement photos, I just had to post about ours! We had ours taken in April at Fenway Park. You can rent the park all to yourself through the events office. You pay by the hour and you can literally go everywhere inside! We had such a blast! The Sox were actually practicing while we were there and we got to meet a bunch of the players and I got a ball from Justin Masterson. The sky was blue and the sun was bright and I think our photographer, David Bibeault did an amazing job! Here are some of our favorites!

Well I have finally ordered my dress. I know i'm a little late seeing my wedding is in less then 6 months. I did not search around much, and kept thinking I would find something I liked better. But i never did. I found it intimidating going into small bridal shops. Some people were very helpful, while at others I hardy got acknowledged. So I decided to get the one I first liked. SInce my wedding is outside I wanted something flowing yet casual. I think this dress is different, and that's what I liked about it. It's ivory too which I love. Heres a pic. Although I feel it does look a lot better in person.

I am pleased to anounce the most resent progress in wedding planning :) It just feels good to scratch something off the wedding to-do list. It's like, it starts out pretty long, and the more decisions you make, the more decisions you have to make, ya know?

Anyway. I was having difficulty figuring out how to incorporate all of our cousins and step cousins in the wedding (19 people, ranging in ages from 3-39). This is a feat that my cousin and his wife accomplished in their wedding this past December, with way more kids, so I had some inspiration. I spent several hours, matching kids, teens and adults with eachother in appropriate roles, and if I do say so myself, I think I came up with a damn good game plan!

Now came the issue of creating the rehersal dinner plan. With all of these kids/parents of/adults, plus some out-of-towners that would need to be included, our number is around 65. 65 people for the rehearsal dinner! And my FMIL has already spoke to us about her intentions and my FFIL's intentions to split the cost of said dinner (they are both remarried). Knowing the type of budget they are expecting, I quickly ruled out any formal dinner, and pretty much all sit down restaurants. .... So I started idea hunting....

The trick is that the wedding itself is very formal. I know FMIL's idea was that the rehearsal dinner would match. But I started looking at other options. I read on a few sites that informal, casual rehearsal dinners are very appropriate for formal weddings. In many ways, it's better than a formal dinner; it gives the family and new family a chance to relax and get to know eachother before the big day, the kids can have fun, etc. So, with that in mind, thinking of where would be an appropriate place, indoors (January wedding), I ran across the idea of bowling. You can rent the whole place, have bowling, billiards, food, drink, all in one spot. Easy, fun, and what better way to get to know people than to laugh together at how terrible of a bowler you are!

I know it sounds really corny, but my fiance and I love bowling! And it's something we do with some of his family and our friends alot, so... we both really like the idea :) Plus, it's a convienent location for all traveling and staying, and dosn't incourgae over drinking the night before. We can bring little details to dress it up, whatever, I'm happy to do something relaxing before the most formal day of my life! Just as long as I don't break a nail... lol

I also tackled the guest list issue. Of course, our ideal "125 people" is not going to be. But, were not too far off. After figuring out the ceremony processional/readers/attendants, it was pretty easy to finish off the list from there.

I've discovered that as involved as my FH is, (and i love it) he much rather prefers to have me do all the research and work and say "this is what I found, this is what I like, and this is what I want." Thats probably pretty typical though :)