Picture perfect

Another thing checked off the list -- I booked our photographer today!
Granted, we've known who we wanted since she took our fantastic engagement pictures, like the one that greeted me on her slideshow when I opened up her web page earlier today:

This wonderful lady is Stacy Duncan of Stacy Duncan Photography (whom I also know as Spawn the Faerie from the high school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream we both faeried around in). I'm thrilled to know that we'll have beautiful memories of our wedding day in the great pictures she takes!
(Also, check out her gallery of adorable kids photos.... so.... cute... eeeeee....)

(Stacy/Spawn is the fourth from the left. I'm the last one on the right (forgive the faerie drag eye makeup...). Note Oberon, third from the left, also known as our groomsman Josh.)

Oh, Amazon, how I love thee.

I'm posting to keep the head rush of making my first big wedding-related purchase from making me spazz out at the circ desk.
I think I've mentioned before that I've been hankering to get started on my fabric flowers while it's still winter, while I have snow days to work on some of my more time-consuming projects. But -- it's hard to make something without the stuff to do it, and it's kind of hard for me to just waltz out and buy fabric. The nearest fabric store is in Johnson City, and I'd been itching for weeks to make a trip to Hancock's. This weekend, I had a chance to run in while on the way to dinner with my future-outlaws-family. I burst through the doors thinking I was going to find everything I needed right then -- but nope. Maybe it was just that I felt rushed, but I didn't see anything that really matched what I had in my mind, and I've made it a cardinal rule for myself not to put money into something that I don't know for certain that I'll want and use. So, I decided to wait.
I was contemplating other places to buy fabric when Mom asked me if I'd looked online. Why no, I hadn't... and so, I did.
After about an hour of surfing fabric websites and not feeling entirely sure where to plunk down my cash (though at least I was finding options of stuff that looked just like what I needed), I started wondering if I could buy fabric through Amazon. And guess what? You can!

I found a pretty good selection of synthetics and blends in colors that fit (to keep the edges of the petals from fraying, you have to toast the edges over a candle flame, and that doesn't really work unless the fabric is at least half synthetic), and the prices were great. I went ahead and ordered fabric for all the bouquets and the reception centerpieces, along with some felt for making felt flowers for the reception as well. I bought most of the extras, too -- some more needles since Mom's are all rusty, thread, cloth-covered florists' wire, glue sticks for the glue gun.
For $111 (including shipping), I think I've got most of the flowers taken care of (which is pretty good for seven bouquets, seven boutonnieres, and reception flowers!). There are a few odds and ends that I'm going to buy in-person at stores, such as buttons to go with some of the flowers (which I plan to buy at a local independent craft store that has just what I want) and ribbon (Amazon's ribbon selection was teh suck for me, but that's okay). I'll probably end up ordering wheat to go in the bouts/maybe in the bouquets/in the centerpieces when I order manzanita branches for the picture tree. And Mom has a ton of lace she'll let me use, which is fantastic.
So! Project Flowers is on the way. I also got some great encouragement about it over the weekend from Joy, one of my bridesmaids, who said she liked the idea of not killing flowers so they can be pretty just for one day. A woman after my own heart... and the fact that she said that helped J wrap his brain around it being an acceptable flouting of tradition :)
For my own reference, I started a list of what supplies I've bought and what I still need. My DIY project list has morphed some more, but I'll save another post on that for when I'm pretty sure it's set.
In the meantime, here's an idea of what I look forward to making:

Weddingbee's Mrs. Locket's DIY Fabric Flowers Series:

• Ditching The Florist...
• Vintage Fabric Flowers - Bouquets In Progress
• How Does Your Garden Sew? Part I: Garden Roses
• How Does Your Garden Sew? Part II: Attaching The Stems
• Bridal Bouquet In Bloom
• Lockets In Love: Pretty Little Details (Part I) -- with professional pics of Mrs. Locket's finished (gorgeous) handiwork

On the intarwebz

As much opportunity as I had to learn them there fancy web-creation skills at SILS, I decided to go the "easy template wedding website" route. I feel a little like I'm wussing out because a secret part of me has always wanted to be able to make kickass websites, but that part got left behind soon after the days of fancy flashing gifs and Geocities (to my middle-school-aged credit, I refrained from most flashing gifs and made stuff that looked as tasteful as something created by an 8th-grader could look. Black and purple all the way, baby... with stars... the theme, it holds together and is not overwhelming!).
So, to keep a "wedsite" *snork* from looking like 8th-grade me made it, I went with a free pre-designed option. I looked at a couple of different services - TheKnot's free ones, and eWedding.com - but their template choices didn't hold a candle to the ones over at MyWedding.com.
For a while, I couldn't decide which template to go with because there were SO many awesome ones. One of the great parts about MyWedding.com is the way that they partner with other services -- everything from Offbeat Bride to Christian fiction author Karen Kingsbury to Green Bride Guide. There seriously is something for everybody.
Even me!

Yep... finding out that they've partnered with Minted, the company that makes the awesome invites, miiiiight have just made everything feel like awesome cosmic alignment.
I don't have everything juuuuust the way I want it yet, but close enough that I'm ready to post it here :) Hooray!

The planning before the action

I made it through Bridesmaid Limbo -- for both the sets of bridesmaids and groomsmen, five of the six have answered in the affirmative that they will join the Fellowship of the Hayes! I still need to get in touch with one potential bridesmaid via phone (who works a crazy schedule) and Johnny needs to get in touch with one groomsman (who also works a crazy schedule), but we're mostly good to go. The video was a hit, and pretty much the entire wedding party wants to wear chainmail and carry axes, so there's no telling what this wedding will look like when I tell them they can wear pretty much what they want :P

So, we've got:
- A date
- A venue
- People

For being engaged for three weeks, I think it's a good start :)
I'm probably going to be taking the rest of November/possibly through December "off" from the practical side of planning because of the craziness of the holiday season and because we'll probably be moving sometime in the next month. What I would like to accomplish before the new year:
- Getting the guest list finalized and getting addresses for everyone.
- Making a list of all the pieces of the wedding/reception, who's paying for what, and how much we're budgeting for them (I have this mostly done, but I want to go over it in detail again).
- Making a list of all the DIY projects I want to do, collect the instructions for those, know what materials I'll need, how much they'll cost, and how much time I'll need to complete them.
So it may not be stuff with tangible results, but it'll make the next action steps a loooot easier.

The Fellowship of the Hayes

Finally, I can present to you the SEKRIT PROJECT which just got sent out minutes ago:

Goin' to the chapel...

Awwwww yeah, I just booked the church! The pastor came over to Johnny's folks house this weekend, and we asked him if we could use the church and if he'd officiate.
The best part -- this is how the conversation went:
Johnny: Well, we were wonderin' if you'd marry us.
Jason (pastor): If I weren't married already, I'd be happy to! Don't know what the elders would say about that, though... we'd probably have to move to Utah...
Us: *stunned silence. Did not know the preacher had such a great sense of humor*
*Johnny's mom cracks up and we break the stun and do, too*

It's a date!

I finally came to a decision! It was pretty hard to choose, but in the end, the argument about having more time on our hands (but not so much that it'll feel like forever) won out. In some ways, October is a busy month (especially for Johnny with some of the newspaper events), but it's all winding down by the time the 22nd rolls around. Another compelling reason for not-August is that half of our potential wedding party has August birthdays, and we both would rather have time to celebrate those birthdays first. There's one very important birthday among my friends in October, but it'll be past by the 22nd, too. So... I think all systems are go :)

The next step is reserving the church, and there will probably be updates on that on Sunday.

I feel a little relieved to have the first big decision under my belt. I'm already noticing how much I waffle on stuff before I decide. I've known that I'm that way -- it's like I have to look at the options before me from allllll perspectives before I can commit (and doubt my choices either way for a little bit beforehand, too). But it's exciting to have an official date :)

My Bridal Manifesto

Today is October 22, 2010, and I'll be getting married in a year. We haven't set a date yet, but we're still thinking about sometime between late summer and the leaf season here in Western NC. I'm excited, thrilled, and ridiculously happy.
And I have a confession to make.
Ever since I first had an inkling that Johnny wanted me to be his main squeeze long-term, I've been looking forward to the day when I could think about wedding stuff "legally." Ah, there was the thrill of covertly reading through posts on WeddingBee on my laptop every once in a while, with Johnny playing Red Dead Redemption blissfully unaware of the craft store DIY machinations taking root inside my mind just a couch away. I think he's guessed that secret, because in the less-than-a-week since he put the ring on my finger, he's already heard about what I envision doing with silk leaves and florist wire and heard about the five or so theme ideas battling it out in my mind. But for the most part, then, I kept my wedding-dreaming to as much of a minimum as I could, feeling like it was better to enjoy dating rather than to get ahead of myself (but it was hard.)
Now I feel like a race-horse ready to spring out of the gate, ready to plan the heck out of a wedding that will host (most likely) at least 250 people, because we both have ginormous extended families. It's a challenge I feel excited to take on, even as it scares the poo out of me.
But engagement didn't erase everything I promised myself and learned during my days as a lady in waiting. I learned from watching a friend go through the early stages of planning her wedding and from another friend's fantastically offbeat wedding. I learned from conversations with my awesome Mom. I learned from my own values of practicality. I learned from praying. And I want to set out my goals for myself as a bride as I get ready to take on a fantastic, exciting, beautiful challenge of a year.

Mere's Bridal Manifesto

• I will do my best to act out of kindness, consideration, grace, and love in all aspects of pre-wedding stuff. I won't go into the details of what I've seen brides-to-be do -- I mean, everybody knows some good bridezilla stories. The heart of what I want is for those around me -- the family I know and love and the family I will be joining, as well as the friends Johnny and I hold dear -- to remember me as a bride who "knows how to act," as my Granny would say. I want to remember that my friendships are more important to my friends than a wedding is. I want to remember that my Mom is my mother more than she is a mother-of-the-bride. I want people and relationships to come before centerpieces and coordinated colors. You get the gist. There's no other time when you're on display more than as a bride-to-be, and I want to represent myself so that people will remember me focusing on the love, not the stress. And really... I want to focus on the love, not the stress! Which brings me to...
• I will do my best to remember the big picture. To me, the big picture is that... dude... we're getting married. Johnny and I love each other enough to give our lives to each other, and to give our connected lives and relationship to God. It's a three-part union (at least for us), and I want this time to be used to build that union. I want to grow closer to my husband-to-be and to God and not let the planning make me forget that that's what's important.
• I will do my best to approach challenges with creativity and an open mind. I've already experienced the bridal freakout feeling when I realized just how many people will be involved in this wedding. It was my first occasion when I did panic for a few minutes -- before I remembered that getting that worked up is unneccessary, and that I can find creative solutions for how to feed and host what might feel more like an army of Spartans than a family wedding. I know I'm capable of figuring out how to adjust to about anything -- I want to remember that I can!

I NOW... PRONOUNCE YOU... MAN AND WIFE!
• I will not cave in to the pressures of the Wedding Industrial Complex. What is the Wedding Industrial Complex, you ask? ("Here is a resource!" says your friendly bride-librarian. Bridebrarian? Oh snap. That's me.) I bought one copy of Bride magazine just to prove to myself that going "traditional" wedding industry isn't my thang. And I was pretty much right. My reactions are a lot like those of Toots in the article. There are a lot of traditional elements I like -- I will be wearing a fantastic ivory dress, I will tell you that. But when it comes to sit-down meals and favors and escort cards, that just doesn't hold any feeling for me. I may not be as offbeat a bride as some of the fantastically awesome brides I love to read about, but I have a feeling that the Hayes wedding is going to be a wonderfully individual mix of things that are just right for us, our friends, and our family and not be beholding to "tradition."

There they are -- my goals. It feels a little surreal to actually put them down, after having mulled them over for months while I wondered if I'd be waiting for this until the year 4027. I put them out here for y'all to keep myself accountable. If you're reading this, consider it my promise to you, whether you're a family member, a friend, or just some awesome internet-reader.
Alright. HAYES FUTURE OF AWESOMENESS -- ENGAGE!
Meredith out.
Rock on :)