I'm Getting Married!

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I can't believe this week is finally here! After a year and three months of planning, we leave for our wedding weekend today! I'm so excited for it all to come together and have my family and friends in one place for an entire weekend.

Here are some of the images that have inspired me and shaped our wedding over the past year...

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It's been so much fun being a part of the E&I community! Thank you for following along on my journey to the alter. Cheers!

Rachel

Vine Hill House Wedding by Bright Room Studio + Ken Kienow

I'm excited to share one of our blogger bride's weddings with you today. Kim & Dan were married at the Vine Hill House in Northern California on a beautiful day with an even more beautiful sunset. Kim designed her own wedding invites and various paper products all around. After her wedding she opened up a Graphic Design studio and specializes in wedding invitations.

Wedding Photography: Ken Kienow Wedding Photography | Wedding Venue: Vine Hill House in Sebastopol, California | Floral Design: BV Florals | Catering: Park Avenue Catering | Wedding Cupcakes: Foxy Cupcakes | DJ: AMS Entertainment | Wedding Stationery: Bright Room Studio | Wedding Dress: Ivy & Aster | Bride’s Shoes: Elie Tahari | Bridesmaids’ Attire: Asos | Groom’s Attire: Joseph Abboud | Groomsmen Attire: Calvin Klein 

A Bubbly Bridal Brunch

A few weeks ago my girlfriends and I threw a rooftop brunch for our friend who is getting married in August. One of the hosts has an amazing spot in San Francisco's SOMA neighborhood, so the backdrop was taken care of.

*Note the bus/boat going into the water in the background. We got to watch it drive right into the water about every hour. :-)

Inspired by our bride-to-be's french roots, we served dishes like quiche,  and, of course, kept the champagne flowing. Fresh peach and strawberry purees (courtesy of my new Vitamix!) made for colorful bellinis. It was a hot day so we also served french press coffee on ice.

Homemade quiche, apple french toast, cheeses, fruit, and fresh beignets. Delish.

We decorated with pictures of the bride and groom-to-be. We also had guests bring a few pictures of themselves with the bride so she could go home with a little keepsake. In our world of digital pictures, it's fun to have a good, old-fashioned photo book!

One of our guests got married last month and had collected assorted china and goblets for her big day, which we were lucky enough to use for the brunch. My friend whose rooftop it is is also a hobby florist and arranged this awesome centerpiece. We tied the napkins with lavender and billy ball sprigs.

It made for a really fun day in celebration of a great friend tying the knot with her sweetie next month!

I can't believe I'll be leaving for my wedding weekend in a week from today. It has really flown by. See you all here next week for my final post before the wedding!

Vendor Guide {Columbia River Gorge}

With the wedding quickly approaching, we have all our vendors solidified. It feels good to have everything set! Here are the vendors we'll be using. If you are getting married in the Columbia River Gorge area, I would highly recommend any of these people/companies...I did the research, so you don't have to :-) Welcome party location: Springhouse Cellar Winery - My fiancé and I love this place because they serve great, local wines and beers and the space is large enough for all the guests we wanted to invite. It also has the cool, laid-back vibe we wanted for the night before.

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Welcome party catering (they have a mobile brick oven!): Solstice Wood Fire Café

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Photographer: Sean Morrison

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Hair and makeup: Patricia of Foils Salon and Day Spa

Wedding venue, ceremony and reception: Mount Hood B&B

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Day-of coordinator: Betheny Roberts of Mt. Hood B&B - She is technically 'day-of,' but has been so helpful answering all of my questions leading up to the wedding.

Florist: Lucy's Informal Flowers

Wedding catering: Boda's Kitchen

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DJ: Gavin Bruhn, The Aussie DJ 

Transportation: First Student

Invitation design: Kimberly Roth, Bright Room Studio

Wedding website: http://weduary.com

Wedding dress: Encore Bridal, San Francisco - new and nearly-new bridal dresses.

Dress alterations: Fichu, San Francisco

Groomsmen Suits: J.Crew Factory

Photographer Shot List

One month countdown to my wedding! It is getting close and left on my checklist are the fine details. Not necessities, but the fun stuff!

My wise sister-in-law-to-be, who just got married, recommended I put together a shot list for my photographer. Something I wouldn't have thought of, but a great idea. Seeing all the beautiful shots out there, I know I want to make a list so I'm 100% happy when I get my photos back.

Here are some I definitely want in the mix...

Closeups of me with the bouquet.

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The details.

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The ring bearer and flower girl getting excited for their walk down the isle.

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Sun behind.

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Cute candids.

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Cool shots featuring the sky at dusk.

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Did you do a shot list for your photographer?

Picking up details

Long engagements get sort of a bad rap. When Erik and I set a wedding date nearly 20 months after our engagement, people thought I'd be worried about losing momentum or that I'd feel like I'd be waiting forever. While there are moments of "lets just do this already", I'd say there are many benefits of having a long engagement. One of the best things has been picking up some small details for the day as I see them and am inspired. Its been fun getting a little thing in the mail here or there, plus shelling out a few dollars here and there gives me time to save up in between. Plus, you can score clearance if you time the purchase perfectly.

So far I've picked up these fun items:

Source: Furbish Studio

Source: ABJ Glassworks

Source: Jason Wu for Target (No longer available)

Its so exciting to start gathering little details while the big stuff is still in the works. I've been using all my restraint to not get carried away with buying too much stuff we don't need, but when its something I love and a great deal (I snagged the Jason Wu dresses for the flower girls at $16 a pop), its nice to have those small things crossed off the list!

A Pattern Project

  Today I'm so excited to share one of the first tangible projects I've worked on during wedding planning.  A couple years ago I met an awesome surface designer at Alt Summit, and when I started wedding planning I knew she would be the perfect person to collaborate with on a visual that could help set the tone for DIY projects. We sent Tammie Bennett our inspiration board in the hopes she could design us a pattern that could be used for paper and fabric components of the event.

 Source: The Ravenna Girls

 Tammie took our inspiration board and ran with it. She pulled out those colors she knew we loved the most: turquoise, corals, and orange, with a neutral backdrop. She pulled out the midcentury vibe and also some of the decor that I told her we planned to use in the space: lights and garland. After a few weeks of work on the pattern she sent me three preliminary options:

Source: Tammie Bennett Design in partnership with The Ravenna Girls

So great, right? I instantly loved them all but for different reasons. In addition to the items from our inspiration board that I thought she'd incorporate, she also added in the playfulness of the paper airplanes which are a nod to our long distance relationship. After looking at them with Erik and thinking about all the different things we'd hoped to use this for, we felt like Option 1 was a little too whimsical (I almost felt like it looks like a kids birthday party), and Option 3 was a little too bold. Option 2, with a few more revisions would be great and versatile.

We went through a couple more design tweaks, removing the hearts and diamonds which I thought were a little too "cute", and infusing more of the dark gray for a richer look. With eager anticipation, I opened the final awesome pattern that Tammie sent me:

Source: Tammie Bennett Design in partnership with The Ravenna Girls

We absolutely love it. Tammie delivered us an Adobe Illustrator file, which means that we can scale the whole pattern as needed and also separate out individual components if need be. I'm looking forward to uploading it to Spoonflower to have some fabric printed for a few projects, have some wallpaper made to use as a photobooth background, and some gift wrap to use for bridal party gifts. We're also using this as inspiration for stationery and decor pieces, including our invitations, ceremony backdrop, chairs and the reception, and cake toppers. Can't wait to show those all to you as they come to fruition!

French Honeymoon

We finally booked our honeymoon and I'm so excited to be going to France! Now, along with the final wedding preparations, we're adding honeymoon planning to our plate. Luckily my fiancé is a great trip planner and we are going to keep the agenda pretty simple so we have plenty of time to relax.

First stop: Paris!

Sources: Lovers Bridge, Food, Chanel, Eiffel Tower

Next up on the itinerary is Provence - a few hours southeast of Paris by high-speed train. We're still researching where we want to stay in this area. The things we want to do - wine taste, eat good food, a truffle tour, see a Roman ruin or two, and relax in the beautiful setting.

Sources: dogs, truffles

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Our last destination will be Côte d'Azur, also known as the French Riviera.

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This will be a first time in France for both of us. I can't wait to see what it has in store for us!

Group Pinterest Boards

One of the most fun things I've done so far with wedding planning is starting a group pinterest board to let friends and family share ideas they came across.  When I first got engaged, people close to me started e-mailing inspiration and I knew I needed to come up with a way to keep it all organized so that I could access it when it came down to deciding on the details.

 Source: Style Me Pretty

So, I started a group pinterest board and sent out an e-mail that if people would like to be involved to let me know and I'd invite them to pin to the board. A couple months later and we're having so much fun with it!  Obviously I've kept my own boards (since I don't want to bombard the group board with the crazy amount of pins I've amassed), so this has been a fun way to separate out the things that other people find that I haven't seen.

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The most awesome thing about it so far is seeing how your friends see your style. So far, everyone has been spot on pinning things I really like and ideas that I think are really creative and fun. Its a really cool feeling to feel like over the years you've developed a style that people have picked up on and that they're so excited about sharing images that fit in with that aesthetic.

Source: Pepper Design Blog

Its also been a really helpful way to have bridesmaids sharing ideas about dresses, shoes, hair, makeup, etc all in one place so that we can keep the long e-mail chains to a minimum. People can Like or Comment on pictures they find especially pretty and that gives me an idea of what my girls would like once we get down to finalizing options.

Source: Hello Naomi

These are all images that friends and bridesmaids have pinned to our board, and even though I get sucked into a ton of blogs, these were all images I hadn't necessarily pinned myself. Its fun to have a lot of sets of eyes out there in the universe to track down inspiration that might be outside of my usual network. Plus, I think they all fit together with our inspiration board really well.

Source: The Wedding Finder

If you're the type of person who gets overwhelmed with too many options, this might not be the road for you, but for me its been a terrific way to keep other people's ideas organized and to start a little wedding inspiration community during the beginning of getting this thing planned!

Two More Months!

This week marks our two-month countdown! It's getting very close and there is still a lot to do, but according to the checklist in my handy Brides magazine, it looks like we are right on track. Here are the things on my to-do list:

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- Dress alterations - I went in this week for the first fitting and go back about a month before the big day for the final one

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- Plan the ceremony vows and any readings

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- Collect and record the response cards

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- Finalize my accessories - jewelry and heels

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- Figure out if I'll be printing menus and/or programs

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- Collect songs for our DJ

Also, coming up in the next two weeks are the bridal showers and our florist preview while I'm up in Oregon. Time is flying!