just kidding!

so i thought i had found THE dress...PSYCH!

since it was my friday off, i scheduled appointments at two different bridal salons, mariposa (anaheim) and mary me bridal (orange).

mariposa: this boutique was so cute! they got their racks of dresses, but what i like the best was "the stage". i don't even remember how many dresses i tried on, but it was definitely more than 10. two dresses really caught my eye: an enzoani and a maggie sottero. i tried those two dresses at least 3 times each...taking pictures along the way. but i had another bridal appointment scheduled so i had to hold off any purchases...

mary me bridal: so many dresses. it was overwhelming! i got paired up with a consultant, marie, and we started pulling out dresses to try on. i was wowed by another enzoani as well as an angelina faccenda. after trying on a dozen dresses, i was so confused! choices are not necessarily a good thing! then my mom showed marie the pictures of the gowns i tried on at mariposa...and surprise surprise, mary me bridal had the maggie sottero. so i tried on the maggie again...and my decision was made! i felt like a princess...it's unbelievable!

so i placed my order and should be getting my gown in about 4 months. eeeks!

wedding gown...

i put on a wedding dress today. i didn't intend to spend my afternoon doing that, but my mom had nagged me so much to drive her to a bridal store to look at color schemes so she could start looking for HER dress. surrounded my wedding gowns, i wasn't looking around (my nose was stuck in the catalogues), but my mother kept asking me to try some on..."for fun", she said. so i acquiesced and looked around. she pointed a few and i said "sure, whatever". then i figured i might as well participate, and i picked a couple as well. the lady helping us out dressed me in the fitting room.

first one. eh.

second. better.

third. wow.

last. this is MINE.

standing on the pedestal, looking at myself in the mirror...i knew i found the dress. it's going to be hard to beat this one, but i will be going to a couple bridal salons this friday to try some more out. i'll give the other dresses a chance. ;-)

it was so weird wearing those gowns. i'm getting married!

nerves...

ok less than 11 months to go...

you ever get those moments when you start freaking out for no reason? i'm starting to get a little anxious that i'm not moving on the wedding planning wagon as efficiently as i would like. as much as i don't like being stressed out, i work extremely well under pressure, and with the wedding so far off i've been a slacker lately. i bet when there's two months to go i'll be rockin' the wedding stuff. but i really need to take advantage of my time now. time to set some hard dates for myself...all the ambiguity on deadlines for all the stuff that needs to get done makes my skin crawl.

finally...

i mailed about half the save-the-dates this afternoon. it feels good to get that stack off my desk and in the mail. woohoo! and it's only half since i don't have the addresses for the others >_<

we're getting there! less than 11 months to go!

our engagement party...

...will probably not happen. sorry! since we already announced our engagement to all our important people, and i'm just about ready to start mailing the official save-the-dates, having a party to commemorate our engagement seems unnecessary. yes, it's a great excuse to get together, but, hey, we don't need an excuse to get together if we wanted to, right? it's not that i don't want to plan or budget for the party, but i seriously can't justify why we would have one in the first place. soooo let's just save up and plan for the bridal party/bachelor(ette) parties/whatever else comes our way!

so here's what's up...

church = done. reception = done. photographer = done. videographer = done. bridesmaids = done. a big hi-five to cristalle for getting us to have dinner last night, so i could have the opportunity to wrap up the bridesmaids. :-) francis just needs to get on the ball on asking the rest of his groomsmen, and then we need start bugging people to be our primary and secondary sponsors. but that's something we want to do in person, if possible.

ok, so i said i'd talk about the pre-marriage experience. it was hosted at st. elizabeth ann seton from 8:45am-5pm. the speakers were two couples, and they each shared their marriage and family experiences...how they communicate...what worked and what didn't. there were several couples attending this session, and we'd pull together for small group activities every so often. honestly, i didn't pay attention half the time...so i KNOW francis didn't either. not to be overly critical, but the examples the speakers used were un-relatable. i don't want to disregard what they said, because the core of what they were saying can be applied universally, despite the generation gap. but seriously, the way the topics were presented and the manner in which that content was delivered was not the best approach for the audience. i understand the message they were trying to convey, but it came across as simplistic and idealistic...which is a far cry from what reality is. *shrugs shoulders* doing this was a requirement, and we fulfilled it...so yay for us. but what we "learned" from the session were things that we had already discussed: keep the lines of communication between us open; sometimes we do need some personal space; and love, love, love...we're making a choice to love each other, and it's not going to be an easy road, but we're making that commitment. so it's up to us to make or break it.

sorry!

ok i PROMISE i will update this soon. it's just been crazy the past couple of days. in short, we have reviewed our photography and videography options. we have selected harvard photography for photos (which means we need to get our $50 deposit back from bella pictures) and we're most likely going with robles video for our videography. we're still negotiating with robles, so things are not yet set in stone. i'll also talk about our pre-marriage experience hosted at st. elizabeth ann seton. that day was LONG.

details to come!