Purple and Pearls

I’m a list girl. I like to make lists, they make me happy.

It helps me to verbalise or write down what I need to do and when I need to do it by.  Planning this wedding has sent me into list overdrive!  I have spreadsheets full of costings, things to do, guests, and schedules.  Our honeymoon alone has 7 dedicated files.

My monthly countdown posts on this blog have helped me out so much.  Every month I will make a list of things I need to complete, it helps me remember everything I need to get done and I don’t end up overwhelming myself with giant “to-do” lists.

But now the wedding is getting closer I decided I needed to step it up a gear.  This is where my wedding planning timeline comes into play

Separated by different headings I have listed everything I need to do before the wedding.  The dates along the top tell me when I should be doing them by.

It includes payments, appointments and when I intend to send out our day and evening invitations.  It also includes the dates of our hen and stag parties along with any other events we may have on that will take up our time including weddings, festivals and weekend breaks.  I can see where things over lap and predict where I’m going to be busiest so I can adjust my timings.  For example I have a lot to finish towards the end of September and the beginning of October and July and August are relatively clear so I have scheduled in those months to finish cutting out our Chrysler Building order of services.

I know that I won’t stick to the timeline 100% but at least it’s a way for me to have everything I need to do down in one place.

I know I say this every month, but seriously who is stealing time!?

I can’t believe we’re only 4 months away from our wedding day, it doesn’t seem real sometimes.   Has told me he’d been thinking about his speech last night and had half written it in his head by the time he’d fallen asleep.  On one hand it feels like there is still forever to wait, especially as the weather has been so gorgeous lately November feels ages away.  Then when I think about all the things we have left to do and how fast time has already gone, 4 months really doesn’t feel too long away at all!

We have our pre-wedding shoot on Sunday which we are both a little nervous about, I just really hope the photos turn out well!  I have a plan for the pictures, which depends on a couple of things and as long as it all works out I’ll share my ideas on Purple and Pearls.

I was determined to finish our invites in June and whilst they’re not 100% complete we did put in a lot of work to get them to where they are now.

We’re intending on sending these out at the end of July/beginning of August so these are top priority this month.

We also began work out the order of services.  I printed out 88 Chrysler Buildings on to thick pearlescent ”Morphing Mauve” card and Suzie and I roughly cut them out until we can spend longer on the more intricate corners.

I also printed out all of our evening invitations and have bought more pearlescent ”Morphing Mauve” card from PDA Card and Craft to back them.

Not on our “to do list” last month but also very important was to finish booking our honeymoon hotels.  I’m very pleased to say we have now booked Seattle, San Francisco and Hawaii with only Dallas still to go.

In July I am looking to…

• Finish, address and send out our day invitations… (exciting!)
• Finish cutting out and back the evening invitations.
• Cut out the Chrysler Buildings.
• Smooth down chalkboard hearts and attach ribbon. (I can also start to write out the names of people I know are going to 100% attend, like me and Has!)
• Tackle a few paint jobs I have to finish.
• Continue the search for bridesmaids shoes. (This maybe more of an autumn task as it’s all about the strappy sandal at the moment, which I don’t think would be suitable.  Frost-bitten toes anyone?!
• Book our Dallas hotel.

I really want to focus on the DIY projects this month.  Ideally I want everything to be completed before September.  Most of our weekends are taken up by various events this month, including a friends wedding this Saturday, a craft fair, 2 birthdays and another festival at the end of the month.  Busy busy!

I had a bit of a “oh crap it’s June, which means we have 5 months left” moment this weekend.  I don’t have a weekend off now until the middle of August with various events so I’m going to have to call on the help of others to get things finished off.

I haven’t crossed off everything from May’s to do list.  I ordered the bridesmaid’s dresses, painted the chalkboard hearts with a second coat, re-joined weight watchers (and lose 5lbs in total so far!).

I also ordered something for the bridesmaids from Yarwood-White for them to wear on the day and I tried out my camouflage make up.  The invitations have had a little more work done to them and are very close to being finished!

Where has the time gone!!?

It’s May!  How did that happen?  I can remember sitting down over a year ago and thinking about the things I’d have to do at the 6 month mark.  It’s scary to think how fast the months are disappearing.

We have managed to tick off quite a few things from our list in April.
We’ve found the Bridesmaid’s dresses (and will be ordering them by the end of May).  We’ve booked two of our honeymoon hotels (New York and San Antonio).  Suzie and Hayley joined me for an evening of invitation making.  We’re by no means finished but we’re getting there! I’ve also done a mock up of the evening invitation and we’ve sent out an email to all of my friends asking them to join us in London for my Hen Party

Busy busy!

I had planned to do a lot more, but some of the projects required nicer weather so I could paint outside.  As soon as the weather perks up I’ll be out there painting and spraying!

So jobs for this month will include

• Order and pay for the bridesmaid’s dresses
• Finish the day invitations.
• Print the evening invitations
• Print the Chrysler Building covers for the order of service and making a start on cutting them out.
• As soon as the sun shines, apply another coat of chalkboard paint to the heart place cards.
• Start the ring hunt!  Now the football season has ended I’ll be dragging Has around the shops in search for our bling.
• Chase responses for the hen party and start to work on a more detailed cost per person.
• I’m going to rejoin Weight Watchers tomorrow…. give me strength and will power please!!
• Finalise wedding day guest list and make sure we have addresses for everyone.
• Start looking for accessories for me and the bridesmaids.

Wow, that’s come round fast!

Of course I wasn’t being serious when I said I’d found the bridesmaid’s their dresses in fact I found the dresses here.  Lovely colour though!

So April is here and we’ve officially made it through winter.  Thank goodness, it feels like winter has been here for a long time!
I’m looking forward to summer barbecues, festivals, floaty dresses and driving with the windows down.   Warmer weather still feels far away though, especially seeing as I had to scrape SNOW from my car this morning!  I think Mother Nature was playing a little April Fool’s herself!  Good one Momma, now bring the sunshine please?!

March wasn’t a very productive month in terms of planning.  I haven’t really had any motivation to get anything done.  I’m hoping April will work out better.

I did manage to cross off a few things from my list. I visited the National Wedding Fayre at the NEC, we booked the remaining honeymoon flights (yay!), we visited one bridesmaid dress shop and decided on a final design for our wedding invitations.

Taking in to account the jobs I didn’t manage to do in March, April’s list looks like this.

• Start making up the wedding invitations (Me, Suzie and Hayley have a date next wednesday!)
• Continue the search for bridesmaids dresses, whether that’s shop bought or custom made.
• Work on finishing the chalk board place cards
• Research honeymoon hotels
• Start mocking up ideas for the evening invitations
• Work on secret bridesmaid gift project.
• Continue work on song choices for ceremony, wedding breakfast and reception
• Work on another little DIY painting project that will require some nicer weather.
• Start cutting out 160 Chrysler Buildings for the Order of the Day booklets……!
• Plan “Hen and the City”
• Get back on the diet wagon!!!  I’ve slipped big time, once I’ve gobbled up all my Easter eggs there’ll be no more treats!

It feels like Spring has arrived this morning with beautiful blue skies and sunshine, I’m not sure how long this is going to last but it’s nice to see the sun!

I can’t believe March is here already… this year seems to be flying by, which is scary!  In January I made a list of things to do and said I would do this ever 3 months.  It really helped me to get a lot done, I work best when I have a schedule and I enjoy having something to tick off.

I have done most of the items on my list, the only thing I’m behind on is the Hen Party.  I’m not too worried about it, because we still have plenty of time to finalise details.

In February we have…

Registered with John Lewis and we have received our gift list cards to put in with our invitation (I may have also searched around on the John Lewis website making a mental list of things I’d like!)

We’ve obviously attended Suzie and Rob’s wedding!

We have started to think about songs we can use during the ceremony and wedding breakfast, Has has put together a little play list of songs on his laptop.  We’ll often have little chats about what songs to use during our journey to and from work and we have quite a few we’d like to hear down on our list now.

Honeymoon flights… well we’re holding off for a little while to see if the price comes down.  I’m not convinced they will but Has keeps checking.  We’ll hopefully have the flights from Honolulu to Anchorage, Anchorage to Seattle and Seattle to New York booked up soon.  Then it will just be a case of booking the coach from Dallas to San Antonio and then the flight from San Antonio to San Francisco.

I think there will be a lot going on in the next few months.

March (8 months to go)

• Attend the National Wedding Fayre at the NEC this weekend with the intention of looking for Bridesmaid dresses.
• Look into the possibility of having the bridesmaid dresses made and contact local dress makers.  (John Lewis provide a list of local dress makers, so I’ll be calling a few of those)
• Start to make up our day invitations.  I still need to decide on an outer design but I shall be working on a few ideas and will hopefully start to make those up.
• Book remaining honeymoon flights.
• Try on MY dress! (It came in to the shop last September but I haven’t tried it on yet!)
• Providing weather is nice work on chalk board place cards.

Wow!  Time is flying by!

I’ve been looking at my “to do” list I made at the start of the year to make sure I’m on track.  So far I’m doing pretty well.
I’ve made my hair appointment for the wedding day, looked at potential hair styles for me and my bridesmaids, I met Sarah from Blue Door Bakery and spoke extensively about cupcakes, emailed my friends about “Hen and the City” and booked our flights from San Francisco to Oahu!

Well today I crossed off two more things from my list.

First of all I registered our gift list with John Lewis, we don’t have to decide on what we want yet but at least it’s all set up ready for us to zap our way around the shop!

Has: “What does this do?”
Laura: “I have no idea?  Lets get it!“
Zap!

Also today I sent off our deposit to Sarah at Blue Door Bakery to confirm our booking for our yummy wedding cupcake tower!

This is the tower we saw at the wedding fayre at Stone Manor Hotel.  Ours will look really similar but with a giant cupcake on top!

I want to try and make the chalkboard placecards this month too, I now have all the things I need after buying 4 more packs of wooden hearts from Hobbycraft this weekend, so there’s nothing really stopping me!

Last night Has found the flights for Honolulu to Anchorage, Anchorage to Seattle and Seattle to New York so we should be able to get those booked up soon too!  Full steam ahead!

Now Christmas has passed, it’s time for serious wedding planning.

Not just for our wedding but Suzie’s too!  She gets married in 47 days and there’s a hen party to prepare for before then!

I need to be able to plan out what I need to do over the next few months and whilst I probably won’t stick to it rigidly it’s good to have it written down.

January

To mark the occasion we celebrated with a chinese and bucks fizz!  Excuse the state of us we both have terrible colds!
The reality of it is we are both now in bed, tucked up with a hot water bottle and a mug of tea!  Romantic hey?  Let’s hope we’re both a little healthier this time next year!