Invitation Workshop

I signed up to go to a free scrapbooking bridal showcase class at Archiver’s last week. I was a little disappointed, because I went to it thinking I would be making something, along with getting lots of good ideas since it was called a class. All it turned out to be was a woman showing you the different types of paper they sell that you could use to make invitations and there were books you could flip through for ideas.

It was nice looking at a few different ideas for invitations. I have thought about the idea of making my own invites before. This “class” and a nice phone conversation with KTG (who had just finished making her own wedding invites) confirmed for me that it would be way to overwhelming to do this on my own. I don’t think the cost saved would out way the stress I would have making 250+ invites on my own. I do think though that I will make the response cards, directions and maybe save the dates on my own, these are much smaller tasks.

Mom, Dad and Ellen will be visiting us in Kansas in 3 weeks and I have a trip planned to a stationary store to look at invites and maybe pick some out. Here are a few favorite invites of mine that I saw when I attended the bridal fair with the Wilkinson’s. You probably wont be getting these in the mail though, as they are on the completely opposite cost end of making your own.

Blizzard!

Even though it is officially Spring, Kansas City was hit with a ton of snow yesterday. It was foretasted 2 to 5 inches of snow. I can't find how much we exactly got but I would say it was more like 5 or more. The storm didn't hit till the afternoon and came in stages. First it was just rain, then freezing rain and hail and finally just snow. But the flakes were huge and falling in massive amounts. If it wasn't a high of 40 today the snow out is the best kind to make a snow man out of(super compact). Not so much the best kind for a Maltese to hang out in though. Every time Chewie went out last night he came back in with snow packed into him(it was up to his belly when he stood in it!). We got out the blow dryer to melt it off of him. We are all glad to see it has begun to melt already. This better be the last snow we see for a while!

Jewelry

I have been thinking about jewelry to go with the girls dresses and I'm not sure what I want yet. Nor do I know if gold or silver would go better. Here are a few pics I have collected of necklaces I like.

by splashdesign

by laweb

both by beadsss

Transportation

Transportation for the wedding day is booked!
We are getting a 16 person "limousine bus" for four hours. It will take either Steve or I (and coordinating wedding party) to the Piper Palm House, then everyone in the wedding party and their dates will ride in it afterwards.

And after the reception there will be two taxi's available, for two hours, for guests to use to get to their end destinations safely. I request that the taxi's aren't used to go too far away though, as we only have them for two hours. :)

Pet Love

Steve and I have decided that instead of giving out favors at the wedding that we would like to do a charitable donation.

Since we love our Chewie so much I think that we are going to do a donation to a local shelter. I had thought about doing a national organization, but I think that it would be nicer to give to something locally. Although the wedding is in St Louis I think we will probably give to an organization where we live. Here are just a few of the local shelters:
Humane Society of Greater Kansas City
Heart of America Humane Society – Overland Park
Wayside Waifs
Animal Haven

I have also thought about instead of doing a monetary donation, buying some items from a few shelters wish lists. Things like food, beds, etc. The benefit to doing a monetary donation though is that my work and I bet Steve’s does too, will do matching.

To go along with our idea of a donation we want to display other peoples loved ones. So each table will be named after a guests pet. The head table will of course be “Chewie”. :)

Shamrock Shuffle

This past Saturday Steve and I participated in our second 5K, the Lawrence St. Patrick’s Day Shamrock Shuffle.
We also added a new member to our little running group, Amy Huber. It was Amy’s first race, just a little more than a month after she started running and she did great! I improved my time from the Groundhog run by 4 minutes; while Steve is becoming lightning fast, almost catching up to Lauren.

It was a great race day, the weather was perfect and the rain that was forecasted held off for us. So far this has been my favorite of the two races we have done. I really enjoyed the path we took. It was on the levee by the river and I was really able to zone out on the scenery, something I usually cannot do. My favorite part of the race by far though was near the end. I came around a small bend, getting ready to go under the bridge and then up a short, but steep hill and I see both Lauren and Steve looking around the bend for me. After knowing they were there looking for me and cheering me on, the rest of the way to the finish line was a piece of cake. It’s a great feeling knowing they are going to be there at the end of every race cheering me on and are so proud of me. I was able to join them and just a few minuets later help cheer Amy on to the finish and that was great too.

Up next for the four of us is a 44 mile relay race, with 5 other people, in April.

Pom Bags

I have been thinking about what to put the pom poms in to give to guests when they enter the ceremony. Both Aunt Nancy and Mama found some cute things to give them out in, but I think I need something a little bigger. Not too big though. My initial idea was to place them in paper bags, with a cute note telling guests when to throw them. So I went out today and found some like I had been thinking of. I found all of these on Paper Mart. They seemed to have reasonable prices. These two below are what I had first pictured. They are a little tall, but could be cut down some. They also come in a variety of colors, brown and white are the best deal price wise though.

Paper Mart also had these "gourmet food bags" that I thought would be cute. They are a little pricier. And I would be concerned about the size of them also. It would be cute to get these printed up with the saying of when to throw them though. That might be more work and money than I am looking for though.

207 Days to go!

The Knot has changed their wedding websites, so I upgraded ours and added a ton more information than was previously on it. I plan on having the url for our site on the save the dates(although we still have not decided on if we are doing them or not) and on our invites. Check it out!

http://www.theknot.com/ourwedding/SarahJames&StephenKozlen