Christina - Maid of Honor

Christina, my sister, is my maid of honor.  As much as we are totally different, she's just like me!  I mean, we're both retarded with the same things; we both talk practically the same; and we both are ridiculously positive and happy about the lamest things!  Christina can totally drive me crazy b/c I'm so Type A and she's not.  But that's probably what keeps me sane.  :)

Christina will tell you that I tortured her during our young developmental years.  I beg to differ.  I just made up things and told the stories with such conviction that it had to be right!  It also helped a great deal that I'm her older sister.  BTW, Christina is younger than I am.  A lot of ppl have thought otherwise, but DON'T SAY THAT TO HER!!!  She gets really upset!!  Christina also has stored all the things I've ever told her into a special memory box labeled: "Do NOT repeat to anyone else!  It's totally wrong!!!!"  HAHAHAHA.  OK, fine.  I probably did torture her. ;)

Anyway, I asked Christina first during dinner/happy hour at Primitivo.  Super great tapas restaurant (if you're interested in tapas) on Abbott Kinney!  :)  I was just a little nervous (ok, I was pretty nervous) b/c it seems like it should be a huge ordeal, right?  I don't know...

So, during dinner, way after we had talked about the wedding planning and when we were talking about some unrelated topic, I just busted out, "Hey Christina, Will you be my maid of honor?"  Christina kind of gasped.  Russ said, "um, timing Jeanne."  HAHAHA.

Needless to say, Christina said yes and now she's my maid of honor.  Thank goodness!  I have very little fashion sense and Christina is always helping me buy clothes!  :)  Yay!!!  1 down, 3 more to ask...

Wedding Planner???

As Russ and I were starting to do more research re: venues, we (probably more me) started having some major concerns b/c of my work schedule and Russ' work schedule. I never know when I'll be busy beyond belief and Russ never knows what his schedule is like either!

We thought it might be best to enlist the help of a wedding planner. I mean, I read Mindy Weiss' entire book and still didn't know what was in store for me! We were hesitant though. We already had our wedding cost and we would add an additional cost of a planner? We just weren't sure if it was the best thing to do. We consulted other friends and got a variety of answers. In the end, we decided that there was no harm in interviewing wedding planners, right?

So, I immediately get into action and start researching wedding planners. Luckily, as I was perusing various websites/blogs, I also wrote down all the planners I thought looked awesome! Well, I didn't hand-write anything. I put it all into my Excel spreadsheet. hehehe. (Come on, Microsoft, payment for the advertising please!) I picked 3 that I thought were great and sent out inquiry notices. We also asked our friend, Heeli Kim Jeng (who, by the way, is a hilarious stand-up comedienne) to give us some insight since she used to do wedding planning! I also sent inquiries to those 2 recommendations. Yay! =)

How To Ask My Bridesmaids?!?!?!

I knew who I wanted to ask to be my bridesmaids ("BM"), but I just didn't know how to ask.  Google to the rescue again!  I googled something like "how to ask a bridemaids to be in your wedding."  And it came up with all these blogs!  Awesome!

If you're wondering why I had such a majorly difficult time asking my friends to be a BM, it's b/c I've only been a BM twice and I just don't remember how I was asked!  Terrible, I know.

Anyway, after perusing a few (probably several) websites/blogs, I saw some cheesy/funny ideas that I incorporated into my own.  :)  One that I thought was really cute were these BM cookies that say "Will You Be My Bridesmaid?"  For someone who LOVES sweet stuff, the cookies just didn't look that appetizing to me.  Sorry cookie company!

http://store.weddingish.com/jalibldrcoyo.html

http://store.weddingish.com/brpacowimeri.html

Since I thought the cookies looked unappetizing, I decided to morph two ideas together into one!  I saw some ppl ask their BMs by making a picture book with pictures of the two of them, and on the last page, it was left blank with a question like, "This last page is left blank for us at my wedding.  Will you be my bridesmaid?"  The other was to make a crossword puzzle that had clues which revealed the question of "Will you be my bridesmaid?"  So...I added some scrapbooking things, printed out some pictures and stuck them on, punched holes in the paper, tied a pretty ribbon around it, and there was my book!  Here's some terrible pictures that I took:

Sorry, you'll need to turn your head sideways to see it b/c I haven't quite figured out how to blog yet.  Christina says I went a bit overboard with the stickers.  I'm kind of sticker happy.  =)  It reminds me of my childhood.  Happy times!

An Average LA Wedding Costs...

Holy crap!!!! I started doing some research on how much a wedding should cost. I came across a few articles saying that the average wedding cost is about $30k. Just google "average wedding costs 2009" and you'll find those articles! Here's one from CNN. Then, I was like, "um, do these ppl live in LA or do they live in Idaho?" No offense to the ppl from Idaho, but the cost of living in LA is just a little bit higher than Idaho.

So, further google research led me to this great website: http://www.costofwedding.com/ You just need to type in your zip and it'll tell you the average cost of a wedding based upon where you live!!! Check it out!!! It's a helpful tool, but I don't think it's all that accurate b/c there are ways (so I've learned) to cut costs. =)

I also asked a few close friends how much their weddings costs. I was quite surprised to learn about the various ranges! I was also surprised that everything in the wedding world is negotiable! Even though it's not in our custom or nature to negotiate, DO IT!!! As Russ says, "so what! They'll only say 'no.'" =)

In any case, I used this info to help develop a total budget. It was still kind of a rough estimate, but it just gave me an idea. Also, I used the info from the various magazines and books I was reading. So, after I side-tracked to the average wedding cost and budget development, I probably should return to the venue searching....

Venue Searching (Part 1)

Once all my cases quit sizzling, I was able to look at the giant list of venues that Russ worked so hard to create. I started looking at all of the websites, reading about it, looking at pictures and attempting to make appointments for these places. But based upon our preliminary guest list count (200-250), we had to eliminate most of the locations on Russ' list due to size. It was such a shame since they were honestly beautiful locations!

So, I started calling all the venues and started arranging appointments. I was amazed that many locations only held visits during the weekdays! But DUH!!! Why would they really have site visits on the weekend! That's when the weddings happen! This is when I started to realize that I might need a wedding planner's help!

Our potential venue list somehow grew smaller and we needed to look up more locations. It was a little disappointing (okay, actually, I was REALLY disappointed) b/c I had combed through the Here Comes The Guide book and certain magazines that have giant lists of locations and none of them seemed to inexpensively accommodate 200-250 guests. :'(

So, my next thoughts were - how much is this wedding supposed to cost? Like, seriously. If you live in LA and have a wedding here, how much does an average wedding in LA cost????

The Preliminary Guest List!!!

One day, Russ came up with a great idea! Let's see how big our wedding would be! So, we created a document for us to fill in. We decided to create the following columns: a) must invite; b) would like to invite; c) if there's room; and d) work invites. We thought this would be helpful in eliminating mass groups of guests to get our guest list down to a reasonable number. It turns out that Mindy Weiss (wedding planning book that Russ bought me) agrees! Yes!!!

Our parents worked on their lists quite diligently and forwarded it to us within a week. We were less diligent. haha.

By the end of June, though, we had our preliminary guest list with people in every column and a guest count of 400 ppl!!!! WAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I nearly died; Russ nearly had a heart attack. Then we reminded ourselves that the list gave everyone a +1 (which we could easily eliminate). We took a peak at the A+B column and that was only 270 (slightly more manageable). We decided that we would aim for a total guest list of 200-250 (to keep costs down). Thank goodness we created the column format to figure out the guest list!!! Super helpful!!!!

Note to future newly-engaged couples: Learn to use Microsoft Excel. It will become your new best friend!!!!! And it will easily add up how many ppl are in each column!!! :) Besides, you can keep track of all the venues you've seen and do an easy price comparison by inserting all the various prices for entrees, appetizers, drinks, desserts, and wedding cake!

Wedding Planning???

So, with our new engagement, we thought we would let it all sink in first before we started to do any actual planning. This plan worked out quite well because I came back from Italy to a boat-load of work, including prepping for 2 trials and 1 big giant multi-million dollar case. That kept me busy for at least until end of June, early July. Thankfully, one of my trials settled (but not before I already put in 200+ hours prepping for it) and the other trial was continued. The giant case also settled (also, not before I put in 200+ working it up). *sigh* But at least it's done and I was able to focus on wedding stuff. =)

During the busy time, we were debating about whether or not to have an engagement party. We thought we could invite all of our friends to a drink get-together, but then what about the family??? After we consulted with the parents, they thought we should just save our $$ and they didn't really think having a giant drinking party would be all that much fun. So, we decided to nix the idea since we had a great engagement story (and had Lavazza cappuccinos from the coffee machine in Italy)! =)

Also during the busy time of June, Russ volunteered to make a list of locations that we would love to have our wedding at. He made a great list, but I wasn't able to look at it until July. :( And most importantly, Russ bought me a wedding planning book to help with all the planning (and b/c he knew I would need some reading materials really quickly)!!! He did some research and this book was a highly-reviewed book. If you need some initial insight about what goes on in wedding planning, check out the book!! It even has pictures of types of wedding dresses, types of veils, types of trains, and types of tuxes. Awesome!!!