Saying NO to bare feet

There I was, in line to buy a few wedding related items of clothing, when the girl in front of me puts her purchase on the counter. It was a pair of crocheted turquoise flats, slightly reminiscent of the ever popular Toms.

I saw, my interest got piqued, I envied. I had already waited in line for 10 minutes and really didn't want to hunt for those turquoise beauties and have to wait another 10 minutes on the newly formed line behind me. So I let out a sigh, bought my items, headed for the exit.

But then.. there they were. Just to my left, on the opposite side of the store. It doesn't hurt to look, right? They might not even look good. They might be more than I'm willing to spend on bright, summery flats. So I made a beeline over to the wall of shoes, and there they were again, right in front of me: a size 9.

I tried them on, I loved them, they were $15. My mind was practically made up for me. I made another beeline back to the register and bought them on the spot. These were far too good to pass up.

And so, if you haven't guessed already.. these will officially be my "back up" pair of wedding shoes! You know, the ones to you change into when your poor little feet are screaming at you for wearing a new pair of 4" heels all day. Even though I originally swore to myself that I'd be fine trotting and dancing around in my pimped out shoes all day.. let's be realistic. I always tell myself I'll be fine, and then in the wee hours of the night when the dancing and drinking is coming to an end and I'm heading home, they come off.

Shoes in hand, walking on the streets of DC. I have no shame.

I also like to keep those feet pointed!

Rest assured, I will not be running around barefoot in my wedding dress (I think). If my feet start getting angry with me, I'll definitely be sporting these cuties!

 

They also coincidentally match my new bird tattoo!

Have you made a wedding related snap decision purchase? What was it for?

Linens & things

Ugh I'm so behind on this. Foxy and I spent a night at our venue and had a meeting with our DOC over a month ago, and here I am just writing about it. #badblogger

Anyhoot, the Vandiver sent us an email a while back promoting cheese & wine for $109 when you book online - a deal they are giving guests if you stay at the inn on a weekday night before January 2012. Um, sign us up please. Since Foxy and I work random hours and days, we were able to go on a Tuesday night back in October and set up a meeting with our DOC for the very next day!

On the agenda:
1. Check out as many of the Vandiver's 17 rooms as possible.
2. Discuss logistics.
3. Choose linens. (Foxy was SO excited for this part. Well, not really. Ok, not at all.)
4. Spend some QT with Foxy Mama.

About #4.. it was a bit last minute, but when I told my mom about our meeting the week prior, she said she would see if she could move some things around and meet us in Havre de Grace. She was apparently really touched by my little blurb on wishing I lived closer to her and could actively plan more of the wedding with her in this post (previously posted on my personal blog a while back). Lo and behold, she was able to drive the 3.5 hours down and join in on the fun! I can't even tell you how much it meant to me - I may have only seen her for a few hours and we really only talked about relatively basic things, but it was the bee's knees (ha!) to have her there.

Now jumping back to numero uno: the rooms. It was a tough call, but we chose to spend the night before the meeting in the Vandiver room (also known as the honeymoon suite due to its jacuzzi tub and gorgeous king sized bed).

Image via Vandiver Inn

The next day, we were able to see 13 of the remaining 16 rooms. Why is this important, your inquisitive mind may ask? Well, we decided to "rent out" the whole venue/all three houses both Friday and Saturday nights of our wedding weekend. Rooms will go to parents, wedding party, and the officiant. Oh, and us. We actually forgot that WE needed a room. (And to add ourselves to the guest list. Apparently we're not actually going to our own wedding..?)

The cool thing is that we can assign rooms to people, and when they eventually call to "book a room", it's already set up for them. It's like my very own Barbie dream house(s)! Except it was really hard to decide on some of the rooms.. I mean, how would I know if Foxy's groomsmen would prefer a room with a nautical theme or filigree wallpaper? Ohh, the decisions.

Once we were done with the room walk-through, we got down to numero dos: logistics. We shared our "vision" with the DOC, I showed her pictures of my dress, we swooned, I told her Mrs. Lox said hi, we talked about colors and vibe and all that fun stuff. Which promptly brought us to numero tres: linens!

After seeing my dress and hearing me harp on and on about my inexplicable love for mason jars, a light bulb seemed to pop on over our DOC's head as she rushed to the attic to grab some linens "that would be just perfect".

We hemmed and hawed for a bit - can you believe they actually don't have a true turquoise linen? Just a blue and jade type green. But it actually worked out for the best; the first thing she showed us was this pretty white lace.

This was about the time when Foxy zoned out.

Since we'll be having more of a "cocktail style" reception, there will only be about 4 big rounds and lots of smaller cocktail tables around the venue. While I was definitely digging the lace, it was just much too much white. I was hoping for the bigger tables to at least have some pop of color. Since they didn't have turquoise, I asked about our accent color - a nice clementine orange. No go there, either. To which Foxy Mama replied, "well, what about peach?". Ah, that woman is a genius.

What you see is an ivory base, peach underlay, and white lace overlay, and hive? I'm in love. I was surprised at how much I dug the tritone look on the big tables, and how excited I am to see just the two tone (ivory underlay and white lace) on the cocktail tables. It's going to give the place such a wonderful rustic-y look without going overboard. ::cue more swooning::

I'm so happy to have this small (but oddly significant?) part of planning out of the way. And as usual, I don't think it would have been nearly as awesome if my mom wasn't there. She picked my dress, she picked my hairpiece, she picked the linens.. she knows her stuff, yo.

Has your mom (or dad, or sister, or SO, or cat..) helped you pick out or decide on anything wedding related yet??

Drinkage

I should start off by establishing that we have decided to only serve beer and wine at our reception. We're both big wino's and Foxy seriously loves his beer. We realistically can't afford a full open bar, and we really don't see the need for a cash liquor bar in addition to an open beer and wine bar. I know people have varying opinions on this, but it's the best option for us.


Now on to the good stuff. For a small extra fee per person, our venue also allows you to do a champagne toast and/or a signature cocktail to serve throughout the night. Given our budget, we can only realistically do one or the other.


On the one hand, a champagne toast would be pretty schweet, because let's be real here: I LOVE champagne (or sparkling wine as the case may be).

Not really a good descriptive photo, but it's def a usual Sunday afternoon ;)

Plus, I love the look and feel and vibe of a true, classic champagne toast. And some of the the pictures can be unbeatable!

Image via What It Costs | Image via Pinterest from These tings Take Time
Image via Pinterest from Free People

Now on the other hand, a signature cocktail is just so fun. For one, it would ensure that there would be at least some type of liquor for those (lovely) sticklers who aren't big  beer or wine fans. Second, we could have fun creating a name for it like "Blushing Bride Blueberry Gimlet" or something equally as dorky and mushy. Third.. and unashamedly one of the biggest selling points for me.. is that we could put said cocktails in super cute glasses!

 

Image via Luna and Chloe Weddings | Image via Green Wedding Shoes, Photo by Jackie Wondersjackiewonders.com

Oh yes. I'm a total sucker for the mason jar glasses and stripy straws.

Needless to say, we're pretty set on the signature cocktail - ultimately, we figure people will be more than able to toast with the drinks they will have in front of them instead of champagne. Now we just need to decide what kind of cocktail to serve!


What kind of bar, if any, did you have at your wedding? Any good signature cocktail ideas??