26 days! And make-up help needed.
Hey hey, WP! Our helpful wedsite tells me there are 26 days left until our wedding. Yikes! That means it's crunch time. And in less than a week I will *finally* be back in CA, where I can start the major grunt work. Intro post here, progress posts here and here. Brief recap: Evan and Jen, getting married in Palo Alto, CA on Jan. 7. No real theme or color scheme, though there is lots of dark teal and kelly green.
We've had most of our guests RSVP already, minus a few stragglers and a few "b-listers" whose invitations were sent out later than others. We invited 134 people, and exactly half of those are people from out of state. So far we have 65 attending, with 14 unknowns and 55 not coming. Considering how far some of these people would have to travel (from Illinois, England and Germany!) I think we have a great attendance rate.
We finalized the ceremony with the officiant and decided on processional and recessional pieces. One of my friends will be playing two pieces from Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites, and I am super stoked. Our reception music playlist is almost complete. We're at 2.8 hours of songs, so I just need E's personal requests (like AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long," undoubtedly) and I think we'll be set-- or at least, we'll be ready for me to arrange the songs into 5-song blocks.
We've had a slight menu change, from pasta to lasagna. Originally, the women who are cooking for the reception had agreed to do a pasta bar with 4 sauce varieties. But then last week the woman organizing the dinner emailed me saying that they all thought making various lasagnas would be easier and more convenient. I have to say I was kind of upset for a moment, because, dude, I want pasta! But then I realized, if I had read some other post on here in which someone was freaking out because instead of pasta they were going to have lasagna, I would have rolled my eyes and said "suck it up, these women are cooking for your wedding, for free, and lasagna is delicious." So that's what I told myself! :P And I do feel ok about the switch now.
Plates, cups, tablecloths, napkins, and cake stand are all ordered and on their way to my parents' house. I am really excited about our compostable palm leaf plates! Our favor boxes have already arrived at the house; we're using these clear boxes filled with Belly Flops (Jelly Belly irregular jelly beans, bought during their Cyber Monday sale, so we got 12 lbs of candy for the price of 6 lbs). If I'm feeling really ambitious I'll pick out all the green beans for the favors, but if I'm too overwhelmed I'll just fill them up with whatever pours out. We may have some boxes with M&Ms for our vegetarian friends, although most of my veggie friends eat jelly beans anyway (because they are so delicious!). The boxes will have a teal sticker (reading "Jen & Evan, 1.7.2012, Thank you for sharing this day with us") and a green ribbon tied around them. This turned out to be the most economical way of doing favors for us, plus Jelly Bellys are E's favorite candy, so these aren't just random candies we're choosing.
For the centerpieces, we're having small flower arrangements (mostly gerbera daisies, roses, and alstroemeria) in green bottles, luminaria, and table numbers probably in these Ikea frames. I finished making the luminaria a couple days ago and I am quite proud of them. I got the idea from APW. I got some washi tape in the same teal as my sister's bridesmaid dress, and I ordered some pressed flowers online, as it was cheaper and faster than buying fresh flowers and pressing them on my own. Here's one, complete with battery-operated fake candle since real candles aren't allowed in our venue:
(Please excuse the messy desk in the background-- it is the end of the semester, after all.)
I also finally have my jewelry sorted. To recap, this is my dress:
I'm wearing this necklace:
and some single pearl studs in my first and second lobe piercings. I'm not sure yet what I'll be wearing in my helix (cartilage) or in my nostril.
Evan also got a suit, and it should be ready to be picked up from alterations tomorrow. We got him a green tie to match my shoes, and we got the two groomsdudes teal ties to coordinate with the bridesmaids. He still needs shoes and a belt, but is getting them when we're out in CA.
The to-do list remains super long: finish the playlist, call the SF Flower Mart and/or order wholesale flowers online, buy drinks, get venue insurance, make place cards, make table numbers, make buffet signs, figure out table assignments, make hair appointments... gah!
Finally, I had my makeup done today at Sephora, since I never wear makeup and needed some help. I'm not sure how I feel about it... I think it looks nice enough in these pictures but the foundation seems rather heavy in real life (as in, I can definitely see it under the harsh bathroom lighting, and I feel like I can see it in the less-harsh bedroom lighting). E is not a fan of the coppery, shimmery eyeshadow, so I'm thinking of using something more matte. I don't want to *just* look good in photos-- I'd like to look good during the actual event, too! So I turn to you, Wedding Planners! What do you think?
First of all, a picture of me sans makeup (aka, how I normally look, since I only wear the stuff for Very Special Events):
E and myself, New Orleans, the night we got engaged. This pic is about a year and a half old now, but I look pretty much the same.
All of these pictures were taken indoors. I took the first one as soon as I got home, without doing anything except take off the awful, sticky, bright pink lipstick the Sephora lady put me in. The pic above was taken about an hour and a half after the makeup was applied.
I then took off some of the lower lash eyeshadow, since I wasn't a huge fan, and added my own tinted lip gloss.
From the side-ish.
And another pic, about 6 hours after application.
Thoughts? Am I just being overly critical? Thanks for any help you can give!
We've had most of our guests RSVP already, minus a few stragglers and a few "b-listers" whose invitations were sent out later than others. We invited 134 people, and exactly half of those are people from out of state. So far we have 65 attending, with 14 unknowns and 55 not coming. Considering how far some of these people would have to travel (from Illinois, England and Germany!) I think we have a great attendance rate.
We finalized the ceremony with the officiant and decided on processional and recessional pieces. One of my friends will be playing two pieces from Bach's Unaccompanied Cello Suites, and I am super stoked. Our reception music playlist is almost complete. We're at 2.8 hours of songs, so I just need E's personal requests (like AC/DC's "You Shook Me All Night Long," undoubtedly) and I think we'll be set-- or at least, we'll be ready for me to arrange the songs into 5-song blocks.
We've had a slight menu change, from pasta to lasagna. Originally, the women who are cooking for the reception had agreed to do a pasta bar with 4 sauce varieties. But then last week the woman organizing the dinner emailed me saying that they all thought making various lasagnas would be easier and more convenient. I have to say I was kind of upset for a moment, because, dude, I want pasta! But then I realized, if I had read some other post on here in which someone was freaking out because instead of pasta they were going to have lasagna, I would have rolled my eyes and said "suck it up, these women are cooking for your wedding, for free, and lasagna is delicious." So that's what I told myself! :P And I do feel ok about the switch now.
Plates, cups, tablecloths, napkins, and cake stand are all ordered and on their way to my parents' house. I am really excited about our compostable palm leaf plates! Our favor boxes have already arrived at the house; we're using these clear boxes filled with Belly Flops (Jelly Belly irregular jelly beans, bought during their Cyber Monday sale, so we got 12 lbs of candy for the price of 6 lbs). If I'm feeling really ambitious I'll pick out all the green beans for the favors, but if I'm too overwhelmed I'll just fill them up with whatever pours out. We may have some boxes with M&Ms for our vegetarian friends, although most of my veggie friends eat jelly beans anyway (because they are so delicious!). The boxes will have a teal sticker (reading "Jen & Evan, 1.7.2012, Thank you for sharing this day with us") and a green ribbon tied around them. This turned out to be the most economical way of doing favors for us, plus Jelly Bellys are E's favorite candy, so these aren't just random candies we're choosing.
For the centerpieces, we're having small flower arrangements (mostly gerbera daisies, roses, and alstroemeria) in green bottles, luminaria, and table numbers probably in these Ikea frames. I finished making the luminaria a couple days ago and I am quite proud of them. I got the idea from APW. I got some washi tape in the same teal as my sister's bridesmaid dress, and I ordered some pressed flowers online, as it was cheaper and faster than buying fresh flowers and pressing them on my own. Here's one, complete with battery-operated fake candle since real candles aren't allowed in our venue:
(Please excuse the messy desk in the background-- it is the end of the semester, after all.)
I also finally have my jewelry sorted. To recap, this is my dress:
I'm wearing this necklace:
and some single pearl studs in my first and second lobe piercings. I'm not sure yet what I'll be wearing in my helix (cartilage) or in my nostril.
Evan also got a suit, and it should be ready to be picked up from alterations tomorrow. We got him a green tie to match my shoes, and we got the two groomsdudes teal ties to coordinate with the bridesmaids. He still needs shoes and a belt, but is getting them when we're out in CA.
The to-do list remains super long: finish the playlist, call the SF Flower Mart and/or order wholesale flowers online, buy drinks, get venue insurance, make place cards, make table numbers, make buffet signs, figure out table assignments, make hair appointments... gah!
Finally, I had my makeup done today at Sephora, since I never wear makeup and needed some help. I'm not sure how I feel about it... I think it looks nice enough in these pictures but the foundation seems rather heavy in real life (as in, I can definitely see it under the harsh bathroom lighting, and I feel like I can see it in the less-harsh bedroom lighting). E is not a fan of the coppery, shimmery eyeshadow, so I'm thinking of using something more matte. I don't want to *just* look good in photos-- I'd like to look good during the actual event, too! So I turn to you, Wedding Planners! What do you think?
First of all, a picture of me sans makeup (aka, how I normally look, since I only wear the stuff for Very Special Events):
E and myself, New Orleans, the night we got engaged. This pic is about a year and a half old now, but I look pretty much the same.
All of these pictures were taken indoors. I took the first one as soon as I got home, without doing anything except take off the awful, sticky, bright pink lipstick the Sephora lady put me in. The pic above was taken about an hour and a half after the makeup was applied.
I then took off some of the lower lash eyeshadow, since I wasn't a huge fan, and added my own tinted lip gloss.
From the side-ish.
And another pic, about 6 hours after application.
Thoughts? Am I just being overly critical? Thanks for any help you can give!